It is important to be pleasant, knowledgeable, and dressed appropriately all the time to maintain a positive business image, but that’s just part of being a professional. Learn how to put together and maintain the whole professional package from how to dress to impress through how to behave around and communicate with customers and clients.
Dress the Part
Nothing too tight, too short or too revealing is a good general rule to follow when dressing as a professional. Buy and wear garments of the best quality you can afford.
However, how you dress as a business professional will greatly depend on what business you’re in. If your business involves leading bicycle tours, then obviously spandex is a fine choice. If you’re a health care professional, you’ll be wearing a uniform.
The general dress watchword for professionals is conservative. Want to be taken seriously? Dress seriously. Save the trendy pieces for off-duty times.
Be sensible. Is it a good idea to be wearing those 4-inch heels when you have four properties to show that day?
Pay attention to your accessories. Don’t overdo the jewelry. Professional and tacky do not go together. If you need to carry a handbag, a portfolio, or a briefcase, it should be current and in good repair. Shoes should be conservative, appropriate to your profession, in good repair, and polished if necessary.
Be Prepared
Show up on time for appointments. Showing up late for a party is fashionable. Showing up late for a business appointment is rude. Avoid being late by planning to be early. If you are late, apologize first thing when you arrive.
Show up ready to go to work. Inside you may feel tired, droopy, and panting for another caffeine hit, but you cannot be dragging yourself around or begging for cups of coffee on a client site. No matter how you feel, you have to present yourself as enthusiastic to go right to work—and do it.
Bring all your supplies/equipment with you. Showing up without the equipment you need to do the job is unprofessional.
Act business-like at all times. You wouldn’t walk into a client’s house, throw yourself onto their sofa, and put your feet up on their coffee table, would you? Well, there are lots of other behaviors that you need to avoid too: smoking, eating and drinking, hugging anyone, or anything else that is not directly related to the job. If someone offers you a cup of coffee or a glass of water, that’s OK, but don’t solicit the offer.
All times means everywhere. You need to act professionally outside client sites and in your office too. Rude or obnoxious behaviors will be noted by anyone who witnesses them and, if they don’t cost you your current client, may cost you a client down the road. So don’t be rude to that person who just stole your parking space; they might be someone you want to do business with.
Behavior
Don’t be over-familiar. A professional is not a friend. As a professional, you want to be friendly, of course, but you don’t want to be encouraging personal confidences or sharing them.
Learn how to chit-chat. On the other hand, you don’t want to come off as super serious and nothing but. Especially when you are meeting a client for the first time, a little general chit-chat can go a long way toward making you look human and your client comfortable.
Have your paperwork in good order. If you’re using a tablet, smartphone or laptop, that’s great, but whatever you show the client still needs to be organized, neat, and understandable, whether it’s a project plan or an invoice. Always double-check your numbers. A client who spots an error is a client you’ve probably lost.
Say thank you. Always thank a client for her time at the end of a meeting, and if they do business with you, say thank you for that, too. A handwritten note is a great way to do this. And don’t forget to ask for a referral or testimonial if things went well.
Customer Communication
Give clients and customers face-time when you’re talking to them. Put your phone away and look them in the eye. Customers and clients want to feel that you’re giving them your whole attention, and you don’t want to lose customers by making them feel unimportant.
Listen to your clients and customers actively. Use behaviors such as mirroring and rephrasing to let them know that you hear them. Practice active listening.
Eliminate habits that interfere with communication. Don’t eat or chew gum when meeting with a client. If you’re meeting in an office, don’t play background music; it can make it very difficult for some people to hear what you’re saying, even when played at a low level.
Learn how to give a firm handshake. As a professional, you’ll be expected to do it many many times, and you’ll also be judged many times on what yours is like. It’s worth the time to learn how to get it right.
Phone Etiquette
Turn your phone off when you’re meeting with a client. Taking calls or otherwise checking your phone when you’re meeting with someone gives the person you’re meeting the message that they’re unimportant to you.
Turn off your phone in social venues where ringing would disturb others, such as performances, movies, concert recitals, etc. In other situations, such as restaurants, setting your phone to vibrate is a good option. It does not make you look professional to be sitting in a restaurant with others and talking incessantly on your phone; it makes you look obnoxious.
If you do receive an important phone call that you must take while in a social venue, excuse yourself and take the call outside or somewhere inside such as a foyer. The people around you who don’t have to listen to you talking into your phone will appreciate it.
Do not discuss the call when you return. Simply say something such as, “Now, where were we?” and carry on. For one thing, no matter how important the call was to you, chances are extremely high they won’t care.
Do not ignore phone calls. Business calls should be answered by the next day at the latest. Can’t manage it? Then it’s time to invest in some additional phone services or hire a receptionist or answering service.
If you use voicemail phone services, check it regularly. It is frustrating for customers when they keep getting the “mailbox full” message when they’re calling you.
Email
Like phone calls, business/professional-related emails need to be answered within one business day if possible.
Design a professional signature using your email program and then use it on all your business-related email.
Use business-like salutations and complimentary closes. Start a professional email with the person’s name alone or with “Hello.” “All the best,” “Cheers,” and “Sincerely” all are good choices for closes.
Use full English sentences and words in the body of your professional email. Think of email much as you would a professional letter, and always proofread and spellcheck your email before you send it. Errors make you look unprofessional.
Turn off your email program’s ping or beep alert and check email at set times during the day. You have a lot of important things to do each day and the more often you drop everything to read the latest email that’s come in, the fewer of them you’ll get done.
Social Media
Keep your personal and your business social media accounts or profiles separate. If you’re on Facebook, for instance, you should have both a business page and a personal one. LinkedIn is one of the few exceptions to this as it’s currently a network solely for professionals.
Don’t post anything on any of your social media pages that you don’t want to have follow you around the rest of your life. Increasing numbers of businesses and government agencies are data-mining social media—including some that might have become future employers or customers of yours if only you hadn’t made that stupid post back then.
The same applies to your comments on other people’s posts and websites. Choose which opinions you “like” or share carefully, keeping in mind that some of your opinions may alienate potential clients.
Keep your posts on your business profiles professional. If in doubt, don’t post.
Choose one or two platforms, post regularly, and be responsive. Answer people’s questions and respond to their comments, even if it’s just with a “like.”
There’s no question that being positive and optimistic both cushions the blows of adversity and makes it easier to notice and take advantage of opportunities when they come your way. But staying positive is difficult if you’re forced to deal with negative people, a category that unfortunately includes a large percentage of the workplace population.
Here’s what you can do to ensure that the complainers don’t bring you down with them:
1. Avoid them when possible.
This probably goes without saying, but the absolute best way to deal with negative people is to cut them out of your life.At work, don’t hang out with them at the water cooler or sit next to them at lunch. Uninvite them to any meeting at which their presence is not absolutely required.
If they’re customers who you can’t avoid, stay cordial and friendly but don’t get sucked into a deeper relationship. If you’re online, don’t read the comments sections on political blogs or anywhere else where people vent anonymously. That’s like drinking from a sewer.
2. Don’t go Pollyanna on them.
When you must deal with negative people, the worst thing you can do is get all bright-eyed and bushy-tailed. Your display of positivity won’t cheer them up. Quite the contrary. They’ll see it as a challenge and amp up their negativity to compensate.
Being optimistic around a pessimist is like painting a target on your forehead–a target at which the pessimist will aim his or her hatred and unhappiness. Don’t believe me? Google “I hate optimists” and read some of the spew. Negative people are invested in their negativity. You’re not going to jolly them out of it.
3. Agree, then weaken by rephrasing.
Negative people express themselves using negative, emotionally charged words (such as hate, sucks, crap, effing, and so forth). Because such words are loaded, they make the negative person more miserable and negative. It’s a classic feedback loop.The only way to help negative people out of that loop is to edge them out of it by putting yourself on their side.
To do this, you immediately agree with every negative statement that they make. Then, as part of that agreement, you rephrase what they said using words that are less loaded.
Examples:
Debbie: “I absolutely hate it with a passion when…”
You: “Yes, it’s irritating when that happens…”
Debbie: “This totally sucks.”
You: “So true. There are some real challenges here.”
When you do this, you’ll notice that the negative person will actually change her physiology. Her body straightens, her glowering frown lightens up.Do this long enough and you can actually erode a person’s negativity to the point where he can take off the crap-colored glasses. It can take a long time, though.
4. Clear your head afterward.
Dealing with negative people taxes and drains your energy. Therefore, whenever you’re forced to deal with such folk, take time afterward to recharge your emotional batteries.
The best thing to do after dealing with a downer is to call or visit a kindred spirit who shares your basically positive attitude.If that’s not possible, go for a walk, listen to some music, read something inspirational. Do something–anything–that creates a mental break.
Failing to do this is like failing to wash yourself or change your clothes after wading through mud. If you’re not careful, negativity can and will stick to you. In fact, that’s the reason that negative people are negative. It’s a learned behavior. After all, most children are natural optimists.
Kids who learn and think differently aren’t the only ones who can feel lonely or “apart” from other kids. Most people feel that way at some point.
But research shows that kids who learn and think differently are more likely than their peers to struggle with loneliness. And they often have a harder time dealing with those feelings when they have them. Learn more about loneliness and kids who learn and think differently.
Why kids who are different might feel lonely
Kids who learn and think differently might feel lonely for many reasons. For starters, they’re more likely to be bullied or left out. They can have a hard time making friends or connecting with people. And struggling in school and socially can make kids feel bad about themselves.
They may feel like nobody understands them or their challenges. And they might even withdraw. Kids with certain challenges are most likely to feel left out and isolated. These challenges include trouble with:
The difference between being lonely and being alone
Some people like spending time alone. That goes for kids and adults. As long as they have the ability to make friends and connect with other people when they want to, being alone is a preference, not a problem.
Being unhappy when alone doesn’t necessarily mean someone is lonely, though. Having a hard time entertaining yourself and feeling bored aren’t the same thing as feeling socially isolated.
Also, loneliness isn’t always about being alone. Some kids feel isolated even when they’re with others. They feel like nobody around them shares or understands their challenges. There’s nobody to connect with.
How loneliness can impact kids
When kids go through the occasional lonely spell, it usually doesn’t have a lasting impact. Feeling lonely all the time is different, though. It can affect kids in lots of ways. And it can lead to other difficulties.
Kids who feel lonely might be:
More likely to have low self-esteem. They might feel like others are rejecting them. Kids might lose confidence in themselves and eventually believe they have nothing valuable to offer.
Less likely to take positive risks. Trying new things can build confidence and lead to new interests and skills. But kids who are already feeling rejected and vulnerable may not want to take this leap. They may be afraid to call attention to themselves and risk failing.
More likely to be sad, disconnected, and worried. Kids deal with loneliness in different ways. They may keep their sadness inside and pull away from others. Or they may become angry and act out. The combination of negative emotions and isolation can lead to depression and anxiety.
More likely to engage in risky behaviors. Teens may drink, smoke or vape, use drugs, vandalize property, or do other risky things if they think it will help them feel accepted.
There are many ways to help your child handle feelings of loneliness. First, don’t force your child to become more social or to make lots of friends. Instead, work on building self-esteem. Help your child find interests that lead to meeting new kids who like similar things.
Keep an eye on signs of depression, too. Don’t hesitate to reach out to your health care provider if you have concerns. And if your child has ADHD, read about the connection between ADHD and depression.
If your child is struggling to make friends, there are ways to help. First, try to figure out why. Some kids need help with social skills. This is common for kids who are immature or have ADHD, autism or non-verbal learning disorder. Other kids are anxious. They may feel overwhelmed in new social situations or big groups.
Kids who are depressed often want to stay in their rooms. They may interpret things negatively and doubt others want to see them. Finally, some kids may have a hard time fitting in because they have different interests.
If you think your child is lonely, ask them. Start by describing a time when you have felt lonely. If they don’t want to talk, try again in a few days. Don’t push them.
If your child says they are lonely, try to be a good listener. Show that you’re listening by reflecting back what they’re saying: “It sounds like you’re having a hard time.” You can also say supportive things like: “That sounds tough. Would you tell me more about that?”
Once you know more, you can try to help. For kids who need practice with social skills, you can break things down into small steps. Then you can role play them with your child. For kids who have a hard time putting themselves out there, acknowledge how they feel. Then remind them that they’ll probably have a good time once they’ve made the effort. Give them lots of support and praise for doing something tough.
Some kids tend to misunderstand interactions. You can give a reality check: “What makes you think he’s mad? Are there other explanations?” For kids who interpret things negatively a lot, pointing it out each time can help break the pattern.
Finally, help kids find a group or activity that is interesting to them. Many kids find success online, where there are lots of virtual groups for kids with specific interests. Getting excited about something will help them feel more confident, too.
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To some, LinkedIn’s try-hard nature has become a perfect example of the worst of corporate culture. But the site’s influencers say the joke’s on everyone else, as they pull in big money with ease. “The only opinion that matters is the market,” one said.
When Justin Welsh set out to start a consulting business a few years back, he knew he would need to get potential clients’ attention. A former software executive, he knew he had the bona fides to help early-stage tech companies succeed; what he wasn’t sure of was how to let potential clients know that.
He’d been on Twitter for years, but it seemed too negative a place for what he was trying to do. By comparison, LinkedIn seemed safer, more positive. To boot, Welsh’s potential clients spent significant amounts of time on the site, and there weren’t as many people creating content. That meant less competition.
So in late 2018, he started to publish “practical and tactical” tips for growing startup businesses each morning on the platform, with a dash of an emotional element here and there. (Representative post: “People vastly underestimate the value of their knowledge. Publish yours and let the market pleasantly surprise you.” One thousand and seven hundred likes.)
By this year, he’d gained more than 300,000 followers. Along the way, he noticed a shift in the inquiries he received. No longer were people mostly asking for software advice. “They were asking me about how I was using LinkedIn,” he said. Today, Welsh is a full-blown LinkedIn influencer who teaches other people to use the platform as well as he does, and his one-man LinkedIn-focused business now brings in nearly $2 million annually, he said.
After years of being known as a place to share resumes and search for jobs, LinkedIn has quietly transformed into a center for a different sort of influencer—the ROI-obsessed go-getter. It is, in many ways, ground zero for hustle culture and what some have deemed “toxic positivity,” an aspirational place for people more concerned with self-care and cash flow than wisecracks and unattainable beauty.
“They feel like, ‘Hey that can be me,’” said LinkedIn influencer Tobi Oluwole, who has built a successful career coaching business through his LinkedIn following. Elsewhere, the site has become the butt of the joke and a focus of increased scorn—the perfect example of a try-hard corporate culture where people mistake banal, rote platitudes for authenticity, a puffy Patagonia vest in website form.
In August, when the CEO of a LinkedIn-focused marketing company was roundly mocked and chastised after he published a tearful video announcing layoffs, the derision was fueled as much as anything by how perfectly it represented what LinkedIn has become to bewildered outsiders.
The hatred of such self-absorbed posts on LinkedIn has become so intense that a subreddit dedicated to mocking the platform’s most “insufferable,” “cringeworthy” posts—like business leaders advocating for taking less vacation to prove your worth or rebranding lunch as “JUST EAT PowerHour”—has garnered 175,000 followers. But the disgust doesn’t reckon with why so many people have become unironically attracted to the platform.
Justin Welsh has built a seven-figure business based around teaching people to use LinkedIn like he does. “People are still kind of puzzled by it,” said the D.C.-based author and advisor Jeffrey Selingo, who has more than 600,000 followers on LinkedIn. The joke is perhaps on everyone else, as many of the same people getting ripped apart on Reddit have figured out a relatively easy way to earn hundreds of thousands of dollars by spouting inspirational, if often conventional, wisdom.
The influencers themselves say the platform has become a profit machine, the sort of business-friendly space where a strong presence can directly lead to speaking gigs, brand deals, sales leads, career coaching opportunities, and more—and without the second-by-second scrutiny that comes with Instagram.
“Opportunities just come flooding through your doors,” said Chantel Soumis, a LinkedIn influencer who said she received $1 million in revenue-generating opportunities in three months after she publicly launched her creative side business on LinkedIn. The shift is partially the result of a conscious, years-long push by LinkedIn to increase its standing as a social platform relative to the competition.
LinkedIn has developed new creator-focused tools and programs and hired full-time employees called creator managers who actively help influencers build their audiences. In recent years, the alterations have started to reap dividends as people started to view the platform as the closest thing the internet had to an online watercooler.
“It’s changed people’s behavior,” said Sujan Patel, who has nearly 40,000 followers and is the co-founder of the software company Mailshake. Compared to the rest of the internet, LinkedIn has developed into a positive, almost benign place, slightly less prone to political infighting, which made it the perfect place to do business. The reason for the “toxic positivity,” as Oluwole put it, is that the stakes feel higher with a name, photo, and employer attached to each individual post.
(“People don’t want their jobs and careers threatened,” said Oluwole, who compared the platform to navigating workplace politics. “You’re smiling even though you don’t really care.” Soumis agreed: “There’s money on the line.”) Inoffensive hashtag campaigns like #LetsGetHonest gained traction on the platform as the most positive members of the business world started to see the platform as a respite from the rest of the increasingly ugly internet—a place where being polite still mattered and self-improvement was valued….Read more….
While most school children are educated in academic subjects such as math and English, there are other important life lessons that don’t always make it into the curriculum. Having empathy is a learned skill that comes with listening and understanding others. That’s why Danish schools decided to introduce mandatory empathy classes in 1993, as a way to teach children aged 6-16 how to be kind.
For one hour each week, during “Klassens tid,” students are invited to talk about problems they have been experiencing. During this time, the entire class works together to find a solution. This teaches children to respect the feelings of others without judgement.
The empathy classes are believed to help them strengthen their relationships, sympathize with others’ problems, and even prevent bullying. They also allow each child to be heard, feel valued, and become part of a community.
Naturally, kids grow up to become confident, emotionally intelligent adults and are more likely to raise happier kids themselves. It should therefore come as no surprise that Denmark is consistently ranked highly as one of the happiest places to live. According to the World Happiness Report—released annually since 2012—Denmark is the second-happiest country, after Finland.
The country took first place in 2016 and has remained in the top three ever since. In fact, Denmark was also number one in the very first World Happiness Report in 2012. Clearly, they’re doing something right.
Denmark has consistently been at the top of the UN’s World Happiness Report. In the latest report, Denmark stood in second place followed by Finland. Denmark has been at the top in 2012, 2013, and 2016. Perhaps the empathy classes have a lot to contribute in this aspect.
The Danish Way stated, “Empathy helps build relationships, prevent bullying and succeed at work. It promotes the growth of leaders, entrepreneurs, and managers. ‘Empathic teenagers’ tend to be more successful because they are more oriented towards the goals compared to their more narcissistic peers.” Empathy is also taught through teamwork where those excelling and those lacking are made to work together.
This not only helps with understanding the positive qualities of each other but also lift each other up to complete a task without being pulled down by competition with each other. Another popular program is called the CAT-kit. In this program, the aim is to improve emotional awareness and empathy by focusing on how to articulate experiences, thoughts, feelings, and senses, reported The Atlantic.
There are picture cards of faces, measuring sticks to gauge the intensity of emotions, and pictures of the body, included in the CAT-kit so kids can understand the emotions being exhibited while also learning to conceptualize their own and others’ feelings. In the classroom setting, along with the facilitator, the children are taught not to be judgemental but acknowledge and respect these sentiments.
“A child who is naturally talented in mathematics, without learning to collaborate with their peers, will not go much further. They will need help in other subjects. It is a great lesson to teach children from an early age since no one can go through life alone,” says Jessica Alexander, author of the book The Danish Way of Parenting: What the Happiest People in the World Know About Raising Confident, Capable Kids.
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Act business-like at all times. You wouldn’t walk into a client’s house, throw yourself onto their sofa, and put your feet up on their coffee table, would you? Well, there are lots of other behaviors that you need to avoid too: smoking, eating and drinking, hugging anyone, or anything else that is not directly related to the job. If someone offers you a cup of coffee or a glass of water, that’s OK, but don’t solicit the offer.
Say thank you. Always thank a client for her time at the end of a meeting, and if they do business with you, say thank you for that, too. A handwritten note is a great way to do this. And don’t forget to ask for a referral or testimonial if things went well.
Turn off your phone in social venues where ringing would disturb others, such as performances, movies, concert recitals, etc. In other situations, such as restaurants, setting your phone to vibrate is a good option. It does not make you look professional to be sitting in a restaurant with others and talking incessantly on your phone; it makes you look obnoxious.
Use business-like salutations and complimentary closes. Start a professional email with the person’s name alone or with “Hello.” “All the best,” “Cheers,” and “Sincerely” all are good choices for closes.
The same applies to your comments on other people’s posts and websites. Choose which opinions you “like” or share carefully, keeping in mind that some of your opinions may alienate potential clients.
