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10 Ways to Inspire Your Team

Think about it for a minute – who inspired you the most? A great sports star often inspires others to take to the sport. A colossus like Mahatma Gandhi inspired a whole nation to follow his path of Satyagraha. A Mother Teresa inspired kindness and compassion in millions. A call by Anna Hazare got thousands out on the street. For many, it is a parent whose actions inspired. Or just maybe, it was a boss at work who inspired you to be a better professional. Inspiration always germinates with an individual. As a Team leader, you have a unique opportunity to inspire. Here are 10 ways how: 1) Servant Leadership: Welcome to “Servant Leadership”. Setting goals is just a task. To inspire, you need to show people how they will reach from point A to point B – and make them believe it is truly possible. 2) The Power of a Vision: Paint a vision of what would be truly seen as a remarkable achievement for the team. Think S.M.A.R.T (Specific, Achievable, Measurable, Relevant & Time bound) goals

Body Language @ Workplace

Body language is an essential form of non verbal communica-tion. Gestures, hand movements, body posture, facial expressions, eye contact all form a part of body language. While talking or listening to a colleague or supervisor, please look the other person in his eyes. Eye contact during a conversation establishes a connection between the listener and speaker, and re-flects attentiveness and sincerity. Avoid crossing your arms . It re-flects defensiveness and rigidity to acceptance of another’s point of view or idea. Keeping hands stiffly by your side or tucked in your pockets can give an impression that you are inse-cure- whether you are or not. Last but not the least body pos-ture is one of the most important components of body language. Avoid a slouched posture, as it reflects laziness, inattentiveness , lack of confidence or lack of en-gagement. Always carry your head high, with shoulders pulled back. In other words stand or sit– tall!

5 Lessons Life Taught Me !!!!!!!!!!!!

5 Lessons Life Taught Me Written By Regina Brett, 90 years old, of The Plain Dealer, Cleveland , Ohio "To celebrate growing older, I once wrote the 45 lessons life taught me. It is the most-requested column I've ever written. My odometer rolled over to 90 in August, so here is the column once more:" 1. Life isn't fair, but it's still good. 2. When in doubt, just take the next small step. 3. Life is too short to waste time hating anyone. 4.. Your job won't take care of you when you are sick.. Your friends and parents will. Stay in touch. 5. Pay off your credit cards every month. 6. You don't have to win every argument.. Agree to disagree. 7. Cry with someone. It's more healing than crying alone. 8. It's OK to get angry with God. He can take it. 9. Save for retirement starting with your first paycheck. 10. When it comes to chocolate, resistance is futile. 11. Make peace with your past so it won't screw up the present. 12. It'

The Lamp

Once a devotte, who had great ambition to know something about the divine, wanted his eye of wisdom to be opened. He entered a cave where a monk was residing. While entering the cave he saw a small light. As he moved forward even that little light got extinguished. In darkness one feels frightened, and in fear, we think of God very intensively. Thus he chanted loudly the name of God and on hearing this, the saint asked him who he was. He said that he had come to seek his grace. The great saint, who was sustaining himself in the cave only by breathing the air around him, had the competence to know the mind of his visitor. He said that he will answer his question later but asked him first to go and light the lamp, which had been extinguished. The visitor took a matchbox and tried to light the lamp but did not succeed. He told the guru that he had finished all the matchsticks and yet he had not succeeded in lighting the lamp. The saint then asked him to open he lamp, put ou

Visualize your Goal

An old proverb "If at first you don't succeed, try, try, again." But what is often left unsaid, till one comes to college is that it is more important to visualize and set yourself your goals. We are all aware of the story of the rejected defeated Robert Bruce and how after watching a spider try to reach the ceiling of the cave six times, failing and yet trying again and again, till it succeeded, inspired him to fight the English once again and free Scotland. What is left unsaid is that Robert Bruce the Scots chieftan had already visualized and set himself the goal of ridding Scotland of the English Monarchy and Englishmen. Narrated below is a true story of Florence Chadwick who in the early fifties (1952) became the first woman to successfully swim across twenty one mile Catlina Channel, that separates Catlina Island from the Californian Coast. Visualize your Goal The Catalina Island is twenty-one miles away from the coast of California, and many

A True Leader

( Former President of India APJ Abdul Kalam at Wharton India Economic forum, Philadelphia , March 22, 2000 Question: Could you give an example, from your own experience, of how leaders should manage failure? Kalam: Let me tell you about my experience. In 1973 I became the project director of India's satellite launch vehicle program, commonly called the SLV-3... Our goal was to put India's "Rohini" satellite into orbit by 1980. I was given funds and human resources -- but was told clearly that by 1980 we had to launch the satellite into space. Thousands of people worked together in scientific and technical teams towards that goal. By 1979 -- I think the month was August -- we thought we were ready. As the project director, I went to the control center for the launch. At four minutes before the satellite launch, the computer began to go through the checklist of items that needed to be checked. One minute later, the computer program put the launch on hol

Rules for being human

When you were born, you didn't come with an owner's manual; these guidelines make life work better. 1. You will receive a body. You may like it or hate it, but it's the only thing you are sure to keep for the rest of your life. 2. You will learn lessons. You are enrolled in a full-time informal school called "Life on Planet Earth". Every person or incident is the Universal Teacher. 3. There are no mistakes, only lessons. Growth is a process of experimentation. "Failures" are as much a part of the process as "success." 4. A lesson is repeated until learned. It is presented to you in various forms until you learn it: then you can go on to the next lesson. 5. If you don't learn easy lessons, they get harder. External problems are a precise reflection of your internal state. When you clear inner obstructions, you’re outside world changes. Pain is how the universe gets your attention. 6. You will know you've learned a lesson whe

A great speech by Chetan Bhagat, which enlight the life in depth

Spark Speech given at the orientation program for the new batch of MBA students Symbiosis, Pune, July 24, 2008 By Chetan Bhagat Good Morning everyone and thank you for giving me this chance to speak to you. This day is about you. You, who have come to this college, leaving the comfort of your homes (or in some cases discomfort), to become something in your life. I am sure you are excited. There are few days in human life when one is truly elated. The first day in college is one of them. When you were getting ready today, you felt a tingling in your stomach. What would the auditorium be like, what would the teachers be like, who are my new classmates – there is so much to be curious about. I call this excitement, the spark within you that makes you feel truly alive today. Today I am going to talk about keeping the spark shining. Or to put it another way, how to be happy most , if not all the time. Where do these sparks start? I think we are born with them. M

3 lessons of life I learned from Phunsuk Wangdu

The movie 3 Idiots is all set to make movie history in terms of revenue. It has been extremely popular and entertaining too. But I am not about to do a movie review in this forum. My intention is to share the most important lessons I learned from Phusnsuk Wangdu, the protagonist. So here you go. Follow your passion : Very often we decieve ourselves by giving in to the demands of the people around us, rather than following what our minds dictate. We go by the set standards of the society and ignore our real passion. This results in dual loss. We end up becoming mediocre professionals in the field that we enter and on the other hand the field which happens to be our real passion, loses a potential talent. A person who has a passion for cooking walks into an engineering college and ends up becoming a mediocre engineer, while the hospitality industry loses a good chef. Strive for Excellence : We tend to define certain parameters of success by looking at the people w

Out of the Box

The Japanese have always loved fresh fish. But the waters close to Japan have not held many fish for decades. So to feed the Japanese population, fishing boats got bigger and went farther than ever. The farther the fishermen went, the longer it took to bring in the fish. If the return trip took more than a few days, the fish were not fresh. The Japanese did not like the taste. To solve this problem, fishing companies installed freezers on their boats. They would catch the fish and freeze them at sea. Freezers allowed the boats to go farther and stay longer. However, the Japanese could taste the difference between fresh and frozen and they did not like frozen fish. The frozen fish brought a lower price. So fishing companies installed fish tanks. They would catch the fish and stuff them in the tanks, fin to fin. After a little thrashing around, the fish stopped moving. They were tired and dull, but alive. Unfortunately, the Japanese could still taste the difference. Becaus

The Candy Store - A Thought

Once, in the middle of a personal development workshop, one of the participants stood up and began distributing diamond rings to each of the one hundred people in the room. He was a wealthy jeweler, he said, and he had made these expensive rings as gifts to open people's eyes to the abundance of life. On his fifth birthday, the man explained, his uncle had taken him to a candy store and told him that he could take whatever he wanted, and as much as he wanted. The entire store was open to him. He had looked at the jars and trays, and he hadn't known where to begin. Eventually, he filled a bag with all his favorite candies. He didn't take everything, but that feeling of being able to have whatever he wanted, stuck. Experience abundance with your candy store… Since then, he said, he had only been able to notice the abundance of life. He saw the world as full of opportunities, wealth and beauty - all you have to do is, take your pick and fill your bag. The

Unconditional Love & Emotions

A story is told about a soldier who was finally coming home after havingfought in Vietnam. He called his parents from San Francisco. "Mom and Dad, I'm coming home, but I've a favor to ask. I have a friendI'd like to bring home with me. ""Sure," they replied, "we'd love to meet him." "There's something you should know the son continued, "he was hurt pretty badly in the fighting. He stepped on a land mind and lost anarm and a leg. He has nowhere else to go, and I want him to come live withus." "I'm sorry to hear that, son. Maybe we can help him find somewhere to live." "No, Mom and Dad, I want him to live with us." "Son," said the father, "you don't know what you're asking. Someone with such a handicap would be a terrible burden on us. We have our own lives to live, and we can't let something like this interfere withour lives. I think you should just come home a

Do u hate someone???

A kindergarten teacher has decided to let her class play a game. The teacher told each child in the class to bring along a plastic bag containing a few potatoes. Each potato will be given a name of a person that the child hates, so the number of potatoes that a child will put in his/her plastic bag will depend on the number of people he/she hates. So when the day came, every child brought some potatoes with the name of the people he/she hated. Some had 2 potatoes; some 3 while some up to 5 potatoes. The teacher then told the children to carry with them the potatoes in the plastic bag wherever they go (even to the toilet) for 1 week. Days after days passed by, and the children started to complain due to the unpleasant smell let out by the rotten potatoes. Besides, those having 5 potatoes also had to carry heavier bags. After 1 week, the children were relieved because the game had finally ended.... The teacher asked: "How did you feel while carrying the potatoes wit

37 Ways to Make a Difference to Yourself and Others

"Making a difference" is not just a scheduled event or activity, but a moment any time when a person finds it in his/her heart to do something good, to care or to share, or to make a voluntary contribution to another individual, a community, or our society. When we consciously give or do whatever we can to help maintain the wellness of individuals and families in our communities, these acts also contribute to the best quality of life of everyone in our society. Let us continue to gather more bright ideas for our own lives and our surroundings. Let's now begin to count the ways and put them into action. The TIME has come... We say 'No more to gloom and doom!' It is time to rise to our true potential... to experience total wellness in every area of our lives, contributing to solutions to maintain the quality of life we enjoy in our communities. It is time for each of us to care more, to shine, and to carry the light of HOPE everywhere! No one indivi

Are You a Workaholic?

You may know people like the three here we discuss about . One is a successful physician, a senior partner in a 4-doctor suburban specialty practice. She works long hours and provides excellent service to her patients. She is known as one of the best doctors in her state. But she’s driving herself crazy. She’s a perfectionist. She wants everything done perfectly, her way, and resents her partners and the office staff when everything is not up to her high standards. Therefore, she ends up doing most of the work herself. She resents others for “making her” has to do everything so that it’s done just right. She’s exhausted and looks forward to the day when she can retire. The second was laid off from his job at a major consulting firm many years ago and swore he would never work for anybody else again. He works long hours in his home office running a small consulting business. He has been successful, at a cost. He is obsessed with his work. He is constantly worried about sati

Job Analysis: Overview

Job Analysis is a process to identify and determine in detail the particular job duties and requirements and the relative importance of these duties for a given job. Job Analysis is a process where judgements are made about data collected on a job. The Job; not the person An important concept of Job Analysis is that the analysis is conducted of the Job, not the person. While Job Analysis data may be collected from incumbents through interviews or questionnaires, the product of the analysis is a description or specifications of the job, not a description of the person. Purpose of Job Analysis The purpose of Job Analysis is to establish and document the 'job relatedness' of employment procedures such as training, selection, compensation, and performance appraisal. Determining Training Needs Job Analysis can be used in training/"needs assessment" to identify or develop: * training content * assessment tests to measure effectiveness of training * equipmen

Performance appraisal -Think out of Box

Every company has a performance appraisal system in place to measure the effectiveness of its employees. Employees are normally rated in most of the companies in the above categories. Apart from the above non performance category is also there, which is not depicted here ) . Needless to say everyone wants to be rated Outstanding. What is the yard stick and how do you measure these aspects? • Employee "A" in a company walked up to his manager and asked what my job is for the day? • The manager took "A" to the bank of a river and asked him to cross the river and reach the other side of the bank. • "A" completed this task successfully and reported back to the manager about the completion of the task assigned. The manager smiled and said "GOOD JOB" Next day Employee "B" reported to the same manager and asked him the job for the day. The manager assigned the same task as above to this person also. • The Employee "B' be

Life's mantra

Once a King called upon all of his wise men and asked them, Is there a mantra or suggestion which works in every situation, in every circumstances, in every place and in every time, in every joy, every sorrow, every defeat and every victory? One answer for all questions? Something which can help me, when none of you is available to advise me? Tell me is there any mantra? All the wise men were puzzled by the Kings question. They thought and thought. After a lengthy discussion an old man suggested something which appealed to all of them. They went to the King and gave him something written on paper, with a condition that the King was not to see it out of curiosity. Only in extreme danger, when the King finds himself alone and there seems to be no way, only then he can see it. The King put the paper under his diamond ring. Some time later, the neighbors attacked the Kingdom. The King and his army fought bravely but lost the battle. The King had to flee on his horse. The enem

Motivational Story - THE BRILLIANT FISHERMAN

As King Parveez and Queen Shireen were sitting in their palace one day, a fisherman who was selling fresh fish was brought in front of them. King Parveez decided to buy a fish and gave the fisherman 4000 dirham for it. The fisherman was overjoyed. He thanked King Parveez and left. Queen Shireen turned to her husband in anger and scolded him for paying so much for a fish. King Parveez let her have her say but said that the fish was purchased and that there was nothing that could be done about it. However, the Queen was adamant and insisted that the fisherman be brought back. "We will ask the fisherman about the gender of the fish," she said. "If he answers that it is female, we will say that we wanted a male fish and if his response is that it is male, we will say that we wanted a female fish! Either way, we will be able to return the fish and have our money back." So the poor fisherman was called back and was asked the question. Fortunatel

Very good morning to you...We can restart life ...

Very good morning to you...We can restart life ... A girl married a boy . At the end of the wedding party, her mother gave her a newly opened bank saving passbook With Rs.1000 deposit amount. Mother said to her , take this passbook. Keep it as a record of your marriage life. When there's something happy and memorable happened in your new life, put some money in. Write down what it's about next to the line. The more memorable the event is, the more money you can put in. I've done the first one for you today. Do the others with your husband. When you look back after years, you can know how much happiness you've had.' She had shared this with her husband when getting home. They both thought it was a great idea and were anxious to know when the second deposit can be made. This was what they did after certain time: - 7 Feb: Rs.100, first birthday celebration of the HUSBAND after marriage - 1 Mar: Rs.300, salary raise for the Girl

SECRETS OF SUCCESS FOR MBA's IN THE CORPORATE WORLD

SECRETS OF SUCCESS FOR MBA's IN THE CORPORATE WORLD Come July - August every year and the Corporate World is ready to provide a red carpet welcome to the MBA's. These MBA (PGDBA, PGDHRM, and MMS…) students having completed two year of professional management education are now on the verge of an exciting career. An enviable clan, since not only do companies woo them during campus recruitment with fancy salaries but also nurture them with well designed induction programs and such. Whilst companies do their best to retain these "High Flyers"; let us also advise these young MBA's on now they could settle down and contribute to the company they have joined. KEEP YOUR FEET ON THE GROUND: MBA's are often accused of being people in a great hurry and carrying a chip on their shoulder. It is true that MBA's are well trained and groomed in their institutes but this still does not make them perfect. A sensible MBA should bide his time and learn a

Good Morning !!!!WHEN A LIZARD CAN, WHY CAN'T WE?

This is a story that happened in Japan. In order to renovate the house, someone in Japan breaks open the wall. Japanese houses normally have a hollow space between the wooden walls. When tearing down the walls, he found that there was a lizard stuck there because a nail from outside hammered into one of its feet. He sees this, feels pity, and at the same time curious, as when he checked the nail, it was nailed 5 years ago when the house was first built!!! What happened? The lizard has survived in such position for 5 years .In a dark wall partition for 5 years without moving, it is impossible and mind-boggling. Then he wondered how this lizard survived for 5 years! without moving a single step--since its foot was nailed!So he stopped his work and observed the lizard, what it has been doing, and what and how it has been eating. Later, not knowing from where it came, appears another lizard,with food in its mouth.Ah! He was stunned and touched deeply. For the lizard that

7 Rules of Excellence for HR Managers

In today’s competitive business environment where people management has come on priority, excellence in discharging HR functions is on high demand from HR managers. There can not be any magic stick by which any HR manager can be transformed into an excellent one. It is only by proactive mindset and practice; HR manager can bring excellence in him. No one is born with the excellence value. Practically it is developed slowly by passage of time. It is not necessary that only a highly qualified manager from a premier management school brings with him the guarantee of excellence. I have witnessed many persons with average upbringing, educational and social back ground proving themselves to be an excellent HR manager. What is required is the quest of learning and attitude of taking ownership of the problems in the organization by the person. The following are the rules of excellence for HR managers: 1. Become leader not a manager. The basic skills of excellence in HR require a