Successful Blog

Ideas & Infographics: Is Social Media Ruining Our Minds?

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by Mihaela Lica

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Social Networkers and Social Conversations Everywhere

Social media is going stronger than ever, Google + now seizing the forefront of all our frontal lobes, or at least resting on the minds of networkers everywhere online. The power of that so called “conversation” we all adopted as a fact of life though, does not come without a price. Along with the profound positive effects Facebook, Twitter, and g+ afford us, there appear to be some “less than positive” effects you may not be aware of.Scientists now believe social media may impact cognitive function and development negatively. From multitasking to other focus oriented skills, it appears a sort of transformative process is occurring – in short, our brains may be adjusting. The infographic courtesy Assisted Living Today below is demonstrative of this theory. You may want to investigate this.

[Click the image to see the isolated infograph and again to see it full size.]

Let’s Move Some Ideas at a Human Pace

As you can see, How Social Media is Ruining Our Minds opens up a bit of a can of worms where knowing what’s good for you on the web goes.

What?

Did we all assume pecking away at our keyboards, smacking those barriers with a slingshot and Angry Birds, endless hours of looking at crazy or not so crazy video would have no effect? The bigger question is, “Just how rewired have you become?” Our attention spans have become so short (perhaps) that soon a friend will have to get even the most “fuzzy” feelings across in microseconds. I don’t know about you, but I like my kindness and consideration delivered at a leisurely pace. That goes for absorbing other wonderful things on and off the web. Of course, those pesky “scientists” don’t know everything yet. Let’s hope so anyway.

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Author’s Bio:

Mihaela “Mig” Lica founded Pamil Visions in 2005 where she uses her hard won journalistic, SEO and public relations skills toward helping small companies navigate the digital realm with influence and success.

You can find Mig on Twitter as @PamilVisions

Thanks, Mig! Thank you, too, to Assisted Living Today!

–ME “Liz” Strauss
Work with Liz on your business!!

Break the Conspiracy to Build a Peak Performing Team in 2012

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Don’t Be Led Astray By the Conspiracy of the Team Player

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I’ve been thinking about the concept of the “team player” and the one time I had the outstanding pleasure of playing on a true team that built a business. I built a team or two and saw them dismantled by situations that undermined and contradicted true collaboration.

Why is that we do so much talking about being part of “the team,” when the underlying message is something different?

Think about it.
We learned to walk, talk, eat without benefit of a team.
No team could teach me to balance a bike or tread water to save my life.
Anyone who’s tried to pass on their experience at any of those skills knows that we learn them individually.

At school, we get individual report cards.
We get graded or assessed on our own performance.
We’re not supposed to share our homework.
We graduate as one person.
Our job applications are about what we as individuals have done.

We get hired alone.
We get raises and reprimands on our own.
We get an individual performance appraisal — it might speak to our team’s performance, but the rest of the team isn’t in the room.

And when we get fired, “the team” is told not to talk to us.

Where’s the team in all of that? What is a team anyway?

How to Break the Conspiracy of the Team Player to Build a Peak Performing 2012 Team

It’s a conspiracy that we ask people to be team players in situations that don’t offer a team. To break the conspiracy, we have to shift our thoughts to the community that is the team by valuing their contribution more than their job roles.

A true team is a group of people with complimentary skills who coordinate, delegate, and collaborate in ways that enable each person to invest peak performance moving the team forward to it’s highest goals. Great teams, like great leaders, are self-aware in that they know what each person should be doing more of and what each person should be doing less of — how each person contributes to the strongest team. When the team loses or adds a team member the team looks to fill a skill set that the team needs to be even stronger at what they do. Leadership is a quality shared by every team member no matter the level or area of expertise.

How do you get to a team like that?

  1. Hire leaders who share your values. Look for self-aware people who know their skills and have their ego intact. Leaders want to build something they can’t build alone. People who share your values will choose the same decisions as you will.
  2. Hire to the team. Don’t hire individuals. Hire one high performer and determine the key area at which he or she excels in his or her given job role and focus that role to take advantage of that. Then look for the additional skills in your next hires. In other words, adjust the job descriptions to enhance the performance of the best talent you find.
  3. Build out the team the same way. When a someone leaves the team, pull out the existing job description and have the team compare it to their own existing skill sets. What skills on that description are already covered well by two or more people on the team? Rewrite the new description to balance what you’ve got. For example if your marketing person leaves team and everyone on the team is social business savvy, write the new job description to find someone who “gets” social, but “lives” marketing data and analytics.
  4. Expect true team behavior and incentivize it. Lay out your goals and hold a quarterly appraisal for team performance that is tied to earnings. Move the team to solve their own problems ciollaboratively in the same the build their budgets and strategies. High performing teams thrive when they have
    • common goals — an agreement to work to achieve the same mission.
    • open communication — honest sharing of information that allows the team to move things forward efficiently
    • shared values — an agreement on what defines the standards of good behavior and good work
    • commitment to the group — every member inextricably bound to the team’s success
    • processes that support a culture of teamwork — the focus is on great performers who attract and nurture other great performers, because they’re truly fans of great performing teams.

    5. If it’s your goal to build a true team, trust the great performers you already have to help you start.
    Be a fan of great performers who are fans of great performers. Ask them what they need to perform at their peak and give them as much of that as you can. Constantly remove roadblocks and keep finding ways that they can do more of what they do well and less of what they do only adequately. Encourage everyone to notice others’ strongest skills and how the team might better use them..

    How will you break the conspiracy of the team player to build a peak performing team in 2012?

    Be irresistible.
    –ME “Liz” Strauss
    Work with Liz on your business!!

Beach Notes: Surf carnival

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by Guest Writers Suzie Cheel and Des Walsh

Surf carnival at Tallebudgera, Queensland, with surfboats ready to race. The surfboat, with a team of rowers and a sweep, used to be part of the basic surf rescue setup on Australian beaches. They were used when individual lifesavers on long reel lines could not get beyond the breakers for a rescue or for mass rescues.

These days they have given way to inflatable rescue craft. Now the surfboats are used for feats of strength and skill and have become the centre of a flourishing sub-culture within the volunteer surf lifesaving movement.

The surfboats were traditionally crewed by males only, when the surf lifesaving clubs were male only. There are now many all women crews, although we have noticed sometimes, when we’ve seen women crews practising locally, that they have a male sweep on board.

Man or woman, a surfboat is no place for the faint-hearted. There is an old joke that when surf clubs were choosing their boat crews they would line up the contenders and throw bricks at them: the ones who didn’t duck got to be on the crew.

How do you choose your crew?

Suzie Cheel & Des Walsh

Thanks to Week 322 SOBs

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Successful and Outstanding Bloggers

Let me introduce the bloggers
who have earned this official badge of achievement,

and the right to call themselves
Successful Blog SOBs.

I invite them to take a badge home to display on their blogs.

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They take the conversation to their readers,
contribute great ideas, challenge us, make us better, and make our businesses stronger.

I thank all of our SOBs for thinking what we say is worth passing on.
Good conversation shared can only improve the blogging community.

Should anyone question this SOB button’s validity, send him or her to me. Thie award carries a “Liz said so” guarantee, is endorsed by Kings of the Hemispheres, Martin and Michael, and is backed by my brothers, Angelo and Pasquale.

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Want to become an SOB?

If you’re an SO-Wanna-B, you can see the whole list of SOBs and learn how to be one by visiting the SOB Hall of Fame– A-Z Directory . Click the link or visit the What IS an SOB?! page in the sidebar.

–ME “Liz” Strauss

Dos and Don’ts of taking a much needed break while writing for web

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A Guest Post by
Rahil Muzafar

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So, you’re on the verge of completing this extensive e-book and feeling desperate for a short break, so you can stretch out those tense muscles. Shoulders aching, eyes paining, head spinning, all you can think of is to somehow finish the damn thing and get some much-needed rest!

Finally! The moment arrives, you’ve completed the entire thing, and you are ready to take a break. But what do you do? Browse the social profiles of your friends, watch some funny videos posted by one of your contact, chat with friends, and surf the web aimlessly? If that’s how you spend time when taking a break from your writing job, then sorry to break it to you but that’s adding more stress to your system. In other words, it’s more destructive than constructive.

What I’ve described above is the typical, “taking a break” scenario where bloggers or fulltime freelancers don’t realize that it’s not only damaging their health but productivity as well. This article will be focusing on freelancers as they are the people who are more at a privilege of taking a break every now and then. And because they are not sitting in a restricted environment of an office, most of the time they end up taking a break the wrong way, thus creating more stress and exhaustion than the needed relaxation.

Following, you will find some general dos and don’ts for freelancers to help them take what can actually be labeled as break. Of course you can come up with your own definition of break via comments, but first, my take on the topic.

The Don’ts –Doing It the Wrong Way

Despite having the advantage (spare some time to think of the misery of office workers!) of getting a break every now and then, freelancers waste it away by doing the following.

Spending time on Facebook, YouTube and the likes: Dude. If you’ve done your work, get up! Don’t stay sitting in the same weird posture and browse your Facebook page for the umpteenth time. Stop checking the continuous stream of Twitter updates. Curb the urge to comment on all status updates or image uploads by your friends.

Chatting With Friends Online: Most of the time, the half an hour break taken for a quick chat can lead to hours of useless debates or gossips. Just because Internet allows you to get in touch with your friends from any place at any time, doesn’t mean you must be in touch all the time.

Watching TV: A few minutes ago, your eyes were literally aching, right? So, why are you watching the TV now? Rest your eyes, after hours of working continuously on PC, the TV’s glaring light and noise will add to the stress even if the show is enjoyable.

Doing Household Work: Taking a break doesn’t mean washing the dishes, going to the market or cooking in the kitchen. These are household chores that should be done before or after you start working, not during your work break.

Eating Junk: Eating a packet of potato fries, or scoops of ice cream, while still remaining seated on your desk is NOT recommended at all. That’s unhealthy for many obvious reasons, so you must avoid getting indulged in any such practices.

The Do’s – How to Take a Good Break

It’s a known fact that sitting consecutively for hours in one place leads to serious health problems. After an hour of working, you should get up and take a 5 – 10 minute break. If you are working from home, that shouldn’t be a problem. So, here’s what you should do when taking a break.

Meditation: If you want some kind of mental peace; this is one hell of a thing to do for the sake of your mind. You can try playing some soothing music and just sit back, thinking of positive and happy things in life, in fact you can think of anything except what you are going to do after the break.

Sleep: Many freelancers prefer to take one long break after 3 -4 hours instead of 5 minute break after an hour. If you’ve worked for 4 – 5 hours and feeling stressed, what’s better than taking a short power nap of 30 to 40 minutes, just to relax your state of being. If you’ve been awake and working hard since morning, then an afternoon nap would be just perfect.

Go talk to your Family: We are not talking about the online socializing; instead you should spend some time with your partner, kids, or anybody living with you. You’ll find yourself infused with positive energy in next to no time.

Eat something Healthy: Keep a tray of fruits by your side. Avoid pastries, cakes, sweets, chips, coke etc. Oh and when talking of food, always keep a water bottle nearby. Consume as much water as you can while working. It’ll keep you hydrated, activated and will provide the necessary breaks in form of nature’s call.

Take a Stroll: A ten minutes stroll around the block is one of the most refreshing breaks you can take. If it’s too sunny outside, then walk around your apartment block! This is not only a good form of exercise, but will also help your mind to think out of the box.

Author’s Bio:

Rahil is an online entrepreneur, he manages a coupon code website listing coupon codes and discounts for purchases like 1and1 and Network Solutions. You’re welcome to avail these coupons at 1 and 1 coupons and network solutions referral codes .

Thanks! Rahil!

–ME “Liz” Strauss
Work with Liz on your business!!

First things first; 5 tips for online relationship building

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A Guest Post by
Rosemary O’Neill

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365 Days of Gratitude

Building a lasting online relationship is a lot like building a fire. You must lay down kindling, and shavings, and a little teepee of sticks, and patiently fan the little spark into flames. Then eventually, you can add the big logs, set them aflame, and warm yourself. If you need a fire that will last a long time, you’ll want glowing coals that will produce serious heat. Building that type of fire takes time.

Following this line of thought, do you think it’s a good method to pile up a bunch of briquets, douse them with lighter fluid, and blow your eyebrows off?

That’s the mistake a lot of well-intentioned people make when they enter the social media world. They try to force a relationship out of nothing, from the merest contact, and then they’re disappointed when it explodes in their face or doesn’t ever catch fire.

Here are five tips that will save your eyebrows:

1. Don’t keep asking for the “like.” If they like you, they will “like” you when they’re ready.

2. If someone follows you back on Twitter, don’t go hunt them down on 50 other social networks and follow them immediately. Establish some rapport on the first network, then you can branch out by mutual consent.

3. Stop the auto-reply that demands something from your new visitor (read my blog, visit my Facebook page, buy my new e-book). Instead, give a human welcome.

4. Always read a blog or forum for a week or two before you plunge into commenting; it will give you a sense of the tone and style of the community.

5. Just as in face-to-face relationship building, be interested in order to be interesting. Ask questions, listen, and then focus your replies on the person you’re talking with. Drop the agenda and make a true connection.

If you take the long term approach, your sparks of connection will light up the world.
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Author’s Bio: Rosemary O’Neill is an insightful spirit who works for social strata — a top ten company to work for on the Internet . Check out their blog. You can find her on Twitter as @rhogroupee