<p>Remote team management might be a difficult task for any manager. It requires advanced communication skills and effective time management. No wonder why many managers struggle with remote teams.</p>
<p>I would like to share my 20 Tips for remote managers. And also provide some useful information about the challenges of managing a remote team as well as tools that can help remote managers to <a href="https://leventieva.com/article/how-to-organize-remote-working">make remote work a successful approach</a>.</p>
<p>If you are a remote worker, this article can also help you to understand better remote team management and know what is expected of remote workers in a remote team.</p>
<p>So let&#8217;s begin!</p>
<h2>What is remote team management?</h2>
<p>Remote team management is a set of processes, tools, and methods to effectively coordinate remote teams. A remote team manager should have the ability to manage people far away, who are not always available for meetings or phone calls, motivate remote workers no matter what their location is. At the same time, remote managers need to be more attentive, as remote worker absence from the office means that remote manager needs to communicate with remote workers more efficiently and set goals very clear.</p>
<p>In a remote team, it&#8217;s much harder to see who is doing what and how productive remote workers are. That&#8217;s why remote managers need to pay attention to monitoring remote worker processes and work time spent on tasks.</p>
<p>Sometimes remote team management can seem like a constant, never-ending struggle. However, remote team management does not have to be so difficult and quite similar to on-site teams. Here are 20 of my key takeaways as a remote manager for the past years:</p>
<h2>1. Clearly define roles within the remote team</h2>
<p>The most important thing for remote managers is to set goals and objectives for remote team members. However, remote managers often overlook the need to define roles within remote teams.</p>
<p>Just like in on-site teams, remote workers need to understand their role within remote teams, what tasks they are responsible for, how their task fits into the whole process. Team members should know who is doing what to avoid any confusion and conflicts.</p>
<p>Managers need to define remote team roles on three levels: remote team member, remote manager, remote company leader. For example, the remote worker can be responsible for email communication, weekly status report with the remote team manager, timely delivery of projects assigned by the remote company leader.</p>
<p>Remote managers should clearly communicate who is responsible for what and how remote workers should interact with each other. Establishing clear remote roles across all remote team members and managers will help remote teams to coordinate their efforts better and avoid any confusion within remote teams.</p>
<h2>2. Communicate clearly with your remote team members</h2>
<p>Clear communication is one of the key elements in successful remote working. This means that managers need to communicate goals, plan remote work very carefully and manage remote team processes.</p>
<p>Remote managers should use different communication channels to stay in touch with remote workers. It&#8217;s important to make sure that remote workers are available on these channels at all times, especially if it is an urgent task or issue. The challenge of remote working is the lack of face-to-face communication, so remote managers should be more attentive to remote workers&#8217; feedback and participation in remote projects.</p>
<p>Remote managers also need to remember about remote work schedules. For instance, remote workers may not be available for phone calls or Skype chats during the nighttime depending on their location across different time zones. Working hours can&#8217;t always overlap with the team members&#8217; location. That&#8217;s why managers should consider different time zones and adjust daily work schedules to manage a remote team more efficiently.</p>
<p>Managers also need to communicate with the rest of the company, so they can support remote workers better. For managers, it&#8217;s important to ask for feedback on projects assigned to remote teams, share work progress with the rest of the company, discuss any problems or issues with remote workers.</p>
<h2>3. Enable collaboration between team members &amp; motivate them</h2>
<p>Remote managers need to <a href="https://leventieva.com/article/10-tips-to-keep-remote-teams-happy-and-productive">encourage their teams</a> more often and make sure that everyone&#8217;s work on projects assigned by company leaders is up-to-date and timely delivered within deadlines. When it comes to working remotely, opportunities for creating teamwork are limited. That&#8217;s why managers should pay more attention to building remote team spirit and motivate each member of the remote teams to do their best.</p>
<p>Remote workers should know that they can count on support from other team members if needed. Without this sense of unity, it will be difficult for any worker to perform at their best levels. For example, each member of a remote team can be assigned to check one another&#8217;s progress and make sure that all tasks are up-to-date. That will help the whole project stay on track and allow workers to ask for help from their teammates if needed.</p>
<h2>4. Manage your time as a manager &amp; plan work ahead</h2>
<p>Remote managers inevitably need to spend a lot of time assessing and managing remote workers&#8217; performance. They need to set goals, manage workflow and make sure each member is satisfied with their work. However, managers shouldn&#8217;t forget about their own tasks assigned by team leaders.</p>
<p>Remote managers should plan their daily work better and use different shortcuts &amp; tools that can improve the working process and save time. For instance, there are some tools that can be used to manage remote team processes and stay in touch with remote workers.</p>
<h2>5. Make sure your remote team meets regularly</h2>
<p>Remote managers have the responsibility to make sure all remote workers are satisfied with their work and able to deliver results on time. There is no doubt that an informal team culture contributes to success in remote working if managers manage their teams properly.</p>
<p>One of the ways to maintain a good relationship between team members is regular face-to-face or video chats. <a href="https://leventieva.com/article/10-tips-for-running-a-meeting">These meetings</a> may over exceed positive results since it allows all participants to clearly understand what&#8217;s going on within the project and motivate each other for further work.</p>
<p>For remote team managers, it&#8217;s important to remember that self-motivation plays a significant role in the success of a remote company. If a manager creates conditions for all team members to be motivated and satisfied with their work, they will have a chance to gather more resources and deliver higher results during the whole project. In order to build motivation within the team and motivate remote workers, managers should regularly discuss and assess results achieved by each member of their teams.</p>
<h2>6. Let remote teams manage their time &amp; work</h2>
<p>Remote managers need to let go of micromanagement – one of the most common pitfalls for off-site teams. Instead, they can rely on tools that allow them to track the progress of each project. For example, there are some tools that allow managers to receive alerts on tasks within projects assigned for remote teams. That will save time and help managers control the progress of work from a distance.</p>
<h2>7. Manage daily tasks &amp; schedule meetings between remote workers</h2>
<p>In order to get a clear understanding of what managers expect from their remote team, they need to clearly communicate deadlines for each task. As a manager, you need to regularly monitor the work of your teammates and assign new tasks when the previous ones are completed.</p>
<p>Regular phone calls between managers and remote workers can also help in arranging different meetings within teams or receive an access to some documents &amp; files without distracting workers from their immediate tasks.</p>
<h2>8. Communicate the goals &amp; expectations from your remote team</h2>
<p>Managers need to make sure their teams know what they are expected to deliver and how their work is valued within the company. For example, managers can divide responsibilities between members of a remote team and make each member understand why these tasks were assigned to them specifically. That will help in building trust and responsibility within a team.</p>
<h2>9. Make your goals &amp; achievements transparent for remote workers</h2>
<p>Remote managers need to make sure employees understand what their tasks are, how successful they were, and what the final results of their work were. A remote worker has all chances to feel unvalued if they don&#8217;t know how successful they&#8217;ve been and what they were expected to deliver.</p>
<h2>10. Set tasks instead of rules for your team members</h2>
<p>The way that managers control their teams plays a significant role in the success of remote work within a company. Managers need to create conditions for virtual employees to manage their own time, work on their own priorities, communicate with each other, and work without constant supervision. The more managers allow remote teams to manage themselves, the higher results they can achieve and the more motivation they will gather within a team.</p>
<h2>11. Don&#8217;t be afraid of mistakes – learn from them</h2>
<p>One of the biggest problems in remote work is that employees usually lack feedback on their work, which may result in lower productivity rates. For example, if a manager doesn&#8217;t provide any feedback on the work of their employees, it&#8217;s likely that those workers will not improve and build trust within a team. But as soon as managers start communicating with their remote teams more often, they will have the ability to understand what mistakes those workers have made and how they can avoid repeating those mistakes.</p>
<h2>12. Encourage cooperation &amp; collaboration between remote teams</h2>
<p>Virtual teams require support from their managers to build team spirit and achieve better results than individual workers can do by themselves. For example, there are some tools that allow teams to communicate better with each other (like Slack or Skype) and collaborate on projects without distractions. That will help in sharing ideas and completing tasks more efficiently.</p>
<h2>13. Give honest feedback to your remote team</h2>
<p>One of the key skills for any manager is providing feedback on a regular basis and encouraging employees to share their own ideas with each other. For example, managers can use stand-up meetings as a platform for sharing complaints within a virtual team and motivating everyone to achieve better results.</p>
<h2>14. Don&#8217;t micromanage your remote team</h2>
<p>Team members working remotely need to have a sense of responsibility and leadership within a team, which can be achieved only by encouraging them to manage their own time and achieve the best results with as little supervision as possible. Managers need to trust their employees, delegate responsibilities, encourage them to make their own decisions, and communicate more with them.</p>
<h2>15. Hire remote workers who are ready for a challenge</h2>
<p>There are a lot of employers who hire virtual employees blindly without checking if those workers have enough experience to work online. For example, managers need to check applicants&#8217; references from previous projects where those people worked remotely as well as check their resumes to see if those workers have enough experience in remote work.</p>
<h2>16. Use an app for time &amp; task management</h2>
<p>Remote managers have all chances to spend hours communicating with their teams, assigning tasks, and checking reports from employees. In order to save as much as possible of a manager&#8217;s time, you can use apps for time &amp; task management, so they will have all their employees&#8217; reports in one place and a possibility to check how each of them is progressing. (I always recommend <a href="https://asana.com/">Asana</a> and <a href="https://basecamp.com/">Basecamp</a>)</p>
<h2>17. Hire self-starters who can work on their own</h2>
<p>Managers need to focus on hiring people who are able to be responsible for the time when they&#8217;re alone at home or in a coffee shop. Self-starters who can manage their own time and prioritize their tasks will be more motivated to work than those workers who need constant supervision and motivation from a manager.</p>
<h2>18. Plan your calendar ahead of time</h2>
<p>Managing the day&#8217;s activities is one of the most challenging tasks for managers, especially when they&#8217;re working remotely as well. When they need to plan their day ahead of time, managers can take into consideration the deadlines assigned to their employees and prioritize how much time should be devoted to each task or activity.</p>
<h2>19. Communicate with your remote team more often</h2>
<p>It&#8217;s important to encourage workers in a team to communicate with each other more often while working remotely. They need to know what their colleague is working on and how that person can proceed with a project. Also, after managers get used to the remote work style, they will start communicating more often with their teams and sharing useful information about projects and their own time management.</p>
<h2>20. Set individual goals for virtual workers</h2>
<p>The most important challenge for any manager managing a remote team is setting individual goals for each member of the team and motivating those employees to achieve those goals by themselves. For example, managers can set up sprints with deadlines to motivate workers and check whether they&#8217;re achieving the project&#8217;s milestones as planned.</p>
<h2>Final Thoughts</h2>
<p>In order to manage a remote team successfully, managers need to be more responsive and available for their teams. They need to work 24/7 if needed because they&#8217;re working with people from different time zones. Also, the most important things for remote managers are open communication and motivation, so they can provide these aspects in their daily activities with employees.</p>
<p>Managing remote teams is not an easy task, so it&#8217;s crucial to take your time and try different methods of communicating with your employees in order to find the ones that will fit you best. Also, if you need additional help or any assistance in managing virtual teams, contact me, I&#8217;m always happy to help 🙂</p>


How to manage a remote team? What are the most common problems in remote teams? Challenges and tools of managing a remote team

Remote Team Management (20 Tips)

<p>I&#8217;m finally getting my head out of the sand when it comes to social media and my personal branding.</p>
<p>I&#8217;m in marketing, so I naturally strategize for others when it comes to their brand. But when it came to personal branding? You could say I am a bit &#8216;shy&#8217;.</p>
<p>I didn&#8217;t want to put myself out there. My work would speak for itself, right?</p>
<p>Wrong.</p>
<h2>Personal vs. Professional Personal Branding</h2>
<p>I would soon realize that Personal Branding is not just about what you do, but who you are as an individual. This means it must be representative of your unique qualities and beliefs.</p>
<p>Think of that for a moment &#8211; you know how busy your day is. There is barely enough time to fit everything you care about on your schedule. Now imagine that someone you don&#8217;t know expects you to get to know them and decide if you like them enough to do business with them.</p>
<p>Wouldn&#8217;t you want to know that person first? Wouldn&#8217;t you prefer they gave you a glimpse into who they are before asking for your time?</p>
<p>Here&#8217;s where social media comes in handy. You can get to know a person or at least their online alter ego on your own terms, whenever you have a spare minute or two.</p>
<p>The internet is a great tool and provides the perfect venue for building your personal brand and showcasing what you have to offer. You can connect with audiences instead of simply talking to them.</p>
<p>Most social media networks were simply too much work. I couldn&#8217;t see how it could be worth my while if I spent countless hours putting my life on display when I prefer to keep certain parts just for myself.</p>
<p>I saw it as the equivalent of throwing my business card in a massive bowl, hoping someone would fish it out and think, &#8220;This is the person I want to work with.&#8221;</p>
<p>But something changed. Social media became less about sharing every moment of my life and more about meeting people where they are.</p>
<h2>Everyone&#8217;s On Social Media</h2>
<p>Even the ones that are saying they&#8217;re not, or don&#8217;t post a lot still scroll through random posts and reels for hours a day.  The global average time spent using social media platforms per day is <strong>142 minutes</strong> in 2021.</p>
<p>However, creating open social media accounts meant a different mindset for me. I&#8217;ll admit, I&#8217;m a very private person and I&#8217;m still feeling a bit odd about sharing things online. It takes time to get used to it.</p>
<p>You might ask &#8220;How can someone be professional and personable on social media?&#8221;. I started to change the way I feel about the harsh online border between professional and personal I had created in my head. I have become very friendly with my coworkers and the casual atmosphere actually helps us work better together. After all, they&#8217;re the people I&#8217;ll be working with every day.</p>
<p>It&#8217;s amazing that social media allows for this type of relationship-building. In fact, determining whether or not candidates are personable enough to work in your company is something you can easily find out through their profile.</p>
<h2>Social Media And Work</h2>
<p>I am a startup employee. I&#8217;ve been in this ecosystem for a long time and I&#8217;ve seen a lot of changes. One of the things about emerging startups is that the teams are small and compact. People&#8217;s personalities are one of the most important factors because they will be spending more time together than with their families.</p>
<p>Also, the hiring process is often rushed and hectic &#8211; it makes much more sense to look at potential candidates&#8217; profiles for a hint of what they are all about.</p>
<p>There is one thing I&#8217;ve noticed about the startup scene. There are different expectations for company culture depending on whether your team consists of 5 founders or 50 employees. What worked to build that small &#8220;family culture&#8221; might not work once you have 50 people in one team.</p>
<p>What you can do is give people a peek into what your company culture is like by sharing content on your social media about things that are important to you &#8211; this will set the tone for future interactions. It&#8217;s nice for people to get an idea of who they&#8217;ll be spending their time with, especially when they&#8217;re not working with their friends.</p>
<p>I started to look at social media as a way of meeting people rather than an avenue for self-expression and personal connection. In fact, it&#8217;s one of the best ways to establish a connection with someone you&#8217;ve never met.</p>
<p>In the past few years, I&#8217;ve been able to build relationships that have been beneficial professionally and personally. I started my job when the first wave of COVID-19 hit. More than a year passed before I got to meet most of my colleagues.</p>
<p>This, plus the fact that we&#8217;re a distributed team and I work from different places (love the ring that the Digital Nomad has) made us communicate entirely online. I know that a lot of people have felt somewhat disconnected the past covid years but for our team, it was just the opposite. We are super close and supportive of each other. All thanks to the trust and intimacy we built online.</p>
<p>I still haven&#8217;t met some of the people I&#8217;m closest to. And I know all about their lives (or the parts they decide to share) from social media. We greet each other on the weekends, discuss life events and support each other with a positive outlook. It&#8217;s basically a variation of the &#8220;co-worker&#8221; relationship that I had inside a company before.</p>
<p>What changed is our approach to social media &#8211; we started using it with a different mindset in mind. When you connect on this level with coworkers who you&#8217;ve never met, it&#8217;s like joining their family. That can be very powerful in a startup where you don&#8217;t have the time to hang around the cooler or grab a bite after work.</p>
<h2>Social Media Is Fake</h2>
<p>I think social media is a great place to start building relationships. You probably wouldn&#8217;t make the effort to get in touch with someone you&#8217;ve never met before (for example, people you see around at meetups) but by connecting on social media you can get an idea of who they are and if their personality matches your expectations.</p>
<p>And yes, I&#8217;m fully aware of the &#8220;social media is fake&#8221; trend. And no, I don&#8217;t expect to see someone having an emotional breakdown online, or telling all about their problems and struggles. This doesn&#8217;t make it fake in any way.</p>
<p>I try to think of people&#8217;s online personalities as the version of themselves they want to be. The parts of their life they want to show. It&#8217;s informative and interesting, yet not too intimidating and personal. The only thing that matters is the quality of interactions you have with people, not whether they are IRL or online friends.</p>
<p>As for me, I prefer to keep my online and personal lives separate. There are still few people that know about my blog (shh) but otherwise, it&#8217;s all business. But hey, if I ever decide to start writing about my mom&#8217;s favorite recipe, you&#8217;ll be the first to know!</p>
<p>There is a big difference between sharing articles and my thoughts on different topics or sharing pictures of my life, environment, vacations, and the things that I like. I want my online presence to be a reflection of my interests and the person I am, but without giving too much control. This is not something that&#8217;s easy to do in our current social media landscape. It takes time, energy, and effort to manage your online persona, which is why it isn&#8217;t for everyone &#8211; just like meeting people offline isn&#8217;t for everyone.</p>
<p>I&#8217;m still learning and navigating this space, but I definitely see the benefits of using your online presence to bring people closer (and I believe that&#8217;s what social media was originally intended for). Connecting with others is a much more rewarding experience than just sharing information and it has made me feel empowered in my job and life. The line between personal and professional is very blurred for me. And I love it that way. It gives me the freedom to choose my scenery and plan my days better. However, I&#8217;m still trying to figure out for myself and decide which parts of my daily life can go online.</p>
<p>I&#8217;ve met some amazing people through social media who have invited me to join conferences or asked me to contribute my opinion on things that I would have never done without them, and all this turned out to be a wonderful learning experience for me. And my blog made me realize that sharing your work online is the best thing you can do to connect with like-minded people and make new connections. So I&#8217;m grateful for that.</p>
<h2>Final Thoughts And Some Tips</h2>
<p>I would encourage everyone to try and find their own balance with social media, experiment and see how it can help you grow. Embrace change and don&#8217;t be afraid to push the boundaries.</p>
<p>What matters is putting yourself out there and being open to new connections. Being on social media is not some kind of punishment or something you have to do in order to keep up with the times &#8211; it&#8217;s just the natural consequence of being part of our digital world.</p>
<p>If you think of social media as a business card, then imagine having the opportunity to get to know someone before giving them yours.</p>
<h2>And The Tips</h2>
<p><strong>You can use one of these platforms&#8217; search functions</strong> to find people in your industry or related fields, follow them and see what they share. You don&#8217;t have to be friends with them or follow their every move. Just get the lay of the land and see what they are sharing.</p>
<p><strong>You can also search hashtags related to your field, join a conversation and engage</strong>. This way you&#8217;re showing people that you&#8217;re interested in what&#8217;s going on around you and that you&#8217;re approachable enough not to come off like a bot.</p>
<p>When it comes to personal branding,<strong> you need to keep in mind that no one wants to follow someone who is overly promotional</strong>, full of themselves, or tedious. Tell people what you&#8217;re interested in and what makes your life tick. Show them the person behind the brand. Share your personality and all those wonderful quirks that make you, well, unique.</p>
<p>And once you open yourself up to the world and start sharing your thoughts &#8211; people will share theirs with you as well. <strong>Social media isn&#8217;t just about what you have to say but also how those around you interact with each other and their environment.</strong> Actively engage with people who share a common interest with you and who you think are interesting. Reply to their comments, share what they&#8217;ve shared with others, and comment on their posts to show that you&#8217;re interested in what&#8217;s going on around you.</p>
<p>Think of social media as a reality show &#8211;<strong> the things you put online stay there forever</strong> so don&#8217;t say anything too personal or confidential.</p>
<p>You want to be witty, interesting, and fun &#8211; not crazy or offensive.</p>
<p>With all that being said, it&#8217;s important to remember that<strong> there are no set rules when it comes to social media.</strong> There are no real boundaries. What matters is figuring out what works for you.</p>
<p>Do you like sharing personal stuff with the world? Do it. Are you shy about your thoughts and opinions? Try talking anonymously until you get used to it.</p>
<p>If the thought of sharing something on social media makes you want to crawl under a blanket, don&#8217;t share it.</p>
<p>And lastly, remember that having an online presence is not necessarily the same as being someone&#8217;s friend or becoming part of their personal life. <strong>Don&#8217;t take it personally when someone isn&#8217;t interacting with you the way you wish they would</strong>.</p>
<p>Sometimes all it takes is for you to go &#8220;Hey, I like your stuff.&#8221; to show that you&#8217;re interested in someone and that you care.</p>
<p>So if this is your first time venturing into the world of social media then good luck! And don&#8217;t forget to have fun with it because, well, it&#8217;s meant to be a shared experience after all&#8230;</p>
<p>If anyone has any other helpful tips please share! And you&#8217;re more than welcome to join my personal venture into the social media sphere 🙂</p>


On social media, tell people what you're interested in and what makes your life tick. Show them the person behind the brand.

Personal Branding And Social Media

<p>I first heard of &#8221;mindfulness&#8221; a few years ago, when a friend of mine went to a retreat. While he made it look appealing and interesting, I had no clue what mindfulness was exactly.</p>
<p>I was into yoga since my early teens but meditation was never really my thing. I&#8217;m usually all over the place, overdoing everything and juggling a dozen tasks at a time. 30 minutes of doing nothing? That was utterly absurd for me back then.</p>
<p>That &#8221;absurd&#8221; 30-minute doing nothing is now a daily routine for me, and I have to say it has changed my life in so many ways.</p>
<p>The most amazing part about mindfulness is the way it works with people who are not really into it or even dislike meditation. For example, you can use mindfulness when taking care of your plants, while cooking, or even while taking a shower.</p>
<p>For me, mindfulness is not only a technique but also served as a transition to meditation, a way to feel more aware in everyday life. It has helped me become more present, allowing me to experience what is going on right now instead of thinking about the past or the future.</p>
<p>Mindfulness has also helped me become more tuned in to my body and how it&#8217;s feeling, which has been a huge help in sports.</p>
<h2>What is mindfulness?</h2>
<p>Mindfulness is not a religion and is in no way connected with any religious practices. Mindfulness simply means being aware of what you do and responding to your emotions, not reacting to them without thinking.</p>
<p>Mindfulness, at its core, is the quality of awareness that arises through paying attention, on purpose, in the present moment, and non-judgmentally. Mindfulness has recently become popularized by clinicians promoting it as an important component of health and well-being. Some clinical studies show mindfulness-based interventions (MBIs) to be helpful in reducing stress, improving mood states, increasing self-efficacy, decreasing anxiety, depression, chronic pain, and overall health. Mindfulness-based interventions are not just for individuals who are sick or experiencing difficulties in life. The benefits of practicing these techniques have been shown to be helpful to anyone, including children and healthy adults. Mindfulness can potentially improve the quality of life in a variety of settings.</p>
<p>What we call mindfulness nowadays started in the late 70s when Jon Kabat-Zinn created the mindfulness-based stress reduction (MBSR) program at the University of Massachusetts Medical School. While teaching a stress reduction class, Kabat-Zinn was struck by how difficult it was for the majority of the participants to sit still and turn their attention inward.</p>
<p>In MBSR, mindfulness is taught as a skill, or &#8221;capacity,&#8221; that can be developed through specific training in meditation practices. In this context, mindfulness is not perceived as a trait of consciousness that allows a person to live a life free from worry and full of attention.</p>
<p>Instead, mindfulness is seen as a mental state cultivated through meditation practice. In this context, mindfulness means being aware of each moment. Mindfulness skills can be learned easily and then practiced in everyday life.</p>
<h2>What is mindfulness practice?</h2>
<p>The formal practice of mindfulness consists of a number of techniques that help an individual develop their awareness by paying attention while focusing on the breath, sensations, thoughts, emotions, or a specific object. There are several different techniques for practicing mindfulness meditation such as: sitting with eyes closed and focusing on breathing; standing and focusing on the sensation of feet touching the ground; taking slow, intentional steps while mindfully walking outside; or simply lying down and paying attention to your entire body from head to toe &#8211; noticing where you feel tension and/or tightness in your muscles and then releasing the tension. Mindful yoga is another growing trend that combines basic mindfulness practices with certain traditional yoga poses. Yoga allows for increased awareness of an individual&#8217;s body, breathing patterns, and how these things are affected by stress, anxiety, or even physical pain.</p>
<h2>What are some benefits of practicing mindfulness?</h2>
<p>The overall goal of mindfulness-based practices is to foster adaptive qualities such as better emotion regulation skills, improved interpersonal functioning, enhanced attentional control/concentration ability, more compassion towards oneself and others, less rumination on the past or worry about future events/experiences, higher self-esteem, less negative thinking (e.g., black-and-white thinking), greater acceptance of all emotions including anger &amp; sadness rather than reacting to them, and a greater ability to focus attention on the present moment rather than worrying about what has already happened or will happen in the future. This leads to a more clear consciousness and a better sense of overall well-being/health for an individual.</p>
<p>Mindfulness practices can show significant improvement in anxiety symptoms, depression symptoms, mental health-related quality of life, self-esteem, rumination (focus on negative thinking), distress tolerance levels (i.e., difficulties tolerating painful or difficult situations), and overall psychological flexibility (i.e., the ability to adapt well in different types of stress and difficult situations). Clinical trials have shown mindfulness-based interventions to be effective in reducing psychological symptoms such as anxiety, depression, and chronic pain. In addition, MBIs can also help improve overall health and levels of satisfaction with life (eudemonic well-being).</p>
<p>Mindfulness can be beneficial for a wide range of people including children, adolescents, college students, adults in the workplace, veterans with PTSD or other trauma experienced during combat roles/deployments, patients recovering from cancer or other chronic illnesses such as autoimmune diseases (like rheumatoid arthritis), elderly individuals living with age-related memory impairment issues (Alzheimer&#8217;s disease), and individuals suffering from a wide range of mental health difficulties &#8211; eating disorders, addiction issues, mood/anxiety disorders (bipolar disorder or generalized anxiety disorder), autism spectrum disorder characteristics, and so many more.</p>
<p>In addition to the benefits listed above, mindfulness has been found to increase cognitive flexibility, an individual&#8217;s ability to shift thinking when necessary instead of getting stuck on one train of thought. In other words, people who experience rumination or repetitive negative thoughts may learn how to shift their focus onto something more positive instead of allowing those obsessive negative thoughts to take over their minds and dominate their consciousness. Mindfulness helps us tap into our experiences in a deeper way so we can become more aware of what is really going on inside ourselves; this allows us to make conscious decisions about how we want to respond or react in different types of stressful situations instead of letting our emotions (anxiety, anger, sadness) dictate our thoughts and behaviors without any conscious participation on our side.</p>
<p>There are many types of mindfulness practices available including Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction (MBSR), Mindfulness-Based Cognitive Therapy (MBCT), Dialectical Behavior Therapy (DBT), Mindfulness-Based Eating Awareness Training (MB-EAT), Mindful Self-Compassion Program, Kirtan Kriya Meditation, Yoga Nidra meditation&#8230; the list goes on and on. There are so many different programs available because mindfulness takes a slightly different form depending on the individual practicing it, their specific problems or difficulties, and their personal goals for practicing mindfulness. Some people may find that practicing yoga is the best way to tap into their inner self and become more mindful of their physical self and surroundings, whereas others may prefer sitting down in a quiet room with gentle instrumental background music to guide them into deeper mindfulness meditation. It is important to find the mindfulness techniques that work best for you, and which you can consistently practice daily.</p>
<h2>How to get started with mindfulness</h2>
<p>There are many different apps that can guide you through your first mindful meditation. Some of these apps rely on guided meditations while others may be more flexible and work with whatever style of meditation you prefer. Some examples of mindful mediation apps include:</p>
<h3>Calm</h3>
<p><a href="https://www.calm.com/">The Calm app</a> is based on mindfulness training and provides many great guided meditations, sleep stories, breathing exercises&#8230; in a word &#8211; all the things a beginner needs in order to get started with mindfulness.</p>
<h3>Headspace</h3>
<p><a href="https://www.headspace.com/">Headspace</a> is another great resource for beginners looking to try out mindful meditation. Headspace can be downloaded for free on Apple or Android devices and provides tons of great information about the benefits of mindfulness, how to become more mindful, and includes a great library of guided meditations to get you started.</p>
<h3>Headspace Guide on Meditation on Netflix</h3>
<p>Another great thing about Headspace is that it has teamed up with Netflix and produced a series of ten short videos dedicated to demonstrating the benefits of mindfulness and how to become more mindful. This is also a great resource for beginners but may be a bit too basic for those already familiar with mindfulness mediation.</p>
<h3>The Mindfulness App</h3>
<p><a href="https://themindfulnessapp.com/">This app</a> is a free download and can be used on both Apple and Android devices. This particular app allows users to create a personalized mindfulness program based on what type of meditation works best for them as well as their preferred areas of focus.</p>
<p>Mindfulness takes some time and practice to master, but once you get the hang of it, it&#8217;s very simple and easy to do. You can perform meditation for one minute or ten minutes depending on your schedule/time constraints. If you are brand new to meditation it might be best to start with a few minutes at a time until you get used to how your body feels during the process. The most effective way to meditate is in a quiet space where there are no distractions or interruptions (e.g., cell phone notifications).</p>
<p>One example of mindfulness meditation involves focusing on the breath by breathing slowly in through your nose for two counts, holding your breath for two counts, then exhaling slowly through your nose for two counts. This may seem really simple, but it can be very challenging to maintain focus on the breath as most people will inevitably find their mind wandering from those two count holds and wavering back and forth as they try to perform this relaxing breathing technique. Once you notice that your mind has wandered away from the breathing process, all you have to do is refocus on your breath again by bringing awareness back into your body/mind experience. There are no rules surrounding how often to breathe in or out during meditation; it all depends on what feels best for each individual person&#8217;s unique body/mind system.</p>
<p>There are many different styles of mindful meditations that involve paying attention to emotions, thoughts, feelings in our bodies, or what is going on in our environment (e.g., sounds, smells). Mindfulness does not require any specific type of meditation to get started; you can try them all and find the ones that work best for your unique body/mind system. You may even end up liking different types of meditations for different purposes; some people like to use sitting and walking meditations for relaxation and de-stressing while others like to use meditations involving their breath during times when they&#8217;re feeling anxious or panicked about something&#8230; There are absolutely no rules when it comes to practicing mindfulness!</p>
<p>In addition to the physical components used in mindful meditation, there are also three important parts of learning how to practice mindfulness: <strong>observing, describing, and participating.</strong> Observing means you&#8217;re bringing awareness into your body/mind experience and noticing whatever emotions, thoughts, or physical sensations are going on at the moment without judgment. Describing involves putting words to those types of experiences so you can label them in a way that makes sense for you (e.g., &#8220;I feel anxious&#8221;). Participating simply means becoming fully present with whatever experience is occurring in your body/mind right now instead of trying to avoid, escape from, fight against, or numb out from it.</p>
<h2>Alternative mindfulness techniques</h2>
<p>If mindfulness techniques don&#8217;t work for you there are many different alternatives available as well: deep breathing exercises, yoga, meditation apps, progressive muscle relaxation, guided imagery exercises&#8230; These alternatives may take a little more time and effort than mindfulness techniques, but if you learn how to practice any of these and it helps improve your overall mood, energy level, and self-esteem then those extra few minutes spent learning the alternative technique are well worth the time.</p>
<h2>Creating a mindfulness practice</h2>
<p>The most important thing when creating a mindfulness practice is to do whatever works for you and your unique body/mind system. If a particular type of mindfulness technique doesn&#8217;t work then don&#8217;t force yourself to continue trying it if it isn&#8217;t making you feel better in some way. There are so many different ways to approach mindfulness&#8230; The best way is the one that fits comfortably with how you live your life on a day-to-day basis, not what someone else thinks would be the &#8220;best&#8221; or &#8220;most effective&#8221; kind of mindful meditation for you to use.</p>
<h2>How long should my mindfulness sessions be?</h2>
<p>There&#8217;s no right or wrong answer here since there really isn&#8217;t any &#8220;rule&#8221; regarding how long you should practice mindfulness. It all depends on what you find works best for your unique body/mind system, which is why it&#8217;s so important to keep an open mind and remember that there really aren&#8217;t any rules when it comes to meditating. If you want to give yourself a time limit for practicing mindfulness then somewhere between five and twenty minutes of uninterrupted mindful meditation time each day is a good range to try. But how long your sessions actually last will depend on what happens during them (if you&#8217;re enjoying the process then the session might end before you want it to; if you get distracted or feel like quitting then the session may end sooner than expected).</p>
<p>I first started with 1 minute. Yes, one! And I barely made it to the minute. At first, I only wanted to do mindfulness for very short periods of time, with no real plan or expectations about how I should be doing this. I just wanted to see if mindfulness was something that might help me with my anxiety, and one minute didn&#8217;t seem like much of a time commitment.</p>
<p>Now I need to set a timer so I don&#8217;t get too carried away. I try to make as much time as I can for mindfulness and meditation, and I do it every day. I still start off with only one to five minutes, but once I warm up I usually go for between twenty and forty minutes.</p>
<p>I found that I get distracted or my mind wanders after only a few minutes. If you&#8217;re like me and you find it difficult to sit still without getting distracted or wanting to stop then the best solution is to simply sit for shorter, more frequent sessions throughout your day. That way, instead of getting frustrated with yourself if you lapse into a daydream after five minutes, you can simply redirect your attention back to the present moment and refocus on the activity you were doing before your mind wandered.</p>
<h2>Final Thoughts</h2>
<p>It&#8217;s only natural for a human mind to wander. Distracting thoughts and feelings are going to happen no matter how much you try to resist them or control your experience at the moment. It&#8217;s best just to accept these things when they happen, refocus on what you&#8217;re doing, then continue practicing mindfulness whenever you get another chance.</p>
<p>To create a solid foundation for practicing mindfulness it helps to start with one minute of uninterrupted mindful meditation at least once per day. Once this becomes comfortable for you then slowly build up from there adding more time or making some changes so that new situations can be handled in a healthy way while old ones gradually fade away as new habits take their place.</p>
<p>You don&#8217;t have to clear your entire schedule if that doesn&#8217;t work for you. Give yourself at least five minutes of undistracted mindfulness time each day, then build on this as you feel comfortable with the practice.</p>
<p>Once you have a good foundation for practicing mindfulness, adding some variety to your sessions will help keep things interesting and more fun so that you can really enjoy what it feels like to be fully present at this moment, right now.</p>


I was into yoga since my early teens but meditation was never really my thing.

Mindfulness

<p>Every member of the team has to have a clear task description People have to be able to work independently Have open communication within the team.</p>
<p>This means no blame culture. Make sure every person&#8217;s skill set is being used, not just their weaknesses or parts of what they know. Otherwise, you will find yourself doing everyone else&#8217;s work.</p>
<h2>Every person needs to be up to date with what everyone else is doing in the team</h2>
<p>Someone/a few people need to do a check-up on how each task has been done and if it&#8217;s not satisfactory, find out why &#8211; don&#8217;t just assume. Planning is crucial: Before you start working together as an online team, everyone needs to have a sit-down and figure out what their daily tasks should be. Everyone should know if they should work first on design, first on programming, or first on testing.</p>
<p>And plan for the whole cycle. Not just from Monday to Friday. You can&#8217;t assume everything will run smoothly as planned over the weekend.</p>
<h2>Communication is everything</h2>
<p>Every member of your team should have a backup internet connection, either a device with a 3G/4G/5G plan, a SIM card with international roaming, or a backup connection within an office. The best solution is if everyone has a backup connection.</p>
<p>It is good to have international SIM cards because someone might be traveling and they can&#8217;t make calls or send messages but they can still use the internet on their device to work with the team.</p>
<p>Every member should have access to a working computer and needs to feel free to use any kind of chat to communicate with other team members &#8211; no matter if it&#8217;s WhatsApp, Slack, Skype, or a different chat app, just make sure that everyone in the team is using the same one.</p>
<p>Cloud-based solutions are perfect for keeping documents together. Every person needs a dropbox account or any other cloud storage solution to be able to share pictures, texts, or images with the other members.</p>
<p>If there are desktop apps you need to use, make sure everyone has access to them.</p>
<p>Phones can get lost or broken &#8211; always have a backup, especially when traveling. Be sure to test your backup before traveling somewhere, don&#8217;t assume it will work without testing.</p>
<p>Never ever assume you have enough power banks or that any other team member has it sorted out either, so check up on them if they look like they are about to run out of battery.</p>
<p>A project management app ensures every member of the team can follow the same tasks and it is easier to keep track of progress.</p>
<p>Make sure at least one person always has access to an internet connection so if something happens with the team&#8217;s project or website, there is somebody who can immediately take care of it. Don&#8217;t assume the others will be able to fix whatever problem arises because they might not have internet access either.</p>
<h2>If something goes wrong, laugh about it.</h2>
<p>If you have a mistake and someone else finds it before you do, don&#8217;t blame them &#8211; instead, thank them for being better at their job than you are. Be open about mistakes or misunderstandings with each other.</p>
<p>If you need a team member for a special task, like programming something that&#8217;s not your expertise, send them an explanation of what they have to do &#8211; don&#8217;t just tell them to go ahead and do it. Once they understand what it is you want, they are more likely to be able to do it.</p>
<p>Don&#8217;t take this for granted. It works best when everybody has some form of English knowledge or experience with writing in English so you can communicate easily &#8211; but if one of your team members doesn&#8217;t have it, don&#8217;t assume they understand everything. Make sure everyone understands what they have to do and how they have to do it.</p>
<p>Don&#8217;t assume everyone understands every task they receive. Make sure there is always someone checking over what has been done before it goes public &#8211; because sometimes something can slip through the cracks unnoticed. Figure out which frequency works best for your team, but make sure there is always someone checking up on things before getting published or released.</p>
<p>If somebody makes a mistake (and trust me, everyone makes mistakes), don&#8217;t blame them for it &#8211; instead, make sure you talk about it with them. Getting to the bottom of mistakes is always better than leaving them unspoken. It&#8217;s important you figure out what went wrong so everybody can learn from it.</p>
<p>Problems are meant to be solved, not hidden &#8211; work as a team and split tasks between each other. Don&#8217;t just blindly do whatever you&#8217;re told, instead ask questions if something isn&#8217;t clear to you. If the person who gave you the task has enough time, he or she will explain how they want something done to everyone on the team &#8211; you don&#8217;t need to constantly remind them that nobody told you anything, they should take care of this themselves.</p>
<p>Don&#8217;t forget yourself either &#8211; make sure your work doesn&#8217;t suffer because there is less time during the day to work on it. Make sure you ask your boss or manager if there is enough time for everybody and then make sure that you contribute as much as possible without neglecting your other duties.</p>
<h2>Meetups</h2>
<p>If you are working with people who live in the same country as you do, make sure you meet up at least once every now and then &#8211; whether that&#8217;s for a movie night or to work together. It will help boost your team spirit.</p>
<p>Figure out how often you want to meet up with each other, depending on your distance from each other. In a distributed team where all members are spread across different countries, it might be useful to have a daily meeting so everybody knows what they have been doing the past day and so they can talk about problems that arose with their work. An hour a day seems like a good timeframe to me &#8211; not too short but also not too long of a meeting either 😉</p>
<p>You can achieve the same results if you meet up over Skype, by having a Zoom meeting once every few weeks to discuss how things are going and what concerns everybody has.</p>
<h2>Scheduling Calls</h2>
<p>If your team members live halfway around the world (or even on another continent), communicating can become difficult if you don&#8217;t schedule calls ahead of time.</p>
<p>Make sure you figure out what times work for everybody involved and then see which day works best for those &#8211; if everybody wants to talk at 3 PM but that doesn&#8217;t work with somebody else who is located in a different country, try to reschedule it or have two sessions one after another.</p>
<p>You also want to avoid too long calls because this might tire everybody out after several hours. Try to limit them to an hour or so and schedule a follow-up session the next day in case everybody still has unanswered questions or wants to talk about something. If it can&#8217;t be resolved by talking, maybe try emailing instead?</p>
<h2>Ask For Help</h2>
<p>Don&#8217;t be shy about asking your manager for help &#8211; as soon as something goes wrong, tell them about it and ask for help instead of trying to sort it out yourself first. You can also have a weekly or monthly check-in with your manager where you go over the past week&#8217;s progress and talk about problems that arose during working hours.</p>
<p>If there is an easy solution to it though, ask for help &#8211; this also applies when you make a mistake and need more information on what exactly you did wrong.</p>
<p>Don&#8217;t wait until it&#8217;s too late and you&#8217;ve done something majorly wrong. And if the manager can&#8217;t help you, they should make sure to find somebody who can. If it&#8217;s about a task though (for example asking for more resources), it might be better to not bother your boss with that and ask one of your co-workers instead to help out.</p>
<h2>Experience</h2>
<p>Remote working is not always rainbows and traveling. It can be tough if you don&#8217;t know what the best tools are and how exactly to communicate with your team.</p>
<p>Timezone differences can make communicating difficult sometimes since some people might sleep when others wake up (or play games when others would like to work). Figure out what time works best for everybody involved and try to align your work schedule with that &#8211; if possible, of course.</p>
<p>Some people might be working from home or in a co-working space and there can be distractions around you all the time (like noise, cats running over your desk, or the TV on in the background). Make sure you find a quiet place where nobody will disturb you and make sure you turn off notifications for anything not related to work (unless it&#8217;s something important; then they should go through everybody else on the team instead)</p>
<p>Doing everything by yourself is not the best idea either &#8211; this is why we have teams after all. Just like when playing video games with friends: don&#8217;t hog the controller and let others take their turns too 😉 And if somebody else knows something better than you, don&#8217;t be the one who is always right &#8211; learn from each other and let everybody participate!</p>
<h2>Have Fun!</h2>
<p>Last but not least: remember that remote working is supposed to be fun &#8211; you&#8217;re usually more productive when you&#8217;re having a good time! Don&#8217;t let yourself get burned out from all the work you have to do &#8211; take occasional breaks and go outside for some fresh air if necessary&#8230; And don&#8217;t forget to eat healthy food too 🙂</p>
<p>That&#8217;s pretty much everything I think is important when it comes to being productive while working remotely with your team.</p>


Just like when playing video games with friends: don't hog the controller and let others take their turns too

How to Organize Remote Working

<p>I am a person that has an identity crisis every once in a while. Maybe a little too often than needed. There were a lot of changes in a short time and I had to be as adaptive as possible, while I was going through some stuff, had to take care of some business, and had my own problems that needed to be fixed. As a result, nothing got fixed at all.</p>
<p>In fact, it even got worse. In the middle of this hurricane of events, when I was in this state of complete despair, with all the doors closed in front of me and no way to even check what&#8217;s on the other side, I couldn&#8217;t handle it anymore. A part of me wanted to give up and another part (that&#8217;s stronger) pushed me forward.</p>
<p>I was exhausted, overweight, sad, overwhelmed with tasks and on top of everything, my two-year-old was throwing one tantrum after the other.</p>
<p>I knew I needed to do something, but what? There were too many things on my plate and the only thing that made sense was getting back at it.</p>
<p>In fact, the change didn&#8217;t come from a sudden moment of spiritual enlightenment, no. In fact, I received a terrible diagnosis that made my MD talk about a 5-year prognosis.</p>
<p>Everything passed and I was well, but I realized that some decisions I had made before were pretty stupid and it wasn&#8217;t worth it to get hung up over them. I was lucky enough to have the opportunity to change the course of my life, whether for better or worse will be determined by me.</p>
<p>So here&#8217;s what I did&#8230;</p>
<p>I found myself on the verge of burnout and it didn&#8217;t look good. I was miserable, tired, frustrated and my life was not moving in the direction that I wanted it to.</p>
<p>After some time, I managed to figure out what&#8217;s wrong with me and how I could fix it. Here is a list of things that you can do if you find yourself on the verge of ruin:</p>
<h2>Cut off people who bring nothing but negativity to your life.</h2>
<p>This is the hardest thing to do, but you have to understand that it&#8217;s just not healthy for you anymore and that you deserve better. It might be a family member and it will definitely hurt, but it&#8217;s the only way to get right with yourself.</p>
<p>You are the average of the 5 people you spend the most time with, so stop surrounding yourself with people who you consider &#8220;negative&#8221; and start hanging out with those who inspire you, motivate you, and support you.</p>
<p>I think this is one of the hardest things, but also one of the best things you can do for yourself.</p>
<p>It&#8217;s about getting rid of toxic people, who don&#8217;t treat you in a way that you deserve, or that doesn&#8217;t make sense to be around them for any reason. They will bring nothing into your life but stress and problems.</p>
<p>Let&#8217;s be clear &#8211; this doesn&#8217;t mean these people are bad or wish you the worst. It just means that this relationship doesn&#8217;t bring out the best version of you.</p>
<p>You have to understand, some people are just not meant to be together and live in harmony.</p>
<p>If they were a good influence on your life, then it would have happened by now, or at least tried new things together. You can&#8217;t stay stuck at a certain stage of your life and refuse to grow up, because you&#8217;re afraid.</p>
<p>Only surround yourself with those who will inspire you to be better; those that want you to be successful; those that understand the vision and goals that you have planned for your future.</p>
<p>You need a cheerleader by your side, not a saboteur. Sometimes we find this in a romantic relationship, sometimes we find it in our family, and other times we find it in the amazing people we meet along the way.</p>
<p>The power of positive thinking is great and you have to be open to change if you&#8217;re ready for it. If you don&#8217;t believe in yourself that will show up through your actions and nobody will help you.</p>
<h2>Make yourself happy before you make anyone else happy.</h2>
<p>It&#8217;s about getting rid of external forces that will influence your happiness, like the approval of others or social pressure. One of the best things you can do for yourself is to prioritize your own needs first (before someone else&#8217;s).</p>
<p>You might find it counterintuitive, but your needs come first. Once you stop worrying about other people&#8217;s validation and start focusing on what makes you happy, things will get a lot easier.</p>
<p>That means spending more time doing the things that make you feel good and taking care of yourself first and foremost (of course always within reason).</p>
<p>You need to know what makes you happy and then work every day on making that a reality. If you don&#8217;t, then you&#8217;ll just be miserable and that will have a negative impact on those around you as well.</p>
<p>You need to focus on the present moment as much as possible and live in it as if it was your last day.</p>
<p>It&#8217;s simple &#8211; stop thinking about the past and future. If you&#8217;re constantly thinking about them, then it means that you&#8217;re not living the present. You need to be here now and stop worrying all the time.</p>
<p>Sometimes we worry so much about not having enough money to buy a house or go on vacation because we don&#8217;t realize how many amazing things we have in our lives already.</p>
<p>Start counting your blessings and enjoy life&#8217;s little pleasures. You need to learn how to appreciate the things you already have, not the things that you don&#8217;t yet own (or think you deserve).</p>
<p>If you&#8217;re always looking ahead and living in fear of what might happen next, then this is a recipe for disaster. It means that anything that happens will come as a surprise to you and it&#8217;s unlikely that it&#8217;ll be good.</p>
<p>So, start living more in the moment and learn how to enjoy the things that you already have.</p>
<p>You&#8217;ll see that it makes a big difference when you start doing this and life will become a lot more enjoyable.</p>
<p>It&#8217;s about understanding that being happy with yourself is the only way to create happiness around you.</p>
<h2>Stop being too sensitive.</h2>
<p>It&#8217;s not an illness, but it&#8217;s definitely something that needs to be addressed. It sounds harsh but oftentimes we misinterpret other people&#8217;s comments for something bad when in reality they are just trying to help us.</p>
<p>You have to fight the desire to always agree with everyone around you and start thinking for yourself. Once you do, other people will like you a lot more and want to spend time with you (and this will be good for you as well).</p>
<p>The world is not conspiring against you. They are either trying to help or, honestly, don&#8217;t care at all.</p>
<p>To be truly happy and successful in life, you need to learn how to be OK with yourself. It doesn&#8217;t matter what people say or think, they are not living your life and you can&#8217;t please everyone.</p>
<p>Once you accept that and appreciate yourself for who you really are, the people around you will start seeing how amazing you are.</p>
<p>Truth be told, when you start doing changes in your life, you&#8217;ll get a lot of negative feedback from other people. That&#8217;s because they feel threatened by the changes or just don&#8217;t understand them.</p>
<p>That&#8217;s why it&#8217;s important to stay true to yourself and not be afraid of criticism. If you start listening to what others say too much or worry about them, then you&#8217;ll always fail in your quest for happiness.</p>
<p>You&#8217;ll never find happiness in things or places because they are always changing. The only thing that stays constant is your own mind and if it&#8217;s preoccupied with worry or negative thoughts &#8211; then your life will be full of misery.</p>
<p>Even when something seems good now, you have to learn how to enjoy it for what it is and not expect more from it.</p>
<p>People are looking for someone who knows how to live life with a big smile on their face, you need to stand out by being the best version of yourself possible.</p>
<p>Be happy with everything that happens in your life because there are no mistakes &#8211; only lessons that help us become better people.</p>
<h2>Start getting rid of things that make no sense.</h2>
<p>I don&#8217;t know about you, but I had my fair share of things that were lying around the house, and they obviously had no reason to be there. They were just taking up space and adding to the clutter that&#8217;s already present in your home.</p>
<p>You need to start getting rid of all the things that are not important or useful anymore. If something is not adding value to your life, then you should let it go &#8211; even if it seems expensive or valuable.</p>
<p>You don&#8217;t want to have a house full of junk because it&#8217;s going to make everything feel disorganized and depressing.</p>
<p>I know how hard letting go of material things is. I used to surround myself with everything I believed would bring me comfort and happiness, but it didn&#8217;t. The more I tried to keep those things close to me the further away happiness moved.</p>
<p>In the end, it&#8217;s all about changing your perspective and realizing what is really important in life.</p>
<h2>Be a good person and help others whenever possible.</h2>
<p>It&#8217;s as simple as that. You don&#8217;t have to become a philanthropist or something like that, but start being nice to people around you and the world will respond with positivity.</p>
<p>For me, volunteering did wonders &#8211; I got to meet wonderful people and at the same time help animals.</p>
<p>It also gave me a sense of purpose in life, knowing that I am doing something good made me feel happy and satisfied with myself.</p>
<p>Always try to make others feel good about themselves, be it, friends or family. Don&#8217;t let them bring you down by telling you what you ought to do &#8211; instead support them and tell them how awesome they already are.</p>
<p>People will love spending time with someone who is genuinely nice and supportive of their efforts, so take on this role right now and help others come out of their shells.</p>
<p>A warning here &#8211; don&#8217;t rush into this. Make sure your own life is on track before you start trying to help someone else. If everything seems good, wait a little longer. Change is a slow process and it&#8217;s going to take some time for you to start getting the results you want. It is also fragile &#8211; you can&#8217;t turn your life in a day or two. It takes time to make the change permanent, so wait a bit before starting to spread the positive vibes.</p>
<h2>Treat yourself the way you want to be treated by other people.</h2>
<p>I know, I know &#8211; it sounds cheesy and impossible at times, but try being nice to yourself from now on. If you were a friend or a family member, then wouldn&#8217;t you treat yourself in a similar manner?</p>
<p>I know it&#8217;s hard when you don&#8217;t understand yourself and what you really want in life, but give yourself some time. One day everything will click into place and you&#8217;ll see that all your efforts were worth it.</p>
<p>Believe me &#8211; if I can do this then so can you.</p>
<p>The inner critic can be very harsh, so it&#8217;s better to ignore it than feed into the negativity.</p>
<p>If you constantly criticize yourself for every single mistake then don&#8217;t expect things to get any better. After all, if you are your own worst enemy then why not try being your own friend instead?</p>
<p>Would you ever talk the same way you speak to yourself to a close friend?</p>
<p>I hope not, so start treating yourself with the same love and care you would show your best friend.</p>
<p>It&#8217;s time to be compassionate and understanding towards yourself &#8211; it&#8217;s a step in the right direction you&#8217;ll never regret making.</p>
<p>Don&#8217;t let anything stop you from being the best person you can possibly be.</p>
<p>Explore who you really are and what you want, don&#8217;t be afraid to make mistakes, and never stop trying.</p>
<p>Your life&#8217;s journey is going to be exciting and fulfilling if you decide to trust your instincts &#8211; so no living for other people, just live your own way!</p>
<h2>Final Thoughts</h2>
<p>No one&#8217;s perfect and that&#8217;s ok because we don&#8217;t want perfection anyway. It&#8217;d be boring if everyone was the same and had the same exact traits as each other so embrace who you are and all of your flaws as well</p>
<p>Instead, try simplifying your life as much as possible and remove all the unnecessary junk from your home (including your mind).</p>
<p>At the end of the day, you should feel good about who you are and be satisfied with your life. Life is too short to be unhappy, so change your perspective and enjoy the ride.</p>


At the end of the day, you should feel good about who you are and be satisfied with your life. Life is too short to be unhappy.

Get Your Life Back On Track

<p>We all know that one person; they are the first to arrive at work and the last to leave. They are always on time for meetings, and they make sure not to miss any of them. They like their coffee black (or with one sugar) and dislike any interruptions during their production time (which is basically every minute of their life). Yes; this is my version of an office superhero.</p>
<p>Workplace superheroes often boast about how much more productive they are than most people around them, but still think that their efforts aren&#8217;t appreciated enough. Despite receiving praise from everyone in the company for being so dedicated to their job, these superheroes can sometimes feel underappreciated if you notice a lack of super-heroic results coming out of their work.</p>
<p>Effective meetings are essential to the health of any company, but not everyone has a natural talent for the organization. There are some simple tricks that you can employ in order to make your meetings seem more productive, without actually increasing output or quality of work at all.</p>
<h2>Talk less</h2>
<p>Even if your team is full of chatterboxes, the less that you talk in a meeting, the more that they can concentrate on what needs to be done. If someone&#8217;s talking mostly about themselves without including any relevant information for the meeting at hand, cut them off early and often by making short points throughout.</p>
<p>Talking less will make your team want to say something important enough to actually take up some time &#8211; don&#8217;t let anyone get away with rambling or repeating themselves (even if it happens more than once). Avoid allowing an informal conversation to develop during a formal setting; keep things moving along smoothly and professionally.</p>
<h2>Be punctual</h2>
<p>If someone important comes into your company; do you want them thinking &#8220;Wow; never on time for anything&#8221; or &#8220;Well; at least they always start meetings on time&#8217;? If you want to be the awe-inspiring one in the room, then you need to set an example of your punctuality. Being late for a meeting will just annoy everyone else who was on time and waiting around for you!</p>
<h2>Be conscious of other people&#8217;s time</h2>
<p>Being late for a meeting isn&#8217;t necessarily a sign of disrespect, but constantly being late is. If someone has been waiting outside your office or conference room, don&#8217;t keep them waiting any longer than necessary after calling a start to the meeting. Not only does it show respect towards them as a person but it also shows that you are attempting to work within their schedule as well as yours.</p>
<h2>Everyone gets 5 minutes each</h2>
<p>This may seem like taking meetings very slowly, but it actually makes them go a lot faster for everyone involved. When you follow this method, the group doesn&#8217;t sit around wondering if their time will ever come to talk. Everyone gets a set period of time where they can say what is on their mind and any other points that need to be considered are also discussed in an equal fashion.</p>
<h2>Stick to the agenda</h2>
<p>Creating an agenda may take more time than just winging a meeting off the top of your head, but it will stop you from going off-topic completely. If everyone knows what is going to happen before they attend, then there is no room for getting side-tracked or going into lengthy discussions about one thing when there are only ten minutes left until lunch break.</p>
<h2>Keep the meeting focused</h2>
<p>No matter how interesting you find one of your co-worker&#8217;s anecdotes, they can&#8217;t be allowed to dominate a meeting with their specific stories. If someone moves away from the topic of conversation then they need to be interrupted and brought back on topic as soon as possible so everyone else knows where they are at in the discussion.</p>
<h2>Stop people dominating the conversation</h2>
<p>Yes; I know that this is awkward, but sometimes you just have to say it! Don&#8217;t try and act like you haven&#8217;t noticed that Brian has become louder than everyone else or that Johnny keeps interrupting his co-workers when he speaks. No matter how good your listening skills are, there will always be times when only a quiet word will do.</p>
<h2>Don&#8217;t be argumentative for the sake of being argumentative</h2>
<p>If you have a disagreement with someone, then fine; air your grievances in the meeting and let everyone know what you think may be wrong. However, getting into an argument just to win either doesn&#8217;t help anyone or it completely undermines the other person&#8217;s opinion without actually offering anything better yourself. If you feel like there is another way of resolving an issue, bring up your concerns but don&#8217;t try and knock someone down simply because they see things differently from you.</p>
<h2>Leave on time</h2>
<p>Many meetings that seem too long are only too long because they keep running over their scheduled time slot! As soon as you can, make sure that everyone knows how much more time is left in the meeting. A little preparation beforehand can save you from this situation leaving no room for one of your co-workers to suggest that we keep going &#8216;just another 5 minutes&#8217;.</p>
<h2>Discuss and note action points after the meeting</h2>
<p>Hopefully; everyone will know what they said was agreed on and you&#8217;ll be able to move on (not forgetting anything important!). Sometimes though; it&#8217;s good practice to re-iterate the task at hand and allow people to ask questions if they weren&#8217;t there or didn&#8217;t fully understand their job when it was assigned.</p>
<p>If everyone knows what needs doing, then you won&#8217;t need any annoying constant reminders throughout the day (or worse; team meetings!). If something changes in terms of an action point, then everyone will know why the meeting is being called again.</p>
<h2>When To Hold A Meeting</h2>
<p>You may not be able to answer this question but some people think that meetings can be called for everything and anything; while others only think they should meet when the need arises.</p>
<p>If you want to run effective meetings, then you could look at these as suggestions:</p>
<p>&#8211; When everyone&#8217;s together in the same physical or virtual room</p>
<p>&#8211; Before a team activity or challenging period of work</p>
<p>&#8211; To prepare for a presentation or major visit from senior staff</p>
<p>&#8211; When it would be helpful to brainstorm ideas online first and come up with them face-to-face later on</p>
<p>&#8211; If there is something difficult that needs discussing and resolving first. This makes sure that nobody faces an awkward conversation alone if it should happen.</p>
<p>&#8211; To discuss any complaints or issues and agree on a solution first. This includes discussing how to approach the problem and what should happen if other people join in with it too.</p>
<p>&#8211; Before making important decisions over something that will affect the whole team (e.g. buying new computers).</p>
<h2>How Long Should A Meeting Be?</h2>
<p>Everyone needs to know what time their meeting ends as well as what time it begins. The worst thing is when you&#8217;re halfway through your agenda and then someone mentions that there are only 20 minutes left before it has to end! It completely throws off your concentration and makes for an unproductive meeting if that&#8217;s all you can talk about from here on out (not remembering anything else!).</p>
<p>On average, most people say that 30-minute long meetings are the best but it really depends on what you&#8217;re planning to talk about. If everything is just a quick point then 10 minutes might suffice whereas if you&#8217;re going to be discussing something complicated for an hour then 1 hour may not be enough! Meetings should always end on time and give everyone enough time to finish their own work afterwards (or come up with any new action points).</p>
<h2>How Should You Begin?</h2>
<p>Think of what you want your meeting to achieve; maybe it&#8217;s how this project compares with similar ones in the past and whether anything can be done differently next time, or perhaps everyone needs some tips on working together as a team more effectively. By agreeing on this and sticking to it; it will leave no room for anyone to wander off the topic and keep your meeting on track.</p>
<p>When you&#8217;re organizing a meeting, you should get everyone together in one place (e.g. a conference call or Skype), so that they can all hear each other and communicate without any technical problems or geographical constraints! If the same things need discussing with several different people, then try and separate them into different meetings so nobody&#8217;s time is wasted by repeating what&#8217;s already been said.</p>
<p>Make sure that everything can be heard clearly and that there isn&#8217;t too much background noise (even if this means sending out an email beforehand asking people not to have their radio on!). Meetings aren&#8217;t usually exciting stuff but they should still be fun so try not to take everything too seriously.</p>
<p>Everyone should know what the point of this meeting is and have some idea of what they&#8217;re going to discuss beforehand. If this will be the first time that a particular problem has come up, then spend some time thinking about how you&#8217;re going to approach it and what action points will be needed.</p>
<h2>Final Thoughts</h2>
<p>Meetings can be a nightmare for everyone involved; especially those who feel like their time could be better spent elsewhere. However; if you want to keep hold of your job and build trust then you need to be able to deal with what life throws at you. As long as your meetings are effective and productive then the people who are in charge will continue to call for them instead of finding alternative methods of coping with their workload.</p>


Meetings can be a nightmare for everyone involved; especially those who feel like their time could be better spent elsewhere.

10 Tips For Running Effective Meetings

<p>Productivity is the name of the game. It doesn&#8217;t matter how much experience we have, we always want to be more productive and stay ahead of the competition to keep ourselves relevant in the market.</p>
<p>The problem is that it&#8217;s not easy to become highly productive. Most people feel like they&#8217;re stuck and can&#8217;t ever get ahead and make progress towards their goals because there are too many distractions, meetings, admin, family, and other responsibilities that tend to take up all of our time.</p>
<p>However, you don&#8217;t need a magic pill or some kind of super-human powers to be more productive; what you need is a little bit of organization and planning as well as consistency in implementing those plans on a daily basis.</p>
<p>I have a ton of hobbies, my pets are high maintenance, I need my daily workouts, I have a million and one things that need to be done in a day, my work is demanding, and I have a special somebody (my daughter) who needs all of my love. At some point, I was completely losing it.</p>
<p>I was sad, overweight, stressed, tired, and extremely unproductive. I couldn&#8217;t understand where all of my time was going. Until one day…</p>
<p>I sat down with a cup of coffee (matcha with almond milk and spirulina) and literally mapped out how I am spending my days; it took me about an hour or two, but the results were amazing.</p>
<p>I re-vamped my schedule completely &#8211; waking up earlier, working out harder, waking up my daughter on time for preschool, allocating specific times of the day to take care of specific tasks, and generally staying more organized.</p>
<p>I realized that I wasn&#8217;t so much unorganized as I was mismanaged; because the truth was that I didn&#8217;t have a daily planner or any kind of agenda to follow. With this new plan in hand, my days were completely different &#8211; not just for me but for the people around me as well.</p>
<p>Here are some tips that helped me become more productive, stay organized, and finally take control of my life again.</p>
<h2>Use a planner to manage your time wisely</h2>
<p>This is probably the most important thing you can do for yourself; if you don&#8217;t schedule your day accordingly, things will get messy very quickly.</p>
<p>Use a planner to map out your day, which means setting up specific times of the day for specific tasks and sticking to them consistently. You can use the Pomodoro technique and work in 25-minute sprints with 5 minutes breaks, you can set up 15-minute blocks of time for different activities &#8211; whatever works best for you.</p>
<p>Once you have mapped out your day, stick to it no matter what. It is very easy for things at work or home to pop up and derail your plans, so be prepared for this eventuality by practicing a little bit of flexibility.</p>
<h2>Create a schedule that works for you</h2>
<p>There&#8217;s no universal standard when it comes to managing your time and if you&#8217;re not careful, you will end up like me: disorganized and fully lacking in control.</p>
<p>I used to be a night owl who slept from 4 am-11 am every day, but I had no idea how much I was hurting my productivity because when the rest of the world wakes up is when I was at my least productive.</p>
<p>You might be a morning person; if so, then set your schedule accordingly and work during those hours. If you&#8217;re not a morning person, then sleep in as long as you can and work late into the night. It&#8217;s completely up to you how long you wish to sleep for and what time of the day you want to be most productive.</p>
<p>I used to stay up for days in a row, watch movies all night long, read books in the dark, and basically pretty much do nothing at night because I was either too exhausted or too distracted when I woke up.</p>
<p>That is not how you should live your life; if there&#8217;s something you need to do, then do it; don&#8217;t wait until the nighttime to get anything done because your mind is on standby and will not be as clear as during the day.</p>
<h2>Do the most difficult task first thing in the morning</h2>
<p>People who do the most difficult tasks in the mornings, report having less stress and performs effortlessly throughout the day. As a result, they accomplish more within a stipulated time. It is one of those habits you must develop as early as possible.</p>
<p>Go one step further by doing the most difficult tasks in the mornings; I don&#8217;t care if it is just learning something new or working on an important project &#8211; do it first thing in the morning and get it out of the way.</p>
<p>I used to leave everything, including household chores and business projects, until after lunchtime and I noticed that my performance plummeted in the evening when I was tired and completely uninspired.</p>
<p>What&#8217;s worse is that by exerting less effort during the day, you tend not to make much progress and might even leave the most difficult tasks for last.</p>
<p>Don&#8217;t be like me; wake up and start your day with the most difficult thing on your agenda &#8211; it will help you make more progress than if you did it at night.</p>
<h2>Take time off for yourself</h2>
<p>This doesn&#8217;t mean only getting time off work, but also getting time off for yourself. It&#8217;s amazing how little time we spend thinking about ourselves, considering that time spent should involve some form of reflection, contemplation, and just plain thinking.</p>
<p>I used to work for 8-10 hours straight, then spend time with my kid, taking care of pees needs without any time to myself and I began hating life because I wasn&#8217;t living it; I was just obligated to do things.</p>
<p>I fixed this by taking at least an hour off each day to go to a bookstore, watch a movie, or just sit in peace and quiet to contemplate my life. I do what makes me happy, not what would make other people happy &#8211; if I don&#8217;t like it, then I walk away.</p>
<p>This is also applicable to work; you don&#8217;t have to work all the time because it will make you miserable. You are human, not a machine; get some time off for yourself every once in a while and you will be able to accomplish more in the long run.</p>
<h2>Don&#8217;t let the urgent get in the way of the important</h2>
<p>The hard part is to distinguish between the two and only focus on what matters. Many of us get caught up in day-to-day tasks that are not really useful in the long run, which makes us unable to accomplish the important things.</p>
<p>I used to work on anything and everything that came my way, whether it was important or not and I realized that a lot of the time I would end up not finishing what I had started.</p>
<p>This was not a productive way of wasting time, so I started being more selective with the tasks delegated to me.</p>
<p>I also got rid of the tasks that were urgent, but not important &#8211; if it wasn&#8217;t contributing to my vision, I would rather not do it.</p>
<p>It isn&#8217;t easy to say no because people will get offended; however, you have to do what is best for you in the long run, not in the short term.</p>
<h2>Get into a routine and stay disciplined</h2>
<p>Routines and disciplined help you accomplish what you want without having to worry much about it. Do the same things at the same time every day, whether it&#8217;s waking up early in the morning or going to bed at night, and sticking with your schedule will make life easier because you will know exactly what comes next and how long it should take.</p>
<p>I used to wake up in the morning and rush out of the house, not having time for breakfast or drinking my coffee and it became a habit; I started waking up later and later because my body was accustomed to it.</p>
<p>Getting into a routine helped me reverse this negative cycle; when you do something at a certain time every day, your brain gets used to doing it and looking forward to it, so sticking to the schedule is not as difficult as you think.</p>
<p>This also applies to other things; if you want to go jogging in the morning, wake up early and do it before breakfast or after dinner &#8211; make sure it becomes a habit and plug yourself into this routine until it becomes second nature.</p>
<h2>Break your tasks into smaller ones</h2>
<p>If you have a big project ahead of you, don&#8217;t think too much about it until you actually start working on it; breaking the task into smaller pieces will help you accomplish more and reduce the stress that comes with having to focus on one thing for too long.</p>
<p>I used to take on big projects that required creativity and I would spend hours just staring at the empty page, not knowing where to start.</p>
<p>I realize now that it&#8217;s important to actually start doing something instead of wasting time thinking about what you have to do first, so I started writing down everything that came into my mind for this particular project &#8211; no matter how silly or irrelevant it seemed.</p>
<p>Once I got the ball rolling, the ideas followed and everything started coming together; there&#8217;s a lot of truth in &#8220;action speaks louder than words.&#8221;</p>
<h2>Reward yourself for your accomplishments  &#8211; invest in yourself</h2>
<p>One of the most important tips on productive living is to reward yourself after you accomplish a project or reach a goal.</p>
<p>When you make yourself the most important person in your life, it becomes easier for you to prioritize what is best for you in the long run instead of focusing on how others see you or what they think about your decisions.</p>
<p>Pampering yourself every once in a while will motivate you to accomplish more and try harder next time because this success is just as precious to yourself.</p>
<p>I started rewarding myself with healthy things I liked &#8211; I would go jogging, eat healthier food, or order something exotic, go to a spa, or a weekend getaway; one day I realized that giving myself these rewards became an addiction and it helped me stay productive even when there was no big project ahead of me.</p>
<p>Investing in yourself can also be done financially &#8211; if you know you are good at managing money, reward yourself with a new gadget or clothes; this motivates you to accomplish more and work towards earning more money.</p>
<h2>Be adaptable</h2>
<p>There are always obstacles in life &#8211; this is something we cannot change, but the way you deal with them can be changed.</p>
<p>The more you practice being adaptable to stress and change, the easier it becomes for you to stay motivated even when faced with huge challenges that seem impossible at first glance.</p>
<p>I started jogging in the morning; one day I woke up late and had to rush out of the house without eating breakfast; I was exhausted after my run because I didn&#8217;t have any energy throughout the day.</p>
<p>Now, my alarm is set 30 minutes earlier and everything has become much easier since then.</p>
<h2>Never forget what remains.</h2>
<p>I was very hard on myself in the beginning; I wanted to accomplish so much in such little time that it felt like everything else around me became insignificant.</p>
<p>In reality, if you forget about your tasks for a single day or spend too much time surfing through social media, all the progress you made up until this point will be gone, and starting from scratch can feel impossible.</p>
<p>It is important to remember what remains when you stumble upon something new &#8211; no matter how big or small it seems at first glance.</p>
<p>Even if someone managed to accomplish a goal faster than you have, this does not mean that they are better people &#8211; everyone has their own set of unique qualities and different obstacles to overcome every step of the way.</p>
<p>Remembering that others are fighting their own battles will remind you to be kind and compassionate towards them, as well as yourself.</p>
<h2>Final Thoughts</h2>
<p>I know it might be hard at first because everything feels so daunting and confusing, but once you get used to juggling your responsibilities and priorities without forgetting what remains unfinished, this becomes second nature.</p>
<p>The more organized you become towards accomplishing your goals, the faster they will get done &#8211; after all, time is our most valuable resource.</p>
<p>If this article was helpful in any way or if you have any tips or tricks of your own which helped you along the way, please let me know and message me 🙂</p>


The more organized you become towards accomplishing your goals, the faster they will get done - after all, time is our most valuable resource

10 Productivity Habits (I Learned The Hard Way)

<p>Did you want to start a diet, but never could stick with it for more than a few days? Or maybe you&#8217;ve been working towards finding a healthier lifestyle by going to the gym three times a week, but as soon as something comes up at work you end up skipping your workout.</p>
<p>We all wish we could be much more productive in our daily lives. However, most of us simply don&#8217;t know how to make that change. Most of us will try and fail multiple times before finally getting it right if we do manage to create a new habit after much effort.</p>
<p>There is an answer: the concept of keystone habits. And here&#8217;s what it can do for you.</p>
<h2>Keystone Habits</h2>
<p>The idea behind keystone habits is that they have a multiplying effect. They create structures that you can build upon, and they help create many additional good habits.</p>
<p>Keystone habits might include something like going to the gym in the morning. This might not be a habit in itself for some people, but by going to the gym in the morning it creates an environment where one feels more energetic during their day, which encourages you to eat better, too.</p>
<p>This way keystone habits encourage other changes that eventually add up into a major lifestyle change &#8211; a positive feedback loop. In my experience, it takes about three weeks before a new habit becomes automatic enough that I only have to put minor conscious effort into maintaining it when there&#8217;s been sufficient repetition of it</p>
<h2>Why Is Building Keystone Habits Hard At First</h2>
<p>You will try and fail but eventually, you&#8217;ll get there. We all have the capacity to change, it&#8217;s a question of when. And three weeks is a very short period of time in comparison to how long deliberate practice takes for many activities &#8211; years, decades.</p>
<p>In my experience, keystone habits are more powerful if they&#8217;re already part of your basic structure before starting with any major life changes. If you don&#8217;t have them yet then adding them, later on, can be useful too, but probably not as much as getting into the habit from the start would be. Here&#8217;s why: think about what happens when we try and start exercising regularly for example &#8211; we give up pretty easily because we aren&#8217;t used to it.</p>
<p>We don&#8217;t feel like we&#8217;re getting much benefit from it because there&#8217;s no context for it in our lives, and we end up losing motivation to do it (and usually end up not doing it).</p>
<p>By building keystone habits into your life beforehand, you create an environment where healthy changes can happen more easily. And this is what you really want: a positive feedback loop that encourages healthy lifestyle changes as opposed to an uphill struggle. In the long term, it will be way easier this way!</p>
<h2>How to Create Your Keystone Habits</h2>
<p>There are two important factors involved with creating new habits: frequency and intensity. As part of your daily routine, something needs to have a high enough frequency &#8211; e.g., once a day &#8211; and it needs to be intense enough that it is a challenge for you</p>
<p>For example, going on a 5-mile run at least once a week and doing pushups every day would be more likely to become keystone habits than an hour of cardio and weight training every other week.</p>
<p>Keystone habits like hitting the gym every day may not be possible or appropriate for everyone. For some people, they know they will only go if someone else comes with them; this is also effective as long as there&#8217;s still intent behind it (an idea of taking action). Other people might go but only do light stretches because yoga isn&#8217;t their thing. If your daily habit does not provide you with enough intensity then auxiliary exercises can be useful in order to achieve the right intensity.</p>
<p>It&#8217;s also important that you start small and give yourself time to adjust, rather than trying to change everything at once. This way it becomes easier because you&#8217;re not overwhelmed with things that feel unnatural, you can work your way up gradually instead.</p>
<p>The main idea is just to make sure you get something done every day of sufficient intensity &#8211; this is enough for some people may be quite a lot more than others need, however, daily habits are always going to be the most effective ones.</p>
<h2>Keystone Habits Examples</h2>
<p>It sounds great so far, but what are some keystone habits that people already have?</p>
<p>Exercise is the classic one, of course. If you exercise even just a few times each week, it makes other things easier: weight control and healthy eating in particular. Exercising daily and with intensity (e.g., weight training) is more likely to lead to this steady decline in other destructive behaviors like smoking or alcohol addiction, for example.</p>
<p>From my experience working with others and myself, meditation has been an awesome tool for creating new habits gradually over time &#8211; such as exercise and healthy eating (and even losing weight!). It does help quite a bit if you meditate every day but even doing it once a week can be enough to bring your attention back into your body when you&#8217;re feeling lost and overwhelmed.</p>
<p>This is a very effective first step to build your self-awareness so you can learn how to deal with those feelings more effectively later on.</p>
<p>In the long term, daily habits have been shown to be especially powerful for personal development because they create a self-reinforcing loop where we start doing things automatically without having to think about them. And it all starts with something so simple that requires little effort but means so much when it becomes part of our lives over time: making progress every single day in some small way. If you want to get ahead in life then I know what you need!</p>
<p>Here is a list of 10 easy to start keystone habits that are universal and can make anyone&#8217;s life better:</p>
<h3>Meditation</h3>
<p>You don&#8217;t need to be a zen master to meditate and the benefits of this practice go far beyond just relaxation. Meditation provides a simple way to bring your mind back into focus and you can develop it as an essential skill for dealing with stress, anxiety, emotional overwhelm, and more. The great thing is that you can learn to focus your attention on any object and it&#8217;s a simple habit that begins to pay dividends immediately.</p>
<h3>Keeping a journal</h3>
<p>If there&#8217;s one thing I know about business then it&#8217;s this: people who keep journals have an easier time achieving their goals, no matter how big or small. One of the most popular journaling techniques is called the &#8220;morning pages&#8221; method, where you write three long-hand pages every morning. There are many other journals out there that can help you improve your life but this simple tool is one of the most effective keystone habits because it&#8217;s like taking a time machine to visit yourself in the future. You simply want to write down your thoughts without editing them and this frees up your mind from thinking about the same things all day long. Starting to meditate each day is very simple, but it&#8217;s also an easy habit to drop. Meditation makes your brain more resilient and you can learn how to be in the present moment by focusing on one thing at a time. This helps get rid of stress and worry that unnecessarily diminishes your energy, focus, and happiness. The benefits of meditation are so great that the details aren&#8217;t important: whether you sit in a chair or on the floor is up to you, if it&#8217;s done with your eyes closed or slightly open is also up to you.</p>
<h3>Exercise</h3>
<p>This is a no-brainer for most people but you can&#8217;t just go on a run or lift weights once a week and expect these benefits to come rushing in. What&#8217;s important is to make regular exercise a part of your routine and the best way to do that is by exercising daily or almost every day. You&#8217;ll notice that you have more energy, are less anxious, sleep better, feel happier about yourself, express yourself with confidence, and become much more productive in work as well as life because you&#8217;re simply living healthier.</p>
<h3>Audiobooks</h3>
<p>Listening to a book recording while you commute/do simple chores around the house – is one of my favorite keystone habits. This way I can use any dead time during the day for learning and getting smarter, plus it makes the time fly by much faster.</p>
<p>I find it interesting how much time people have when commuting daily but they don&#8217;t use it to learn something new. Audiobooks are one of the best ways to start learning new things and you can even switch it up and read a physical book if that&#8217;s your thing. This is what I personally do and the information I convey in this post was based on what I learned from reading books, attending seminars/webinars, listening to podcasts, and more.</p>
<h3>Saving money</h3>
<p>You don&#8217;t need to be rich to save money but it does take planning and discipline because saving money isn&#8217;t always easy. One of the best habits to have is to set up a direct deposit from your paycheck so that you save a certain amount each month. Having a savings account not only makes you financially responsible but also gives you a sense of security and peace of mind, plus it helps you avoid debt which can be even more dangerous than usual in some cases.</p>
<h3>Cold Showers</h3>
<p>These have been associated with all sorts of benefits from strengthening immunity to acting as an antidepressant. To make your own self-experimentation more accurate, try alternating between hot and cold showers every other day for 1 week each. You will be surprised at what you discover!</p>
<h3>Write down 3 things you are grateful for</h3>
<p>This keystone habit is different from the others because it takes only one minute to complete. But it is so small in size that you may think there&#8217;s no reason to do it.</p>
<p>The act of writing down 3 things you are grateful for each day changes your perspective on life, makes you happier, reduces anxiety, strengthens self-regulation, and boosts self-esteem. The reason it succeeds at all of these things is that it makes your brain more resilient. Gratitude helps you become more optimistic, which reduces worry and stress, which in turn makes it easier to be more productive.</p>
<p>Writing down 3 things you are grateful for each day requires self-reflection and discipline, but this keystone habit is scientifically proven to make you happier.</p>
<h3>Jump out of bed as soon as the alarm clock rings</h3>
<p>This is one habit that I struggled to create for a long time but now I have no complaints. I found out that it helps you beat procrastination by making your mornings easier, which makes it desirable for other habits to form.</p>
<p>For instance, if you beat procrastination by waking up early, eating a healthy breakfast will make it easier to wake up in the morning. This makes it easier to do work which makes it easier to eat healthy because you don&#8217;t feel like cooking and you&#8217;re probably hungry (which makes it easier to save money because you would rather eat at home than order expensive take-out).</p>
<p>There are many things you can achieve by beating procrastination and establishing this keystone habit.</p>
<p>It can help you create healthy eating habits, get more work done, and change your life in many positive ways.</p>
<h3>Eat a healthy breakfast every day</h3>
<p>This habit is one that I&#8217;m guilty of breaking all the time. This is especially bad when I&#8217;m in a hurry to get to work which results in either eating junk food or skipping breakfast.</p>
<p>This keystone habit can give you more energy and mental clarity throughout the day, it makes it easier to eat healthy because you will crave healthier food after a few weeks of eating a healthy breakfast every morning, and it helps you save money because eating out is expensive.</p>
<h3>Make your bed first thing in the morning</h3>
<p>This is a surprisingly easy habit to create and it requires almost no effort. This keystone habit will make your room look neater which in turn makes you feel neater which helps you make better decisions throughout the day.</p>
<h2>Final Thoughts</h2>
<p>Keystone habits are an extremely powerful tool if used correctly; they help create good habits while discouraging bad ones by enabling lifestyle changes that support these new routines. They can help improve your life more quickly but only if you start small and move at a pace that&#8217;s suitable to your current situation.</p>
<p>Once, you&#8217;ve got keystone habits in place though, the possibilities are endless!</p>


Keystone Habits

<p>People who work as employees inside the organization, as well as those who run their own businesses, always complain about productivity. Even though they work hard and spend a lot of time getting things done, they often tell us that it is not enough.</p>
<p>Productivity is defined as a ratio between the quantity produced and the cost of production during a certain period of time. Productivity can be measured within working hours or even outside working hours – for example with regard to housekeeping chores performed.</p>
<h2>What is the biggest productivity problem for employees?</h2>
<p>It is very important to note that when people complain about productivity, they do not mean working hard or spending a lot of time on things. What they mean is that despite spending much time and effort, the result coming out of it are not enough. For this reason, employees end up working more hours than their contract demands. Sometimes it even comes to them taking time off sick or using vacation days in order to work extra hours at home because of too many deadlines which suddenly emerged at once.</p>
<p>When employers hear complaints like these, what would be their first reaction? It could vary from &#8220;You can&#8217;t handle your workload&#8221; to &#8220;I&#8217;ll hire somebody else to help you&#8221; and &#8220;We need more people like you, not less!&#8221; up to &#8220;Do as much as you can and we&#8217;ll see later&#8221;.</p>
<h2>What is the biggest productivity problem for those who work on their own?</h2>
<p>For those who run their own businesses, the biggest problem is that they do not always manage to finish what they planned. This can be because they underestimate how long certain tasks require or they cannot maintain such a high pace as they would if they had an employee helping them out. Some of them even have so many ideas going around in their heads that it becomes impossible to focus on one thing at a time – this is especially true after the euphoria of starting a new business has faded away.</p>
<h2>So what is the solution to this problem of being unproductive?</h2>
<p>First, every person should be aware of their limitations. People who run their own businesses know that they are not meant to do everything alone, but sometimes they forget about it when they get enthusiastic about new ideas. Second, there are some important reasons why people are less productive outside working hours. The main reason is our changing lifestyle which limits the time available for work. What makes things even more complicated is that due to the advances in technology and mobile gadgets, we can now contact anybody at any time of day or night!</p>
<p>This causes stress levels before deadlines to rise greatly because employees cannot stop worrying about how much time they have left until a deadline while simultaneously trying to solve problems on their way towards it. Another very important reason is the fact that we are &#8220;lazy&#8221; by nature. This means that people would rather do things that are easy, require less effort, and yield immediate results instead of working on tasks that might bring them better results but take much more time to complete.</p>
<h2>What are the most important productivity tips for employees?</h2>
<p>When it comes to getting work done effectively, there are no golden rules because each person is different. All one can do is try every possible solution until they find something good enough for themselves. The main tip is to plan ahead as much as you can before starting a task. It should be noted that professionals often drink coffee or tea during breaks between tasks so try this if you think your productivity could increase after gaining some energy.</p>
<h2>What are the most important productivity tips for those who work on their own?</h2>
<p>The first step would be to determine what affects our productivity and how much (some things like frequent distractions, listening to music while working, etc.). Then, depending on that finding an individual strategy that would allow us to maintain high levels of concentration throughout the workday. For some people, this might mean putting themselves in a different environment (i.e. not sitting at their desk), using multivitamins (especially Vitamin D3), exercising, sleeping well, etc.; whereas for others, it might mean limiting social media or caffeine intake before important tasks during the day.</p>
<h2>What are the most important productivity tips for employers?</h2>
<p>Companies should be aware of a few things when it comes to their employees&#8217; levels of productivity. The most important thing they can do is to help people work in an environment where they can remain productive throughout the day and not lose motivation at any point. This could mean different measures depending on the workplace, but it usually means healthy snacks, resting areas with comfortable chairs or couches for short naps, pleasant music, etc. In some cases, customized programs might be created that would enhance focus and productivity among workers.</p>
<h2>Productivity at home</h2>
<p>Concentrating on tasks at home can be just as difficult as concentrating on work outside of office hours. Modern, hectic lifestyles make it hard for people to find enough time for themselves and their families which often leads to high levels of stress and unhealthy eating habits (which only make things worse).</p>
<p>Chores are often left for later, and tasks that do not require much concentration are prioritized over the ones that aren&#8217;t. To avoid this, make sure you set up a schedule for yourself and stick to it without changing your mind every other day. It is also good to take short breaks between tasks because people can get overwhelmed if they try to complete too many things in one go.</p>
<h2>How to be productive at home</h2>
<p>One good way to stay productive at home is to have a designated work area where you can peacefully focus on your tasks without being distracted by other things around you. This might mean moving the TV into another room, turning it off altogether, or just closing all social media tabs that are not related to the task for which you are trying to concentrate. If chores are constantly being assigned to you instead of being done willingly, ask someone close to encourage them if they don&#8217;t do them regularly.</p>
<h2>What should people do if they don&#8217;t want to sacrifice their personal time for the sake of productivity?</h2>
<p>There is a fine line between being productive and not having enough time to enjoy yourself. This can be avoided if you try to plan your day ahead instead of making it up as you go, but the search for the best ways to increase productivity should never stop because there are always new tips and tricks coming out.</p>
<p>Being productive often means doing things we do not like (like chores), but this also gives us more free time in the end (which could even include watching TV or playing video games, etc.). Being mindful about everything that goes into our routine and how we plan our days/weeks will allow us to truly benefit from higher levels of productivity. What are the most important productivity tips for those who work from home?</p>
<p>The first step towards achieving increased productivity is setting up an environment where employees feel like they can focus on their tasks. It doesn&#8217;t matter what that environment looks like (it might even include limited access to social media sites); all that matters is that it works. Second, people should consider making rules about how many times per day they will check new messages or emails; this will allow them to focus more on the tasks at hand during the workday.</p>
<h2>Why is productivity equally important for work and at home?</h2>
<p>Whether it&#8217;s work or chores, staying productive throughout the day benefits us by allowing us to complete important tasks without feeling stressed out about them. It also allows people to enjoy their spare time without having to worry about unfinished business. If you want a happy life and a good work-life balance, you need to be organized and plan ahead.</p>
<p>Going through life without a clear goal or idea about what you want to achieve is like driving with your eyes closed; it might work for a little bit, but eventually, the chance of getting hurt is pretty high.</p>
<p>And by goals, I&#8217;m not even talking about changing the world or inventing something groundbreaking. You can start very small, with tasks or activities that are important to you but which you might not be putting your full effort into.</p>
<p>The feeling of fulfillment and being productive might come from repotting a plan, cleaning up, or finishing a work task before the deadline. It can be anything, but you need to go after it with all your heart.</p>
<p>Think of something that has been tiring you for some time now. It can be a chore, or it can be something at work that you have been putting off for too long.</p>
<p>Then think of a plan of how you can accomplish it without being overwhelmed. The important thing is to stick with the plan, so don&#8217;t give up, no matter how much it seems difficult at first.</p>
<p>In the end, you will thank yourself for being able to do what you planned instead of doing nothing or putting it off for another day.</p>
<h2>Final thoughts</h2>
<p>The modern world has brought us many new distractions and obstacles for our way towards achieving excellence in our jobs and homes lives. It is vital for each person to know how to overcome these challenges since they are not going anywhere. Productivity remains vital in the home, work, and everything else.</p>
<p>So what about you? What do you think it takes to be productive? What has worked for you?</p>


It is very important to note that when people complain about productivity, they do not mean working hard or spending a lot of time on things

Why Is Productivity Equally Important for Work and at Home

<p>At the beginning of the pandemic, it was estimated that <strong> 37 percent</strong> of all jobs in the U.S. could be done entirely remote virus would kill a third of the world.</p>
<p>That is, more than 3 billion people. A story that got out of control, as the virus is a pneumonic plague, transmitted from human to human via droplets of respiratory and pulmonary fluids. However, with globalization and international flights, COVID is going to be one of many plagues. And even if we aren&#8217;t willing to give up our lifestyle, being in an airtight office with dozens of people for eight hours a day doesn&#8217;t make sense when health is at stake.</p>
<p>The point: Remote work has become a large part of our society and it&#8217;s not going away. It should be embraced and companies should work hard to keep their<a href="https://content.leventieva.com/remote-work/"> remote employees</a> happy and productive.</p>
<p>But this isn&#8217;t easy. As I&#8217;ve written recently, there is a lot of things we need to do to keep our online team happy.</p>
<p><strong>But is it true? Is 37 percent really accurate? Is technology making the world so much smaller than before and putting us in such close contact with everyone all over the world, which will make people increasingly difficult to interpret each other when we work together remotely?</strong></p>
<p>Technology has not changed human nature, and human nature does not make it more difficult to work with each other.</p>
<p>Human beings have been working together from prehistoric times until now, whether in small groups or large companies, and the core of that collaboration has always been the same: social interaction.</p>
<p>And while technology can improve our ability to collaborate geographically, we should not let it be a crutch that conceals or distracts from the lack of knowledge or will to work as a team, wherever they are.</p>
<p><a href="https://leventieva.medium.com/how-to-feel-at-home-when-youre-a-digital-nomad-1da431abce86">Our ability to influence each other</a> and our surroundings has not changed since we started walking on two feet and developed language.</p>
<p>Our ability to learn from each others&#8217; differences remains constant, no matter how far apart we sit.</p>
<p><strong>And our need to be happy and productive in the workplace, regardless of where we work and who we&#8217;re working with, is just as strong.</strong></p>
<p>What technology has changed in recent years, however, is the way we communicate and collaborate.</p>
<p>The growth of telecommunication technologies such as Skype or Google Hangouts has accelerated globalization and made it easy for individuals and organizations to interact with each other instantly, giving rise to remoteness as a new norm.</p>
<p>And it&#8217;s not just remoteness that&#8217;s affected by this technological change only: the way we speak, listen and behave at work is changing as well.</p>
<p>Some studies estimate that employees who work remotely are more engaged than those who do not, citing greater job satisfaction and higher employee retention. Other employee surveys reveal that remote workers feel less distracted, enjoy increased productivity, and rarely miss meetings.</p>
<p>All this seems to indicate that remote work can be better than onsite&#8230; But what about collaboration? Is working together really easier when you&#8217;re not in the same room? Can technology help us collaborate effectively so we do not lose touch with each other while we&#8217;re physically apart?</p>
<p>The answer is yes, but it depends on how you use them.</p>
<p>Use technology to your advantage, not as an excuse to act like emailing or Skyping each other is the same as working together in person. Technology can help us collaborate more effectively, but only if we remember that real communication involves subtle body language and nuanced expressions, which are best experienced when you see face-to-face.</p>
<p><strong>If you want to successfully lead a remote team, you have to know how to balance the need for structure with the need for autonomy, both of which are essential to keeping them happy and productive. That means creating a shared vision, defining clear work processes, providing regular feedback, and fostering an environment where everyone feels comfortable being open about challenges or concerns. </strong></p>
<p>Remote-first is a <a href="https://leventieva.medium.com/how-to-manage-an-overachiever-5f4e88e54c6d">nightmare for a lot of managers and executives</a>. It sounds scary, it sounds risky, and it makes them feel like they&#8217;re losing control. And let&#8217;s face it: many organizations still prefer to keep important meetings in person because there is a belief that people can better connect and establish trust with each other when they see and interact with each other directly.</p>
<p>But we are not trees, we shouldn&#8217;t be avoiding each other because we feel threatened by the lack of shared physical space. And who says that collaboration is not possible outside of a shared office?</p>
<p>The truth about remote work &#8211; and the reason many people find it difficult &#8211; is that we&#8217;re used to collaborating in person, and we confuse face-to-face interactions with intimacy.</p>
<p>And intimacy is not always necessary when it comes to collaboration.</p>
<p>If you are good at what you do, you can be equally (if not more) effective working remotely. Your opinion and presence will be valued even if you are not physically sitting next to your colleagues.</p>
<p>You can find people who will tell you that you cannot lead a team without working side by side with them, or that your employees will lack motivation if they don&#8217;t get any feedback from their manager every day.</p>
<p>They&#8217;re wrong: as long as you create the right conditions, you can lead a team without ever meeting your employees face-to-face.</p>
<p>And it&#8217;s not just managers who feel this way: even remote workers themselves often struggle to work effectively and productively when they&#8217;re on their own. They miss having someone to talk to every day and feel that their contributions go unnoticed, or they feel frustrated that their managers don&#8217;t seem to know them well enough.</p>
<p>But the truth is that your team will not start hating you because you work remotely &#8211; in fact, you could actually find they enjoy working with you more than other distractions.</p>
<h2>Here are ten ways to keep remote teams happy and productive:</h2>
<h3>Set clear work hours.</h3>
<p>If employees know when they should be available for communication, it will help avoid miscommunication and frustration during the day. While there may be some flexibility with these hours &#8211; because all jobs require some flexibility &#8211; it&#8217;s important to <a href="https://leventieva.medium.com/working-hours-and-productivity-d423ba4251a1">set clear guidelines</a> and stick with them.</p>
<h3>Use collaboration software correctly.</h3>
<p>Collaboration software such as Google Docs, Dropbox, Asana, Jira or Basecamp can be a great help if you know how to use them effectively. Whether it&#8217;s a project management tool or a shared document, these platforms should make the work easier, not more complicated. Too often we waste time chatting about documents instead of working on them. The goal of collaboration should always be getting things done, not merely making it seem like you&#8217;re busy doing something.</p>
<h3>Keep communication open and honest at all times.</h3>
<p>Some people fear that remote teams will hide information from each other due to a lack of trust or visibility into what others are doing. To avoid this, make it clear that you expect everyone to communicate openly at all times. If people feel like they are being watched every time they collaborate, they will be less likely to share important information with each other.</p>
<h3>Have regular check-ins.</h3>
<p>It&#8217;s easy for remote teams to lose touch with what&#8217;s really going on if you don&#8217;t have a system that keeps them accountable. Regularly scheduled meetings help keep remote teams connected and working towards the same goals throughout the project or during specific periods of time rather than checking in sporadically which can often leave teams feeling lost and unproductive.</p>
<h3>Schedule face-to-face time together.</h3>
<p>Encourage employees to meet in person during company retreats and conferences. This will help people get to know each other better and bond over a shared experience rather than simply discussing concepts over Skype chats or GChat. Plus, these conference events can be a great opportunity for learning and networking with industry experts in the field.</p>
<h3>Hold regular video conferences.</h3>
<p>These one-on-one meetings allow employees to check in on a regular basis while avoiding the time commitment of large group meetings. If there is something wrong with the technology, go old school and meet in person! After all, it&#8217;s always easier to connect when you&#8217;re face-to-face.</p>
<h3>Accountability.</h3>
<p>Make everyone feel heard by assigning each person an &#8220;owner&#8221; or point of contact on different projects. Encourage strong relationships among the team members by making everyone feel comfortable to ask questions and voice concerns. The most important part of keeping remote teams productive is keeping employees happy, so make sure employees are feeling included rather than neglected.</p>
<h3>Regularly send group updates about projects or goals.</h3>
<p>Send out weekly blog posts or brief emails to your team with any relevant information. This can be anything from a new marketing campaign you launched to an internal announcement about company goals for the next quarter. Update people on anything they might need to know but don&#8217;t require them involved in, especially if you&#8217;re just sending out daily communications via chat features.</p>
<h3>Don&#8217;t over-communicate!</h3>
<p>Make sure that &#8211; no matter how often you are communicating &#8211; there is a clear purpose for each message you send out. Remember that the goal of these messages should always be to improve productivity, not just keep everyone in the loop.</p>
<h3>Have fun!</h3>
<p>While it&#8217;s important to provide clear guidelines and stay dedicated to your projects, don&#8217;t forget that remote teams are often made up of talented people who are passionate about their work. Having fun &#8211; whether it&#8217;s through company events or random team chat conversations &#8211; is an easy way to bond with your employees and make sure they feel happy and appreciated throughout the day.</p>
<p>There are countless ways to keep your team happy and productive, these are ten of the most effective methods that I&#8217;ve found in my experience with managing remote teams. I hope they work for you too!</p>


There are countless ways to keep your team happy and productive, these are ten of the most effective methods that I've found

10 Tips To Keep Remote Teams Happy and Productive

Productivity is one of the hype-concepts of modern life. It's one of those things that people nod sagely about when they hear the word

Productivity

<p style="text-align: left;">A distributed team is a group of people in different locations who are communicating primarily via email, phone, or generally, the internet. Distributed teams can occur when employees work remotely, either by choice or circumstance. Employers also may use distributed teams to provide coverage across time zones and/or borders. And organizations tend to use these teams when employees work on projects that require teamwork and collaboration on a global scale.</p>
<p style="text-align: left;">Indeed, distributed teams can be found in nearly every industry and company size. These teams face several unique challenges. But when managed successfully, they also can bring many benefits to companies and employees alike:</p>
<h2 style="text-align: left;">Increased productivity in distributed teams</h2>
<p style="text-align: left;">Employees working remotely are able to get more done in less time because they don&#8217;t have daily commutes or disruptions from office noises around them. This allows limited-time workers to have more hours each week which otherwise would have gone to commuting. And it gives remote workers more hours each week for uninterrupted work so that their total output isn&#8217;t compromised by distractions.</p>
<h2 style="text-align: left;">Increased employee retention</h2>
<p style="text-align: left;">Distributed teams can retain the best talent while saving companies money on recruitment and training costs.</p>
<p style="text-align: left;">In addition, more companies are embracing remote workers because it better connects them with people from different parts of the world who add diversity into their workforce. And this increased cultural awareness is expected to boost innovation while helping various divisions think more critically, solve problems faster and open new markets for their products and services.</p>
<h2 style="text-align: left;">Customized working conditions</h2>
<p style="text-align: left;">Different team members can work under the ideal conditions for them, whether that&#8217;s in a co-working space or at home. And distributed teams often are more flexible than traditional ones because they don&#8217;t require employees to show up at specific places and times.</p>
<h2 style="text-align: left;">Increased collaboration</h2>
<p style="text-align: left;">Distributed teams tend to be more collaborative because technology makes it easier for them to exchange ideas and feedback quickly. They also can work together across time zones, sometimes even on the same day (depending on where they live), which is beneficial because each team member doesn&#8217;t have any interruptions during prime hours of the day.</p>
<h2 style="text-align: left;">Higher employee engagement</h2>
<p style="text-align: left;">Because remote workers aren&#8217;t confined by cubicle walls or office politics, they tend to enjoy higher levels of engagement, which leads to increased business performance.</p>
<h2 style="text-align: left;">Challenges of distributed teams</h2>
<p style="text-align: left;">Although there are significant advantages to distributed teams, they also bring specific challenges that organizations must understand and address before creating these work environments:</p>
<h3 style="text-align: left;">Poor communication.</h3>
<p style="text-align: left;">Distributed teams can struggle with frequent misunderstandings because not everyone is in the room listening to the same conversations, seeing the same facial expressions, or hearing the inflections in people&#8217;s voices. And this can create confusion about responsibilities, roles, and assignments on a project if team members aren&#8217;t on the same page about their individual tasks and deadlines.</p>
<h3 style="text-align: left;">Time zone differences.</h3>
<p style="text-align: left;">Having employees who work across multiple time zones can cause issues if some stay up late while others get started early in order to communicate with each other from different parts of the world. In addition, coordination can be a struggle when different time zones make it difficult to sync up calendars and schedules for meetings and specific tasks.</p>
<h3 style="text-align: left;">Lack of face-to-face interaction.</h3>
<p style="text-align: left;">Remote workers miss out on the informal exchanges and casual conversations that occur in an office environment, which often leads to misunderstandings and hurt feelings among team members who earnestly want connectedness with their colleagues. This also can lead to employees feeling isolated or discriminated against if they work outside of the office while others are there every day working casually with each other instead of doing their jobs.</p>
<h3 style="text-align: left;">Boredom/lack of engagement.</h3>
<p style="text-align: left;">When individuals don&#8217;t have regular interactions with their managers, peers and direct reports because they&#8217;re not working in the same location, it can lead to disengagement and boredom.</p>
<h3 style="text-align: left;">Lack of leadership/direction.</h3>
<p style="text-align: left;">It&#8217;s important that distributed teams have managers who are adept at managing virtual employees because they&#8217;re unable to monitor what their staff is doing during the day. This can create problems with employee engagement if managers struggle with direction or don&#8217;t provide clear expectations about the work that needs to be completed.</p>
<h3 style="text-align: left;">High turnover rates.</h3>
<p style="text-align: left;">Remote workers often feel frustrated by poor communication, slow response times and a lack of transparency when working for organizations that haven&#8217;t mastered how to make distributed teams effective yet. And this is one of the biggest reasons why employees leave companies after starting out as remote team members; however, there are ways to avoid this from happening.</p>
<h2 style="text-align: left;">How to find the right fit for your distributed team</h2>
<p style="text-align: left;">Because a distributed team is only as strong as the individuals on it, organizations need to be able to identify and hire employees who have the skills and traits needed for working remotely. Here are some tips to help pinpoint prospective remote workers:</p>
<ol style="text-align: left;">
<li>They can&#8217;t imagine themselves being inside a traditional office environment or within cubicle walls every day. In other words, they&#8217;re not career-oriented people who strive for promotions that would put them behind a desk; instead, they&#8217;re entrepreneurial thinkers who want flexibility and autonomy with where they work.</li>
<li>They&#8217;re self-directed because they understand that their managers won&#8217;t be hovering over them or checking in on a regular basis to see what they&#8217;re doing.</li>
<li>They like variety in their work and aren&#8217;t looking for a one-track career path that leads to the same type of work every day; instead, they want to explore multiple areas and don&#8217;t feel chained down by routine or structure when working with teammates and managers who trust them.</li>
<li>They like the excitement of finding new ways to be productive outside of an office environment because it provides a challenge and keeps things interesting; however, they also understand how important it is to show up at scheduled meetings throughout the week so everyone can stay connected to each other&#8217;s projects.</li>
<li>When given tasks, they immediately get started without needing much guidance or oversight from others about what needs to be achieved because they have a strong work ethic and understand how to prioritize their responsibilities.</li>
<li>They&#8217;ve worked with remote teams before so they know what&#8217;s expected of them when it comes to completing assignments, attending meetings, and staying connected from afar via tools that provide real-time updates about what everyone is doing throughout the day.</li>
<li>When working on projects, good remote workers can either play a lead role or collaborate within a larger group where it&#8217;s important that they communicate well with others because things move quickly and there isn&#8217;t much room for misunderstandings due to a lack of effective communication.</li>
<li>They don&#8217;t shy away from feedback because they want to improve upon their weaknesses as well as capitalize on opportunities for professional development; however, they also don&#8217;t let criticism bother them because they know it&#8217;s just someone else&#8217;s opinion about their work and there&#8217;s nothing personal behind it.</li>
</ol>
<h2 style="text-align: left;">Managing distributed teams</h2>
<p style="text-align: left;">What can managers do to ensure their distributed teams are productive? Here are some tips:</p>
<ol style="text-align: left;">
<li>They should set expectations for all employees upfront so that everyone understands what&#8217;s expected of them no matter where they&#8217;re located; this includes details about working hours, the number of days worked per week, how many meetings will be held, when updates should happen within Slack or other similar types of communication platforms, etc.</li>
<li>They should provide clear guidelines to remote workers about expectations for responding to emails and direct messages; however, they also need to make sure not everyone responds at the same time so things aren&#8217;t overlooked or left unanswered for extended periods of time.</li>
<li>They should hold one-on-one meetings with remote workers twice a week to discuss the status of ongoing projects, answer questions about what&#8217;s happening next, and address any problems that may have come up between scheduled meetings; this includes talking about new ideas that are being considered as well as changes to someone&#8217;s role on the team.</li>
<li>They should create an incentive program where employees who consistently demonstrate strong performance can be rewarded with more perks like extra vacation days for working around the clock on company matters instead of following traditional business hours.</li>
<li>Managers need to understand how their behavior towards their team members impacts morale; this includes paying attention to the tone of their voice during meetings, how quickly they respond to questions sent via email or text message, and giving remote workers access to the same types of resources their office-based employees use.</li>
<li>They should let everyone know what type of information is ok for them to share within Slack or an alternative platform; this includes details about staff issues that could be affected by conflicts with other teams or departments, changes in projects that will affect deadlines, etc.</li>
<li>They should meet with staff members who are based in different locations at least once a year (if not more often) so remotes can spend time face-to-face with managers and colleagues if possible; this helps strengthen connections between team members so there&#8217;s more of a sense of camaraderie between everyone involved.</li>
<li>They should ask individuals who are in different locations how they would feel about changing their roles so that they can either gain more work experience or specialize in certain areas; this is the best way for managers to gauge whether something like switching desks or telecommuting on specific days will be beneficial to employees.</li>
<li>Managers need to encourage feedback from remote team members at least once every two weeks so that issues can be discussed and resolved quickly before they become too big of a problem; this includes answering questions, apologizing for gaps in communication, and getting more details about why someone feels a certain way about a situation or task instead of brushing it off as unimportant right away.</li>
<li>They should offer to interview job candidates who are currently working remotely; this is the only way managers can determine whether someone will be a good fit for their company culture and reach out to them if they&#8217;re interested in hiring them.</li>
</ol>
<p style="text-align: left;">All of these tips can help managers create a positive work environment for their employees regardless of whether they&#8217;re working in an office or remotely; however, to make this happen, they need to be willing and able to adapt the way they communicate with people who are working away from the main hub of activity within their company.</p>


These teams face several unique challenges. But when managed successfully, they also can bring many benefits to companies and employees alike.

Distributed Teams

<p style="text-align: left;">A hybrid work setup is where members of an organization (usually remote) are required to meet in person on a regular basis, e.g. once per quarter.</p>
<p style="text-align: left;"><a href="https://content.leventieva.com/?p=90&amp;preview=true">Remote work</a> or telecommuting (often shortened to telework or home office) means that employees can perform their jobs at least part of the time <a href="https://leventieva.medium.com/what-is-the-future-of-work-culture-b084411138be">away from the employer&#8217;s office</a>, either by working mainly remotely or with some meetings and interaction with others at offsite locations. Some organizations now encourage or even require this kind of workstyle if possible.</p>
<h2 style="text-align: left;">How is a hybrid setup different than remote work?</h2>
<p style="text-align: left;">The difference between these two concepts is subtle, most remote work does not require employees to meet physically at all, but hybrid (or co-presence) does. Additionally, some <a href="https://qr.ae/pGVnvp">organizations</a> using a hybrid work setup also allow their employees to work remotely too.</p>
<h2 style="text-align: left;">Why should I do it?</h2>
<p style="text-align: left;">Doing this increases communication efficiency and company loyalty while providing economic benefits. It is highly recommended to make sure your organization is ready for remote working before doing so. You can ask yourself these questions:</p>
<p style="text-align: left;">Am I able to hire people remotely? Would my team be OK with working in the same office while having other people work remotely? How many meetings are there per week? If everyone works from home/remotely how would that affect the number of weekly meetings? How will communication happen if it&#8217;s not face-to-face?</p>
<h2 style="text-align: left;">How do I implement this in my company?</h2>
<p style="text-align: left;">A lot of work has to be done before trying a hybrid working mode, especially when the company is not used to remote work. Here are some recommendations:</p>
<ul style="text-align: left;">
<li>Create a culture where face-to-face communication is important and beneficial (obviously).</li>
<li>Let everyone know that you will add an extra day per quarter where they&#8217;ll need to travel somewhere (ideally abroad for international companies) and spend time with their co-workers.</li>
<li>Implement online tools like Slack, Google Drive/Docs, Hangouts etc.</li>
<li>Make sure your legal team approves of your employees working remotely (especially in the EU).</li>
<li>Be sure that trust between co-workers is strong.</li>
<li>Keep in mind that not all positions are suited for remote work, some examples are customer-facing positions or jobs where you need to be on hand at any moment.</li>
<li>Set up an easy way of tracking hours worked remotely. It doesn&#8217;t have to be heavy since most companies can&#8217;t afford to hire someone full-time just for this role, but it has to be something reliable enough so your team doesn&#8217;t get angry with you.</li>
</ul>
<h2 style="text-align: left;">What organizations are fit for remote working?</h2>
<p style="text-align: left;">Remote working isn&#8217;t suitable for all types of businesses and even if it was, not all employees would want to work remotely. Here are a few things to look out for when deciding whether your business is cut out for remote work:</p>
<ul style="text-align: left;">
<li><strong>The type of product/service your company sells</strong> &#8211; if your company is 100% service-oriented, with the majority of communication happening on phone calls or in-person meetings, it&#8217;s not suitable for remote work.</li>
<li><strong>Whether creating physical products or not</strong> &#8211; manufacturing companies are very hard to set up remotely since employees have to be near their workplace at all times due to production schedules, other types of companies are more flexible when it comes to where employees do their work.</li>
<li><strong>How many people work there</strong> &#8211; obviously the bigger your team is the harder it will be to implement this change and keep everyone happy and productive (will cover that later).</li>
<li><strong>Geographical location</strong> &#8211; some positions don&#8217;t work well in remote settings, for example, in some European countries there is a law that requires employees to be at the workplace, and for others, the employer must pay more than normal if they want their employees to travel.</li>
</ul>
<h2 style="text-align: left;">What organizations benefit from hybrid working?</h2>
<p style="text-align: left;">This new working style benefits everyone: companies, employees, and society as a whole. Here&#8217;s why:</p>
<ul style="text-align: left;">
<li>More efficient communication</li>
<li>It provides flexibility for those who want it, but also team cohesion &#8211; many employees working remotely can cause some difficulties when you need them all in one place (e.g monthly company meeting), but you don&#8217;t want your entire team to travel for this meeting either.</li>
<li>It gives employees the freedom of choosing where they want to work &#8211; some people like working from home, but others prefer cafes or co-working spaces. This also allows them to get out of the house and socialize more often (social isolation is a real problem nowadays).</li>
<li>Financial benefits &#8211; having an employee working remotely can be a big cost-saver in many areas: rent, commuting costs, office supplies. And with so many companies going global in today&#8217;s interconnected world, sometimes it makes sense just to have one person stationed at HQ while everyone else is remote since it saves money on transportation for meetings and such.</li>
<li>Talent retention &#8211; some people are simply not cut out to work in an office, so being able to provide them with a remote position is more beneficial since they are not willing or are incapable of doing something else.</li>
<li>Fits into the new model of flexible working &#8211; it&#8217;s great for millennial employees who want the freedom of not having to sit at their desk all day, but also provides enough structure and oversight that is required by most companies today.</li>
</ul>
<h2 style="text-align: left;">How to implement a hybrid working mode in your company?</h2>
<p style="text-align: left;">Since this can be quite challenging for many teams, here are some tips on how to make it work without too many hiccups:</p>
<ol style="text-align: left;">
<li>Make sure you have tech tools ready before implementing this new working style &#8211; there are many practical things that will help you keep control of what your employees do, for example, Trello boards to assign tasks and track their progress, Scrum software to manage all the team&#8217;s workflow, Google Docs.</li>
<li>Team leaders should be proactive &#8211; make sure every single one of your team members has some duties assigned to them besides working on their very particular area of expertise (for example project management). That way you don&#8217;t end up having multiple people doing the same thing.</li>
<li>Don&#8217;t forget about culture fit &#8211; if not implemented correctly this can cause serious problems in the company&#8217;s work ethic. Make sure everyone agrees with these new changes starting anything new or restructuring how the team works.</li>
<li>Infrastructure is key &#8211; make sure your company provides you with all the equipment you&#8217;ll need, whether it&#8217;s a laptop or phone, don&#8217;t expect employees to provide their own devices just to work remotely (you should be paying them enough anyway).</li>
<li>The customer always comes first &#8211; even though your employees are working remotely, they still need to answer calls and respond to customers quickly. If you think this will cause problems for any of your team members, try teaching them how to communicate effectively using Slack channels, video conferences, etc.</li>
</ol>
<h2 style="text-align: left;">What organizations are fit for remote working?</h2>
<p style="text-align: left;">There are many types of businesses that would benefit from having at least some employees working remotely:</p>
<ul style="text-align: left;">
<li><strong>Freelancers or agencies</strong> &#8211; these companies usually have many clients all over the world, so having remote employees means they will save money on rent and transportation costs.</li>
<li><strong>Consulting firms</strong> &#8211; this way you can employ an entire team based in one location while outsourcing specific tasks to people living in other countries where it&#8217;s much cheaper to operate businesses this way.</li>
<li><strong>Design &amp; development studios</strong> &#8211; working remotely is especially beneficial when your studio also consists of freelancers who are scattered across different time zones. ShareDesk was created specifically for this reason to help design teams find places where they can work together.</li>
<li><strong>Companies with multiple big offices</strong> &#8211; if your company has multiple big offices around the globe it makes sense to build a virtual communication network between them where employees can communicate more easily.</li>
<li><strong>Companies with a lot of remote work</strong> &#8211; try to implement some sort of communication system between your global offices and your teams working from home, at least a few times a year you should have virtual meetings with everyone to catch up on what they&#8217;re doing and build new connections.</li>
<li><strong>Any company that wants their team to be more efficient</strong> &#8211; if you want your team to be closer or simply get better results, going for a hybrid setup is one of the top choices you can make today!</li>
</ul>
<p style="text-align: left;">There are many benefits to having a hybrid working setup. Hybrid working is a great option for companies with employees spread across different time zones since they can connect more easily. Working in this way helps companies reduce the costs of renting office space and hiring people locally, while also helping them build better relationships with their team to increase productivity.</p>
<p style="text-align: left;">Hybrid working is all about your company having some employees that work remotely while the rest of your team works in an office. This means that to make it work you&#8217;ll need to:</p>
<h3 style="text-align: left;">1. Communicate frequently and accurately</h3>
<p style="text-align: left;">Make sure all your employees know what&#8217;s going on and that you&#8217;re always in touch with everyone, avoid silos within your teams.</p>
<h3 style="text-align: left;">2. Maintain a good company culture</h3>
<p style="text-align: left;">No matter how many members of your team work remotely, make sure they feel like part of the same team and not like second-class citizens (make them feel special).</p>
<h3 style="text-align: left;">3. Make sure everything is trackable</h3>
<p style="text-align: left;">Many remote workers are way more productive, so you don&#8217;t want to lose them because of bad communication. Make sure all the important tasks are trackable through time tracking software or apps like Toggl to breathe easy.</p>
<h3 style="text-align: left;">4. Show employees your trust</h3>
<p style="text-align: left;">Trusting your employees is one of the most important factors in keeping them happy and wanting to work for your company. If you already have remote employees, make sure to hire more people who are willing to work remotely.</p>
<h3 style="text-align: left;">5. Make sure employees can communicate easily</h3>
<p style="text-align: left;">This means clear communication on virtual platforms like Slack or Skype, as well as making sure you&#8217;ve hired enough people with excellent communication skills (if your current team doesn&#8217;t suffice, hire more people until you have enough).</p>
<h3 style="text-align: left;">6. Make proper decisions</h3>
<p style="text-align: left;">Even though your team is spread throughout different time zones, make sure everyone gets a chance to voice their opinions on major company decisions no matter what. If you&#8217;re really into democratic business then maybe this approach won&#8217;t work for you since it can slow down the decision-making process with a lot of back and forth between your employees.</p>
<h3 style="text-align: left;">7. Keep track of all the changes</h3>
<p style="text-align: left;">This is probably one of the most important parts if we&#8217;re talking about remote work, there always needs to be someone in charge that&#8217;s responsible for making sure things go as planned no matter how many members of your team are working from home or abroad.</p>
<h3 style="text-align: left;">8. Make sure employees maintain an active presence</h3>
<p style="text-align: left;">Even if you think all your employees spend their time working instead of chatting with their coworkers, make sure they maintain an online presence so that anyone who needs them can reach out through different platforms like Slack or Skype.</p>
<p style="text-align: left;">If you keep these things in mind when implementing hybrid working into your company, there shouldn&#8217;t be any problems bringing your remote team closer together!</p>


If you keep these things in mind when implementing hybrid work setup into your company, there shouldn't be any problems.

What is a hybrid work setup and how to implement it?

Getting used to remote work doesn't have to be a big deal - it's going to take time, but once you get used to it, it only gets better!

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What is a hybrid work setup and how to implement it?

Remote work

Remote Team Management (20 Tips)

Remote Team Management (20 Tips)

10 Tips For Running Effective Meetings

10 Tips To Keep Remote Teams Happy and Productive

Distributed Teams

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Remote work

Remote Team Management (20 Tips)

Personal Branding And Social Media

Mindfulness

How to Organize Remote Working

Get Your Life Back On Track

10 Tips For Running Effective Meetings

10 Productivity Habits (I Learned The Hard Way)

Keystone Habits

Why Is Productivity Equally Important for Work and at Home

10 Tips To Keep Remote Teams Happy and Productive

Productivity

Distributed Teams

What is a hybrid work setup and how to implement it?

Remote work

Remote Team Management (20 Tips)

Remote Team Management (20 Tips)

10 Tips For Running Effective Meetings

10 Tips To Keep Remote Teams Happy and Productive

Distributed Teams

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