Related Articles

What to Do When Trust is Low
Trust is essential. You can't run a business without it.

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A Management Strategy
I witnessed some interesting behaviour from one of our premier management schools this summer. A behaviour that I have since discovered is not uncommon.

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Check Your Communication Skills
Use this check list to assess your communication skills.Focus* Do you pay complete attention to others when they are speaking? (A wandering focus discourages open communication.

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Four Ways To Make the Case For Outsourcing
How do you convert outsourcing leads into clients? You may need to make the case for outsourcing."Businesses today are kicking into survival mode," says Bill Allison, managing director for the Pacific Southwest Management Solutions & Services Group at Deloitte & Touche.

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Quick Tip - Effective Meetings Have SMART Goals
The first step in planning an agenda is to identify the goals for the meeting. Properly done, goals have five S M A R T characteristics.

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Gossip And Rumors And Hearsay, Oh Why?
In the Wizard of Oz, it was "Lions and tigers and bears, oh my!" Many organizations today are singing a slightly different tune: "Gossip and rumors and hearsay, oh why?"It is estimated that gossip and rumors within a company can cut productivity by as much as 50%. Of course this translates to lower profits and can negatively impact the company in the long-term.

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Tales From the Corporate Frontlines: Managerial Influence
This article relates to the Manager/Supervisor competency, commonly evaluated in employee satisfaction surveys. This competency evaluates an employee's feelings regarding their direct manager or supervisor.

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Holding Effective Meetings Can Be Easier than You Think!
I'm sure you've experienced those typical "headache" meetings! You know the kind I'm talking about -- the ones where the key players are running late, no one knows exactly why the meeting was called, and there's not a single agenda in sight. Everyone's sitting around wondering, "Will this last 20 minutes or will we be here all day?" It's impossible to tell!Then, once the meeting finally gets off the ground, the real pandemonium starts.

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My Companys Leadership Sucks!
Maybe it's the season or just a more buoyant job market; but lately I'm sure involved in a lot more discussions about leadership.I'm receiving more requests for help defining the key characteristics which make a great leader; and I'm hearing a lot of negative stuff from clients about their bosses.

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What Every Manager Should Know About How to Maximize the Two People Inside
Every one of us, in reality, has two people inside: The person we are today and the person we can become tomorrow and in the future.We go to work every day, are never late or absent, earn a promotion; and receive occasional raises.

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Hire Winners: Ask the Right Questions
How do you as a manager, supervisor or team leader hire winners? One very successful interviewing technique is behavioral interviewing---selecting the right person for the right job using a job-related rather than a gut feel approach. A job-related approach is asking for a behavioral example of skills and traits that are required for a position.

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Measure for Measure
Can you imagine playing hockey without a goal? Basketball without hoops and nets? Football without a goal line? Golfing without holes or greens?There may be leagues where it doesn't matter whether anyone is keeping score, but not the big leagues. Champions of the Super Bowl, the Stanley Cup, the Masters can only be determined when there is someone keeping score.

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ISO 9001 What Records Does My Business Need To Keep?
Which documents must I keep for ISO 9001?In addition to the legislative requirement for your business to keep certain records ISO 9001 2000 requires your business to retain other records to demonstrate compliance with its various clauses.From an ISO 9001 2000 viewpoint records are documents generated whilst operating your Quality Management System.

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Internal Prisons: The Thief of Productivity and Quality in our Workforce
As a professional speaker, one of my biggest challenges is to grab the attention of my audience within the first few minutes of the presentation- grab them by the throat if you will. I do this by coming out in a suite and tie, following an introduction in which I have been described as a recent college graduate who earned both of his degrees with a 4.

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Business Fails When We Do Not Talk
You may remember being told as a child, "Keep quiet!" "Children should be seen, not heard," and "You talk too much." You were a "good" kid if you kept quiet.

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The Best Way to Keep Track of Meetings
How should you keep track of meetings?Have you ever wanted to run away from a meeting? I worked for one of the top five companies in the US and they seemed to hold meetings to plan meetings. It absolutely drove me around the bend! I would try and multi-task like all the other participants and secretly hoped they would not call on me for any information.

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Vampire Meetings and How To Slay Them
Meetings can be like mythical vampires - sucking the life out of intelligent and creative people. And sucking the funds out of businesses.

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Office Politics
Office politics! It's just another way of saying: "The employees are not getting along!"When so much of a company's success depends on the employees' ability to work together as a cohesive team, it is critical that people understand and appreciate the differences in each other.Symptoms of Office Politics:ConflictStressJob DissatisfactionPoor communication skillsThe Results:High employee turnoverReduced productivity and profitabilityThe Solution:Improve employee communication and understandingThe Disc Classic behavioral assessment is widely used by the nation's largest companies to improve the working relationship amongst its employees.

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Leadership Skills
Recent studies have shown that industrial supervisors are working at less than 60% of their potential. Basic management skills training is guaranteed to change all this and at such little cost.

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He Hate Me: Turning Their Bad Attitude Into Your Great Results
"He Hate Me" was the nickname of Rod Smart, a leading rusher in 2002 for the Las Vegas Outlaws of the now defunct XFL pro football league. Looking for an edge, the XFL allowed players to put nicknames on their uniforms.

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