How To Escape Procrastination
How To Escape The Procrastination Doom Loop
When you imagine a highly productive person, you likely think of someone who focuses effortlessly on the job and never succumbs to procrastination. You know, the type who can sit on the ground in a subway station with their laptop and still manage to get more done in an hour than you would in a day at the library.
The truth is, ridiculously productive people face the same procrastination challenges as the rest of us. The difference is, they beat procrastination by using a calculated approach. First, they understand why they procrastinate, and then they apply strategies that beat procrastination before it takes hold. Anyone can follow this two-step, research-driven process to overcome procrastination.
The Procrastination Doom Loop
You can’t hope to stop procrastinating until you first have a firm understanding of why you procrastinate. New research from Joseph Ferrari at DePaul University shows that procrastination is more complicated than most people think. People tend to think of procrastination as coming from poor time management or laziness, but Ferrari’s research shows that procrastination stems from negative emotions that hijack your mood. Once you’re under the influence of these emotions, you can’t bring yourself to work.
Instead of being lazy or disorganized, people usually put things off because they aren’t in the right mood to complete the task. Doing so places you firmly inside the procrastination doom loop. Since you’ve decided that you aren’t in the right mood to work, you distract yourself with other tasks—checking email, checking the news, cleaning your desk, talking to a coworker, etc.—and by the time you come up for air, you feel guilty for having wasted so much time. This only worsens your mood, and as the deadline draws closer, you feel worse than you did when you first put off the task.
Escaping The Doom Loop
Beating procrastination is a simple matter of exiting the doom loop by taking control of your mood. With the right strategies in place, you can take the reins and get yourself in the mood to get things done. The strategies that follow will help you to make this happen.
Figure out why. When you aren’t in the mood to work, procrastination is telling you something important. It could be something simple, such as you need to take a break or get something to eat. It could also be something complex, such as you’re carrying the team on your back or you’re dissatisfied with your job. Whatever it is, instead of punishing yourself for procrastinating, take a moment to reflect and figure out why you’re procrastinating. This could end up being the most productive step you take in conquering your task.
Remove your obstacles. Prior to getting started on a task, take a moment to carefully consider the obstacles that might get in your way. Then, develop a plan to ensure that they don’t. For example, you might have instructions for a task in your e-mail inbox, and if you don’t do anything about it, you’ll repeatedly go back to your inbox to look at them, only to get distracted by other incoming e-mails. In this case, your management plan should be to get the instructions out of your inbox prior to starting your work. By planning ahead, you can maintain your focus and avoid procrastination. After all, it’s much harder to regain focus than it is to maintain it.
Jump right in, no matter what. Sometimes it’s really hard to get started on something, even when it’s something that you love to do. I might be staring at a blank Word document or standing on the beach on a cold winter morning. That first step is difficult, but once you get going—typing that first paragraph or taking off on that first wave—your mood improves dramatically. When you focus your attention on how difficult and cruddy it is to get started, you discourage yourself from doing so. When you dive right in no matter what, your mood quickly improves, which helps you to stay on task.
Cut holes in your project. We often procrastinate because we feel intimidated by the size of a project. To minimize intimidation, try cutting holes in it. Find smaller pieces of the task that you can quickly and easily accomplish. For example, writing a proposal might require 10 hours of intense concentration, but you can spit out an intro in 15 minutes and develop a list of deliverables in 10. Before you know it, these smaller tasks have cut serious holes in the project and it’s no longer intimidating.
Work in the right environment. Even if you do everything else right, working in the wrong environment can make you succumb to procrastination. This means keeping yourself away from television, electronics, friends, and loud places. This isn’t what works for everyone, but you need to exercise discipline by working in the environment that’s right for you.
Enjoy small victories. There’s nothing quite like checking something off of your to-do list. To keep yourself from procrastinating, you need to experience this sense of accomplishment by tracking your progress carefully. Small victories build new androgen receptors in the areas of the brain responsible for reward and motivation. The increase in androgen receptors increases the influence of testosterone, which further increases confidence and eagerness to tackle challenges. This keeps you fired up and moving forward. Sometimes crossing a few easy things off of a list is all it takes to build up the mental strength to tackle something big. Remember, it’s not about doing small tasks to avoid big tasks; it’s about including small tasks in your daily checklist to build your confidence and momentum.
Get real. Setting unrealistic goals for your day is a great way to become discouraged and to succumb to the negative moods that fuel procrastination. Setting realistic goals keeps things positive, which keeps you in the right mood to work.
Take control of your self-talk. Saying to yourself, “I’m not going to procrastinate. I will not procrastinate,” virtually ensures that you will procrastinate. There’s a classic study where participants were told to not think about a white bear. It turns out it’s nearly impossible to avoid thinking about something that you tell yourself not to, as your mind gravitates towards the thing you’re trying to avoid. The trick is to shift your attention to something completely different (and positive). Instead of telling yourself not to procrastinate, think about what you will do and how great it’s going to feel to have it done. This way, your mind fixates on the action you want to take instead of the behavior you’re trying to avoid.
Don’t be a perfectionist. Most writers spend countless hours brainstorming characters and plot, and they even write page after page that they know they’ll never include in the book. They do this because they know that ideas need time to develop. We tend to freeze up when it’s time to get started because we know that our ideas aren’t perfect and what we produce might not be any good. But how can you ever produce something great if you don’t get started and give your ideas time to evolve? Author Jodi Picoult summarizes the importance of avoiding perfectionism perfectly: “You can edit a bad page, but you can’t edit a blank page.”
Focus on results. Chances are, you don’t enjoy going to the dentist. Not many people do. So why do you go? It gets results. Your dentist is quite good at making your teeth and gums healthier and more appealing. You also go because the pain of having someone pick at your teeth for an hour is nowhere near the pain of getting a cavity filled, a tooth pulled, or a root canal. You go to the dentist because you know the process is worth it. The same mentality applies to a challenging task. While it may make you anxious to get started, don’t focus on that. Just think of how great it’s going to feel to get things done and how much worse you’ll feel if you wait until the last minute and don’t give it your best effort.
Forgive yourself. There’s no point in beating yourself up when you slip up and procrastinate. You might think that punishing yourself will help you to avoid procrastination in the future, but it actually has the opposite effect—beating yourself up sends you right back into the procrastination doom loop.
Bringing It All Together
The key to beating procrastination is to understand that procrastination is rooted in emotions. The strategies above will help you to turn the procrastination doom loop on its head and to achieve greater productivity than ever before.
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How To Avoid The Five Emotional Pitfalls Of A Job Search Spoiler alert: your job search will be anxiety-inducing, frustrating, and at times, painful. It..
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Sep 6, 2019Back to Work
Summer's Over: Here's Why It's The Best Time For Job Seekers And Hiring Managers To Act Now Labor Day has come and gone, which means..
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Aug 30, 2019Effective Time Management
11 Signs You're Not Managing Your Calendar Effectively Time to admit there's a better way to stay on top of your appointments. If you’re like..
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Aug 23, 2019Great First Impression
How To Make A Great First Impression At Your New Job You only get one chance to make a first impression, so make it count...
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Aug 16, 2019Purpose And Values
How To Connect With Your Company's Purpose And Values Some employees feel fully inspired by their company's mission, vision and values. But they don’t just mindlessly glug the Kool-Aid—they connect on a deep,..
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Aug 9, 2019Holiday Season Job Search
4 Reasons You Should Keep Up Your Job Search During the Holidays Now that the holidays are upon us, you may be considering taking a..
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Aug 2, 2019After the Interview
What Not To Do After A Job Interview The waiting period after a job interview can be one of the most stressful times. You’ve done..
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Jul 26, 2019Job Search Difficulties
3 Surprising Reasons Your Job Search Still Isn't Working It’s been months into your job search and you’re just about ready to pull your hair..
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Jul 19, 2019Attitude vs IQ
Why Attitude Is More Important Than IQ When it comes to success, it’s easy to think that people blessed with brains are inevitably going to..
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Jul 12, 2019Video Interviewing Tips
Video Interviewing: Lights, Camera -- But No Connection Nothing screams “personal” more than you on a 20-inch video monitor, beaming in from a remote location..
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Jul 5, 2019Overloaded And Overwhelmed?
Overloaded And Overwhelmed? Four Things You Can Control When Your Workload Is Out Of Control Our research indicates a terrifying 43% of knowledge workers do..
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Jun 28, 2019Successful People
13 Difficult Things Highly Successful People Learn To Do Young To invent a product, turn a profit or start a business is to be accomplished. To..
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Jun 14, 2019Career Summer Checkup
A Career Summer Checkup For Professional Growth Whether you’re graduating college or gearing up for your first fiscal year-end performance conversation, the summer months represent..
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Jun 7, 2019Five Things Employees Want
The Five Things Employees Really Want I haven't managed to catch all the episodes of Undercover Boss this season, but there was one I knew..
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May 31, 2019Thrive At Work
6 Steps To Unleash Your Inner Polymath And Thrive At Work In a previous article I explored some of the virtues of striving for a..
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May 24, 2019Successful and Happy
The One Daily Action That Will Make You More Successful And Happier At Work In our fast-paced world where we have more to do than..
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May 10, 2019How to Evaluate, Accept,…
Congratulations! You got the job. Now for the hard part: deciding whether to accept it or not. How should you assess the salary as well..
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May 3, 2019Great Employees
What It Takes To Be A Great Employee: The Parable Of The Oranges Being a great employee pays off with better positions, higher pay, and..
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Apr 25, 2019Your first Job
10 Essential Strategies To Succeed In Your First Job Congratulations, graduate! After the exhausting and stressful process of finishing school, searching for and landing your..
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Apr 19, 2019Starting a New Job?
When You Start a New Job, Pay Attention to These 5 Aspects of Company Culture When you join an organization, you have a short window..
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Apr 5, 2019Exceptional Employees
8 Clues That a Candidate Will be an Exceptional Employee Over the past 40 years, I have reviewed at least 30,000 resumes and LinkedIn profiles..
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Mar 22, 2019Increase Employee Retention
4 Smart Ways to Increase Employee Retention Keeping your employees once you have them is a thorny problem in the staffing services industry. The difficulty..
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Mar 15, 2019Things Happen!
Here's How To Recover From A Career Setback Whether you’ve botched an interview question, cancelled an important meeting last-minute or missed a typo in an..
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Feb 27, 2019Sabotaging your job search?
8 Ways You're Sabotaging Your Job Search Following certain best practices can make or break you in your quest for the right job. Some bad..
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Feb 15, 2019Workplace Diversity
In an 8-Minute Animated Film, Pixar Just Captured Why Companies Still Struggle With Workplace Diversity Yes, it's a movie about a pink ball of yarn--but..
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Feb 1, 2019Your Social Media Profile
Here’s what recruiters look for on a candidate’s social media profile Maintaining the right balance between being professional and being yourself on social media can..
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Jan 25, 2019Effective Job Interview
How to conduct an effective job interview As the employment market improves and candidates have more options, hiring the right person for the job has..
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Jan 18, 2019Things You Should Never…
14 Things You Should Never, Ever Say In A Job Interview It’s always intimidating to interview for a new job, whether you’re fresh out of..
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Jan 11, 2019Reasons for Leaving?
How To Answer Why You Left (Or Want to Leave) Your Employer If you want the job, don't reveal this. Job interviews are designed to..
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Jan 4, 2019A good LinkedIn Summary
Here's how to write a LinkedIn summary that could help you land your dream job, according to a marketing director at LinkedIn You might approach..
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Dec 14, 2018Stay Focused Through the…
14 Ways to Stay Focused at Work Through the Holidays We’re in the midst of the holiday season, and as you try to juggle parties,..
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Dec 7, 2018Great Employees Leave Great…
Why Great Employees Leave “Great Cultures” “We have a great culture.” We have all heard it. We have all said it. But what does that..
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Nov 30, 2018On-the-Job Training
Young Workers No Longer Get the On-the-Job Training They Need -- So They're Finding It Elsewhere With companies training people less, the most valuable path..
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Nov 23, 2018Help Your New Hires…
3 Ways You Can Help Your New Hires to Succeed Filling a vacant position is expensive, and unless you do these three things, it's liable..
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Nov 15, 2018A Successful Meeting
Three Ways To Prevent Someone From Stealing Your Spotlight In A Meeting We've all been there at one point or another. You're in a meeting,..
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Nov 2, 2018When should managers overlook…
Why managers should overlook results in these situations By focusing on culture and people first, you can set your team up for success in the..
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Oct 26, 2018Recruitment in Cyprus
Recruitment in Cyprus - Thoughts and Ideas from Advance Career Team Read the detailed interview published on TopJobsCyprus website and share your comments and ideas!..
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Oct 19, 2018Find Career Clarity!
How To Find Career Clarity Using Three Top Career Theories Feeling like you need to make a career pivot because your job isn’t a good..
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Oct 12, 2018Integrators VS Segmentors
Are your employees integrators or segmentors? An organization has both integrators and segmentors. Being a segmentor is a tough ask. If you choose to be..
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Oct 5, 2018Help Your Team Members…
Help Your Team Members Succeed (Especially When They're Tempted to Leave) Help that valued employee being lured by another opportunity think through what they are..
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Sep 28, 2018Avoid Toxic Team Members
Are You Hiring a 'Team' Player -- or Someone Just Looking out for No. 1? How can leaders make sure they're not unwittingly inviting a..
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Sep 21, 2018What Motivates You to…
What Motivates You to Work? That paycheck will never be big enough if it's the only reason you're going to work. Each of us respond..
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Sep 14, 2018Update Your Resume
Updating Your Résumé Might Mean Updating Yourself It seems like a total no-brainer: you should update your résumé and online profiles when you are job..
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Sep 7, 2018Tap Into Your Motivation!
Putting Yourself In Drive: How To Tap Into Your Motivation The one common component in every great success story is motivation: an ever-elusive elixir that..
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Aug 31, 2018Enhancing your job search
How To Bounce Back When The Job Search Gets You Down With a dream job in mind, an updated résumé in hand and responses to..
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Aug 17, 2018Social media can cost…
When 'What Happens In Vegas' Ends Up In Your Job Search What happens in Vegas really doesn’t stay there. That “funny” picture about that..
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Aug 10, 2018Avoid Summer Slump
How To Improve Productivity For Yourself And Your Team This Summer July and August are historically bad months for productivity. It might be the warm..
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Aug 3, 2018Emotional Intelligence at Workplace
How To Develop More Emotionally Intelligent Employees In the quest to develop leaders who will foster a culture of equity and inclusion in the workplace,..
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Jul 27, 2018Are you ready to…
The Difference Between People Who Succeed and People Who Flop Successful people charge forward, take calculated risks, and come out on top because of it...
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Jul 20, 2018Rewarding Employees Wisely
5 Ways to Reward Employees When Raises Aren't an Option Many workers are doing double duty these days because employers either can’t afford to hire..
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Jul 6, 2018Hiring the right people?
5 Steps to Hiring the Right People for Your Business "Hire slow, fire fast" is great advice, but it's not always easy to follow. The..
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Jun 29, 2018Ready for Entrepreneurial Success?
4 Entry-Level Jobs That Will Prep You for Entrepreneurial Success Success is a journey, not a destination, so think hard about where to start. Entrepreneurship..
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Jun 22, 2018Simple Work-Life Balance
Work-Life Balance Is Simple. To Succeed at Work, Get a Life. With the right balance of health and business, entrepreneurs can maximize productivity. The Organization..
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Jun 8, 2018Back On Track
How to get back on track when you’re having an unproductive day A rocky start shouldn’t dictate your entire workday. Do these things to reverse..
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Jun 1, 2018Value of Office Communication
Why Office Communication is Highly Valued and Often Ignored A huge number of employees don't trust their bosses, and it's not hard to figure out..
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May 25, 2018Impacts of High Turnover
The Negative Impacts of a High Turnover Rate High turnover rates can negatively affect a company and its employees in many ways. With the constant..
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May 11, 2018Employee Onboarding Strategies
Seven New Onboarding Strategies You'll See This Year According to a study from Equifax, more than half of all employees who left their job in..
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May 4, 2018Strategic Workforce Tools
Your Workforce Tools Are More Strategic Than You Might Think This is not a typical article about attracting talented job candidates or retention — while..
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Apr 20, 2018Engagement Strategy
Don’t Let ‘Meaning’ Be Missing From Your Engagement Strategy Meaning is one of the five keys in building employee engagement and it may be the..
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Apr 5, 2018Inclusion in the Workplace
Inclusion Doesn’t Mean Including Everything and Everyone Inclusiveness is not about thought policing. It’s also not about turning everyone into a liberal. It’s a normal..
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Mar 30, 2018Inspire Change In Your…
4 Ways To Inspire Change In Your Employees Have you ever listened to a speech that inspired you so much, you were ready to make..
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Mar 23, 2018Employees Feel and Act…
7 Ways to Incent Employees to Feel and Act as Owners Building accountability into your business culture is a leadership process. It can't be driven..
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Mar 16, 2018Don’t Shuffle People Into…
Don't Shuffle People Into the Wrong Job Just Because They're Already on the Payroll You grow your company by putting proven performers where you need..
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Feb 26, 2018Minimise Workplace Negativity
Tips for Minimizing Workplace Negativity To Deal with Negativity in the Workplace, Use These 9 Tips Nothing affects employee morale more insidiously than persistent workplace..
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Feb 23, 2018Leadership Role but Unprepared…
You Were Promoted To A Leadership Role But You Feel Unprepared - Don't Panic You’ve been at the job for years. As much as you..
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Feb 16, 2018Fail at Switching Jobs?
This Is the No. 1 Reason Why People Fail at Switching Jobs (and What to Do About It) There's a reason changing careers is so..
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Feb 9, 2018The future Workspace
Why a Coffee Shop Will Probably Be Your Workspace Within 10 Years As the gig economy grows, there are both social and scientific reasons why..
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Feb 2, 2018A Technique To Get…
Didn't Get Your Dream Job? This 1 Technique Could Get You a Second Chance Every job seeker experiences this at least once, if not several..
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Jan 26, 2018Prepare new employees for…
The Best Way to Set New Employees Up for Success Create an onboarding program that's both meaningful and memorable Congratulations; you've just hired a terrific..
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Jan 19, 2018First Hour, Day, Week,…
Do This In Your First Hour, Day, Week, And Month Of Your New Job Getting settled into your new job is the ultimate act of..
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Jan 12, 2018Make 2018 a Productive…
11 Expert Tips To Make 2018 Your Most Productive Year Ever Could eating cake for breakfast and never listening to your voicemail help you get..
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Jan 5, 20187 Ways Modest Leadership…
7 Ways Modest Leadership Increases Team Success When we imagine the traits of successful leaders, whether they are managers, high level executives, CEO's or owners..
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Dec 29, 2017Grateful Workplaces and Engaged…
Grateful Workplaces and Engaged Employees All leaders need to ask themselves why happy and engaged employees are worth their weight in gold. If you’re a..
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Dec 22, 2017Career Goals for 2018
How to Set Your Career Goals for 2018 and Achieve Them Each New Year offers the opportunity for a fresh start—and that includes your career...
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Dec 15, 2017Employee stress during Christmas
Managing employee stress during the festive period More than half of employees feel stressed in the weeks leading up to Christmas, with most calling for..
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Dec 1, 2017Appreciating your employees
How to Avoid the No. 1 Reason People Leave Their Jobs William James, the father of psychology, stated that the most fundamental psychological need is..
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Nov 24, 2017HR Function in 2024
Will You Be Leading an HR Function in 2024? Here are five things to look at to examine and determine if you’ve got what it..
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Nov 17, 2017Employee Appraisals
Importance of Effective Employee Appraisals The performance appraisal may be one of the few times during the year where an employee and the reviewer, typically..
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Nov 10, 2017Your Impact at Work!
What Is Your Impact? We keep throwing this word around called "impact." Do you know what your impact is and how would you define, discover,..
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Nov 2, 2017The workplace is changing
From Cubicle To Coffee Shop - How The Workplace As We Know It Is Changing In the past few years we have seen a major..
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Oct 27, 2017Inspiring Career Advice
LinkedIn CEO Jeff Weiner's 3 Best Pieces of Career Advice Jeff Weiner, LinkedIn's CEO, has had nothing short of a successful career. After graduating from..
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Oct 13, 2017Working for small companies
Why You Should Consider Working For A Small Company Eighty-four percent of small-business employees are happy in their current job, according to the 2017 Aflac..
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Oct 6, 2017HR’s key role in…
HR's key role in enlightened office design HR magazine and Landid's roundtable on the workspace of tomorrow explored how HR can positively influence facilities management..
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Sep 22, 2017Workplaces still hamper productivity
Workplaces still hamper productivity Noise, lack of privacy and space are some of the factors causing the greatest dissatisfaction among office workers Nearly half of..
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Sep 15, 2017Lost your Job?
Nine Things You Should and Shouldn't Do If You Lose Your Job Most of us wouldn’t think to associate the words "joblessness" and "fun," but..
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Sep 8, 2017Why Risk Is A…
Why Risk Is A Necessary Component To A Successful Career - And How To Balance Risk With Reward Taking at least some risk is necessary..
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Aug 25, 2017Top 10 Benefits Of…
Top 10 Benefits Of A Workplace Wellness Program When Google opened up in the 90s it took a unique approach to employee satisfaction. In an..
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Aug 16, 2017Write your first CV
It's all about potential: how to write a CV with no work experience Follow these tips to stand out among competing candidates – from research..
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Aug 10, 2017Friends and Career
Being Too Busy for Friends Won’t Help Your Career Friendship matters. Everything we do to succeed in our careers is improved when we’re supported by..
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Aug 4, 2017Is it time to…
The Best Ways to Reward Employees. Having an effective reward program in place can help solve many of your HR issues. Every company needs a..
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Jul 28, 2017Burnout: exhausted or lonely?
Burnout at Work Isn’t Just About Exhaustion. It’s Also About Loneliness More and more people are feeling tired and lonely at work. In analyzing the..
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Jul 21, 2017People don’t take HR…
People Don’t Take HR Seriously; Here’s Why That’s Dangerous Legacy beliefs like being the bad guy and a lack of strategic vision isolates HR, and..
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Jun 30, 2017Career Development
Think Strategically About Your Career Development In a world where the average employee sends and receives 122 emails per day and attends an average of..
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Jun 16, 2017Diversity and Inclusion
Diversity Doesn’t Stick Without Inclusion Leaders have long recognized that a diverse workforce of women, people of color, and LGBT individuals confers a competitive edge..
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Jun 2, 2017Advance Your Career
How To Advance Your Career In A Crappy Entry-Level Job Yes, you can still bring yourself one step closer to snagging that dream job even..
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May 8, 2017Interview Preparation
Interviews are generally regarded as the primary decision-making event in any recruitment process. Regardless of your academic credentials or career thus far, it is crucial..
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May 2, 2017Employee Burnout
What causes burnout and how it can affect both the employees and the organisation How HR Can Help Prevent Employee Burnout An engaged workforce. It's..
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Apr 3, 2017Interview questions you have…
Studies have shown that structured interviewing is more than twice as reliable a predictor of future employee performance than unstructured interviewing. That is why most..
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Mar 19, 2012Job Search Tips That…
Cyprus unemployment has been steadily increasing monthly since 2008 and is getting closer to double digits (January 2012 Eurostat figure – 9.6%). However there are..