Top 10 tips for productive, creative, fun writing - The Chief Happiness Officer Blog

Top 10 tips for productive, creative, fun writing - The Chief Happiness Officer Blog Well whaddaya know: Its only been three months since I wrote and posted the first chapter of the happy at work book and now the whole book is done?(minus one chapter which is almost done). Im having trouble believing it myself: Not only did I write a book in three months, Ive also taken a holiday in that time, worked on other projects and done a serious amount of blogging. This means I actually wrote the book in twenty writing days, writing only before lunch. So howd I do it? Well the answer is obvious isnt it? Clear goals, hard work, perseverance, sticking to it, eliminating distractions and writing no matter what, right? Wrong. Wrong, wrong, wrong. I tried that. Didnt work. So I tried the exact opposite and that worked. Here are my top 10 tips for fun, creative and productive writing, which can be applied to blogging, writing a book, an article, a report at work, a thesis, a term paper or any other major writing project. 1: Go out and write On writing days (ie. days where I feel like writing and have nothing else to do before lunch) I get up whenever I wake up (typically around 7:30 or 8) then make my way down to a local caf? with free wifi. I set up my laptop, order coffee and breakfast and start writing. My desk at MJ CoffeeGetting out of the house means Im not distracted by all of the other stuff I could/should do at home (from washing the dishes to finally fixing that loose door handle). Also the caf? has noise, music, people coming in and out and while this may not work for everyone, its a nice level of distraction for me, and actually allows me to concentrate better than I do in a quiet office. 2: Leave the laptop charger at home This may be the most important tip. This way the battery life of my computer sets an upper limit to how long I can write. I cant sit there all day I have 3 1/2 hours at the most. This means I spend zero time surfing the web, checking up on news, etc Also, I could never write for a whole day. I have about 2-3 good writing hours in me per day before the creativity, productivity and qualityof my writing starts to plummet. 3: Decide on the structure first I start by lining up all the chapters, so I know what sections the book has and which order they will come in. I dont write the chapters in that order, and I also change this outline as I write. But I do know where each chapter will fit, and approximately what it will contain. This saves me from moving a lot of text around and it also makes it easier to write the chapters without always having to refer to something thats coming later in the book, something I find sloppy and indicative of a messy structure. 4: Write what you want to write Every morning, I work on the chapter that interests me the most that day. Because I have the overall structure in mind, I dont need to tackle the chapters in sequence. If I feel like writing about why happiness at work is important to you and me I do that. If the question what is happiness at work is on my mind, I write about that. This helps make the writing process fun and less of a chore. Theres a corollary: If you dont want to write, dont. Writing is rarely fun, productive or good when youre not in the mood. Instead of forcing yourself to write, consider if theres something you can do to change that (like going out to write) or if maybe its just time for a day off from writing. 5: Work on it in your head before writing One reason the writing can go so fast is that I know what I want to say. I have spent a lot of time thinking, taking notes, talking to people and gathering stories and business cases about happiness at work. Writing while at the same time finding out what to say takes a lot more time. So find out what to write first. Talk it over with other people. Then write it. 6: Work on two chapters in parallel I always write on two chapters at the same time. Well not at the exact same time, but on the same day. One of these is almost finished and just needs a rewrite and some polish. The other one Im just starting on, and this is where most of the actual writing happens. The good thing about this approach is that I dont aim to finish a chapter the same day I start it I can fill out most of it, but leave open questions or difficult sections to another day. This also means that each writing session contains both original writing and re-writes, so the process is more varied. Spending a whole morning just re-writing chapters is way too boring. And finally this eliminates the practice of writing the whole thing and then doing reviews and rewrites which only serves to make reviewing intensely unpleasant. 7: Write alone Even if youre working on a project together with someone else, do the actual writing alone. Two (or more) people sitting at a computer arguing over each sentence is not a good use of peoples time. If youre collaborating with others then: Decide on a structure for the whole project Decide who does what Do the actual writing alone Then get together and compare notes Never, ever do the actual writing together :o) 8: Get feedback as you go Because I post chapters straight to the blog, people are reading what I write right away, not in some distant future where the book may have been published and people may have bought it. This gives the process an immediate pay-off that motivates me. Also I get great feedback in the comments. I have already gone back to previous chapters and updated them, based on the comments people leave. Also, I get encouragement. Im a sucker for praise, and the fact that people leave encouraging comments motivates me a lot. 9: No deadlines or goals I have had no specific targets or goals. I did not set out to write half the book in 8 mornings that wouldve been serious hubris. I have no deadline, no goal to write so many words per day. I could never write to a specific deadline, because writing is a creative process. I can do it when Im in the mood. Trying to write when Im not, is a frustrating exercise in futility. But having no deadlines does not mean Im slacking Im actually looking forward to getting up in the morning to write. This attitude is the basis for good writing. To me, good writing can never be a chore. To quote The Laziest Man in North America: If it feels like work, youre not doing it right. The sci-fi author Lois McMaster Bujold tried this approach and to her great surprise found that she wrote more than twice as fast as when she was writing to a deadline. She also had a lot more fun. 10: Make it fast While I have no fixed deadline I did decide to write the book quickly. I couldve given myself half a year to write, but I prefer to immerse myself in the project for a short period of time as opposed to having it on the backburner for monhts on end. This keeps the structure, content, tone and feel of the book consistent in my mind and makes the process easier and ultimately more efficient. The result The thing is, Ive started on a book before but had to stop again because I just couldnt focus on the writing or because I lost steam somehwere along the way. But this time Ive found a process that works very well for me and this has made writing: Fun I just cant wait to write, its that much fun Productive I mean a book in 20 days Creative Im taking some chances and trying a lot of things I havent tried before Good I like what Im writing, and its really high quality for what is essentially a first draft And the very best thing is coming out of the caf? with the really, really great feeling that MAN, this is fun and MAN Im proud of my work. That is what writing should feel like! I dont know if these tips could work for you. Theyre very different from traditional writing tips, which focus mostly on setting goals, concentrating, eliminating distractions and generally sticking to it no matter how unpleasant it gets. Unsurprisingly, I focus more on trying to make the process natural and fun after all, the book Im writing is about being happy at work writing it has to be fun or it just wont work. Try some of these tips out on your next writing assignment or project. Be sure to experiment and find out what works for you. Done right, it transforms writing from a chore to something you actively enjoy and look forward to. And that is guaranteed to result in better writing. If you liked this post Im pretty sure youll also enjoy these: Top 5 business maxims that need to go part I part II 5 reasons to make your startup a great place to work The top 10 advantages of low-rent living Thanks for visiting my blog. If you're new here, you should check out this list of my 10 most popular articles. And if you want more great tips and ideas you should check out our newsletter about happiness at work. It's great and it's free :-)Share this:LinkedInFacebookTwitterRedditPinterest Related

How to Answer the Tell Me About Yourself Question - Ask Me Anything IM HIRED

How to Answer the Tell Me About Yourself Question - Ask Me Anything How to tell them all about you well only the good bits Sell yourself! This questions maybe approached in many different ways but I haven’t seen an interview yet where it isnt asked in some shape or form. A great piece of advice for getting this spot on is to write a short paragraph about yourself and repeat it to yourself before your interview. (In the same way you practise your Oscar acceptance speech in the mirror, you want to be fluid in your response but not scripted and no need in this one to thank Mum and Dad!) I wrote all about this in my  The Interview Answers that will get your Hired!  so feel free to check out the whole post. You need to show them why youre perfect for the role; this is usually the first question and you want to start on a bang as it will set up the rest of the interview well. You need to be confident in your own abilities and know why you fit the job because to put it bluntly if you cant sell yourself and talk about what makes you great, no one else will be able to see it. Although throughout the interview you will discuss your experiences in much more detail, your introduction should be a summary. Think about the highlights of your career so far and all the roles or projects you have been involved in that are most relevant to the job specification. Its all about tailoring again! If you dont have experience dont worry, instead replace this with your relevant skills and strengths, giving short examples to add depth and to demonstrate you have showcased those strengths previously. Whilst you are tailoring your answers, look to add in key points of information about the company from your research. Its important to not go overboard when youre dropping those facts you picked up online and instead feed it into your interview. Finally, you need to explain why you are interested in the job in question. Be passionate about the role and show your genuine interest into their company and role. Dont make it sound like youre just going through the motions and instead make it clear you only want their job!

Teaching Professional Resume Writing Class Online - How to Create an Effective Resume Online

Teaching Professional Resume Writing Class Online - How to Create an Effective Resume OnlineOne of the best ways to stand out in a competitive job market is by creating a teaching professional resume that will make the hiring manager's eyes light up with wonder. When people hear about a teacher, they want to know more about that person, their teaching experience, their education and what the type of education they have received has been like. They do not want to be left with a vague picture in their minds and then hire the next person that comes along.For this reason, creating a professional resume is essential for any teacher seeking employment. This does not mean that one needs to spend many months on it; a couple of days should be enough. However, if you are looking for a one-on-one time, it will certainly be advisable to make sure that you write it all by yourself and not by using a professional resume writer.Teaching professionals who have participated in a teaching professional resume writing class online can really be helped out when they need to create a good resume. These days, there are many teaching professional resume writing websites that specialize in this area. Using these types of websites will enable you to create a professional resume that will impress both hiring managers and possible future employers.The first thing that you will want to look for when you are choosing a teaching resume writer is the reputation of the writer. You can do this by reading some of the previous resumes that were submitted by the writer.Since the resume is usually a very detailed document, make sure that the writer can present all your information in the most effective way. Make sure that the content is good so that it captures the attention of the reader and therefore make sure that the resume writer is capable of doing this.Another important aspect that you should look for when you choose a writing class is the type of experience that the writerhas. In fact, one of the things that you should not get yourself involved in is wasting time trying to learn everything about a resume writer and his/her background; this only wastes time and if you are not a professional, it might also put you at a disadvantage.There are plenty of other things that you can choose from when it comes to hiring a professional writer; however, these two are a must and can help you understand a lot about how you should approach a resume writer. By doing this, you will have a better idea of whether you need to spend a lot of time on this or whether it will be easier for you to come up with your own.

Your Job Is Your Biggest Asset

Your Job Is Your Biggest Asset Here’s something you may not have thought about: Your biggest asset is your ability to earn money. You should be aggressive to protect and grow this asset. If you want to advance your career, or simply keep your job in tough times, think like an owner. I spend most of my time working with entrepreneurs. One of the biggest complaints I hear from them is that they don’t have employees who think like themselves. I have a business myself, and I love to hire people whose parents own a business. These people know how to think and act like an owner. They learn it from their parents. If your parents don’t own a business, you can still borrow this mantra and change how you do your job. Your value dramatically increases if you do. Read More: 3 Legends’ Advice Show passion for the company. This is the first rule. You always get the attention of your bosses if they see your passion for what you do. Too often I had people working for me who obviously are just there for a paycheck. These are the ones who are always the first to go when things get tough. Put the company’s interest first. Too many employees do the opposite. They think about what’s best for them and put their interests in front of the company. Thinking about the company’s best interest means doing your best when you work, and going an extra mile. Ask yourself: If you owned the company, would you do your job in the same way you do it now? If your answer is no, change your behavior. Read More: Human Advice vs. Robots Don’t be afraid of making suggestions. Rather than wait until someone asks you what you think, volunteer. If you see a better way of doing things, speak up. If your boss does not adopt your idea immediately, don’t get discouraged. I sometimes don’t deal with employees’ suggestions on a timely basis, either because I’m too busy at the moment or I have other things on my mind. But it’s never because I don’t want to hear suggestions. If you have good ideas, keep them coming. Your boss will eventually thank you. Read Next: These Are the Best Jobs in America in 2016 If you don’t like where you are, leave. Sometimes, your boss doesn’t want your ideas. Sometimes, you just don’t like what the company does. Sometimes, you feel frustrated and know you could do better. This is the time for you to leave your job. If you think like an owner, you should have no problem finding a company where people recognize your value. Employees who think like owners are always stars. If you show real interest in your job and your company, you can really stand out and be rewarded. It’s up to you. Read Next: Vital Questions on Variable Annuities Josh Patrick is a founding principal of Stage 2 Planning Partners in South Burlington, Vt. He contributes to the NY Times You’re the Boss blog and works with owners of privately held businesses helping them create business and personal value.

Dont Weed Out; Select In How to Improve and Build an Effective Interview Process - Your Career Intel

Don’t Weed Out; Select In â€" How to Improve and Build an Effective Interview Process - Your Career Intel Just saying the phrase aloud can evoke nauseaâ€"in candidates and interviewers alike. Weve all heard the horror stories. If real-life interviews were secretly filmed, there’d no doubt be a YouTube channel awash in interview disasters. Yet many hiring managers dont know what to do or how to improve the hiring process. Throughout my career, Ive witnessed or heard about some really dreadful interviews, though I’m glad to say the truly horrible ones are few and far between. More often, people experience bland, homogeneous, impersonal, unrewarding and uninspiring interviews. Only a rare few could be classified as exemplary, and Ive come to understand quality interviewing is a craft, a honed skill. How to Improve The Interview Process The good news is that like many skills, the practice of conducting interviews can be refined and improved. Last year, our professional services firm undertook the company-wide initiative of identifying, disentangling and carefully defining key characteristics â€" our 8Cs â€" intrinsic to and shared by our most successful salespeople. We also developed Associate personas (similar to marketing’s customer personas) to efficiently target our highest potential new hire candidates. It’s less about who and more about how. But we didnt stop with who we select for an interview, we also studied how we interview. Rather than the typical approach of using interviews to weed out incompatible candidates, we flipped our method to focus on determining whom to select into and through our candidate process. Leveraging a series of interviews with sales managers and high-performing Associates as well as data-driven research, we developed documentation detailing what our diamonds in the rough might look like â€" not by past experience or education alone, but by their embodiment and expression of our 8Cs. From the earliest phone screenings through our most detailed and cross-team conversations, we utilize the practice of CIDI, Chronological In-depth Interviewing. We believe the most accurate predictor of future performance is past performance in a similar situation. Not the same situation; a similar one. That slight difference in wording is critical. We don’t blindly pursue people because theyve sold in our industry. Nor do we simply seek out professionals in the verticals we serve. We look for demonstrated success in analogous situations. Chronological interviewing via CIDI enables us to evaluate candidates through the lens of real-world experience and avoid the check the box tunnel many hiring companies find themselves in. There’s no need to place bets on gut feelings, hunches or hypothetical responses. CIDI helps us examine any career, progression paths or time gaps. Most significantly, the process of chronological, in-depth, structured interviewing encourages candidates to share past major decision details, including reasoning, logic, situational aspects and lessons learned. That insight serves as a sound predictor of a candidate’s future decisions and actions. CIDI works for us, in part, because we purposefully designed engaging, flexible questions and conversation topics to align with our company’s identified 8Cs (conscientious, compelling, coachable, connectors, communicators, competitive, confident and community/cause oriented). From internal recruiting and HR to hiring managers and peer interviewers, everyone works from a shared interview playbook. CIDI provides a series of question options for each of our 8Cs, and allows the interviewer to pick and choose based on how the conversation is flowing, comfort with topics and lines of common interest. Many of our CIDI questions begin with phrases such as: Tell me about a time…. and Share an example when…. The interview doesnt end with the handshake. There’s another key aspect of efficiently using CIDI as a candidate evaluation approach â€" the interview doesnt stop when the conversation concludes. An interesting and insightful discussion is only truly effective if the information gleaned is subsequently collected, analyzed and assessed. Some time and thoughtful effort is required by the interviewer after the candidate leaves the building. Along with questions and discussion guidelines, our CIDI documentation includes strategies to decipher what an interviewer learns and provides tools to help determine and present sound conclusions. In an upcoming blog, I’ll share more about the post-interview process and how you can create a useful candidate documentation method that enables everyone in the hiring progression to utilize company-wide nomenclature and execute upon common evaluation practices. While interview disasters make for good movie scenes, they make miserable real-life moments. Keep these time-wasters where they belong, as 5-minute mental breaks on YouTube.

A Career-Change Guide for 21st Century Job-Hoppers

A Career-Change Guide for 21st Century Job-Hoppers A Career-Change Guide for 21st Century Job-HoppersThese days, job-hopping is the norm. If youre always on the search for the next best thing, heres what you need to know. TWEETEver hear the term job-hopper? It used to refer to an individual who roamed from job to job to job, seemingly for no reason but wanderlust or a higher paycheck. It implies a fickleness, disloyalty, and lack of direction/long-term commitment. Now its the norm. And its okay good, even. How?Well, for one, changing careers is expected, especially in todays economy. Even if you stay in the saatkorn field, the chances of you getting brand-new responsibilities relatively quickly are reasonable, considering how many job titles and roles are being created every year that didnt exist the year before. Physician assistant. Chief content officer. Medical biller and coder. Data scientist. Independently contracted (Uber) driver. Zumba instructor. Inside sales representative. App developer. Home health aide. Brand evangelist.Indeed, it may be a myth that job-hopping welches ever outside the norm. Even in the old days, late-period baby boomers held an average of 11.7 jobs from age 18 to 48, according to BLS data. We may be changing jobs less frequently as we get older, but if were anything like the boomers (who leise averaged 2.4 jobs from age 40 to 48), well always have our eyes on the horizon. These days, people change not only jobs multiple times by the time they hit their thirties, but careers.Not your grandfathers workforceTo begin to understand how to change careers successfully and why career changes are now fashionable, we should look to U.S. labor-market history. Stable manufacturing jobs once awaited high-school graduates with competitive middle-income pay, handsome benefits and a guaranteed pension. College degrees (in lower supply) automatically conferred white-collar status on graduates and went a lot further than today as a ticket to a high -paying, highly skilled job.Times have changed.Now, pensions are gone, all but the most skilled manual labor is outsourced, and you cant rely on loyalty from employers in the knowledge economy, though you can count on competition from a glut of young college degree-holders. At the same time, getting an zugnglich education or starting your own business is easier and cheaper than ever. Access to education, entrepreneurial tools and the Internet-enabled gig economy make the self-employed world much mora realistic. Even if you still primarily work for somebody else, second incomes come in many varieties, and you can shape opportunities to your demand and lifestyle. Dont want to work today? A driver in the sharing economy makes her own schedule. Cant find the right job in the current market? Relax. Maybe your perfect job just doesnt exist yet, but will surface in a few years.Building bridgesSo, now that youve gotten over the stigma associated with changing careers, lets discuss the impor tance of keeping good relationships. If youre going to learn how to successfully change careers, you dont want to alienate people along the way. As bad as things might be with your current employer, put on a happy face and make nice with everybody. Think like a diplomat You never know when you might need a personal recommendation for future work or to facilitate an introduction between your new employer and your old for mutual benefit. A burned bridge is even more wasteful in a professional world where LinkedIn keeps everybody at virtual arms length.Personal brandingSpeaking of building bridges, maintaining your personal brand independent of a single company is essential to creating a self-directed career. Why do you want a self-directed career? Because if you dont direct yourself, who will? Your circumstances. Or people that dont have your best interests at heart will try to exploit you for their gain. You dont want to be a victim of fate, pulled by puppet strings with no agency. I n order to avoid living a lie in your work life, you need to actively work to match your talents and personality to your occupation before navigating how to change careers.Your personal brand should represent these skills and project your attitude to the world. Whether you build popularity/influence on social media, through blogging-content creation-publishing, participating in a professional association, attending a recurring conference, or presenting on the lecture circuit, do whatever you can to cultivate and perpetuate a distinct identity. Articulate a summary of this identity and put it front and center on your resume or personal website. Make it part of your LinkedIn profiles headline, corporate bio, blog author profile or job title.As one of my smart college classmates told me when I later interviewed him professionally for his take on marketing, you want your byline to convey more than just the current company you work for. His reasoning was your time at any given employer m ay be limited, while the gifts you offer the world endure from job to job and therefore, deserve their own billing independent of your employer. (This was the theory behind the practical matter of referring to me on his blog as Paul Richlovsky, job title at Employer X vs. Paul Richlovsky, Employer Xs job title. This grammatical difference is subtle, but important Youre putting the person first.)Loving what you do, doing what you loveDoing what you love is paramount, so you should be changing careers if your current employer is not fulfilling your will and drive for purposeful work. Contrary to the notion of being a quitter or paycheck-seeker, changing jobs to put yourself in the best possible environment to thrive is not only desirable, it is noble.From teacher to marketer/writer (and back)For inspiration, take my own story. An English major one year out of college, I packed up and moved across the world to teach English in China. Teaching was a blast, though some of the required cu rricula of one my programs I was not best qualified to teach, such as English for business. In fact, teaching a business English class or two on marketing vs. selling and AIDA was the extent of my marketing background until 5 years later, Im back in my hometown and find a new full-time job at a fast-growing 20-person digital marketing agency. 10 years later, here I am still serving the same company (now 150+ people) as a content strategist and editor. Though I no longer stand in front of a classroom of Chinese college students, I am still teaching and surrounded by college students (I mean, recent graduates) that continue to make me feel young.I am thrilled to have regular opportunities to learn and teach on the job. I educate clients, help my colleagues and try to keep myself informed in a rapidly changing marketing industry with monumental technological innovation and philosophical discussion on how to be excellent. Immersed daily in an atmosphere of growth, I couldnt imagine doi ng anything better. I wish the same for you.Ready to make changing careers simple? Hire a TopResume writer todayRelated Articles

Finding the Best Tips for Writing an Objective for Resume

Finding the Best Tips for Writing an Objective for Resume What to Do About Tips for Writing an Objective for Resume Before It Is Too Late Writing a winning college student career objective is a rather effortless approach to bolster your application for this internship or job youve got in sight. Although you might have minimal work experience for a high-school student, you may use your resume to highlight activities and exclusive skills that show your value to a possible employer or college interviewer. When youre crafting your resume objective, you should concentrate on particular abilities and experiences which are directly linked to the job. You should clearly state what kind of a job which you want, and know what types of skills and experiences are necessary to succeed in that job. Try to remember, the start of a resume objective shall communicate straight to the reader at a very first glance with its striking and strong statement. The info within the purpose statement may want to get customized based on your industry too. Your objective statement is the very first thing theyll see and read, as its the very first thing on the webpage. So beware a greatest objective statement can produce the path. Using resume examples can be quite helpful too. Creating your first resume doesnt have to be a struggle. You need to have five objective statements. Resume Objective Writing objective statements can be among the most challenging elements of producing an effective resume. Everyone has desirable abilities and experiences to provide employers including you If youre asking for a job which has unique requirements, you might need another edition of your resume to completely demonstrate your qualifications. When youre applying for work, you arent the only applicant with the best resume format out there. Prioritize the info supplied for each position starting with the most relevant and important details in regard to the job which you are applying for. Objectives ought to be checked for spelling and proofread by a specialist. Resume objectives can be a little controversial. Most resume objectives consist of one or two sentences. The same as the cover letter, the objective ought to be specifically tailored for a certain job application. Moreover, if youre not certain, include one. For instance, you may require a resume summary or a resume objective, but you ought not incorporate both. Because resumes have limited space, your career objective should be concise. Though a resume objective is a favorite approach to commence a winning resume, it isnt the only method to introduce yourself to the employer. Your career objective might be the very first impression your possible employer ever gets of you, which explains why it should be both impressive and on-point. A perfect career objective isnt just about what you want to attain. That means you should define a new objective for each work application. The Ultimate Tips for Wri ting an Objective for Resume Trick Writing objectives isnt the simplest job on the planet, but with our tips you will produce a convincing objective statement for resume in virtually no time. LinkedIn summaries are rather different.