Focus on the Solution, Not Your Bad Boss’s Ridiculous Demand or Behavior!

It’s natural to get frustrated, depressed, or just plain angry with yet another unreasonable demand or idiotic behavior from your Bad Boss.

It’s tempting to dwell on the ridiculous demand or behavior--after all, it’s demeaning, disgusting, disrespectful--take your pick!

However, wallowing in the misery of it all prevents you moving through to the success you long for.

Kristy Smith suggests:

“The next time you find yourself fed up – it could be in your role, a responsibility you are required to carry out, with your boss, perhaps with the staff you manage, maybe it’s your peers. Whatever it may be, write it down, get it out, but keep the problem limited to a few sentences so it stays focused. Now, and maybe not like right NOW, maybe in a few hours, come back to it; what action-based solution can you implement to minimize or reduce the probability of it re-occurring? Remember, a solution doesn’t necessarily mean the problem is solved; it can be a resolution to a solution. The important thing here is that you are taking real, tangible action to eliminate whatever it is that is slowing your momentum down…

By practicing pairing solutions with problems, you are training your brain to automatically default to solution-based thinking vs. problem-based thinking. Stop wasting time assessing the problem and start identifying the solution!”

And with that--implement the solution and get back on your path to success!

Give Yourself the Helping Hand to A Promotion that Your Bad Boss Never Will

You want a helping hand from your Bad Boss to get up the company/corporate ladder? Help you get that promotion you lust after? Good luck! Never gonna happen.

Not to worry! There are two outstanding ways for you to give yourself that helping hand, suggested by Dan Schawbel:

“Become a subject matter expert. If you want to stand out at work and gain visibility and recognition, you need to be an expert on a particular topic. If you’re well versed on a topic, and it’s important to the company, people will be knocking at your door and your value will skyrocket. You will be given opportunities to present to other teams and you will be able to demand promotions because you’ll have the leverage to do so.

Take on projects outside of your job description.

If all you do is what’s listed in your job description, you can’t get ahead at work. You must always push yourself outside of your normal job activities to take on additional responsibilities. 58% of managers are either very willing or extremely willing to support an employee who wants to capitalize on a new business opportunity at work. By taking on additional projects, you will further your next [advance], develop your skills and be better positioned for leadership opportunities.”

Excellent advice!

Don't Let Generational Differences Get In the Way of Your Success

Your Millennial co-worker wears his earbuds all day long, and you seriously wonder if he has a clue what’s going on…

Your GenXer co-worker lives on her iPad, no matter what’s at issue in a meeting, in her cubicle, or in a client presentation…

Your Boomer co-worker insists on face-to-face communication for the least little thing rather than just send off an email…

You’re in the middle of generational sticking points, those behaviors and attitudes that people of a different generation than your own hold, which are totally mysterious--and generally disliked or disapproved of--by you.

Get real! How much does whatever your different generation co-workers do or don’t do impact your ability to do your work?

If you get down to basics, you’ll find that rarely do these generational differences actually damage or impair your ability to do your job. If the behavior is simply personally annoying, give it a rest. Let it go.

If the behavior interferes with your job, such as your concern that your earbud wearing co-worker won’t hear your request--then email it to him. It will take you less time and energy to create an easy work-around than to try to convince your co-worker to unplug his ears.

Because frankly, he’s wondering how on earth you can get along without them!