Benjamins Yarn

Every employer should want to boost morale, increase communication between staff members and in the end increase productivity, so why don’t all organisations send their staff to take part in team development events?

Maybe it’s because some of these events can suffer because they evoke negative connotations - many connected to the farcical events portrayed on television shows?

Certainly, the words and wisdom of David Brent from TV’s “The Office” have forced middle management personnel to consider themselves and wonder if that’s who they reflect.

Amongst Brent’s many, now well-known, quotes the one that best summarises his thinking about working as a team reads: “There may be no ‘I’ in team, but there’s a ‘ME’ if you look hard enough”.

Fans of the show will remember the brilliant show in which a team development expert visited their offices. Brent quickly took over, and transformed the meeting into essentially a celebration of him, including an interpretation of his seminal 1980s pop ballad “Free Love on the Freelove Freeway” on acoustic guitar.

However, in real life team development events are nothing like the cringeworthy and destructive nightmare depicted in the show.

Numerous companies across the country now offer businesses the opportunity to take their staff away from the office and away on a team building day.

Team building allows staff members to learn and develop the tools and skillsets required to drive business growth as well as sustain improvement and development.

And despite the worldwide recession, staff development remains essential to the growth of a business. In fact, it’s even more important, as when the recession stops there will certainly be opportunities for the best-managed businesses to take advantage of the developing marketplace.

Team development can take many different forms, from in-house education to getting out into the great outdoors and undertaking adventure courses, high ropes trails and personal challenges - which will certainly inspire and be memorable for staff members.

All these events are fashioned to encourage staff - regardless of age and background - to work as part of a team for the common aim of your company, and they all contribute to the common long-term goals of your organisation.

That’s why team development events are important to business growth. Just don’t follow the example of David Brent, whose hiring policy was simple: “Avoid employing unlucky people - throw half of the pile of CVs in the bin without reading them”.

If you’re reading this article, you’re most likely searching for a way to have control of your finances. The best way to do this is to develop a monthly budget and sticking to it. Having a sound budget is essential for managing money, one that has allowed me to live well even on limited funds. Managing my monthly budget is one of the most important things I do every month, and it has allowed me to consistently meet all expenses, grow my savings, and control debt.

I usually plan my budget for the coming month close to the end of the month. That gives me a heads up about what’s down the road. It’s not a good idea to develop a budget after getting paid because, too often, that flush feeling of having a paycheck leads to nonessential and impulsive spending before the paycheck ever reaches the bank.

I start my personal budget by outlining all the disbursements that must be paid on time like, loan repayments, utilities, insurance policy payments and car loans. The general idea is to apportion a budget for the things that I must pay to keep a adequate roof over my head and continue earning money. I like to pad these essentials to make “money back” after paying the bills and, if costs increase unexpectedly, I’m always covered.

Next, my budget is subjected to a list of discretionary things I need to cover but could live without if absolutely unavoidable. An example are monthly savings deposits, credit card repayments and donations. Don’t get me wrong, some of these things are also necessary, but in case of emergency they can be omitted. By paying credit card companies the maximum instead of the minimum, I keep my credit score high and my debt low.

My budget does not include the cost of food, clothing, or entertainment. Ultimately, these items get covered by what’s left in the budget. Some months involve lots of beans and rice, slow-cooker meals, free or cheap entertainment, and only one inexpensive piece of clothing . This strategy of overseeing my monthly budget has worked out very well over the long term as long as I honor it conscientiously.

It can often be hard to handle a family budget and ensuring that the expenses is in line with the overall household income. Most people aren’t used to managing finances under this much scrutiny, and they can let things get out of hand. This is particularly true in rough economic times, when you are balancing a full time job and also trying to care for a family. It is not right to waste what you have worked so hard to build, which is the main reason why you need to seek help. How do I get my budget back in control? It’s all about spending sagely.

The importance of my budget

Most people do not understand the importance until it is too late, but having a budget and following the plan is the most important thing you can do. Many folks find themselves asking why my budget doesn’t work over the long haul. In short, if you don’t have a plan for where your money is going, then you will have to scramble for resolutions at the end of every month. What each household need to do is to pay a visit to mybudget and get expert advise on their current financial situation. With any budget projecting, always try to be as organized as possible. As the head of the household, you owe it to yourself and to your family to be a reliable steward.

The challenges affiliated with organizing my budget

As you have learned, producing a budget is not easy. How much should we allot for food? What about funds for emergency situations? These are questions that you need to ask yourself to to factor in all the monthly costs. This is where establishing my budget can get so tricky, and I’m sure it’s the same with you. With all of the stress associated with working a job, it can often be easy to let these things slip by the wayside. After all, how important is just one bill? It is obviously very important, and if you want your family’s finances to be in order, then you should most definitely use a dependable programme like the one found at mybudget.

All in all, budgeting is a serious challenge and it’s something that can make you want to pull your hair out. With the resources at your disposal today, you can put your family’s finances into an coordinated plan and you can follow through with that plan completely. It’s helped with my budget, and it should do the same for yours.

It can be very stressful at times with overseeing my household budget, but not managing it can put me in to financial debt before I realize it. The gains from looking after mybudget correctly not only save me money but help to relieve some tension I have pertaining to my debt.

I have many things in life that regulate me financially, but there is probably nothing that impacts my finances more than a household budget. There are not many individuals these days who have learned how to budget and this can result in many financial troubles, including debt. Many of us think that creating a budget was too complex, this is the main reason why people get in to trouble. But in essence, creating a budget is not difficult at all; it is as easy as writing down what we spend and updating it every month. By practicing this habit, we do not spend more than we have.

It is important for me to keep in mind that my budget is only my programme for my monthly expenditure. Just like any programme, mybudget does call for me to oversee it to keep it working correctly. First step is to prepare the information that I need in it. I monitor my expenses like car loan repayments, utilities, car insurance, groceries, etc. If I do not organise mybudget, I can easy find myself in debt. It is very important for me to know how much I require on expenditures every month.

I see two benefits with keeping abreast with my finances through my budget. Firstly, it eliminates uncalled-for expenditure. Secondly, I can keep myself from going into unnecessary debt. When I spend my money wisely, I buy only things that are necessity and I free up money that I can use on something that I want or can save it. With the extra money I am able to save, I have the option of putting it aside and investing.

Sometimes I am not so miserable, ’cause dating games don’t “get” me. I finally bottomed out, merely hours ago I ate a whole bag of Oreos. On a weekend of datelessness, no less. You better believe it was great. Is that even legal? Honestly, it’s when I first thought about dating again in my area.

Nothing that can’t be fixed. I’ll meet new singles thru a matchmaking service like Great Expectations Dallas. That sounds like a plan. Here’s a story. While eating corn on the cob at George’s graduation in Dallas two weeks ago, my sister wanted to know if I’ve found my soulmate. I just can’t believe that came up. So, I said, “I’m eating here, and no.”

Can you believe that even “The Twerp” (my nephew, age 9) chimed in about marriage. I leveled to the whole group: “Hey look, my romantic destiny is right over there!”

Guess what? They smiled politely. Irritated, I emailed my astrologist because the dating pressure was too much. Why can’t I stop thinking about this! Nothing was helping and I needed some damn help. Chuck, who was a fellow Ram in high school (go Rams!) advised that I join Great Expectations. I said, “Sure, whatever.” What a relief. I am truly grateful for Great Expectations Denver.

When I started, dating events were kinda foreign from my perspective. This was all really foreign to me, so much so that I got a little queasy. This mess didn’t stop us from enjoying ourselves. That night I enjoyed was full of crazy-fun mingling. The greatest most memorable part of it all was the attractive, single women.

There’s something great about going to these glorious Great Expectations Dallas singles events and mixers, I rubbed elbows with a handful of marvelous guys and gals who I could tell share a like-minded spirit when talking about real-world dating. Can’t imagine why I used to let everyone get on my back about living the bachelor’s life after all these years. Amazingly enough, mingling with Great Expectations is my pleasure and care-free social experience.

Ted

Lonely No More

Whether your children have attended preschool or not, it’s essential to spend quality time with them each day in order to get them prepared for kindergarten. Your children’s literacy, math, social, and fine motor skills must all be developed in order to make the transition to kindergarten as smooth as possible.

Tips for Developing Literacy Skills
Read to your children every day and as often as you can. Reading aloud helps to build your children’s vocabulary and teaches them comprehension and rhyming. Let your children practice writing their names. Put magnetic letters on your refrigerator at eye level so your children can recognize them and practice grouping them together. Teach your children rhymes, songs, and riddles.

Activity Ideas for Developing Fine Motor Skills
Children need to develop their fine motor skills in order to complete activities satisfactorily in kindergarten. Give your children the opportunity to develop their fine motor skills by providing them with crayons, scissors, glue, and paint. Do arts and crafts activities together such as shaping play dough, putting puzzles together, and making necklaces with big beads.

Help Your Children Brush Up on their Social Skills
To ensure that your children’s school days run smoothly, it’s essential that you give them plenty of opportunities to play and talk with other children. Encourage your children to share, take turns, listen to others, and express their feelings with self control. Teach your children to clean up after themselves and give them little chores to do around the house so they understand the importance of responsibility.

Prepare Your Children for Kindergarten Math
Teach your children how to sort by colors, size, or shapes anytime you are playing with blocks, eating candy such as M&Ms, putting toys away, or folding laundry. Use flash cards with shapes, colors and numbers to play simple card games like go fish. Start out by teaching your children numbers 0-5 and build from there.

Play board games that require the use of a die so your children can learn how to count spaces on the game board. Use the calendar frequently to talk about the days of the week, the date, and the number of days until an appointment or holiday. Most importantly, play kindergarten math games with your children to help build their understanding of the math fundamentals they will be taught in the classroom.

We all go through periods in our lives when we feel like it is
spinning out of control and we don’t know what to do about it.
It may be because of an unexpected tragedy that rocks us to our
core and causes us to re-evaluate what is most important to us.
It could be because we are going through a more positive, yet
stressful, experience by choice, like planning a wedding or
moving to a new and exciting place. Or it could just be because
we have a hard time saying no and have too many commitments.
Whatever the case may be, we can all relate to the experience of
feeling out of control. But how do we get that control back? The
following are three sure-fire strategies that you can apply
today to begin to get a sense of control and feel some peace of
mind.

Take a few minutes to just stop and breathe. This is perhaps the
most powerful way of gaining control in the moment that you can
do. I even suggest that you sandwich your day with this
practice. Before you get out of bed in the morning take just
five minutes to breathe. Just focus on your breath. This
technique is very calming. You are going to be tempted to start
thinking about all you have to do that day or whatever worries
are on your mind, but go back to your breath. You can think
later, but for now, just breathe. A calm mind will be much more
efficient than one that is hopping from thought to thought. Do
it again before you go to sleep. Are you having trouble
sleeping? This can help you calm your mind so you can get some
rest and be more efficient the next day. Use this technique
throughout the day whenever you start to feel that “pumped up”
feeling. You will immediately begin to feel more in control and
at peace.

Prioritize. You can prioritize for the day, for the week, for
your life, or even for just the next moment. Sometimes that is
all we can handle. Any level or depth of prioritizing will help
you gain control. Prioritizing means choice. You choose what is
most important to you at any given time. You always have the
power to choose. Even when events happen to you that are out of
your control, you can choose how you respond to them. In that
moment you prioritize your thoughts and feelings. You may say
that you can’t control your feelings, and this is true to a
degree. You may not be able to control your initial reaction,
but you can choose how you will think about a situation, which
will eventually lead to how you feel about it. As you begin to
feel as though you are gaining control, you can then begin to
prioritize for the long term. The more you think about and
decide what is most important to you, the more you will operate
from a place of conscious choice. As you do this, you will have
more feelings of control and peace.

Focus on doing one thing at a time. I know in this day and age
of multi-tasking we think we can’t get enough done if we are not
doing more than one thing at a time. But is this really true?
Have you ever noticed that the things we do with only half our
attention, we often have to do over? Generally, when we give our
tasks the undivided attention they truly require, we can get
more done more efficiently. Just try this for a day and see what
you can get accomplished.

What are you willing to begin today? Commit to at least one
strategy, notice the effects, and you will want to incorporate
all three. Applying these strategies during stressful times will
help you gain a sense of control in your life. If you also begin
to practice them in your daily life any time, you will begin to
discover what it feels like to be at peace. Isn’t this what most
of us are ultimately striving for anyway? I guess the key is to
stop striving and breathe, prioritize, and focus. I guarantee
that over time, the accumulated effects of these changes will
dramatically change your quality of life and give you peace.

I love watching the top sports individuals and teams;
especially, the ones who consistently year in and year out
maintain the highest level of excellence. What is the
common factor of these successful individuals and teams?
Great coaching! Great coaches analyze the talent they
presently have and work to maximize the athlete’s strengths,
while minimizing or eliminating the athlete’s weaknesses.
This makes the individual and team better at what they do;
while, at the same time, it identifies obstacles or challenges
and helps the athlete and team overcome these challenges.

What do top business professionals such as Donald Trump
and Bill Gates (especially in their early days) have in common
with these top notch athletes? They realize that to
accomplish their goals faster, they enlist the help of coaches.
Whether it is presentation coaching, success coaching, or
executive coaching, the coach assists the professionals
realize their full potential, maximize their assets, minimize and
eliminate their weaknesses, and helps them realize their
opportunities in career, business, and life.

What are the qualities of a great coach? It’s the same
qualities you see in the great coaches in the athletic arena
everyday. The following are some of the qualities to seek
when enlisting the services of an effective coach:

1. Positive Communication

When communicating with you, the coach will use
communication that shows ownership and empowerment.
Instead of saying, “I think…,” “I hope…,” “we kinda…,”
“maybe we could…,” “I like to…,” the coach will use words
and phrases such as “we can…,” “we will…,” and “we need
to….” These words and phrases convey a sense of
ownership, empowerment, and expectancy of positive
change.

2. Clear Goal-Setting

Your coach will ask variations of these questions, “Where
are you now?” and “Where do you want to be in one year,
five years, 10 years, etc.?” The coach will work with you to
develop a personalized plan or proven system that is flexible
and fits your special needs. The coach will hold you
accountable for achieving the plan and help you find ways
to accomplish the plan.

3. Motivational Ability

Your coach will find the motivating factors that are important
to you and keep you focused on your goals based on these
factors. Having established a close relationship with you,
your coach will know when and how much to motivate you.

4. Honest Feedback

Your coach will give you constructive, honest feedback so
that you can take the steps to go to the next level in your
career, business, and life. Many times when I coach
individuals in organizations, the number one concern
employees have is one or more of the following: “I never
receive feedback on my performance,” “I only receive
negative feedback,” or “I only receive feedback during my
once-a-year performance review.” Feedback is important for
improvement.

Could you imagine a basketball coach never giving his team
any feedback during the basketball game or season? Or
even worse…only negative feedback? How would the
individuals on the team know what areas to improve upon to
succeed? Your coach’s feedback will keep you on track to
be more successful.

Another important benefit of coaching is that it is
confidential in nature. Just you and your coach will know
what your goals are for success. Often the reason
individuals don’t ask for help or guidance is because they
don’t want others to know their weaknesses. Your coaching
sessions are confidential and all feedback is kept between
the participants.

5. Making the Future Now

Your coach will help you see your future opportunities today
and jumpstart you to take action immediately. Many times
we will see our future opportunities but don’t know how to
get there. The coach provides a “bridge” to help you move
toward your opportunities and goals. Like the old saying
goes, “If you can conceive it and believe it, you can achieve
it.” The coach helps you achieve it by seeing the future now
and having you act on it.

Enjoy the benefits of successful individuals and
organizations if you are serious about creating success in
your business, career, and life. Do what successful people
do and find a coach that meets your unique needs and helps
you accomplish your goals quickly. You will be amazed at
the results.

Ed Sykes is a professional speaker, author, and success coach in the areas of leadership, motivation, stress management, customer service, and team building. You can e-mail him at mailto:esykes@thesykesgrp.com, or call him at (757) 427-7032. Go to his web site, http://www.thesykesgrp.com/SERV03.HTM, and signup for his newsletter, OnPoint, and signup for the newsletter, OnPoint, and receive the free ebook, “Empowerment and Stress Secrets for the Busy Professional.”