Here’s something I ask all of my CEO clients to do: I’ve worked with hundreds of CEOs from across the globe, and you know what they all have in common when they complete this exercise? On their busiest days at the office, they are spending as much as 50% of their day managing email. I was shocked when I first noticed this pattern. We are talking about highly skilled, well-trained leaders spending the majority of their time emailing (a low-level skill) on the days when their unique abilities are needed the most. Talk about inefficient. ...
People are always asking me: How did you get published in [insert prominent publication here]? How did you get an interview with [insert celebrity here]? How did you snag [insert big company here] as a client? · It’s simple, I tell them: I sent an email. I don’t have any special connections. There is no big secret to my success. I’m just really good at finding the right email addresses and crafting an enticing pitch. By sending an email, you could accomplish your dreams, just like I have. For over a decade, I’ve worked as a journalist, ...
Whether an expecting or experienced mother, there is always more to learn and be inspired by. These 10 books for working moms provide encouragement, advice and brutal honesty for the women trying to extract the core pleasures of this dual role without the unattainable ideals. These books are also for the working moms who just want to maintain their sanity. Are you trying to balance everything in your life—your career, aspirations, family and friends—all at once without a break? As the idea o...
2. When you receive an email asking more than one question, be sure to address each question in your reply to prevent further emails asking the same things. ; 3. Share your calendar and encourage your team members to check your availability; use meeting requests instead of emails to plan meetings or conference calls. ; 4. At the end of a meeting, assign action items to avoid everyone revisiting the meeting afterward via email. ; 5. Set parameters with your team so everyone knows whom to “cc” on what.
If the number of emails in your inbox just seems to tick up ominously day by day, maybe it’s time to try a new strategy. Laura Mae Martin is the executive productivity advisor at Google and author of Uptime, and her key to a productive inbox is simple: Sort it like laundry. Martin says the way we tend to mix sorting, reading and answering emails is an energy drain. “If you folded one shirt and wadded it up, then took out a pair of pants and didn’t feel like dealing with it and threw it back in the basket, you would never feel done with la ...
Day 1 ; The two emails come before noon on a Monday. One confirms interest in a story I’ll write about a trip to North Dakota. The other offers me an unsolicited assignment to write about the relationships that formed after a retired soldier suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder sent his Purple Heart to a NASCAR driver. Sold in 2 hours, 14 minutes, those two deals represent more than half a month’s typical pay for a freelance writer like me. After I tell my editor at SUCCESS about the great morning, he wonders what my best month eve ...
People often say that if you follow your passion, you’re never really “working” at work. But that’s not always true. To understand why you can still feel mentally overwhelmed, let’s look at how the human brain is configured. The prefrontal cortex is the most advanced segment of the most advanced section of the brain. It contains the most expansive evolutionary structures, and is responsible for the cognitive functions we think of as uniquely human, such as the ability to set complex goals, plan our futures, restrain our instinctive im ...
2023 has been a year of disruptive technology. ChatGPT strolled into the public eye and companies scrambled to get their best AI business tools out to a market eager to learn how to use AI to make business operations more efficient. This year, I emerged out of a communication studies graduate program where I was researching human-machine communication in the world of industry, and somehow, digital marketing was where I landed. Just like a business should review its financials at the end of the year, it’s also a great time to reset your market ...
If you master one strategy—exceeding expectations—you can send your sales, revenues or nearly anything that applies here, through the roof. Better news: Doing so is probably easier to accomplish than you think. Consider the real estate salesperson running out of time to show properties to out-of-town clients. The agent pays to put them up in a luxury condo overnight, covers the change fees on their flights, and sells them a home the next day. Or what about an elegant restaurant that has a dress code prohibiting shorts? Instead of turning so ...
I call it the email sucker punch. You’re having a great day and then you get that email. The one that makes your heart sink to your stomach and threatens to color your day with a red pen. The one from someone who immediately makes you feel small, misunderstood and hurt. A rude email sucker punched me a few weeks ago. I was having a wonderful day, the kind where you’re just in flow. I was emailing people left and right, exploring new options, getting stuff done—overall, I was excited about the future. Eventually my inbox was empty, ready f ...