Business Leadership Skills 02 (Feb 13 - Apr 15)

[winston]

"If your actions create a legacy that inspires others to dream more, learn more, do more and become more, then you are an excellent leader."

- Dolly Parton

[winston]

[b]Magic Johnson's Business Advice (1-minute video)[/b] By Verne Harnish

This short Fortune interview of sport legend Magic Johnson is worth listening to while reading the rest of this insight - three strong pieces of advice for any business leader from a guy who has amassed a half billion net worth from making some smart business moves.

In the end it's about hard work and discipline and finding the right "who's"; the same any biz leader or athlete needs to be #1 in their chosen sport (worth sharing this minute with your children).

http://fortune.com/video/2014/12/10/mag ... ss-advice/

[winston]

"The key is not to prioritize what is on the schedule, but to schedule your priorities."
-- Stephen Covey

[winston]

5 Ways to Save 15 Minutes in 2015 By Craig Ballantyne

1) Get up 15 minutes earlier. Seriously. Everyone needs to do this. They need to be up 15 minutes before everyone else. It is the SINGLE biggest thing they can do to have an amazing year. It gives you time to think clearly about any problem, or to prepare your food, to write something important, to practice your presentation (again), or to do a short workout. It's not fancy. It will elicit grumbles. But NOTHING will work as well. Period.

2) Stop watching TV. It's all baloney. Live your own life, not one of magical elves on game of thrones or zombies or whatever. Patton didn't waste his life watching TV.

3) Make a list of what matters and what doesn't. Cut the fluff from your life. Start cutting out gossip, TV, cardio, traffic jams, and hangovers.

4) Block time wasting web sites from your computer. Use programs like Internet Freedom.

5) Man-Up and take back your life. Set cut-offs for phone calls, meetings, when you must finish dinner, and when you go to bed.

Bonus) Check your email only twice per day and use a timer. Learn how to filter the email into folders. Give 'emergency' type folks your phone number. Survive with texts and phone calls for most communication.

Source: ETR

[winston]

5 Ways to Save 15 Minutes in 2015 By Craig Ballantyne

1) Get up 15 minutes earlier. Seriously. Everyone needs to do this. They need to be up 15 minutes before everyone else. It is the SINGLE biggest thing they can do to have an amazing year. It gives you time to think clearly about any problem, or to prepare your food, to write something important, to practice your presentation (again), or to do a short workout. It's not fancy. It will elicit grumbles. But NOTHING will work as well. Period.

2) Stop watching TV. It's all baloney. Live your own life, not one of magical elves on game of thrones or zombies or whatever. Patton didn't waste his life watching TV.

3) Make a list of what matters and what doesn't. Cut the fluff from your life. Start cutting out gossip, TV, cardio, traffic jams, and hangovers.

4) Block time wasting web sites from your computer. Use programs like Internet Freedom.

5) Man-Up and take back your life. Set cut-offs for phone calls, meetings, when you must finish dinner, and when you go to bed.

Bonus) Check your email only twice per day and use a timer. Learn how to filter the email into folders. Give 'emergency' type folks your phone number. Survive with texts and phone calls for most communication.

Source: ETR

[winston]

Are You Wasting Everyone's Time By Verne Harnish

Emails and meetings, they are eating us alive - leaving us no time to read and think and work on the important stuff - and it's normally a few people (or outsiders) that create most of the problems.

This Wall Street Journal article titled "Stop Wasting Everyone's Time" discusses how some companies are using various software programs to analyze the problem and ferret out the time wasters.

For instance, in studying more than 25 companies, VoloMetrix (one software solution) has found executives who consume more than 400 hours a week of colleagues' time, "the equivalent of 10 people working full-time every week just to read one manager's email and attend his or her meetings." The confidential feedback helps managers stop their time-wasting behavior.

Are You the Problem? The article includes seven questions you can quickly answer to see if you're the one wasting everyone's time. Review at your next weekly meeting (OK, the irony is not lost on me) - but if you run your weekly and daily meetings correctly, they should only consume 4 to 5 hours per week and result in dramatically fewer emails - vs. the 20 hours/week of meetings some find themselves in.

http://www.wsj.com/articles/how-to-stop ... 1417562658

[winston]

How to Do a Full Day's Work in 90 minutes

By Steve Pavlina

http://www.mindpowernews.com/FullDaysWork.htm

[winston]

"Who has not served cannot command."
-- John Florio

[winston]

The BEST Way to Set Deadlines By Adam Rifkin

In a recent study, people were “more likely to start working on a task whose deadline is in the current month than in the next month,” even though the number of days to finish the task was the same, said Yanping Tu, a Ph.D. candidate at the Booth School of Business at the University of Chicago.

Color can also influence the perception of time, she said.

She and Professor Soman found that simply by coding a stretch of calendar days in the same color — say, blue — with an assignment occurring on the first “blue” day and the deadline set for the last “blue” day, people were more likely to complete the tasks.

Once again, this serves to make the future deadline seem more like the present. (Managers, are you listening? Get out your crayons.)

Source: New York Times

[winston]

Stop Feeling Overwhelmed: 3 Steps By Steve Pavlina

Sometimes you may have more items on your to-do list than you can reasonably complete. This can quickly lead to overwhelm, and ironically you may be more likely to procrastinate when you can least afford it. Think of it as your brain refusing to cooperate with a schedule that you know is unreasonable. In this case the message is that you need to stop, reassess your true priorities, and simplify.

Options for reducing schedule overwhelm include elimination, delegation, and negotiation.

First, review your to-dos and cut as much as you can. Cut everything that isn't truly important. This should be a no-brainer, but it's amazing how poorly people actually implement it. People cut things like exercise while leaving plenty of time for TV, even though exercise invigorates them and TV drains them. When you cut items, be honest about removing the most worthless ones first, and retain those that provide real value.

Secondly, delegate tasks to others as much as possible. Ask for extra help if necessary.

And thirdly, negotiate with others to free up more time for what's really important. If you happen to have a job that overloads you with more work than you feel is reasonable, it's up to you to decide if it's worthwhile to continue in that situation.

Personally I wouldn't tolerate a job that pushed me to overwork myself to the point of feeling overwhelmed; that's counterproductive for both the employer and the employee.

Source: ETR