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31 SMART Goals Examples for Students of All Ages

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A new school year is underway, and students are facing unprecedented challenges as most are having to “learn how to learn” in a whole new way. Due to the spread of the COVID-19 virus, students have brought traditional classroom learning back into their own homes, giving a huge rise to the relatively new concept of online education.

While students have always needed motivation and self-discipline to excel in school, this new academic climate takes that requirement to the next level. Students no longer have a teacher looking over their shoulder or instructing them to put their smart phones down and pay attention. It’s now up to all learners to be proactive in their studies and feel a sense of responsibility for their educational outcomes.

Teachers can support students in this endeavor by teaching proper goal-setting techniques so students can focus their efforts appropriately, effectively manage their time, and see the positive results of their work. And setting SMART goals isn’t just important for helping students focus and maintain their momentum during these months of virtual learning–it’s a critical skill they will use for the rest of their lives.

Now, if you’re the student, learning the art of setting SMART goals will help you continuously improve yourself, which will help you gain a competitive advantage over your peers once you enter the working world. And, the simple act of setting effective goals will be an integral part of your success.

According to Locke and Latham’s goal setting theory, two people with the same skills and knowledge can perform very differently on the same task if they have different performance goals because their goals ultimately determine their motivation to succeed. Whoever is more driven to succeed will probably do so.

In this article, we are going to look at the value of SMART goals and why students of all ages should know how to set SMART goals to lay the foundation for their academic success.

Then we will go over 21 specific examples of statements that students can use to improve their performance at school, in their extra-curricular activities, and in their lives in general. (And if you want a simple tool to track these goals, then check out this 13-week goal planner, backed by science and success psychology, that is designed to optimize your day and help you tackle your goals.)

My Own Personal Examples of Goals in Life of a Student

1. Start a Growth Journal

You’re reading a blog from someone who has been journaling since kindergarten. Seriously – my uncle bought me a journal in kindergarten and I have crayon-written, half-sentences all over it.

It’s such a pleasure for me to go back through the 17 or so journals I have to reflect on my past, to gain better understanding of myself, and to remember times of good and times of bad.

2. Make a Goal to Use Social Media Less

Social media can take over a person’s life. Little by little, you spend more time on your phone or computer checking statuses and making updates…until before you know it, you’re spending more time online than in real life.

Set phone reminders or use their phone’s stopwatch to time themselves, and just allow two 15-minute slots in their day on social media (or whatever other timeframe you want to use that is considerably less than what they’re doing now).

3. Read a Book Every Month

4. Accomplish Their First Individual Goal

Goals for High School Seniors

High school seniors are about to enter the real world – whether that’s getting their own apartment, starting college in the fall, getting that first real-paying job, or having to help pay rent at home for the first time.

1. Apply for One Scholarship or Grant Per Week

Your scholarship and grant search goals do NOT need to end once you get accepted and pay for that first year. You could snag a new scholarship to decrease your overall student loan bill your sophomore year, over summers, and even your last year of college!

2. Book a Senior Week Trip with Friends

When I was a senior in high school, I realized that I didn’t have any plans for where to spend senior week (and boy did I want to go somewhere). SO, I gathered a handful of my friends who were interested, and I set about booking a house in Delaware on the beach.

3. Learn to Cook One Entire Meal (from Scratch)

Look – seniors are going to have to figure out their own food in short order. SO, the best way to help them with not busting their budgets (plus get them curious and interested in cooking for themselves)? Is by teaching them an entire meal from scratch.

And to accomplish this? They’ll have to pick out a recipe, budget for ingredients, shop for those ingredients, then get timing down in the kitchen (like, do you cook the side dish first earlier in the day to free up time to focus on the main dish? Can you cook the main dish ahead of time and reheat while making the salad and dessert? It takes practice).

4. Set Up and Use a Planner for 30 Days

They can try a digital planning system, or use a paper one (you might want them to start with a paper one so that they can wrap your head around things by writing them down, first).

5. Volunteer X Hours Per Week or Month

My last tip for a student setting a goal: the magic of goal-setting really comes from the lessons learned and from moving onto the next goal. SO, in order to get your students and teenagers interested in setting goals a second, third, and umpteenth time, you want to help them set a really achievable first goal. Build their confidence, and watch them soar over the coming months and years!

Amanda L. Grossman

Amanda L. Grossman is a Certified Financial Education Instructor, a 2017 Plutus Foundation Grant Recipient, and founder of Money Prodigy. Amanda’s kid money work has been featured on Experian, GoBankingRates, PT Money, CA.gov, Rockstar Finance, the Houston Chronicle, and Colonial Life. Read more here.

Be Your Personal Best

Goals for school and student goals in life are all created in the same ways. Challenge your students from preschool through college to be introspective and proactive with fun goal setting activities. What personal goal do you want to achieve next?

Related Articles

Do you often find yourself setting out big plans, only to fall flat and push the plan aside? This is a common occurrence. Luckily, there exists a well-defined solution that’s easy to follow. It comes in a detailed system of measurable goals and objectives that puts you on a path to success.

College is a time for growth and change. But, you don’t want to lose sight of your bigger goals in life. Set actionable long-term goals using the SMART method. Use examples of actionable long-term professional and academic goals as inspiration to create your own.

Resource:

https://www.developgoodhabits.com/smart-goals-students/
https://www.moneyprodigy.com/personal-goals-examples-for-students/
https://examples.yourdictionary.com/8-personal-goal-examples-for-students-to-be-successful.html

Strategies of Effective Interviewing

The executive engaged in the normal conduct of business devotes much of his time to interviewing. However, there is an appalling lack of effort given to systematic attempts at building improvements into this age-old process. Interviewing remains one of those activities which we think we know all about merely because we have been doing it so long; we have been lulled by habit. It seems apparent that a modest effort aimed at an analysis of our interviewing techniques would yield generous returns.

In the broad sense, interviewing is the process whereby individuals (usually two) exchange information. The individuals may be concerned with a job opening, a promotion, a special assignment, a product sale, information for intelligence purposes, a proposed merger, or other questions. The information exchanged need not be limited to facts. In business, particularly, such products of an interview as meaning and understanding are oftentimes more significant than objective factual statements.

Interviewing in the contemporary business setting invariably takes place in an atmosphere filled with a sense of urgency. The time allocated to the interview is necessarily limited. Consequently, a nondirective approach finds little application; it is necessary to use the guided interview in the vast majority of situations. This inherent time constraint sometimes brings about dysfunctional consequences: the interviewer is so preoccupied with budgeting his time that the content and the purpose of the interview are vitiated. Hence, we must define what we mean by an effective interview. For the purposes of this article, an effective interview is one that optimizes the perceived communication objectives of the individuals involved, with time as the principal constraint. We shall focus on research findings concerning:

Planning & Preparation

The lack of adequate planning for an interview is the greatest single fault found in my studies of the interviewing process. 1 All too often, the inexperienced interviewer launches into a discussion only to find midway through that his preparation is incomplete. A moderate amount of preplanning can easily obviate such unfortunate occurrences.

When the objective of the interview is well-known in advance, it is usually a good practice to allow the individual concerned ample time to prepare for the talk before the actual involvement. By indicating, ahead of time and in writing, the points to be covered, the interviewer gives the interviewee an added advantage and reinforces the specific purpose of the session. Too often the expectations of the interviewee may be far different from those of the interviewer. This misunderstanding, if not corrected, can be disastrous.

On the other hand, too much preplanning and detailing for an interview can be equally harmful. The interviewee may then develop conventionally correct answers or platitudes which, of course, reduce the informational content of the interview to virtually zero. In short, he needs a guide, a “steer”—but no more than that.

A written outline of important points to be covered is not necessarily an indication of rigidity; rather, it reflects consideration for all parties concerned. When explained, it generates a feeling of confidence as well as fairness—particularly if two or more people are to be ranked in an evaluation. The outline may even include typical questions in order to solicit comparable responses. Again, however, a warning against excess is needed: too much reliance on a programed questioning approach is often disconcerting to the interviewee and may lead to stereotyped answers. Ideally, of course, each question should be designed for the situation and the respondent.

In presenting information, a speaker allocates blocks of time to various items on his agenda. If no time limit is established, the presentation can continue indefinitely. Even worse, the truly important information may never be told. This process takes place by dint of the normal human trait of retaining the most significant bits of information for the end. Psychiatrists recognize this and are particularly attentive in the last ten minutes of the therapy session. Borrowing from this insight, the interviewer, although not able to set an hourly cycle as does the psychiatrist, should try discreetly to indicate a time scale. This allows the interviewee to plan and to include relevant information which otherwise might be withheld. If the interview is terminated too abruptly, the probability of losing valuable information is very high.

A time limit can be suggested by citing the next appointment or by noting, perhaps, a previously scheduled conference. Actions such as tapping—consciously or not—on one’s watch to indicate time are out of order, of course; so is sitting precipitously on the edge of the chair. Sometimes it may be in the best interest of both parties to set another date for an extended session or to plan on completing only one or two stages of progress at a time.

Interviewing techniques tip 2: Develop a compelling story

We tend to conclude that our lives are pretty much the same as other people’s, that they’re average and boring. As a result, many people don’t tell their own story well. But your story is so much better than you think. The way your life has evolved; the things you’ve learned; your achievements, failings, and dreams—these things are unique to you and much more interesting than you realize. Sharing your well thought-out story is a powerful interviewing technique.

Your story is what helps people understand who you are and where you are going. So learn to tell your story and tell it well, especially for interviewing and networking purposes. Putting together your story takes a lot of work and practice. However, the benefits to you and to your career are enormous. Your stories:

Developing your story for job interviews

• Take a comprehensive inventory of the chapters of your life. Think about major events, memories, and turning points that shaped who you are. Make notes about your feelings, expectations, and frustrations, or what you learned, accomplished, and experienced. Organize your chapters by time periods or jobs.
• Focus on memorable “aha” moments. These stories need to have vivid dimensions so people will experience that moment with you. It may have been a moment with your mom on the porch, or a trip you took to a faraway place, or what a boss or mentor told you. The stories don’t have to be dramatic, just meaningful to you.
• Uncover the themes in your story. What emerges as your passion? Mentoring others, doing research, helping a specific type of client, advancing knowledge in your field? What gives you joy? Are you a teacher, a leader, an entrepreneur, a risk taker?
• Reflect on your career path. How have you arrived where you are today? Why did you make certain choices? Who helped you along the way? What motivated you then and now? Have your career goals remained the same or have they changed? Are you someone who likes new projects? Or executes the details of someone else’s vision?

Practice makes perfect

Once you’ve developed your story, the next step is to practice telling it—saying it out loud, ideally to others. Don’t wait until the interview to tell it for the first time. Try reciting it into a tape recorder or sharing it with a confidante for feedback. Get over your feelings of story inadequacy or thinking that a job well done speaks for itself.

As you become more comfortable in how to tell your story, you will see that your life has not just been a string of random events. Your story has a past and it has a future and the road ahead becomes clearer when you understand where you have been. The ultimate test will be the next time someone says, “Tell me about yourself.”

Interviewing techniques tip 3: Tailor your story to the job

Applying your story to a specific employer or job is the next step. Lining up the stories that apply to the opportunity at hand is critical. Put yourself in the interviewer’s shoes and pose the questions you would ask. Which stories are relevant to this job interview? Think about personal stories that show how you handled change, made choices under pressure, or learned lessons from mistakes and failures. You should also think about stories you can tell in the interview that reveal your skill set.

Learning and appreciating your story is a prerequisite to any interview process. Don’t rely on your ability to think on your feet. Anticipate the questions and have answers at the ready. In the end, this is about making a great and memorable impression that demonstrates competency and ability.

You may want to start by developing your stories around these areas:

If you’re having trouble developing a good interviewing story, ask your friends or family members for their own success stories. Notice the elements that make them work, such as specific details and a smooth flow. Notice elements that don’t work, such as vagueness or rambling. Then think about your own experience and try to uncover the moments when you really excelled or when you rose to meet a challenge. After you identify several, practice them until they flow easy and work on adapting them to different types of questions.

How to Handle the Interview

Listen. The best job interviews often feel like a conversation (albeit one where both parties are trying to impress one another). To achieve this, remember to focus on listening, not just waiting for your chance to speak. Not only will you be able to respond more effectively to their questions, you’ll also demonstrate a valuable soft skill.

Handle Questions About Salary the Right Way. Dreading the salary negotiation portion of the interview process? You’re not alone. Less than half of respondents to a CareerBuilder survey said that they negotiated salary after receiving a job offer. And 51% of those non-negotiators said that they resisted because they were uncomfortable asking for more.

When they do, keep in mind that it’s likely a good sign: employers typically don’t broach the subject of salary requirements unless they’re contemplating you coming aboard. (This differs from questions about salary requirements and salary history earlier in the process, which are intended to weed out applicants whose demands are outside the budget.)

Avoid Typical Interview Blunders. Mistakes happen. Sometimes, a question will stump you. Or an unexpected situation will make you late. Many of the most common interview mistakes can be avoided with a bit of planning – and some awareness of interviewer pet peeves.

What to Do After the Interview

Send a Thank-You Note. One of the most important parts of the job interview happens after you leave the building: sending a thank-you note. How important is it? According to an Accountemps survey, 80% of hiring managers say that they consider thank-you notes when deciding which candidates to hire. The same survey found that only 24% of candidates actually sent a post-interview note, though, so if you take the time to say thanks, you’ll stand out from the competition.

Follow Up the Right Way. What if you send your thank-you note and don’t hear anything back? If a week or more has gone by—or you’ve waited the amount of time specified by the hiring manager—it’s a good idea to send a follow-up email to check in and reiterate your interest in the job. After that, let it go.

Don’t Pause Your Job Search. Don’t wait to hear from the hiring manager, even if things look good. Keep your job search rolling and you won’t have to restart it again if the job offer fails to materialize. Plus, you never know what kinds of opportunities are waiting for you if you keep looking.

Resources:

https://hbr.org/1964/01/strategies-of-effective-interviewing
https://www.helpguide.org/articles/work/interviewing-techniques-and-tips.htm
https://www.thebalancecareers.com/winning-interview-skills-2061350
https://www.talentlyft.com/en/blog/article/270/top-5-interview-techniques
https://www.educba.com/interview-tips-for-interviewer/

How to Speak Spanish with Confidence: 21 Ways to Beat Your Fear and Just Start Speaking

Do you remember learning how to read when you were a child? Chances are you sounded words out, letter by letter. Spanish language learners can do that very same thing with absolute success.

1. Take Spanish Classes

Taking Spanish courses in person is one of the quickest ways to learn and practice new vocabulary. To boost your confidence and increase your learning, refrain from speaking any language other than Spanish during class, even if you feel tempted to ask a question in your native tongue.

You might also consider taking one-on-one lessons if you’d like a little extra attention during class. You can search for Spanish classes and conversation groups in your local area with meetup.com or consider taking a Skype lesson if there aren’t any classes being offered near you.

2. Watch Movies and Telenovelas

Watching movies and telenovelas in Spanish is a great way to familiarize yourself with conversational dialogue. Even if you’re a beginner, you should still be able to pick up a wealth of information from visual cues and body language.

You might also try watching with subtitles to help improve your understanding. The more you watch, the more you’ll become familiar with the accent and tone of voice commonly used in Spanish. The more Spanish you hear, the more confident you’ll be when it comes time for you to speak.

3. Listen to Music and Sing in Spanish

Have you ever noticed that it’s much easier for your brain to remember something when put to a song? To help increase your vocabulary and to better familiarize yourself with the language, start listening to music in Spanish as much as possible.

Listen with the lyrics in front of you so you can sing along. Try memorizing the lyrics and practice speaking them as well as singing them. Doing this won’t only prove to be an enjoyable practice, but it’ll also help boost your confidence and make you feel more comfortable speaking in Spanish.

4. Start Thinking in Spanish

There’s no doubt about it, once you can successfully think in Spanish, you’ll find that your confidence in your speaking ability will drastically increase. It’s easy to feel nervous when you find yourself stumbling for words and thinking too long about what to say next.

In the early stages of learning a language, you have to translate what you want to say in your head before you speak, which can make it difficult to carry a conversation at a regular pace. Fortunately, this process gets easier the more you’re exposed to the language. Eventually, you’ll find yourself able to think in Spanish without having to translate first.

5. Read out Loud

Another effective way to boost your Spanish speaking confidence is to start reading to yourself out loud in Spanish. Try waiting until after you’ve finished a paragraph before you look up any words.

In doing so, you’ll allow the words to flow out of your mouth more naturally, which will help you prepare for the authentic flow of a real conversation. Try reading books, magazines or newspapers in Spanish. You can also find many Spanish websites and blogs online as well.

6. Record Yourself Speaking Spanish

Try recording yourself having a conversation or reading in Spanish. By recording yourself and playing it back, you’ll have a chance to hear what you sound like and notice if there’s any room for improvement. Consider recording yourself on a regular basis so you can track your progress.

7. Get a Language Buddy

Having a language partner to practice with will encourage and inspire you to start speaking more. You can practice with another language learner so you feel more comfortable making mistakes or try practicing with a native speaker who can help correct you. Don’t be shy when speaking with native speakers.

Most people will be glad you have taken an interest in their language, so they’ll likely be patient and won’t mind slowing down the pace a bit for you. If you don’t know someone to practice with, try finding a partner using italki.

8. Educate Yourself on Common Mistakes

Most anxieties and insecurities are due to a lack of understanding and awareness of the Spanish language. If you familiarize yourself with the common mistakes Spanish language learners make, you’ll feel more knowledgeable and thus more comfortable when speaking.

9. Learn New Vocabulary Every Single Day

It’s hard to feel confident speaking in Spanish if you don’t have a strong vocabulary. Help increase your confidence by making it a point to learn new Spanish words every single day.

You can learn new words simply by reading a book or magazine and looking up the unfamiliar words you come across. You might also consider using flashcards to help you remember new words and phrases.

Our first advice: LISTEN

Listening, that is how anyone who wants to learn a language should begin. The language they speak best is our mother tongue, did not we learned by listening? No one told us: “Son, this toy is for you to learn how to conjugate the subjunctive.”It would be absurd !. We learned to talk by listening to our parents, family and friends. And this is the only way to master Spanish or any other language: LISTEN.

The key to success in anything, including learning Spanish is to practice a lot. When you hear some Spanish, try it again. Listen again to the audio. No need to be away, you can do it later or the next day. But listen again. That will help your brain in the learning process.

Children just learning to speak many times they hear the same words, phrases or expressions. His first words are often mom or dad because they are some of the words most heard. Moreover, they are easy to pronounce.

A Short Break, And Some Unexpected Magic

Martyn was still exhausted, but you could see the excitement bubbling up to the surface. He started to reach for more to say – more little moments of communication – and he was understanding most of what I was saying back to him. It encouraged both of us. A few simple moments of real communication – speaking real Spanish – and suddenly all the worry that the method wouldn’t work disappeared.

Martyn was still making mistakes. Mountains of them. At a guess, he was getting about 10% of the target phrases right before he heard Rosa. But it didn’t matter any more. We could both see that he was genuinely learning.

He was starting to fine-tune, as well. ‘Usted habla lo’ became ‘usted lo habla’ (you speak it) without any clues from me, and then ‘Puede usted lo decir?’ switched itself back to ‘Puede usted decirlo?’ (Can you say it?). I kept wanting to high-five him.

I’d decided, more or less at random, that the first 25 sessions we’d built were our ‘Level One’. Martyn had session 22 finished by half-past three – and despite his new enthusiasm, he was yawning too much to answer at least half the time.

In less than 24 hours, Gaby was going to call him on Skype, and speak Spanish at him. And we were going to record it. Martyn obviously felt a little stressed about this, and I can’t say I was calm. I imagined finishing this experiment with a video showing Martyn failing to remember any Spanish. Pressure can make anyone crack, and it’s worse for a brand new learner.

Speak Spanish in Four Days: Day Four

I used to teach languages in a British high school, and I can still remember the sense of helpless worry I’d get when my students were going into exams. It’s a horrible feeling. You want to freeze time so that you can give them a month or two of last minute reminders. But you worry that if you throw any extra details at them, it’ll push the other stuff out of their brains.

I’d emailed Gaby asking him to use questions that Martyn had covered in Level One. I know how easily fluent speakers can start talking about things that a learner doesn’t understand! Martyn and I decided that we’d just finish Level One by doing the last three sessions, and we wouldn’t move onto Level Two.

By 1:00pm we’d finished three sessions, and Martyn was consistently speaking in groups of five or six words together. This would have been impossible on Day Two. Even on the particularly difficult last session, which revises everything we’d done in the whole of Level One, he was doing better than on Day Three.

We decided to take the last couple of hours as a chance to relax on the sofas in his living room. We played around with possible questions, and tried out different answers. Martyn was starting to achieve real communication in Spanish – talking about real things, about the process he’d been going through, about what he wanted to do. It felt like much more than you’d expect from a standard beginner who’d only be learning how to speak Spanish for four days.

There’s a moment when something you’re worrying about becomes inevitable, and time suddenly accelerates. It’s like the moment on a roller-coaster, at the top of the climb, when your fear gives way to excitement, and everything becomes a blur.

Ready… ready… ready! I pressed play on the camera, and suddenly there was Gaby throwing Spanish words at Martyn. I knew for a fact Martyn had never heard these words in his life. It’s all going to fall to pieces! But no… wait… what’s this?

Martyn does not freeze in front of the camera. In fact, the camera seems to inspire him. He’s putting words together in ways he hasn’t tried before . That’s the final ingredient that turns speaking a new language into a magical experience.

I thought that I would record 10 minutes or so of Martyn speaking, and choose the best two or three minutes. That didn’t happen. I only recorded the first 3 minutes, and left it at that. By the time they’d finished speaking, Gaby and Martyn had arranged to meet up and have a Welsh/Spanish intercambio (language exchange) in the Welsh National Eisteddfod in August. To be fair, by that point the Skype conversation had become something of a Welsh/Spanish intercambio itself. When Gaby switched to speaking Welsh, Martyn said he’d never in his life been so relieved to hear a language he really understood!

Source:

https://www.fluentu.com/blog/spanish/how-to-speak-spanish/
https://www.spanishpodcast.net/how-to-speak-spanish/
https://www.fluentin3months.com/how-to-speak-spanish-in-4-days/

How to write a short story

The short story is a fiction writer’s laboratory: here is where you can experiment with characters, plots, and ideas without the heavy lifting of writing a novel. Learning how to write a short story is essential to mastering the art of storytelling. With far fewer words to worry about, storytellers can make many more mistakes—and strokes of genius!—through experimentation and the fun of fiction writing.

Nonetheless, the art of writing short stories is not easy to master. How do you tell a complete story in so few words? What does a story need to have in order to be successful? Whether you’re struggling with how to write a short story outline, or how to fully develop a character in so few words, this guide is your starting point.

Famous authors like Virginia Woolf, Haruki Murakami, and Agatha Christie have used the short story form to play with ideas before turning those stories into novels. Whether you want to master the elements of fiction, experiment with novel ideas, or simply have fun with storytelling, here’s everything you need on how to write a short story step by step.

Step 1: Planning

To know how to write a short story, you first need to understand what one is. Let’s start by answering the obvious question: how long should a short story be? Unfortunately, it’s not a question that’s easy to answer. Some say that anything that is between 500–7,500 words is a short story. Others say anything less than 10,000 words. Though, to add to the confusion, if you’re looking to submit short stories to magazines or online publications, most will set word limits that fall somewhere between 500–4,000 words. However, don’t worry too much about word limits when you start. Instead, focus on mastering short story outlines and then you can begin to worry about wordcounts (more on that in a bit).

Now we have a better idea of how long a short story can be, or at least, when a short story is too long, let’s look at what else we need to write a short story. Much like any story, short stories require conflict.

Conflict is when your main character wants something or wants to achieve something, but there is an opposing force or obstacle that stops them from having it. It can be anything from escaping a scary house to pursuing a relationship with someone or becoming a world-famous ballerina. Conflict can come in the form of a villain (or antagonist) or a societal issue (corrupt governing body, issues within society such as racism, homophobia, etc.) to name a couple of examples.

Before you start to write a short story, you need to know what your point of conflict is. While the process of writing a short story can be very similar to writing a novel, there is a difference that may come as a shock to any ‘pantsers’ (those who make up the story as they write). When writing a short story, you need to have an outline of what you want to happen. Not only does it help to know what you’re writing about and to avoid rambling but, by having an outline, you’ll have a clear pathway through your story and have the foundations of one which is well-paced.

If you’re a writer who likes to ‘go with the flow’, this may prove a challenge. To adapt to this change, have a clear idea of what you want your story to look like then add in ‘stepping stones’ to keep you on track.

A good rule of thumb is that the longer the short story is, the more that can happen. It might sound obvious, but a lot of people will try to cram in additional scenes or parts to a story that messes with the overall quality. When starting with short stories, it can help to stick to a simpler outline, at least until you become more used to the structure and can experiment a bit more.

When you first start writing short stories, it can be tempting to add in additional details that deviate from the key plot points (especially if you’re coming from a novel-writing background) so, by keeping your first short stories briefer, you’ll learn to recognise what parts of a short story are necessary to include and what is filler. If you find that your idea keeps growing and mutates as you plan, you may have accidentally come up with an idea for a novel rather than a short story. Save it for later and then have another think.

Short Story Writing Tools

Writing anything – short fiction, novels, nonfiction – can be daunting and difficult. Sometimes the shorter pieces are even harder than a novel-length work because you don’t have as much wiggle room.

This can come in the form of human help from your fellow writers, or you can turn to some writing software to guide you. There are many options when it comes to this, but I can recommend two that will no doubt help you create the best short story possible.

Squibler

All of these things can come in handy when you are writing a short story. Depending on the style and genre of your story, you may need to do a lot of research despite the shorter length.

Grammarly

However, we are human and we make mistakes. Grammarly is there to help you through the editing process. Once it scans your work, it will pick out the spelling and grammatical errors, and show them to you.

In addition to pointing out the errors you’ve made, it tells you how to fix them. These can be small things like an unnecessary comma or a missing period. But, a lot of little things can add up.

Grammarly makes your writing better, but it also makes you a better writer. It will fix up your current writing, and if you pay attention to the corrections it makes, you can start learning from your own bad habits.

Grammarly is an effective editing tool for all types of writers, fiction or otherwise. It cleans up your work fast. This saves you time, improves your craft, and helps you remain professional and polished.

Writing Prompts

A good place to start is with this writing prompt generator. It offers you more than 500 options to inspire a story. Use the prompts for a first sentence idea or to solidify the end of the story. Sometimes creating that satisfying ending first actually helps you develop the rest of the plot.

Source:

https://writers.com/how-to-write-a-short-story
https://medium.com/swlh/how-to-write-a-short-story-f18165a47ed0
https://www.squibler.io/blog/how-to-write-short-story/

How to Keep the Conversation Going (With Examples)

When engaging in social interactions, you may want to develop strategies to keep the conversation going. This requires reflection and practise to ensure your conversations flow easily. By knowing how to continue conversations, you can improve your professional relationships and feel more at ease socializing with a variety of people in any situation. In this article, we discuss how to continue a conversation and provide several questions to help you continue conversations.

1. Ask open-ended questions

Open-ended questions refer to questions that require the other speaker to explain their answer. Speakers can answer closed-ended questions with yes or no, while open-ended questions require longer answers. Here are some examples of closed-ended questions:

2. Ask follow-up questions

When having a conversation with another person, you may find it beneficial to ask follow-up questions because this shows the other individual that you care about their experiences and opinion. When your conversation begins to slow or when you don’t know what to say, you may want to ask follow-up questions. Here are some examples of follow-up questions to keep the conversation going:

3. Determine when to share and ask questions

When communicating with others, you may want to consider your balance between sharing and asking. A strong method to use is the IFR method, which is an initialism for inquire, follow-up, and relate. Inquiring requires you to ask a sincere question, while follow-up requires you to ask another question, and relating requires you to share information about yourself or your experience. Here are some IFR examples:

4. Consider limiting questions

When having a conversation, you may find it beneficial to limit the number of questions you ask. By asking too many questions, the person you converse with may feel interviewed and may limit their answers or explanations. Consider providing personal details and personal information between questions to contribute to the conversation. By providing personal details or information, you also enable the other person to ask you follow-up questions. This can change the direction of your conversation.

5. Show interest

If you want to keep your conversation going, you may want to show the other person who you’re interested in the conversation. You can do this by using both verbal and nonverbal cues. For example, a strong cue or form of body language requires you to nod your head while the other person speaks. This shows them you pay attention to what they say and that you still follow the conversation.

6. Discover common interests

You may find it beneficial to determine common interests with other people to provide you with strong talking points. When you have common interests with another person, you have more opportunities to continue the conversation. For example, if you both enjoy reading books, you can provide the other person with book recommendations and talk about various components of books you’ve both read.

7. Maintain eye contact

Maintaining eye contact helps you continue conversations because the person you speak to can tell you’re paying attention to them when they speak. When individuals feel uncomfortable, they may habitually turn away or avoid eye contact. By maintaining eye contact, you can show the speaker that you’re interested and that you care about what they’re saying. It can also make you appear more confident.

8. Establish comfort with silence

When trying to keep a conversation going, you can develop comfort with silence and consider when it’s appropriate to speak and when to take a break. This ensures you consistently continue the conversation when you’re relaxed and prevents forced conversations. By becoming comfortable with silence, you also ensure the other speaker feels more comfortable, which can promote easy conversations.

9. Discuss previous conversations

When trying to keep your conversation going, you may want to discuss a previous conversation to get clarity and show the speaker that you pay attention when they speak. When doing this, consider whether the speaker mentioned topics you thought were especially interesting. Here are some examples of phrases to use when discussing previous conversations:

10. Share a story

If you don’t know what to say to continue a conversation, you may want to consider telling a story. This helps you develop a relationship with the other speaker. Before engaging in conversations or social events, you may find it beneficial to think about some stories you can tell if you need to continue a conversation. Think about stories that relate to particular subjects you want to discuss, and ensure they’re appropriate for your audience.

11. Be informed

To keep conversations going, consider spending time every day doing research on subjects that interest you. This ensures you have the knowledge required to elaborate on subjects as they arise. You can read about amusing stories that you recently read. When you’re well-informed, you can have more light-hearted, interesting conversations.

How to Text Asking for a Date

Once you’ve established a rapport and you want to take your conversation to the next level, you should arrange to meet up in-person for your first date (or date early in your relationship). The most acceptable way is to text for a coffee date. Set a date and time and then show up prepared to have an in-person conversation.

Whether you’re texting with a romantic partner or a potential one, you should have a good idea about how you wish your conversation to go. Prepare a few topics ahead of time to help you keep the conversation on track. Don’t type out your questions as though rehearsed. Allow the conversation to have a natural flow. Choose topics that are relative to the person, your region, company they work for, career, and other personal interests.

How To Keep a Conversation Going with a Girl at a Party

It’s a subtle change, but you’ll find that by interviewing her to objectively learn about her, you consciously shift all that pressure/focus away from your own impression and onto finding out more about her. In a way, it frees you.

1. Understand That She’s Not Perfect…

Even if you’ve known her for a while, you may still assume that she’s exactly what you want. but there could easily be something about her that you don’t know, but would want to before you ask her out.

2. Look for Her Real, True Personality.

Don’t blindly assume she’s perfect, but do try to uncover the real her (almost like a reporter). Remind yourself that there’s no need to feel nervous… you’re not trying to impress this girl, you’re figuring out if the real her is worth your time.

3. Remember to Be Yourself.

. Because if you act completely different than your real self and she likes it, she’ll be insanely disappointed when she discovers the real you… and if she doesn’t like it, maybe she would have actually liked the real you!

More Ways To Get The Girl

When you’re really looking to get a girl, you know there’s more to it than just how to keep a conversation going with a girl. To get the whole process, read these articles as well:

Knowing how to keep a conversation going with a girl is perhaps not quite as easy as just shouting “will you be my girlfriend,” but it is fairly simple if you know a few simple steps to do it.

The road to how to get a girlfriend runs straight through learning how to talk to girls, so this is about as important a set of steps to learn as possible. Besides, following these steps makes the whole process so much more fun. You’ll be able to stop stressing about how to keep a conversation going with a girl and just enjoy it for a change.

Source:

https://ca.indeed.com/career-advice/career-development/keep-the-conversation-going
https://dating.lovetoknow.com/dating-conversation-topics/17-ways-keep-text-conversation-going
https://www.mantelligence.com/how-to-keep-a-conversation-going-with-a-girl/

Write.

Share your knowledge with the world by writing articles to publish on a website. It’s so easy to start a website these days, taking just minutes to get up and running (Medium.com is a good place to start).

You can write about whatever you like. Write about a passion – sports, politics, gardening perhaps. Write instructions for how to do something. Share your opinions on things. Don’t focus on how many people read the articles; just write them for you and consider any readers as a bonus.

If you want to write about more personal things – your thoughts and feelings for instance – you should get yourself a physical journal to write in. No one needs to see what you write, so you are free to pour your heart and soul out if you need to.

Even if you’ve never read a poem in your life, you’d be surprised just how fun, interesting, and challenging it can be to get the right words together in the right way to make a poem that flows. Try it out and see if you like it.

If you’ve got a little more time on your hands, you could always write your own stories. Think of a plot, come up with some characters, figure out what they might say to each other or what their personalities are like. If you have any children, why not write short stories for them – they don’t have to be long or complicated.

Regardless of whether you think you have good sense of humor, you could try your hand at writing jokes, or comedy sketches. Whether you go for short one-liners, or more elaborate setups with stories that lead to punch lines, it doesn’t much matter. You can try them out on your friends too as an added bonus.

If you love listening to music, you’ll know the power of good lyrics to transport you mentally and emotionally to some place else. Well, you could transport yourself away from whatever boring thing you’re doing by penning your own verses and choruses.

Do something with your hands.

Aside from painting or drawing, there are lots of ways that you can keep your hands busy whilst simultaneously passing the time. You could bake, work in the garden, sculpt out of clay, build out of wood or some other material, knit, sew, or do any other sort of craft that involves using your hands.

When you’ve got time on your hands – either because you’ve got nothing to do or because your job requires little in the way of conscious focus, you have the opportunity to engage in a little admin. Not your usual life admin such as paying bills or planning meals, but personal growth admin.

What are your strengths and weaknesses in general? What are your good points and bad points as a person? What skills, mental traits, or behaviors would you like to work on? What kind of person do you want to be?

What about your life? What is going well? What could use some work? And what do you want to change? Do you like where you live? Is your job/career something you want to change? Which relationships serve you, and which do you need to prune?

These sorts of questions are not always simple to answer, but this is what makes them so great at eating up the time. You can spend hours thinking about these things, considering all the different angles, deciding what your priorities should be.

Resource:

https://www.aconsciousrethink.com/9431/make-time-go-faster/

The competence and attitudes of managers have an important bearing on productivity. In many organizations, productivity is low despite latest technology and trained manpower. This is due to inefficient and indifferent management. Competent and dedicated managers can obtain extraordinary results from ordinary people.

Productivity: Meaning, Concept, Factors, Importance, Formulas, Techniques, Measurement and Other Details

Productivity refers to the physical relationship between the quantity produced (output) and the quantity of resources used in the course of production (input). “It is the ratio between the output of goods and services and the input of resources consumed in the process of production.”

Output implies total production while input means land, labour, capital, management, etc. Productivity measures the efficiency of the production system. The efficiency with which resources are utilized is called productive efficiency. Higher productivity means producing more from a given amount of inputs or producing a given amount with lesser inputs.

At the level of a plant or an industry productivity is an output-input ratio. But at the macro level, productivity is a measure of performance of an economy or country. From a nation’s viewpoint productivity is the ratio of available goods and services to the potential resources of the country.

Productivity means an economic measure of output per unit of input. Output refers to the total production in terms of units or in terms of revenues while input refers to all the factors of production used like capital, labour, equipment, etc. Productivity is a good indicator of the efficiency with which a factory is operating. If a firm has higher productivity, i.e. it produces more with a given amount of inputs, it means it is utilising the resources properly.

Similarly, a lower productivity indicates wastage of resources and time. It is vital to have a high productivity rate because resources like capital and time are scarce and should be exploited in the best possible way. Productivity can be calculated as the ratio of the volume of output to the volume of inputs.

For the long term growth of the firm and the economy as a whole, it is impertinent that a high level of productivity is maintained. A high productivity means that the resources are utilised to the optimum, while minimizing wastage. This leads to reduction in cost of production, and subsequently availability of quality products to customers at lower price. Profitability of the firm is also related to its productivity. More profits mean that more retained earnings which would ultimately increase shareholders’ wealth.

Productivity – Concept (With Formula)

The concept of productivity can be applicable to any economy, small, medium and large business, government and individuals. Productivity aims at the maximum utilization of resources for yielding as many goods and services as possible, desired by consumers at lowest possible cost. Productivity is the ratio of output in a period of time to the input in the same period time.

“Productivity is the quantitative relation between; what a firm produces and what a firm uses as a resource to produce output, i.e. arithmetic ratio of amount produced (output) to the amount of resources (input)”.

Productivity is the ratio between output of wealth and input of resources used in production processes. Output means the quantity of products produced and the inputs are the various resources used in the production. The resources used may be land, building, equipment, machinery, materials, labour etc.

What makes people productive?

There is no magic formula for productivity. But decades of research suggest that some people are better able to execute and be productive than others and that personality, motivation, and emotions all play a key role in how well someone is able to get things done. While some factors that drive productivity, like personality, aren’t always easy to change, those who feel naturally less productive need not despair. Anyone can take steps to increase their productivity, identify hacks and techniques that work for them, and overcome obstacles to productivity that may be in their path.

In humans, the drive for productivity tends to be motivated by a set of overlapping natural desires. These include a desire to contribute to a group, a desire to be challenged and mentally stimulated, and a desire to fulfill basic needs such as food, shelter, and safety. Such desires could motivate someone to complete a project at work, clean the house, make dinner for loved ones, or engage in any other necessary task.

Beyond these basic needs, productive pursuits are also driven by identity and emotions; people may be motivated to complete a difficult project because it will grant social status, for instance, or because they will feel pride afterward. The desire to be perceived by others as a productive person—a highly valued trait in many cultures—may also motivate someone to get things done, even if they aren’t technically necessary for survival.

Best Productivity Books

— It’s no secret I’m a fan of Drucker. This book provides a practical perspective on productivity that I think every knowledge worker should read. The most important lesson I’ve learned about work is this: It’s not about what you do, it’s about the results you get. That’s the difference between efficiency and effectiveness. Sending 100 emails per hour might be a very efficient use of your time. But what results does it bring you? That’s what matters the most. — Productivity is about doing the right things. And this book helps you to focus better on what matters to you, personally. Once you know what you’re after, it’s easier to get there. — Forming new habits is a practical skill that immediately impacts the quality of your life. Want to lose weight? Be more productive? Exercise regularly? Build successful companies? One thing is sure: Without habits, those things will be extremely difficult to pull off. — A unique insight into the habits and rituals of the world’s most renown figures. You’ll be surprised how simple their lives were.

Productivity tools can make your life a lot simpler. They help you to save time, improve focus, and improve the overall quality of our work. However, every time I talk about productivity tools, I also talk about the downside. Too much technology often decreases our productivity. That’s why the list of apps and tools is short. I don’t overcomplicate productivity.

Authorship:

https://www.economicsdiscussion.net/management/productivity-meaning-concept-formulas/32324
https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/basics/productivity
https://dariusforoux.com/what-is-productivity/
Productivity

Productivity isn’t just a way to get more done at work – or grow more pumpkins. When you’re thinking, “ What is productivity to me ? Why do I want to be more productive?,” the most obvious answer that will probably come to mind is that you’ll have more free time to do the things you enjoy doing. If you’re able to reach your goals sooner, that leaves you time to set and achieve other goals, whether that’s relaxing with a book or learning a new skill.

What is productivity, really?

The classic productivity definition is “a way to measure efficiency.” In an economic context, productivity is how to measure the output that comes from units of input. Farming makes for a good example: One acre of land that produces 10 pumpkins? That’s not very productive. But one acre of land that produces 2,000 pumpkins? That’s a much better return on your pumpkin planting.

But what is productivity in our daily lives? It’s easy to produce theories and examples based on abstract units of work or numbers of plants, but your life isn’t a managed supply chain. To get what you want in life, you need to learn that what makes you productive isn’t a day planner or a to-do list. The art of productivity goes much deeper.

What is productivity?

Writer Charles Duhigg defines productivity as “making certain choices in certain ways” that moves us from being “merely busy” to “genuinely productive” in his book Smarter Faster Better . Tony Robbins’ approach to productivity focuses on ways people can systematize and better manage their lives so they can stop procrastinating and have more time to do what they want.

How do you define productivity? While the end goal for how to be productive in life is personal, productivity is always about getting the results you want with less time and effort. When you’re trying to understand how to be productive, what you’re really seeking is a way to achieve your goals while having time to spend on what matters. “We’re living through an economic revolution,” Duhigg said in an interview on The Tony Robbins Podcast .

Increasing Efficiency

Given that workplace productivity is basically completing goals in a timely manner, it is important to understand how to accomplish that without sacrificing the quality of the work. This means that in addition to being quick, employees must also be correct. It is the efficiency that cannot be ignored if maximum productivity is the aim.

In order to increase efficiency, and ultimately workplace productivity, employees can do a number of things. In today’s technological world, getting rid of distractions is one of the first necessary steps to achieving efficiency and productivity. This often means silencing personal cell phones, blocking social media from work computers, and even turning off music with lyrics.

It is also recommended to focus on the least favorite item on your to-do list first thing in the morning. While doing the easy tasks first might seem as though you can ease into the workday, in truth, you are putting off the things that require more effort. By the end of the day, you will likely lose steam and have to put off those tasks for the following day.

That said, some people are not as productive in the mornings. It is important to identify your own most productive hours. Once those hours have been identified, scheduling tasks based on difficulty within those times will help to achieve the highest level of efficiency.

The most efficient day will not only be scheduled out, but the day will adhere to that schedule. Using a daily to-do list and a timer will allow you to ensure that no time is being wasted and the appropriate tasks are getting done at the most efficient times. If a task takes longer than scheduled for, analyze the situation and learn how to improve.

Efficiency is also hugely affected by goal setting. While a to-do list can be daily goals of sorts, other goals, such as sales reached this week, or total words written today can make noticeable positive changes. Whatever it is that your company would like to accomplish for long term reasons should be written down and truly attempted to achieve.

Although some workers feel that a break does nothing but waste time, it can actually help to clear the mind and allow working times to be better. When the brain spends so much time on a specific task without a break, it can be difficult to come up with new information or thoughts on the topic. This why a 10-15 minute break strategically placed throughout the day can help productivity.

Productivity also gets a boost when your office space is clean and properly organized. Ensuring that items are where they should not only save time from looking for it, but it can help in the thought process. When we have to stop during our most productive times in order to locate a document, we can easily post our train of thought. Getting back into the right mindset after searching for that document can be a struggle, thus a productivity killer.

Surprisingly, multitasking is not a way to improve productivity or efficiency. In fact, performing multiple tasks at once will likely diminish the quality of the work and take longer in the long run. While it may seem like so much is being accomplished, by avoiding multitasking and completing the tasks one at a time, both quality and time will be saved.

By taking the time to learn how to be more efficient, a company and its employees will discover that productivity provides benefits in numerous ways. Focusing on those benefits will help to drive change.

How to be productive in life

We all have 24 hours in a day; productivity is being able to make the most of them and create lasting habits of achievement and fulfillment instead of chasing endless lists of tasks. Here’s how to work smarter, not harder.

1. Discover what makes you productive

Why have you set those goals in the first place? If you really want to increase your productivity , think about what’s driving you to do so. Sure, you probably want to make more money at your job or be able to go on more vacations, but why? What’s the hunger or purpose that’s driving your actions?

2. Look to others for productivity in action

We’d all like to succeed with less effort. But how can you calculate productivity, let alone increase it? Your first step is to find some models of what productivity means and what it doesn’t mean to you personally. As Tony says, success leaves clues. Failure does, too.

If your desire to increase your productivity begins at work, model your success after a colleague noted for their productivity. Look for someone who’s got a clear vision for their day, sets limits on their time and even gets projects done early. Ask them how they designed their particular structure and if they’re using any tools. You can start to design your own method based on theirs.

3. Turn productivity into a habit

It would be nice to say “I’m making a change” and then it just happens with no further effort on your part. But learning how to be productive in life , like any other shift, requires some work on your end. It can take up to three months to form a new habit , whether that’s creating a daily checklist of tasks to guide your day or building out a weekly gym habit.

Once something becomes a habit, it becomes much easier to integrate into a routine. Soon, you realize that a task can become second nature. By turning productivity into a habit , you can achieve far more in your professional and personal life.

4. Get the right tools

Tony tells us that success is 80% psychology and 20% mechanics – but it’s still important to have the right tools in our toolbox. From apps to daily planners, there are plenty of products out there. Tony has used his decades of experience coaching top businesspeople, entrepreneurs and athletes to create his own proven methods for productivity , like:

The Rapid Planning Method®️ (RPM™)

The Time of Your Life®

As Tony says, “You can’t have a plan for your day until you have a plan for your life.” With this ten-day program, you’ll discover what really matters to you – and how to create more time for those things in your life.

Remember, there’s a big difference between movement and achievement; while to-do lists guarantee that you feel accomplished in completing tasks, they don’t ensure that you move closer to your ultimate goals. There are many ways to increase your productivity ; the key is choosing the ones that are right for you and your ultimate goals.

Authorship:

https://www.tonyrobbins.com/productivity-performance/what-is-productivity-really/
https://opensourcedworkplace.com/news/what-is-workplace-productivity-how-to-increase-and-why
https://www.tonyrobbins.com/productivity-performance/what-is-productivity-really/
Productivity

As a student you may find yourself bogged down with work, trying really hard to get your grades up in order to reach your goals and ambitions for the future. It’s challenging for everyone and if you don’t structure your time right, it can become a real nightmare.

Productivity

The main productivity means getting the results you want with less time and effort. When you’re trying to understand how to be productive, what you’re really seeking is a way to achieve your goals while having time to spend on what matters.

We all want to know how to increase productivity and how to improve our time management strategies in order to lead more productive and fulfilling lives. But sometimes, however hard we try we just find ourselves getting distracted by everything, everywhere.

Whether you’re a student or a professional in the workplace, there’s always a way to procrastinate and waste time, and that to-do list you were so sure you’d finish by the end of the day, just goes out the window. With barely anything checked off of it, you go home at the end of the day with a feeling of self doubt and annoyance knowing you could have got more done should you have just concentrated harder and been less distracted.

Researchers in the past have noticed that productivity can be cultivated through focusing on meaningful elements of a larger goal, or focusing on a larger meaningful goal that can help activate energy and drive to complete tasks.

With that in mind, it’s time to increase productivity whether you’re at work, studying at school or just looking for a way to get more done during the day and we’re here to give you some of the best tips and tricks to help you improve your productivity starting today!

What are the main measures?

Usually, the growth in labour productivity exceeds the growth in multifactor productivity. The additional contribution comes from ‘capital deepening’. That is, the accumulation of more and better capital equipment over time helps to make people more productive.

The output of simple businesses can sometimes be measured in physical units, such as the number of shoes or tons of steel. However, when thinking about entire industries or the economy as a whole, the range of different outputs need to be added together. The Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) calculates productivity using a measure of output called ‘gross value added’ (GVA), which is the value of the output produced by a firm minus the intermediate inputs used (materials, services and energy used in production).

In what parts of the economy is productivity measured?

The most accurate estimates of productivity are for those industries where prices are set in markets — known as the ‘market sector’. Market prices provide a measure of the quality of different products and make it easier to measure output in terms of real industry gross value added. The ABS provides estimates for two ‘market sectors’ — the 12 and 16 industry market sectors — the latter distinguished by the fact that less historical data are available.

Labour productivity can also be measured for the whole economy (in terms of real GDP per hour worked). Labour productivity measured in this way contributes to growth in living standards (commonly measured as GDP per capita), but is a poorer indicator of technological change and efficiency improvement because of the difficulty measuring output in health, education and public administration.

Productivity measurement: a stylised example

Suppose Ben works in a chocolate factory. Ben’s boss, Colin, wants to measure the labour productivity of his workforce in order to make operational improvements at the factory. Colin estimates that during a 40 hour work week, Ben produces 2000 chocolate bars. So Colin calculates Ben’s labour productivity as:

While this allows Ben’s performance to be compared to other employees in the chocolate bar branch, Colin cannot compare Ben to employees in the chocolate biscuit division. To allow for comparison, Colin estimates the gross value added of Ben producing 2000 chocolate bars is $4000. Colin then calculates Ben’s labour productivity as:

Other Useful Productivity Apps

30. 24me (Android, iOS, Web)

What you need is an assistant, but then you’d have to keep up with their calendar! That’s where the 24me sync comes in. It’s the smart personal assistant to sync all of your calendars–including Google, Microsoft 365, Yahoo and whatever else.

31. Grammarly (Android, iOS, Web)

32. Pocket (Android, iOS, Web)

You can save any article that you want and then read it later in a simpler, less-cluttered interface. You can also tag and organize any of your articles, so if you’re interested in a particular topic then it stays top of mind. Their suggested reading list is a winner, too.

Authorship:

https://blocksite.co/productivity/
https://www.pc.gov.au/what-is-productivity
https://clickup.com/blog/productivity-apps/

This business analysis technique is used when a technology solution is changed. For example migration from one technology to another which enforces builds from scratch. In this type of analysis technique, a business analyst mainly focuses on system performance and data storage requirements to measure the performance factors of the proposed system for live data. Non-functional requirement analysis is performed during the Analysis phase of a project and implemented during the Design phase.

Business Analysis: How To Analyze Any Business

Business analysis is a research discipline that helps driving change within an organization by identifying the key elements and processes that drive value. Business analysis can also be used in Identifying new business opportunities or how to take advantage of existing business opportunities to grow your business in the marketplace.

As I received this question over and over again, I thought to show a simple framework to analyze any business. For the sake of this framework, we’ll leverage on business analysis to reverse engineer a business to either help it grow or to gather insights that can help us grow our own company.

Keep in mind the business analysis requires a good amount of creativity, and while a single framework is a good starting point, you will need to use your experience, understanding of the industry and what is available out there to draw a picture of what you’re looking at.

Thus, while we’ll be using a few data points to understand a business, we want to keep our minds able to connect the dots in several areas to draw a picture that unlocks strategic insights that we can test.

Financial moat

How does it make money?

Revenue streams are important as a baseline to understand any business. Following the money can be very powerful in business as it unlocks a set of questions that will help us drill down into the current picture but also to draw some possible conclusions about future operations and strategy.

From this first look, we can depart from looking at other bets and other revenues. Not because those are not important for the future. Quite the opposite, one of the hidden gems of Google’s success in the next ten, twenty years might hide there.

But here we’re not trying to predict the future, which is impossible. We want to reverse engineer the current business to gather some insights which will help us drive our own strategy now (for instance, if you’re building a business today by gaining organic traffic from Google understanding its logic helps a lot!).

Where’s the real cash?

How does the company spend money?

List of Best Business Analysis Techniques

However, as a business analyst or a professional who wants to pursue a business analyst career, it is required to know about some of those best business analysis techniques. Hence, in this blog, we will discuss 10 most popular business analysis techniques that are widely used in the industries.

SWOT analysis is one of the most popular business analysis techniques followed in the industry. Furthermore, it is easy. It is an enterprise level analysis technique and not only limited to business analysis. It could be used at any stage of the project if the unit needs it and most of the people know it. Hence, it is widely used in the industry.

MOST Analysis

MOST analysis is a powerful business analysis framework and among the best business analysis techniques using which the business analysts analyze what an organization does and plans to achieve the goal and what it should do to maintain strategic alignment. Hence, MOST analysis is a clear way to understand an organization on its ability and purpose.

Mission: This is the most critical factor for an organization which defines its purpose and the goals it wants to achieve in the future. If the mission is specific, then it is easier to analyze and measure the remaining factors.

MOST analysis is a structured business analysis technique followed by every working level in an organization from the top to down. The process ensures that an organization retains focus on the mission which is the critical factor for the success of an organization.

Support the Technical Implementation

On a typical project employing a business analyst, a significant part of the solution involves a technical implementation team building, customizing, and/or deploying software. During the technical implementation, t here are many worthwhile support tasks for you to engage in that will help drive the success of the project and ensure the business objectives are met.

• Reviewing the solution design to ensure it fulfills all of the requirements and looking for opportunities to meet additional business needs without increasing the technical scope of the project.
• Updating and/or repackaging requirements documentation to make it useful for the technology design and implementation process.
• Engaging with quality assurance professionals to ensure they understand the business context for the technical requirements. This responsibility may include reviewing test plans and/or test cases to ensure they represent a clear understanding of the functional requirements.
• Making yourself available to answer questions and help resolve any issues that surface during the technical design, technical implementation, or testing phases of the project.
• Managing requirements changes to ensure that everyone is working from up-to-date documentation and that appropriate stakeholders are involved in all decisions about change.
• When appropriate, leading user acceptance testing efforts completed by the business community to ensure that the software implementation meets the needs of business end users.

Help the Business Implement the Solution

Your technology team can deliver a beautiful shiny new solution that theoretically meets the business objectives, but if your business users don’t use it as intended and go back to business-as-usual, your project won’t have delivered on the original objectives. Business analysts are increasingly getting involved in this final phase of the project to support the business.

A lot happens throughout the course of a project. Business outcomes are discussed. Details are worked through. Problems, big and small, are solved. Relationships are built. Change is managed. Technology is implemented. Business users are trained to change the way they work.

In this flurry of activity and a focus on delivery, it’s easy to lose track of the big picture. Why are we making all these changes and what value do they deliver for the organization? And even more importantly, are we still on track? Meaning, is the solution we’re delivering actually delivering the value we originally anticipated?

Nothing creates more positive momentum within an organization than a track record of successful projects. But if we don’t stop and assess the value created by the solution, how do we know if we are actually operating from a track record of success?

Sources:

https://fourweekmba.com/business-analysis/
https://www.whizlabs.com/blog/best-business-analysis-techniques/
https://www.bridging-the-gap.com/business-analysis-process/

The pressure to perform at a high level can often result in mistakes and inefficient habits. Learn from your mistakes and take ownership of them. Communicate in an open and honest manner. Ask for or provide help when needed and remember that every new mistake is also an opportunity for better performance.

Why a workplace mistake could be the best move you’ve made

Ah, the work blooper. Whether you’re an intern or the CEO, a self-orientated perfectionist or if you swear you triple-checked your email recipient, one day you WILL make a mistake. It’s an inevitable and unavoidable part of life.

For article research, I asked friends, colleagues and LinkedIn’ers if they’d be willing to reveal their most unforgettable career-clangers. The responses wove a fascinating (and hilarious) tapestry of goofs. A helpful reminder that we’re all human – it’s the quirks of our mental make up that truly makes us interesting – and that even the most painful slip-ups can be helpful…

Why do we make mistakes anyway?

From clean forgetting the attachment on an all-company email to accidentally forwarding a highly inappropriate spam video to your Chair of Trustees – rather than flagging it with your PR team as you’d intended – the workplace gaffe is cringingly familiar.

It’s safe to say most people have experienced the palpable gut-wrench of making an absolute clanger. So why do we make mistakes? Are we simply being careless or in a rush? Ignoring our intuitions and pushing ahead with an approach we know deep down will fail? Or is there more at play than personality and intelligence?

American journalist and author Joseph T. Hallinan thinks so. In his book ‘ Why We Make Mistakes ’ , he believes humans are pre-programmed to mess up because of our inbuilt ‘design flaws’. That it’s the way we think, see and remember – and forget – that leads us to make mistakes. By delving into psychology, neuroscience, and economics, he deduces that the same qualities that make us efficient can also make us prone to error.

These design flaws, like when our eyes play tricks on us, are all-too-relatable. ‘I once sent an email about how incompetent and what a pain in the a***e a client was – only to send it directly to him’ said one of my friends.

Not spotting a missing letter can also wreak havoc, as a teacher friend discovered. ‘My teaching assistant was responsible for the gardening club and needed to write an emergency flyer home to parents due to bad weather. She intended to ask them to wear wet-weather gear – wellies in particular. But, the note read something along the lines of. ‘Dear gardeners, please don’t forget to bring your willies to school tomorrow!’. It was my job to check – I missed it and the note went home. Thank goodness our parents are fairly good humoured!’.

Why is it good to mess up?

None of us are entirely flawless but we’re acclimatised to curated perfection in our virtual worlds. We share our successes and luminous achievements to our followers, but we rarely exhibit our failures when things haven’t gone so well.

Then again, messing up can feel like the end of the world. The immediate reaction is usually negative; panic, nausea, wild irrationality. As you simultaneously update your LinkedIn profile in readiness for a new-job search and WhatsApp your friends requesting an urgent wine-up to wallow in catharsis, you can feel like the worst (*add job title here) in the country.

Yet giving yourself permission to make mistakes could actually make you stronger. No matter how crushing they feel at the time, getting it wrong can be right in the long term. As Viv Groskop explains in her article for The Pool , ‘ the more we stumble the less likely we are to head towards a major fall’. Making a mistake allows you to pause and reflect on the decisions made and actions taken which caused the error. Essentially, you get clarity on what’s gone wrong and can take steps to put it right.

Post-mistake anxiety – the I never want to experience this embarrassment or worry ever again feeling – can be the driving force to do better next time. You may also push yourself in a way you wouldn’t if you’re used to playing it safe and striving for perfection.

Author Elizabeth Day’s inspiring podcast ‘ How To Fail With Elizabeth Day ’ celebrates the things that haven’t quite gone right. Every week, she asks her interviewee what they learned from their failures and how to do it better next time, – and succeed. In her article for The Guardian , she shares, ‘I realised that the biggest, most transformative moments of my life came through crisis or failure’. Crucially, she survived. ​

So, what can I learn from a mistake?

► Embed a valuable skill. When one senior designer first started out in publishing, he printed ‘10,000s of John Grisham audiobooks with the title misspelt on the spine. It was…quite a biggy’. Gulp. Yet, the one thing they’ve carried with them, apart from an innate fear of a legal thriller, is how crucial it is to double check anything that goes public. My friend who sent a disparaging email about a client TO the client? ‘I never wrote a single word about anyone on my work email ever again!’.

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If you’re looking for interview tips, you’ve come to the right place. With decades of experience in guiding our candidates through interviews successfully, and helping them secure their dream job, we’ve compiled The Ultimate Interview Guide. By combining our collective experience, we’ve crafted the one guide you’ll need to get ahead and stand out amongst the other candidates rallying for the role you’re after. The Ultimate Interview Guide looks at every type of interview, each and every interview stage, what to expect, what questions to ask and more. Download the guide by clicking below today! The Ultimate Interview Guide.pdf Size: 74.5 MB ​ 12 tips for video interview success These days there’s a good chance your next interview will be conducted via the magic of Zoom*, introducing a whole new world of things to worry about beforehand. Fortunately executive recruitment expert Jenny Hills is here with practical tips to get the best from the process. Read more >> *other videoconferencing solutions are, of course, terrifyingly available.

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How should managers react to mistakes at work?

Managers are responsible for reacting to and assisting employees with mistakes at work. Even in the most high-pressure situations, doing so with care is not only good for morale but will prevent similar mistakes in the future. How a manager reacts to mistakes at work can make all the difference between transformational leadership and losing otherwise great employees.

Great managers can also recognize when they themselves have made mistakes. Before you approach a team member, take a close look at yourself to see if you’re really worried about their work. If so, what do you think about their performance? Who is responsible for their work so far?

You may find that you’ve contributed to the environment, the process, or the miscommunication that made the mistake possible. Reflecting on this ahead of time will relieve everyone of playing the blame game and instead solve the problem from a fair and level-headed place.

When approaching an employee who has made a mistake, start by being curious about it. Ask questions about what happened and what their perspective is on the situation. Use active listening skills when speaking to team members, as it will let them know that you are paying attention.

They may fess up immediately. If they take the blame for something that wasn’t their fault, which is pretty common, address that. If they don’t admit to making a mistake, approach the situation with care and focus on the issue, not placing blame.

Give the team members the autonomy to figure it out on their own. Then, provide your feedback in a fair and balanced manner. Afterward, encourage them to learn from it and avoid repeating the same mistake.

When communicating with an employee who has made a mistake, in-person meetings are often best. However, many teams are now made up of contractors, gig workers, and freelancers who work remotely so a physical location is not always accessible. If that’s the case, lean on digital tools to illustrate the issue.

For example, reports and individual task assignment lists from project management tools. These can also be used to prevent future mistakes, as managers can easily use them to communicate the actions and behaviors expected of team members and improve the overall work management process.

There may be times when mistakes happen over and over again. If that’s the case, the employee may be engaging in a pattern of behavior that keeps them from performing at their best. Managers can step in and provide ideas for healthy habits that will prevent the same type of mistake from cropping up again.

For example, you can ask a marketing team member to overcome a common marketing mistake of missing a content publishing deadline by writing a to-do list every day. This will help them stay on top of their tasks while also motivating them to finish their work at the same time.

How to admit a mistake in a professional environment

You may end up in a situation in a professional environment where an apology is needed. And when it comes to making mistakes at work, honesty is the best policy. Certain actions can break trust, but an apology can help rebuild it.

It’s important to address the person you’re apologizing to by name, regardless of their status. Having an open conversation can help both of you understand the other person better, and it can prevent an insincere apology from happening.

If the mistake you made affected someone personally, it’s important to validate the feelings of the other person. Having the courage to admit that you’re sorry can make a huge difference in how people treat you.

Take responsibility for your actions and have a plan in place for how to make amends before you approach the appropriate person or people. Having a plan in place shows that you’re thinking about how to make things right. You may even want to read about examples of taking responsibility at work and model your behavior on whichever feels appropriate for the situation.

Sources:

https://www.harrishill.co.uk/blog/2018/12/Why%20a%20workplace%20mistake%20could%20be%20the%20best%20move%20you’ve%20made
https://www.wrike.com/blog/how-to-handle-mistakes-at-work/
https://www.indeed.com/career-advice/career-development/mistakes-at-work

Empathy can also help you understand and address your coworkers’ challenges, such as an increased workload or a personal matter. You can practice empathy by offering to help in any way you can. This gesture can show your team members that you are dedicated to ensuring the team’s success and will assist them to reach team goals.

Examples Of Empathy In The Workplace

It’s no surprise that great leaders and thriving organizations care about empathetic communication among their teams. But research shows that empathetic communication skills are in short supply. In this article, we outline six ways leaders and workplaces can practice empathetic communication in the workplace.

Empathy includes understanding another person’s feelings and perspective. It can be a powerful tool for leaders and managers. Using empathy helps us to navigate our relationships and the world around us. It is a critical piece of emotional intelligence.

Empathy can also give you a career boost. A study by DDI, a management consulting company, found it was a critical driver of overall performance. Researchers have also found that those with empathy are rated as higher performers by their bosses. Unfortunately, the DDI study found that only 40 percent of leaders have strong empathic abilities.

What Is Empathy?

In its simplest form, empathy is the ability to recognize emotions in others, and to understand other people’s perspectives on a situation. At its most developed, empathy enables you to use that insight to improve someone else’s mood and to support them through challenging situations.

Empathy is often confused with sympathy, but they are not the same thing. Sympathy is a feeling of concern for someone, and a sense that they could be happier. Unlike empathy, sympathy doesn’t involve shared perspective or emotions.

You can feel sympathy for someone you see in tears in the street, for example, without knowing anything about their situation. Sympathy may develop into empathy, but doesn’t necessarily do so.

According to influential psychologist Daniel Goleman, empathy is one of the five key components of emotional intelligence – a vital leadership skill. It develops through three stages: cognitive empathy, emotional empathy and compassionate empathy. We discuss each stage in turn, below.

Cognitive Empathy

Cognitive empathy is the ability to understand what another person might be thinking or feeling. It need not involve any emotional engagement by the observer.

Managers may find cognitive empathy useful in understanding how their team members are feeling, and therefore what style of leadership would get the best from them today. Similarly, sales executives can use it to gauge the mood of a customer, helping them to choose the most effective tone for a conversation.

Cognitive empathy is a mostly rational, intellectual, and emotionally neutral ability. This means that some people use it for negative purposes. For example, those with a Machiavellian personality trait may use cognitive empathy to manipulate people who are emotionally vulnerable.

Emotional Empathy

Emotional empathy is the ability to share the feelings of another person, and so to understand that person on a deeper level. It’s sometimes called "affective empathy" because it affects or changes you. It’s not just a matter of knowing how someone feels, but of creating genuine rapport with them.

3 tips to develop your empathy in the workplace

As a manager, developing these skills should be top of mind if you want to create a team built on trust, connection, and open communication. Here are some tips to help you flex that empathy muscle!

1. See things from your employee’s perspective by getting involved in their day

While this may seem obvious, putting yourself in your team’s shoes will help you remember what their day-to-day struggles look and feel like. One of the quickest ways to build empathy for your team and understand what they need is to go through what they are going through.

We spoke with Mario the manager who explained to us that his team was working slower than anticipated and not on schedule to submit a project. Before getting upset with them, he knew he needed to understand where they were coming from.

🎙 “I would show up on-site as early as they did so that I could spend the day working with them. This helped me better understand their roadblocks so that I could help them find a solution. I knew that I would not be able to move the project along any quicker without really understanding what my team was going through.” – Mario

💡 Tip: Before drawing conclusions about someone’s behavior or outcomes, ask yourself if you’ve done enough to empathize, and consider alternative explanations. This is all part of taking on their perspective!

2. Sharpen your active listening skills

Sam the manager explains that when he notices someone on his team acting out of the norm, he will often ask them questions to better understand what they are going through beyond work.

🎙 “Once they start talking, I will simply listen. This helps them feel comfortable opening up and I often respond by letting them know that I am here to support them. I encourage them to take the time and space they need to express themselves and don’t judge or question their feelings.” – Sam

Why is empathy important in the workplace?

Each person has their own values, cultural understandings, backgrounds and perspectives that make them unique. You can use your ability to empathize and understand others when working on these types of teams. Here are other benefits to being empathetic at work:

1. Improves communication

When you practice empathy, you are better able to adapt your communication style to the person or group you are interacting with. You can adjust your tone of voice or body language to best fit the conversation, such as if you are giving a presentation or speaking with a supervisor.

2. Strengthens working relationships

3. Boosts creative thinking

When you use empathy in the workplace, you may also develop more creative solutions. As a team, your company may ask you to consider your audience’s perspective or the most important needs of your target customers. Using empathy can help you and your team members put yourselves in the customer’s place and think of strategies that would most appeal to you in that situation.

Understanding a product or service from the recipient’s point of view can help you identify challenges or opportunities you hadn’t thought of before and be more willing to experiment with new solutions.

4. Increases sales and investment opportunities

Empathy in the workplace can help you better understand the motivation of your current and future stakeholders, such as clients, customers and investors.

Investors may have differing motivations for choosing companies, so you can practice empathy by researching your potential investors. Discover their professional background to identify any similarities you may share. During your conversation, appeal to their knowledge and experience that likely impacts their decisions.

You can apply the same research tactics and discussion methods when securing contracts with new clients or updating old contracts with current clients. Research to discover what is important to them so you can appeal to their needs in your pitch. Identify potential challenges their company may face that your company can provide solutions to.

The benefits of empathy:

Empathy is being able to put yourself in someone else’s shoes and understand what they might be experiencing. This helps you connect with those around you and can lead to a healthier work environment where people don’t feel alone or isolated.

A lack of empathy can cause problems as well. According to studies, workplaces that have a “cutthroat” attitude and create a culture that doesn’t value teamwork or compassion for one another suffer from higher turnover rates.

Instead of focusing on the bigger picture, employees become more concerned with their own personal progress which can lead to infighting and backstabbing within the company.

References:

https://www.togetherplatform.com/blog/empathetic-communication
https://www.mindtools.com/pages/article/EmpathyatWork.htm#:~:text=How%20to%20Develop%20Empathy%20at%20Work%201%20Give,%22right%20way%22%20to%20demonstrate%20your%20compassionate%20empathy.
https://officevibe.com/blog/empathy-in-the-workplace
https://www.indeed.com/career-advice/career-development/empathy-in-the-workplace
https://academyflex.com/empathy-in-the-workplace/