Tag Archives for " productivity at work "

Are you Superwoman or a Busy Fool?

By amandaalexander | Mindset

“I’m feeling overwhelmed with so much to do at home and work. I have a big proposal that needs to be in tomorrow and then I have a presentation to prepare before Tuesday with Monday already full with stuff, so if I don’t get a move on I will be working the weekend which I haven’t got time for, as lots on at home with kids’ social schedules, building work and a poorly husband who can’t drive. I so need to be super efficient and effective right now, but telling myself that still isn’t getting me there! I just can’t mentally apply myself to anything important and I am procrastinating a lot and making lots of cups of tea!”

This is a quote from Eleanor, one of my clients. She’s not alone in feeling overwhelmed and the description of her week echoes those I’ve heard from most of my clients at some point. If I had a pound/dollar/euro for every time I heard the word “overwhelmed” from my clients over the past 16 years, I’d be a rich woman by now!

90% of the women I’ve worked with over the years have had caring responsibilities – usually for children, sometimes for ageing parents, sometimes as carers, and increasingly – as I get older! – I am noticing that many of my clients have both children and parents to look after. 21st century life is busy for most of us, but for women who are mothers or carers, ‘busy’ is taken to a whole new level.

I get the “jugging act” and “balancing act” of work, life and family. I get it because I speak on an almost daily basis with my clients who are striving to master that juggling act. I also get it as I’m at the sharp end myself! as a mum, with a coaching practice and a new business, maintaining a house, raising 2 energetic boys (and of course my 4-legged “boy”, Ernie) I often wonder how on earth I keep going! And just like my clients, I’m keenly aware of the dangers of burnout and conversely, the importance of carving out time for my own health, wellbeing and happiness. But how do we carve out that time when we have so much on our plate?


Of course, the more we have on our plate, the longer it takes to clear that plate. And the plate is never empty. Just as soon as you’ve cleared a space, something else appears on it. Looking at that plate, piled so high that you don’t know where to start, can be completely overwhelming!

But here’s the issue: For the most part, we are loading up that plate ourselves. We are largely responsible for our own tendency to fall into overwhelm, as we are so busy trying to be Superwoman.

Are modern women a “generation of control freaks”? Judith Warners, in her New York Times bestseller “Perfect Madness: Motherhood in the Age of Anxiety” thinks so – and control freaks who are unable to say “No” to boot: In “Perfect Madness”, Warners cites an article from Redbook, a women’s magazine about the cult of busy-ness amongst modern women:

“What has modern woman done with the four or five hours she used to spend at the wash line? Chances are she has let herself be dragooned into doing something that is just as tiring and time-consuming. She is working on one more committee, helping out at a pre-kindergarten art group or collecting furniture or clothing for the town swap shop.. permi(ting) the time saved by (the) mechanical devices to be wiped out by increased standards of performance”.

Don’t make the mistake of thinking that this is a description of a stay at home mum: The “modern woman” described above is also highly likely to be building a career, as well!

Here’s the rub…

“The obligation for working mothers is a very precise one: 
The feeling that one ought to work as if one did not have children, 
whilst raising one’s children as if one did not have to work”

There are 8 main reasons for overwhelm in talented women that I have observed over many years of coaching. Only the first two are external; the other six are about talented women getting in their own way by trying to be that mythical creature – Superwoman:

  1. Information overload
  2. Volume of work
  3. High expectations of myself
  4. Putting too much pressure on myself
  5. Trying to be perfect
  6. Needing to live up to other’s expectations of me
  7. Taking on too much
  8. Needing to do it all, “because nobody can do it as well as I can”

HOW TO STEP UP

One of the best ways to let go of the habit of being Superwoman is to get real on your expectations of yourself. Superwomen with control freak tendencies tend to have unrealistically high expectations of ourselves. This inevitably leads to overloading your metaphorical plate which in turn leads to you becoming overwhelmed. Getting into a cycle of coping-overwhelm-coping-overwhelm is not, as you might have already suspected, a sustainable one. Ultimately it leads to burnout and this has some serious health implications.

Checking in with your expectations of yourself is simple, but not always easy. Simple because you just have to take a step back and ask yourself, “What am I expecting myself to do here?.. Is this realistic/reasonable?” However, it is not always easy – because you are likely to be so ingrained in the habit of handling everything and getting things done that your default position is to respond to each challenge with

“How can I fit this in?”

rather than

“Where are my expectations unrealistic?”

This is why it is helpful to speak regularly to a good Coach or a friend, to get them to reflect back to you. You need someone who can pull you up short and point out the obvious…

“Hang on, you’ve just told me that today you are going to do A, B, C, D and E at work. That’s going to take you at least ten hours, and you’ve only got six working hours in the day!”

Gina had a big list of “must dos” in her week but she was frustrated with herself, as she wasn’t achieving them. She said:

“There’s no reason I can’t do all of these things. I just need to be more efficient with my time”

We drew up a grid and sectioned into days of the week and waking hours in the day. We walked through every single thing that Gina wanted to achieve in an average week.

Gina had a picture of how her life was going to be completely perfect with every element of a balanced life incorporated. She believed that the only thing that was stopping her was her own lack of time management. She believed that, if only she could get it right, she would be able to “do it all : Time for work, time for the kids, time for herself, time for her community, time for her hobbies and time for many other projects she was trying to juggle.

As we listed all the elements of her ideal week, I asked Gina how many hours per week she wanted to spend on each activity in her life. As we went through every element of her week, I asked the same question and quietly added up all the hours.

She was shocked when I told her the total hours: In order to achieve everything, she needed to have over 130 waking hours per week. There was no room in Gina’s week for the unexpected curve balls that have a habit of popping up regularly and certainly no room for anything to deviate from plan. Most of all, there was no room for sleep! It left her with just over 5 hours per night. Hardly a perfectly balanced life!

This was a reality check for Gina and it was a useful exercise. But she was only doing what millions of women do – over-estimating what she could achieve in the time given and setting expectations that only Superwoman could meet!

You might have a to-do list, and you beat yourself up because you haven’t achieved it, try this exercise yourself. Get real about how long things take – by underestimating you will feel constantly disappointed with yourself and constantly anxious.

This is a painful way to step up – no doubt about it! Looking at how long things really take is uncomfortable. However, this is the only way to prove to yourself that you are setting your expectations too high.

What You Need To Do To Get Flexible Working

By amandaalexander | Business

My latest Inspiring Women Interviews Podcast has just been broadcast on and . This episode is an interview with Tina Freed, founder of E2W and a champion of flexible working to support talent retention and attraction.

Tina has been helping highly talented women in the city to continue with their careers since 2002, when she and her husband formed E2W, a company with this objective as its primary driver.

Tina’s philosophy is:

“Flexible working is not an obstacle, it’s an opportunity – and we can prove it” 

Before setting up E2W Tina worked in the city within financial services for over 15 years. When she had a baby, she realised that the choice, then- 16 years ago – was to either have a child OR have a career – not both. But she didn’t think that was right, so she did something about it.

She saw a gap in the market –  the opportunity for people like her to continue working in the city AND to fulfil her aspirations as a mother were nonexistent, so she started her own business.  E2W was created so that Tina could be a mum without sacrificing her career.

She knew that she wasn’t alone in wanting this balance, so she set out to find a way to offer flexible working for women who wanted to develop their hard-earned careers and still be a mother.

She also felt that the city-based firms that she’d worked for could benefit from the experience of such women, and potentially it would be a much more cost-effective way of using these talented women.

Tina sought to tap into the big resource pool of mainly women who’d left the city when they were excluded from financial institutions, because those firms couldn’t offer that true work-life integration. E2W set up offices where the women lived, as opposed to where they were working. This obvious solution helped women to overcome the challenge of juggling the daily commute with childcare.

Tina understands that flexibility means different things to different people. Some want to work short days, some want to work 3 long days. For others, an ideal flexible working week might be a traditional 9-5 day, simply because they are currently working 6pm -11pm.

Whatever people’s definition of flexibility, the point is that there are may different patterns that companies can put in place to enable women to continue to work. It starts with thinking creatively.

 “Some of our employees work 9:30 to 2:30, and they do as much in five hours as they would if they went into the city and worked eight hours.”

Many women in middle management face career stagnation, not advancing because of a fearful mindset about the scarcity of opportunities for professionals that also advocate flexible working patterns.

These talented women feel that they can’t leave their current company or seek promotion, because they won’t be able to retain the same level of flexibility they’ve enjoyed.  There is a commonly held belief that flexible working patterns are only offered to those who have served their time and proven their loyalty.  This results in many talented women staying in roles that they have outgrown, simply because they see it as the lesser of two evils.

Challenging a limiting mindset is one of my favourite things to do as a Coach, and it’s also a big driver behind me launching the Inspiring Women Interviews podcast. I want women to learn from role models who have proven that it IS possible to combine a great career with having a life!

I’ve coached many such women over the years and I know that the only way around this is to challenge them to be courageous. Often easier said than done, of course, especially when well-intentioned family and friends reinforce the fearful belief.

My clients frequently tell me that their partners or parents urge them to keep their head down and make the most of it –

“You’ve got a good thing going here, it’s not that bad – don’t rock the boat”.

We need to actively support and encourage more women to challenge the status quo, perceived or otherwise. Ultimately it is up to them. This requires courage and often a suspension of disbelief, but also confidence in their abilities.

Tina agrees: She encourages women to thinks about what they can offer, how they might be able to support a new company, and to position themselves from this perspective.

“It’s about saying, ‘Look, I’m valuable. I have lots to offer. I have lots of experience that you would benefit from. For me to be able to do this, I would like to work in a flexible way. Flexibility to me means … Whatever it is’.”

I encourage the women I support to change their internal language from:

“But why would they employ me and offer me flexible working?”

to

“Why wouldn’t you employ me? Because I can do this role and make a valuable contribution.”

Attracting and retaining middle management women is crucially important to filling the leadership talent pipeline. There’s an onus on companies  to give these women explicit permission to  step up and fulfil their potential. This means that employers need to be open-minded and creative about flexible working and communicate this position loudly and clearly.

But equally as important is the onus on women themselves.  They need to take a deep breath, screw their courage to the sticking place and step up.  Try this for a career affirmation…

“Flexible working is not an obstacle, it’s an opportunity – and I can prove it”

And then… go and prove it!

Keep reading . . . now that you know what you need to do to get the career you want AND flexible working, I’ve created a fantastic, 3-part video coaching programme to help you with the confidence you’ll need.
Career Confidence 101 will help you get clarity on your strengths, focus in your career direction and the self-belief to achieve your goals.  However, the full Career Confidence 101 coaching programme is available for a VERY limited period. Within about a week, it will be shortened and you’ll get part 1 only. If you want to get all 3 coaching sessions of Career Confidence 101, sign up now!
to sign up for Career Confidence 101
Career Confidence 101

This Is The One Thing Successful Women Do Consistently!

By amandaalexander | Business

I was at an event last weekend and I asked 2 female millionaires this question:

“What differentiates you – as millionaires – from others? What are the attitudes you have or the things that you do differently that have helped you to become millionaires?

They each had different answers. But there’s one thing they both said and it stood out very clearly to me:

They both said that no matter what, they keep taking action. Even when they don’t know what to do, they take the next action – any action.

After the event, another successful woman messaged me on Facebook. Her name is Jane Cassell and she runs a company called JC Independent Wills & Probate. Incidentally, she’s also the woman who is about to write my will (she is brilliant)!

This is what she said:

“You asked a great question on Saturday evening – characteristic / distinction. My answer to that question is action. Without a doubt, action. We continue to take action, even when we’re tired, and life gets too busy to take action. We still take action.”

But it’s not the millionaires or even the brilliant Jane Cassell who have inspired this week’s post. It’s a lady called Lyn, who emailed me this week after attending my “Set Backs and Stepping Up” presentation for The Global Women in Leadership Summit. She thanked me for my session telling me it had made a huge difference to her. She described herself as “the stereotypical shy person in a room full of strangers”.

Despite being a stereotypical shy person, this is what Lyn did after my presentation:

“I have genuinely spent the last few days thinking about all the things I can do in order to connect with people – I’ve accepted an invitation to an event; I’ve started my Fabulous 50 list; I’ve contacted 7 people so far, from that list; I’ve been through my Outlook contacts to see who else I should be speaking to!

I’ve also applied for a job I saw advertised online – it was one of the headline jobs in an email, I took a look and decided to send off my CV – usually I would have agonised over whether or not to send it, and whether or not I’m actually capable of doing that role. I used to spend an hour a day poring over the websites, trying to find something that I can do (without a degree!). Today, I just thought, ooh that looks good, it’s in London, it’s a better salary (and different level) to what I usually look at; I’m sending my CV! I have just proved to myself that I don’t have to spend hours overthinking these things – and that’s probably a bigger deal than the actual application!!”

Did you read that last bit? I’ll repeat it, just in case!

“I’m sending my CV..I don’t have to spend hours overthinking these things.”

Wow! How’s that for a bit of weekend inspiration, eh?!

Quite simply, Lyn took action. Even though she’s shy. And I bet you agree when I say that she’s got a big chance of getting the job she wants because of taking these actions.

We can talk ourselves to death about WHY we don’t take action – too shy, lack of self-belief, don’t have time, no energy, don’t know what to do, don’t have the support, don’t know where to start, too tired at the end of the day.

There’s some tough love coming with this week’s post. Let’s cut through the c**p and get straight to the point: In brief, you gotta take action!

How do you do that? Well let’s imagine you don’t have ANY excuses – what is one action you COULD take towards your goal?

Now do it!

And then…

Rinse and repeat.

But maybe you really DO have a valid reason for not taking action? Let’s deal with that now, shall we? 🙂

Take for example this common and understandable reason amongst busy women with multiple responsibilities:

“I’m too tired at the end of the day”.

OK – I get that. Don’t we all? 🙂

But if you have a goal and you really want to achieve success, whether it’s with your career, your money, your relationship or anything else in your life, you’re going to have to take action anyway, even if you’re too _____________ (fill in the blank with your excuse)!

If you don’t know where to start, just start anywhere. Do it EVEN IF….

Keep taking action – just like Jane, just like Lyn and just like those millionaires.

Managing Menopause in the workplace: How to Cool Down, Calm Down and Breakthrough the Brain Fog

By amandaalexander | Career

This week, our guest post is from Julie Dennis. Julie will also be running a masterclass for The Academy for Talented Women on managing menopause in the workplace. Read how you can join us at the end of the post.



In a recent study nearly 50% of the women interviewed felt menopause symptoms had a negative impact on their performance at work.
Is that you?

The most common symptoms were poor concentration, tiredness and poor memory.

And surprise surprise hot flushes were cited as a major source of distress for women at work too.

Hot flushes aren’t just uncomfortable, they’re embarrassing, especially when you’re with colleagues.

You know how it is. Mid meeting you suddenly sense that inner spark ignite.

You try to stay focused on what’s being said, maybe casually remove your jacket or put your hair up to get some cool air on the back of your neck.

Perhaps you make a joke about being a woman of a certain age, “is it hot in here or is it just me ha ha?

Except it’s not funny is it? It’s humiliating.

The good news is it doesn’t have to be that way. You really can learn about managing menopause in the workplace. The secret lies in managing your cortisol levels.

High levels of cortisol, your main stress hormone, is the most common hormone imbalance in women over the age of 40.

Your body is designed to release cortisol when your mind perceives you to be in a stressful situation. It’s part of your fight or flight response.

Your adrenal glands pump out cortisol to give you the energy to either flee or stand and fight. This ancient response was originally designed to help you deal with the stress of a life or death situation. Perhaps a confrontation with a neighbouring tribe or an attack by a dangerous animal.

Modern day stresses of course are very different. They’re made up of certain foods, types of drink, poorly worded emails, traffic jams, toxins and even your working environment.

Menopause itself is a form of stress on your body.

But here’s the thing, the same stress response still gets triggered today even though the danger isn’t actually life threatening.

And stress in the 21st century workplace is unrelenting. So instead of cortisol being produced when you actually need it, your body starts to produce it all the time.

So what’s stressing you out? What are you eating, drinking or experiencing during your working day that’s triggering your fight or flight response, increasing your cortisol levels and making your menopause symptoms worse?

Once you know what your triggers are you can work on managing or eliminating that trigger and you really can cool down, calm down, breakthrough the brain fog and stay on track with your career.

You see, whilst you can’t avoid stress in the 21st century what you can do is learn how to manage it, through the way you eat and drink, the way you exercise, your menopause mindset and by reducing your exposure to toxins.

Julie will be running a virtual seminar on managing menopause in the workplace for my Academy for Talented Women Members on Wednesday 12 OctoberShe will also share a simple but effective framework for you to follow so you can talk to your boss about how your symptoms are affecting your ability to do you job without damaging your career.

If you’d like access to the webinar – both live and recorded version, to watch, listen or download whenever you want, click here to read all the other benefits and join the Academy now.


What is The Academy for Talented Women?

Imagine a virtual “gym”, but a gym where, instead of working on your fitness, you work on your mindset, your skill set and your life!  Now imagine you don’t have to travel to that gym and you can access it from anywhere in the World – on your computer, your tablet or your phone.

Imagine that, instead of signing up for a Zumba or a Spinning Class, you could go to a class on, for example..

  • How to Declutter Your Home
  • How to Deal with Conflict at Work
  • How to Boost Your Energy When You Have No Time
  • How to be Incredibly Confident at Work

or even…

  • How Not to Divorce Your Husband (YES! We do have that class!)

And let’s say you could sign up to do that class at the time it’s scheduled. But if you missed it, it wouldn’t matter, because you could simply do the class by yourself, at any time of the day or night to suit YOUR schedule!

The Academy for Talented Women has been created and built by me, Amanda Alexander. And I created it from having coached hundreds of working mums over many years.  I know that, for a woman to be successful, there are many elements of her life that have to work – and they have to work in harmony.  That’s why I built The Academy is around 3 pillars of a working woman’s life:

– Your Career
– Your Life
– You

Would you like to coached, but it’s too expensive?

I believe that getting coaching with a GOOD Coach is an invaluable investment in your career and your life. It certainly changed my life for the better when I first worked with a Coach back in 2002! But what if funds simply won’t stretch to your own Coach? I get that – even if you’re earning a good salary, after food is paid for, kids’ activities are paid for, the phone bill, the council tax bill and the boiler you’ve just had to replace.. you quite understandably might see coaching as a luxury that you literally can’t afford.

But what if you COULD get access to a GOOD Coach without the usual price tag? In fact, what if you could access not just a GOOD Coach but a multi-award winning, highly experienced Coach who was accredited as Professional Certified Coach with the ICF? That’ll be me then! (You can read more about me here).

That’s why I included a monthly “drop in” coaching call” within The Academy membership. It’s usually held during “lunch hour” from 12.30 to 1.30 pm BST, with the odd evening call at 8.30 pm BST.  But if you can’t make it to the call, you still get to ask a question beforehand.

The idea of the coaching calls is – if you’re stuck, you need an idea, motivation or inspiration, I’m here for you.

Precious Little Time for Personal Development or Investing in Yourself?

The Academy has also been created to allow you to access learning, development and support when it suits YOU.  I understand how busy you are – so am I!  I understand that, for you to invest in yourself and your career, you are probably going to do so in pockets of time, often whilst multi-tasking. So do I!

That’s why I created an online members’ area with all the Academy’s fantastic masterclasses, coaching sessions and online life coaching course under one roof!

For me, it’s about the right kind of support

None of us can do it alone. Whether your goal is to change your career, get a promotion or even leave your career and go it alone, you need support. Or maybe you’re just struggling to keep up with the fast pace of life – you need support (and practical strategies).  You need someone who can be your cheerleader when the going gets tough, who can be your advisor when you’re stuck and who can hold up a mirror to  show you how capable you really are, when you have lost sight of the fact.

I created The Academy for Talented Women to give you the support you need in order to be successful. Whether it’s in our warm and friendly private Facebook group, in our monthly coaching calls or even at our annual “Stepping Up” live event (yes, you even get a live event!),  The Academy for Talented Women is all about providing you with the right kind of support you need to be successful, fulfilled and balanced.
How do you join?

You pay a monthly subscription via PayPal or your credit card. You can leave at any time. There is no “minimum contract”. There are NO catches.  You can get the full details about The Academy and join here. 
I look forward to supporting you!

Amanda ALEXANDER

 

How to get everything done?

By amandaalexander | Time Management

“How do I get everything done?”

Last week, following the publication of her brand new book “How to be Really Productive: Achieving clarity and getting results in a world where work never ends”, I interviewed Grace Marshall for Psychologies Magazine’s Life Labs blog. I wanted to drill Grace for her BEST tips on how to feel more in control and how to avoid overwhelm in the run up to Christmas.

Grace is brilliant at helping people how to feel more productive and more in control, teaching them ways on how to get everything done without expecting them to become super-humans.

Here are the 5 top tips key points from my interview with Grace to stop you from ’going under’ with stress and feeling overwhelmed at this very busy time of the year!

1. The myth of getting everything done

When we talk about productivity, people think the question is, “How do I get everything done?” That’s the wrong question.

The everything myth is that we have to do everything. We have to be all things to all people. We have to get everything done. We can’t let anything slip. It’s a myth because we can’t do that. As human beings we can’t get everything done. The problem with the everything myth is, actually, when we try and do everything, all we end up doing is spreading ourselves thin and diluting our impact and missing out on the things that matter to us.

2. Distinguish between concern and influence.

Not everything that we worry about is within our control. If you made a list right now of all the things that are worrying you and that you think you need to sort out, stop and reflect: How much of that can you actually do something about? How much of it is a genuine action that you can actual complete now and how much of it is just a vague nagging worry?

Taking Christmas for example. Christmas is not an action. Christmas is a worry! We worry about things like who’s coming to Christmas dinner, about family tensions or how we’re going to do all the present buying and card writing. So start to distil that worry: Ask yourself “What’s the thing that I could do something about here? There’s a difference between the concern, the stuff that worries us, and where we can actually do something about it, our influence.

3. Distinguish between fake work and real work.

Being busy is not hard. We live in a world where work and “stuff” never ends. There is always more work and stuff we can do. There are always more presents we can buy, more trimmings we can add to the turkey. But we need to remember they are just ideas. Sometimes we take those ideas and we think, “Oh, I’ve got to do something about that.” Last year’s meal plan wasn’t good enough.

The problem with that is sometimes we can set ourselves up with such high standards that we just forget to enjoy it along the way and all we feel is exhausted. Fake work is the work that keeps you busy and gives you very little in return. Real work is the stuff that actually gives you meaning and purpose and joy. It takes you forward. It gives you a sense of progress, a sense of achievement, a sense of satisfaction.

If you apply that kind of thinking to your work, your projects that you’re trying to get done before Christmas at work, the question there is, “Okay, what here is fake work? What’s actually not going to give us much return? What’s the real work here that’s going to give us the most return in terms of what we’re trying to achieve?”If you apply that to Christmas, home life and stuff, you need to think in terms of shat’s the stuff that actually doesn’t matter? What can you let go of and what will you focus on? Productivity is as much about saying no to things so that you can truly commit to what you really want.

4. Harness the power of the pause

Sometimes when things are really busy, the default position is to just get on and do it. JFDI is a good motto to have, but sometimes we can get so caught up with doing that we forget to think. However, when there’s a lot going on, actually what we need to do is give ourselves space to think, because thinking can make the difference between a really productive, satisfying day and a day when you just feel like you’ve been so busy but you’ve no idea what you’ve actually achieved. Giving ourselves the power of the pause, but actually permission to stop and think as well. It’s almost like a guilty pleasure.

Often, the most productive thing you can do to take a break, go for a walk, or stop what you’re doing, turn your emails off, your phone off, and get some clear thinking – “what is it that I need to do here?” On a bigger scale as well, that power of the pause in terms of our recharge time, our recovery, is really important. Our ability to make good decisions and do good thinking is a depleting resource. It’s like a muscle. The more decisions we make throughout the day, the more that muscle will get tired. Yes, we can train our muscles to handle more, but at the end of the day, it’s still going to get fatigued.

The same thing happens with our minds. We get decision fatigue. That’s why at the end of the day, you can go home and think, and get to the point where somebody asking you, “What’s for tea,” is like the question that breaks the camel’s back. It’s like, “I can’t deal with that anymore.”Ask yourself: “How can I give myself a break? or “How can I give myself one less thing to think about?”

5. Reframe it

One of the chapters in Grace’s book is about our mind monkeys and our lizard brain. It’s about what goes on in our head that causes overwhelm, procrastination and exhaustion. Overwhelm often comes from that conversation that’s going on inside your head. Quite often it’s our mind monkeys saying, “Who do you think you are? How are you going to get this done?”

More often than not, we play the conflict or the situation or the problem up to be bigger than it is, or maybe playing ourselves to be smaller than we are. If you find yourself thinking, “I HAVE to do this. I HAVE to do that.”, start playing with those words and maybe change them to, “I get to.”

So instead of, “I have all these things I HAVE to do.” it’s actually, “I GET to do this.” So, from “I have to organise Christmas presents for my family” to “I get to organise Christmas presents for my family” orfrom “I have to finish this report before next week” to “I get to finish this report before next week”If nothing else, it will make you smile!

If these 5 tips are freeing you up to think more constructively about “having to get everything done” in the run up to Christmas, then you’ll love Grace Marshall’s book. It’s a goldmine of strategies and common sense.

You can get the first chapter of How to be Really Productive FREE here: http://howtobereallyproductive.com

How to Feel Fabulously Confident at Work even in the Toughest Situations

Next week in The Academy, I’ll be welcoming Sherry Bevan, author of “The Confident Mother”.

Sherry will be teaching you “How to Feel Fabulously Confident at Work even in the Toughest Situations”.

In November’s masterclass, you wil learn:

· How to project confidence in the way you walk and talk
· How striving for perfection is a killer for your confidence
· Why it’s so important to give yourself permission for self-love
· How to boost your confidence by understanding your strengths and limitations
· Why it’s essential to journal your achievements at work to reinforce your identity

Our masterclasses are delivered by webinar an you can join wherever you are in the world, by your computer or by phone (we even have freephone numbers for most countries). Or you can wait until the recording is uploaded to the members’ area, watch it on demand or download the mp3 audio version and the slides and listen to it whilst you’re driving, cooking, walking or on taxi duty!

The Academy is a blended learning platform with support, self-development, masterminding and coaching for women, beautifully packaged within an online membership area that you can access 24/7, from anywhere in the World on any of your devices.

I’ve designed it to be flexible to different learning needs and varying time commitments (which for most of us that means not much time!). My big driver is to support middle to senior management women who are busy “doing it all” with very little support. I feel that these are the women who really need more support – and blossom when they get it!

Sometimes you just need a boost, sometimes you need a bit of coaching, other times you realise there’s a gap in your personal skill set that will help you achieve your personal and professional goals. This is where the Academy’s masterclasses come in. Each month, we have a guest expert who delivers a content rich webinar. But there is so much more to The Academy than the masterclasses. Take a look and discover all the benefits

There are 2 special offers for new members until 14th November, so now is definitely the best time to join! Click here to get the details