Entries Tagged 'work-life balance' ↓

Stores are busy right now. Maybe people aren't buying as much as in past years but they're buying nonetheless. Everyone is in the spirit of giving, but deep down also looking forward to receiving. The common denominator here is "things" and "stuff". Now, I'm all for making people happy and seeing the smile on their face when they open an exciting gift - that really brings me joy. And, of course, I love receiving a gift from someone special, but life experience has taught me that this "stuff" cannot really bring what most of us want for Christmas .

It’s December and one side of my brain is already thinking about presents, imagining the warmth of home, and preparing a list of “must-buys” for Christmas entertaining . The other side ois stuck with the reality of my daily life: me, at the office, dealing with day-to-day tasks. My attention has been divided and this can be seen in my results. It’s not the best situation you want to deal with, especially when the boss has clear expectations from you and reminds you that holiday starts only on  the 24th of December. Therefore, we all most refocus and get concentrate to get things done in time. If this sounds like you, the tips listed below might help.

1. Create shopping lists on the weekends. Gather with your family and write down everything you need to buy for Christmas: food, presents, etc. This is also the right moment to decide where you will go and to make reservation if applicable.

2. Beat the rush. To remain productive at work it’s important to make plans and schedule while you are home and to do this in time without delaying untilthe last moment. In this way you will not be stressed before Christmas.

3. Dedicate your after-work time to online shopping. If you are searching for gifts and sales after work then you will not be tempted to do this at work the next day.

4. Ask for favors. There’s nothing wrong in asking for help from your friends and family if you find yourself stressed by time.

5. Organize your work and get things done. Once you get to the office, forget about Christmas and organize your work. Schedule your tasks and start working.

6. Deal with important tasks first. Morning is the most productive part of the day for most of us, so it’s better to get the most important tasks done in this part of the day. Doing this you might get some free minutes for daydreaming about the holidays in the afternoon (but don’t be too obvious).

7. Steal time from your break if you want to check last-minute offers. If you know there will be a good promotional offer and you want to catch it, you can do this during you lunch break. But don’t waste all your time in front of computer eating junk food because this will definitely not increase your productivity.

8. Focus on your work not on how your vacation will be. I know the holiday spirit has caught hold of you, but stay on target. Try picturing yourself not taking that vacation because you lost your bonus due to sloppy work while you were daydreaming about your holiday trip.

9. Avoid distractions. You will receive e-cards, your colleagues will go on about their vacations, but you have to ignore all that and stay focused. Don’t get involved. Choose an e-card and schedule it to be sent automatically to all your contacts and in this way you won’t have to worry you missed someone.

10. Be consistent in your work. If you start falling behind, don’t give up! Take a 5 minute break and start over with new energy and fresh ideas.

11. Think about the consequences if you won’t finish the work. It’s not a nice approach but this might motivate you.

Like everything else, we have to find a balance between work and Christmas preparations. Managers will not accept unfinished projects no matter how badly you need to go buy gifts for your family and friends. Moreover, you don’t want spend the Christmas Eve at the office finishing tasks that you’ve put off. Choose to be productive and you might receive a nice reward for your work.

How do you stay focused at work with the holidays upon us? Share your strategies in the comments!

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Elisabeta Ghidiu is an Internet marketer and advocate blogger, writing about productivity and technology on Cyclope-Series - Let’s talk about productivity - a manager-oriented blog. She is also the women behind AllAnonymity Online and Security blog.

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I don’t like to take risks.

I also haven’t had my own business for very long, so I’ve felt like every penny I made had to be sealed away in a vault for safekeeping in case I’d wake up one morning and have no writing assignments, no consulting clients, and no speaking engagements.

Mentors told me I needed to invest in my business, but I didn’t really listen. The thought of parting with any of my hard-won cash made me feel a little sick. What if I didn’t get that money back?

So even as my business grew, I did everything myself. And I mean everything. If a book needed to be overnighted to a new contact, I ran to the post office over lunch. I learned the rules of small business accounting. I became a scheduling pro.

In the last year, I decided to develop two workbooks for my corporate seminars on recruiting and retaining members of the Millennial Generation. I designed the first one myself. It looked pretty decent – after all, I do have a modicum of talent when it comes to print design. The only trouble was, all the formatting and tweaking and formatting and tweaking some more took me 22 hours over the course of a week.

Online print firms charge about $200 to design the same type of workbook. My hourly consulting rate is $100, so I spent $2200 of my own time.

That was when I realized that doing any and all tasks myself to save a few bucks was actually harming my business. I could have been spending those 22 hours fostering new client relationships, or improving the ones I already have. These are the relationships that allow me to do what I do, and without them, I wouldn’t have the freedom to do the work that’s personally meaningful to me. Things needed to change.

So for the next workbook, I decided to get smarter. I let an online firm handle the design. They finished the project in a week, and it looked just as nice as the first one. I saved $2000. And incidentally, this $2200 figure doesn’t take into account the speaking engagements I do every other week, which command a much higher hourly rate. So if I had used the workbook design time to secure additional speaking gigs, I would have saved thousands more.

Even if for some reason I didn’t care about the clients or the money, my 21 month old son would love to spend 22 hours with me. I would take him to the park and music class. I would watch him run around the Chicago Children’s Museum squealing with excitement. I would pocket the memories of these hours, because he’s never going to be 21 months old again.

You all are just as busy as I am. And while there’s this pull to be independent, we need to realize that our time is worth something – a lot, actually. We can all be happier, wealthier, and more successful if we play to our strengths and spend our time doing things that only we have the unique combination of talent and experience to pull off.

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Alexandra Levit's goal is to help people find meaningful jobs - quickly and simply - and to succeed beyond measure once they get there. If you're struggling with what to do with your career in the New Year, visit www.newjobnewyou.com for free guidance and resources.

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We’re coming up on back-to-school time, and for thousands of young people everywhere, that means taking their first great big step into adult life: college. Going to school, whether you stay at home or travel across the country or around the world, can be terrifying. It can also be your life’s greatest adventure.

What you do in your first year of college can have a big impact on the rest of your college years – not to mention on the rest of your life. A few missteps might be possible to undo later on, but too many wrong moves and you might well find it impossible to recover later. Blow off too many classes, for example, and your grades will suffer – and no matter how much you reform your ways in ensuing years, your GPA will always suffer. Do poorly enough, and you might find yourself on academic probation or even thrown out come the end of the school year!

It doesn’t have to be that way. And your first year doesn’t have to be an endless drudge, either. What’s important right now is not that you bury yourself in schoolwork until you bleed, sweat, and crap knowledge, but to establish a healthy balance of academic work, social activity, and just plain living – a balance that once established, you’ll find easy to maintain through the rest of college and into your future.

Here, then, are my 15 tips for making the most of your freshman year:

1. Get organized. Get yourself a sturdy file box and a set of file folders, and set up a folder for each class. Start using a planner, and keep a to-do list. Unless you’re heavily into computers, I actually don’t recommend you use software or web services to manage your schedule; most of the time, you won’t have easy access to a computer which means you won’t use those tools when you need them most. Develop a note-taking strategy and use it religiously. Keep every paper you write, every syllabus, and every handout – you never know when you’ll need to challenge a grade, prove you finished an assignment on time, or recall a book title from a previous class.
2. Plan ahead. By the end of your first week, you’ll know when almost every assignment for the semester is due – put those on your calendar and write down a set of milestones (with due dates) you need to accomplish to finish them on time. There’s no reason you should be stressing over papers or big tests the night before they’re due. Start making good use of your time at the beginning of the semester and approach your due dates calm and relaxed. (By the way, if you think you do your best work when a deadline is bearing down on you, you’re probably wrong. Your problem isn’t the lack of a deadline, it’s a lack of motivation. Get motivated now – or seriously re-think why you’re in college, before it’s too late.)
3. Eat right. College students often gain weight in their first year. Without mom and dad buying the groceries and planning your meals, and with easy access to pizza, microwave burritos, and cheese fries, it’s easy to lose track of just how many calories you’re consuming. Try to limit the fast food and late-night delivery, and maintain a varied diet. You can still have that meatball sub now and again, just try not to live on them.
4. Sleep well. It’s ironic that the time in our life when we need sleep the most is the time when we’re most tempted to skimp on sleep. Adequate sleep is essential for college students. Believe it or not, it’s when you’re asleep that most of the work of learning happens – that’s when the brain processes and files away the stuff you stored in short-term memory in your classes the previous day. It’s also important for regulating your metabolism – every hour of missed sleep is like eating an extra meal! (Which is one reason for freshman weight gain.) Losing sleep causes stress, which affects performance on tests and quizzes. And, of course, consistently going to bed late makes it increasingly likely that you’ll oversleep and miss those early classes.
5. Talk to your professors. College students tend to be intimidated by their professors. Don’t be. They’re there to help you, and for all but the meanest and laziest professors, that extends well beyond mastery of the course material. Visit a professor during his or her office hours just to chat now and again. Tell them about a book you read that deals with their course material, or ask for recommendations. And, of course, ask for help, whether with a tricky point in your readings or with big life issues – if nothing else, a professor can point you in the right  direction to find the resources you need.
6. Join something. Sign up for a sports team, even if it’s just intramural Frisbee. Join a club, or a fraternity or sorority, or the student council. Taking part in some sort of extracurricular activity will keep you socially active (a lot of first-year students feel isolated and overwhelmed), provide an outlet for nervous energy, and maybe even teach you something new. And they don’t look bad on your resume, either.
7. Call home. Make sure you keep in touch with your friends and family back home. Though you don’t believe it now, you’ll start growing apart form your high school friends this year, but you don’t have to let go too easily! Friends and family can really help ease the transition by grounding you in a world that’s familiar and comforting. Because they know you better than anyone else, they’ll also know when something’s wrong – often before you do!
8. Speak up in class. College is interactive. Ask questions, answer the professor’s questions, and share your opinion as much as possible. Now is the time to break free of your high school conditioning – there are no points for sitting quietly anymore.
9. Use the library. There are so many resources available in the library – magazines, guides to local places, databases, leisure reading, videos, and of course, the books you need for your papers. Learn as much as you can about your library, as soon as you can. Talk with the librarians about the resources available in your field. Check out the resources you can access remotely – so you don’t come up stuck when you realize you need one more reference in the middle of the night.
10. Relax. Make a point of taking it easy now and again. Take a no-study day. Go to the park. Party. Go shopping. If you don’t do something non-class related once in a while, you’re going to burn out. Remember: balance is key. Study enough, and live enough. No more and no less.
11. Use the gym. Many college campuses have gyms that are available free to students (or at a very low cost). Pizza, late-nighters, and early classes sap your energy pretty quickly – working out, swimming, or having a run can help recharge your batteries (And, of course, fend off that first-year weight gain.)
12. Use public transportation. Get to know the public transportation system in your college’s town, especially if you’re living on-campus. Leave the car at home, if you can – public transportation is easier on the wallet (no insurance, no gas, no maintenance) and in many cases your school ID will get you free rides everywhere. And while you are likely too young to drink legally, if you do get drunk or high somewhere, taking the bus instead of driving home might well save your life, or someone else’s.
13. Walk a lot. Walking is good exercise, of course, but it’s also a great way to learn the lay of the land. Explore the hidden corners of your campus, as well as the city or town around it.
14. Get a job. You’ll feel a lot better about college if you’re not always struggling to make ends meet. Plus, a job can help you meet new people and be a good counterbalance to your course load. A part-time job at a local business or on campus is ideal, especially if you can find something related to your field of study. A few hours a week, maybe 10 or 15  if you’re really organized, is ideal – you’re working for pocket money, not to support a family. Not everyone can manage this, so be honest with yourself and quit if you start falling behind. (This point assumes you’re not paying your way through school. Some students have to work, but even so remember: school is your first job.)
15. Don’t get a credit card. You’ll get bombarded with apparently sweet credit card deals almost from the second you step on campus (many college bookstores put credit card flyers in the bag with your textbooks!) Consider that credit card companies have fought hard for the right to turn a large profit from fees for being overdrawn, missing payments, or going over your limit – now consider how they expect to make a profit from you. Even if you never do anything to earn a penalty fee, you’ll end up paying way more than however much you charged in interest and annual fees. Stick to a bank account and debit card.

Good luck, class of 2013!

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Dustin M. Wax is the project manager at Stepcase Lifehack. He is also the creator of The Writer's Technology Companion, a site devoted to the tools of the writing trade. When he's not writing, he teaches anthropology and gender studies in Las Vegas, NV. He is the author of Don't Be Stupid: A Guide to Learning, Studying, and Succeeding at College.

Follow him on Twitter: @dwax.

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I’m moving this month, and one of the things I’m looking for in a new apartment, even though I live alone, is a second bedroom where I can put up an office. My current place is a small 1-bedroom, and while there is a little computer “nook” in one corner of the living room, it’s just not working for me.

I’d noticed my productivity falling off soon after I moved in, but having just gone through a break-up, I assumed it was just normal post-relationship trauma and that it would bounce back once I got back on my feet.

It hasn’t.

For a long time I told myself I was just unusually busy, but that’s not it – my workload hasn’t increased. It wasn’t until the last few weeks that I’ve realized: I felt busier than usual because I wasn’t getting as much done. Where I used to be on schedule, or even ahead, with most of my work, I’ve been rushing to finish things at the last minute, which has kept me perpetually on the cusp of being behind, and occasionally good and fully late.

One of the biggest factors in all this is not having a clearly defined workspace. My apartment is simply too small – I’ve been here 10 months and I’ve still got a wall of boxes that I haven’t been able to unpack! But the worst part is that I’ve ended up using the same small space to eat, work, and relax in. And that’s simply no good.

Here’s the thing: when you live and work in the same place, both living and working suffer. When you’re just trying to relax – say, by watching a movie or reading on the couch – your work-life is still there. And when you’re trying to get some work done, your daily life is all around you – the stack of magazines under the coffee table, the TV, the stereo, the book you’re reading draped over the sofa arm.

We get conditioned by certain places. Sitting down in an upright chair at a desk primes us to work; sinking into a sofa tells the body that it’s time to relax. When we mix the two – I’ve been working on the sofa a lot with my laptop – the signals get crossed, and the mind  tries to go in two ways at once.

So, for instance, last month I taught an evening class four nights a week at the community college. I’d get home at around 9:30 or 10:00 pm and pick up my book or switch on the TV. But every night, this little knot of tension would rise up in my chest, this anxious feeling that I was forgetting something, that I was slacking off. In the daytime, when I was actually working, I’d keep getting drowsy, or my mind would wander, or I’d be tempted to check the TV – you know, just to see.

This isn’t a quirk of my personality. Well, not just a quirk of my personality. Psychologists have found consistently that environmental cues can trigger certain states of mind in us, making us work harder or move more slowly.

In a study at Stanford, for instance, a group of subjects was primed with objects related to business and office life (like boardroom tables and briefcases) while a control group was primed with neutral objects (kites, toothbrushes). Tests performed after the priming showed that those whose minds had been directed towards business became more competitive and less cooperative than those whose priming was not business-oriented.

In practical terms, that means that just seeing the accoutrements of business life can make us more competitive – which is good, since usually when we’re around such objects we’re in the business world where we need to be more competitive.

Priming can have all sorts of odd effects. It can make young people move more slowly (after unscrambling sentences containing words like “Florida”, “wrinkled”, and “gray”); it can make people more likely to clean up after themselves (in a room scented with cleaning fluid); it can even make us smarter (students asked to picture themselves as a professor scored higher on a cognitive tests than students asked to picture themselves as a soccer hooligan)!

So what cues are priming me when I sit down to work in the same space where I relax, or vice versa? My pencil cup and laser printer might be telling me “it’s workin’ time!” while my cozy blanket and TiVo remote suggest “it’s playtime!”.

It’s clearly important to keep these spaces – and their signals – better-defined. If I were moving in today, I think I would have divided the room up into a clear relaxing area and working area. Instead, I’ll be moving soon, and my first priority is a clear working area, a second bedroom that’s “work only” so I can “go to work” in the morning and have some sense of separation from the rest of my life – and when I’m done, a place I can leave and “come home” from.

By the way, as a single guy, I often eat dinner on my sofa as well. Which may be why I’m always hungry when I’m working…

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Dustin M. Wax is the project manager at Stepcase Lifehack. He is also the creator of The Writer's Technology Companion, a site devoted to the tools of the writing trade. When he's not writing, he teaches anthropology and gender studies in Las Vegas, NV. He is the author of Don't Be Stupid: A Guide to Learning, Studying, and Succeeding at College.

Follow him on Twitter: @dwax.

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