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Year: 2021

Develop critical listening skills

In our competitive business environments, the ability to listen well is a crucial edge. It’s one of those soft skills that employers look for and clients crave. But it takes consistent practice to achieve the goal of listening (i.e., taking in information).

Go ahead, pull the ‘I commit’ lever!

Sometimes we just don’t feel like being as productive as we should. That’s OK, right? Well, yes, but what’s not OK is to consistently let yourself down and undermine the goals you’ve set for yourself. If this sounds like you, it’s time to lock yourself in a cage.

Try the Eisenhower Matrix for workflow

“I have two kinds of problems: the urgent and the important,” Dwight D. Eisenhower purportedly said, though he didn’t claim the original thought as his own. “The urgent are not important, and the important are never urgent.” From this musing emerged the time management method known as the Eisenhower Matrix.

Leash those emails until they’re ready

Here’s a sequel to the classic tip about always attaching a document before you actually compose an email to avoid the “oops” moment of forgetting to include it. Remember also to enter the recipient’s address in the “To” field only after you write and re-read your message. Take the vow: No more prematurely sent emails […]

Pandemic leave donations: More time to do good

Last year, as employees were piling up accrued time they couldn’t use, the IRS allowed them to cash out their unused time, donate the cash to their employers and their employers would donate the cash to charitable organizations helping people impacted by the pandemic. The IRS has extended this relief through the end of this year.

U.S. employers planning larger pay raises for 2022

Pay raises are making a comeback. U.S. companies plan to give employees larger raises next year as they recover from the economic fallout from the pandemic and face mounting challenges attracting and retaining employees, according to a new survey by the Willis Towers Watson consulting firm.