52 Things You Can Do To Improve Your Work - A Week At A Time

By Long Yun Siang http://www.career-success-for-newbies.com

52 Things You Can Do To Improve Your Work - A Week At A Time 2009 Long Yun Siang. All rights reserved worldwide. PERMISSION The author grants full permission to distribute this mini eBook freely, in your ezine, website, blog, forum, RSS feed or print publication and/or distribute it as a free bonus with other products, provided it is left completely intact, unaltered and delivered via this PDF file for FREE and not be sold. You must agree to include the FULL Resource box or SIG line provided below in your distribution and to make the link active/linkable with no syntax changes. Resource Box/SIG line: Long as he is popularly known - went through a period of disillusionment many moons ago. A slap and a kick from a good-hearted cousin then woke him. He found himself graduating and having a good career. In his free time he runs http://www.career-success-for-newbies.com with his wife Dorena as their way of paying it forward. Download these free eBooks - Career Success Recipe for Newbies and SHINE At Work: Your 30-Minute Guide - at this website (your sites URL) now. The author also grants full permission to republish excerpts provided it remains in the proper context and is accompanied by an attribution link back to http://www.career-success-for-newbies.com as the originating source.

DISCLAIMER The information contained in this mini eBook was complied in accordance with the observations and experiences of the author. It is an opinion based rather than fact based mini eBook. The author makes no representation or warranties of any kind with regard to the completeness or accuracy of the contents of this mini eBook. The author accepts no liability of any kind for any losses or damages caused or alleged to be caused, directly or indirectly, from the use of information contained in this mini eBook.

52 Things You Can Do To Improve Your Work A Week At A Time Copyright 2009 Long Yun Siang http://www.career-success-for-newbies.com All rights reserved worldwide.

Dedicated to: Those Who Are Committed To Improving Themselves Daily

52 Things You Can Do To Improve Your Work A Week At A Time Copyright 2009 Long Yun Siang http://www.career-success-for-newbies.com All rights reserved worldwide.

Foreword
I hope you will find some nuggets of suggestions in here that works. But it can only work if you work on it. I do not believe everything here works for everyone. Some suggestions you may even disagree. But the important thing is - I hope it will at least shift your mindset a little and act upon the habit that can mean changing your work life for the better. You can speed through this book in thirty minutes. But that is not its purpose. Too often we hear about people complaining about work, work life, colleagues and work related problems and challenges. The fact that we spend a lot of time at work means it has the potential to dictate how we feel throughout the day, months or year. How often do we reflect and act upon what we can change? If you can act upon some of the steps here diligently then you will begin a process of changing your work environment for the better. Realize that when you change, your environment changes too. You cannot expect overnight results with things that are behavioral in nature. It can only work over time with a new mindset and continuous conscious effort. Sure, speed through the book. But more importantly, run though it now and then through the year when the need arises. You can also opt to subscribe to the FREE newsletter that acts as a reminder for you. Every now and then when we update the site we will send you a newsletter that acts as a reminder for you and also new suggestions to keep your motivation going. Its FREE and you can unsubscribe anytime. Subscribe here: http://www.career-success-for-newbies.com/newbiescareerzine.html It is interesting that most of us would think about our monetary investments and look for returns on those investments but we never look at investing time to better ourselves. Invest time in yourself and changing yourself for the better now, at this moment and reap its return in the year to come. If not you who? If not now when? Long Yun Siang July 2009

52 Things You Can Do To Improve Your Work A Week At A Time Copyright 2009 Long Yun Siang http://www.career-success-for-newbies.com All rights reserved worldwide.

52 Things You Can Do To Improve Your Work - A Week At A Time

1. The Toughest Part - Know What You Want The toughest part about finding your dream career isnt about finding the dream career. It is about finding yourself. Do you know what you want? This is the first question you need to ask yourself. It is a seemingly easy question many answer by mentioning what they DONT WANT instead of what they WANT. But that is not the answer that will ensure you to find your dream job. Knowing what you dont want does not mean you easily arrive at what you want. Unfortunately, the process of elimination does not work in finding your dream career. You can go through a thousand dont wants and still not hit it. How to find your dream career? Start by knowing what you want! 2. Know Your Values If you feel a little lost with finding what you want, start by knowing your values. Ask yourself, what do you really value? Time? Thats a common answer I get and a good one too. We all want more time for family and ourselves. So, if you value time then you know the dream career you are looking for must offer more time. Is that all? List a set of values you treasure. Then things will begin to fall in place. You have defined what it is that will fit in these criteria. 3. Know How Much You Are Willing To Sacrifice Do you have the knowledge and skill set that fit the needs of your dream career? If you do not, how much are you willing to sacrifice in order to add those skills set in your repertoire? How to find your dream career is easy. How much you are willing to sacrifice in order to achieve it is tough to answer. 4. Make Learning A Key Objective If you are new in the work force and have been job-hopping quite a bit, my advice to you is this - truly find out what you want. Once you know that, find a company that is willing to train or how they are willing to commit to their employees career in the long term. If they have structured training programs, join them. Make learning the relevant skills and knowledge in that industry your key objective. The skills and knowledge that you learn will contribute to your career success in the long term. It is something that you can bring with you the rest of your life. Once you see the benefits of committing to a
52 Things You Can Do To Improve Your Work A Week At A Time Copyright 2009 Long Yun Siang http://www.career-success-for-newbies.com All rights reserved worldwide.

company who is willing to train you for more than two years, hopefully you wont be job-hopping often anymore. 5. A Positive Mental Attitude As boring as it sounds, this is important. It is probably the most important of all. As you think so you are. You want positive things to happen to you, you must first have a positive attitude. That means looking on the bright side of things regardless of how tough your days, months and year is. You dread going to work tomorrow; your day will turn out a dread just as you thought it would be. You are a master of your thoughts, not a slave to it. You feel you have lost interest; remind yourself why you found interest in the first place. Almost always it will re-ignite you. You dont know how to be positive? Start with a single thought. As pathetic as it sounds, say to yourself Look at the sun today. Such a nice day. But that is also as easy as it gets. Its tough? Thats because you think it is tough. Again, it goes back to your thought. Make positive thinking part of your career planning success. Think, feel, and do. Think happy thoughts, feel the energy and act happy. When you do it often enough you become a positive person. The same energy needed to think worrying and negative thoughts is the same that is needed to think happy and positive thoughts. Why waste that energy? Think a happy thought now. 6. A Sense Of Purpose We think when people say, what is your purpose in life? The answer must surely be grand. Maybe, go to such and such country, start a charity, volunteer at a home and so on and so forth. Sure, if you know that is your calling, so be it. Go ahead and do it. But what if you do not and are still muddling through life? Is lifes purpose so easily discovered? If your lifes purpose were revealed to you today, would you even know it? Are you willing to pay the price for it? While you discover your purpose in life may I suggest this? Your work is not a hindrance to that search for your grander purpose in life. If it is, you have a choice. If it isnt, do not blame your work. Get angry at it, you will drift further from your answer. In fact, your work now is part of the process of discovering your grander purpose in life. It is filled with hints, clues and challenges that point you to that purpose. To do that, find a sense of purpose in your work now. What is your purpose at work? What role do you play? What services do you offer to your fellow colleagues to that make this a better place to work and a better world, and also through the services and products offered by your
52 Things You Can Do To Improve Your Work A Week At A Time Copyright 2009 Long Yun Siang http://www.career-success-for-newbies.com All rights reserved worldwide.

company? Understand that role and you will understand your grander purpose better, if not discover it. This is an important part of your career planning success and a factor for career success. 7. Joyful Effort Too many times, you hear people talk about effort. About having to work hard and how you need a combination of working hard and smart. You want to make your career success journey a happy one. Remember these two words. Joyful effort. Effort itself is not enough. You must do it joyfully. Work will become a dread whether through monotony or constant challenges that comes your way. If it was just plain effort, you get tired easily. Joyful effort gives you energy and endurance in pursuit of your goals. It keeps you from being sidetracked by laziness and challenges. It keeps you from becoming disillusioned by challenges and adversity. How do you put joy into effort? One way is to have a strong and healthy mind. How do you have a strong and healthy mind? Think positive. How do you think positive? Seed a positive thought. The other way is to see setbacks as lessons that increase chances of success and adversity as a test of mental strength. When you see how these efforts contribute to your success and discovery of your purpose, you will do things joyfully. 8. Focus You can be doing many things with joyous effort and yet fail because you do not focus. Being focused means to train your mind not to wander. Do not focus on one goal now only to switch goals before you even do enough for the previous one. Be mindful and aware of everything that you do is also being focused. Detach from your ego. There is no need to be right all the time and argue for the sake of wanting to be right. Concentrate on the task at hand and single-mindedly pursue it. When you focus, you gain clarity to situations that are confusing and insights into misconceptions that feed negative thoughts to your mind. Then your career planning success has a higher chance of coming to fruition. What does this mean? For example, if you have a project that everyone has agreed to pursue but half way someone outside the group criticizes it. Focus. Those comments only bring confusion to you if you do not focus and allow your ego to get into that situation. You will become confused and distracted. Gain clarity by focusing and you will know those comments arent important to the pursuit of your goals. Focus is an important factor for career success.

52 Things You Can Do To Improve Your Work A Week At A Time Copyright 2009 Long Yun Siang http://www.career-success-for-newbies.com All rights reserved worldwide.

9. Right Ethics Big words but it really just means in the things that we say or do we abstain from lying, abstain from using harsh words, abstain from gossiping, abstain from using divisive speech and abstain from being malicious. Always think win-win at work (and in life). You have to believe that there is such a thing as win-win. Do not scheme and plot your career success. There are no such things. Even if it happens by such means, it wouldnt last. If you put in the right effort, good things will happen to your career soon enough. Your career planning success is really as simple as that. Of course it is tough practicing this principle, but the more you are able to do it the more freedom you will feel. The more self-discipline you have in doing it, the less you will be caught up in confusing situations and it frees you from malice and wrong views. Being nice is really just that easy. Practice the right ethics. 10. Embrace Setbacks There are no failures in life. Only setbacks. In your career planning success do not ever believe in failures. And you truly only fail when you give up. So long as you continue to try and do and focus on your goals, you will still be in the running for success. Learn to embrace setbacks. They teach you what not do the next time and they test your patience. It is also a test of your resolve. You are not born to know how to do such and such. Hence, everything is a learning process. As with all learning process, there are bound to be setbacks. Even if you know how to do something there is no guarantee of success, as we are prone to forget. Setbacks can be just that. A reminder of what we have forgotten. Include this factor in your career planning success. When faced with setbacks, know that they are just that setbacks. You can still spring forward. Learn from it, plan and activate what you have learned. You need not beat yourself over it. Cut yourself some slack, so to speak. Minimize the anger and sadness and move on.

52 Things You Can Do To Improve Your Work A Week At A Time Copyright 2009 Long Yun Siang http://www.career-success-for-newbies.com All rights reserved worldwide.

11. Teamwork And Support Group No one can teach you everything. No one can know everything. No one can do everything. You need to know the value of teamwork and the process to forge teamwork. You increase your own success when you help the team succeed. The teams goals are intrinsically weaved into your own goals. Just as your goals at work are weaved into your personal goals. The more people you help succeed, the faster you succeed. Include others in your career planning success and you will succeed faster and easier. Create a support group of positive people in the office and outside to motivate, encourage or just to slap some senses into you when you need it. This support group can be made up of individuals who are your friends whom you meet often. It need not and is not meant to be a formal meeting. The important thing to remember is to have POSITIVE people. When you are down and negative you do not need more negative energy infused into you. You need to remember not to be a positive energy drainer as well in such situations. Do not go to your friends and expect to be convinced to be positive. You must allow others to make you positive. Positive people have a tendency to avoid negative people who drain them too often. 12. There Is Nothing Positive About Anger Accept the fact that there is nothing positive about anger. There is also nothing positive about expressing anger. As long as you feel anger as an emotion is positive and brings benefit, then you would not feel a need to change. After all, why would someone want to change something that brings benefit? Some people feel that anger is constructive. They feel that when someone irritates, offends, or inconveniences them, they have the right to be angry. Somehow, they feel anger is justified. Well, it doesn't. Accept the fact that anger is negative. Does anger bring any positive emotions? Are you happy when you are angry? Do you feel joy when you are angry? When we are angry we end up saying things we do not mean, we act irrationally. We end up regretting it later. The most important component in this anger management tip is accepting the fact that anger is negative. Then you begin a journey to correct that bad habit.

52 Things You Can Do To Improve Your Work A Week At A Time Copyright 2009 Long Yun Siang http://www.career-success-for-newbies.com All rights reserved worldwide.

13. Make A Decision That Control Is Possible All behavioral changes start from one thing. The decision, acceptance and commitment in your mind that you want to make that change. In this case, self-control is possible albeit a long and gradual process. Only you can make the decision on how to control your emotions. Remember that YOU hold the key to your own success as your behavior can threaten your career success. The idea is that you want to avoid extreme emotional responses for example in the case of anger rage and hate. 14. Identify The Emotions You Need To Control Chances are you already know which emotions you need to control. The first step is to identify which emotion. Based on personal experience and observation in the office, these are the few I can identify anger, anxiety, fear and enthusiasm. You may say, Wait a minute, isnt enthusiasm a good emotion? Why should we control it? Well, remember that we are talking about excessive expression of that emotion. Ever met a colleague who shows too much enthusiasm on a particular project that it just gets in the way of other team members? 15. Get Rid Of The Stupid Excuses We often hear colleagues acknowledging that they have a certain problem but that there is no point in changing their behavior. These people like to admit their mistakes expecting you to excuse them but at the same time you are to accept that they wont make an effort to change. It is crucial to get rid of the stupid excuses that make you think you don't have to control your emotions. In this case again, we are referring to excessive expression of emotions in the office. If you truly want to know how to control your emotions, then take a step to get rid of these commonly used excuses: "I am being true to myself, why should I change? I am young - I can afford to be foolish. Well, if they are good colleagues/friends, they just have to accept me for who I am.

52 Things You Can Do To Improve Your Work A Week At A Time Copyright 2009 Long Yun Siang http://www.career-success-for-newbies.com All rights reserved worldwide.

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