JibberJobber now always https (aka, secure)

JibberJobber now always https (aka, secure) JibberJobber launched 11 years ago this year.  Back then, I had some reservations about SSL (aka, https, encryption, secure, etc.). Because of my roots in web development, I was concerned about having too much of the site going through the encryption process, which means that every single thing that gets served to you has to go through an additional process. which means it takes extra time to serve every single page. Back in the days of slower internet connections and slower computers, it was a legitimate concerns of web developers from yesteryear. I should note that there were two very specific places where we did encrypt data: when you logged in (so your username and password were always encrypted) and when you upgraded (so your credit card information was encrypted).  But, wed then switch you back to unencrypted.  We also have had a link so you could force SSL whenever you wanted. But, of course, things have changed.  Internet connections are faster, computers are faster, servers are faster, and the overhead of serving encrypted data became negligible.  Bad guys have gotten worse and users have become more sophisticated. If you notice some of the websites you frequent, youll see that they are ALWAYS in encrypted mode.  And now we are too. Always. More good changes are on there way stay tuned. JibberJobber now always https (aka, secure) JibberJobber launched 11 years ago this year.  Back then, I had some reservations about SSL (aka, https, encryption, secure, etc.). Because of my roots in web development, I was concerned about having too much of the site going through the encryption process, which means that every single thing that gets served to you has to go through an additional process. which means it takes extra time to serve every single page. Back in the days of slower internet connections and slower computers, it was a legitimate concerns of web developers from yesteryear. I should note that there were two very specific places where we did encrypt data: when you logged in (so your username and password were always encrypted) and when you upgraded (so your credit card information was encrypted).  But, wed then switch you back to unencrypted.  We also have had a link so you could force SSL whenever you wanted. But, of course, things have changed.  Internet connections are faster, computers are faster, servers are faster, and the overhead of serving encrypted data became negligible.  Bad guys have gotten worse and users have become more sophisticated. If you notice some of the websites you frequent, youll see that they are ALWAYS in encrypted mode.  And now we are too. Always. More good changes are on there way stay tuned.

Mean Girls Are women harder on each other

Mean Girls Are women harder on each other Last week our relationship columnist, Lauren Schaefer, apparently struck a nerve or two in her post The Drink War. You should check it out. As the Community Manager for the site, I must say I was a little surprised at some of the reactions. Lauren is one of my favorite writers (of any blog) because she knows how to get important conversations going about things that many of us are 1. ) too embarrassed to admit we think about,  2.) things we talk about only with a group of close friends or 3.)  she makes us think seriously about issues that are often portrayed only in a humorous or passive way. I have been getting to know Lauren over the last few months through her posts and our communications, and have observed as shes started some amazing conversations on the site.  Shes funny, shes witty, and she writes on the edge every now and then. Not all of our readers agree with Lauren and I certainly do not. In fact, many times, I have disagreed with her viewpoint as have many others. Last week, however, was the first time I noticed some mean girl attitudes and so Ive used her last post to inspire my column this week. (Thanks Lauren!) The best part about being a blogger is when people disagree with you and have something constructive to add to your viewpoint. Isnt that the best part of conversation in general? Imagine a world where we all agreed? BORING! But what I saw last week was something Ive seen online and in real life. Lauren easily became an easy target for what I call women-hating. In fact, she herself was accused of using women-hating language by one reader. But, lets look at the facts: FACT 1: Laurens column is dedicated to writing about relationships and dating from her perspective. Just like my column is about the post-grad life from my perspective. Her perspective is there for you to disagree with as are any of the writers on this site (and most sites.) What I find dumbfounding is people telling her that she doesnt have a right to that perspective. She does. FACT 2: Okay, so this next one isnt exactly fact. But I have hardly met a woman who hasnt used the term slut, whore bitch,  to refer to another woman. Im not proud of it but Ive used it and unless you can honestly say you havent, getting all self-righteous about it isnt really fair. Im not saying that its okay or that its not okay, Im saying, pots shouldnt call kettles black. Anyway, Ive been thinking about how girls interact with each other these days, and I am starting to think that many of us are really hard on each other, including me. Sure, in this scenario, I am defending Lauren because I like her and her writing style, but that hasnt always been the case. I grew up with boys and childhood memories of being made fun of by girls has often made me suspicious of many females in the first place. But thats just not a good enough excuse. I started to think about some of the things that Ive said/say about womankind in general that Im not proud of: Girls are bitches. Thats why I just find it easier to get along with guys. Guys make better friends than girls. Girls just seem to be catty Girls seem to judge me/dislike me when they first meet me. Can you relate? A lot of my girlfriends say the same thing too! (Oh, the irony.) Among my closest group of girlfriends, we pride ourselves on being one of the guys. We love the fact that all of us can hang with the boys. This is a trend that Ive noticed with a lot of girls in my generation.  Ive never thought of myself as a mean girl. In fact, Ive spent much of my life aiming to be the anti-mean girl by being one of the boys. But, inadvertently, I think this has made me harder on girls. Bringing it full circle, what I saw from last week, was a lot of girls being hard on Lauren and well, I didnt like it. Maybe Im turning over a new leaf already Think about the relationships you have with other women (that are not your girlfriends). What do you think: Are women harder on each other?

Sell the Gap On Your Resume - Personal Branding Blog - Stand Out In Your Career

Sell the Gap On Your Resume - Personal Branding Blog - Stand Out In Your Career Many times the question is asked, “How do I explain being out of work for a year or longer?” This is where a few sales techniques may successfully be applied. The first step is to approach the problem from a positive standpoint and leave your fear behind. Whenever you meet with clients or hiring managers, speaking with confidence is a requirement. The manner in which you express yourself is how you are initially identified. In other words, how you communicate, including attire, verbal, facial, body language, and your choice of words, work in unison to begin building your brand. Given the importance of communication, it is wise to practice telling a short story for you to get the feel of how you come across to others. However, when you deliver your story in person it should sound natural and not rehearsed. Whenever an objection arises in your meeting, such as you have been unemployed for a long time, cheerfully acknowledge the statement with a smile on your face. This is referred to as “Agreeing with the objection.” The person interviewing you will be pleasantly surprised by your calm demeanor and will appreciate the forthcoming open dialogue. Now it is your turn to shine by telling your story in an honest, open manner. This improves your brand and standing. For example, in your own vocabulary, describe how you took the time off to vacation, rest your mind and do some soul searching. During the process you recognized your true talents and interests. You took it upon yourself to self-educate further in this new direction to ensure a long career. The next step is to apply the information you found about the company and its industry, prior to the interview, and your updated interests, to the job described. Keep your story to two minutes or less because people do not like to listen to long-winded explanations. The final sales technique is to finish your personal story with a “buy-in” question such as, “Do I sound like the type of candidate you are seeking?” Buy-in refers to getting the other party to say, “Yes.” Sales experts agree you need 3-5 “buy-ins” or mini-agreements to make a sale or advance the interview. What transpires is the other party, by agreeing with you several times, will begin to talk themselves into recognizing you are the best person suited for the job. Remain truthful at all times, and do your best to appear and sound relaxed and happy. No one wants to hire someone who seems desperate for the job. Once you are on the premises of the hiring company, the job is no longer about you but it is about how you will help the company solve their problems. This method of conducting meetings and interviews builds your brand on many levels. Among them, you demonstrate leadership, confidence, and creativity, and these are traits usually sought after. Applying these sales techniques to the interview will help you advance toward hearing HIRED! Last quarter of 2011, job seekers will be treated, at no charge, to an online career convention. It is a community effort arranged by companies and sponsors to help get Americans back to work. The only requirement is that you register to attend the sessions by clicking the following link: http://bit.ly/AmericaHires360. Upon gaining employment, remember that working on a grander level with others will enable you to enjoy far greater visibility and many ‘a Smooth Sale! Author: Elinor Stutz, CEO of Smooth Sale, LLC authored the International Best-Selling book, “Nice Girls DO Get the Sale: Relationship Building That Gets Results” and “HIRED! How to Use Sales Techniques to Sell Yourself On Interviews”. She delivers inspirational keynotes at conferences, team training, private coaching and finds joy in helping her clientele turn their dreams into reality. Elinor is available upon request for consultation.

Put yourself in uncomfortable situations

Put yourself in uncomfortable situations One of the biggest changes in the workforce in the new millennium is that we have to be information synthesizers instead of information producers.   All information is available online.   So we cant add value by memorizing it.   We have to add value by reframing it. I call this synthesizing. IBM conducted a survey of CEOs to find out what they thought were the most important leadership skills of the near future. And in the top five was boundary spanning, which is networking ideas and collaborating in order to synthesize information in new ways. Side note:   I have a theory that this is why we suddenly are noticing how many people have Aspergers, because it used to be that people with Aspergers were extremely valuable for their memorizing capacity.   Today, when we dont need to hire people to memorize things, people with Aspergers are suddenly viewed as weird and unemployable instead of savants and extremely valuable. This made me start thinking about how we create that unexpected clash of information that leads to new ideas. Organizations have been spanning boundaries for decades as a way to expand their brand equity. For example, Shell Oil sponsors the Van Gogh Museum in Amsterdam.   Shell has a prominent facility in Amsterdam.  Shell funded  research into how van Gogh chose paint, and as part of that, Shell offered up their research facilities and their own researchers to do lab work on the project. As the collaboration got deeper and deeper, the result was a ten-year investigation of how van Gogh taught himself to paint through color, and how we can understand color in different ways today. One of the most memorable results is that van Gogh experimented with destabilizing red pigments, which means that today many of his paintings have become more blue than they originally were like the walls in The Bedroom. This changes our understanding of the bridge between the impressionists that van Gogh hung out with and the colorists, such as Matisse, that van Gogh provided a bridge to. But how can we as individuals span boundaries in order to become better at information synthesis? Pair yourself with unlikely people. 1. Go somewhere you dont fit. Travelers to other cultures are the obvious example of people spanning boundaries. In the past I talked about how stupid travel is because people generally use it as a method of getting away from the problems in their life. However, you can use travel as a way to address the problems in your life if you use travel to do a specific job.   If you set out to solve a problem and then you need a different type of information to solve that problem, you can travel to create that solution. This is very different from traveling to get away from your problems, because when you travel to get away from your problems, you dont have a very specific solution that youre on a mission to discover.  A test of whether youre using travel productively is whether or not you have a very clear way to implement the results of your travel once you get home. 2.   Work with people you dont like. When you get hired, your job is not to do your job description.   Your job is to help your boss. The boss that youre most likely to give the most help to is someone who doesnt share your skill set at all. This means that if youre good with people, you need to work with someone who is terrible with people.   If youre good with numbers, you should work with someone who is terrible with numbers. One of my most successful attempts at being an employee was when I worked for a CEO who was a frat boy. He was still wearing his fraternity sweatshirts ten years out of college.   The chief marketing officer was his fraternity brother, and so was the CFO. When we sat in meetings, my sole purpose was to be the intellect in the company.   They never would have hung out with me outside of work because to them I was boring and overly concerned with the future.   But they needed me a lot because my way of thinking was so different from theirs.   Most of the great ideas we came up with were a combination of my ability to see the big picture and their ability to make my ideas fun and saleable.   3. Make yourself nervous. I made a rule for myself that I can never hire people that I coach, but it happens all the time that I coach someone and fall in love with the idea of working with them.   I coach such smart, interesting people, and theyre usually backed into a corner because theyre very good at something, but the thing theyre very good at is not working at that moment.   So even though I have a rule for never hiring people I coach, I end up hiring them all the time. When I was dictating posts to Melissa we had a few problems.   I could talk faster than she could type.   She got frustrated when I made corrections and she always wanted to add her two cents. Melissa is not a focus-in-the-moment person.   Melissas brain is wandering all the time to new ideas.   So we cant have two people wandering to tons of ideas if one person is supposed to be writing down the other persons ideas. So I was coaching this woman who is a court reporter, but the court reporter business is going to India and she doesnt know what to do. Of course, I hired her to write while I dictate blog posts. She can write so fast that we can actually get five posts done in one hour, but only if Im focused.  So what ends up happening is I get really nervous before our scheduled call, because theres no reason for me to pause.   I should be dictating posts the whole time which means I have to prepare, and it means I have to commit to posts that I think Im going to write, but maybe I dont want to write. Dictating posts to Carmen also encourages me to take more risks, because the posts go so quickly that if they end up being stupid, it doesnt matter. I would never have dreamed of hiring a court reporter, but when you pair yourself with someone you never dreamed of pairing yourself with, you do things that you never dreamed you were able to do. The point here is that the risk takers will rule the next millennium. This is how we find a clash of new ideas and a surge of creativity, by taking intellectual and emotional risks. The other reason that risk takers will rule is that Generation Y is risk averse because theyre people pleasers  and Generation Z is risk averse because they are consensus builders. The last fifty years have been dominated by Baby Boomers and Gen Xtwo generations known for taking risks. As they retire, there will be a dearth of risk-takers, yet the need for risk takers will be increasing. So those who can put themselves if very uncomfortable situations, on purpose, will have the most to offer at work.

Musical instruments will boost office productivity - heres why - Debut

Musical instruments will boost office productivity - heres why - Debut No-one knows me like the piano in the Harvey Milk room of the University of Birminghams Guild of Students. I sued to go there between classes and badly play Radiohead songs I learnt from YouTube. Im not any kind of musical virtuoso, but after a long day of lectures, sitting down at a piano felt strangely natural. The embarrassing seminar contribution, the bad mock exam result all of it would melt away while I was sat there. 18 months later, Ive graduated and started working for Debut, and the WeWork were based in is *chef kiss* amazing. There isnt much you could want for there are self-service beer taps, free coffee and meeting rooms that turn into ping-pong arenas. But after a tough day writing articles, I do still miss those ivory keys in the Harvey Milk room. And it led me to think about how so many of these large offices and co-working spaces pride themselves on having world-class facilities. They provide you with everything you need to do a solid days work, hell, even things you dont need. So why do so many of them not have music rooms? It might seem a random appendage to the average workplace, but trust us, there are plenty of surprising, beneficial effects to workplace productivity. Its official, playing music gives you brain power High powered execs should definitely take note of this. According to several studies, the benefits of music and instruments extend far beyond pleasure or learning new skills. Ted-Eds Anita Collins notes that playing musical instruments serves as a challenging cognitive exercise, which activates your entire brain and strengthens connections between its various tissues Playing a musical instrument  engages practically every area of the brain at once,  especially the visual, auditory, and motor cortices, she says.  As with any other workout, disciplined, structured practice in playing music  strengthens those brain functions, allowing us to apply that strength  to other activities. Youve probably heard of certain activities being described as left-brained or right-brained. This refers to the different hemispheres of the brain which are designed for specific tasks. For instance, maths and linguistics are handled by the right side of brain, while creative pursuits are co-ordinated by the left side. According to Collins, music practice requires activity from both sides, effectively giving your brain a full-body workout. Why is this a good thing? Because youre increasing the volume of activity going between the different tissues of your brain, forcing it to fire off more messages along the nerves and create diverse routes to different synapses. This can increase your capacity to creatively solve problems, use logic and even improve your emotional intelligence. Last I checked, those were pretty good skills to have in a work setting. Musical instruments also work wonders for your mental health Of course, skills and brain functionality are not the only things that affect office productivity. Poor mental health can do that too. And in a world where identity is increasingly tied to your career, mental health at work becomes a more startling issue as time goes on. Luckily, research has identified music therapy as one of the ways we can wok to combat this. Symptoms of mental health tend to get worse when you allow your mind to wander. Thats why things like meditation and yoga help with mild mental distress they centre you and help you to focus. Same with music. Learning an instrument requires dexterity, hand-eye co-ordination and yep, you guessed it focus. And your focus on rhythmic or melodic patterns can often be relaxing and soothing. According to research done by LiveScience, making music can also lower blood pressure, decrease heart rate, reduce stress, lessens anxiety and depression and may even help fight viruses. I suddenly understand why I loved playing piano so much. So what are you proposing? Hear me out. The mental benefits of playing musical instruments are clear for all to see, and they beat playing table tennis by a long way. So on behalf of everyone at Debut, Im proposing that all large offices with leisure facilities for staff dedicate a room for music therapy. Every kind of instrument you can imagine, available to everyone of all ability levels. You dont have to be Mozart or Kanye for this to work for you. Music is universal. Even if you think you have no talent, pick up a triangle and see if hitting it a few times doesnt improve your mood. Then, get everyone in your company on it and watch your office productivity go through the roof. Your move, WeWork. Connect with Debut on Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn for more careers insights.