Category Archives: Work

Work, boredom and procrastination

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Today I was thinking about my previous entry on procrastination. Therein I said that people who do not love their work are bored (and likely boring) people. I want to add up to it:

  1. Work is desirable because it might serve as preventive of boredom. Indeed, our work at a given time and location might be really tedious or uninteresting. However, such tedium is quite small in comparison with the boredom stemmed from empty days, days without nothing to do.
  2. Further, work has another benefit: it makes vacations much more enjoyable when they come. A happy life requires balance. All pleasures, all the time, are no good for the soul. Contrasts help us to appreciate the world in the right context.
  3. And third, the obvious one: work increases our probabilities for success, both economically and profesionally.

The conclusion seems clear: work, even a boring one, always leaves some kind of profit.

The 7 Key Points of a Successful Training for Leadership

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Leadership of an organization that pursues great achievements must sustain and defend guidelines leading to constant training for its leaders, comprising several areas of leadership. Training the leaders of an organization is a process that should be implemented not only as a set of theoretical activities, but also by means of practical tasks. In the following, we will expand on 7 keypoints or principles that should be taken into account for the training of business leaders.

1. Knowing rights and duties

When you train a staff, the first thing you should teach is that leaders start by knowing their rights and duties within the organization. Teach them their rights, that will give them confidence in the organization and a sense of belonging. Besides, point out their duties, what the organization expects from them, their responsibilities. Take into account that leaders will utterly fail conducting an organization unless they perceive that their work will be rewarded. Your leaders must understand that leadership requires:

  • commitment
  • consistency
  • monitoring several activities
  • ensuring excellence
  • solving problems
  • making suggestions
  • controlling programs
  • following agendas
  • promoting ideas
  • defending organizational values

among other things requiring constant effort and dedication. This is why it is absolutely important to convey the leaders the value they have for the organization, the importance of their work, and the reward they can receive for their work. Leaders have to demonstrate passion and dedication. Motivation and perseverance are also at the core of leadership.

Knowing their duties will also allow them to know under what conditions they will be leading the organization, what are the expected results of their leadership, what is the proper way they should develop their leadership, and what are the milestones they are fully obligated to met for their leadership to be effective, and fully approved by the organization.

It is important that leaders know what are the rewards their leadership will bring along, because they are leaders committed to the organization, and they deserve wage benefits, admission to exclusive activities of the organization, and merit distinctions, promotions, delegated authority over certain matters of the organization. Of course, always in accordance with the results of their leadership.

When training a staff to lead, the future leaders must feel that the organization trust them, that they will be respected. Conversely, training must state that the organization expects dedication and concentration from their leaders. Teaching the leaders’ rights and duties within the organization is at the core of educating for leadership, of promoting a doctrine of respect between the organization and its leaders.

2. Train leaders for success

Leadership development means that you must train leaders to continually grow and mature. Leadership is not a static concept; leadership is a dynamic, mutable, adaptative process. More than training leaders, you should train successful leaders.

Some leaders fail distinguishing between successful leadership and being a leader and feeling successful because of such status. There is a great difference between being a leader who thinks he is successful because he has reached a leader status, and being a leader who has set out to achieve things, worked hard, and has achieved his success because he conquered his goals. The later one has the right attitude. Success is not a random thing, success is achieved when one is out to reach a goal, and has managed to reach it.

If you do not want to have mediocre leaders, teach them to differentiate between what a leader is and what it means to be successful leaders. You must train leaders so that they understand that having a leadership position is not everything: having a status, an office, an appointment, maybe a team, does not mean to be a successful leader. In order to qualify as successful, a leader has to:

  • Have a clear goal she wants to reach.
  • Such goal comprises general and specific objectives to be achieved.
  • Arrange such objectives in estimated time intervals.
  • Identify the required steps to achieve each objective.
  • Know limitations and obstacles, and possible solutions for overcoming them.
  • A leader does not to stop, a leader does not get discouraged by adverse outcomes: leaders are perseverant, they keep going on.
  • Stand firm despite attacks and impediments.
  • Do not stop until he reaches the end of the goal.
  • A leader, no matter victories and defeats, is carefully enough to keep the right target. No deviations are allowed.

All these steps tells us that being a leader means more than just only a status. Trying to keep leadership according to these parameters will allow the leader to achieve success in everything she undertakes.

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Leaders, Energy and Success

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It’s an obvious statement that physical energy is required for entrepeneurship. Thanks to such physical energy we are able to demonstrate resilience, willpower and perseverance. On the other hand, intellectual energy fuels the process of discovering solutions to problems and enforcing other shades of thought. It’s also very important to highlight the role of intellectual energy in the support of emotional energy, i.e., our thoughts exert a heavy influence in our emotions (you may want to read Learning to believe in order to review some nuances of the relation between thought and emotion.) On turn, emotional energy drives all of our actions, and also, in a kind of loop, provides feedback for thought and physical systems. For instance, when we are loaded with positive energy, happiness and optimism, we convey our powerful and constructive emotional force to our projects and all the people involved in them. Sound emotional energy boosts our best feelings and opens the door to success.

Leaders radiate their happiness, and convey energy rather than absorbing it. People wishing to achieve success and raising to the top must be full of positive energy, and project it to the things they do. Willpower alone is not enough; it must be accompanied by a good deal of energy to undertake new businesses and projects, and to bear any hurdles along the way. Energy, when effectively conveyed to other people, allows us to lead them positively. Leaders are, in essence, sources of energy, and people will follow a true leader if they feel enhanced, relaxed and supported by their leader’s energy.

At the core of Leadership

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Being a leader and enacting the virtues of leadership implies, mandatorily, that we have achieved success. The converse, however, is not necessarily true: reaching success does not mean we are leaders. Success is tantamount to conquering our goals. In other words, success means we have crossed the goal line.

Leadership can be defined as the will to control processes and events, to understand what is required to focus all of the involved activities in a specific direction, and to yield the power to complete tasks and distribute resources, properly harnessing and directing the abilities of each person involved in the project. Summarizing, leadership is about control, focus, and also about effective management of people and resources.

There are two kinds of leaders:

  1. Nominal Leaders: The main goal of nominal leaders is to establish, between her organization and its environment, a set of relations which allow the perfect execution of a project’s tasks. A nominal leader defines such tasks and monitors them to verify they are carried out entirely.
  2. Concrete Leaders: This kind of leader expresses and represents the perspectives of her group. It might happen that the nominal leader will not properly represent or understand the emotions of her people, and under such circumstances, a concrete leader could emerge and oppose the inpetitude of the nominal leader (and even replacing her.)

This tell us a very important fact: groups follow the person which is able to quickly and clearly connect with their emotions. Leadership is, then, also an emotional journey.

Some leaders are more effective managing small groups, instead of huge organizations. Other leaders are able to inspire great masses, but are little respected by their immediate collaborators. And there is a third group of leaders, the best leaders, whose followers are everyone: masses and close collaborators.

Regardless of the cognoscitive field a leader adresses, they have several interesting characteristic which distinguish them from everybody else. The 3 most visible characteristics of leaders are:

  1. They have achieved incredible success in their work and in their private lives; it’s often said about them that they have the Midas touch.
  2. They seem to own an unlimited luck.
  3. They are rich, and they are getting richer (even right now).

There exists a wrong belief about leadership being a hereditary, genetic issue. And some people think being a successful, real leader is a matter of luck. Nothing further from the truth. Leadership has to be built, has to be shaped, and (very important) has to be mantained. And there’s always room for improvement.

All of we are able to achieve professional success. But we have to study, we have to observe, we have to learn which are the traits of leaders and the keys for success. Obviously, success can be achieved, taught and learnt: we have to reshape a set of our behaviors, and suit them to the profile of a successful person. We have previously touched upon 3 visible traits of leaders. Now it’s time to delve into this point. And now we’ll discuss the two key traits of leaders:

Motivation

Leaders are like tireless motivation machines. Leaders are continuosly motivating themselves, and they renew their motivations easily, almost effortlessly. Leaders communicate and convey their motivation to the people around them. Leader are always motivated, and always motivating their people.

Perseverance

And motivation is the fuel for the kernel of success: perseverance. They are entrepeneurs and innovators. Generally, successful people have faced harsh beginnings. What distinguishes them is their faith in what they are doing, in what they are pursuing. Leaders believe. Leaders insist in their projects, goals and tasks. They set realistic tasks, and they fight over and over until fully completing each one of such tasks. How many times do common people abandon their startups at the first view of difficulties? How many projects are never realized just because of plain laziness? It’s in that initial moment of doubt when leaders raise above the crowd. Leaders keep going forward, because they are relentless fighters. Note that leaders are perseverant in work and effective use of their resources. Perseverance without a rational application of forces and use of resource will only lead to an utter failure.

And what’s life but a struggle against the chaotic forces of the universe? Leaders are the warriors who are able to tame those chaotic trends ;-)

Building a Network of Contacts

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There are plenty of available jobs in the market, and there also are a lot companies recruiting right now, but it is possible that those job openings are never advertised or published in newspapers or on the Internet. Further, important or high-rank job openings are rarely advertised. How to approach this hidden job market? Certainly, it’s not enough to investigate listings of job openings. The key is word-of-mouth or networking.

Networking means building a list of contacts. Contacts are people you’ve met during your business or social activities. More often than not, such friends and acquaintances will provide you information about job openings, companies and industry leads. Moreover, they’ll introduce you to other so that you can grow your network. Therefore, it is important not only to inform them about your job search, but also give them some résumés.

This list will provide some hints about the people and organizations we should include in our network:

  • Relatives
  • Friends
  • Recruiters
  • Former Employers
  • Neighbors
  • Professional Organizations
  • Other Job Seekers
  • Academic Contacts (School, University)
  • Business Associations
  • Merchants

Organizing your Network of Contacts

Please, organize your network. Save information about your contacts in a spreadsheet or a database. Include their names, titles, company, address, phone and fax numbers, and email. It’s also important to register a few notes about the way in which any of your contacts is valuable, for instance, what do they know?, who can they refer you to?, and so on. Further, organize their business cards.

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A Shining Job Interview: How to Succeed

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Typically, the first prerequisite for a shining job interview is a well-redacted and organized Résumé. A shining Résumé can move you to the first places of a list comprising perhaps hundreds of prospects. Therefore, your Résumé should list your best germane abilities for the job you are applying to… those abilities that would guarantee a star performance in the job. Remember that you are the ultimate responsible for highlighting your attributes to constitute a valid option to integrate the new team that the company is forming. In order to determine which of your abilities are the most suited for the job…

you have to research your potential employer beforehand

…that will give you a very important lead. Get as much information as you can about the business, and also about the potential interviewers (you should research their style and attitude… that’s very important). If you know someone who has previously taken an interview in that company, talk with them about their experiences in the interview. Try to extract pure information, i.e., don’t let them to influence you (specially about the job being impossible or, on the contrary, being too easy).

1. First Approach

Remember that you have to dress with a professional look, according to the nature of the job. You are a professional… thereby each and every aspect of you must communicate that fact. Now, during the interview, take into account that Interviewers will ask questions related to their company, for example, why would you like to work for us? They may ask you about your opinion on the company’s products or history. Typically, this information is available on the company’s website, and by knowing it you demonstrate a genuine interest for the job.

2. Virtues and Limitations

Talk about your virtues, but not excessively. In this regards apply balance and good sense. Answer this question presenting your virtues in the context of the requirements of the job you’re applying to, with a clear and concise language. However, other almost granted question they will do is about your defects, thereby you must also be prepared to answer that. Furthermore, the interviewer may ask about your abilities and limitations: prepare an answer beforehand in order to allow you to present your defects as a new opportunity for keep improving.

3. Expect the Unexpected

You have to be ready for anything… a group interview, a forum about some specific problem of the company, a written exam, and so on. Carry any material you think you may need: think of the interview as your first day of work.

Leadership and Job Interview

When entering to the interview, greet to your interviewer with a smile. Visual contact must also be direct and firm (but not exceedingly). Remember that, no matter the circumstances, you have to act formally instead of dared or zany (refer to your interviewer using his title… Dr., Mr., Engineer, etc.), unless they demand you to treat them informally (but that’s relatively rare; read point 6. Be on the alert). Listen to your interviewer very carefully. Sometimes the applicants are so focused in the things they want to say that forget what they are really being asked about. No answer is good if it does not truly answer the matter asked about.

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A Shining Résumé

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Typically, the first prerequisite for a sound job application is a well-redacted and organized Résumé (a document closely related to the Curriculum Vitae, but the latter focuses more on education, publications, and other accomplishments). A shining résumé can move you to the first places of a list comprising perhaps hundreds of prospects. Therefore, your résumé should list your germane abilities according to the job you are applying to… remark those abilities that would guarantee a star performance in the job. Remember that you are the ultimate responsible for highlighting your attributes to constitute a valid option to integrate the new team that the company is forming. However, a good résumé is not a guarantee of success, but it indeed is our presentation letter, and it may be the deciding factor in the employer’s final decission. Often the résumé is processed by the employers in order to select a group of applicants for interviewing them. Thereby, our résumé has to grab the employer’s attention positively. Our résumé has to be professionally elaborated, and reflect clearly, concisely and attractively the information about our academic and professional achievements. A résumé is our marketing letter… and our first goal has to be that the recruiters or prospective employers can’t put down our résumé.

Resume Girl

Let’s see how recruiters or prospective employers will not put down our résumé.

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What I like about Credit Cards

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Yummy… a pizza with onion, green pepper, mushrooms, olives, plenty of tofu and a bit of minced fresh garlic. Tasty! Oh, and I have to buy my new laptop. Well, for all these things and little pleasures there’s the credit card. I prefer to pay with my credit cards as I dislike the notion of acting like an ambulant cash dispenser :) However, using credit cards requires control and knowing well the “policies behind the card” (the rates, the limits, how the credit reporting system works, etc.) Managing and using credit cards is just a matter of applying good sense.

Credit Cards

That said, I have some friends that abuse their credit cards usage. They charge a lot! They go nuts because they feel like they work pretty hard and should be able to do that sometimes. The problem is not that they cannot afford the payment or cannot pay it off. The problem is that most of their purchases are frivolous things they really don’t need. Surely, they work hard and they deserve to enjoy the fruits of their work. But they are not enjoying anything by acquiring a bunch of unneeded objects. On the contrary, they’re wasting their money. The only thing that such frantic credit card usage satisfies is the desire of material possession. Do we indeed work so hard only to crumble under such lame desire? When we are going to use our credit card we always should examine the actual reason behind the purchase. Review carefully your financial state… are you paying a house, a car, a small loan? Then try not to acquire more debt. Moreover, if we have a short or troubled credit histories we must try to do things right. Pressure of extreme debt is what leads to desperate and dangerous measures such as payday loans, for example. Really dangerous. Calm. Relax. Think. Good sense, remember? Life is beautiful.

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The Blogger’s Wish List (Edition 1)

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Recently, I’ve thinking of replacing my old and faithful Toshiba laptop with a new and more powerful machine. I will surely keep my Toshiba in use, mostly to write articles for Life, Money & Development. However, I work as a manager for a software development company, and frequently have to run several applications that are steadily exceeding my laptop’s computing capacity. Then, it’s time to update. The question raises… what machine I should purchase? Additionally, now that I’ll have to visit the Electronics store, I think it may be a good chance to bring home some gadgets. I’m totally opposed to squandering, and thereby I will focus only on those machines or items that could prove useful for blogging and for my job.

1 The Laptop

Albeit my experience with the Toshiba has been good, I think it’s time to go Apple. The problem with the Toshiba is that one is forcefully restricted to Windows environment; we may also install Linux but it would be too cumbersome for my needs. On the contrary, by using an Apple machine I have access to the powerful Mac OS X operating system, and besides I can compile and test some applications originally targeted at Linux, without doing separated installations. The Mac runs all the software I need. Someone may also add that the Mac is stylish, but that really is not my motivation as I prefer functionality over appearance. For example, it is evident that the relatively new Mac Air is very stylish, but it is also evident that it relinquishes an important quota of computing power. Therefore, I think I will choose the Apple MacBook Pro MB133LL/A, which boosts a display of 15.4″, 2.4 GHz Intel Core 2 Duo Processor, 2 GB RAM, 200 GB Hard Drive, and DVD SuperDrive. Just all I need. I’m aware about the direct relation between big displays and laptop weight (this MacBook weighs 5.4 pounds), but I prefer to reduce any strain on my eyes.

Mac Book Pro

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The Art of Saving

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Saving refers to the preservation of money for future use. Such future use might include capital and goods purchase (house, transport, vacations, etc.), emergencies, and miscellaneous expenses. Strictly speaking, saving is the difference between our income and our consumption expenditure. Besides, saving is our main tool to cope with mortgages, credit card debt, extraordinary bills, and other loans. Without savings, such debt and expenditures may sharply erode our personal finances. Saving also allows for harnessing sudden investment opportunities and to gain access to quality services. All in all, saving is a fundamental aspect of personal finance.

Money has to be tightly controlled. We must know where money comes from, and where it goes to. We must strive to know the way our money flows, the paths it travels, and the drains taking most of our income. By closely watching our money’s nature, we’ll learn to control it. Control is a keyword of personal finance. Control refers to checking the errors we are incurring with our money’s management, and to take the corrective action to rectify any deviation from our desired goals. Setting goals is other important requirement for saving, and it answers the question what are we saving for ?

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