Fun Things to Do with your Staff in the New Year

[To comment: larry@larrylitwin.com]

From Dale Carnegie short and sweet:

  • Office Road Trip:  Have a mandatory half-day of fun at a local mall or offsite venue.
  • Special Employee Awards: Recognize your coworkers for their achievements; sincere or silly.
  • Homemade Dessert: Have a day at the office where everyone can bring in their best homemade dessert. 
  • Employee Trivia: Test your knowledge about a coworkers’ unique habits, interests or quirks. You may be surprised by what you find out. 
Dale Carnegie® Training of Central & Southern New Jersey 
1 AAA Drive, Suite 102 | Hamilton, NJ 08691 
Office: (609) 631-0500 

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10 Tips To Help You — I call it Leadership 101

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From Anita Zinsmeister, president, Dale Carnegie Training of Central and Southern New Jersey

10 Tips To Help You
Become A Better Leader
 
  • Word count for this issue: 793
  • Approximate time to read: 3.2 minutes @ 250 words per minute 
When a business hits some turbulence, an executive’s instinct is sometimes to focus on greater efficiency and productivity by tightening control.  But the truth is that giving up authority and giving employees independence can improve innovation and success, even during crises.  With that in mind, we have put together a number of tips to help you or someone you know become a better leader in the coming months.    
 
10 Tips To Help You Maximize Your Leadership Skills:
 
1.  Build Better Relationships – Great leaders know the value of relationships.  They know who people are, what is important to them, and what motivates them.  Knowing this will help you understand their goals and how you can support them.  When you help people, they will care about you and your goals in return.
 
2.  Get To Know People On A Personal Level – If you take the time to get to know people you like, they will no doubt come to like you, too.  Furthermore, it is always nice to ask people about their families and interests.  You will also find that, if people like you, they will be more open to helping you and taking the extra time to get things done. 
 
3.  Develop A Mentoring Program – Great leaders know that mentoring someone will not only help develop that person’s career, but also help leaders refine their skills.
 
4.  Be Upbeat And Stay Positive – In the business world, it is easy to criticize what everyone does and to be negative, especially in this economy.  As a leader, you need to find ways to stay positive and find ways to do things better, faster and more effectively.  It is important to remember that people are not perfect, and while you do need to address poor performance, great leaders know the value of acknowledging when people are doing things correctly.  Doing so builds a positive work environment that helps make people feel appreciated.
 
5.  Know Your Strengths – We each have strengths and weaknesses.  That being said, you will find that it is better to spend time working on your strengths rather than your weaknesses.  By doing this, you will find that you can rise to the expert level sooner than you would be by working on your weaknesses.  Bottom line: Know what you are good at and keep at it.
 
6.  Surround Yourself With People Who Complement You – As I mentioned above, we all have strengths and weaknesses.  Great leaders know what their weaknesses are and find people who support their shortcomings.  Not because they need to cover their weaknesses, but because they know the benefit of having a strong team — and when the team wins, everyone wins. 
 
7.  Look At Your Career, Not So Much At The Company – Great leaders know that they are the ones who will create their own career paths; therefore, they will work on making it happen.  And once they become an expert in their selected careers, they will find that they can go almost anywhere they want to go.
 
8.  Respect Your People – If you do not like to be around people, let alone lead people, then do not take a leadership position.  Conversely, if you do want to be in a leadership position, start building relationships with people by respecting what they do.  Additionally, it is important that a great leader never misses an opportunity to learn more about the people behind them.  Great leaders never skip an employee’s birthday gathering or a holiday party because they are too busy — they know that work will always be there. 
 
9.  Balance Your Work And Personal Life – Great leaders are often times driven people, but they know the key to success is to balance work and family.  Life is too short for you to live at your job.  One day, when work is winding down, you will think to yourself I wished I had done things differently.  Unfortunately, it will be too late to do so.  Great leaders set career boundaries and know when to spend more time with family and friends. Doing this will make stronger leaders.
 
10.  Evolve Into Someone You Aspire To Become – Great leaders know that they are individuals and that, as an individual, they are not required to be like everyone else.  They also know that they can take the path less traveled, as the risk is sometimes greater than the reward.  To be a great leader, one must become a person of great interest who has great skills.   
 
Executive Summary: When it comes time to lead people, great leaders know the power of information, information they gather from listening to people they respect.  They also know what to say, how to say it and when to say it so that during tough times things get done.

[To comment: larry@larrylitwin.com]

Keep holiday cards professional

[To comment:larry@litwin.com]

From Hallmark comes this Tip to Succeed:

Keep holiday cards professional…
• Holiday greeting cards should be more tailored and formal than cards for family and friends. Keep messages brief and secular unless you are certain of the recipient’s religious faith.
• Sign each card personally – even if your name is preprinted on the card.
• An email greeting is a poor substitute for a real greeting card.
• Mailing holiday greeting cards first class will ensure they are delivered to a forwarding address or returned if the address cannot be located.
• Include your return address in the upper left-hand corner or on the back flap of the envelope.
• Use an office address when mailing holiday greeting cards to business associates.
• Take the extra step to verify how recipients’ names are spelled.

Marc Wagenheim – Hallmark

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Getting Media Coverage

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Number ONE is building relationships. No matter the market size, there are more opportunities to get your story on TV than ever before. The days of only two daily newscasts are long gone. Most television stations have early morning, mid-day and early afternoon casts in addition to the traditional 6 and 11 p.m. or 10 p.m. shows. They are hungry for excellent features. You can get YOUR story on the air.

          When you get a chance, check out Larry’s Blog via www.larrylitwin.com.

For now, here is a tactic – plus advice from the National Association of Broadcasters, which may be helpful – we have often used to build those relationships and – in fact – even received “side bars” on our approach. Here goes from The Public Relations Practitioner’s Playbook page 281 (Media Relations):

In-service For Reporters

A rarely used, but accepted and encouraged method among strategic communicators is the “in-service” for media members covering a long-term story or special event. A New Jersey school district that had lost nearly a dozen bond and budget referenda over several years determined that neither the public nor the media understood the issues.

The public relations professional and school administrators invited media to a series of workshops spread out over several weeks. The workshops, over lunch (reporters do have to eat), lasted 45 minutes to an hour. Media outlets were encouraged to send any reporter who might cover the next referendum. A number of handouts – electronic and printed – were distributed and visuals were used freely.

Attendance was excellent. The message was communicated to the reporters who in turn took it to the public in terms the audiences could understand. Those in-services – cutting edge at the time – were considered successful because the district went on a “winning streak” at the polls. (A number of media outlets were so impressed, they decided to run [side bar] stories on what they considered a unique approach.)

Getting On The Air (page 320)

The National Association of Broadcasters (NAB) suggests that if your appeal is to be effective, you should have the answer to some key questions before contacting local stations: (Some refer to it as the MAC Triad – message, audience, channel.)

  •  What is your message? [message] Are you sure of the basic idea you want to communicate?
  • Who should receive your message? [audience] Is it of general interest to a large segment of the audience? Can it be tailored to reach a specific audience?
  • How can you best put your message across? [channel] Does it have enough general interest for a special program? Would a PSA serve just as well?

Your answers to these questions should help you determine in advance whether your pitch will work.

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