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Achieving a Better Family and Work Balance Makes for Better Job Performance Are you constantly working after hours and weekends at the office? Are beginning to forget what your family even looks like? Many people find themselves in this predicament. Work seems to get more and more demanding with every passing day, and to stay on top of your game at work, you feel like you need to put in long hours. The flipside to this is that of course when you are at the office, you are away from home – away from family dinners, play time and your kids’ sporting events or school plays. You may feel like your hands are tied – that no matter how much you want to be more involved with your family life, you have to keep working as hard as ever to make sure your family is provided for in the long run. The truth is, however, that you may be doing yourself a disservice on both fronts. Studies have shown time and again that well rested workers with well balanced lives are more productive in the time they do spend working. In the end, the best way to be a stand out worker at the office is to be fully involved and present in your family live. But wait, you say, “I’m working practically around the clock now, and everything still isn’t getting done.” However, maybe the problem isn’t that you aren’t working hard enough. Maybe the problem instead is that you aren’t working smart enough. Think about the way you spend you working day. Are you taking on more responsibility than you need to, instead of delegating tasks to others? Are you spending a lot of time chatting in the break room when you run for a cup of coffee? Are you procrastinating so that big projects require you to work all-nighters instead of spreading out the work? Keep a journal of all of your activities at work for a few days. You might be surprised to see how you are really spending your time and in what areas you could make improvements. Simply staying on task and delegating effectively could get you home in time for dinner. When you have done everything you can to make your work habits as productive as possible, it is time to turn to other ways to balance your work life and your family life. Rule number one is the hardest one for most people to follow you – draw clear lines of distinction between work time and family time. Family time isn’t really family time if you are constantly on your cell phone making and receiving work calls or if you are on your laptop for the entire family vacation. When you’re working – work. When you’re with your family – concentrate on them. The time you spend actually taking a breather from work will recharge your batteries and make you a better worker when work time rolls around again. Next, you have to evaluate your priorities. Maybe working around the clock will help you make partner faster, but at what cost? Decide if seeing your daughter’s soccer game every week is more important to you than moving up the corporate ladder quickly, and make adjustments in your schedule appropriately. There is no right or wrong answer, but deciding where you priorities lie will make scheduling easier for you. With your priorities in mind, see what work options are available to you to help you meet them. If you want more time with the kids, see if your office offers flex time or part time hours to help you meet your family commitments. Last but not least, don’t feel guilty about taking time with your family. Not only is this time important to your family, you can rest assured that the time out from the office stress will make you more productive when you return to work.

Following Up on Fallacies about Getting Free Stuff “Free stuff” – the mere whisper of the words is often enough to make many people throw common sense out the window and head for the free goods like a missile to a target. And then there are those people whose eyes glaze over when they hear those words, because they can’t believe anything worth having can actually be free. The truth about free stuff is really somewhere in the middle. Yes, you can really and truly cash in on many freebie deals for things that you want to have, but a healthy sense of cynicism about free gear is also useful. Here are some of the important things to keep in mind about free stuff. The first myth you should throw out the window is that nothing good comes for free. The fact of the matter is that the price tag on a good doesn’t always match up to the quality, and there are many great free things out there. Case in point: music. Sure, everyone has heard the scare stories about file sharing online, and maybe some big record labels will come after you if you focus on their artists. Dig a little below the surface, however, and you can find a whole new world of really great bands that are more than happy for you to listen to their music over and over again. The same goes for free software. People on the cutting edge of technology who have a passion for creating new and efficient applications often develop open source code software. They’re doing it for the love of it, and they often have more talent than any ten suit-and-tie tech guys trying to hock their latest product for a mega profit margin. Here is where the reality part comes in, however. Yes, you can find wonderful things that are completely free – but yes, you can also find a lot of free things that aren’t worth your time at all and in some cases can cause you a lot of trouble. The net is a great place to fall victim to a “free stuff” scam, but you can also sometimes come across these scams in the mail as well. If something is free, but requires you to give your credit card number or bank details, run the other way. Another myth people have about free stuff, especially free stuff on the internet, is that when you try to cash in, the only free stuff you will be getting is an inbox full of more spam than you can handle. The truth about this is, well, that is can certainly be true. Many companies give away free things in exchange for your email address, so they can try to hit you up to purchase things in the future. What makes this a myth, however, is that it can be avoided. If you don’t want to choke on an inbox of spam, and who could blame you, set up a special (free) email account that you will use exclusively for freebie hunting. You’ll have the best of both worlds. The last myth about free stuff involves the “catch” people are always looking for. Often, for free stuff, the catch is a bit of junk mail or email or the fact that you have to submit to a time consuming survey. Sometimes, the catch is that if you get free stuff through a trial offer, if you don’t cancel it, it keeps coming, and this time you have to pay. The truth about these catches is, however, that the catch is in the eye of the beholder. These things don’t make products any less free; so don’t write off every free offer offhand. You might just find a catch you can live with to get a great free product you really want.

Making Effective Web Publishing Content (web publishing content) Web publishing content is important for a successful website. The content of a web site can often make or break that site, and it is important to make the site as attractive as possible, without over doing it. The content of a web site must be updated on a regular basis to keep web surfers coming back. Updated web content not only keep surfers coming back, but is also indexed more frequently by search engines. Fresh material is one of the key aspects of successful web publishing content and may generate fresh faces to a web site. One way to update the content of a web site is to update the existing web pages. Providing new content could include updating the conditions of a service, adding a new product or service, or creating a turnkey solution that will save the customer’s money or time. The web content should reflect the most recent information about a business. It is simple to provide changes to the web content, but many web sites provide updates without providing a notice. So, it is indicative to provide a notice of change each time web publishing content is changed. The announcements should be displayed prominently on the web site so that all surfers are able to see. It is also important to write articles for the web site. Articles can be seen as a valuable source for a web site’s success. The articles can be used to educate visitors on the web site and the business, while showcasing the owner’s expertise. Articles can be posted on the web site or used in a newsletter and submitted to other newsletters and web sites for syndication. This web publishing content can be used by other web site owners, which will provide leverage to the articles while generating publicity for the author and the author’s web site, while exposing them to new audiences. Writing an article seems simple enough, but there are many web site owners who are unable to find topics to write on. However, topics may be more evident than most web content writers may think. Topics for articles can be found in the news, in conversations with clients and colleagues, in networking events that are attended, and even in speeches. Blogging is also an excellent way to expand your list of web publishing content. Most web site owners can benefit from learning to blog, learning to start a blog, learning how to gain readers, and learning to make money from blogs. Blogging is becoming one of the most popular tools for showing new content on a web site. A web log can be used to answer web site visitors’ questions, inform users about new services and products, and to keep them up-to-date on industry news. Blogs are a great resource for sharing opinions and displaying expertise. The blog can be used to help an owner connect with their web site visitors while generating new web site content. Updating web publishing content on a regular basis is vital to the success of a web site and very important for many web site owners. Articles, newsletter, and blogging should be a part of a regular business schedule, and will work perfectly in keeping a web site owner connected to their visitors. The quality of the web content on a web site can make it more attractive to users or can make it very unattractive to users. Owners should use their expertise to provide writing that is interesting and necessary. Visitors will appreciate the extra effort and owners will get the rewards of maintaining good web content for their users.