Imagine the best experiences – two weeks in Singapore with husband and children, celebrating a promotion with family at a restaurant, acquiring a new iPhone – these are memories for some and dreams for others. And yet, the means, the job, through which the experiences are actualized, is usually taken for granted.

Staying employed is a fulltime enterprise, much like making a relationship work. To keep a job would mean taking on responsibilities that may be new to fresh graduates and to those who just landed their first professional engagement.

Here are five essentials for new and old employees to avoid getting a pink slip:

1. It is not to be taken lightly. For some companies, it is the measure of a worker’s commitment to the job. If one is always on time, the employee considers time as a valuable commodity for the both business and himself.
2. Issues related to the business must be discussed with managers or supervisors, avoid the tendency to make anything personal. Practical approaches to a problem prevent escalation. Some new workers and even ancient ones are slighted when manager and colleagues makes reference to a particular task. It is important to keep in mind that focus is required for work to be done and being an employee means work comes first.
3. Certain behaviors such as rudeness or smoking may be unacceptable to some. Looking at it with the larger picture in mind, evaluate its effect before taking offense. Being pleasant towards someone with negative attitude or who smokes will not make anyone less of a person. A solution is always available; the trick is to find it.
4. Ask questions. It is always best to ask questions when in doubt. It is one sure way to stay on the right track whether it concerns project management or company policies.
5. Working together, with three or four people, towards a common goal is a constant in an office setting, both in real or virtual time. An example in the real world could be getting a car out of a bog and all passengers get out to give it a push. In the virtual world, it is important to have seamless transitions when working in eight-hour shifts.

It takes time to make dreams come true. But more important, it takes conscious, focused effort at work to breathe life to any dream.

Written by Yoli P. – The Help

Hurray! You’ve just been promoted. Congratulations! Now go out and celebrate. GIve yourself a pat on the back and a well deserved night out. On Monday, you’ll be facing a whole new ballgame once you get back to work.

It’s not Monday yet but over the weekend, a dawning realization comes over you. The team that you will be managing is your former team – a team composed of your lunch mates and drinking buddies. You have an easygoing, friendly relationship with these guys. But now, well… you’re kind of the bad guy. While you’re really not the bad guy and do not want to be seen as the bad guy, you know you’re going to have to make some hard and unpopular decision for the sake of the business. But you also have more than few good ideas to share. How are you going to get them to take your lead? The answer is: very carefully.

Give yourself a timeline:

Do not expect to start a project  in the next 30 days. Ease into it and don’t start changing things right out of the gate. You must use this time to reframe yourself as the leader. You have to make sure to set boundaries. You should keep your relationship strictly business. Starting with limiting those karaoke nights and those bar hopping soirees. You should conduct yourself more professionally anyway, so drunken singing will really ruin  your reputation here. Working lunches are fine – use them to  catch up  and nurture your relationship with your friends and forge new allies.

Earned it:

I’m sure if you ask anybody, they’ll say they saw your promotion coming. I’m sure you expected it to,  having worked so hard to get to where you are now. I’m sure you deserve it. And unless, you’re the child of the company owner, everybody knows you’re a top performer and that you’re the most deserving candidate for that promotion.

And you did earn the promotion. Now it’s time to gently remind everyone why you got promoted in the first place. While being a manager is new, there are parts of this job that you know so well, like the process, the people, the numbers. Nobody knows about the accounts more than you do. You have the credibility to lead! Show them how much you know and you’ll silence even the critics. Your knowledge and skills are what got you this promotion in the first place. Now is NOT the time to be shy about  being the subject matter expert or the expert in your field. People follow those who know what they’re doing.  You’ve got this!

That small room called acceptance:

You must accept that your relationship with your colleagues will change. There will sometimes be resistance and probably resentment, especially if you were competing for the same position. But you have to believe that you have been chosen because you are the most qualified person for the job. Know that if you choose to delegate tasks, you can still count on these very same people to perform, not for you, but with you. Make sure though that you are fair and not just pick the best projects and assign them to friends. Give others a chance to prove themselves, too.

Congratulations again on your promotion! These steps are more like guidelines because, as we all know, everyone has a different managerial style. So, have you ever been managed by a friend?  Have you managed people you deem as friends? Are you ready to take the lead?

 

Written by Jaie O.- The Help

The very wise Aristotle once said that “He who cannot be a good follower cannot be a good leader.”  A lot has been said about this old adage. There are many interpolations offering advice on how one can be a truly effective leader. It kind of plays along the lines of “learn the rules first before you break them”. Only, the more appropriate analogy is to “learn the rules first and improve on them” To be an effective leader, not only must you learn the rules – know how they work to your advantage!

Sounds like an illegal wall street scam right? Actually, NO. It is a basic aphorism that many powerful leaders ascribe to. In reality, there is a lot of truth to it. It is how effective leaders become stalwarts in their industries. Let us take a look at some steps bosses take from being a good leader to being a better one.

From being a doer to being a mover

Good followers are doers. They are task driven and they concentrate on end results. Better leaders learned how to channel people’s energy into finishing tasks and projects and get good results. Now, effective leader on the other hand, channel their energy in motivating people to have a goal for themselves. They challenge their employees into creating career goals. They coax employees to work towards a goals for themselves which they inherently want to achieve not just for the company but because they are empowered. Effective leaders are the right kind of pushy. They challenge employees to bring their best ideas to the table. This means that effective leaders have to be sensitive to their employees strengths and weaknesses.

Own up

Nobody is perfect. An effective leader owns up to his or her mistakes. They don’t pass the blame on to someone else. The buck stops with them. No one wants to work for a fault finder or a nitpicker. People need to know they have job security and won’t lose their job simply because of a minor mistake. Effective leaders make their employees feel that they have room to grow.

Perfect pairing

Great followers are most attuned to their strengths and weaknesses. They know which projects play up their strengths, which ones to take the lead on, and which ones to play supporting cast to. As a an effective leader, the master the art of pairing the right skill to the right task. This can only be gained by getting to know their people by spending time learning their strengths and what motivates them.

The beacon of light

Employees must know that they are not being just herded into a fock or supervised the way toddlers are supervised in day care. They must know that they are in the company of achievers. Effective leaders have to let their employees know that they are in very capable hands. To do this, they must earn the respect of their employees. As long as their employees know that they have laudable work accomplishment, moral integrity and a strong work ethic, leaders stand as someone who has the credibility to lead. Effective leaders are an example that employees too can achieve their goals. Great leaders make their employees  feel that they have something tangible to strive for and they will be more than willing to deliver.

Are you taking steps to being an effective leader?

 

Written by Jaie O.- The Help

The Social Anxiety Institute defines social anxiety as the fear of interaction with other people that brings on self-consciousness, feelings of being negatively judged and evaluated, and, as a result, leads to avoidance. While it is a very serious illness that stems from a variety of reasons, most of us have had a bout or two with social anxiety in small doses.

Even the best of us get episodes where we just clam up and get all nervous and sweaty when interacting with people. A little anxiety is healthy. It gets our adrenaline flowing and keeps us alert What isn’t healthy is when social anxiety interferes with important tasks like work.

Do your just smile and then skulk around when people gather around the coffee maker in the break room? Are you one of those people who shy away from speaking up at meetings? Are you scared to share your ideas for fear of being judged?

That’s not even the worst of it. You know it gets really bad when you feel like you just don’t have anything to offer, so you avoid sharing your thoughts altogether. This comes back to bite you when you get asked your opinion on a big company decision by your boss and you clam up or worse, say something ludicrous.

Don’t let that happen to you. If you  have serious Social Anxiety you should see a doctor. For the rest of us who have mild communication challenges, take steps to boost your confidence and hone your communication skills.

Don’t take yourself so seriously. Everybody makes mistakes, no one’s perfect. Learn to laugh at yourself and lighten up. It won’t  be the end of the world if your favorite color is red and the rest of the office loves blue. It’s not a problem if you like cupcakes while everyone else likes doughnuts. It’s not a big deal to tell your boss that she needs to  extend the timeline on a project instead of cramming all the activities in a short timespan. Any  leader worth his/her salt will  take your suggestion into consideration in good faith, so lighten up!

Communication isn’t just about the spoken word but all about body language too. Avoid hunching your shoulders and crossing your arms. Straighten up your spine and roll your shoulders back. Hold that posture. Don’t you feel more confident already?

Avoid fillers. Don’t fill the gaps in your conversation with “um”, “like”, or “aaaand.” That just makes you sound like you’re either a teenage brat or that you’re not sure about what you’re saying. You can keep it short and straight to the point and no one will complain.

Don’t be a pushover. Have an opinion of your own. Don’t just agree because it’s the popular decision. Be assertive but not aggressive. Assertiveness says that you’re self assured, confident, and that you know what you want. Aggressiveness says you’re contentious and will fight for the sake of argument. Try  this  exercise with a trusted friend: argue an unpopular point like “why drinking soda can be good for you.” It doesn’t matter that it isn’t true, the  point of the exercise is to make you comfortable with decision making and arguing the merits of a point.

Be a good listener. Let’s face it, we sometimes drift through conversations or oast along because we feel we can’t contribute. The point is to listen. What you gather from there will be the whole arsenal of what you can use to build your confidence  and communication skills. It’ll give you the ideas for topics to  sustain the conversation, give you the pointers needed to form an opinion, it’ll give you the leverage to get the other person to pay attention to you. Practice being a good listener.

Overcoming this challenge takes some practice but putting in the work beats getting caught with nothing to say.

 

Written by Jaie O.- The Help

 

Reference: https://socialanxietyinstitute.org/what-is-social-anxiety

We all  have difficult co-workers. You know, those people who make work a miserable experience for everyone. Without them you actually look forward to work and think it’s awesome. If you don’t know who it is, it might be you...seriously.

Here are 4 personality types and what makes working with them difficult:

What to do when your coworker is Difficult Dan:  

Dan is a diva. He is contentious and thrives on drama and conflict. He tries to incite it at any opportunity he gets. He sees this defiance as being ‘constructive’ and his way of educating people about how wrong things around the office are.

During a meeting, he proceeds to tear the presentation apart point by point with no concrete  solutions to offer. The usual 15 minute meeting has now been running for an hour and it doesn’t seem to be ending soon. When dealing with Dan, you have to be assertive and a little bit sneaky. Divas have inflated egos and feel that he’s doing everyone a favor. Throw in some flattery and see if this softens them up. Remember that you cannot win Dan over but try to see it from his perspective and maybe work with the similarities you discover.

For example, if you see his point about a longer timeline, then tell him so. But work it into a flattering statement so that he sees that you have contemplated his point but that you can drop the discussion on that. Say something like “I see your point about extending the timeline, Dan. We could all benefit from more planning but we can’t afford the delays. We’ll revisit that when you have a more concrete suggestion.” Be firm in saying that you are good to reopen the discussion when he is more amenable.

What to do when your coworker is a Negative Nancy:

Nancy catches you by the break room. You know it wouldn’t  be polite to not say “hi!” So you say a tentative”hi!” She takes that as an invitation to tell you about her lousy day. She begins by telling you how she slept through her alarm, then proceeds to telling you about the horrible traffic, and how the  barista messed up her coffee and bagel order again. You sigh inside, you just wanted to take a well deserved coffee break but now, you can’t wait for it to be over.

You just have to bite the bullet with Nancy. Tell her that you’re sorry she’s having such a bad day but that you would really have to get back to work just about now. Try to call her out on being negative but say something sensitive like “I’m sorry you’re having such a bad day but it’s not over yet. Maybe things are starting to look up, give it a few  minutes.” Sometimes, all they need is a gentle reminder that life isn’t all fire and brimstone and things can come up roses.

What to do when your coworker is Angry Andy:

You notice Andy slapping and banging at the photocopier, sometimes he’s kicking the trash bin, most times he’s heard verbally abusing his screen monitor. People avoid him. He’s a ticking timebomb and no one wants to be there when his temper tantrums take a turn for the worse and he finally explodes.

Then one day your deepest fear happens. You get paired with Andy for a big work project and would have to work closely with him. You are now bracing yourself for him to suddenly turn green and angry. What do you do? You can’t just go around and walk on eggshells and agree with everything this guy says, right? You are bound to have an instance where you two will not see eye to eye on a topic and you need to have a mature discussion about it.

People like Andy are addicted to anger and might have other personal issues that they can’t manage so they take it out at work. Your best bet is to be calm but firm. Any show of anger from you would reinforce his beliefs that anger is the best way to resolve issues. When he starts to get passionate about the discussion, calmly ask him to NOT raise his voice because shouting is absolutely unnecessary. Tell him to hold that thought and that you will continue the discussion when he is calmer.

What to do when your coworker is Loud Lara:

Lara is the life of the party, but sometimes she’s too much. Ok…a lot of times, she’s too much. Everyone knows when Lara is in for work. Her voice carries over 2 departments away. Her energy is contagious but sometimes, she’s more distracting than helpful. You just have days when you want  to hunker down and work through a tight deadline in peace. Lara and her loud antics are an extra challenge.

The good thing about this is that, among the 4 types of challenging co-workers, Lara is approachable,friendly, and well meaning. Don’t be afraid to let Lara know that you are working through a deadline and that if she can take  it down a notch, you’d really appreciate it. Suggest that they can maybe take it somewhere else and that you really need to get this report done. Never ever join her though for a gossip session. When she starts gossiping, cut her short and say you really don’t want to talk about other people’s private lives. Offer no excuse and just walk away.

 

Written by Jaie T.-  The Help