Etchings on the Attic Wall

Highly Effective Work Habits:  Conquer Fear of Failure
I believe the majority of people have an innate fear of failure.  Nobody wants to fail.  Unfortunately, this often results in under-performing employees.  If you let your fear rule you, you’ll never take risks and achieve results.  A good lesson here is that the best way to learn [...]

Highly Effective Work Habits:  Have a Life Outside of Work
People are far too overworked these days.  This leads to increased stress, lower energy levels, and increased tempers.  At some point, you’ve got to step back and realize that work is not everything.  You have got to strike a good balance between work and your personal/family [...]

Highly Effective Work Habits:  Staying Indispensable

Salary.com recently published an article entitled “14 Ways to Stay Indispensable“.  And while there is never a guarantee you will stay indispensable, these tips will certainly help make it less desirable for an employer to get rid of you.  Here is the list they published:

Be noticeable.  Basically, put yourself [...]

Highly Effective Work Habits:  Accurate Time Reporting
Many organizations out there these days force their salaried employees to track their time.  And by this, I don’t mean clocking in and out.  I mean actually recording how many hours you work towards each of your tasks.  I’ve been working in the IT industry for over 13 years [...]

Highly Effective Work Habits:  Flexible Work Hours
As I mentioned before, with more and more companies out there retaining their existing employees and not hiring new talent, job roles are expanding.  Along with this, employers are looking for their employees to be more flexible in their work hours.  In the IT world, this is nothing new.  [...]

Here’s a fun web site from the same guys who brought you Uncrate.  On Devour, the site administrators hand pick the best videos from YouTube and send them to your inbox on a daily basis.  All of the videos are in HD and they all play on the iPhone and iPad.  So, you no longer [...]

Highly Effective Work Habits:  Communication
This is a common problem for most companies.  A majority of issues stem from lack of communication.  In most of the places I have worked, this has always been an issue (with all teams big and small across all departments).
This is a complicated topic with lots of ways to communicate properly [...]

Highly Effective Work Habits:  Knowledge Sharing

Sharing knowledge should be a key aspect of working in any team environment.  As I mentioned in a previous post, hoarding information is never a good thing.  Sharing information/data helps people to view you as a “team player” and also helps build up the entire team’s skills.  Do you [...]

Highly Effective Work Habits:  Get Up and Move
For those of us who work in cubes/offices all day, sitting down for that length of time can take its toll.  Several times each day, pick yourself up and walk around a bit.  If you need some reasons, try these on for size:

It is easier on your eyes [...]

Highly Effective Work Habits:  Keep a Clean Workspace
Having a clean workspace will help you to stay organized at work. I’ll cover organization in more detail in a future topic. It is much harder to get things done if you have to hunt around your desk for materials. Most people who have cluttered [...]