Three Ways to Effectively Deal with People and Reduce Your Stress

                                                     

The late author, Og Mandino, said, “In life we always headed towards a crisis, in the middle 

of a crises or headed out of a crisis”.  In other words, if you are experiencing problems, you are alive and be thankful.

That may not make you feel much better so let’s talk about how you can make the most of the stress you do experience in being part of a school system. 

The important thing to remember is that everyone experiences stress, and if they can deal with it, so can you!  When you can develop a system for successfully dealing with stress, you will have something that will be a dependable tool that you can use whenever you find yourself facing a stressful situation.

The three most common areas where people experience stress in their lives are coping with:

            Financial concerns

            Family members

            Co- workers, customers, managers and bosses

As you look at the list of the most common areas of stress, it is interesting to note that people make up two thirds of this list. Successfully dealing with people is an art. The human race is composed of individuals who are similar in some ways and unique in many others.  People’s values, expectations, upbringing, and a host of other variables make them different from you. These differences can serve as a stumbling block, or a stepping stone. The choice is yours.

Here are three tools you can use to be more effective when dealing with others in a stressful situation. First is communication. Most successful people are able to communicate with others in a way that creates a connection. Even though they may not agree with the other person, they are able to find some common ground or area of agreement.

The second tool is listening. When you can simply listen to the other person without interrupting them, you can resolve most disagreements. The real challenge is truly listening to the other person and not rehearsing what you are going to say to them when they stop talking.

Finally, the last tool is flexibility. Being flexible with others and not rigidly adhering to your own view point can allow you to come to a compromise and resolve the issue being discussed. One analogy that demonstrates this concept is comparing the oak tree to the willow tree. The oak tree which is very rigid and hard will lose several branches or have its’ trunk severely damaged in an ice storm. The willow tree which is very flexible will simply bend but not break.

So, by using these three tools: communication, listening and flexibility, you can effectively reduce your stress when dealing with other people.

For more information on the services of Tom Borg Consulting, LLC can help your public school administration and staff improve communication, please call our office at 734-404-5909 or email us at: tomborg@tomborgconsulting.com

Listening to Your Customers is the Key to a Successful School System.

One of the smartest things you can do with your school district in these tough economic times is to make your students and parents happy. This happens by design not by accident. The people you and your staff serve want to feel important and they will reward your school district with their loyalty and support.

This all starts with the attitude of running your organization or department like a marathon, not a fifty yard dash. It is too easy to cut corners on scheduling and hiring when you are trying to save money. That makes the bottom line look good in the short term, but if you are planning on keeping your school district over the long haul, you have to think in terms of your customer’s best interests.

So what are the things that make your parents feel important? What are the actions you and your staff can take that will make them feel like valued human beings? One of the best ways to find out is to ask them. Sitting down with a parent over a cup of  coffee (your treat), can help them give you insights you never dreamed of hearing.

Many times the things you think are important to parents and students are not.  Curiously enough, the list of things that are important may change from week to week or may remain constant. This depends on the circumstances surrounding the people you serve. By having an ongoing dialogue with your parents and students, you can keep abreast of their service perceptions and realities.

In this age of increasing technology and the everyday frenzy that accompanies it, slowing the pace down and getting face to face with parents and students can be priceless. Investing fifteen minutes to simply ask a few questions and sincerely listening to the responses can be like hitting the mother lode of gold.

For more information on how we can help make your school district the best it can be, contact our office at 734-404-5909.

Help Your Employees Create the Right Kind of Cultural Awareness

Creating the right environment for the development of cultural awareness within your organization does not happen by accident. At your next company meeting, make some time for your employees to raise their level of understanding of the different cultures  within it. This can lead to a positive impact on the quality of everyone’s life within your workplace.

Get Your Employees Involved

Paul Gorski, founder of EDChange, makes the point that when you get your employees involved in cultural awareness activities, it allows people to learn more about each other. It helps them eliminate preconceived notions and myths about each other’s culture, and allows people to become more comfortable with each other. Here is an exercise that Gorski recommends that can be used to develop cultural awareness within your organization.

Cultural Awareness Exercise

Ask the participants in the meeting to find someone who they do not know. Ask them to introduce themselves to that person and spend five to ten minutes talking about respect. What does it mean for you to show respect, and what does it mean for you to be shown respect? After the allotted time, ask the participants to return to their seats, and open the discussion. What ideas did people discuss?

When you get the participants back into the large group and discuss the discoveries that were made, responses could include things like:

·         Not everyone wants to be treated the way I want to be treated.

·         Not all cultures are comfortable shaking hands.

·         Different cultures have different expectations in social situations.

Learn From Each Other’s Differences

This type of an exercise can help your managers and employees learn from each other’s differences. When people are able to communicate openly about the differences between their cultures, mutual respect, trust and understanding can develop. In addition to the differences, people begin to see how many similarities there are. By structuring cultural learning time into your meetings on a regular basis, improved cooperation and greater cultural inclusion within your company can be obtained.

Tom Borg is president of Tom Borg Consulting, LLC. He is a business consultant, speaker, trainer and author. He and his associates help public schools become more successful and service oriented. For more information on our services contact our office at 734-404-5909 or visit our website at www.tomborgconsulting.com.

Don’t Use These Words

The words you use color your attitude. If you are constantly using words that are negative, you can be sure you will have a more negative outlook on life. One of the best ways to change your attitude is to be careful with which words you use.

When you are caught in a slowdown in traffic? What do you say? Don’t call it a “traffic jam”.  A more positive way to refer to it would be to describe it as “a chance to slow down and do some thinking”.

Rather than calling a disagreement with another person a, “heated argument’, you can refer to it as a situation where you both saw things from a different perspective”.   

When you make a mistake on a project and, “have to start over”, use self talk that describes it as “an opportunity to make it even better”.

Rather than complaining about the broken dishwasher, discuss the advantage of how it might be time for a new, more efficient one.

When you are running low on groceries, don’t complain about how much food costs. Simply say, “it would be fun to get out of the house and do some grocery shopping”.

The key here is to start positively reframing the situations you are experiencing.  By looking at things from a different perspective, it gives you a more pleasant and optimistic outlook on life. It allows you to look up and see things that you might have missed if you had kept your head down and kept complaining.

It never ceases to amaze me how many people think they have it bad when all they have to do is look around and see how good they really have it. It reminds me of the poem I once heard that goes like this:

“I had the blues because I had no shoes,

Until on the street I met a man with no feet.”

Tom Borg is president of Tom Borg Consulting, LLC. He is a business consultant, speaker, coach and author. He shows school districts and organizations how to attract and retain more clients and customers. For more information on his services please contact our office at 734-404-5909 or email him at: tomborg@tomborgconsulting.com

Using an Analogy to be a Better Communicator

If you are a school superintendent, principal, secretary or an employee, it is critical that you use as many tools as possible to help you communicate effectively. Most people will criticize things they don’t understand.  In order for you to be convincing, you must keep your communication tools as sharp as possible.

One of the best ways to verbally convey ideas that may need some explanation, is to use something called an analogy. An analogy is taking something that is familiar and comparing it to something that is not familiar. By taking this approach, it allows the listener to bridge the gap between something they are already accustomed to, to something they are not. Using an analogy can be the difference between having the person or group you are talking to agree or not agree with you.

For example, if you were trying to explain what the office paper shredder does, you could use an analogy of how a cheese shredder works. A cheese shredder takes a block of cheese and slices it into tiny fragments. The office paper shredder does the same, only it takes paper and cuts it up into very small pieces

Another example is, if you were trying to explain how easy it is to accomplish a major project. You could use the analogy of how a large bundle of twigs cannot be broken in half as a bundle, but when taken apart, each twig could be easily broken. It is similar to how you can break a major project down into small enough tasks that would allow the person to easily complete them one at a time. By taking this approach, the entire project would gradually be completed.

Using an analogy to communicate your ideas can help you gain the understanding and support you need to communicate your ideas effectively.

For more information on how Tom Borg Consulting, LLC can help your school system please call us at 734-404-5909 or visit our website at:  www.TomBorgConsulting.com

Do This to Avoid Email Problems

Email is everywhere in public schools across America. What’s worse is that it is getting more burdensome than ever. What is a person to do? Here are five tips from Harvard Business School’s Working Knowledge for Business Leaders E-publication.

 1. Make Action Requests Clear - If you want things to get done, say so. Clearly. There's nothing more frustrating as a reader than getting copied on an e-mail and finding out three weeks later that someone expected you to pick up the project and run with it. Summarize action items at the end of a message so everyone can read them at one glance. This rule  is mandatory for professionals who want to land a job in communications.


2. Combine Separate Points into One Message - Sometimes the problem is the opposite—sending 500 tiny messages a day will overload someone, even if the intent is to reduce this by creating separate threads. If you are holding a dozen open conversations with one person, the slowness of typing is probably substantial overhead. Jot down all your main points on a piece of (gasp) paper, pick up the phone, and call the person to discuss those points. I guarantee you'll save a ton of time.


3. Edit Forwarded Messages - For goodness sake, if someone sends you a message, don't forward it along without editing it. Make it appropriate for the ultimate recipient and make sure it doesn't get the original sender in trouble.


4. Check E-mail at Defined Times Each Day - We hate telemarketers during dinner, so why do we tolerate e-mail when we're trying to get something useful done? Turn off your e-mail "auto-check" and only check e-mail two or three times a day, by hand. Let people know that if they need to reach you instantly, e-mail isn't the way. When it's e-mail processing time, however, shut the office door, turn off the phone, and blast through the messages..


5. Use a Paper “Response List” to Triage Messages Before You Do Any Follow-up - The solution to e-mail overload is pencil and paper? Who knew? Grab a legal pad and label it "Response list." Run through your incoming e-mails. For each, note on the paper what you have to do or whom you have to call. Resist the temptation to respond immediately. If there's important reference information in the e-mail, drag it to your “Reference folder.” Otherwise, delete it. Zip down your entire list of e-mails to generate your response list. Then, zip down your response list and actually do the follow-up.


Tom Borg is president of Tom Borg Consulting, LLC. For more information on how he and his associates can help your public school please contact our office at 734-404-5909 or visit our website at www.tomborgconsulting.com

How to Tap the Mind Power of Your Local Business Leaders

One of the key result areas every school district should take advantage of is the wealth of mind power and potential financial support from local business leaders in your community. By connecting this group of people with your school board members, you can create a very powerful and influential team.

Far too often these two groups do not have the opportunity to communicate with each other on a regular basis. One way to make sure that this happens is to create a structure for it to happen.

Here is a three part formula to make this idea become part of your strategy to strengthen your school district. 

First, create a list of local business leaders from your community. Invite staff from all departments to submit names of various business leaders in the community with which they have a connection.

Next, set up a time to meet with each business person on an individual basis. Explain that the purpose of the meeting is to discuss the idea of tapping the mind power of the business community and discuss their possible interest of being included in such a group.

Finally, once you get enough people interested, conduct the meeting and generate a to-do list of possible projects that could be acted upon.

The main ingredient in building your school district is to get all interested stakeholders from your business community to communicate with your school board in an ongoing basis. The action oriented business people in your community can be key contributors to the success of your school district.

Contact our office for more ideas on how to maximize the wealth of mind power between your business community and your school board. We are available for in-services or for consulting. You can reach us at 734-404-5909.