The Daily Grind

Are You a Workplace Fire Starter?

Work Fire StarterDo you enjoy coming to the rescue in a crisis? What happens when everything is peaceful and there isn’t a problem to solve? Do you find yourself starting little fires at work just so you can put them out later? According to an article in the Harvard Business Review, some employees take their love for providing solutions to the extreme. These individuals routinely create drama and chaos only to swoop in and be the “heroes” who come to the rescue by resolving the issue they created.

The article cites a case of an employee who habitually stirred up conflict among his co-workers. Once the situation reached a boiling point, he’d use his insider knowledge to solve the problem. At first, management thought this employee was very skilled at uniting people until they began to notice the pattern of workplace tension that followed him wherever he went.  Once management removed him from the early stages of group projects they discovered the conflicts stopped occurring.

Thriving on action isn’t necessarily a bad thing, unless it causes you to create tension where none previously existed. If you find that you love putting out fires more than you enjoy peace and quiet, take care that you don’t become a workplace fire starter.

When you feel your workplace is getting dull, instead of thinking of ways to stir the pot, brainstorm ideas for becoming more efficient and productive at your job. Not only will new challenges keep you excited, but your supervisors will also have a real reason to praise your efforts.

Do you find yourself looking for ways to become the office hero? What tactics have you used to add drama to your workplace? What have been the results?

What Not To Wear To Work on Halloween

What will you be this Halloween? It may seem an odd question for anyone over the age of 12, but a growing number of workers from across the country are celebrating October 31 by dressing up. In fact, Shop.com recently released a survey that showed that 25% of adults plan to dress up, and 20% plan to trick-or-treat for themselves!

Not surprisingly, many go all out, transforming their workplaces to veritable haunted houses or candy factories. Many companies allow parents to bring children to trick-or-treat in their offices. Malls across the country host Halloween events, and mall employees are encouraged to dress the part.

But not all Halloween costumes are created equal, and if you plan to dress up for Halloween at work, it’s important to carefully consider your attire. To keep the peace and ensure a successful, productive holiday, here are a few categories of costumes you should probably avoid:

Thinly Disguised Casual Wear. It’s not really a costume to just throw on sweats, jeans, shorts, or other super-casual non-dress-code clothing in lieu of your professional norm. Even if you try to cop out saying you’re dressed up as a bum, urban cowboy or yourself on vacation, your employer likely won’t appreciate the joke. This attitude of  minimal effort can be seen as insubordinate rather than participatory. If you’re going to dress up, give it an honest shot.

The Sexy Version. If you want to wear a sexy costume, reserve it for your post-work parties. Even though dressing up for Halloween at work is an escape form the norm, you should still respect your dress code guidelines and not reveal too much.

Blood and Guts. Many people associate Halloween with the scary side of life, but keep the gore to a minimum when it comes to what you’ll wear to work. Remember, people have to interact with you, so don’t wear something that will cause discomfort when you enter the room. To keep your costume from being outrageously gory, wait to add the extra blood factor until you’ve clocked out.

The Political Statement. There are a lot of political satire-based costumes out there, but work isn’t typically the place to showcase your political ideology. Just as you should respect people you work with in what you choose to speak about at work, pick a costume with respect for other people in mind.

If you plan to dress up at work for Halloween, keep these things in mind as you choose your outfit. Remember, it may be a holiday, but what you do and how you present yourself will likely be remembered throughout the year. So, feel free to enjoy the lighthearted, fun freedom of dressing up, but keep your best professional foot forward.

Do you have any examples of Halloween costumes gone wrong at work? Does your workplace have Halloween traditions you’d like to share? Let us know what you think in the comments below, or vote in our online poll. 

Strengthen Your Memory with These Five Tips

Have you ever walked into a room and stopped in your tracks, wondering what brought you there? Or, perhaps at work you’ve opened a search engine only to blank out on what term you needed to find. Memory lapses like these are common, and they grow more and more frequent as we age. They can slow us down, whether at home or on the job.

But believe it or not, there are many ways you can build your brain function. Check out these five ideas to strengthen your brain.

1. Try Normal a New Way. A concept called neurobics, developed by Lawrence C. Ktaz, Ph.D. and Manning Rubin, advocates using your brain’s power to form new associations to strengthen brain functions. Their book, Keep Your Brain Alive, offers 83 ways you can integrate neurobics into your existing schedule – while you drive to work, on the job, and at home. Some of their ideas include

  • Drive to work a different route.
  • Brush your teeth with the other hand.
  • Unlock the door with your eyes closed.

2.  Exercise Your Brain. Prominent Japanese neuroscientist Ryuta Kawashima, M.D., advocates daily, short training of the brain to keep it in tip-top shape. Your brain, just like your body, works better when it’s exercised regularly. His book Train Your Brain: 60 Days to a Better Brain offers a daily program of simple math equations to strengthen brain functioning. For those who prefer a more active program, Kawashima is also the mind behind the popular Nintendo DS game Brain Age, which uses a variety of short games and tests to help you keep your brain up to speed.

3. Learn Something New. For most of us, after we graduate from high school or college, our pursuit of new knowledge bottoms out over time. This can slow down brain functions, because the process of learning actually helps create new pathways in your brain, keeping it spry. Simply learning basic vocabulary in a new language, taking up ballroom dancing, or learning to cook new things can keep your mind sharp.

4. Stay Active. That’s right, heading to the gym or walking with a buddy on a regular basis isn’t simply a good way to stay in your current jean size. A new study from Columbia University shows it’s a great way to fight memory loss related to aging as well.

5. Learn to Breathe. Most people practice this in the form of meditation. Taking a few minutes each day to find a quiet spot to breathe and reflect can help reduce stress, but it can also increase attention span and focus, both of which are critical to a good memory. In fact, researchers believe that focusing on a single image, sound or idea actually exercises the area of your brain that helps you pay attention.

Using these ideas can help you strengthen your brain and expand your memory capacity. How do you keep your brain sharp?

How to Give Bad News to Your Boss

It’s tough to be the bearer of bad news, especially when the person you have to deliver the message to is your boss. If you have to share negative information with your supervisor such as problems with a project, mistakes on an important task or that you’re leaving the company, don’t freak out. Instead, prepare yourself by calmly going over the facts in your mind. If necessary, rehearse what you plan to say in advance. You can even write out your main points and bring the notes with you into the meeting, that way you’ll be sure to get it all out in a clear and concise manner.

The following tips can help you deliver sour news to your supervisor in a way that demonstrates your thoughtfulness and professionalism.

Don’t Expect the Worst. You might be tempted to blow a situation way out of proportion in your mind and imagine a terrible reaction from your boss. But, try to avoid getting too worked up. Worrying about how your boss will take the news won’t help the situation and will only rattle your nerves. Instead, stay calm and focus on communicating the facts effectively with your supervisor.

Don’t Beat Around the Bush. Waiting to give bad news won’t make it easier. In fact, this usually only exaggerates a problem. For one, waiting may result in your boss hearing the information through the rumor mill first. Additionally, putting off delivering bad news causes more stress for you. Take a day or two to prepare yourself, and then set up a time for a private meeting with your supervisor at their earliest convenience.

Offer Solutions. When it’s time to give your boss the bad news, make sure you are prepared to offer some solutions. Thinking ahead about ways to resolve the issue demonstrates to your supervisor that you’re a proactive thinker. When you concentrate on trying to resolve the issue instead of dwelling on what’s wrong, you’re making progress toward a positive solution.

When have you had to share bad news with your boss? What did you say, and what response did you receive?

5 Tips for Finishing the Work Week Strong

productive weekHave you ever had one of those weeks with a constant stream of interruptions, back-to-back meetings, and an increasing workload? Or, have you felt so hectic that when Friday rolls around, you feel so bogged down in work that the joy of the weekend is shadowed by the sheer amount of work you must do?

Regardless of the work environment you’re in, you’ve probably experienced times of overwhelming workload. So how can you cope when priorities are weighing you down? Here are some tips for using Fridays to finish the week strong and cope with work overload.

1. Kill e-mail. A recent report in USA Today highlighted a phenomenon called “Zero E-mail Fridays.” At Intel over 150 engineers at the company recently committed to forego e-mail on Fridays and to opt for a phone call or face-to-face meeting if communication is needed. Other professionals are going a step further and deleting their entire inbox each Friday in order to have a clean slate when Monday rolls around.

2. Get an e-secretary. You may not be able to take things this far, depending on the type of work you do and whether or not you’ve followed up on important e-mails, but many prominent time-management gurus advise that at the least, workers should avoid staying logged in to e-mail throughout the day. If you can’t commit to this every day, start doing it on Friday. One way to do this is to treat the out of office e-mail function as a personal e-secretary. Simply type a message saying something along the lines of: “I’m in the office right now but not checking e-mail until 4 p.m. today. If you need to get in touch with me immediately, please call…” That way, you can commit to checking your e-mail only two or three times each day and have more time to focus on the tasks at hand as the week ends.

3. Purge the paper. If you are like most workers, you have a constant inflow of information, and not all of it is digital. In fact, research shows that the Internet has increased the amount of paper we use – 1 billion trees total or 735 pounds of paper per worker are consumed each year in the U.S. alone. But, studies show that when you’ve touched paper once, you will only look at 10% of it again. So, start throwing it away (or stop printing it out!). Don’t even waste your time filing, unless it’s something that’s necessary to have a hard copy back up of. Do you really need that memo about the new software training you’re signed up for? Probably not. Into the recycle bin with it. Making a goal of tossing 90% of the paper on your desk at the end of each week will help you cut down on the clutter and keep only the most important documents within reach.

4. Make time to plan. Try to carve out a chunk of time on Friday to plan for next week’s work. An hour is a good goal. This gives you time to review and update your to-do list, to rearrange priorities, to look at your calendar and to think strategically about how to approach your work. You’ll thank yourself when Monday rolls around and you can hit the ground running without a second thought.

5. Give yourself a break. Now that you’ve done the hard work, the planning, the organizing, and are set up for a great upcoming work week, it’s time to give yourself a break. That’s what days off are for, after all. So, after you leave the office for the week, turn off the Blackberry, forget about your to-do list, and find some time to unwind. Making time to enjoy life will help you feel balanced, increasing your focus and job satisfaction once you return to work for a productive week.

Instead of finishing the week on a tired, frazzled note, try using these tips to make Fridays your week’s best asset. What are your Friday tips? Let us know in the comments below.

4 Tips for Knowing it’s Time to Quit

Do you ever feel left out in a team meeting? Do your co-workers exclude your from group discussions? Are you doing work that you find unrewarding? If you answered “yes” to any of these questions, it might be time for you to quit your job.

Often times, people tend to stay at one job because they don’t want to be seen as job hoppers, or that they can’t handle difficult situations. Other times, the need for financial stability keeps people in their current positions, despite the hardships they feel on the job. Below are several clues that might indicate it’s time to move on from your current job.

You dread going to work. If you find yourself moaning on Sunday about having to go to work the next day, you should consider why you feel this way. It could be fatigue or personal issues that are weighing you down. Try getting a little extra sleep the night before, exercising more or taking a few days off of work to clear your head. If you still find yourself checking the time throughout the day and waiting for 5 p.m. to roll around, then it might be time to find a new job.

You don’t get along with your boss. If you feel that you can cut the tension between you and your boss with a knife, chances are, they feel that way too. Try scheduling a meeting to discuss your problems and concerns before making drastic decisions. If you’ve tried to communicate with your boss about your feelings and nothing has changed, then it might be time to clean out your desk.

You get all the grunt work. If you feel that you’re being underutilized within your department while others take on more challenging tasks, then you might want to check in with your boss before you check out of your job. Talk to your boss about increasing your workload or presenting you with more engaging projects. Also, it could be you’re new to the department, so you might have to prove you worth. Remember, everyone has to do work on projects they don’t want to every now and again. However, if you’re constantly taking on the scraps while your co-workers get the good assignments, even after confronting your boss, then you might want to investigate another job opportunity.

You feel excluded from the team. If you find yourself on the outskirts of team meetings or your fellow co-workers ignore your requests to go to lunch or small talk, then you might want to inquire as to why you aren’t included. If you have spoken with your boss and tried their suggestions, and nothing has changed, a light bulb should go off inside your head.

If you feel that any of these pertain to you in your current position. Try communicating with your boss and/or co-workers first before you retreat into another job. It could just be a simple miscommunication. Letting your feelings known just might be the answer to your problems. If you have tried everything possible to remedy the situation to no avail, then you might want to start looking for a new job. Remember, it is OK to not feel as though you are a perfect match within your job, but if it starts to affect your health or sanity, then leaving might be your only option.