I published a post on LinkedIn recently about consistency and why lack of it is annoying. It got me thinking a lot more about consistency - and why it’s important.

To be honest it boils down to two things, effective communication and trust - here you’ll find ten tips on how you can demonstrate trust and use your communication skills to best effect.

Communication is a fundamental part of everyday life, yet often we don’t think about what/how we are communicating with others. I’m sure you can recall at least once when you've been annoyed by the way someone spoke to you, or offended by a brusque email, perhaps you’ve felt uncertain by someone standing too close to you, or confused because you have no clue what the emojis in a text message mean?

The benefits of WFH are well documented - no commute, you can be more comfortable, and of course there’s much more flexibility…

All of us are members of several teams, family, friends, work..but also much wider teams - ultimately the ‘one world’ team.

This I was already aware of, however the most important team of all, it’s a team of one - ourselves!

Delegation is something many of us are familiar with outside of the workplace - and if you’ve managed that over the years - successful delegation within the workplace should be a cinch.

…generally (not always) it’s about work, becoming your own boss, getting qualifications, how much money you can earn…..

Teamwork happens when each of us are committed to making it happen. Great teams are made up of great teammates. When we work together we can do things we couldn’t do alone as the following teamwork story demonstrates.

Bosses are the most difficult of all difficult people, because they have authority. Many bosses haven’t been trained in managing people because they’ve been promoted based on technical ability.  Most of the time they’re making it up as they go along, probably replicating poor management they have suffered themselves and so they are probably doing it badly.  

Multi-tasking – why not? “I can do two things at once”.

So goes the (slightly modified) quote from Heraclitus, an ancient Greek philosopher.

So how do you cope/survive? Seven tips to make it through organisational change.

Assertiveness is an important success quality, and it doesn't come naturally to most. If you’re not careful it can become arrogance - getting the balance right is tricky.

I’ve often heard the statement - ‘if we train people and they leave then we’ve wasted resources!’ to that I’ll counter with this alleged discussion between a chief finance officer and a chief executive CFO ‘what happens if we train people and they leave? CEO What happens if we don’t and they stay?’

This is a question people often jokingly ask on a Time Management course, thinking I can’t possibly do it.

Or can I…?

Acronyms have been around for ages, most of us have heard of S.M.A.R.T. goals (not that I agree with this, I have my own version C.O.V.E.R.) but in today’s world of quick response text speak they’ve become part of everyday parlance, LOL, BRB, even WTF!

However, their common usage isn’t why I L.O.V.E. them. My adoration comes from how they can help me when I make my own up.

I’m not sure where this originated, so I’m unable to properly credit it - but here are eight reasons why a good manager needs to be like a farmer..

We often read and learn about different management styles - Authoritative, Consultative, Laissez-faire etc. and these are linked to volume/type of work, organisation culture, goals, and the personalities of those being managed.

What about other constraints?

There’s that one person on the team who annoys you - and seems to antagonise others too.  Let’s sort it out. It’s always tough dealing with difficult people, but before you take action there is one very important question to ask - “Is it me?”

Diversity is important, not for political correctness reasons, but because by valuing differences and bringing the strengths of those differences into our daily lives the whole is greater than the sum of the parts. I love the way this is demonstrated by the fable ‘The Animal School’ by Dr RH Reeves.