e-Panorama
20th Jan‘ 07. Year2,Vol.9
Newsletter of Bharuch District Management Association
If we could sell our experiences for what they cost us, we'd all be millionaires. Abigail Van Buren We lie the loudest when we lie to ourselves. Eric Hoffer A boss creates fear, a leader confidence. A boss fixes blame, a leader corrects mistakes. A boss knows all, a leader asks questions. A boss makes work drudgery, a leader makes it interesting. A boss is interested in himself, a leader is interested in the group. Russel H. Ewing Page 1 of 8
e-Panorama
20th Jan‘ 07. Year2,Vol.9
Newsletter of Bharuch District Management Association
Ten Career Resolutions Dan Miller Like the old saying, "Today is the first day of the rest of your life," it's never a bad time to start moving your career in a better direction. Here are 10 New Year's resolutions to help. Pay Attention in Class Treat every workday like a school day. Be sure you learn something and use it to make yourself more productive. It doesn't have to relate to your skills set. It may be as simple as understanding how to work with specific peers or emotional intelligence. Take mental notes. Don't sleepwalk through the day. Look for the Next Rung You need to excel at your job. This is how you gain credibility. But understanding your next step is key to career happiness. Career pathing is critical to remaining engaged on the job. Schedule discussions with your manager to get clarity on the next challenge. If you don't get it on your team or in your company, it may be time to look elsewhere. Understand Company Goals Make sure you understand how your job contributes to your company's business objectives. Are you in a revenue-generating role? A brand-awareness role? Is your mission to delight the customer? Knowing how your job fits into the big picture will give you inspiration and a sense of accomplishment -- and will help you understand your job's impact. Be Ethical Bring integrity to your job. Whether you're running the company or cleaning its bathrooms, be honest in all you do. Don't call in sick just to get a day off -- that's stealing. Put in an honest day's work. Be accountable. If you're working remotely, be sure you are. Do what you say you're going to do. Honesty and reliability mean a lot to your manager. Stay Fit OK, this was probably on your last New Year's resolutions list, but that's because it's so important. Try to break a sweat for 20 minutes, three days a week. Go for a walk at lunch. Join a gym. Lift weights. A healthy body makes a healthy mind. Exercising increases blood flow to the brain and gives you ideas. You'll be more productive at work, and best of all, you'll feel better. Stretch Your Role Occasionally think how you can go above and beyond. Are there projects outside your defined role you could help with? Be proactive; ask to join. Page 2 of 8
e-Panorama
20th Jan‘ 07. Year2,Vol.9
Newsletter of Bharuch District Management Association Come up with your own ideas, and work with your manager to implement them. If you're a hamster, step off the wheel and poke your head out of the cage. Stretch a little. This won't go unnoticed. Manage Up Make sure you and your manager are in firm agreement on what you're doing. Be proactive and get on his calendar to ensure you're meeting or exceeding expectations. Don't assume he's paying close attention. There are bad managers. If there's a disconnect between what you're doing and what your manager wants, you're partly to blame. Don't wait until review time. Manage Across Even if you work primarily alone, be sure to make time to understand your peers' roles and how they go about their jobs. Show an interest. Don't just choose a few friends and become part of a clique. High school is over. You never know when you may need people -- or be reporting to them. Communicate Don't leave people waiting for answers. If you're in an email environment, return emails promptly. Let people know what you're doing. If you're working on a project, always ask yourself who needs to know about it, then tell them. Talk to people; give them a heads up. And when someone helps you out, be sure to thank him. It's amazing this even needs to be on a list, but bad communicators abound. Don't be one of them. Make Time for Play Have fun. Work hard, but smile while you're doing it. No one likes a grump. Approach each day with a positive spirit and stay loose. Enjoy your family and friends as well. Make time for them -- and you. It's called work/life balance. All work and no play makes life a chore. This article originally appeared on Monster.com.
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e-Panorama
20th Jan‘ 07. Year2,Vol.9
Newsletter of Bharuch District Management Association
BEAT STRESS Stress-related ailments hypertension, heart attack and so on are top killers in today's world, especially in the urban areas. Yet anybody can beat stress in drug-free ways. Here are a few time-tested tips to do that. One. Relook at your attitudes. An important point about stress is that in most cases it is not what is out there that is the problem, it is how you react to it. And how you do that is determined by how you perceive a particular stress. The Chinese have a meaningful word for crisis 'Weiji'. It is a fusion of two words danger and opportunity. That is exactly what every problem we encounter in life is a chance to show that we can handle it. So if you want to avoid stress change the way you think. By viewing a difficult assignment at work as a chance to improve your skills, for example, can change a life of stress and discomfort to a life of challenge and excitement. Two. Take a mental holiday. Doctors advise that when you feel too stressed take a mini vacation in your mind. It is a very helpful way to defuse or manage stress. How to do it? Relax in your chair (or bed, if you are at home). Close your eyes and visualise any beautiful scene you have known, say a sand beach in Goa. Imagine yourself lying on it as a soft breeze is blowing in off the Arabian sea. The surf is rolling in quietly in the background. Relax in this situation for 10 to 15 minutes at the least. You would be amazed at what this imagining will do to reduce your stress. Three. Use anti-stress affirmations or 'mantras' (incantations). Have an arsenal of anti-stress affirmations ready for repeating at a moment's notice When you are overtaken by a stress generating situation. The simpler they are the better like "I can handle this" or "I know more about this than anyone here". Once you start chanting these affirmations, the mere doing of that will pull you away from your usual (animal) reflexes to stress (like quick breathing, cold feet and so on). Instead, you would move into the reasoned response, the intellect, the part of you that can really handle it. Four. Simply count to 10. When a stressful situation arises, simply refuse to respond to it right away. Instead start mentally counting from one to ten. Doing this is enough to defuse the onset of the tension. Psychologists say that by making a habit of pausing and relaxing just for a few seconds, or minutes, if possible before responding to routine interruptions of your day can scale down the stress you experience. For instance, when the phone rings, breath in deeply. Then as you breathe out, imagine you are as loose and limp as an old rag doll. All this will give you time to feel that you are control. That automatically makes any situation less stressful than when it is out of your control. Deliberately pausing before answering the phone can, thus, become and instant tranquilizer.
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e-Panorama
20th Jan‘ 07. Year2,Vol.9
Newsletter of Bharuch District Management Association Five. Stretch your muscles. Everything we feel has a physical manifestation in our body. Thus, when stress hits us, our muscles become tense. So by stretching the muscles we can at least reduce the sensation of stress. As the muscle relax, our tension tends to diminish. Six. Drop your jaw and roll it left to right. People under pressure have a tendency to clench their teeth. As such. dropping the jaw and rolling it helps make their muscles relax. This automatically reduces tension. Seven. Inhale deeply. When under stress or strain, you are likely to find breathing difficult. And impaired breathing can aggravate the anxiety you already feel. To relax your breathing, roll your shoulders back up and back then relax. The first time inhale deeply as they so back, exhale as they relax. Repeat four or five times, then inhale deeply again. Repeat the entire sequence four or five times. Eight. Relax all over. Try a simple technique called programmed relaxation. It can lead to immediate and dramatic downscaling of your sense of stress by reducing physical tension. Starting at top or bottom, tense one set of muscles in your body at a time, hold for a few second, then let them relax. Work your way through all major body parts - feet, legs, chest and arms, head and neck - and enjoy the sense of release it provides. Nine. Move around. Regular exercise builds stamina that can help anyone battle stress. Someone who played golf confided that he does so to reduce tension. "Before I see up a golf ball," he said, "I put the name of the person who is causing me a lot of stress on the ball and I hit the ball as far as I can." Another hits the tennis balls thus. Some do something as casual as walking in the park, streets, or on lonely roads, others run, go cross-country racing, just to throw off tension. Exercise is what your body instinctively wants to do under stress-run or fight. What you choose to do is not important as just getting out of stressful environment into the open and doing some physical activity. It is something that you enjoy doing or is just fun, all the better. And it works Why? Firstly, it burns off some of the stress chemicals (hormones from endocrine glands that increase heart-beat, respiration, rise in blood sugar, increased perspiration, dilated pupils, slowed digestion) that the tension produces; secondly, a tired muscle is a relaxed muscle. Ten. Have someone to talk to. Usually stress soars when we bottle up our feelings instead of sharing them with someone we relate with or trust. It could be a friend or even one's spouse. Doctors say that any person who stuffs his emotions for years instead of letting them out is a prime candidate for a heart attack to avoid getting into such a situation, develop a relationship with someone to who you can bare your feelings without let or reservations. Of course the person you trust for revealing yourself totally and honestly, should be someone who will not judge you and also never use what you say against you. Page 5 of 8
e-Panorama
20th Jan‘ 07. Year2,Vol.9
Newsletter of Bharuch District Management Association
Average Worker v/s Military Man Your alarm goes off, you hit the snooze and sleep for another 10 minutes. He stays up for days on end. You take a warm shower to help you wake up. He goes days or weeks without running water. You walk down the beach, staring at all the pretty girls. He walks the streets, searching for insurgents and terrorists. You complain about how hot it is. He wears his heavy gear, not daring to take off his helmet to wipe his brow. You go out to lunch, and complain because the restaurant got your order wrong. He does not get to eat today. You go to the mall and get your hair redone. He doesn't have time to brush his teeth today. You roll your eyes as a baby cries. He gets a letter with pictures of his new child, and wonders if they'll ever meet as he himself cries. You criticize your government, and say that war never solves anything. He sees the innocent tortured and killed by their own government and remembers why he is fighting. You see only what the media wants you to see. He sees the bodies lying around him. You stay at home and watch TV. He takes whatever time he is given to call and write home, sleep, and eat. You crawl into your bed, with down pillows, and try to get comfortable. He crawls under a tank for shade and a 5-minute nap, only to be awakened by gun fire. You sit there and judge him, saying the world is a worse place because of men like him. If only there were more men like him?? REMEMBER THE FAMOUS QUOTE AT THE KOHIMA WAR CEMETERY.... "WHEN YOU GO HOME, TELL THEM OF US AND SAY THAT FOR YOUR TOMORROW, WE GAVE OUR TODAY". (inputs from Mr. Mukesh Mehta, Heubach Colour)
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e-Panorama
20th Jan‘ 07. Year2,Vol.9
Newsletter of Bharuch District Management Association
Reflect and... Act. The difference between the poor countries and the rich ones is not the age of the country. This can be shown by countries like India & Egypt, that are more than 5000 years old and are poor. On the other hand, Canada, Australia & New Zealand, that 150 years ago were inexpressive, today are developed countries and are rich. Japan has a limited territory, 80% mountainous, inadequate for agriculture & cattle raising, but it is the second richest world economy. The country is like an immense floating factory, importing raw material from the whole world and exporting manufactured products. Another example is Switzerland, which does not plant cocoa but has the best chocolate of the world. In its little territory they raise animals and plant the soil during 4 months per year. Not enough, they produce dairy products of the best quality. It is a small country that transmits an image of security, order & labor, which made it the world’s strong safe. Executives from rich countries who communicate with their counterparts in poor countries show that there is no significant intellectual difference. Race or skin color are also not important: immigrants labeled lazy in their countries of origin are the productive power in rich European countries. WHERE IS THE DIFFERENCE ? The difference is the attitude of the people, framed along the years by the education & the culture. On analyzing the behavior of the people in rich & developed countries, we find that the great majority follow the following principles in their lives: 1. Ethics, as a basic principle. 2. Integrity. 3. Responsibility. 4. Respect to the laws & rules. 5. Respect to the rights of other citizens. 6. Work loving. 7. Strive for saving & investment. 8. Will of super action. 9. Punctuality. In poor countries, only a minority follow these basic principles in their daily life. We are not poor because we lack natural resources or because nature was cruel to us, We are poor because we lack attitude. We lack the will to comply with and teach these functional principles of rich & developed societies. We are like that….. In name of ‘service charges’, we willingly pay bribes to RTO, Police, Bureaucracy and many more.. We like to give and take favours. We promote casteism..religion... over performance. We publicly praise and align with those in powers no matter even if they are corrupt or characterless. Then we like to discuss USA, JAPAN, CHINA and criticise Democratic Govt. voted to power by us !
If you love your country, let this message circulate for a major quantity of people could reflect about this & CHANGE and ACT ! Page 7 of 8
e-Panorama
20th Jan‘ 07. Year2,Vol.9
Newsletter of Bharuch District Management Association
p\iyi[ d&rºtpy<ºti: s>pdi[a(p d&riRminim` . Bv(ºt (h s&Ki[dki< (vpdi[a(p mhiRminm` —232—
d&j<ni[n) s>p(_i pN mi[T[ Big[ Krib a>tmi> p(rNimnir) Yiy C[ an[ mhip&@Pi[n) (vp(_iai[ pN Uµc p\kirni s&Kn[ p\kT krnir) Yiy C[. ::Editorial Committee:: Chairman Mr. Jayen Mehta, GNFC Ltd. Members Mr. Mukesh Mehta, Heubach Colour, Ms. Sheela Mistry, Insight Associates, Mr. G M Patel, Mr. G.B. Trivedi and Mr. R V Revar, GNFC Ltd. ePanorama Advisory committee Mr. R P Vyas -President, Mr.Kamlesh Udani -Past President, Mr.Ashok Panjwani -Vice President, Mr.K A Shah -Vice President. Bharuch District Management Association 601/602 Vaikunth Township, Opp: Polytechnic College Bharuch - 392 002 Gujarat - India To send your feedback, suggestions and articles e-mail: Jayen@GNFC.IN Page 8 of 8