Important Mindsets A Boss Should Have

 

Are you a boss? Then the following mindsets are for you to remember and practice. Are you not a boss? Then the following mindsets are for you to remember and practice too, perfecting it as you make your way to the top. Naturally, one of the most coveted Singapore jobs is that of an executive, so you really need to up your game when it comes to perfecting the role of a boss.

But before we list the important beliefs and guiding principles, let us first lay the grounds for what a boss is what he does. Being a boss is not merely a position. If it were, then companies would have long gone kaput because of faulty leaders. That said, a boss is a leader and not just a placeholder.

In other words, it’s not only about you. Majority of being a boss is about the people that you lead and the company that you serve. Ready to become a better boss? Ready to be a boss in its truest sense? Here are mindsets that you need to effectively lead:

Push
A good boss should be able to encourage his team to press on towards a goal, to exert more effort willingly and for the company, to persevere with the vision that the boss himself cast to everybody.

You should be able to encourage your team to do great right NOW, not because the deadline is nearing, but because time is always of the essence. Urgency has a big difference from emergency. The push that you give your team should be that of urgency instead of emergency, for better results with better motivation and purpose.

This is one of the most confusing traits to develop. Too much push or assertiveness can result to an irritated team and a disappointed boss. On the other hand, lack of assertiveness will result to a team that achieves very little with a large amount of resources getting wasted.

Balance it by paying more attention to how your subordinates feel about the push that you give them. Try to wait for the best moments to apply some pressure on your team, challenging them and inspiring them at the same time.

Success in small bites
A good boss sees the big picture, but is also able to look at things in bite-sized successes. Celebrate the little things as victorious moments, and appreciate every opportunity to succeed. By doing this, you become more accountable to yourself, never taking for granted every moment and doing your best in even seemingly trivial tasks.

To achieve this, create short-term goals that all lead to your big dream. Cast it to your team and also encourage them to celebrate their own personal victories. You may also apply this mindset in problem-solving, so as not to overwhelm yourself and your team every time a complicated problem comes up. Solving it bit by bit will inspire confidence and calmness in everybody.

Protecting the Team
As said earlier, a boss is a boss because he’s expected to lead a team. In doing so, you need to learn to protect your team against discouragements, conflicts, office politics and other executives who are meddlesome. As you conduct your job search in Singapore, master the mindsets that set a good boss apart from the rest.

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Tips for Project Managers

A project manager is somebody responsible for ensuring that the goals of a team are achieved on time (or ahead of time if possible), in the most efficient way possible, and as excellently as possible. Needless to say, a lot is expected from them, as compared to different positions such as IT jobs and a sales job.

They need to be ale to manage risks and resources, in addition to managing a team of individuals with different personalities and preferred working styles. How can you balance everything out and still arrive at a goal despite hurdles and challenges? Here are some tips for the project manager who wants to achieve more and improve his performance:

Always have a plan B. A project manager should be realistic enough to have a plan for when problems will arise. This means that aside from your main plan, you have a backup one ready in case things don’t work out.

Pad your timeline, budget and other resources enough. You will most likely don’t need to use your plan B if your plan A uses time, money and human resources conservatively without compromising the need for leeway.

Have a network of go-to people. When problems arise, you should be able to approach the right kind of people, those who can drop what they’re doing to accommodate your needs in your project.
Learn from every mistake. Instead of thinking of the what-might-have-been’s,  think of the lessons that you learn from every mistake or wrong move that you make. Resist the urge to blame and dwell in the mistakes of others. Apologize for anything that you do wrong, and get up and encourage your team to do better for next time.

Be flexible enough for renegotiations when you commit mistakes. As a project manager, it is your responsibility to keep your clients satisfied. So when something goes wrong, you should do your best to minimize the troubles that your client may go through because of your mishap.
Ensure all details are correct before you launch a project. Have others check the details that you have laid in place for your project. This includes contracts, budget plans and security documents. Seeing a set of information over and over again may lead to missing out on little errors that can translate to bigger problems in the course of the project.

Stay cool. As the manager, you reflect to the whole team whatever emotion you feel. A cool manager exudes a much better vibe than somebody who always worries and stresses out about the little things. Your positivity will go a long way in promoting a constant stream of good vibes, brilliant ideas and great performance from everybody.

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Dont Get the Job If...

After a long while, you finally get a job offer. However, there’s a clincher, a red flag that screams “There’s something wrong here!” Hey, it doesn’t matter how much you want a new job, it doesn’t matter how great the boss is. If you see any of these red flags, whether you’re taking a finance job or a banking job, take a moment to analyze things and think of the effect that it will have on you and your career:

An entirely different culture that does not suit your preferences. If you had been in an office where everybody is expected to wear business attire every single day, then you might find it difficult to adjust to a work environment where everything is casual, from the attire to the work dynamics. If you will feel uneasy in a new job environment, think of its effects in your performance and in your general well being.

A lower pay. It doesn’t matter if the cut is small and you deem as insignificant. A pay cut is a clear sign of taking a few steps back in your career growth. You need to know how much you deserve, so that during the salary negotiation process, you can demand for the right amount of pay for your level.

Being unqualified. If a company will not hesitate to hire you even though you are not qualified for the job, you may be in for a wild and difficult ride of your career. It is very likely that the company is in dire need of somebody to stat working immediately on things that have been waiting for quite a long time. And though being busy can be all right, it’s not knowing anything abut the job that can stress you out. Besides, why would you want to be in a job that will boomerang back to you?

A bad boss. If you fund it difficult to work in your previous company because your boss was terrible, then don’t expect things to get better when you know that you’ll have version 2.0 of the big bad boss. If you get that feeling that you will not get along well with your new boss, then rethink and reevaluate your job application. If you’re willing to take the chances for your career growth, then at least you know that having a bad boss will at least be worth something. However, if you know in your heart of hearts that it’s not worth it, then look someplace else.

How to Be Found Online

Sometimes, opportunities in executive jobs come when you are in the right place at the right time. However, we cannot rely so much on serendipity alone. We need to ensure that when opportunity comes, we won’t be late, and we will be the ones who will be seen first.

In looking for a job, technology has continued to aid us in a lot of ways. Back then, you would have to cold call or troop to an office just to get one of the many available accounting jobs. Today, all you need to do is turn on your computer/smartphone/tablet and submit your resume to the email addresses of your target employers.

The thing is, everybody now has that access. This results to employers drowning in a sea of resumes from executives. It can become frustrating for HR representatives to browse through a lot of resumes to no avail. What they do instead is to search the Internet for the best fit for the job that they need to fill. Name it, they look in it. Google, Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn are the most popular avenues for employers to find people to interview.

That said, you need to amp up your presence on the Internet. How can you make sure that when your dream employer searches for somebody, you will show up in the list and you will be the best fit? Here are some tips:

•    Mind your title. Employers will search for keywords such as “Senior Software Engineer” and “Chief Operations Officer”. Make sure that your resume highlights the titles and job positions that you want to get. For instance, if you have never been a manager, and you want to target a managerial position, write an objective that goes something like “To contribute to the company as a manager”.

•    Know where to post your resume. Aside from LinkedIn, optimize your profile in other jobsites. Be proactive in these sites. Some jobsites push resumes back to the end of the list if the account has been dormant for a time. So make sure that you log in and search for jobs or update the information on your resume from time to time.

•    Upload your resume, one that highlights the skills that are required in the job that you want. For instance, you want to make sure that your resume speaks of your desire to work as a manager, instead of in a technical position. So instead of highlighting all your technical skills that you learned through training, you should pay more attention to your leadership and organizational skills.

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How to Focus on Your Work Better

Well, it seems that we all need a little more help in focusing. With all the distract… (Hey, I have a Facebook tag from my friend! Great party!) Where was I? Yeah, there are a lot of distractions that are out to get us. It’s not our fault right? It’s all the awesomeness of the Internet, of the smartphone and of this tablet that I got for work.

So how do we get back to the basics of getting our job done and skipping Facebook for a while? Here are some killer tips that will kill your distractions and will help you become more productive. Don’t worry, after you read them, you can check your Facebook.

Take note of the time you spend for every task and activity. If you aren’t sure why exactly you end up with no more time and a lot more to do, then you need to observe and tally your activities all throughout the day. Don’t worry, you won’t have to do this every single day, just for the next three days perhaps. From there, you will see that the little minutes add up to a full hour of looking at Faceboko photos, and only ten minutes go to actual work. That’s a lot of time wasted. What were you able to achieve before Facebook got invented anyway? A lot, I’m sure.

You know yourself, observe the way you work. At what times of the day are you easily distracted? Do you feel energized after a cup of coffee? Are you more productive when break time is near? Factor in all of these details about yourself and design a work schedule that incorporates some rest time (such as playing Cut the Rope or grabbing lunch). For instance, if you know that you work well when everybody’s still not around, then come to the office an hour earlier than everybody so you can start off right. Hopefully, you will be able to sustain your momentum.

Use tools. Thankfully, a lot of other people are struggling with procrastination and losing focus. As a solution to their own problems and yours and mine, they have created tools that help us become more productive. What works best for me is LeechBlock, a Mozille Firefox plug-in that blocks off certain sites at certain times of the day. I cannot access Facebook, Twitter, Tumblr and Pinterest from 8:00AM to 12:00NN, and then during lunch break I open all these sites and enjoy my break time. But come 1:00PM the “leech” will show up on my browser window and remind me that I need to get back to work.

Evaluate yourself. If you’re wondering why some people find it very easy to focus while you’re having a hard time, then maybe you don’t really enjoy what you’re doing. Maybe you’re not doing what you’re supposed to be doing. If you feel so slow doing that sales job, then why not check out other opportunities in IT jobs! Think of something that you would be very much willing to do anytime, all the time. That’s exactly what you should be busy with, instead of that report that you’ve been working on for three days already.

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Secrets to a Better Professional Brand

But what if your job isn’t really a passion? What if it is something that you do best, but not necessarily love to do? Then think of the things that excite you, the ones that make you wake up early on a weekend. Then, find a way to converge your passions with your job. Based on that, you can create your own unique professional brand.

Because of all the hype, personal branding seems to get a more confusing definition and in turn, a confusing approach to it. But what really is executive branding? Simply put, it is developing a unique value that only you can bring to the table. With this, you also need to be able to determine the steps through which you can communicate that value and make yourself highly “sellable” in the volatile and competitive job market of today. Here are key secrets to an effective professional brand, for executive jobs such as higher level IT and accounting jobs:

Passion

Are you passionate at what you do? If yes, then you won’t find it difficult to market yourself as a professional. In fact, you may already be doing a great job of letting other people know of your job and how good you are at it. If you can’t stop talking about your job and if you love the challenges that come with it, then you’re off to a great start in branding. It may only need some refining.


Target

Just like any business, targeting a certain group of audience or market is crucial to branding. Imagine being an archer equipped with the best bow and arrow. Without a target, all your efforts, skills and competencies will be for naught. Identify your market and locate them. Base all your branding strategies on what they are looking for, so you’ll be a perfect fit for them.

Authenticity

Fakeness is very easy to spot. If you don’t want to be dismissed as someone who’s only after a position or after the money, then you need to watch out for such flaws. Be true to the people you talk with. Say what you think or feel, and if you get the opportunity to say something about yourself, speak the truth. It would be very easy to check your credentials, and how can you follow through fallacious claims after all?

Personality

Employers do not hire solely based on skills and competencies. For executive level jobs, your bearing is highly important. How do you carry yourself in conversations? Will you be able to represent the company well? Are you unique in a way that will make you an invaluable asset to the company? Do you interact well with younger professionals? Give a feel of your personality as you talk with an employer. Your unique traits will make your name and brand stick.

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Office Habits Review

You may be working in a company for a long time already. In fact, you may have started as a rank and file staff working one of those IT jobs or sales jobs, and have gone up the ladder. Whether you’re the manager or the director, some office rules, albeit unwritten, should be followed. Here are some of them:

•    Don’t swear in the office. Regardless of whether you run a pretty young team, or you have a mix of the baby boomers and the Gen Y kids, it is very unprofessional to curse in the office. Moreover, you might end up offending others. Use your grandmother as a peg for how you would speak in the office. Be respectful, use the right words, and don’t use terms that your grandma will not understand. Steer away from slang terms. Your boss isn’t your “dude” for crying out loud.

•    Don’t complain. If you need to, vent out by talking with your closest office buddy (not buddies, so as to lessen the negative vibes spreading from you). Maintain a positive attitude all throughout the day. And while it is true that sometimes things do not work out right for us, there is never an excuse for slacking just because you don’t feel good. A grumbling employee is very difficult to be with, and could be perceived as somebody who’s out to destroy the company with his words.

•    Don’t play games. Whether it’s a game on your cell phone or on Facebook, it shouldn’t be accessed when you’re at work, most especially using your office computer. Okay, it’s fine to play a quick game of minesweeper after completing a long report, but if it takes up a lot of your time to the point that you’re missing out on other important tasks, then it needs to be cut off.

•    Dress properly. There might be no dress code in the office, but that does not mean that you can wear a top with plunging neckline. This is a very basic rule that a lot of employees seem to not know of, or simply neglect. There is a reason why there are dress codes, albeit some of which are unwritten, and that is to uphold professionalism in a company. And don’t start on freedom of expression. If you want to have something like that, you should’ve started your own business where you won’t mind your employees wearing nothing but tattoos.

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Get a Better Job Now

So you don’t like your current job. You can either hold a self-pity party and live a life stuck in your current company, or take the necessary steps on the way to a better job. Here are some things you can do to land a good job in a good company that you will love.

Create a good resume.

You probably know by now that resumes aren’t really read. Instead, they’re skimmed and tossed to the paper shredder. However, the interesting thing is that a lot of companies are still looking for resumes from their applicants. Moreover, not only do you need to email it, but it is in fact advised that you print it out and bring it on the day of your interview. Needless to say it is very important.

So how do you create a resume that will stick out from the rest? Have somebody lay it out nicely. Make it look modern and minimalist, with one or two colors and emphasis on the correct sections. Of course, the content should always be customized for each and every company that you will submit to. So if you are applying for a manager job or a director job in one company, place emphasis on tasks and roles that involved leading a team. On the other hand, if you are looking at a more technical job, highlight your academic achievements and the capabilities and skills you have.

Know where to look.

There are job sites that are saturated with different vacancies, most of them not applicable to you. Why not look for one that is more niche-based. For instance, if you are in the field of information technology, look for a job in a website that focuses on industries that require IT professionals. Or go to a jobsite that specifically targets executive jobs, so that you can have a narrower search.

Focus on the company instead of on the job.

We have been used to looking for vacancies in different companies. Why not change it up a bit by listing down the companies you want to work in, and then sending them an email asking about any vacancy that you may apply in. Who knows, they might like you a lot and create a new job item just for you. This is where your network will also come in handy. If you have friends in companies that you want to apply in, ask them for referral. If possible, you can be routed directly to your future boss instead of through an HR representative.

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