The Working Women's' Guide- A YouTube Series

This is a three part series on working women.

I have always personally believed that motivation and inspired living could be about a lot of things, it definitely is about the vibe at work. We spend so much of our time at work, that it does impact our confidence and mental health.

This series is inspired form multiple conversation with friends and is a very personal take. By no means I am an expert, however this is what I do.

So, if you are interested hop over to the Youtube space and watch it.

Part 1- A Working Women's Guide to Skincare
Part 2- A Working Women's Guide to Natural Office Makeup
Part 3- A working Women's guide to office Accessories (Bag, shoes, jewellery and miscellaneous)




The YouTube channel is all about Motivation, Inspired Living and Work-Life Balance

(Pic courtesy: Pexel)

Fav Reads

October is here and yes there’s plenty if time to catch up on your readings.

Get yourself a cup of coffee and here are some of my fav reads:

Work 

1. Top leadership sites if you are climbing up the chain orintent to  
2. This is what every boss who  should read 
3. Time Blocking and how Elon Musk uses it 
4. Has interviews for internship made you feel uncomfortable oreven toxic? 
5. More on productivity  and different ways to handle time management
6. Why mentoring women can lead to more innovation 
7. Talented people fail under pressure 
8. 9 Mistakes of managers that make people quit  
9. What you need to know as a first time manager  
10. Free help, all you can get to run your business or life  
11. What every parent needs, more time and better ways to manage it  
12. Handling imposter syndrome  
13. The virtual boyfriend  
14. Becoming rich  
15. Debunking 6 myths about Agile  

(Pic courtesy: https://www.pexels.com)

6 Steps to Hire Remote Workers in your Team

If you have read my last post on ways to communicate with remote co-workers or peers you will know that everything is doable even if you are not sitting across the person in a physical space. 

If you are starting on your own idea/business or working for a small start up, this could be helpful. working with someone who is in a different location has been there for a while but is picking up more on the trend as we have freelancers and entrepreneurs on the rise. 

Here’s a quick look at the five steps you might need:

1) Cast a wide net -You can advertise remote working jobs as you would any other position; place a listing on a job’s website and then go through the replies. In addition, you can also place a request on third-party websites that are designed to connect business owners to remote workers. 

2) Create a shortlist-After a few weeks, you should be able to compile a list of candidates for the position. Ideally, this list should be kept to three or four options, with a few backups you can return to if things don’t work out with your initial selection. 

3) Research each candidate- Many third-party websites provide profiles and reviews of each candidate, so these are a must-read, but do additional research and verify any claims (particularly in regards to experience) wherever possible. If hiring independently, then check the references of your candidates. 

4) Conduct interviews-If everything looks good, invite your potential candidates to an interview over Skype or video chat. This gives you an opportunity to get to know them better and ask any specific questions you have about their prior experience.

5) Select your candidate- Make an offer to the candidate that you feel is best suited to your business and agree a start date. It’s also worth contacting those who were unsuccessful, explaining your reason for the decision; if a candidate was particularly impressive, but just not the right fit at this time, ask if you can keep their details and get in touch in the future if a position becomes available. 

6) Provide training to your new recruit -Remote workers are hired based on their existing skills and experience, but you will still need to ensure they are thoroughly trained to work in your business. Find out more about e-learning by reading over the infographic below and then consider this option to help provide the assistance your first remote worker will require.

Infographic Design By Top eLearning Statistics

7) Look forward to a successful future-You’ve got the right person for the job, and now your business can benefit from the expertise your first remote worker will surely be able to provide. 

P.S - This is a partnered post. Thank you for reading.

Using Technology: Easy Communication with Remote Co-workers or Employees

The working world is forever changing, but it has probably changed more in the past twenty years than it has in most other periods of history. 

Thanks to the internet, people don’t have to physically be in a location to work (for some jobs at least); they can do it from wherever they happen to be. This is excellent if you’re an employer or a start up or hustling since you’re able to dip into the global talent pool, rather than simply being restricted to whoever is available nearby. But it can cause some issues. When you’re not face to face, there can be problems with closeness and productivity. 

Below, we take a look at a few ways you can make sure that everyone is on the same page. 

Setting Expectations

In a regular office environment, it’s usually easy for new employees to fall into step with the rhythm of the company. When there is no office environment, this is more difficult, and the co-worker/employee can’t be to blame if they’re on a different wavelength. You can keep everything running smoothly by clearly stating your expectations and the general company culture before the employee comes on board. They’ll know what’s expected of them, which will reduce confusion.

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Regular Video Chats

You may not have the opportunity to hang out in the same city, but, thanks to technology, you can do the next best thing: host video meetings. It’s a good idea to host weekly meetings (or daily, depending on how much you need to talk) just to bring everyone together. It can be as much about bonding as about discussing the work. Make sure everyone’s got Skype or Google Hangouts, and find a time during the day that suits everyone (especially if they’re in a different time zone). 

Files Access

While you might not have a regular office, it’s important that you’re functioning as if you do. In a normal working environment, everyone can access the files and documents they need without delay. You too can have this, though it’ll need a little bit of work. For your regular files, you’ll probably be able to get away with cloud storage. For your bigger files (such as videos), it’ll be best to host them in a torrent file, which your staff will need a torrent downloader for Mac to access. As well as making all your files available online, you’ll need to remind your staff to upload the documents they’re working on too. This way, everyone in the organization can be kept up to date. 

Keep them Engaged

Traditional companies can have problems with staff engagement, so it’s normal that there can be problems with remote workers. To keep everyone on the same page, you’ll have to work extra hard to keep your team engaged. You can do this by paying them well, offering incentives, and making sure they know that they’re valued. You should make yourself available to chat should they need to, as well. 

Is there any tip you would like to share, don’t hesitate in leaving a comment below is something has worked for you. 

P.S - This is a partnered post.

Happy Weekend

(Pic courtesy: Soma_B)

Fav Links- Good Reads

I haven’t shared some of the good reads in a while, I hope you enjoy them as much as I have.

Lifestyle and Wellness:

• Mindful: How to constantly be mindful and live a better life 
• Simple Living: Why minimalism isn’t enough 
• Networking  and co-working space for women- The place we all want 
• Why sleep is important: And what lack of it can do for your brain 
• Good eats: What nutriniosts eat 
• Motivation: If you need to know the science behind it  
• Alpha women- How do u know your kind  and what it means 
• Happiness: Brain chemicals that make you feel happy 

Career:

• How to pick your career: The blog that will come in handy for getting a broad overview about how w make our career decision and do’s and dont’s. 
• Lessons form the Queen Bee: How you can improve and grow in your work life 
• Project Management Templates- A help that everyone needs 
• Under Management- One of the best reads for me this month 
• Professional Decline: How to be ready for it 
• Learn to Code: One of the articles that actually makes you think why coding should be learnt by everyone and you don’t need to a software engineer  
• Spotify: How they are constantly innovating 
• Agile: Amazon’s use of it 

Youtube Finds

• MBTI: Whats your Personality Type  
• Time Management: A doctor who is also a YouTuber shares his method. 
• Planning for August: Bullet Journaling 

(Pic courtesy: Soma B and Good Images)

Happy Weekend

(Pic courtesy: Instagram)

Debunking Six Misconceptions About Agile

This articles was first published in ProjectManagement.com

For those of us in the project management community, agile is a familiar term. But despite its prominence, it’s often misunderstood. 

All too often, teams and organizations focus on the wrong things or are misinformed. And eventually, agile takes the blame. 

Here are six common misconceptions that can lead to an anti-agile mindset:

1. It is all about the tool. Any tool that’s hailed as what makes agile works is still just a tool. Yes, with distributed teams it helps to have a tool where everyone has access to project details and data. However, when introducing your team to agile, your training shouldn’t be tool-centric. I prefer teams to see and understand how agile really works—the simple use of sticky notes or a whiteboard does the trick. The move to a tool can and
   
   will happen eventually, and when it occurs, you don’t have to send multiple follow-ups to ensure the team is populating the data. 

2. Agile is changing requirements in the middle of the sprint. While agile is known for inspecting and adapting, changes can get out of control. I hear teams talking about changes happening so often that they can barely focus on the work, or they are constantly handling changes. When the pressure to change a requirement is happening too often within a sprint and ends up becoming a norm in the team, the product managers or sponsors need to jump in to determine what needs to be built. Otherwise, team members tend not to focus on the work because they know no matter what they do today, everything will change tomorrow. 

3. Agile doesn’t use data. The idea that data isn’t tracked is wrong. In fact, there are many ways to look at data. However, we also have to be mindful so data isn’t just being used for the sake of data, leading teams to start bluffing around it.  

4. Agile doesn’t offer predictability. You’ll often hear that there was better predictability before—and now nothing works. Sponsors always need to know the timeline. And yes, this can be done in agile. In fact, using and tracking the right data can bring in the predictability your team needs. The velocity metric will let you know how much a team can handle in a sprint. So, whether it’s a burndown chart, sprint or release planning, there are multiple ways to get the required predictability and commit accordingly.   

5. Agile doesn’t offer time to think. I recently was in a session about thought leadership and someone mentioned agile being the greatest blocker because there was no time to think. Interpretation, I believe, is the biggest problem of all. You can still block a certain percentage of your team’s capacity or yours to try out new ideas, participate in hackathons or learn a new skill that adds advantage to your product or service. If you are not speaking up about the problems, you should. And if flexibility isn’t allowed, that’s because of the team culture, not the process. 

6. Agile is all about micromanagement. One of the funniest misconceptions I’ve heard is that an organization moved to agile because leadership wanted everything to be micromanaged. Individuals didn’t understand that team capacity and complexity (as measured in story points) aren’t ways to track team members. Instead, they are tools to help team members make the right commitments during their sprints, commitments they can actually keep and deliver. In this case, a lack of explanation about why the organization moved toward agile triggered multiple miscommunications. So, the responsibility lies with management and the agile coach to take the time to explain the move to agile. Because instead of micromanagement, agile is really about the opposite. It, in fact, allows teams to be empowered, to be able to self organize, to be vocal and to get the work done. 

These are six misconceptions I’ve seen about agile. What are the common ones you’ve encountered?

(Pic Courtesy: Google Images)

Finishing 2019 Strong: Keeping up with Your Resolutions

We have just crossed June and how time flies by. 

It seems almost yesterday I was writing my New Years Resolution and today its already been 6 months.

Hows your new years resolution going so far? I have been going through my list  and here are few ways to make sure you end 2019 strong.

5 ways to get it done:

1. Break the goal into a small task- The one you can get done everyday and doesn’t take away a chunk of your life. That allows you to still keep it than abandoning the goal.
   
2. Remember the why’s- Hey, every goal starts because we want something out of it. So yes, remember why you wanted in the first place. Was it a lifestyle change, getting off medication, feeling good about yourself or being financially secure. Write down the why and go through it everyday. This can be part of your affirmations, your vision board or a sticky note in your car. 
3. Do it everyday- Turn it into a habit and reward yourself when done (when done for 15 days straight). The Cue, trigger and reward helps.  And do it for 66 days straight. 
4. Don’t be over ambitious- Your goal should be something you can do with a little effort. A lofty goal can also mean you have something in mind that you dont have the skills to achieve yet. These are the tricky ones, because once you fail at it, you won’t go back to it. Setting up goals is a science and an art, just not words that trickle down in the paper. 

1. Look at it everyday- yes, keep it in mind and give it its due time. Some do better sharing it with friends, some like it to keep it to themselves for the big reveal. Whatever is your style, figure it out and then keep doing it. Celebrate smaller goals and keep your eyes on the big one.

There’s still 6 more months to go, enough time to get things done. So, don’t give up yet but follow your heart and work hard. 

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Pic courtesy: Google Images

Happy Weekend

Pic courtesy: Soma_B

Creativity:How you can bring it back in your life?

Do you consider yourself a creative?

In this video we talk about how we can bring back the creativity in all of us and we don't need to be the replica of the person sitting next to us.

So, if you are reading it in office, home or cafe- please know that we can still be creative in small ways. Let me know what you think.

Enjoy the video:)

Presentation Skills : Basics

How many times have you been told to present and you have bailed out?

Worried who’s going to listen to you after all? How to hold on to everyones attention and really what do I tell?

Here are some tips that over the years I have relied on:

• Do your Research- Use more numbers, specially when you start your presentation, that gets everyones attention plus it looks like you know about the subject. 

• PPT should tell a Story- don’t just read through line by line, I prefer mine to have pictures than bullet points. Now people are looking at you, not reading through the PPT.
  
  
  

• Practice- Practice through multiple times, now even you are nervous you will end up saying what you practiced, thats way better than mumbling.

• Keep Eye Contact- Look at the people you are giving the presentation to, not at the PPT. Ask questions, stop when required and allow participants to ask questions or talk. 

• Q&A- Don’t worry if you don’t know the answer to every single question, just be honest and mention you will have to look into but it will get in touch with them with the information. 

• Contact Details- Make sure your your email or office number are clearly mentioned. 

Have a favourite tip, don't forget to share with us.

Happy Weekend

Happy Weekend to you all.

Thats a slice of my life, from filming for the YouTube Channel. 

(Pic courtesy: Soma B Instagram)

Take Pride in your Work

It was a warm summer day in Kolkata and I was waiting on the curbs looking for a cab at 7.30pm. it was late and horribly humid and warm and I just wanted to get home. Cabs sparsely stopped and refused to go, this was before likes of Ola and Uber hit the streets. 

Finally the cab I got into amazed me. It was a regular yellow cab, that had a bottle of water and days newspaper placed neatly, a small fan that kept you cool and curtains more as a way to keep the sun out when required. The car smelt fresh and was clean. The driver polite and soft spoken. All I could think was he really was happy and proud of what he did. 

You can look at someone at work on how they conduct themselves and know if they enjoy what the do. Isn’t that true? 

If we all took pride in our work, the mistakes would be lesser because we would care on what goes out with our name on it.  There would be lesser conflicts because you would care about your team or try to resolves problems. The production defects would be lesser, technical debt in control and the environment much more positive.

And we all know a happy team can handle way more complex work. 

So, here are 3 ways to make sure you are proud of what you do:

Know the scope of your work- Sometimes the work seems less challenging or not exactly what you were looking forward to, now that doesn’t mean it can’t be scaled up or get the project or work you want at some point. So, stop cribbing and first get the job at hand done. Now look at what else is going on and where there can be opportunity. You can also look up profiles of people with similar jobs in your organisation who have grown and then see what else you can ask for. Ask when appropriate and make sure you are building strong working relationships along the way. 

Check your work before signing off- Everyone likes to have team members who are sincere and good at what they do. Quality matters, so every time you sign off on something ensure the quality is intact. It might sometimes mean a few hours more of work, fact checking and code reviews…. Its all worth it when everyone gets to know you as the person who is reliable, responsible and takes great care in what they work on. 

Share your mindset and have faith in yourself- Its not easy to take pride in your work always, when the environment isn’t always easy to work with. If you are new to the environment, simply listen. When an opportunity comes by, be positive and speak objectively. Try to share your mindset and may be who know something might change. If you work alone running a business or doing what you love, this might  look easy but keeping the mindset all in control might be a quite a challenge when you are handling everything on your own. 

What do you think? Are you proud of what you do?

(Pic courtesy: Google Images)

Finding your Mentor: The Do's and Dont's

Well first of all Happy Mothers Day to all the mothers reading the blog. 

I haven't posted in a while and you know the lack of posts also means that things have been  a little busy and I am sorry about not letting you know that I wasn't going to be able to publish for a while. Honestly, I didn't know it either. This blog has literally been with me for ages now.....so I always come back :) 

If you have been reading the blog for a while, you also know that I have always been a firm believer of having a mentor, so today I thought will share with you what you need to have one. 

The video is about everything you need to know about mentorship- why you need one to how to find one. If you have any questions, please let me know in the Facebook Page.

Have a Good Weekend

(Pic courtesy: Soma B)

Happy Weekend

(Pic courtesy: Soma b)

Happy Reading (Link Round Up)

Hello Hello! If you are looking for some interesting read this week while you take that coffee break or are bored- this is it.

Of course its random, so pick your read. 

Since Women’s day is right around the corner, thought will start with a read related to women and then just go from there.....here you go. 

1. Why women quit (hint- related to salary)
2. Happiness at work 
3. Working too much, you are not alone
4. What you should know as a first time manager
5. How Elon Musk uses time blocking 
6. if you are an IPhone user, productivity apps
7. Interesting read on the website that has billion views (related to sports). 
8. Sometimes you just need to be stubborn
9. Scrum at Tesla

(Pic courtesy: Google Images)

Happy Weekend

My mornings, specially that of weekends start with watching something from creative world while I sip on coffee. Topics range from cooking (Chef's Table, Mind of a Chef) to generic watching (documentaries) or something specific like this one Abstract- The Art of Design (a series in Netflix). This is turning into a wonderful ritual, specially how wonderful it makes me feel. Good Vibes all the way :)

(Pic courtesy: Somab)

Video Alert: Small Changes- Big Impact

If you have read the article, you will like the video.
Thanks for watching :)

Happy Weekend

(Pic courtesy: Soma Bhattacharya)