Archive for the ‘Social Skills’ Category

Gordon Brown’s gaffe and the lessons for us all

Wednesday, April 28th, 2010
Gordon Brown makes disparaging comments to Gillian Duffy, in Rochdale, after being nice to her face. Forgetting that he was ‘miced up’ this was probably down to the stress he is currently under. He is under pressure and apologised, but those comments were made and broadcast.
He has apologised, but not surprisingly the lady’s opinion of him hasn’t changed.
So many people work in jobs where they need to be a different sort of person to how they really are and it can lead to all sorts of internal conflict, and sometimes ‘leakage‘ where you say one thing but your body language is incongruent and so the message doesn’t seem true.
I help my clients to understand more about who they are so that they can do a job that allows them to be the person they are rather than to struggle to do something that is not a great fit.
In the workplace at times we have to say things that we don’t believe in, but it goes with the job. We all need to be careful not to be heard to say something ‘off message’ that may then get back to the client/customer. Remember Gerard Ratner’s comments, about his jewellery being chap and a prawn sandwich would last longer than some of his earrings? 
I worked with someone who was overheard making negative comments about an internal client, who was very senior within the organisation. The comments got back to him and he was not only taken off the high profile project but transferred into another part of the organisation in a much less interesting role.
So be careful on what you say, you never know who could be listening.
 

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Getting things done – Denise’s story

Thursday, December 24th, 2009
It’s Christmas Eve, and I’ve realised I’ve been a bit tardy in writing my blog, and in tweeting. I’d expected this to be a quiet week, it has been in the past but Monday and Tuesday were very busy days with 2 clients getting a great start on getting a brilliant job next year through going through the first half of the Gold Programme – this is the 3 hour session where we discuss the results of The Highlands Ability Battery, Myers Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI) and Strong Assessment. I’ve also undertaken a telephone interview ready for The Career Change Formula which starts in January. I’ll pass on more details when I here.
 
Yesterday and today I’ve focused on getting straight. Like many people I have a huge pile of pending, all those little jobs that should get done but are not essential. I have a big project I want to work on next week and I could have started this yesterday but these tasks will just sit in piles around my office, so I decided to focus on them and am really pleased to get many of them out of the way.
 
Most books on getting things done talk about dividing work into important and urgent – so you do the important and urgent stuff first and leave the not important and not urgent stuff – but eventually these need to get done and also I think it makes people feel good to get things done and out of the way. So I’m feeling good to have cleared out a load of tasks and as my husband won’t get home till 6 tonight I’m aiming to clear out more.
 
I do like having these sorts of days as it gives me time to think – and I’ve been thinking of putting some structure to my blog writing. what I’m thinking of is:
 
Monday: – Motivational stuff to set people up for the week
Tuesday: – Career discovery type articles
Wednesday: – Job search articles
Thursday: – Assessments
Friday: – Career Management and my fitness update
 
I may also add other posts, but I think this should be useful for my readers, so I’d be very interested in what you think. Do either email me or make a comment below.
 
Almost forgot, I sent my newsletter subscribers a Christmas message and never posted it on the blog. Here’s a link there’s some very interesting web links you might like to see: http://www.amazingpeople.co.uk/newsletter/christmas.html
 
Happy Christmas
 
 
 
Denise x
 

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Active listening – a key article from the career coach

Tuesday, August 18th, 2009
We are taught how to read and write, but not how to listen. We can enhance our relationships with others through effective listening. Here
are 20 things you can do to enhance your listening skills
 
Leave your own concerns to one side.
You can’t focus on somebody else if you are also thinking about your problems, to do list or concerns. This leads onto
 
Allow yourself sufficient time.
If you have to dash off to a meeting, you will want to go at a quicker pace to suit you, not the person who you are listening to.
 
Talk less than you listen. We have two ears and one mouth, so have your communication in the same proportion.
 
Use eye contact. It is hard for someone to continue to talk with someone who is not looking at them.
 
Show some nonverbal behaviour.
Make use of nods of the heads and uhhuhs etc. All of these encourage the other person to say more. But don’t just use them ad hoc when you are not really listening. It devalues them.
 

http://www.amazingpeople.co.uk/pdf/activelistening.pdf

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Treat people well

Thursday, February 22nd, 2007

As a psychologist I am very observant to peoples’ behaviour and so often I notice situations getting out of hand when a different approach would have had a more favourable result. Whilst travelling to

London by train last night, the train manager got into a bit of a confrontation with a passenger who was sat in 1st class and didn’t have a first class ticket.   Rather than to use more calming and polite language, the train manager interrupted someone on the phone (he had done the same with me earlier, which I found very rude) and insisted on seeing the correct ticket.  Once he saw a standard class ticket, he was insistent that the passenger move right away, even though he was on the phone throughout and so not able to concentrate.  

A better option, which I see from many train managers, is to ask the passenger if they realise they are in 1st, to give them an option to buy an upgrade, and then ask them to move, but to give them time to get their bags together.  This little incident resulted in two really grumpy men which would probably impact on other relationships with people that night whereas to have handled things more sensitively everyone would have been happier in their relations with others and with themselves.

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