Group items tagged

blog post in 2005 about how difficult it was to keep up with all the blogs! "I don't want to lie any more. I don't want to feel guilty any more. So let me tell you flat out: There are too many blogs I like and too many people I like to making "keeping up" a reasonable expectation, any more than you should expect me to keep up with Pokemon characters or I should expect you to keep up with Bollywood movies. I'm not going to feel guilty any longer about my failure. I will read your blog on occasion, either because I've been thinking of you or because something reminded me of you. Maybe it'll be because you sent me an email pointing to a post you think I'll enjoy. Go ahead! I'd love to hear from you."

from American Express: Glen Stansberry lists 5 reasons to keep a work diary or journal, including that it feels good to unwind and recount the day at the end of the day, focus on what got done not on what didn't, building on what went wrong to prevent it happening again, having a picture of what your work days look like so you can make adjustments.

Blog post by Jeff Cobb, the author of Ten Ways to be a Better Lifelong Learner and Mission to Learn blog, on EvoLLLution (illuminating the lifelong learning movement), 3.26.2012 See excerpt below for obstacles that keep people from lifelong learning: "AA: What are the major gaps keeping today's adults from effectively continuing their education? JC: There are two ways to come at that question, at least. It's high-level at first, to differentiate between education-which I consider to be primarily a formal, structured activity-and learning, the vast majority of which is informal and not necessarily structured. And learning encompasses education, but learning is just so much broader. When it comes to education, there can be any number of barriers that prevent an adult from continuing her education. Time and money tend to be two of the biggest. Those barriers can be overcome; like anything in life it's just often a matter of priorities and planning, both on the part of the individual and the society, but they do have to be overcome. On the other hand with learning, there's really nothing that can prevent an adult from continuing learning if they are in fact dedicated to doing that. We really can't help doing it; we're pretty much hard-wired to be continually learning. But we all know how overwhelming the flow of information can be around us these days; on the one hand it's this sense of being overwhelmed that can hold people back, I think another factor is that we simply don't look at a lot of the amazing new opportunities that we have, primarily through what the web now enables. … We don't necessarily look at these as learning tools and as things that can really help us to engage with and grow in life. Really, once you recognize that and once you start thinking in terms of effective strategies and effective approaches, the sky's the limit."

blog post by Andrea Coombes, 3.14.13, published by WSJ on creating the perfect boomer resume. 1. Keep it timely 2. Keep it focused 3. Tell a story 4. Make sure contact info is up to date 5. Tailor the format to the situation 6. Stick to a simple format (font) 7. Adjust your attitude.

Great article by Susan Weinschenk, Brain Wise: Work better, work smarter, September 11, 2012, and why dopamine keeps us "seeking" when we already have enough information. excerpt: Do you ever feel like you are addicted to email or twitter or texting? Do you find it impossible to ignore your email if you see that there are messages in your inbox? Do you think that if you could ignore your incoming email or messages you might actually be able to get something done at work? You are right!" ... "Instead of dopamine causing you to experience pleasure, the latest research shows that dopamine causes seeking behavior. Dopamine causes you to want, desire, seek out, and search. It increases your general level of arousal and your goal-directed behavior. From an evolutionary stand-point this is critical. The dopamine seeking system keeps you motivated to move through your world, learn, and survive. It's not just about physical needs such as food, or sex, but also about abstract concepts. Dopamine makes you curious about ideas and fuels your searching for information. Research shows that it is the opioid system (separate from dopamine) that makes us feel pleasure." Turn off the cues - One of the most important things you can do to prevent or stop a dopamine loop, and be more productive is to turn off the cues. Adjust the settings on your cell phone and on your laptop, desktop or tablet so that you don't receive the automatic notifications. Automatic notifications are touted as wonderful features of hardware, software, and apps. But they are actually causing you to be like a rat in a cage. If you want to get work done you need to turn off as many auditory and visual cues as possible. It's the best way to prevent and break the dopamine loops. What do you think? How do you deal with dopamine loops? Are you willing to turn off your cues?

From Inc. by Christina Desmarais, August 14, 2013. Good advice about dealing with family members, friends, other phone calls while using a home office. Also, names some tools to help keep up with collaborative projects and work teams: Hipchat for group chatting, Trello or Asana for project management, Expensify for tracking expenses and submitting expense reports, and Sqwiggle which keeps your webcam on so co-workers can see you work.

Interesting assessment of the value of volunteer moderators, July 7, 2015, by Ernie Smith on Reddit

ComsterCollege.com article by Lauren Bayne Anderson, June 16, 2011. Excerpt Here are some benefits to joining a professional organization: Jobs Many professional organizations help their members find jobs, or at the least, offer up job listings that other members may be offering. Mentoring Mentoring is the cornerstone of many professional organizations when it comes to working with younger members. You may never get in the room with someone at the top of your field, for a very long time. But professional organizations have the ability to pare you with someone much more experienced. Professional Development Many organizations offer professional development via courses, workshops, publications, and information on their website shared only with members. They also keep members up to date on industry trends and how to deal with them. Some organizations (take the National Association of Black Journalists for example) offer news and print coverage of their annual conferences, run by students-which is an excellent opportunity to gain experience. Networking Most organizations have an annual conference. This is an opportunity for you to mix and mingle with others in your field in both professional and leisure settings. There is also often a job fair where you can make contact and stay up to date with the very people who hire - even if they're not hiring right now. In fact, some people find recruiters follow their career and stay updated when you stop by their booth at the job fair. They may be keeping an eye on you until they are ready to finally offer you a job. Scholarships For the youngest of members (high school and college), scholarships may be the primary reason to join a professional organization. Many offer scholarships to the new members studying to enter the field.

blog post by Natalia Castaneda, 8/28/14, at Leadership Learning Community. Good reminder of how to take strategic plan and use it as a guide to implement. "1.View planning as an ongoing process It may be that you have to focus on the process first, trying to see what is the best way to implement an agile strategic planning process in your unique context Set 90 day goals, to keep the process dynamic 2.Keep it simple: "Simplicity allows people to act"[2] The plan should have three main components: identity (organizational vision, mission and values), goals (strategies and goals), and implementation (the actual plan) In terms of the implementation, it is helpful to think about not only the team members who will be implementing a given task, but also a 'champion' who is basically a project manager who is responsible for ensuring that the task gets completed 3.Create accountability among the organization's leadership team Organizational leaders should make strategic planning part of their responsibilities and develop accountability systems to ensure that the process is running well"

blog post by Daniel Newman, author of Millennial CEO on need to learn continuously and quickly.  Find the reference to IBM asking employees to acquire tech skills.  could be reference in ECO Byte #1. 

Really good articles that comes down to offering choice and balance to keep both introverts and extraverts learning and growing. Nicki Monahan, Faculty Focus, October 28th, 2013

Reference cited by Bevan Rogel. Donna Sapolin, the editorial director and general manager of Next Avenue wrote this blog about the nine principles cited by Josh Waitzkin to keep your brain sharp, learn new skills, and sustain employment

The reference from Bevan

Interesting blog post bu Elizabeth MacBride, April 5, 2013, on virtual partnerships, 5 secrets 1. must have the same agenda 2. you actually like the person 3. complementary skill sets or traits 4. open lines of communications 5. good legal underpinnings Excerpt "Our number-one rule - and the glue that holds our partnership together - is keeping the workload manageable. We don't take on too many clients, and we don't hold ourselves to unrealistic standards for production. "Our business is focused on helping people navigate a big, ongoing trend-the shift from traditional jobs to an economy built around freelance, contract and temporary work. Pulling all-nighters at the business and cutting ourselves off from the rest of the world, as we might at a venture-capital backed startup, doesn't seem like the right way for us," Pofeldt says. "Why not enjoy one of the best parts of freelancing: the freedom to have an active life outside of work without apologizing for it?" Barry "CB" Martin and Larry Gaian are food writers and marketers-for-hire who met via their common networks. "This year I started several new ventures," Martin wrote via email. "I asked him to be a sounding board. On one of the ideas, he was thinking along the same lines so we decided to combine forces." They're working together under the moniker Guys In Aprons, asking food companies to hire them to write recipe posts and interview expert chefs."

In keeping with our mission to find icons or symbols to convey the categories of our shop, this is a beautiful list and suggests that maybe we could combine some brightly colored fun shapes for our shop

Blog post by Kerry Hannon, November 7, 2012, Next Avenue--where grown-ups keep growing, a PBS sponsored site. Raises issues that WLS is concerned with. 3 Tips 1. Set up a free LinkedIn account. Create a winning LinkedIn profile. 2. Open a Twitter account. "Follow people or companies who interest you and ones you might want to interview for someday." 3. Share, ask, and engage. "Identify an online community of 'thought leaders' who discuss your field...

good article by Sam Polk, July 2016, on how sexist talk by men about women catapults even worse behavior by men

from Entrepreneur.com. Another article on how to network when you are an introvert. First suggestion is network and make connections online to develop relationships on LinkedIn, Twitter, Facebook and other social media platforms. This is especially helpful if you are going to a conference or event as you will "know" people before you get there, and they will know you. Arrange to meet up with them ahead of time. Talk about your accomplishments to better connect with others so they know what you have done and what connections you have with them. Discuss your goals and ideas to join or jumpstart the conversation, and ask for others' goals and ideas. Don't overthink it and go over and over your interactions. Concentrate on the positives you get out of the interaction. Maintain strong relationships when they develop and keep in touch regularly. Take Notes - remember faces, names, and what they said. Send an email to them to continue the conversation and remind them of who you are.

Ron Thomas's blog from April 25, 2016 on how it is up to each individual to keep their skills up to date and follow the trends of their career industry. This was highlighted in Jane Hart's blog this week.

by Next Avenue on where grown-ups keep growing

Is this what we need to do on a regular basis with WLStudio? #EdChat http://www.facebook.com/EdchatPLN This is a different type of group - #Edchat is Twitter based. In their own words, "#Edchat is a hashtag discussion among educators from all over the world on education related topics. It happens every Tuesday at Noon EDT and 7PM EDT. To join us simply follow the #Edchat hashtag on Twitter!" The Facebook Page keeps users up on discussion topics, and provides additional resources.