Soft skills

Saying No at Work – When and Why to Do it

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Knowing why, when, and how to say no at work is essential to your career success and work life balance.    We may not want to say no at work for fear of not being liked or worse – being fired.  This is simply NOT TRUE especially when you learn how to say no tactfully.  Before we can talk about how to say no, let’s get on the same page about why and when you should be saying no at work and how this can benefit both you and your employer. ...  read more

What Makes a Good Manager – 7 Qualities

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What makes a good manager?  This is an excellent question to ask as you are getting promoted to manage others or have already been managing for awhile.  There are many managers out there but few are good ones.   The goal of a good manager is to achieve stellar results (results you cannot achieve alone) through inspiring, leading, and developing your team. ...  read more

How to Network for a Job

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To succeed like an executive, you not only need to know how to excel at your current job, but also need to know when it’s time to leave and how to best find your next job.   Most people has at least 8 to 10 jobs in their lifetime.  Don’t wait until you know you want to leave a job to start job search.  It’s important to network early and often while still at work in order to find a great next job. ...  read more

How to Recognize Good Management During Job Search

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Good management is hard to find and recognize. Here is a 10 minutes one-on-one coaching discussion I had with a job seeker on how to best recognize whether a company has good management while she is interviewing with the company. She has 10+ years of experience and so far has had mixed experiences with good and bad management in the last 4 jobs she held. ...  read more

Are You Overworking? 4 Tips on How to Stop

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If you are overworking, you are not alone.  Here are some statistics on how hard Americans work today (see detailed infographics at the end of this post):

  • Over 75% of Americans work more than 40 hours a week, and about 10 million Americans work more than 60 hours a week.
  • 10% of worker take work home every other day, and 24% of workers think about work at home or at social events.
  • 1 in 3 American adults don’t take their vacation days.

Being overworked comes at a price to the employee and the company they work for – increased chances of disease, less time with family, disturbed sleep, more stress, and less productivity. ...  read more

7 Steps to Effective Interpersonal Communication

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improve interpersonal communication

Anyone can master interpersonal communication.  There are few people who are naturally good at it. For most people, it takes conscious effort and practice to master this skill. Here are 7 steps to achieve effective interpersonal communication at work — today!

  1. Start with self awareness – Do you know how well you communicate right now? What works and what doesn’t? If you don’t know, gather feedback so you can know your strengths and weaknesses. Use the rest of this list to help with your self-assessment.
  2. Always keep the other person in mind–  For any instance of interpersonal communication, plan out your approach ahead of time. Start with the other person in mind — Try your best to put yourself in their shoes and figure out what might be their mindset, sensitivities, and how they may receive your words. Effective interpersonal communication can only happen if you understand where the other person may stand.
  3. Determine your desired “win-win” outcome:  The outcome of any conversation must be a “win-win,” as not all outcomes you desire are good for the relationship. For example, you may want to prove that you are right, but that would mean the other person needs to be proven wrong. You may win the argument, but lose the relationship. That’s not a good outcome.
  4. Gather the facts:  While facts can’t be the only focus of your conversation, you need the facts to keep the discussion as unbiased as possible. It’s hard to resolve anything if all you have is “he said she said.”
  5. Practice a calm approach/tone:  This will require the most time, especially if you are emotional about the situation. You need to calm down first, and then communicate with an open tone. This requires time, since our instinctive reaction is to take a defensive or offensive tone. An open tone can be one that gives the benefit of the doubt, or focuses on “we” instead of “you vs. me.” Your openness and calmness will invite the other people to listen, and your tone will show that you are there to build the relationship.
  6. Listen as much as you speak:  Effective interpersonal communication is a two way street.  You should spend 50% of the conversation listening. We are sometimes prepared so much that all we focus on is talking. You can lose the listener quickly that way. Pause after a few sentences so the other party can respond. That way you can adapt your communication based on how they react. Sometimes it takes fewer words than you think to achieve the “win-win” outcome.
  7. Don’t expect anything: We cannot control or change anyone else. This is an easy concept that is easy to forget. After all this work we put into structuring an interpersonal communication, there is no guarantee about how the other person will react. Everyone is responsible for their own actions. All you can do is play your part the best you can, accept whatever you get, and adapt your actions from there.
At the end of the day, the key to effective interpersonal communication comes down to practice. We interact with people every day. Some interactions can go well, while others may not. That’s part of the process. As long as you put conscious effort into improving, you will become effective at interpersonal communication over time. For more on this topic, and how to improve your communication skills at work, sign up for my Career Success Newsletter – How to Succeed Like an Executive, where you’ll find insights not published on this blog to accelerate your success. Email Address

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How to Network – Party More

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I am not joking. I will prove it to you why “partying more” will help you with networking.  I went to a Deloitte Consulting alumni event last week and had a blast. I met up with so many old friends, had fun, and discussed quite a bit of business at the same time.

I worked for Deloitte for 10 years but still was pleasantly surprised to see I knew half of the alumni at the event. Some are now Senior Managers and Partners at Deloitte and others are senior executives or successful owners of their own business.  The funny thing was as I was talking to people and recounting old times, I realized I never worked with 95% of the people I knew.  Instead we discussed the good old days of lavish consulting retreats, late night illegal golf cart rides, and dancing up a storm at the annual Christmas parties. ...  read more