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In order to survive in the increasing demands of the workloads that our management offers, we need to keep ourselves from worrying a lot and be more focused on what are the effective ways of building confidence in a team.

Team building involves goal setting and a game plan. A virtual organization must always begin a strategy plan with the goal. You cannot hit a target that you don’t have your eyes clearly set upon. So setting goals is where the productivity begins. When you have a goal, you can then immediately proceed to the next step of team building.

The contemporary management scene also requires that team building strategies should include the understanding of virtual organization and community. Virtual organizations are built so that logistical, personnel and critical resource issues can be addressed. The use of telecommunication and other computing technologies have become the defining ground of any virtual organization. Taking this into consideration is a must in any management and team building initiative.

Virtual organization team building should also become more competent in the development and the creation of a strong team that is highly flexible, honest, inspirational and innovative. The innovative techniques to be used in building the qualities of a team results in developing, an energizing, highly efficient and inspiring organization.

A good way also to build a team in a virtual organization is the kind of motivation the team builder must create. Motivational talks, tools and strategies are designed to let the team members embrace the leadership role and to help them realize their goals and worth in the changing course of time.

Another strategy is to revitalize your team and organization through off-site retreats for one to two days. It really helps to be with nature as you work to amp up the process of company revitalization. The renewal of advocacy vows should be integrated with the aim of providing easy ways of handling responsibilities.
The need for innovation should also be integrated in the team building process. The need for a change is very significant in today’s defining moment. A change in the team members’ values and attitude towards work is also suggested as a major strategy for success.

Don’t lose heart. Persist in developing your team. Team building can be a very exciting job when the participants are willing to be changed for the better.

Source: EzineArticles

Related articles

• The Four Keys To Success With Virtual Teams (forbes.com)
• Making Change Happen: Smart Team Building: California Digital Library (cdlib.org)

If you and your teammates are experiencing communication problems, I have one question for you. How much of your communication is happening via email?

When the problems are many, the percentage is usually high. This is because email is missing some key information that helps us understand the message, namely body language and vocal qualities.

In research published in the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, a study found that email recipients only correctly interpreted an email’s tone 50% of the time. The study also found that people believed they got it right 90% of the time. You can image the problems this can lead to on a team that communicates primarily through email.

Most teams would benefit from using less email and having more telephone and face-to-face conversations. But let’s face it. Email is great because I can fire off a message whenever it’s convenient for me and not have to be present if there’s an unpleasant reaction.

If you are going to use it, then I recommend the following tips. My guess is that everyone has at least a couple of these they could improve upon.

• Get their attention with an appropriate (honest and interesting) subject line. Don’t trick them by overdoing it.
• Keep it short and to the point. People are busy and won’t read your email if it looks too long.
• Pay attention to spelling, grammar and punctuation. Make it easy to read, unless you want to send the message that you are either uneducated or don’t care.
• Make it personal, using proper salutations and sign-offs.
• Use the right level of formality. This is dependent upon the relationship you have with the intended recipient. Choose the wrong level, and you risk offending.
• Send it only to the person or people who need to receive it.
• Assume your email will be forwarded, especially to people you don’t want to see it.
• Don’t try to convey humor, sarcasm, or other complex ideas. It just doesn’t come through very well.

Effective communication is critical to a team’s success. Make email effectiveness one key part of your overall team development strategy.

Source: EzineArticles

Related articles

• When Emails Are Taboo (psychologytoday.com)

Team Motivation increase productivity and energize your staff or even yourself to do more at the work place. Team motivation is an important skill of a leader or a manager.

Our own experience and research show that team motivation increase productivity no matter what type of business you manage. This is related to the following factors:

1. Work achievement: Staff who achieve a goal that is well directed by their supervisor are work motivated usually. They come to work the next to make the next achievement milestone.

2. Recognition: Staff who achieves his or her manager directed goals and work hard and long hours to achieve them expect to be recognized. They would expect usually for salary increase, bonus, or a job promotion. “Thank you” is a great work motivator. Praising loudly is a Team motivation that subordinates like a lot. Failing to give it to them fades the Team motivation, self motivation and team motivation! Never steal credit of your staff.

3. The work environment: is a great work motivator. Decent surroundings motivate staff to come to work and feel at home. This factor covers the team the staff operates within and the overall culture of the entity. Free coffee, as simple idea as it sounds, make a big difference.

4. Self growth: is a work related motivator. Put it simply, staff who don’t get promoted in their jobs for long lose the Team motivation. A good gauge for self growth at work is the salary increase, job title, authority and responsibilities given to grow the self growth and self esteem.

To summarize, Team motivation is necessary to increase productivity and retain the skilled staff. How to motivate staff at work depends on your understanding of the needs and goals in life for each staff you manage or supervise. It is your analysis and frank discussion that will help you know your staff better and assess the team motivation they seek.

Source: EzineArticles

Related articles

• Increasing Workplace Motivation with Rewards (personal-work-habits.suite101.com)
• Motivational IQ, Helps People Develop Greater Motivational Intelligence, Achieve Goals More Consistently, and Enjoy Greater Levels of Happiness (prweb.com)

IT mangers would find their jobs much easier if every employee voluntarily accepted and used the company’s choice of online collaborative tool. This, however, only happens in an ideal world, and real employees tend to resist change- even if it helps them perform their jobs faster and more efficiently. One way to encourage the use of your online collaboration tool is to involve the future users in the decision making and training process. This allows certain members of your team to become the “software champions” and encourage voluntary participation across the board. Remember, of course, that there are several different types of tool users in your team and the key to successful collaboration is ensuring that each user group’s needs are met.

Stark Difference Between Tool Users

No matter what the workplace business tool involved, there will be different levels of users who employee these tools. Some team members will find certain features more valuable above others. Make sure to identify these distinct types of users beforehand and consider each one’s needs when looking for your solution. A great way to encourage adoption is to provide incentives for their cooperation.

The Software Champions

These are people who are highly active in the workplace community and participate in company-wide projects. This type of person will take ownership of a particular project and ensure that the right processes and tools are being used to complete the project successfully. This type of user can help examine the online tool for any glitches and drawbacks and bring these to the attention of the appropriate manager, while offering solutions. These users tend to be the software champions in a company, and often act as the informal trainers for new hires.

Ordinary Users

This group probably constitutes the majority of your user base. They will login regularly while contributing ideas and suggestions about the online collaborative tool. While they are not as active and enthusiastic as all-knowing users, there is a larger number of them, spread out through different layers of employee activity. This group’s needs should be of utmost priority when choosing a solution.

There will be plenty of different types of users throughout your organization. Make sure your tool fits every type of user in your company, is easy to adopt and navigate, and of course, scalable for your growing organization.

Source: EzineArticles

Related articles

• 5 Questions to Ask When Choosing Enterprise Collaboration Tools (webworkerdaily.com)
• 5 Questions to Ask When Choosing Enterprise Collaboration Tools (BuzzVoice.com)

Do you get overwhelmed by emails into your inbox? It can so distracting, and takes away time and energy from your work. Not to mention, it can create stress from information overload.

Is there a simple way of managing your emails? Well, in a word, yes.

If you’ve been on the internet for any length of time, you’ll probably have subscribed to a newsletter or two. However, it’s more likely you’re receiving tons of emails from different authors and companies that clog up your email inbox.

And you’ve probably subscribed to these lists because you were interested in the information that the authors were providing you. Short of unsubscribing, what can you do?

If you’re like me, I receive tons of emails from the different lists that I’ve subscribed to. So much that instead of allowing me to focus on what I want to do, the emails have just become a distraction. Not to mention that I have to set aside time and energy to clear my inbox when it gets too crowded.

This is where the value of categorization comes in useful, especially if you want a quick and easy method of managing the emails that come into your inbox.

Step One: Sort out the information categories of your email

What I did was sort out the main types of mass email I get, which are related to internet marketing and trading online. For example, two categories are:

1. Internet Marketing Related

2. Trading Related

Keep the main categories broad enough without breaking them up into niches. You’ll understand why in the next step.

Step Two: Create one free email account per category

The next thing to do is to create 2 free email accounts, using gmail for each category. You can use other free email services, but it so happens that I use Gmail from Google, and they have tons of storage space.

You can understand now why I suggest just using the main category and not break it down further. You’ll only want to handle a limited number of free email accounts, instead of creating another huge list of free email accounts to manage.

Step Three: Change the subscription details for each list you’re subscribed to

The next step is then to go through all the current emails in your Inbox, and changed the subscription details to your free email accounts. In this example, I redirected all the internet marketing related lists to my account dedicated to internet marketing, and the same for trading related emails.

This way, you can still remain subscribed to the lists you’re interested in, but without being overwhelmed by the number of emails that keep pouring into your Inbox. You can always log into your email accounts during your free time, and catch up on news and updates as necessary.

Step Four: Slow and Steady

You could do all your subscribed lists at one shot, if you’re subscribed only to a few. But if you’re subscribed to a large number of lists like me, it’ll probably be more productive to do this email re-direction over a period of a week or two.

As for paid services and products, you might want to stick with your primary personal email. I use my main personal email account still as I want to make sure I get any updates or notifications on time. It’s only the free information or lists that get delegated to my free email accounts.

Summary

Managing information is crucial to keeping focused on your goals. With so much information available today, it’s easy to get distracted and lose sight of your primary goal. Information overload can also cause you stress, especially if you’re already busy with other projects.

Keeping Separate email accounts for Emails Newsletters, News etc is is a simple, straightforward way to manage information. Configure those free Email accounts in Taroby, along with your Primary Email accounts. It’s an easy way you can adopt in removing distracting emails from your primary Inbox, and also access those emails when you need them without switching Applications.

Source: EzineArticles

Related articles

• 10 Tips for Managing Information Overload (edtechpower.blogspot.com)
• How to Handle Information Overload (webdesignerdepot.com)

Photo Credit: mikaylasway.com

If you are a leader you will be leading at least one and in reality probably multiple teams. Building a successful team is a challenge but there are some simple things that you can do to greatly enhance the likelihood of success.

Be clear on the results

If you are to have any chance of building a successful team you need to start by getting clear about the outcome or result that is to be achieved. The result needs to be specific and written in a language that will be understood by everyone. Remember that vague specification of results is likely to lead to okay but less than optimal outcomes.

Be clear about the skills you need

A successful team needs to have the right blend of skills to deliver the results. A soccer team for example needs the right mix of defensive, attacking and creative players. A business team is no different. Get clear on the essential skills to deliver the results you want.

Be clear about the attributes that are needed

Skills are important but they are only part of what helps you achieve results. Attributes or interpersonal qualities are just as important. They include areas like motivation, influencing, relationship building, personal drive and resilience to name just a few. Make sure that you don’t lose sight of having the right attributes when building your team.

Bring out the best in everyone

It’s all too easy to pigeon hole people or make up what they can or cannot do based on their job title. You know the kind of things that people say day in day out like marketing are the only creative folks, accountants won’t take any risks, quality assurance get in the way, human resources are too rules based to name just a few.

Make a point of finding out what people can bring to the table rather than just guessing what they can or cannot do.

Recognize that it takes time

No team ever leaps immediately from forming to performing. They go through a series of stages where they move forward, move back, work together, have conflict and hit obstacles. Accept this and see it as a short term setback for a bigger long term gain.

Bottom Line – Teams can deliver great results. So what do you need to do differently as a leader to get more success from teams?

Source: EzineArticles

One of the best goals to have is to create effective work habits, and your interest in wanting to find out how to achieve this is a major positive step already. So if you want to be more effective at work, here are some tips to help you out:

1.    Have proper motivation. With most resolutions, a major deciding factor to your success is a healthy motivation. It’s best that you have a good and constructive reason that will truly push you to succeed. And your motivation shouldn’t be about what others think, or about “proving yourself” to others. Try to be motivated instead to be the best person that you could be.

2.    Practice time management. The chunk of having effective work habits has something to do with time management. Think of it this way: time is even more valuable than money, since you can earn back money even if you lose it, but you can never take back wasted time.  There are many methods for effective time management; it’s really a matter of finding out what works best for you based on your personality, your type of job, and your preferences. It isn’t any good to lay out a time management plan and then just give it up soon after because it doesn’t suit you.

Effectively managing your time can start simply by having the right tools where you can take note of your deadlines and responsibilities. Then, you could visualize how long it will take for you accomplish your tasks and plan your schedule accordingly. The whole point to this is that you’d have better control of your work time, and there’d be fewer chances of you missing deadlines.

3.    Don’t hesitate to break your tasks into chunks. This is related to tip number 2. Many people have a tendency to want to do their tasks in one sitting, usually the day right before it is due. It’s really time to take a different perspective – got an extra 30 minutes on your hands? Check your task list to see which tasks you’ve got pending, and experiment how much you’d be able to accomplish in that short amount of time.

4.    Have a role model and mentor. It’s a great idea to have someone at your workplace who understands your work situation and will know how to guide you to get where you want to be. This person will have to be someone you look up to and who is very effective at work. Ask guidance from that person; chances are, he’d only be too happy and flattered that you’d ask his help.

5.    Resolve to have work-life balance. Just because you’re bent on being more effective at work doesn’t mean you’d neglect your personal life. In fact, having a life outside of work gives you motivation to do better at your profession. And again, practice proper time management so you’d have time to balance both

6.    Be consistent. Habits form when they are done consistently for about 3 weeks. Be disciplined about adopting effective workplace techniques and you’d find that you’d start doing them automatically.

There you have it! These are highly doable ways for you to start creating effective work habits. Remember, it all starts with the proper motivation, and the consistency to carry it through! Good luck!

Source: How To Do Things

Related articles

• 9 Productivity Techniques for Freelancers (sixrevisions.com)
• 50 Tips for Effective Time Management for Freelance Designers (theprodesigner.com)

Email is an extremely convenient mode of communication; perhaps too easy, as it seems to invite people to contact you for sometimes barely any reason at all. And with all that email coming in that needs attention, it can be hard to get anything else done. So how can you get a grip on your business emails before it gets its grip on you?

Getting Control Of Email

Success in small business relies on discipline, focus and good time management. Often, however, necessary tasks like checking, reading and responding to emails can start to overtake productive work time and decrease your productivity – and in turn, your profitability. That is why it’s important for you to be managing emails, rather than letting emails manage you. Here are some pointers from the experts:

• Schedule time for checking emails; this can be once, twice, or three times daily at times that fit into your schedule. Block out time and when the time is up, move on to other pressing matters.
• Do not use email for emergency contacts; inform clients and business associates that you are not available immediately via email, and that they should phone or contact you via instant message or mobile phone for pressing matters. This makes it possible for you to handle emails in chunks rather than constantly throughout the day. Be careful who you give emergency contact information to, though, so that it is used for its intended purpose.
• Turn off automatic alerts, both audio and visual, so that you are not tempted to immediately respond every time a new message comes in, breaking into your productive work time.
• Deal with emails during your ‘down time’; do not schedule your most creative and productive times of day for organising emails. Put email management into your schedule where it makes sense – those times of day when you need to slow down, or that do not take away from more complex activities.
• Use tools for organising emails; get to know the features of your email client and use them to prioritise emails. For instance, separate emails into folders according to priority levels, clients, or subjects, or use settings to automatically send emails to appropriate folders or locations.
• Respond to emails when read; many people will read all emails before responding, and then go back and start with the most important ones. But this only multiplies the time it takes to get through the lot. Respond to emails as they are read, and you will not have to begin all over again sifting through them.
• Separate business and personal emails; do not give out business email addresses to friends and family that do not have a business reason to contact you.

Email is a very useful and important business tool, but if you don’t learn how to efficiently manage your emails they will begin to take over your business life. Put into practice these and other tips to put email in its rightful place.

Source: EzineArticles

Email etiquette is essential to help save time and increase productivity in an office environment. Many times a simple phone call as the question that is being asked can be handled quickly and effectively when discussed verbally. More complex topics need more details that can easily be given over the phone.

Below are some tips on how to maintain proper email etiquette so you can have a smoother functioning office and avoid the needless fluff that can come across our work systems.

1. Email should be concise and to the point. People lose interest quickly in lengthy topics, deliver the vital information and press send.
2. Avoid open ended emails. As the sender, you need to answer questions before they are asked to avoid numerous questions being asked and increasing email volume.
3. Grammar is essential. Most email programs can check your grammar and spelling. Use it.
4. Respond quickly to questions. Instead of putting an email off, answer it once you receive it. If you need to research a topic let the sender know. This gives them the common courtesy of knowing their email has been received and is being worked on.
5. Only add important attachments. People are mistrusting of most content sent through email. Unless you are sending a vital document, don’t attach anything to your message.
6. High Priority means it is urgent. It shouldn’t be used on items that aren’t due in a short period of time. This can be a rude way of delivering messages. Also, never use URGENT or IMPORTANT in the title of your email.
7. Capitals are shouting. A vital part of email etiquette tells us that when we talk in caps we are shouting. Refrain from shouting at people unless you intend on them responding offended.
8. Use Reply. Don’t start a new message for the same topic. Continue the original topic so individuals can see the progression of information. Don’t ever hit reply all unless it is your intent to send it to everyone.
9. Read the email before sending. If it sounds strange to you or leaves you with questions, it will have the same effect on others.
10. Chat Lingo and Emoticons are Rude. This is a business being run, not a friendly correspondence. Unless you know the person and the email isn’t for business don’t use these common references.
11. Chain letters need a broken link. Don’t forward chain letters or funny jokes. While you may enjoy receiving them, most people don’t. There is also no validity to any chain letter, no one has ever won money or died suddenly.
12. Never use email for confidential information. Email can be easily read if it is left open, and can be hacked by some people. Don’t ever give out confidential information in this manner.
13. Never put in any offensive material. No one wants to hear your offensive, sexually explicit, or racist remarks. Curse words also have no business in an email.

These are the basics of email etiquette. As you continue to learn more about email, you will find there are other things that aren’t proper. Take some time to learn all you can before you send messages that people find offensive, or poor in context.

Source: EzineArticles

Related articles

• Stop Making E-mail Etiquette Errors: Here’s How (mashable.com)
• Email Etiquette Discussions, Tips and Proper Practices (netmanners.com)
• Netiquette No-No’s: Top 4 E-mail Blunders (lifescript.com)

We are working relentlessly to add new features to make Taroby an even better experience for you. We are Closing Taroby Public Beta sign ups temporarily from July 22, 2010. Here are a few changes you’ll find in the Newly Released version of Taroby:

• Significantly faster in both speed and responsiveness.
• Simplified and better organized menu elements and tool bar.
• Moved the position of the folder tree permanently to the left side.
• Detailed information section per message on the right side in order to know more about the contact, to view recent conversations, and to get the files sent in the previous mails.
• Moved the buttons on bottom to top for easy access of functionalities like download new mails, assign, comment, reply, forward, print, and history. A ‘More’ button calls the entire context menu directly.
• Search functionality is now available from all tabs.
• Filter layer is now near to the search box. Some common filters like ‘All’, ‘New’ and ‘Mine’ are there on the left side.
• Ability to close the Messages tab. To open it go to ‘View’ menu on top and click on the menu item ‘Messages’ in the ‘Module tabs’ menu.
• The count of messages is now available at the bottom.

We thank you for all the overwhelming support and the feedback you’ve given us over the past 2 years. We hope to receive such support in the future as well, in making Taroby a better application for all.