Team Taskmaster

Dear readers,

Today marks the final installment of Team Taskmaster. I’ve enjoyed writing for you for the past year and a half, and as I’ve endeavored to share my insights and discoveries with you, I’ve also learned a lot along the way.

I’ve seen that being effective at work is about more than making lists, that flexibility can improve productivity when it comes to your workday (or your mindset), and that a job is, well, just a job.

I’ve learned that rewarding and engaging your team should be about more than money, and that a literal or figurative pat on the back and a heartfelt “Thank you” can have a far greater impact than a few extra dollars.

I’ve discovered that a slavish adherence to productivity tools and systems can backfire, and that procrastination is not only normal but manageable (and perhaps even beatable).

More than anything, I’ve learned that there are a lot of smart, insightful people out there who read this blog, and who are willing to share their tips and tricks for getting more done with less stress, for being a better manager, and for finding work-life balance.

To all of you, I offer my sincerest thanks and appreciation. And although I won’t be penning Team Taskmaster here on BNET any longer, I do hope to make occasional guest appearances as a contributing writer, either for other BNET blogs or by authoring feature articles.

I wish you all the best — and again, thanks for all the support and inspiration.

With warmest regards,

C.C.

p.s.: If you’ve missed out on some of my Team Taskmaster posts, here’s a list of topics I’ve covered in the past. Enjoy!

• Collaboration
• Employment
• Engagement
• Leadership
• Management
• Mental Health
• Motivation
• Office humor
• Organization
• Procrastination
• Productivity
• Strategy
• Stress
• Success
• Technology
• Time Management
• Tips
• Wellness
• Wisdom
• Work Life

Yep, you read that right: triple your reading speed. In 20 minutes.

And am I also selling a bridge, you may ask? Not so fast, my doubting friends. I’m actually riffing off a post written by Tim Ferriss (yes, he of The 4-Hour Workweek fame) about his PX Project. It’s a 3-hour cognitive experiment that produced an average increase in reading speed of 386%.

Writes Ferriss,

“It was tested with speakers of five languages, and even dyslexics were conditioned to read technical material at more than 3,000 words-per-minute (wpm), or 10 pages per minute. One page every 6 seconds. By comparison, the average reading speed in the US is 200-300 wpm (1/2 to 1 page per minute), with the top 1% of the population reading over 400 wpm.”

Ferriss’s method is based on refining the principles of the human visual system to eliminate inefficiencies and increase speed while improving retention. Want to give it a shot? He’s got detailed, step-by-step speed-reading directions on his blog.

I’m going to give it a try. Imagine how much more efficient you could be at work if you could tear through those reports in half the time, or less? Yowza.

(image by Dawn Endico via Flickr, CC 2.0)

Are you well-versed in the care and feeding of your geek team? If not, you could be squandering one of your most important assets.

As with any employee, your technical folks need to be engaged, motivated, and, yes, happy at work in order for you to maximize their productivity and their value to your company. But geeks, so to speak, can be seen as a bit of a different species.

Alexander Kjerulf, who writes regularly about happiness and how to foster a happier work environment, recently referred to a post he wrote a few years back about how not to lead geeks. It’s chock-full of great advice and still seems timely, especially in light of the motivation challenges facing managers in this economy.

A few of his suggestions:

• Offer recognition. Some managers might not understand exactly what their techs do, which makes it hard to reward their work. That hurts motivation. If that’s your situation, work with your geeks to define a set of goals you both agree upon; when the goals are met, you’ll know they’re doing a great job and can give them the praise, recognition, and rewards that matter.
• Avoid management-speak. I for one hate corporate jargon — and according to Alexander, a former geek himself, so do your tech experts, who see it as superficial and dishonest. Just tell someone, “We have to be on time with this project” rather than saying, “We need to proactively impact our time-to-market.”
• Don’t make tech decisions without them. Geeks usually know the technical side of the business better than the managers do, so forgoing their advice or input can be a big (and costly) mistake.

For all of Alexander’s great suggestions, read the full post. And feel free to add your suggestions for how to treat your geeks below.

(image by philip-odegard via Flickr, CC 2.0)

Everybody and his brother had been talking up Twitter, and one of the latest Twitter trends has been for companies to use the social-networking site for recruiting.

Writing for Workforce Management, Tracy Cote and Traci Armstrong discuss how digital ad agency Organic has made Twitter the cornerstone of its job-posting strategy. More than three-quarters of the company’s jobs are placed solely on social media sites such as Twitter; while only a quarter of their postings are on traditional job boards such as Coroflot, Mediabistro, Monster and TalentZoo.

According to job-hunt.org, a who’s-who of top companies use Twitter to find talent, including KPMG, Intel, Burger King, Microsoft, Mattel, Verizon, and Hyatt Hotels. Even the U.S. Department of State has hopped on board (although it’s the only branch of the federal government recruiting on Twitter).

Of course, there are downsides to seeking talent through Twitter, as Lane Kiffin and the Tennessee Volunteers learned with a recent recruiting violation. Oops.

And I’m still not convinced that you’ll reach as compelling a talent pool as you might, say, through referrals, word-of-mouth, or recruiting. Jack Marshall at ClickZ says that in practice, it’s unclear whether firms are really enjoying tangible benefits using Twitter.

Haley Marketing lays out a number of ways companies (and staffing firms) can use Twitter to their advantage, but also admits the jury is still out on how beneficial it is.

So what do you think?

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Fans of work/life balance, mark your calendars. June 2 (next Tuesday) is the fifth annual Leave the Office Earlier Day.

The brainchild of productivity expert Laura Stack, the event is actually on the up-and-up: It’s listed in Chase’s Calendar of Events, the official compendium of all celebrations, observances, and events both solemn and random. So you can tell your boss you’re observing a legitimate holiday.

“June 2nd isn’t about playing hooky or ditching work sooner,” explains Stack. “It’s an opportunity for people to focus on changing work patterns, adjusting priorities, and engaging in conversations to find ways to achieve work/life balance while improving workplace productivity.”

The idea isn’t really to duck out of work after lunch, of course; rather, it’s to stick to a sane and sensible eight-hour day, allowing you to devote the extra time to your friends, family, and fun.

(image by –Mike– via Flickr, CC 2.0)

(This post comes from Larry Dignan of ZDNET, one of BNET’s sister sites.)

This in from outplacement firm Challenger, Gray & Christmas: You must bring your smartphone, laptop and every other work-tethering item on your vacation. If not, you’ll just worry about being laid off.

Here’s what America has come to — a two week vacation is deemed too long and you have to at least look like you’re working. Hell, why bother with the vacation at all?

It has been apparent for some time that the U.S. is nutty when it comes to work. Just ask any Brit, Aussie or Kiwi about U.S. vacation habits.

Now here comes the press release designed to stoke the stay connected worries. The money quotes:

Workers will be reluctant to take a long, two-week vacation. For many, even a weeklong absence from the workplace will produce too much anxiety to actually achieve a stress-free vacation. They will make due with stretching holiday weekends, such as Memorial Day and Independence Day, into four- and five-day getaways, thus minimizing the time away from the office.

Where companies are making relatively quick decisions about staffing levels, being out of sight could lead to being out of a job. This does not mean that employees should avoid even short getaways. However, now more than ever, it is critical that vacationing employees stay connected while out of the office.

That one cracks me up. Rest assured if there are layoffs they’ll find you.

Challenger’s advice: take your cell phone, laptop, pager and hand-held electronic organizer wherever you vacation. Let people know they can reach you if necessary. And enjoy some peace of mind knowing you are not putting your work at risk by going away.

As work-life balance grows in importance, some commentators deride what some call office-obsessed people who cannot shut off work even while vacationing. But the same office-obsessed worker is recognized by the employer as someone who puts the needs of the company first and therefore will likely survive any workforce reductions.

And just in case you weren’t worried enough:

The advice of wellness experts who urge workers to cut off all contact with the office while on vacation would be fine in a Utopian world. But we live in the fiercely competitive real world, where employers cannot afford to put any piece of business in jeopardy because you are purposely unreachable. Now is a particularly bad time to provoke any doubt about your commitment, because the pool of available, skilled replacements grows daily.

The general theme of Challenger’s advice isn’t to actually work, but to look like you’re working. That’s productive. Here’s Challenger’s advice with my comments in italics:

• Arrange with your hotel to have a fax machine installed in your room. Chain hotels favored by business guests already have done so. Yes, your boss will be damn impressed that you have a fax machine in your room—especially since he hasn’t used one since 1995.

• While most of the large hotels now offer Internet connections (some free, some for a fee), some of the smaller hotels and motels favored by budget-conscious travelers may not. Prior to leaving, visit websites that can help you locate Wi-Fi hotspots near your hotel. Translation: Spend your vacation in Starbucks.

• If traveling internationally, check with the hotel or car rental agency about leasing a cell phone capable of receiving/making international calls. Or call your carrier for a global card.

• Do not change your voicemail to say you are on vacation and unavailable. Customers may respond by seeking out a new source where someone is available. Many newer phone systems allow you to forward calls to a cell phone. Yeah, that would be great for me. PR calls at the beach woo hoo!

• If you don’t have call forwarding, check voicemails throughout the day and respond personally. Damn, I’m screwed. I don’t do this when I’m working.

• Check e-mails regularly and respond or arrange for someone at the office to respond. This is just in case one of those 1,000 emails a day are worth anything.

• Provide cell phone number, hotel phone number and/or e-mail to your supervisor so they can reach you. That way it’s easier to find you amid layoffs.

• Make sure your laptop or smartphone is set up to retrieve your emails on the road. Probably doesn’t apply to our audience.

• During the workweek, check in with your supervisor and/or a colleague in your department at least twice a day (once in the morning and once in the afternoon). The goal: Be as annoying on vacation as you are during the workweek!

• Make sure you have synched up your PDA so that your calendar, Rolodex, e-mail history, and to-do list are current. And we’re trying a vacation why exactly?

• Make sure to bring the various chargers and A/C adaptors for your cell phone and laptop. The only sane advice here. This applies to all travel.

Just shoot me.
More for the long weekend (if you dare to take one):

• Telecommuting nightmare: Workers use mobile devices 2 to 6 hours per week in bed, survey says

• Tom Steinert-Threlkeld: Adult Attention Disorder: ‘Splittering’ communications

• Jason Perlow: Have we all become a bunch of anxious, depressed, sleep-deprived irritable stress-heads?

Have a Mac? I’m envious. I definitely would love to cross over to the white side, but cash considerations have kept me stuck on the other side of the fence for now.

So, from the green-eyed-monster perspective, I have to admit I was a little bit pleased to see Gina Trapani’s post on Lifehacker yesterday about how to clean up and revive a bloated, sluggish Mac. Slow? Bloated? You mean Macs aren’t immune to that? Now I don’t feel so bad (as I reboot Windows Vista for the second time today).

But I digress. I’m not writing to gloat — I’m writing to help. If you lucky Mac owners are suffering from the aforementioned sluggishness, here are seven ways you can primp your computer for more productivity. (For more great details and links to helpful utilities, make sure you read her full post.)

Oh, and before you do any of this stuff, back up everything. Just in case.

1. Find CPU and memory hogs in the Activity Monitor. Go to Applications > Utilities and see which apps are hogging your CPU. Quitting and restarting those apps can provide quick relief.
2. Clean up your startup. Too many programs starting up when log onto your Mac? Go to System Preferences > Accounts > Login Items tab. If you see an app there that you don’t need and use, select it and click the minus (-) sign.
3. Uninstall unneeded apps (and related files). Trash anything in your Applications folder that you don’t need or use any longer. Ideally, you’ll use an uninstaller program to do this. It won’t make your Mac run faster, but it’ll free up some space.
4. Do some maintenance. Run Disk Utility (in Applications > Utilities) to verify and repair disk permissions and the disk itself.
5. Reclaim hard-drive space. Need to figure out what’s taking up all that space on your Mac? Trapani recommends a tool called Disk Inventory X that creates a tree map of your hard-drive usage.
6. Care for/troubleshoot your battery and memory. On a Mac notebook, calibrate your battery to make sure it’s giving you the right readings. If the battery bails before you get a “You’re running out of power” warning, reset the SMC or PMU. And some problems can be solved by resetting your Mac’s PRAM and NVRAM.
7. Beef up your memory, and get the latest system updates. The more memory your Mac has, the happier (and snappier) it’ll be, so think about upgrading. And stay up-to-date with OS X patches and versions.

Happy Mac’ing!

(image by felix.triller via Flickr, CC 2.0)

If you’re struggling to combat apathy, low morale, or a loss of enthusiasm in your office, you’re not alone: Plenty of businesses are feeling the economic downturn not just in their bottom lines, but also in employee engagement. No wonder. It’s tough to feel good about your job if you’re worried about losing it.

Poor morale can lead to poor performance, which can in turn send your business further into a spiral. But don’t despair, says Renee Cormier in Human Resources IQ; you can employ these six tactics to energize your employees. (The bonus? None of them cost much — if any — money.)

1. Celebrate the day. Bring in regular treats and tell your team it’s because you appreciate what they do. Never underestimate the power of cupcakes!
2. Socialize. Get out of your office and take a genuine interest in their staff. How are they? What did they do over the weekend? Anything on their minds you can help with? Show your employees that you genuinely care about, because you do. (Right?)
3. Give a compliment. No, not about what they’re wearing — recognize something essential to who they are. Lauding someone’s tenacity, attention to detail, or willingness to go the extra mile is a great form of recognition and appreciation.
4. Ask for an opinion. Just because you’re the boss doesn’t mean you’re omniscient. Got a big decision coming up? Ask for input. And accept it. That’ll make your team feel valuable. And you just might get some great ideas that you’d never have considered on your own.
5. Support a cause. Get your team together to raise money for charity. Let everyone chime in when it comes to choosing a cause, and have fun with it! Make T-shirts, hold a kick-off lunch, train for the walkathon at lunch breaks…the possibilities are endless.
6. Start a club. Having fun together outside of work (even if it’s just on a lunch hour) lets you all see another side of each other. It could be a book club, a basketball team, or whatever. Fostering friendships is a great way to keep employees engaged.

Do you have any other ideas about how to get your team more engaged? Share them in the comment section.

(image by norwichnuts via Flickr, CC 2.0)

Here’s a quick tip on how to get the upper hand on a dreaded competitor: Be nice.

Laurie Ruettimann of Punk Rock Human Resources writes,

“The best way to kill your competition is to humanize them, friend them, and mentor them. They will realize, rather quickly, that they just can’t keep up with your awesomeness.”

Extending an authentic olive branch tends to make them step up or move on — more often, the latter. It’s hard to keep competing with a compassionate and understanding adversary.

Besides, making your competition into the bad guy reflects negatively on you. As Ruettimann writes,

“When you demonize your competition, you bring out the worst in yourself — and you look like a chump. Hands down, chumps always lose.”

What do you think? Share your insights in the comments section.

(image by markhillary via Flickr, CC 2.0)

You guys are probably sensing a theme right now. Yes, I’m focusing on lateness this week — first discussing whether the occasional less-than-punctual arrival is a big deal, then listing some fabulous real-world excuses for tardiness.

On a more serious note today, let’s talk about chronic lateness and how to tackle it. An estimated 15 to 20 percent of us are usually running late.

For many of them, being unable to get somewhere punctually isn’t just a function of poor time management. Often, there are deeper issues going on.

Sometimes habitual lateness is due to personality. It can also be because you have trouble realistically assessing how much you can do in a given time — or because you perceive time differently than other people, based either on cultural differences, innate wiring, or even a disorder such as ADHD.

But whatever the reason, being chronically late can play havoc on your social life, your career, and even your self-esteem. Luckily, there are some effective steps you can take to seize control of your inner, dysfunctional clock.

• Try doing things ahead of time and pay attention to how liberating it can feel.
• Plan to be 15 minutes early for engagements — then you’ll probably be on the dot. If you’re early, spend that time with a book or some to-do items.
• Make a daily plan, with a written schedule of your activities with start and end time estimates. This helps you see what you really have time for. Punctuality expert Diana DeLonzor said most people underestimate how long it takes to do something by about 30 percent.
• Set up a system of rewards and penalties. If you’re late to meet a friend, agree that coffee is on you. Or, if you’ve made lots of progress, reward yourself.
• Create mantras, such as, “It won’t get any easier in five minutes,” instead of hitting the snooze alarm for the fifth time.

Any other tips you have for the habitually late? Pass them on to other Team Taskmaster readers in the comments section.

(image by Aldaron via Flickr, CC 2.0)