One Sentence You Shouldn't Forget in a Job Interview Followup Letter [Job Search]

One Sentence You Shouldn't Forget in a Job Interview Followup Letter [Job Search]:

Following up after a job interview without being annoying is tough. We put together a few suggestions, but we missed one important sentence. Sean Weinberg, co-founder of resume-grading web app RezScore, suggests that there's one line you don't want to leave out: "Please let me know either way." He explains why: More »

How To Build Trust in Relationships

How To Build Trust in Relationships:

During my recent training on Management, the course of discussion slightly moved to the subject of Building Trust. Our trainer (my mentor as well) draw our attention to some important aspects of building trust. Since the idea of writing this article was originated during the training so I dedicate this article to my teacher, Georgie Collis, as she sowed the seed in my brain to produce this article.

So, before we go in to the details on how to develop trust, let us understand what Trust is.

Trust is the permanent certainty and confident expectation from someone for something. Lack of trust might lead to shattered relations so Trust is the most critical ingredient for strong relationship; the relation which can either be between Husband-Wife, Boss-Employee, Father-Son, Brother-Sister, supplier-customer and so on.

Here are some recommended behaviours which you need to demonstrate in order to develop trust:

1-    Being Responsible: ensure you are performing your day-to-day responsibilities and meeting the short-term and long term expectations by your dependants.

2-   Listen: Listen, Listen, Listen. God has given you two ears and one tongue so you listen more and speak less. Effective Listening is a skill; develop this habit. Google it today and learn.

3-   Being Truthful: Be honest and fair. Don't deceive someone. Remember the fact that building trust is tough but it takes seconds to have scratches-in-the-jewel which usually is very hard to recover.

4-   Keeping Promise: your promise is your commitment with someone to do something, so don't break at any cost. In case you couldn't meet your promise, there is always a door for dialogue for re-consideration of things. In case of dialogues be fair, be truthful and be open. Confess the short comings on your end.

5-   Consistent behaviour: the ever changing attitude is an indication of your non-predictive personality which is an anti-trust drive. So be consistent in what you speak and what you do.  

6-   Apologizing behaviour: Sorry is the best medicine in healing relationship complications. In fact, Sorry and Thanks are the two golden words which my Kindergarten going son has refreshed for me. Use them often and you will see massive improvements in your daily life.

What are your suggestions to develop Trust?

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M Junaid Tahir Read my Blog : http://paradigmwisdom.blogspot.com/

     

Use Simple Productivity Practices to Get More of the Right Things Done

Use Simple Productivity Practices to Get More of the Right Things Done:



If you are a knowledge worker and read Lifehack then we can safely say that you are in a group savvy individuals who are looking for better and more productive ways to get life done. And with this “savvyness”, comes intelligence and a constant yearning to better yourself.
I have delved into the productivity and lifehack realm for a number of years now, and even after reading and writing post after post about how to do ‘X’ and why you should do ‘Y’, all of the lifehacking and productivity tips come back to one base theme: Simplicity.
In a nutshell, we have to simplify our lives (including the ways that we are productive) to make sure that we are getting the right things done on a continual basis. Here is the why and how of simplifying your productivity.

If it isn’t simple…

If your productivity system and tools aren’t simple, then you probably aren’t getting things done, and more importantly, you aren’t getting the right things done. We can spend all day tweaking our systems and making sure that we have set up the right GTD contexts in our “trusted system”, but until we sit down and start getting the work done, our system isn’t worth anything at all.
So, if your systems aren’t simple, then your ability to get more and better work done will be diminished.

Complex jobs need simple instructions

There is nothing easy about being a knowledge worker. We have a bunch of round pegs that need put into square holes that we have to deal with on a minute-by-minute basis. It’s up to us to define and breakdown our work. We all have to know how to take complex projects and break them down into actionable units to ensure that we are making progress on them.
We have to simplify the complex.
Sometimes, simplifying your life can take some complex tools, especially if you are in certain fields, but remember, the first step to completing any project is identifying the next physical thing that you have to accomplish. Without that simple step, the most complex job can end up being impossible. It doesn’t take complex productivity tools and systems to figure out what your next step is of a project; the next physical thing you have to do to reach a desired outcome. This next steps is the beginning of your simple set of instructions to complete your complex job.

When you know you are thinking too much

If you are anything like me, then you are a productivity system “tweak-aholic”. That is someone who can’t get enough of tweaking their systems until they are just right so they can get more done. This state of just right doesn’t truly exist. Even if you could reach this state of just right if wouldn’t help you get more things done (unless we had some sort of artificial intelligence backed productivity system that forced us to always do the next right action not matter what).
If you are trying a ton of different systems and always switching between them, then you are thinking way too hard about “being productive” and not actually being productive. If you are in the viscous cycle of checking out “productivity porn”, then you can be sure that you are thinking and trying too hard.

Back to simplicity

So, now that you know you are over-complicating your productivity systems and destroying any form of getting things done, what can you do about it?
Simplify.
I’m not talking about shaving your head, joining a monastery, and retreating from the “real world”. You can still lead a complicated life and work life while utilizing effective and simple productivity tools and systems. Rather than complicate the already complicated, use tools that simplify your complex life.
We have suggested using paper in the past to clarify your projects and next actions on those projects, but if you work digitally most of the time, it’s probably better to have a few simple digital tools that will do the trick. We have a few great posts on selecting the right tools as well as some suggested tools for different platforms.
SEE ALSO: Productivity Made Simple: Where to Start with GTD, Productivity Made Simple: The 7 Main Elements of GTD, Productivity Made Simple: How to Keep Your Projects from Killing You
It isn’t about the tool that you choose, as long as it is something that you can use and aren’t repelled by. It’s all about you actually interacting and utilizing the tools that you have chosen create a make good, simple decisions on what to do next.
(Photo credit: business cube creation via Shutterstock)

5 Awesome Project Management Tools to Get Your Team on Track

5 Awesome Project Management Tools to Get Your Team on Track:



We talk a lot about project management tools here at Lifehack, but mostly on how to setup your own personal project management systems. As project teams are becoming more and more distributed and our work becomes more and more digital, it’s important that we have good team-based project managment tools to augment our personal productivity systems.
Here are 5 project management tools that will ensure your team stays on track.

Asana

Lifehack’s editor, Mike Vardy has taken quite the liking to Asana, in fact, we here at Lifehack use Asana for our internal project management. Asana is a great, fast project management solution for teams and can even work for personal use.
You can use tags, projects, due dates, assign tasks to coworkers, and comment on each task. One of my favorite things about Asana is how fast and responsive the web app is and how the use of the TAB key gives you some very useful ‘hot keys’ to make your task processing even faster.

Orchestra

Orchestra gives you the ability to create tasks, create lists of tasks (sort of like projects), assign due dates (but no due times), share tasks with people and of course comment on each task. Using Orchestra is a treat and is pretty neat to see real time updating of tasks as you are working with others.
When we were looking for team project management tools for Lifehack we tried out Orchestra for 30 days, mostly because of the strong use of conversations and collaboration around a given task. Also, the iPhone app is top notch and quite beautiful.
The app is still in beta but is free to use.

Flow

One of the prettiest project management tools around, Flow, helps you plan and execute projects with teammates. Flow let’s you create tasks, comment on them, add tasks to lists, tag tasks, assign tasks to others, and even has a cool Flow Concierge service for lucky beta testers where you can assign “simple” tasks to a personal assistant. Amazing.
Flow also has a great iPhone app that is updated regularly as well as a Mac companion app for easily adding tasks and viewing updates. Flow is $99 a year for all of its functionality and has a 14 day free trial.

Google Docs

Google Docs is one of the best team project management tools because almost everyone that does anything on the web has a Google account. And with a free account you get shared spreadsheets, documents, presentations, email, and storage (that is if you consider access to your information so you can be marketed to, free).
I can’t even explain how many times I have used Google Docs in a project setting whether it be for school, work, or Lifehack. Even with all of it’s small bugs that I have found from time to time, the time and energy that Google Docs has saved me and the many teams I have worked with is priceless.

Basecamp

Basecamp is sort of the “grandad” of all team project management apps online. I recently had the priviledge to test out Basecamp 2, and while I’d rather use something more feature rich like Asana or Flow for team project management tools, Basecamp is definitely an awesome way to keep your team on track.
For the base price of $20/month you can get 10 projects and unlimited users for Basecamp. With that comes task and project creation, discussions, due dates, tags, and more. Also, Basecamp SSL data encryption and daily data backups for all plans.
Are you and your team using any of the project management tools mentioned above or are you using something completely different? Let us know in the comments.
(Photo credit: Three colleagues are discussing a round-table draft house via Shutterstock)

Success Depends on Your Team: Tap the Potential

Success Depends on Your Team: Tap the Potential:
Take it from Ford's Alan Mulally. Leaders who look for talent, nurture it, and give it authority are ones who achieve.
Wise leaders look at what an employee can do rather than what he cannot do.
When Alan Mulally became CEO of Ford Motor Company in September 2006, it was expected among senior executives that some, if not many, would lose their jobs. Mulally was an outsider, hired from Boeing for his expertise in turning around big organizations.
But according to Bryce Hoffman's riveting account, American Icon: Alan Mulally and the Fight to Save Ford Motor Company, the newly appointed CEO did just the opposite. He chose to keep nearly all the top leaders despite being warned by some on the board as well as inside the company that infighting might cripple turnaround efforts.
Mulally was not disheartened, nor did he opt to hire many from the outside like himself. He dug down into the ranks to discover new talent that had been under-utilized. He also realized that some of these folks simply needed a new opportunity and, if sufficiently motivated, they would rise to the challenge. And they did. Today Ford is sharply back in the black and is considered the most respected automaker in the world.
The lesson for leaders who evaluate people--that is, every leader--is to adopt a "glass half full" versus a "glass half empty" attitude. Sometimes, as happened at Ford, employees become beaten up by the system and they stop trying, or at least stop thinking creatively, and acting courageously. They go through the motions. It therefore falls to the leader to "wake them up" to tap into their potential.
Mulally's story is not limited to executives just like himself. All leaders have an opportunity to mine the talent of their organizations.
An executive who is evaluating talent should ask three questions about the individual:
1. Does this person have the skills to do the job?
Most importantly, a staffer must be competent and fluent in the discipline he is being asked to manage. Competency is not simply a matter of knowing how to do the job now, but also how to do it when the job evolves into new responsibilities.
2. What has been holding him back from achieving?
This question gets at roadblocks. Often people have been held down, or mismanaged in such a way that they have yet to prove themselves. Their skills have been sidelined due to an inept boss or simply a lack of opportunity. It is important to explore this question deeply to decide if the candidate has what it takes to undertake new responsibilities.
3. What can I do to help him succeed?
A leader must engage in the employee development process to help unleash the individual talents. Sometimes this is simple. Delegate the authority and responsibility and watch the executive succeed. Other times it will take the form of coaching, and regularly meeting with the individual to discuss her progress, and the challenges she is facing.
There is one more important step: support from the boss. A senior leader needs to express confidence in newly promoted individuals to assure them he has their backs. Mulally is a master of this; he instilled confidence in his team by discussing his confidence in them.
There is also case for people who must be let go. Some at Ford were not on board with Mulally's One Ford plan and opted out. Fine. Companies going through a re-invention or reinvigoration need more than compliance; they need commitment. If an executive is not fully committed to the new direction it is better that he or she leave.
Talent is not a commodity. It is the lifeblood of the enterprise and those leaders who look for it, nurture it, and seek to capitalize on it are ones who achieve their objectives.