The economy is in rough shape as most people know. However, I give credit to the Business Journal for attempting to spin a good story out of this hot mess. Here is the headline: Challenger report: June job cuts hit 13-month low Sounds positive and they lead off with this info: Nationally, the country’s employers announced plans to slash 37,551 jobs in June, down 39 percent from May, which marks a 13-month low for planned cuts, according to a new report from human resources consultancy Challenger, Gray & Christmas Inc. Ah, but the truth often lies in the later paragraphs: Still, halfway through 2012, there have been a total of… Read More
Continue ReadingBad Habits Are Good?
I am struggling with this Salary.com article – 12 Bad Habits That Can Actually Help Your Career. Here is one example: Procrastinating Today’s work culture expects us to multitask, run from one project to the next, and constantly be on the go. The urge to procrastinate indicates your brain is overtired, overstressed, and needs to slow down. Indulge and take a time out. You’ll come back refreshed, and better able to focus on the tasks at hand. What? Indulge and take a time out? As a manager, procrastination from my direct reports was…discouraged. I never recall telling them to indulge and take a time out. To me it seems like… Read More
Continue ReadingCoffee House Creativity
Sometimes stories come along that just land in the wheelhouse. This article would be one of them – Study of the Day: Why Crowded Coffee Shops Fire Up Your Creativity. Hello. I don’t need a study to tell me this fact. In case you didn’t know: Compared to a relatively quiet environment (50 decibels), a moderate level of ambient noise (70 dB) enhanced subjects’ performance on the creativity tasks, while a high level of noise (85 dB) hurt it. Modest background noise, the scientists explain, creates enough of a distraction to encourage people to think more imaginatively. Which leads to this assertion: The next time you’re stumped on a creative… Read More
Continue ReadingLeadership Jargon
Oh does this Sales & Marketing Management article hit me where I live. The gist of the article is the corporate speak many leaders use in hopes of sounding…smarter? I really don’t know why they do it. I have encountered this approach when working with leaders and their teams. Assessing teams provides insight into how the team interacts and how the leader interacts with the team. There are many leaders out there who seem preoccupied with the latest buzzwords and corporate speak. A waste of time in my opinion. Apparently the author shares this view: “My leadership philosophy is to optimally leverage the passions of my people such that at… Read More
Continue ReadingOf Authenticity
I have encountered this issue of authenticity recently in a handful of situations and it has captured my attention. Here’s why – Gen Y is all about authenticity. As a Gen Xer, I would argue that it is high on our list also. Yet, some Baby Boomers have a different approach to authenticity and it stems from one key approach – they believe they have to have the answer to every question. Now I’m not talking about aerospace-grade questions, but questions regarding their field of expertise. Recently I witnessed 3 different situations where different Baby Boomer-aged experts encountered a difficult question. The question was clearly beyond what they knew yet… Read More
Continue ReadingAgile Leadership
Here is a Forbes article that hits on a crucial topic for the next generation of leaders – agility (h/t Rick Brimacomb). Short article but let’s set the table: For companies to continue succeeding, next generation leaders must be able to handle any curve ball thrown their way. Leading through this new business environment requires the capability to sense and respond to changes in the business environment with actions that are focused, fast and flexible. The best way to put it: next generation leaders have to be agile. Exactly. The business market moves in rapid, titanic shifts requiring leaders to be nimble and agile to react. The author’s description: Agile… Read More
Continue ReadingThe Money Trap
-Discounting is a hot topic in sales especially in this prolonged, down economy. However, discounting is never the best choice regardless of the situation. Here is a good Eye on Sales article speaking to that point. Here is a good suggestion: The first question I ask anyone who thinks they need to lower their price to close a sale is if they know at least 3 needs the customer has and if they have been able to measure the real value of those needs with the customer. Exactly. The author is speaking to qualifying which is the core of all successful selling. This is why it is of the utmost… Read More
Continue ReadingRapport Sells More
This is one of those topics I always believe people inherently know…and then I come across a robotic salesperson. Apparently not everyone is aware of this truth. This quick post from Selling Power speaks to the importance of rapport-building and successful selling (and I lifted the title from them). A quick refresher: 1. Match your customer’s style. Pay attention to how your customer prefers to communicate and get in step. Does your customer prefer to get right down to business or warm up by engaging in some small talk? What kind of a sense of humor does your customer have? If your customer talks fast and loud, you certainly won’t… Read More
Continue ReadingThe Lamest Of Excuses
CareerBuilder.com comes out with an annual list of Most Unusual Excuses and this year’s list does not disappoint. Here it is from a press release (my personal favorites in bold): 1) Employee’s 12-year-old daughter stole his car and he had no other way to work. Employee didn’t want to report it to the police. 2) Employee said bats got in her hair. 3) Employee said a refrigerator fell on him. 4) Employee was in line at a coffee shop when a truck carrying flour backed up and dumped the flour into her convertible. 5) Employee said a deer bit him during hunting season. 6) Employee ate too much at a… Read More
Continue ReadingOverused Adjective
I am spending an inordinate amount of time reviewing resumes and one particular word keeps appearing throughout many of the resumes. The word is… proven Perhaps the most insipid phrase is this – “proven track record.” Every time I see this phrase I immediately want the candidate to prove it. In most instances, the quoted achievement would be difficult to prove to an outsider. That fact makes this throw-away phrase easy to included. My personal take is to have the candidates simply state their record in numbers.
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