What’s the first thing you do when you arrive at your desk? For many of us, checking email or listening to voice mail is practically automatic. In many ways, these are among the worst ways to start a day. Both activities hijack our focus and put us in a reactive mode, where other people’s priorities take center stage.
A better approach is to begin your day with a brief planning session. Use it to determine the activities you want to focus your energy on.
Then—and this is important—create a plan of attack by breaking down complex tasks into specific actions.
Productivity guru David Allen recommends starting each item on your list with a verb, which is useful because it makes your intentions concrete. For example, instead of listing “Monday’s presentation,” identify every action item that creating Monday’s presentation will involve. You may end up with:collect sales figures, draft slides, and incorporate images into deck.
Studies show that when it comes to goals, the more specific you are about what you’re trying to achieve, the better your chances of success. Having each step mapped out in advance will also minimize complex thinking later in the day and make procrastination less likely.
Finally, prioritize your list. When possible, start your day with tasks that require the most mental energy. Research indicates that we have less willpower as the day progresses, which is why it’s best to tackle challenging items – particularly those requiring focus and mental agility – early on.
By starting each morning with a mini-planning session, you frontload important decisions to a time when your mind is fresh.
http://blogs.hbr.org/2014/06/how-to-spend-the-first-10-minutes-of-your-day/
28 Eylül 2014 Pazar
To Build Influence, Master How You Enter a Room
How can you wield influence while being empathic? It begins with how you enter a room.
Be aware of your unconscious cues. When you stand, are you taking up all of your space, or do you shrink into corners? When you move, do you move confidently, or do you slink? When you’re sitting alone, do you slouch or sit straight?
There are two essential points here. The first is that you’re always signaling about your intentions and feelings, and so is everyone else. The second point is that most of the time you don’t pay conscious attention to all those signals — either the ones you’re putting out or the ones others are sending to you. Your unconscious mind handles all that. It determines an extraordinary amount of the relationships you have with other people and your influence upon them. Thus it’s essential to get a handle on these unconscious cues. Once you’ve formed a picture of yourself and have either embraced what you see or resolved to improve it, then you’re ready for the next step.
Focus on a key emotion.Think of a time when you’ve walked into a meeting, or come home to your significant other, and been asked without preamble, “What happened?” You’ve been brimming over with some news — either good or bad. You’re excited, or in despair, or triumphant, or whatever the case is. That’s charisma. It’s really about focus.
And finally, have something interesting to say. If you’re going to wield influence, you need to know what you want to be influential about. And you’d better have done your homework because once all eyes are upon you, everyone will expect you to have something worthwhile for them.
http://blogs.hbr.org/2014/09/to-build-influence-master-how-you-enter-a-room/
Be aware of your unconscious cues. When you stand, are you taking up all of your space, or do you shrink into corners? When you move, do you move confidently, or do you slink? When you’re sitting alone, do you slouch or sit straight?
There are two essential points here. The first is that you’re always signaling about your intentions and feelings, and so is everyone else. The second point is that most of the time you don’t pay conscious attention to all those signals — either the ones you’re putting out or the ones others are sending to you. Your unconscious mind handles all that. It determines an extraordinary amount of the relationships you have with other people and your influence upon them. Thus it’s essential to get a handle on these unconscious cues. Once you’ve formed a picture of yourself and have either embraced what you see or resolved to improve it, then you’re ready for the next step.
Focus on a key emotion.Think of a time when you’ve walked into a meeting, or come home to your significant other, and been asked without preamble, “What happened?” You’ve been brimming over with some news — either good or bad. You’re excited, or in despair, or triumphant, or whatever the case is. That’s charisma. It’s really about focus.
And finally, have something interesting to say. If you’re going to wield influence, you need to know what you want to be influential about. And you’d better have done your homework because once all eyes are upon you, everyone will expect you to have something worthwhile for them.
http://blogs.hbr.org/2014/09/to-build-influence-master-how-you-enter-a-room/
7 Eylül 2014 Pazar
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