Entries by First Sun Team

Strategy: Here’s the Morning Routine that Experts Recommend for Peak Productivity…You Have 2-2.5 Hours of Peak Productivity Every Day. You May Actually be 30% More Effective at that Time

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What’s the best way to start your day so that you really get things done?  Laura Vanderkam studied the schedules of high-achievers. What did she find? Almost all have a morning routine. Phil Jaber, founder of Philz Coffee. I’ve interviewed a ton of top experts about their productivity secrets: Tim Ferriss, Cal Newport, Dan Ariely, Charles Duhigg, and others.  But you’re busy. You […]

Your Career: LinkedIn Tags 10 Careers Where Job Networks Matter Most…These Fields Did at Least 26% of their Hiring from Existing Employee Networks

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How will you find your next job? Everyone wants a better strategy than simply clicking on an endless blur of hiring notices. A fresh study by LinkedIn highlights 10 types of careers where a strong personal network of contacts may pay off the most. (Photo credit: Simon Cockell via Flickr/Creative Commons) In a blog post published […]

Leadership: What The Best Managers Do Differently…Only 34% can Name the Strengths of their Employees & Only 32% have Had a Meaningful Discussion about Their Employees’ Strengths in the Last 3 Months

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Could your manager name your top five strengths – you know those things you’re good at and actually enjoy doing at work? And if yes, have they sat down with you recently and had a conversation about how you can build on your strengths as you go about your job? If you’re shaking your head, […]

Strategy: 5 Simple Things Super Productive People Do on Mondays…Starting Monday Firefighting will Put You Behind Schedule for the Entire Week

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Monday can totally feel like a drag. You just had a great weekend of fun and play and now it’s back to the workweek. Even those who love their job can find Mondays a real buzz kill. But Monday can also be an exciting beginning. With the right approach it can stimulate efficiency and productivity for the […]

Leadership:You Don’t Have To Be A People Manager To Have A Successful Career…Did you Know Research has Shown that Only about One in 10 Employees has the Necessary Traits to be a Good People Manager?

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At a recent coffee talk with several young people I mentor, the discussion took an interesting turn. When I asked the group what it meant to be successful in their careers, almost every person said that success meant being promoted into higher and higher-level jobs and eventually managing a large team of people. [fusion_builder_container hundred_percent=”yes” […]

Strategy: 6 Verbal Tricks Bosses use to Manipulate Employees…Now it’s Your Turn. Any Deceptive (or Just Irritating) Conversation Moves You’d Like to Add to the List?

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We all notice when people overuse certain words or phrases. (I love him, but as I write this somewhere Howard Stern is saying, “In other words…”) I’m guilty too, having once carried on an all too public affair with, “That’s neither here nor there.” (In my defense I always thought it was neither here nor […]

Leadership: We Are All Temporary Workers…It Will all be Over Sooner Than you Think. Whether you Love or Hate your Job, it is Not Permanent

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Nothing is permanent. It is easy to forget that.  Day after day, you take the same commute to work. Month after month, someone – your client or boss, perhaps – manages to annoy you. They are unreasonable, over-demanding, insensitive. You long for the day when no one is your boss. Not so fast. It will […]

Your Career: How To Conduct A Pain Interview With Your Hiring Manager…You May have to Ask Several Pain-Related Questions. Even Very Competent & Astute Managers Don’t Always have a Clear View of What’s Working Well & What isn’t. You Will be a Consultant to your Hiring Manager, Even Before you Get a Job! Practice Pain Interviewing & ee if you don’t find what other Job-Seekers have Found: That it’s More Interesting, more Intellectually Stimulating, More Fun & More Likely to Lead to a Job Offer to Talk about Pain & Solutions Than to Stick to the Interview Script!

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Pain Interviewing begins when you shift your hiring executive’s focus from the standard interview script to the actual business matters he or she is responsible for. We call it Pain Interviewing because in the same way that a Pain Letter deals with the real Business Pain behind the job ad, a Pain Interview digs into […]

Strategy: Tips for Dealing with Employees Whose Social Media Posts Reflect Badly on Your Company…Today, Employees Share Gripes & Gossip Online, as They Used to Around a Water Cooler

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In early February 2015, a Texas pizzeria owner “terminated” an employee before she’d even had her first day of work after she tweeted vulgarities about her future job. In January 2015, the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals found that a Mississippi police sergeant, fired in 2012 after she posted Facebook comments criticizing her police chief, […]

Leadership: To Get To The Top, Know What You Want & Be Prepared To Take Risks…So, If you Want to Make Waves in the Office, Treat your Career Like an Adventure. Be Single Minded, be Determined, Listen, & Learn

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Last week I spoke to Shellye Archambeau, CEO of Silicon Valley based Governance, Risk and Compliance Cloud Apps company, MetricStream. Additionally a Board Director of Verizon, Nordstrom, Watermark, and the Silicon Valley Leadership Group, in 2014 Shellye featured at #2 in Business Insider’s list of the 25 most influential African Americans in Technology. One of […]