Dodo Loves Marketing

Shyness affects just about everyone under certain situations. While most people cope reasonably well with occasional shyness, there are some who live in a personal prison, unable to reach out and make friends or relate positively to others. Being shy at work can severely limit work effectiveness, unless of course, you work generally on your own with little or no contact with others.

Shy people present themselves at work in many varied ways. There is the quiet wallflower who fades into the background and is not often noticed. At the opposite extreme, there is the raging extrovert who can be loud, aggressive and abrasive, but who finds it difficult to relate on an intimate level to others. In between, there are many other people, such as the knocker, the person who knocks or degrades others. ..more

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With reference to a particular person X at work, do you frequently

• Wake up in the morning and immediately think ‘Oh no, I’ve got to face X again today’?
• Store anger throughout the day about X?
• Find yourself frequently in conflict with X?
• Experience jealousy about others‘ ability to get on with X?
• Back away from confrontations with X and then get angry at
  yourself because of your inability to act appropriately?

• Disagree or have arguments with your boss, who unfortunately is X? ..more
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Harmonious and productive working relationships exist primarily because the needs of the individuals in the work team are being met. For some, there may be a need to remain quiet and removed so that they can get on with their work. For others, however, there may be a need to forge closer ties and warmer relationships with workmates. As long as the aims of the employing body are being met, then these varying needs of the work team members can be tolerated.

Problems occur, however, when this reciprocating system of need/satisfaction gets unbalanced. If one or more people want to satisfy needs which are outside the aims of the employing body or antagonistic to the other work team members, then problems occur. For example, if one person wants to manipulate the work schedule to ensure more flexitime at the expense of the others, then that person can expect some resultant turmoil in the group. As work team members often spend more time with each other than they do with their own family members, it is important to maintain positive and effective work relationships. Let’s look at several ways relationships at work can be enhanced and made more harmonious and productive. ..more

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Often when we decide we want something, we want it now, and when we do not get it straight away, we feel that life is unfair, that we have been treated unjustly, even cheated. Sometimes we convince ourselves that it is because others, and even forces beyond us, do not want us to have what we want. In choosing to believe that we have been singled out, we may rationalise that we must do unto others before they do unto us, or, at the very least, get in first before others, rather than adhere to the Golden Rule of treating others as we would wish to be treated. In taking things personally, we convince ourselves that the acquisition of our desires is at the mercy of the inquisition by others. ..more

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The only way to gain and keep the goodwill and high esteem of the people we work and live with is to deserve it. Each of us will eventually be recognised for what we are because of our motives, not for what we try to be through our moves. Having the right motives will always win over making the right moves, yet, often prompted by personal ambition, we focus on gaining quick success by learning artful techniques. In the long run, no technique, no matter how clever, can conceal the motives a person has in his or her heart.

Many businesses focus on making all the right moves with the understandable motivation of greater return. Indeed, the majority of employment training is on specific competency techniques to ensure that the right moves are practised. But the motives behind practising the right moves are not always in harmony with what the business purports to be in business for. ..more

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The new market leaders know that the greatest constraint on today’s customers is time—more critical even than money. The broader choices, the constant stream of innovations, and the pace of contemporary life conspire to crowd people’s schedules. Whether you’re in the market for a CD player for home or a new supplier of components for your company, you don’t have time to evaluate every option, consider every shred of information, and explore every contingency—even though it would probably be useful to do so.

Time is a flexible commodity: We willingly spend more of it on some activities than on others. A busy manager for whom every minute counts will happily spend hours on thegolf course, but an easygoing person with time to chat will hang up angrily on a telemarketer who calls at dinnertime. ..more

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