SELF IMPROVEMENT AND MOTIVATION

There is a common misconception that a business presentation must be crammed with information, serious and dry. It seems the higher you go in the corporate world; the more you are expected to “confuse to impress”. This results in presentations that are long, verbose, poorly structured and capable of inducing prolonged somnolence! I believe every presentation is a ‘sales pitch’ of some kind. You may not be selling a product or service, but you want to persuade your audience to take on board your message, take action or change their attitude/views/ minds on a subject. Because of this, every presentation is a balance between entertainment and information. Entertainment is simply the way you get your message across, information is the message itself. Too much information and you confuse your audience or worse still, they switch off. Too much entertainment without the information and your audience feels cheated that they have wasted their valuable time. Good speech structure helps...

*Who is poor ?* *A wealthy woman goes to a saree store and tells the boy at the counter* *Bhaiya, show some cheap sarees. It is my son's marriage and I have to give to my maid."* *After sometime, the maid comes to the saree shop and tells the boy at the counter* *Bhaiya, show some expensive sarees. I want to gift my Mistress on her son's marriage"* *Poverty is in the mind or in the purse?* *Who is rich ?* *Once, a lady with her family was staying in a 3-star hotel for a picnic.* *She was the mother of a 6 month old baby.* *"Can I get 1 cup of milk?" asked the lady to the 3-star hotel manager.* "•*"Yes madam", he replied, "But it will cost you money."* *"No problem", said the lady.* *While driving back from hotel, the child was hungry again.* *They stopped at a road side tea stall and took milk from the tea vendor.* *"How much?”* *she asked the tea vendor*. *"Madam, we don't charge money for kid's milk...

Choosing a career path (or changing one) is, for most of us, a confusing and anxiety-riddled experience. Many will tell you to “follow your passion” or “do what you love,” but as Cal Newport argues in  So Good They Can’t Ignore You , this is not very useful advice. When I graduated from college, I liked lots of things. But love? Passion? That would have been seriously overstating it. We all want to choose a career that will make us happy, but how can we know what that will be? Research suggests that human beings are remarkably bad at predicting how they will feel when doing something in the future. It’s not hard to find someone who started out thinking that they would love their chosen profession, only to wind up hating it. In fairness, how are you supposed to know if you will be happy as an investment banker, or an artist, or a professor, if you haven’t actually done any of these things yet? Who has ever, in the history of mankind, taken a job and had it turn out exa...

Self-discipline is one of the most important and useful skills everyone should possess. This skill is essential in every area of life, and though most people acknowledge its importance, very few do something to strengthen it. Contrary to common belief, self-discipline does not mean being harsh toward yourself, or living a limited, restrictive lifestyle. Self discipline means self control, which is a sign of inner strength and control of yourself, your actions, and your reactions. Self discipline gives you the power to stick to your decisions and follow them through, without changing your mind, and is therefore, one of the important requirements for achieving goals. The possession of this skill enables you to persevere with your decisions and plans until you accomplish them. It also manifests as inner strength, helping you to overcome addictions, procrastination and laziness, and to follow through with whatever you do. One of its main characteristics is the...

Discipline is a way of life, where one tries to be on time and live in a systematic way. Discipline is not limited to money, riches or by poverty but it is just a personal orientation towards life. It is a habit and not an adaptation in life. So one can  practice discipline  for better life. Many successful people attribute their success to discipline. For them more than knowledge, communication or skill, discipline played a key role in their way to success. Discipline in life has many virtues like being focused, staying healthy and also avoiding problems. As per the current life style and social trends, discipline techniques seems to be one of the essential life skills. Discipline is one of the factor by which people judge others. Those highly talented and hard working people cannot be successful if they are not disciplined. Discipline extends to personal life, career,work, study, life style and even social life. So it is good to inculcate stud...

One of the challenges of being an entrepreneur is always having to be “switched on,” to be constantly vigilant and on the lookout for new opportunities that will build brand awareness and promote a product or service. Except being “in the zone” all the time is tiresome. The brain, just like any muscle, gets tired the more it’s used. Heck, mine is already tired from writing this article. The point is that learning  how to manage your mental throttle control  is critical if you want to stay at the top of your game. Every athlete, speaker and entrepreneur needs rest because  that’s  when new insights and reflections come to mind. Daniel Goldman, author of  Focus , said it best: “A failure to focus inward leaves you rudder-less, a failure to focus on others renders you clueless, and a failure to focus outward may leave you blindsided.” To mitigate the potential for suboptimal focus -- and hence, diminished productivity -- here are six ...

Those of you familiar with Stephen Covey's  The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People  will recognize the term Quadrant II manager. This ideal manager recognizes that time spent on the important but non-urgent aspects of her business are the most vital for success. The Quadrant II manager spends time during the work day on long-term planning, developing relationships and training staff to take on delegated tasks. Note that she spends virtually no time answering e-mail, plowing through an inbox or attending meetings. Many entrepreneurs are operate solo; they're the cook, maitre d', busboy and bottle washer of their business. Many have families to attend to and are desperately trying to keep all the plates on the tray without dropping any. I believe that's why so many startups fail. There's no way to manage that kind of chaos the way most of us try to manage. If you find yourself working night and day and still feel you're accomplishing nothing, stop, take sto...