Over time, I’ve worked with many people, had many hobbies and volunteer activities, sat through MANY meetings, and worked with many teams and individuals both in my career and in my personal life. I’m often asked for advice on how people can further their career, have better work-life balance, and just generally make their lives better.
Here are 3 things you can do to improve your career and your life interactions in general; and you can start working on all these today with no additional training needed.
- Master presenting and being concise
Even if you have the best idea in the world, if you cannot present effectively, it’s going to be harder to make things happen. In a similar vein, if it takes you a long time to get to your point, you are going to lose people in the conversation. I started with this one because people hate it. I’ve heard all the arguments: It shouldn’t matter; I’m just not good at public speaking; I need time to explain; the list goes on. You can think all those things but know that in believing them you may limit yourself. It doesn’t change the fact that mastering these two things will make your interactions smoother and help you achieve what you want. You don’t have to be ready to give a keynote speech tomorrow, but you can sharpen your skills to get some traction.
- Learn the difference between empathy and sympathy
Empathy is the ability to understand and share the feelings of another. Sympathy is the feeling of pity or sorry for someone’s misfortune. Why is this important? Empathy is what allows you to see different perspectives on a situation which leads to the ability to form creative solutions. It can help you ‘read the room’ and make your interactions more productive. Sympathy is a feeling you get when someone is going through a hard time. Empathy helps you understand and adjust to still move toward the objective.
- Know the value of your time
People often think about their time having value in the scope of their work or career, but they don’t often think about the value of their time outside of work. Your time has value. Period, end of story. And others may try to claim your valuable time for their priorities. If you are constantly spending time on things that don’t reflect your value or aren’t valuable to your priorities, it’s time to readjust.
