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#Leadership : How I Decreased My Weekly Office Hours From 40-plus to Less Than 8…Can a CEO Work Eight Hours a Week? Yes, and Here’s One Who Did It.

October 29, 2016/in First Sun Blog/by First Sun Team

You sit down at your desk ready to destroy your workday. You brew a pot of coffee, break out your calendar and dive into your most important task.

And then it happens. The phone rings, or a co-worker stops by to say “hey.” Maybe your boss swings by to ask about those TPS reports.

Whatever type of interruption you face, you’re annoyed. And if you work in an office, you know exactly what I’m talking about: Just because you’re sitting behind that desk and have already “clocked in,” everyone thinks it’s perfectly okay to engage you. Unfortunately, these random engagements can absolutely kill your productivity.

Not only can they knock you off task, but they consume your mental energy for the day. I didn’t notice how much time I was losing before I had kids, but I notice it much more now that I have four. And yes, being a parent has severely limited my ability to endure small talk and mindless babble. Parents, you know what I’m talking about: 20 minutes in the hallway talking about last night’s game. A co-worker lamenting over workplace stuff. A leisurely lunch invite that turns into a two-hour affair against your will.

This is the type of stuff that can waste your productivity and reduce your potential.

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Creating space and forging a new path

After a few years of enduring these wasted moments and opportunities, I was convinced something needed to change. I wanted to get out of the office more, but to accomplish nearly the same amount of work. More importantly, I wanted to stop wasting so much time, when I could be home with my family or out enjoying life.

At first, I thought that leaving the office more often would be an impossible feat. I mean, how could leave more often yet still accomplish the same level of work?

Sure, I was the CEO of my own wealth-management firm, but that didn’t mean I could come and go as I pleased. If I wasn’t in the office, what would my clients think? Was my team even capable of running everything in my absence? What if something went wrong?

It took me a while to realize I was consumed with limiting beliefs. Fortunately, a few amazing entrepreneurs and thought leaders made me realize the error of my ways. First, I read Tim Ferris’ book The 4-Hour Workweek and realized what was possible. Using the strategies in his book, I could reduce my time in the office significantly, right? Second, I joined a coaching program called Strategic Coach. The program introduced me to the concept of “creating space.”

One exercise we did involved tallying up how many free days we had taken in the last year. Why? Because they said we needed to learn to “create space” in our lives. And, to create that space, we had to give ourselves a break and some time off. Over time, the mental exercise of “creating space” allowed me to figure out what was important in my life, then outsource the rest.

Third, I started listening to productivity geniuses like Michael Hyatt. Highly productive entrepreneurs aren’t born that way, Hyatt says. They learn to become ultra-productive by mastering their environments. According to Hyatt, constant interruptions and distractions are the number one obstacle entrepreneurs face as they check off their to-do lists and work toward their goals.

And that is a shame, Hyatt say his websites. “Entrepreneurs and executives like us have too much value to contribute to our businesses and the people that matter most in our lives to let distractions drag us down,” he says on.

Just listening to experts like these taught me to “create space” and step away from my situation, to a certain extent. From there I set out on a path to limit distractions and build a better workday. Over time, I brought my office time from 40 hours per week to less than eight hours, with no impact to my productivity and even greater earnings over time.

How did I do it? Five ways.

1. I hired strategically. Although I already had a drector of relations on staff, I added an associate advisor, as well. The associate’s job was to be “me” when I wasn’t there — giving expert advice to our clients and providing the service they deserve.

This is where I think a lot of small business owners fail. Scared that no one could ever stand in their shoes, they refuse to outsource their most important work. But, if you want to reduce your hours, this step is crucial.

It took a while to get everything set up. For several months, I had to work 60-hour weeks to teach this new hire everything he needed to know. But once the hard work was done, I had a trusted and polished counterpart to lean on.

2. We started documenting our processes. Eventually, I learned I could make my life easier by streamlining processes I did over and over. A tool that I stumbled on, Sweet Process, helps you create processes for everything in your business.

Using this tool, we began creating processes for higher-level tasks such as opening new accounts. From there, we created processes for making bank deposits and processing client contributions. Once we got all the higher-level tasks squared away, we even created systems to take over the small tasks in our workday.

Creating all those processes takes a lot of work up-front work, but once you’re done and new people you’ve taken on are trained, you never have to do these things again. Even better, if you eventually have to hire someone new or replace someone, your documented processes can serve as a training manual.

3. I “created space” and scheduled time for being away from the office. Once I hired more people and created processes, I had to schedule time for being away, to see if my new strategy could work. So, that’s exactly what I did — even though I had to force myself to leave the office.

At first, I spent time hanging out at a coffee shop or working from home. That way, I could test my new employee’s abilities without stepping away completely. Once I felt more comfortable, I started taking Tuesdays off. Then I started added more “off days” to my calendar each week. Eventually, I was down to just eight hours in the office each week, yet everything was still running smoothly. And yes, it felt great!

4. We improved communication. Before I reduced my hours, I had used email, texting and Google Chat as my primary sources of communication. This worked fine for a while, but we eventually realized we were losing conversations and details this way.

Then we stumbled on Slack. Slack allowed us to create channels specific to certain needs for our financial advisory firm; we could conduct ongoing conversations by searching past ones for details. Where we had once lost important information and conversations, Slack kept all of our correspondence in one place.

5. We reviewed actions and looked for ways to improve. Just as happened in the military where I participated in After Action Reviews, I created a process for weekly reviews in my office. We didn’t review one other’s work per se, but instead, how the week had done in general. How was our communication? Did everything get done? Did anything fall through the cracks?

By highlighting any gaps in our communication and planning, we could find ways to improve. And that’s exactly what we did. Over time, we improved everything from our daily communication to results for our clients.

Final thoughts

Where I once felt I could never step away from the office, I now work less than 8 hours each week at the office. And as the final nail in the coffin and proof that everything I outlined here works, we have drastically improved our profitability as well. In fact, Alliance Wealth Management (my firm) is on pace to grow revenue by 31 percent this year.

With more time on my hands, I am now able to be a better father and husband. In addition, I’ve created space and time to do something I have always wanted to do — which is to create a course geared toward financial advisors who want to become a force to be reckoned with in the online space. And you know what else? My course, The Online Advisor Growth Formula, is on track to add $100,000 in revenue to my business this year.

This fact underscores the idea that more work hours doesn’t always mean greater results and that, sometimes, less is more.

None of this could have happened if I had never stepped away – and if I had never listened to the savvy productivity experts who forged this path for me.

If you’re tired of working more to accomplish less, make sure to listen to the experts that study productivity like it’s their job (because it is). You might feel “stuck” working too many hours now, but a few small changes can make a world of difference.

Entrepreneur.com | October 28, 2016 | Jeff Rose

#Leadership : 14 Habits Of The Most Productive Remote Workers… From Hardware to Soft Skills, Here’s What it Takes to Master the Art of Working Remotely.

June 12, 2016/in First Sun Blog/by First Sun Team

Working from home sounds like an idyllic situation, in theory: You can roll out of bed each morning (or afternoon, even) and get started on your day without having to dress up, brave traffic, or engage in mindless chit-chat around the communal coffee machine.

However, not going into an office every day presents its own set of challenges, like determining how to separate your home life from your work life, and making sure you’re feeling connected to your colleagues and clients, among other things.

To help ensure that you’re on the right track while working remotely, we consulted seasoned work-from-home veterans who shared their top tips for staying productive—and thriving—in their careers.

OUTFITTING YOUR OFFICE

Whether you have a whole room dedicated to a home office or prefer working from the couch in your living room, having the right setup can keep you productive while on the clock.

1. They make sure they have the equipment they need.

It’s important to invest in the quality of your workspace by getting equipment that helps you do the best work you can. When I transitioned to an at-home employee, I went out and bought a similar version of the computer I was used to working on so that my productivity levels wouldn’t suffer from an inferior, slower setup.
—Brit Casady, 24, Lehi, UT, graphic designer

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2. They invest in ways to stay active at home.

My favorite part of working from home is the fact that I can work on my treadmill desk. I can kill two birds with one stone by exercising while I work. I’ve found that being able to walk helps keep me focused and because of that, I’m able to succumb less to the distractions that come from working at home. On the days I work on the treadmill, I typically spend two to four hours on it—that adds up to about 10 to 15 hours per week. I pretty much do any kind of work on my treadmill, from writing posts to sending emails to creating social media content and so on. At a two mile-per-hour pace, it’s not so fast that certain tasks are difficult to do because I’m walking.
—Brent Hale, 30, Sparks, NV, online entrepreneur and owner of IncomeAddon.com

MANAGING DISTRACTIONS

Let’s face it—distractions run rampant wherever you work, whether it’s in an office with coworkers or in your own kitchen. Keep productivity zappers at bay with these strategies.

3. They get organized with the “three-minute rule.”

I allow three minutes to tend to anything I feel I need to respond to immediately that is not on my to-do list. Give yourself three minutes every hour of your official ‘work hours’ to scan and respond to important emails, put shoes that accumulate around the doorway in the closet, etc.—if it takes no more than three minutes. It puts your mind at ease and reduces at-home work distractions without derailing your day. It also helps you spend less time cleaning the house and dealing with administrative tasks when the workday ends.
—Stephanie Taylor Christensen, 38, Columbus, OH, freelance writer, yoga instructor, and mother to a 6-year-old

4. They don’t let socializing get in the way of working.

Notify friends that you do have work hours, even if you are at home. For the longest time, I had friends popping over at all times of the day whenever they were free! Make sure you are assertive and tell them what your hours of work are and that you stick to a no-visit schedule during these times.
—Laura Fredrick, 28, Marlton, NJ, public relations professional and owner of Laur PR

5. They let their kids visit their home offices occasionally.

With a home office and three kids, it’s not easy. My advice? Get a white board. When the door is closed, do not disturb. But if it’s open—and leave it open as much as possible—my kids can come in and draw on it and leave me little notes. It’s magnetic, so they can put stuff on there for me to display. Everyone is happy.
—Gregory Pavliv, 38, Bloomfield, NJ, music teacher and owner of Music Teaching Guru

6. They minimize online distractions.

One of my favorite productivity hacks comes with the help of an app called StayFocusd. When working from home, Facebook and Twitter can be a major distraction. StayFocusd helps you avoid these distractions by restricting the amount of time you can spend on them. The Google Chrome extension lets you set specific time restrictions on certain websites with a 10-minute default option. Once your time has been used up, the sites you have selected to block can’t be accessed for the remainder of the day.
—Lori Cheek, 43, New York City, founder and CEO of Cheekd.com, an online dating app

7. They time-delay their email responses in order to manage expectations.

I time-delay every single email I send. I have gotten people out of the habit of thinking that they control my workday and that they will get an immediate response. I time-delay up to a full day if I feel it’s necessary. Inbox by Gmail has been critical in helping me maintain my inbox. I love it because I can simply save messages for later, create my own bundles (like per project or sender) and remind myself to do things. It has been tremendously helpful as far as keeping my mailbox from getting out of hand.
—Ashley Sharie, 27, Washington, DC, CEO and founder or Aspire Business, a business consulting firm

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CONNECTING WITH CLIENTS

Checking in with colleagues and customers can be challenging when you don’t see them every day. This is why it’s important to put your best foot forward in all of the interactions you do have.

8. They build in prep time for client meetings.

When you work from home, your schedule can be all over the place—workout classes whenever, meetings at different places and different times. Plus, I don’t know about you, but if I don’t need to get dressed in professional clothes, I won’t. My calendar helps me in that regard. Each time I schedule a meeting with someone outside of my home, I set my alert for 30 minutes or an hour before, depending on how long it will take me to get there. Then I set another alert for two hours before. This is my “Go take a shower and make yourself presentable” alarm. Without it, I would show up to many of my meetings looking and feeling frazzled.
—Alden Wicker, 29, New York City, freelance writer and founder of EcoCult.com

9. They err on the side of over-communication (sometimes).

We’ve found that most workplace tension is caused by inadequate communication—particularly when you are unable to speak with colleagues in person due to remote work situations. When you are unable to speak to clients or colleagues in person, make sure they know you are on the case by always being crystal clear. Frequent communication with your supervisor and co-workers can help reinforce bonds of friendship and trust, making collaboration easier throughout your time at a company.
But when it comes to email, remember that less is more: Try to communicate your message using as few words as possible to save time for your reader. When crafting a written message, it’s easy to get lost in long blocks of text and drift off on tangents—particularly when you need to explain a complicated concept to a coworker. To keep yourself focused and on-message, consider using bulleted lists to help structure and explain your thinking. The natural segmentation of bullets and ability to indent can help you keep your thoughts logical, organized, and succinct.
—Sam McIntire, 26, San Francisco, founder of Deskbright, an online learning platform designed to help people thrive at work

10. They speak up during conference calls.

In a remote environment, it’s often easier to sit quietly during conference calls. But it’s really important to go into a conference call with at least a few specific talking points to discuss. It not only shows that you’re prepared, but it also helps to move the conversation forward in a productive way, rather than hemming and hawing while you think of something to talk about.
Also, challenge yourself to ask two questions during a meeting. This really forces you to pay attention to what’s being discussed. Even if a topic of discussion isn’t directly related to your job, it’s a nice idea to ask questions, both to learn more about the company and your coworkers and to show that you’re paying attention and engaged.
—Brie Weiler Reynolds, 34, Dallas, director of online content at FlexJobs

STAYING ON A SUCCESS TRACK

It’s easy to get stuck in a rut managing your daily to-dos, but periodically taking a step back to evaluate your overall performance can help make your work-from-home experience a success.

11. They give themselves yearly reviews.

In December or January, I conduct a yearly review. This is partially to reconcile my numbers and partially to see which of the services I offer pay the most on both an hourly and total-dollars basis. In my year-end review I note items such as gross annual income, average hourly rate, average rate per word, average days from invoice to payment, total hours worked (plus average hours per week), total number of words edited or written (this is more for personal curiosity than anything), most lucrative service by total dollars and finally, most lucrative service by hourly rate.
—Anitra Budd, 37, Minneapolis, freelance writer and editor

12. They block off time for professional development.

Leave open space [in your schedule] for planning and networking meetings, as well as time to reflect on what is working and what is not working. Perhaps Friday afternoons or Monday mornings where you block off time in your calendar to set up your week and revisit your goals.
—Cara Maksimow, 43, Chatham, NJ, clinical therapist and owner of Maximize Wellness Counseling and Coaching

13. They keep their schedules flexible.

Know your schedule—your actual schedule, not a clone of the in-office working model. If you know your home or parenting responsibilities will make working in the morning tough but you’ll be uninterrupted at night, you’ll be more productive by planning your day that way rather than attempting to mix home and work. Be realistic about it so you can build boundaries based on efficiency. The end result is an enormous increase in both your productivity and your sanity!
—Monica Reccoppa, 42, Totowa, NJ, financial manager at Cardwell Beach, a creative marketing agency

14. They write a goal list.

I have my personal and professional goals written down and posted at my desk. This allows me to see them every day—it’s easy to get caught up in task-mode and only focus on checking off items from your to-do list. Having written goals displayed openly forces you to remember the larger reason why you are performing these tasks and take a step back to examine whether you’re on track to meeting the goals you set for yourself.
—Casey Bond, 29, Manhattan Beach, CA, editor of StudentLoanHero.com

FastCompany.com| June 8, 2016 | NATASHA BURTON

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#Leadership : 6 Productive Ways to Spend Your Idle Time…Regardless of your Workload, You are Sure to Have a Few Gaps Here & There. Choose to Spend your Time Wisely & Make Every Second Count.

June 1, 2016/in First Sun Blog/by First Sun Team

Only the most productive among us see time as it really is: one of our most valuable assets. Perhaps you’re one of the ones who recognize that time has a “limited offer” attached to it; after all, there are only 24 hours in a day. Therefore, you strive to make every single second count.

While downtime is vital for the preservation of our health, you cannot dismiss the fact that there are meaningful activities you can be involved in, even when resting. This takes multitasking to a whole new dimension.

Here are six things you can do in your idle time:

1. Record your goals.
To be successful at anything, you must first set clear goals of what you want to achieve. People who write down their goals are far more likely to achieve them than those who simply think about a goal, or those who have no goal at all.

This will also save you a lot of time in the future. If you use your spare time to clearly record your daily and long-term goals, it will eliminate other distractions and give you an objective to focus on. Hence, time that would otherwise be spent on mindless diversions will be converted into productive time.

As you complete your goals, cross them off your list to give you a greater feeling of accomplishment.

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2. Listen to audio books.
Acquiring new knowledge never loses its value, and we should never really stop learning until we die. The increase in technology has made it convenient to acquire information and with a wide variety of audio books that can be borrowed from the library at no cost or downloaded with the click of a button, you can listen and learn while traveling, exercising, or even relaxing on the beach. It is a simple as having someone read a book for you, at your convenience.

3. Learn another language.
As with audio books, technology has made it quite simple to learn a new language. Gone are the days when it was necessary to sit in a classroom. With CDs, downloads, and podcasts you can begin your journey to becoming bilingual (or multilingual). As an added bonus, knowledge of other languages will make you more marketable.

4. Check up on your loved ones.
Because productive people are often very busy, they may find it difficult to find the time to spend with friends and family. As a matter of fact, it is easy for productive people to become so caught up in the goal of getting ahead that they can forget about their loved loves in the process. Although it may not be possible for you to spend all the time you want with your loved ones, using your idle time to touch base with them over the phone, or even in a handwritten note or card, will help bridge the gap.

5. Get moving.
No matter how busy you are, you need to exercise if you want to live long enough to enjoy the fruits of your labor. Do some squats or lift hand weights while talking on the phone, or use your lunch break to walk around the neighborhood.

6. Give Back
Part of happiness comes from serving others, so instead of watching TV, help someone learn to read, serve dinner in a soup kitchen, or help an elderly person with their errands. These activities are not overly demanding of your time and provide a wealth of rewards.

Regardless of your workload, you are sure to have a few gaps here and there. Choose to spend your time wisely and make every second count.

Entrepreneur.com | May 31, 2016

JACQUELINE WHITMORE

CONTRIBUTOR

Author, Business Etiquette Expert and Founder of The Protocol School of Palm Beach

#Leadership : How Being Busy Makes You Unproductive…”Beware the Barrenness of a Busy Life.” –Socrates

March 30, 2016/in First Sun Blog/by First Sun Team

Being busy has somehow become a badge of honor. The prevailing notion is that if you aren’t super busy, you aren’t important or hard working. The truth is, busyness makes you less productive.

When we think of a super busy person, we think of a ringing phone, a flood of emails, and a schedule that’s bursting at the seams with major projects and side-projects hitting simultaneously. Such a situation inevitably leads to multi-tasking and interruptions, which are both deadly to productivity.

“Beware the barrenness of a busy life.” –Socrates
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David Meyer from the University of Michigan published a study recently that showed that switching what you’re doing mid-task increases the time it takes you to finish both tasks by 25%.

“Multitasking is going to slow you down, increasing the chances of mistakes,” Meyer said. “Disruptions and interruptions are a bad deal from the standpoint of our ability to process information.”

Microsoft decided to study this phenomenon in their workers and found that it took people an average of 15 minutes to return to their important projects (such as writing reports or computer code) every time they were interrupted by emails, phone calls or other messages. They didn’t spend the 15 minutes on the interrupting messages, either; the interruptions led them to stray to other activities, such as surfing the Web for pleasure.

“I was surprised by how easily people were distracted and how long it took them to get back to the task,” said Eric Horvitz, the Microsoft research scientist behind the study. “If it’s this bad at Microsoft, it has to be bad at other companies, too.”

Beyond interruptions, busyness reduces productivity because there’s a bottleneck in the brain that prevents us from concentrating on two things at once. When you try to do two things at once, your brain lacks the capacity to perform both tasks successfully. In a breakthrough study, René Marois and his colleagues at Vanderbuilt University used MRIs to successfully pinpoint a physical source for this bottleneck.

“We are under the impression that we have this brain that can do more than it can,” Marois explained.

We’re so enamored with multitasking that we think we’re getting more done, even though our brains aren’t physically capable of this. Regardless of what we might think, we are most productive when we manage our schedules enough to ensure that we can focus effectively on the task at hand.

We are naturally drawn to being busy despite the fact that this hinders our productivity. As it turns out, you really do have to slow down to do your best. When you don’t, the consequences can be severe.

If you read my recent article on mindfulness, you’ll recall that practicing mindfulness increases your ability to focus and concentrate because it increases brain density in the anterior cingulate cortex (ACC). As it turns out, multitasking has the opposite effect on this critical brain area. Researchers from the University of Sussex compared the amount of time people spend on multiple devices (such as texting while watching TV) to MRI scans of their brains. They found that high multitaskers had less brain density in the ACC. It’s as if being busy all the time (via multitasking) trains your brain to be mindless and unproductive.

I doubt these findings completely surprise you as we’ve all felt the distracting pull of competing tasks when we’re busy. So why do we keep doing it?

Researchers from the University of Chicago have the answer. They found that the belief that busyness is a sign of success and hard work is so prevalent that we actually fear inactivity. A recent study there coined the term idleness aversion to describe how people are drawn to being busy regardless of how busyness harms their productivity.

The researchers also found that we use busyness to hide from our laziness and fear of failure. We burn valuable time doing things that aren’t necessary or important because this busyness makes us feel productive. For instance, responding to non-urgent emails when you know you have a big project that you need to finish. It’s tough, but you need to recognize when you’re using trivial activities to shield yourself from sloth or fear.

Bringing It All Together

We are naturally drawn to being busy despite the fact that this hinders our productivity. As it turns out, you really do have to slow down to do your best. When you don’t, the consequences can be severe.

How do you keep from getting too busy? Please share your thoughts in the comments section below as I learn just as much from you as you do from me.

Travis co-wrote the bestselling book Emotional Intelligence 2.0 and co-founded TalentSmart.

Forbes.com | March 29, 2016 | Travis Bradberry

#Leadership : Why We Seem To Be Talking More And Working Less — The Nature Of Work Has Changed….The Real Reason That we Communicate More is Because, Today, we Need to Collaborate More to Be Effective.

March 7, 2016/in First Sun Blog/by First Sun Team

Are communication technologies like Slack, Yammer and Skype actually helping us, or just getting in the way? Certainly, they have made it easier to communicate, share information and collaborate with colleagues, but what if all that extra communication is actually preventing us from getting important work done?

In a recent article in Harvard Business Review, Bain & Co. partner Michael Mankins estimates that while a typical executive in the 1970’s might have received 1,000 messages a year, that number has skyrocketed to more than 30,000 today and argues that we may “have reached the point of diminishing returns.”

I think just about everyone can see his point. Today, the amount of meetings, emails and IM’s we receive can seem overwhelming and it’s increasingly hard to find uninterrupted quiet time to focus and concentrate. However, the nature of work has changed. The real reason that we communicate more is because, today, we need to collaborate more to be effective.

Today, Machines Do A Lot Of The Work For Us

First, consider how different work was 20 years ago, when Microsoft had just released Windows 95 and few executives regularly used programs like Word, Excel and PowerPoint. We largely communicated by phone and memos typed up by secretaries. Data analysis was something you did with a pencil, paper and a desk calculator.

Now consider how Mankins performed the study he described in the article. He writes, “My colleagues at Bain and I have studied these effects using people analytics and data mining tools.” It’s safe to assume that all that data was collected and analyzed electronically and shared instantly with the press of a button.

It’s also safe to assume that he and his colleagues spent quite a bit of time discussing what the results of all that analysis meant. 20 years ago, they would have had to set up a meeting or a phone call when they were all free, but today, they can toss around ideas between meetings, in airport lounges or even while waiting for an elevator.

As Mankins himself wrote in an earlier article, “Today, an algorithm can assemble many more facts about the accounts than any human being could easily process.” The truth is that we’re increasingly collaborating with machines to get cognitive work done and so it shouldn’t be surprising that we’re taking more time to discuss that work with each other.

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Problems Are Becoming Much More Complex

Another thing to take into account is that the work we do today is far more complex. Would Mankins have even undertaken his study without the “people analytics and data mining tools” made available to him today? Possibly, but it would have been significantly more onerous.

It’s also important to note that the trend toward greater communication is not just visible in industry, but in academia as well, where we can assume that researchers have more options to work quietly and without interruption. Yet they are increasingly choosing to work in teams and those teams outperform solo performers.

The journal Nature recently noted that the average scientific paper today has four times as many authors as one did in 1950 and the work they are doing is far more interdisciplinary and done at greater distances than in the past. It’s hard to see how any of that could happen without the improved communication technologies we enjoy today.

Clearly, technology is enabling us to tackle problems we wouldn’t have dreamed of addressing a generation ago. To work on these challenges, we are increasingly collaborating in teams and our work has become more social and less cognitive.

The Value Of Sharing Information

In the past, communication was often just chit chat. Valuable information was locked away in file cabinets and, if we could find it, we would have to make a hard copy in order to share it with anyone else. Yet today, even teenager with a smartphone has more access to information than a highly trained specialist a generation ago.

For a typical executive, the effect has been even greater. The new technologies that make up the Internet of Things collect information automatically from a vast array of sensors embedded in just about anything you can think of. This data, in turn, is analyzed through the use of other technologies, like Hadoop and Spark, to help us make sense of it.

So it shouldn’t be surprising that we’re discussing all of the information we now have access to. We can glean new insights, share them with others and they can reply with insights of their own. The result of this collaboration is often even more collaboration, as we pull people in with a greater diversity of experience and expertise to get their take.

That doesn’t seem like wasted time to me. The truth is that nature of work is changing. The office is no longer a place where we access information—today, we can do that anytime, anyplace—but rather a place where we access people. It’s where we can meet face to face, communicate non-verbally as well as verbally, build stronger working relationships and collaborate more effectively.

Collaboration Is The New Competitive Advantage

To be fair to Mr. Mankins, his greater point—and the subject of much of his other writing—is that we should put more thought into how we adopt and use our newfound communication assets. Surely, we all spend time attending meetings, getting pulled into conference calls, reading and responding to messages that could be used more productively. And that’s frustrating.

However—and this is a crucial point—we don’t know those interactions will be fruitless until we actually have them. Further, while it’s easy to remember the frustration of having our time wasted, it is not much harder to recall times when we have come across a random thread of information that we were able to capitalize on by sharing with colleagues.

It is also those chance encounters that often lead to bigger things, precisely because we are able to share them, get diverse viewpoints and mobilize the efforts of others. Increasingly, we live in a social economy with collaboration at its center. It is no longer just efficiency, but agility and interoperability that makes firms successful.

So, while I take Mankins’ point about the potential for new communication technologies to unproductively monopolize our time, we shouldn’t throw the baby out with the bathwater. Yes, the cacophony of the constant barrage of communication can seem distracting at times, but it can also open up new worlds of opportunity. That is, if we are paying attention.

Greg Satell is a US based business consultant and popular speaker. You can find his blog at Digital Tonto and follow him on twitter @DigitalTonto.

Forbes.com | March 6, 2016 | Greg Satell

Your #Career : Here’s Why #Facebook is Bad for You & Your Career…You might Think you’ve Earned a Few Minutes on Facebook after Completing a Task or Getting Through a Meeting, but Taking Frequent Social Media Breaks Can Derail your Productivity.

March 3, 2016/in First Sun Blog/by First Sun Team

It probably happens before you even realize it. One minute you’re in the middle of a work project and the next, you’re mindlessly scrolling through your Facebook timeline, Twitter news feed, or even your LinkedIn connections to see if there’s a colleague you haven’t yet connected with. In some cases, you don’t even remember opening a new tab and navigating to the social media site, and there’s not even a new notification waiting for you because this is the second time in an hour you’ve done this. Not only should this habit be slightly concerning on a personal level, but it also has the potential to be a huge detriment to your professional goals. You might think you’ve earned a few minutes on Facebook after completing a task or getting through a meeting, but taking frequent social media breaks can derail your productivity.

We’ve written before about the dangers of using social media too much, especially Facebook. Social media can distort your perceptions of your friends, affect your mood in ways you don’t even realize, and is even linked to an uptick in depressive tendencies. An article from Psych Central summarizes a number of studies that have expounded on this idea. Using social media too much can often have a negative effect on a person’s self-esteem, especially since people tend to only post the best aspects of their lives on social media. The excessive use of Facebook and other social media sites is also linked to an increase in anxiety and trouble sleeping. In other words, you tend to get uptight and on edge after staring at your news feed for too long, so it’s no wonder that it’s a bad idea to spend your work breaks on the sites.

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Social media’s ‘distracted norm’

Avoiding social media during the workday has made several lists about how to be more productive in the workplace, and it’s not just because they occasionally have negative effects. For some people, checking Facebook regularly won’t lead to negative feelings. But even if you’re immune to social media, checking social media throughout the day is still bound to be a professional pitfall.

There’s a new ‘distracted norm’ in almost every sphere of life now, including the workplace, writes Forbes contributor Frances Booth. The author has written extensively about digital distractions, particularly in the workplace, and has found that phones buzzing in pockets, the easy accessibility of email, and even the habit of surfing the Internet lead to decreased productivity at work, even if you’re doing your best to ignore those digital distractions while on the clock. In one article, Booth asks how long it typically takes for you to switch from a focused work task to a distraction — with email or Facebook the common culprits. Is it an hour? Thirty minutes? Or is it (more likely) quick bursts of 10 minutes or less?

The larger issue here, Booth argues, is that easy work tasks get accomplished within a few minutes. You can easily reply to one quick email, post on social media for work purposes, or something else that’s relatively simple. But more complex work issues either get pushed to the side, or take way longer than they should. “If a task is too difficult or too boring, instead of working through this and sticking with it, the easy answer is to turn to a distraction,” she writes.
Number of Active Social Media Users by Network | FindTheCompany//

The fear, in terms of work productivity, is that innovation and creativity requires deep thinking. This means you can’t be turning to a distraction every five minutes. You need to sit with a problem, think about it for yourself before turning to Google to answer it for you, and be willing to work through an issue for multiple hours at a time. A Facebook dependency won’t help you accomplish that. “Giving in to distraction produces half-formed thoughts, unoriginal thinking, and the same old arguments again and again,” Booth argues.

Facebook has more than 1.4 billion users worldwide, so it’s easy to make that site the bad guy in all of this. But it’s not the only platform that leads to distraction, and it makes up just a part of what behavior science expert James Clear refers to as “digital procrastination.” Clear, in an interview with Entrepreneur, says that digital procrastination is a productivity killer, but it also can negatively affect other decision-making long after the work day is finished.

Fighting social media = less willpower

The reason is because you likely know you shouldn’t be checking Facebook every half hour during the day, so you try to resist the pull of social media while at work. But you’re using up a lot of your willpower to do that, which means you’re vulnerable later in the day to try to resist other bad habits you’re trying to break, like smoking or eating that second piece of cake. “Willpower is like a muscle,” Clear explains. “Every time you use a little bit of it — to resist going to Facebook or BuzzFeed or whatever it is — you’re flexing that muscle. By the end of the day…your willpower fades.”

Entrepreneur suggests trying an app like Freedom, which blocks social media sites and other select websites during the work day (or whatever timeframe you set up for yourself) so that you have no choice but to stay on task. Freedom charges a fee to use its services, but others like Cold Turkey have free options. “It takes the decision making out of your hands,” Clear said.

While we’re on the topic of work breaks, though, keep in mind that research does show that more frequent breaks for smaller amounts of time does help productivity throughout your work day. One study found that productive people often work for 52 consecutive minutes, and then take a break for about 17. Those might be arbitrary numbers, but give it a try to see if a similar breakdown works for you. Just opt for a quick walk or a chat with a coworker instead of logging into Facebook to see whose birthday it is.

CheatSheet.com | March 3, 2016 | Nikelle Murphy

Your #Career : Work From Home? 4 Key Ways to Maximize Productivity…To Help you Tackle the Specific Work Issues you’re Likely to Face, we Tapped 3 Work-from-Home Experts for their Tips on How to Maximize 4 Key Areas of Home-Based Office Life so You can Boost Productivity & Success.

March 2, 2016/in First Sun Blog/by First Sun Team

No morning commute. No open floor plan that makes it challenging to focus on your work. No boss looking over your shoulder or co-worker who insists on showing you photos of his cat every morning. The sweet freedom of working from home can seem like a dream come true for some—and the number of people doing so is growing.

For example, Global Workplace Analytics found that the work-at-home population increased by 103% between 2005 and 2014, with a 6.5% rise in 2014—the largest spike since before the recession. U.S. Census data also show that working from home is more popular than ever. In 2010, 13.4 million people worked at least one day at home per week, an increase of more than 4 million people in the last decade.

Although statistics indicate that the trend is picking up steam, that doesn’t mean it’s easy to work from home successfully. Whether you’re telecommuting to a full-time job or running a home-based business, there are distinct challenges that come from merging your work and home lives.

To help you tackle the specific work issues you’re likely to face, we tapped three work-from-home experts for their tips on how to maximize four key areas of home-based office life so you can boost productivity and success.

Work-From-Home Tip #1: Turbocharge Your Space

Whether you’re working at the corner table next to the couch or have an entire spare room to devote to your home business, it’s important to create a space that helps get you into work mode and keeps your attention there.

• A little separation is a good thing: If you can, carve out a designated space in your home as an office where you can keep your work organized. “A separate workspace makes it easier to set boundaries between your home and office [fusion_builder_container hundred_percent=”yes” overflow=”visible”][fusion_builder_row][fusion_builder_column type=”1_1″ background_position=”left top” background_color=”” border_size=”” border_color=”” border_style=”solid” spacing=”yes” background_image=”” background_repeat=”no-repeat” padding=”” margin_top=”0px” margin_bottom=”0px” class=”” id=”” animation_type=”” animation_speed=”0.3″ animation_direction=”left” hide_on_mobile=”no” center_content=”no” min_height=”none”][lives],” says Lisa Kanarek, author of “Organize Your Home Office for Success: Expert Strategies That Can Work for You” and founder of WorkingNaked.com, a site that helps people create productive home offices. “When you have a separate space, you can store files, supplies and other business essentials in one area.”

If, however, your home office needs to be wherever you can find a spot to open your laptop, there are other things you can do. Elaine Quinn, a certified professional organizer, consultant for solo business owners and author of “There’s No Place Like Working from Home: Get Organized, Stay Motivated, Get Things Done!,” recommends using your dining table as a desk, especially if you have stacks of paperwork to sift through. If you’re working while your family is around, put on noise-canceling headphones to not only block out distracting sounds but serve as a visual cue to others that you’re on the clock.

• Get your (organizational) act together: Having an orderly desk helps you stay focused, boosting productivity so you don’t lose precious time looking for that critical contract—or whatever it may be—under a messy pile of papers. “Visual distraction is just begging for you not to be able to concentrate,” says Quinn. To minimize clutter, think of your desk as the center of a bull’s-eye. “All of the things you need on an everyday basis should be within arm’s reach,” she says. If you don’t need an item that often, it shouldn’t be on your desk. The next circle out should be items you don’t need more than once a week and can be stored off your desk, like in a nearby filing cabinet. The final, outer ring are items you need or want to hang onto but aren’t using anytime soon, such as old client files and contracts. These should be stored away in a closet or basement, if you have one.

If your office is the kitchen table one day and the back porch another, consider putting your work projects in separate boxes so you can grab the one you need at that time, and then put it away when you’re done.

• And remember, there may be tax benefits to creating a home office:Whether you rent or own your home, if you use part of the square footage regularly and exclusively for business, you may be able to do a home office deduction on your taxes, according to the IRS. The federal government now offers a fairly new (as of the 2014 tax season) simplified way to calculate this, with a standard deduction of $5 per square foot of the home used for business, with a maximum of 300 square feet. Talk with your accountant about the best way to include your home office expenses in your taxes.

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Work-From-Home Tip #2: Stay Connected

When it comes to professional communication, Kanarek says that keeping your work and private lives separate is key. If you telecommute, it may be easier to set these boundaries with a work email that’s tied to your main office. If you have a home-based business, it can be trickier.

• Customize your communication: Instead of handing out your primary personal email for work-related matters, Quinn strongly urges her clients who are small business owners to create a second custom work email address, such as jane@yourcompany.com, for a more professional touch.

“Also, set up a third account that you give out when signing up for newsletters and updates,” Kanarek says. That way, you can stay in the loop without clogging up your business email account.

To better manage your inbox, there are tools that let you schedule emails so they’re sent during business hours, rather than when you’re burning the midnight oil. “If I don’t want to appear too eager to respond to something but don’t want to forget, I use Boomerang for Gmail,” says Quinn. “Or if I have an email that I don’t have to take action on right now, Boomerang can make that email reappear at the top of my list at a future date.”

You can also use apps to schedule texts to go out when you want, rather than pinging someone when you’re working on the weekend. Quinn uses SMS Scheduler, a delayed-text scheduler app on Android.

• Streamline your phone system: Many small business owners have ditched their landlines and exclusively use a mobile phone for business, says Kanarek. But if you use your primary number for work, it can be hard to gauge whether that incoming call is personal or business when you’re on—or off—the clock. To counter that, “some have one cellphone for business and the other for personal use,” Kanarek says. But Julie Morgenstern, time management expert and author of “Time Management From the Inside Out: The Foolproof System for Taking Control of Your Schedule—and Your Life,” prefers a dedicated business landline. “The sound quality can be better than on cellphones,” she says. Or you can use the phone line that often comes bundled with your cable TV subscription service as your business number.

If you’re using your own home phone or cellphone for business and don’t necessarily want your personal number out there, try using Google Voice, which lets you choose a brand new number from Google. “You can keep cycling through to find a number you like,” says Quinn. “Or you can type in words and see if they have the numbers to correlate.” If you’re more concerned with missing a call, you can use your existing mobile number with Google Voice and set it up so that one number rings to all of your phones. The service also provides online voicemail with rough transcriptions, sent to you by email or text, so you can quickly get the gist of voicemails on the go.

Work-From-Home Tip #3: Create a Schedule That Fits Your Life

If you’re telecommuting, your hours may be set by your boss. But if your office is flexible or you run a business out of your home, one of the perks is setting your own hours. While there’s freedom in that flexibility, it’s also easy for work-life balance to get really out of whack. Make sure you create a regular schedule, says Morgenstern. “It’s a hot mess when people work whenever they feel like. People love structure. It’s a forcing mechanism that energizes you and also helps you shut off when it’s time.”

• Block out your days with a hard stop: Morgenstern recommends thinking of your day in three blocks of time—morning, afternoon and evening—and factor in how much energy you have in each time period. “If you’re more productive in the morning, then get up and do your work then,” she says. You should also factor in what time you typically need to interact with co-workers and clients, as well as your family’s schedule.

“You may want to be done for the day when your kids come home from school, for example,” Morgenstern says. That way, your kids’ arrival signals quitting time instead of being a distraction keeping you from working another few hours.

• Be realistic about your time: Anyone can write a to-do list, but completing every action is another feat entirely, especially if you’re overly optimistic about what you can reasonably accomplish in a day. Instead of creating a never-ending task list, Morgenstern advises asking yourself three questions: What do I need to do? How long will that take? When will I do it? Keeping in mind your deadlines for each, prioritize and block out your schedule to tackle these responsibilities during a time window when you can maximize your attention toward them.

Not sure how to prioritize tasks? “Think of your work week as a time budget,” Morgenstern says. For example, “if you’re doing writing, editing, administration and pitching, those are the four categories of your time budget. Then, create a regular routine of when you do each. A little bit of boundaries [between task categories] helps.”

• Don’t forget to schedule breaks: In general, whatever schedule you choose, aim to work no more than 90 minutes at a time before taking a quick break. The combination will keep you productive and give you time to clear your head. “After that time, most people lose focus anyway,” Quinn says. “You’ll work better in 90-minute chunks.” Others, including Quinn, find that working in even smaller chunks—up to 45 minutes, followed by a 15-minute break—is more efficient.

Work-From-Home Tip #4: Know That You Don’t Have to DoEverything

It can be overwhelming when you are your own tech support, accountant and executive assistant while working from home. And the truth is, “anyone who is working from home can’t do everything themselves,” Quinn says. So how do you make sure you keep your business running?

• Get your go-to people in place: Luckily, this is easier than ever since there are plenty of businesses geared toward home-based workers that offer tech support, such as Support.com, and billing services, such as FreshBooks, at reasonable prices. “It’s always a good idea to get referrals from others,” Kanarek says. “I use Quicken and I have a Mac tech person who always knows how to solve any tech issues I may have.” Some tech support consultants can even virtually jump into your computer and see if they can fix something easily.

• Go virtual: Quinn recommends using a virtual assistant from theInternational Virtual Assistants Association (IVAA), which connects you with professional independent contractors who can offer administrative, technical and creative support. A virtual assistant can help with various tasks, such as bookkeeping and following up on outstanding invoices, creating a monthly newsletter or doing research for a work project. But if you have simple, straightforward tasks like booking appointments, transcribing notes or faxing documents, Quinn suggests finding a more affordable virtual assistant through services like Upwork or Fiverr. Whichever route you choose, having a virtual assistant saves you from getting bogged down in mundane tasks, allowing you to spend more time focusing on building your home-based business and reaping the rewards.

Forbes.com | February 2, 2016 | LearnVest

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#Strategy : One Thing I Did Last Year That Nearly Doubled My Productivity…Adopting this Schedule has Helped me Become more Efficient, But it wasn’t Necessarily my Output that Saw a Spike this Year; It was More of an Increase in Quality.

January 13, 2016/in First Sun Blog/by First Sun Team

It’s difficult to nail down an effective, efficient workflow. There are many things to take into account – your diet, your environment and immediate surroundings, even the temperature in the room can impact how much, or how little, you’re getting done. We can spend a lot of time studying different strategies and attempting to make everything perfect, but sometimes no matter what we do, we just don’t see the results we’re hoping for in terms of increased productivity and output.

Well, last year I added something to my daily routine that helped me increase the quality of my work, function in a more clear-headed way, and ultimately become much more productive: I started working out in the middle of the workday.

The change

I have to begin with the admission that I’m fortunate in that I am able to work remotely, and more or less dictate how, when, and where I do my job. That’s an advantage a lot of people don’t have, so it’s important to mention. I also have access to a gym, 24 hours a day, seven days per week, in my apartment building.

And I must bring up the circumstances under which I added my mid-day workout, and that allowed me to act as an observer as well as participant in seeing how it impacted my workflow. Due to a lingering (but relatively minor) medical issue, I had pretty much given up on serious exercise for a couple of years. After having said issue surgically repaired earlier this year, with ample recovery time, I was able to devise an exercise strategy with the intent of not only getting back into shape, but also seeing how physical activity affected my productivity.

I’m happy to say it’s paid off.

I suspected it would, as science backs up the notion that physical activity is closely associated with improved cognitive ability. When I exercise, I find that my head clears, and I’m able to think with improved clarity. It also opens me up to an influx of ideas – something else that researchers have linked to exercise. But the real trick, I think, was adding the workout into my routine during the middle of the day, rather than in the morning (I would become exhausted earlier), or after work (I would miss out on the boost in cognitive function).

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My routine

I came up with an exercise plan (including both weight lifting and cardio), and set the wheels in motion. It took a while to get the right pieces in place through trial and error, but I finally figured out what worked best for me.

First, I worked out at night. Then I tried going to the gym early in the morning. Finally, I settled into a routine at which I was going at around 11 a.m. or so, which is about five hours after I typically begin my work day (I’ve become a morning person). This, I found, was the ‘sweet spot’.

Essentially, I would (and do) spend the first chunk of my day responding to emails, outlining, and doing other tasks that don’t require my brain to be firing on all cylinders – all while waking up, drinking coffee, and eating my daily breakfast: three eggs, no yolk, on an English muffin. I am able to get the lion’s share of my work done this way, and leave the ‘surgical strikes’, or things that require some serious critical thought, for the post-workout period.

This is reminiscent of the time management hacks brought up in Tim Ferriss’ book The Four Hour Workweek, in so much that I was basically minimizing the time I was really ‘working hard’ throughout the day. It’s not an exacttranslation, but a similar principle for those of you familiar with the book.

I then head to the gym around the middle of the day, laptop in hand. I continue to work from the gym, finish up, head back, eat, drink, shower, and then tackle the tasks I had been putting off. That’s my workflow, in a nutshell.

The results

Adopting this schedule has helped me become more efficient, but it wasn’t necessarily my output that saw a spike this year; it was more of an increase in quality. In fact, if I look back at the amount of work I was doing last year, I’m probably doing less. But I’m getting more bang for my buck. I’ve merely found a way to get the most out of the hours I am spending on the clock.

The difference has really been in quality. I’ve made fewer mistakes, and have been able to work more efficiently, think with more clarity, and even be more assertive and confident. The big difference has been in the intangibles, which can be hard to describe or measure – but I’m able to better get in ‘the zone’, for lack of a better term.

This was a big change, and it’s not something that everyone is going to be able to incorporate into their daily routine, unfortunately. And it was coupled with changes to my diet and sleeping patterns as well. But once I was able to nail it down, I’m reaping the benefits.

Will it work for you? The science suggests it should. But then again, everyone is different. Either way, if you’re looking to boost your productivity, try giving your routine a shakeup, or adding exercise if you aren’t already.

Follow Sam on Facebook and Twitter @SliceOfGinger

CheatSheet.com | January 12, 2016 | Sam Becker

#Strategy : No Kidding…4 Ways Having Sex Makes You More #Productive at Work…Do you Want to be More Productive at #Work? Have more Sex. That’s Right, you Read it Correctly.

November 14, 2015/in First Sun Blog/by First Sun Team

Here are some ways that having sex can increase your productivity.

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#Strategy : Here’s How to Know If your CoWorkers Secretly Despise You…So, If your CoWorkers Don’t Like You, You’ll Want to Figure It Out & Turn Things Around Immediately.

September 17, 2015/in First Sun Blog/by First Sun Team

Being well-liked in the office has its perks. The experts say you’re more productive and creative when you have healthy workplace relationships; you can ask for and get favors more easily; and people will volunteer to help in times of need, just to name a few.

So, if your coworkers don’t like you, you’ll want to figure it out and turn things around immediately.

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Here are some subtle signs your coworkers all secretly hate you. Keep in mind that you may just be misreading their body language or tone — but if you notice you’re the only victim of these behaviors, it probably means they’re not your biggest fans.

BI_Graphics_Signs Your Coworkers Secretly Hate You

Businessinsider.com | September 16, 2015 | Jacquelyn Smith and Dylan Roach