Smile On
“A virtual print proves your existence, shows who you are, what services you provide”
Mind promenade
A week late. It has been hectic: overtime, partner away for a couple of days and daughter slipped with school attendance again… You know, life.
Progressing
Contracts. Work commitment. What can they do for both the client and the freelancer? They protect. They help prevent potential disputes.
We want to be prepared. We want to make sure we are on the same page as the client concerning the rate, the time we are offering and the availability. The client will also want to ensure he gets value for his money: results. Results that ideally translate into new and strong leads.
A contract helps preserve diplomacy in the working relationship, it’s an agreement that both can refer to when something is not quite right. A verbal agreement is easy to dodge when things go wrong. As much good faith, we may want to put on the other party, the contract ensures the good health of the business relationship.
Regressing
To a time when war was simple. Only joking. I don’t think there was ever such a time. As humankind evolved, relationships just got more and more complicated, a very real game of thrones. All in the name of money and power.
When any likely war seemed to point in the way of a virtual or bioweapon, we are currently on the brink of a nuclear one. Clearly, humankind does not learn the wise easy way.
Remote work – In case you missed it…
Some interesting reads this week. And one I missed last week, that popped up on my Chrome Newsfeed. The article I missed was the one about the 10 best places to work remotely. I couldn’t feel prouder but all are good choices, all for the best reasons.
Responsibility and communication go hand-in-hand and are key to making remote work possible and productive. Read about “Solving the hybrid paradox” in the Canadian Financial Post. I can’t argue against the savings remote working brought to my petrol bill, but I find hybrid holds the balance between the savings and the social connections essentials. The Insider says it’s no longer about the virus, people have just grown accustomed to working remotely, even though the best employee may be the one in “sweat pants”.
But my article of choice was one that showed up on my LinkedIn Daily Rundown. This one article is about a job interview by a chatbot. I like to think I am a progressive thinker in what relates to the human-AI partnership, but I’m not convinced this concept will have legs. we can’t deny there is a benefit for AI to screen keywords, years of experience, education, etc. But there are too many variables when it comes to a face-to-face interview. I wouldn’t rely on AI to make a character judgement. Plus, once someone cracks the algorithms that’s a door open to whomever, qualified or YouTube “trained”…
Another interesting article from Benjamin Laker, on Forbes, focuses on the way remote work may be letting our younger generations down when they are starting their employment journey out. He speaks of the need for “handholding” and how the lack of trust by today’s senior management is preventing them from adapting to the new remote work/hybrid culture, particularly from their onboarding. The way I see it this is not happening just to the youngsters, this is happening to anyone who is starting a new job, following a redundancy, taking a new leap onto a new career. Anyone starting now will be feeling daunted by this new normality. Equally, anyone taking in new staff will be mistrusting at the start, until they get to know them.
There are productivity measurement platforms out there nowadays, there is no excuse for mistrust over employees working remotely. However, remote work (whatever shape it takes) should not replace or block physical social interaction. It is important to have one or two days a week where you re-group and ground the team down. This is why I find hybrid is a much healthier way to work. We need that social interaction and no Teams can replace that. In my opinion, the success of remote (or hybrid) work relies on people’s ability to be responsible adults, the same way as they are expected to be when it comes to protecting themselves and others during this whole pandemic. We are all grownups and are expected to act as such.
Minding my business
(Click the images to learn more)
#life
A SPA on the horizon
Since January, I have volunteered to work an average of 10 hours overtime a week more. This may not sound much, but when we’re talking totals of around 45 hybrid hours/week, still looking after the house and the kids (this last one has been overwhelmingly hard)… I am shattered. I need a quality day off.
#Family
Where did I fail as a parent?
Two whole weeks and two days of consecutive full-time attendance and she decided to take the rest of the week off school. How do we talk a teenager into what’s in their best interest? Even the side treats to keep her going don’t seem to have convinced her. I have tried to remain reasonable, giving her the benefit of the doubt countless times. She says she hates school. All she enjoys doing is spending time playing on the computer, or on her phone, which we got her, with the main purpose of keeping in touch with her when needed. And she doesn’t even answer the bloody thing!
#food
Dave
I try preserving that traditionalist taste for things that are so typical of me. I like old towns, I like handcrafted, homemade, old arts, and town markets. I am invariably an irreparable nostalgic. Since I moved to Whittlesey, I have always looked for local produce. Because the big commercial surfaces have suffocated in unaffordability, and although people keep trying, they don’t tend to stick around for very long. I would love to help these businesses. But how can you compete with the “big dogs”, when they can provide more, cheaper and quicker?
#goals
The easily dismissed art of repurposing content
At times like the one I had this past week, one of the things I still dismiss, while busy dealing with everyday life, was that I have posts from previous blogs from which I can drink from when time gets scarce. There is so much potential in revisiting old posts. I have quite a few that I posted that I took down because either these didn’t have any interest or that I just didn’t publish because I didn’t find it ticked the boxes.
Last week…
If I mind yours
and you run a Dental Practice or Service…
We all go to the dentist at some point in our lives. In fact, going to the dentist for a check-up has become the norm. It is recommended by all dentistry health professionals that we keep our smiles in check, rather than waiting for that nasty pain to get in the way of our schedules.
Next: Recruitment Services
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