Dodo Loves Marketing

• First, do your homework. Find out if anyone else in the organization is working — or has worked — from home. Your union as well as the personnel department may know. If so, arrange to have a drink or meeting with them, to find out how they tackled the subject, how the arrangement works or, if it has stopped, why it ended.

• When I decided to move to the Isle of Bute, in Scotland, I thought I’d have to leave the bank,’ says Kevin Attwood, Strategic Planning Development Officer for Nat West who now works two days from home, and three in London. ‘In fact, I kept the move so quiet that when I told my boss I’d moved to Scotland over the weekend, he was flabbergasted. When we had lunch I said flippantly, that if I’d got my act together I would have come up with a strategic plan for teleworking. He told me to come up with a proposal. I rung up people in the bank who were already working from home some of the time and talked to them extensively before coming up with my plans. Listening to their experiences helped me make a convincing proposal.’ ..more
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Motivation is perhaps the single biggest factor in making the difference between success and failure in any business venture. Surveys have shown that poorly motivated employees, however hard they are worked, consistently produce poorer work than those who may work less hours but have better motivation.

But what gives us our motivation differs with our personalities. For some people, motivation is largely external. They work hard because they have external rewards to motivate them — a pay cheque, the approval of colleagues, or a boss breathing down their neck. However, when you work at home, you are largely out of sight — and possibly out of mind — of your boss. (This is the major reason cited by managers for their opposition to teleworking. In a recent Department of Trade and Industry study, many managers said that they did not approve of teleworking, because without a boss to manage employees their work would invariably decline.) Even more challenging, you may actually be your own boss. If you have been the sort of person who regards the boss’s holiday as a good reason to down tools yourself, you may well have problems working from home. ..more

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Practical confrontation skills

Being able to stand up to people and speak firmly and constructively to them, is a valuable skill in handling problem people. If you tend to fume and walk away from a confrontation muttering to yourself, ‘I wish I had said . . . !! to that*O#!’, then you need confrontation skills.

Constructively confronting people is a communication strategy which allows you to speak your mind and represent your feelings in a direct way. It is not a strategy of name calling or aggressive outbursts. ..more

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Working Absenteeism

Absenteeism continues to be a major industrial and economic problem. The causes are numerous, but where worker satisfaction is high, absenteeism is generally low. The problem is all too frequently dismissed by workers as a fault with the system, but management generally takes a far more serious view. Absent workers put a strain on their workmates who are generally required to take over the duties of the missing person. With less than the required number of workers available, the work process can be significantly retarded causing serious declines in productivity.

If you, the worker, are aware that you are taking time off work for sickies or because you are feeling just a bit off, then you should ask yourself what is wrong with your work situation. What is prompting you to be absent when you are basically fit for work? We can all have grey to black days. However, if these days occur every week or so, there is a problem somewhere. ..more

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In terms of your advancement, promotion (or stagnation) and general welfare at work, the most important person outside of yourself is your boss. The relationships between bosses and their employees can be: close to distant, warm to cool, authoritarian to democratic, and open to closed, to name but a few relevant dimensions.

This could be devoted to the complexities of the boss-worker relationships, but there are two aspects which the worker would be well-advised to foster—trust and respect. ..more

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Most adults must go through a job interview before getting hired. Some teenagers have it easier. The high turnover rate in teenage jobs forces employers to fill positions quickly, sometimes without a formal interview. A desperate employer may conduct an interview like this one:

BOSS: Are you human?:

YOU:Yes.

BOSS: Are you an escaped convict?
YOU: No.

BOSS: You’re hired. ..more

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Do What’s Right

Your job is one of the toughest proving grounds for your integrity. Behavior that’s clearly wrong at home or among friends is often standard conduct at the workplace. Work is where many people who disapprove of lying, cheating, and stealing have no problem calling in sick when they aren’t, stretching the hours on their time cards, or taking home merchandise that’s not theirs.

Behave according to what you know, not according to the code of ethics that you see others following. ..more

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Here’s what I’m picturing: You worked hard to land a good job. Once there, you worked even harder, proving yourself as the ideal employee. In fact, you’ve done such excellent work that your employer has now made you a boss. New title, new responsibilities, (hopefully) new money, . . . and the power to tell other people what to do (get my coffee, shine my shoes, do ten push-ups).

Actually, you probably already know that being a leader is mostly what you do for other people—not to them. If you want to grow in your job and be as good a boss as you were a lowly worker, you’ll have to work harder than ever. Here are five ways to be a good boss. ..more

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A promotion is a victory, an accomplishment to be proud of. As excited and enthusiastic as you are to make your mark in the new job, there are unseen stumbling blocks on that higher rung that can trip you up if you’re not very careful.

Here are some common problems that recently promoted managers encounter and suggestions for handling them:

• Letting go. This is one of the biggest difficulties for newly promoted managers. They are more familiar with the problems of the old job and know how to fix them. And they usually feel more comfortable operating in the realm where they excelled.

Suggestion: Withdraw by delegating to people you have confidence in. The more you feel your staff is up to the job, the easier it will be. Reassess each person’s skills from your new perspective. ..more

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Like desperate survivors in a lifeboat, managers whose jobs are jeopardized because of company change sometimes resort to tactics they wouldn’t ordinarily consider.

One of the worst—backstabbing—often increases during a stormy period, but it can occur even in a normal business climate. It pays to be on the lookout for colleagues or superiors who may be out to undermine you so that you can decide when and how to respond.

• Motives. Backstabbers‘ actions are often triggered by several different things, rather than one particular factor. A sense of insecurity, which may be heightened during a period of transition, is most often the reason why someone tries to discredit you. You may exude an air of competence that the underminer perceives as threatening. Or your responsibilities may overlap territory the backstabber regards as his— or hers—alone. ..more
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You have been aware of the situation for some time now. Bits and pieces of overheard conversations, some rather telling comments from your boss, cryptic glances from some employees. Putting it all together, it seems to add up to one thing: One or more of the people who report to you are going behind your back, taking ideas, complaints, whatever, directly to your boss while bypassing you.

But though you are aware of what is happening, you don’t know why it is. “And that’s something I’m going to have to find out,” you tell yourself. “I’m getting it from both sides—and I have to find a way to put an end to it.” Now you wonder, just what is the best approach to take in a situation of this kind? ..more

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