Top 4 Skills You Should Never Neglect as a Professional
June 23, 2017 by Dr. Letitia Wright
Filed under Featured Articles, Front Page
Top 4 Skills You Should Never Neglect as a Professional
The internet has changed the way professionals build their personal brands completely. In a previous article, we discussed how to further refine your personal brand and show off your expertise. Maintaining a strong online presence and a positive personal brand can lead to many new opportunities to explore.
Boasting a specific set of skills is great, but having those skills mastered should never stop you from covering the basics. There are important basic skills to have in order to succeed as a professional in today’s competitive market and we are going to take a closer look at the top four to master in this article.
Attention to Details
According to a well-known computer science professor, Cal Newport, ‘focus’ is the new IQ. A professional’s ability to maintain focus and pay close attention to detail play important roles in determining the quality of work produced at the end of the process. Good attention to detail is even more important since customers now have more options, which means they expect nothing but the best results possible.
MikesPhotos / Pixabay
Driving
Driving is considered a mundane skill and not many professionals take it seriously. In reality, driving can be invaluable. You can save a lot of time and get to meetings faster when you have the ability to drive. You can also stop worrying about messing up your suit or attracting unwanted odors while taking public transport.
There is no reason why you shouldn’t learn to drive and pick up a driving license today. You can even find mock theory tests and more information on the Highway Code by checking out resources on the Toptests website.
Humility
Humility is more of a trait than a skill, but it is a trait that can be mastered nonetheless. The last thing you want to do is acting like you know everything. It’s even worse when you become arrogant since this often leads to you treating your clients poorlyHumility is the key to building genuine relationships on a more personal level. Clients that like you personally are more likely to hire you for future projects. You will also get along better with team members and will have a generally better time exploring different opportunities on the market.
Data Analysis
Regardless of your industry, being able to capture information and analyze data is critical. The world is built on data these days. Every business decision is made using data as the defining factor.
Good data analysis is a skill that can also be transformed into the ability to analyze situations based on relevant information. This is a skill that can be applied to customer analysis, market analysis, product development, and various other fields you want to explore. It is a critical skill to have if you want to succeed in the modern market.
Master these four skills and you will be able to present yourself better as a professional. These may seem like basic skills that can be mastered overnight, but they are invaluable nonetheless. You will be surprised by how much better your life as a professional will be once you have these key skills under your belt.
The best middle name ever By Seth Godin
June 14, 2017 by Dr. Letitia Wright
Filed under Featured Articles, Wright Ideas
The best middle name ever
It’s not Warren or Susan or Otis or Samuel or Tricia.
It’s “The.”
As in Attila The Hun or Alexander The Great or Zorba The Greek.
When your middle name is ‘The’, it means you’re it. The only one. The one that defines the category. I think that focus is a choice, and that the result of appropriate focus is you earn the middle name.
Jordan’s Furniture in Waltham was the place to go for that sort of thing. Bocce Pizza and the Anchor Bar were the places in Buffalo when I was growing up. Google is more appropriately called Google the search engine.
Seek the.
Of course, Winnie the Pooh is the exception that proves the rule.
My Commentary: American Society responds to celebrity. This strategy goes in that direction. It’s time to start building your own celebrity into your business.
Tell me your name with ‘the” in it!
How to Refine Your Personal Brand
June 12, 2017 by Dr. Letitia Wright
Filed under Featured Articles, Front Page
By Dave Saunders
You have a reputation. You have a Web site. You have a key look that every one recognizes – or at least, some people.
Now what? Your personal brand is never a pool float. You can’t rest on it. You can’t let it drift out there with the current. In order to make it viable, you have to keep it inflated.
Coca-Cola is no longer the “pause that refreshes.” Oh, you may know that that’s what they used to say about Coca-Cola, but that was a long time ago. Now there is “the Coke side of life” – and those who are in the know know what Coke will be saying next. McDonald’s is out there copying Chick-fil-a for healthy yet fried alternatives to the all-American burger and pretending they invented the chicken sandwich, and no one knows anymore about Burger Kind even though we used to sing about holding the pickle and the lettuce because special orders don’t upset us.
Your personal brand is a living, breathing entity. There’s no question that you have a place in your little corner of the planet. You offer a service, a benefit, a shining good turn to the world. However, there are a brazillion (not a Brazilian) other people out there who can offer a service that’s (in theory) just as good, just as important, just as meaningful.
It is your job to continuously breathe new life into your brand. The fact is that your brand is like any living entity – it wants to grow, it wants to move forward.
Your brand is about integrity, about self-love, about competence that moves above and beyond the norm. In order to keep life in your brand, it has to constantly evolve; it has to keep up with the times.
If you think about the best magazines, the world’s most popular brands – they really do think about things before most people. We went from the jeweled tones and English country glamour of the late 1990s to the calm blues and chocolates of the mid 1990s to the recent splash of citrus. And next year’s color?
Well, to figure that out, you’ll have to watch my Web site. There are trends in life that – if you stay on the cutting edge – you’ll be able to overcome. Overcome? Yes. There’s no question that if your brand stays stale – Swanson Hungry Man in the middle of the Diet Debate – you will not stay alive. Tang in the middle of Natural Goods, Vidal Sassoon after the creation of a brand associated with a hairstyle that denoted a certain time and place, Underalls in a world in which women don’t wear pantyhose most of the time.
Today, most people want ready-to-drink beverages with some sort of nod to natural flavors. Tang in 2007 introduced ready-to-drink units with new sweeteners. Vidal Sassoon is pulling itself out of the grocery stores and is concentrating on self-named and independent salons, where its brand name can move away from the notion of “bargain” and imbue itself with a new relevance with a new generation of hair-needy clients. Underalls is working to develop itself as a new brand whose products include along line of undergarments that include, but is not relegated to, pantyhose.
You need to take a cue from these corporate brands, which are beloved in American corporate myth but have taken their hits with the sands of time. Look for time cues and trend updates – and keep your brand in the running.
