Teaching Business Communication and Workplace Issues

“Happiness is a habit – cultivate it.” Elbert

Hubbard

Happiness is one aspiration all people share. No one wants to be sad and depressed.

We’ve all seen people who are always happy – even amidst agonizing life trials. I’m not saying happy people don’t feel grief, sorrow or sadness; they just don’t let it overtake their life. The following are 21 things happy people make a habit of doing:

1. Appreciate Life
Be thankful that you woke up alive each morning. Develop a childlike sense of wonder towards life. Focus on the beauty of every living thing. Make the most of each day. Don’t take anything for granted. Don’t sweat the small stuff.

2. Choose Friends Wisely . . .

As a repented procrastinator, I know what I mean.

Today I found, fortunately, some very effective tools to avoid mostly resorting to this vicious subterfuge. Why we are procrastinators?

The reasons are many and complex. Without going into the medical maze (yes, it can happen in extreme situations), I’m just going talk from the level “light," which affects many people and that everyone should be able to manage themselves . . .

There’s no point in getting more efficient at doing things that don’t need to be done. -Jan Jasper

Before you start making a schedule, organizing a task list, setting deadlines, gathering materials, delegating, prioritizing, and so on, stop and do this first.

- Write down your top five goals for your business in the next five years, say, or just in the next year. Make it long-term enough to pull your perspective out of the current crisis or negative cash flow or whatever it is that is screaming “URGENT” at you.
- Now, with those five goals in front of you, list backwards the actions you need to take. In other words, start with the ultimate goal and work your way back from there to where you are now...

This article debunks four common procrastination myths we often tell ourselves in order to avoid doing the hard work that needs to be done.

There are less than one hundred days left in 2011.
If you have a backlog of projects that you meant to work on this year, but which you haven’t gotten around to, it’s very likely that procrastination is the culprit.

Timothy Pychyl, Ph.D., creator of the popular web site procrastination.ca, is one of the world’s foremost experts on procrastination. Dr. Pychyl defines procrastination as “the needless, often irrational, voluntary delay of an intended task”. That is, you intend to work on a task but you go off and start working on something else which you know is not as important, and which doesn’t need to get done right away...

The best way to produce quality results that ring try with what matters to you involves a simple step: be honest with yourself.

There are many tools you can use to increase your level of productivity. Whether paper-based solutions are your cup of tea or you’ve dove into the digital well of task management offerings, you’d be wasting a ton of time trying to discover all of the tools out there. I’d wager it is one of the least productive things you could ever do.

But of all the tools at your disposal, the one between your ears is the one that needs to be actively engaged to allow for prominent increases to happen. There’s a human component that leads to better productivity on the whole, and while analog tools may not remove the brain from the equasion as fully as digital ones might, when we trust our lists as written without using our brain in tandem, the results for the items that are crucial to us are less desirable...

We are all faced with challenges constantly in every area of our lives. Most people have a hard time accepting and dealing with these challenges that arise. The truth is that you will have to deal with difficult problems throughout your life, whether it is in your personal life or career. Most of us get really afraid and run away from problems because we don’t want to accept reality the way it is.

Running away from your problems is the worst thing you can do to deal with the challenges you are faced with. I have some tips for you below on learning how to deal with everyday challenges. Start now and develop the self-discipline to practice the below points...

No matter how much you love your job, there are times when your work motivation is just going to bottom out. There can be any number of reasons for this but the important thing is that it does happen to everyone at some stage. If you follow the simple tips I’m sharing here, you can regain your motivation and achieve a new sense of drive that you’ve been sorely missing:

1. Be Honest With Yourself
Admit that you’re lacking motivation and that you need to do something about it. Honesty is always, always the best policy...

There is always more to do than time in which to do it. And the more you take on, the more there is to do. You finish one task and six more pop out of no where; it never ends. To toss a major understatement at you - you need to invest your time wisely and that means being productive.

Yes, the dreaded 'P' word. Easier said than done, that's for sure. Sometimes, you just aren’t productive. You want to be, but things seem to never get done.

Here’s why...

What Kills Productivity?
There are only a few broad reasons why your productivity could be suffering. I’ll talk about all the specific instances in a moment, but let’s start with a high-level look:  . . .

We all do it to some degree or another; put off for tomorrow what we know should be done today. Postpone the inevitable pain for the current moment of pleasure. But we know that even if we can manage to put it out of our minds for the present, it will eventually come around and bite us on the butt and disturb our external calm demeanor.

Below are some of the symptoms of a Procrastinator and the remedies to try.

1. Lack of Vision
Not having a clear vision for the future is one of the biggest reasons people procrastinate. If you can’t see the benefits of completing certain tasks why would you bother starting them?
Remedy: Have a clear picture of all that needs to be achieved and the reasons why, you are much more likely to be motivated to get going and get things done...

Do you have trouble staying focused?

Whether you work for yourself or for an employer, spending hours surfing the net and updating your Facebook profile won’t get you any closer to your goals ... yet you find it hard to keep on-task.

Even when you do try to concentrate, you might get to 5pm and feel like you’ve not accomplished anything.

Here’s how to stay focused and get more done – every day.

Minimize Interruptions
If you live alone and work from home, interruptions are unlikely to be a big problem. If you work in a busy office and your job involves a lot of reactive tasks, like answering phone calls or emails from clients, you might be getting interrupted every few minutes...

Want to get the stuff done that really matters? Boost your productivity and lessen distractions by scheduling them in time blocks.

The demands on our time are greater now than ever before. With information coming at us faster than we can digest it, responsibilities handed to us faster than we can handle them and communication moving at breakneck speed, finding ways to fit as much as possible into your day is a daunting task to say the least. But there is a way to get more done of what you want and need with less distraction, and it’s a strategy that you likely employ for some things already.

You have to schedule stuff. Not just the appointment-specific stuff, but all of the stuff that matters. You can do that by scheduling time blocks.

The one great equalizer that all of humanity has is time. No one has twenty-five hours in their day; we all have twenty-four. How we choose to use those hours is what separates us. By scheduling the stuff that matters (from the urgent to the crucial), you’ll be spending those hours far more wisely. In addition, you’ll be living your days proactively rather than reactively...

There will never be another Steve Jobs. His parting gift to the world are 10 lessons we can all use in life and leadership. Steve Jobs lessons in digital leadership.

Digital Leadership

It is a sad day for the world when a visionary like Steve Jobs is no longer walking among us. It truly reminds all of us how short and precious life is. Just like there will never be another Socrates, Wayne Gretzky, Winston Churchill, or Ghandi, there will never be another Steve Jobs. While we can never become Steve Jobs, nor should we strive to be (follow your heart). What we can do is understand what is the greatness of Steve Jobs and, where applicable, apply these principals to help us develop as leaders...

Let’s face it. We all fail.

As we go through life we have relationships that don’t work out, jobs that just aren’t right, exams that we flunk, initiatives that don’t succeed. The more new things we try the more failures we are likely to have. In fact, the only way to avoid failure is to do nothing new.

The important thing is how we deal with failure. It can be part of a downward slide in which lack of confidence reinforces feelings of inadequacy and incompetence. But experiencing failure can be a learning experience and an opportunity for a fresh start. A good way to begin this process is by asking yoruself some tough questions...

I started the day watching this video from Gel 2011. I love stories like Anil Dash's because I experienced myself the power of networks. Especially after moving continents and starting from zero, alone.

Few things give you more joy than doing a good deed. Often that goodness comes from introducing someone to something or someone else, and that someone else doing the same -- and so on. We need to do this, more of it if we're already doing it.

Understanding the importance and power of networks, combined with new tools is our lifeline. We have the ability to transform businesses and institutions, and a need to undertake that transformation. I hope you got goose bumps from the video.

That's what true connections can do.

Today I want to share some of the truths I have learned over the years that have stopped me moving forward in life.

Do any of these ring true for you?

1. Perfection – Perfection does not exist. If you accept that everything can be improved upon then perfection cannot exist. Give up the concept of being perfect and get on with your life as best you can.
2. Waiting for the right time – The right time is now, why put it off. If you’ve been waiting for the right time for something and haven’t taken action yet, it’s going to be difficult to start...