The Office... its a Fun(ny) Place to Work

The Office... its a Fun(ny) Place to Work Now unless your office is based in North Korea, we all expect to have a little bit of a laugh within our workplace otherwise what dull place it would be. Especially as you spend a third of your day there. So youll be pleased to know that humour in the workplace is a good thing and if youre the one telling the jokes then it could seriously boost your rep as a leader. Well thats according to Professor Maurice Schweitzer as reported recently in the BBC. He  recently co-authored a study entitled Risky Business: When Humour Increases and Decreases Status. He says: In the workplace context, people look up to those who are confident. Being funny is taking a risk, and being risky shows confidence. Being funny requires us to take into consideration other peoples points of view, and what they may find funny. And being funny means you understand effective timing, and how to straddle a fine line between what is humorous and whats offensive. Prof Schweitzer adds that if a person tells inappropriate jokes, be they insulting or unfunny, they are still regarded as more confident, but perhaps unsurprisingly also incompetent. The study says: Telling inappropriate jokes signals low competence, and the combined effect of high confidence and low competence harms status. So how far would you go when it comes to humour and cracking jokes to your candidates or employees? Do you think youre funny? We asked some of our recruiters to tell us their best work-related joke. Well let you decide if theyre funny.or not. When my boss asked me who is the stupid one, me or him? I told him everyone knows he doesnt hire stupid people. A job applicant was asked: what would you consider to be your main strengths and weaknesses?  He replied: Well my main weakness would definitely be my issues with reality. Sometimes I have difficulty telling whats real and whats not. Interviewer: Okay. And what are your strengths? Interviewee: Im Batman. There are only 10 types of people. Those who know binary and those who dont. Me: Sorry Im late everyone, my car wouldnt start. Colleague: Sorry to hear that, what was the problem? Me: There was nobody in it to turn the key. Team work is important; it helps to put the blame on someone else. Why did the can crusher quit his job? Because it was soda pressing. I went for a job interview and the manager said, “We’re looking for someone who is responsible.” “Well I’m your man,” I replied. “In my last job, whenever anything went wrong they said I was responsible.” There is a new trend in our office; everyone is putting names on their food. I saw it today, while I was eating a sandwich named Kevin. What’s your biggest weakness?” “Honesty” “I don’t think that’s a weakness” “I don’t give a monkeys what you think” Boss: go to hell. Me: so stay? or leave? I’m confused. In a 2006 study published in The Journal of Behavioral and Applied Management, researchers found that for healthcare workers, emotional exhaustion was significantly lower among those who experienced greater levels of fun at work. Barbara Plester, senior lecturer at the University of Auckland Business, says it is simply vital for jokes to not cause offence. The author of The Complexity of Workplace Humour: Laughter, Jokers and the Dark Side of Humour, also cautions about high-ranking managers bringing comedy to the office. While some managers do retain and use their sense of humour, the potential for causing distress is even greater when you add a power differential. Therefore, a manager joking with a subordinate risks not only offending the worker if the humour is taken poorly, but may come in for other accusations, such as sexual harassment, if the humour backfires. A special thanks to Jon Gregory, Lysha Holmes, Liz Sebag-Montefiore, Farhan Raja, Erin Wilson  for their funny contributions.

My name is not really Penelope

My name is not really Penelope In this age of transparency and authenticity it seems absurd to not tell you my real name. My real name is not Penelope Trunk. Well, in fact, it is Penelope Trunk. Sort of. At any rate, my name is definitely a lesson in personal branding. My name started out Adrienne Roston. Its fun to write that because if you Google that name, you will find only professional beach volleyball statistics. But running this post means that finally all my unrequited high school crushes, who surely are desperate to contact me, can find my email via Google. So, anyway, I was Adrienne Roston, and then I started reading Adrienne Richs poetry in college. This lead me to believe that the key to undermining the patriarchy was through words, and I didnt want my last name to be a definition of the men I was associated with. So I went to court to change my name to Adrienne Greenheart. As a foreshadow of my complicated relationship with feminism, I was careful to pick a last name that my current boyfriend would take as well, should we get married (we didnt). So in fact I have a name he picked. (My first choice was Breedlove. Thank god he voted that down.) It was in the heart of the start of the Internet: GeoCities, EarthLink, CompuServe. So I spelled my name GreenHeart. I policed my family assiduously they could barely remember to stop using Roston, let alone add a capital H in the middle of GreenHeart. In court, the judge asked me why I was changing my name (they have to look out for felons, you know?) I said, Im changing my name because I dont want to be associated with patriarchal naming conventions. She said, Thats a great reason, and banged her gavel. Changing my name was amazingly easy. I had just quit playing volleyball and I moved to Boston for graduate school. I got there and introduced myself as Adrienne GreenHeart. Done. I couldnt believe how well it worked. Of course, there is a thousand-year history of women doing this changing their last name overnight. So the world is set up for it, in a way. When I got my first major job, at a software company, I dropped the capital in the middle and kept my name origins to myself. Then, lo and behold, my masters thesis won a big award in the software industry. I found out because my boss told me. He shook my hand. He said hes honored to have me on staff. Then he called me into his office where and said, Did you write this? he pointed to the screen where my thesis was unfolding. He said he thought it was pornography. I didnt say to him, you are an ignoramus and Philip Roth won a National Book Award and he wrote about a boy who masturbates with meat. I did not say that because my boss had been very supportive of my career. And this time was no different. He said, You will go very far in corporate America, but not with your name tied to this. If you had your name on this when our board investigated you we probably wouldnt have hired you. So I made up a new name and slapped it on my masters thesis. I sent news of my award to my mom. I told her to go read my stories online. And she said, Oh my god, did you change your name again? Then, I got my first columnist job from Time Warner. I approached the contract like any other business contract, and I started negotiating. I said, Do I really need a new pen name? I already have a pen name. My editor said, Time, Inc. does not negotiate with a no-name like you. So I didnt say anything when the magazine assigned me the name Penelope Trunk. The day my column launched, I had my mom go to the magazine site, and she couldnt find my column, because of course, she did not know my name. For a long time, I wrote the column in cognito. I actually had no idea how widely read my column was until I wrote about my companys office party at the beach. I was too specific about details, and I blew my cover. I nearly got fired, but instead agreed to delete from the online archive a small group of columns including the one about diagnosing my CEO with manic depression. Soon after that, I became a full-time writer, I thought of writing under Adrienne Greenheart, but I already had too much invested in Penelope Trunk. Thats who people had been reading for three years. It was too late to change. So I posted my photo by my column and I became the name officially. I used to change my email settings when I had to send something from Penelope. But I ended up having so much email for Penelope that I created two, separate email addresses. One for Penelope and one for Adrienne. I was always forgetting which email client I was in, and I sent email with the wrong name on it all the time. And surely you know that people delete email from names theyve never heard of. By this point, I also had a lot of people calling me on the phone and hanging up when they heard Adrienne Greenheart on my voicemail. So I took my name off my voicemail. Before I started writing for the Boston Globe, I seldom interviewed people. I usually just wrote about me and my friends. But the Globe demanded interviews. It took very little time before I was spending more of my day talking on the phone as Penelope than as Adrienne. Then I started becoming friends with people I interviewed. And I could never decide when to tell people that my real name is Adrienne. If I told people too late in the friendship they would get insulted. So I started telling people earlier, and then I couldnt remember who knew what name. And then I found myself signing my Penelope emails as Adrienne. Things were getting complicated. So I took a drastic step and got rid of my Adrienne email. One email account would be much easier. And by this time, almost everyone who knew me as Adrienne Greenheart also knew that I wrote as Penelope. So I thought it might work. Things just got more and more complicated, and then I moved to Madison. And I remembered, on the plane ride to Madison, how easy it was to change my name in grad school. You just tell people a different name. So when I signed up for my sons preschool, I told them my name was Penelope Trunk. My husband had a fit. He told me I was starting our new life in Madison as an insane person and I cannot change my name now. But I explained to him that it would be insane not to change my name now. I am way better known as Penelope than Adrienne. And my career is so closely tied with the brand Penelope Trunk, that I actually became the brand. So calling myself Penelope Trunk instead of Adrienne Greenheart is actually a way to match my personal life with my professional life and to make things more sane. At first it was a little weird. For example, we were driving in the car one day and my son said, Mom, whos Penelope Trunk? But now it feels good to be Penelope Trunk. No more having to figure out what name to give where. No more pretending to be someone, sometimes. No more long explanations and short memories of who calls me what. Now, even my husband calls me Penelope. He has to. Because if he called me Adrienne in Madison, no one would know who hes talking about. So, my real name really is Penelope. Now. And you know what? Its not that big a deal, since, after all, it is the fourth time Ive changed my name.

Personal Branding Interview Jessica Kleiman Meryl Weinsaft Cooper - Personal Branding Blog - Stand Out In Your Career

Personal Branding Interview Jessica Kleiman Meryl Weinsaft Cooper - Personal Branding Blog - Stand Out In Your Career Today, I spoke to both Jessica Kleiman and Meryl Weinsaft Cooper, who have a combined 30-plus years experience in the public relations industry, having worked both in-house and on the agency side. They are the co-authors of Be Your Own Best Publicist, which just came out today. In this interview, they discuss how to get publicity for your personal brand, why not all publicity is good for your brand, and more. Its becoming increasingly competitive to break through the noise in the media â€" and the workplace. Any tips on how to stand out? In public relations, you constantly must find ways to break through the clutter and get noticed. So we often have to use strategy and creativity to get our clients the right kind of attention. In Be Your Own Best Publicist, our goal is to help people see themselves as a brand so they can get noticed in the workplace. In order to do that, first ask yourself: What is unique about me? What makes me particularly good at what I do? Do I have a signature style? If not, should I and what would it be? Once you have that down, you can make a planâ€"set goals and work backwards to figure out how to achieve them. Do you want to land a new job? Get a promotion or recognition in your current position? Attract more clients for your own business? Once you’re clear on what you want to accomplish, push yourself to use creativity and resourcefulness to get there. What made you want to write Be Your Own Best Publicist, besides the fact that you are a publicist? We’ve known each other a long time and a couple of years ago we talked about writing a career guide of sorts for Gen Y, which ultimately morphed into Be Your Own Best Publicist, which caters a broader audience. The book is designed to help people navigate the do’s and don’ts of the work world and learn how to promote themselves in the best way possible in order to achieve their career goals. Since between us we have 30-plus years of PR experience, we thought that the skills and techniques that we use in our jobs would easily apply to people who want to get noticed for their own talents and accomplishments. Is all publicity good publicity? Why or why not?There’s an old saying, “As long as you spell my name right.” But we don’t actually ascribe to the “all press is good press” philosophy because some publicity can be damaging to your brand and have a long-term impactâ€"particularly in the Internet ageâ€"where things live forever online. The same goes for your personal brand. More and more HR professionals are Googling potential hires before extending an offer (or even an interview opportunity). If you have photos of yourself drinking beer out of a funnel on your Facebook page, have written inappropriate blog posts or have Tweeted “I hate my job,” keep in mind that current and potential employers could see itâ€"and that’s not good. Treat your online presence as part of your brand and reputation. How important is networking to a job search or building a personal brand? We like to say that your network is your net worth. Research has shown that networking accounts for up to 80 percent of all jobs landed at the executive level. All things being equal, people are simply more likely to hire someone they know or who has been recommended. Keep an open mind, expand your circle as wide as you possibly can, and be sure to maximize all opportunities. Once you have those contacts, it’s important to stay in touch on a regular basis, not just when you need something. Whether it’s through professional events, connecting with friends of friends, informational interviews or social media, connecting withâ€"and helpingâ€"others who might help you are critical steps for career development and building a personal brand. What should you do if someone is criticizing you at work? What about if they are saying positive things about you? That depends. If someone, like a boss or client, is criticizing you, try not to take it personally and instead view it as constructive feedback. Did you mess up? Could you do something better next time? If you can show that you listened, learned from the criticism and were able to focus on improving in those areas, bring that up in your next performance review. An employee who demonstrates growth and the ability to learn from mistakes is a valuable one. However, if you really believe the criticism is unwarranted, have a private conversation with the person who gave it (even if he did so in front of others, which is never advisable) and explain that you don’t agree with their feedback and calmly explain why. If you’re getting positive feedback, that’s a good thing. In our book, we advise hanging on to any notes or emails of praise so you can read them again when you’re feeling downâ€"and be sure to reference them when negotiating for a raise or promotion. Taking it one step further, ask the people saying nice stuff about you to recommend you on LinkedIn or, if you have your own business, to write a testimonial that you can use on your website to attract more clients. - Jessica Kleiman is the co-author of Be Your Own Best Publicist and is currently VP-public relations for Hearst Magazines, one of the world’s largest publishers of monthly magazines. She has guest lectured about publicity at NYU and the Radcliffe Publishing Course at Columbia University and has written for various newspapers, Web sites and magazines. Meryl Weinsaft Cooper is the co-author of Be Your Own Best Publicist. She joined DeVries Public Relations as managing director of the Home Lifestyle division in Fall 2010. Previously, as SVP-Partner at L+S, she led programs for a variety of hospitality, spirits and consumer clients including Veuve Clicquot, Viceroy Hotels, Vikram Chatwal Hotels, BR Guest Restaurants, Tourism New South Wales, Magnolia Bakery and Belvedere Vodka. A graduate of Ithaca College’s Park School of Communications, her PR experience includes stints in art, music and entertainment, including time at the Screen Actors Guild’s New York office.

On the Job by Anita Bruzzese What Does Your Facebook Photo Say About You

On the Job by Anita Bruzzese What Does Your Facebook Photo Say About You I'm always amazed by the truly stupid photos people post of themselves online. The reason I'm surprised is that we're so quick to judge a celebrity with a hair out of place, that sometimes we fail to consider the image we're projecting to the world. This latest story I did for Gannett/USAToday may have your reconsidering.... Its often said that people make a judgment about you within seconds of meeting you, and now new research shows the same may be true even when theyre viewing your photo onFacebook. When a persons Facebook photo includes positive comments or social cues such as what the person does those opinions strongly affect the level of perceived attractiveness of that person, according to aUniversity of Missouri study. Others comments can make the person seem more appealing physically, socially and professionally, saysSeoyeon Hong, a doctoral student who did the research withKevin Wise, an associate professor at the university. While the researchers didnt pursue how this could affect an employers opinion of a job applicant, hiring managers also might take their cues from what other people say about you online. If you present yourself one way, that information is useful, Wise says. But its not as credible as what other parties say about you. If you present yourself as a nice, professional, responsible person to an employer, but those online are posting that youre a total schmuck, that could be a red flag for employers because others comments often garner more attention, he says. In theUniversity of Missouri study, Facebook profile photos were shown to about 100 college students. College students thought the people in photos with comments and additional information, such as an athlete playing sports, were more physically and socially attractive. Those with plain headshots and no other information on Facebook were not seen as attractive, Hong found. Visual images are becoming more powerful online. Not only does Facebook reveal our photos to the world, but sites like Instagram and Pinterest are becoming much more popular as a way to reveal our interests or personalities. AnROI Research study found that 44% of respondents are more likely to engage with brandsif those brands post pictures. What this indicates is that no matter what you put on Facebook, Twitter or LinkedIn to enhance your professional image, you must make sure the photos are consistent with your written message and that comments from others are equally positive. Some ways to enhance your image online: Get recommendations.LinkedIn offers a feature tolet others recommend you. While you dont want to have dozens of recommendations that might ring false with employers, its a good idea to have positive comments about your abilities that go along with a flattering LinkedIn profile photo. Watch the sarcasm.You might consider it harmless or fun to have friends say snarky things about you online, but those comments might give an employer pause. Again, its a case of a third party presenting a less-than-flattering image of you that may weigh more heavily with employers. Get positive customer reviews.Just as consumers often pay close attention to customer reviews online about products or companies, it can be a good idea for employers to read positive reviews about you. If you write a blog, it can be beneficial for others to post supportive comments of your efforts or show support by promoting your blog through their social-media channels. Clean house.Remember the last holiday party where you had tinsel on your head and a beer in your hand? Employers might not find that so fitting, so take care to remove such photos and ask friends to do the same if you appear on their Facebook pages. Even if you use privacy settings, your connections might not follow suit. Try to monitor whats posted about you online so you can make sure the right social cues are being broadcast.

The Roots of Personal Branding - Executive Career Brandâ„¢

The Roots of Personal Branding A friend and colleague Galen Tinder, senior consultant and manager for Ricklin-Echikson Associates, wrote an excellent article, The Promise of Personal Branding, in the August Worldwide ERC (Workforce Mobility Association) Mobility Magazine. He describes personal branding as a means by which a person establishes a consciously crafted and public professional presence and status in his or her field and the world at large. Describing the historical context of personal branding, he explains its evolution from the convergence of two trends forty years ago: 1. The shattering of the implicit assumptions of employer-employee loyalty with the massive layoffs in the 1970s. Employees could no longer count on lifelong or even long-term employment with one company. 2. The consequent empowering of employees to take responsibility for their careers and re-examine the purpose of work. The notion emerged that jobs should provide benefits beyond monetary compensation. People also came to  expect fulfillment and meaning from their jobs. As these two trends entrenched themselves in the developed world, we were convulsed by a communication revolution that is still hurtling forward at a torrid pace and transforming the ways in which human beings communicate with and relate to each other. Technology has multiplied the means and the reach of individual self-expression on every imaginable level and in doing so has given us the tools for personal branding with the touch of a computer ‘on’ button. The article covers  the hows and wheres of personal brand development and communication: Defining your brand Branding four critical career documents Social media branding Where to begin and stop with branding in the virtual world Further clarifying, Galens social media personal branding basics are essentials to understand and embrace: 1. Consistency For your brand to thrive, reinforce it by communicating the same  value message across all social media and networking channels. 2. Digital dirt You are being Googled by prospective employers, business partners, customers/clients, and just about anyone who is considering associating with you in some way. Monitor what they are finding when they Google your name, avoid posting anything that will discredit you, and clean up any existing dirt that you can control. 3. Generosity Practice give to get networking. Be helpful and share your expertise to solidify your brand. Generosity does more for self-branding than the blinkered pursuit of self-interest. 4. Authenticity In the long run, tiresome self-promotion doesnt work. Instead of branding yourself as selling, focus on being authentic and your true character and abilities will be crystal clear. The article includes plenty of valuable resources, and concludes with Galens take on the impact of social media on branding and job search: Social media is profoundly democratic. It opens up the world of careers, professions, and job search to anybody who is interested and, pulling us into a maelstrom of information and conversation in which we are both learners and teachers. We are not judged by the number of degrees after our name, the number of books we have published, but by the quality of our contributions and actions. Related posts: 10 Steps to an Authentic, Magnetic Personal Brand What Personal Branding is NOT Executive Branding: Personal vs Career Branding The True Measure of Your Executive Brand 00 0

Believe In Yourself Anything Is Possible - Pathfinder Careers

Believe In Yourself Anything Is Possible - Pathfinder Careers Believe In Yourself: Anything Is Possible I usually don’t get too personal in this blog but today, I want to share something amazing that happened to me recently that will hopefully be an inspiration to someone else who might be struggling or going through a rough time. But first, let’s zip back to about 25 years ago… to when I was a teenager. (Gulp, has it really been that long? Ye gods…) When I was in high school, I was one of those kids that got picked on a lot.   My parents had strange ideas about wanting us kids to wear homemade clothes (during the era of Gloria VanderBilt jeans) and tied wearing those items to pushing us into some form of individuality… which was the wrong time for those intentions, since most teenagers would rather conform than stand out. Combined with the fact that our family moved from Baton Rouge, Louisiana to a small farming town in Wisconsin where most of the kids had all grown up with each other, my thick Southern accent and deeply tanned skin stuck out as an immediate outsider.   It didn’t help that my home life was pretty rough either… I was caught between trying to please my parents wearing the clothes that they had made for me and dodging the inevitable scuffles of the high school pecking order, including getting bullied on a regular basis. It was a lonely time, and as a kid, I often felt hopeless about my future. I didn’t really have any dreams, and had no real idea of what I wanted to do for a career.   That impacted my studies and I didn’t really try… it was a slippery slope and when my mom (a college professor) finally sat me down and said she didn’t think I was ‘college material’, it felt as though I had truly failed her and myself. Weighed down with virtually no sense of belonging or self-worth, my depression was deep and dark. Then, one day at my lowest point ever, I tried to commit suicide by hanging myself in a closet. For some reason, the clothes railing that I had attached the rope to broke, and I came to, surrounded by a mound of clothes and my sister’s disbelieving face in the doorway. To this day, I remain convinced that something happened in the cosmic universe at that moment which said that this wasn’t my time to go yet.  And miraculously afterwards, things slowly started to improve in my life. My senior year, I had several inspirational teachers that coaxed a little bit of the new me out, bit by bit.   They were patient, kind mentors who gave me a seed of hope that started to send out small roots.   My grades improved, and by graduation, I had a fairly decent GPA that enabled me to get into college. Starting over at a college out of state helped me escape the social stigmas that had plagued me in high school, and I started to grow more, and found even more positive challenges from my professors. From there, I launched into a career in television, determined to make a name for myself, and was lucky enough to be on the team that won an Emmy Award for children’s programming.   My career took some twists and turns after that point, but I was always able to roll my skill sets into the next position, which led to my being able to travel the world working as a tourism representative in Portland, Oregon.   I had the incredible honor of being asked to be one of only 5 presenters providing regional updates to the all of the U.S. Commercial Service officials from across the world during a seminar at the U.S. Embassy in Berlin, Germany.   Additionally, I gave my first national convention session in Los Angeles to my industry peers, which was another thrill.     The biggest honor came when two Oregon-based tour itineraries that I developed were recognized by the Clinton Administration White House under the Pathways 2000 Cultural Heritage project.   I was invited to attend a reception i n Washington, D.C. organized by the U.S. Department of Commerce. Since then, I worked at a event planning/tour company and also as a state school to career director with a trade association.   In 2007, I launched my own business providing résumé writing services and traveling around the U.S. as a professional speaker on career management topics.   One of the most recent highlights is when I was asked to be a columnist for two different magazines… one of my very few childhood dreams of being a published writer finally came true. Then, earlier this year, a former high school  classmate nominated me for the 2011 Distinguished Alumni Award, and the selection committee chose me. I was completely and utterly stunned. And very much humbled. I flew back, nervous, to my hometown… I was to ride in the homecoming parade, and attend the homecoming football game where an announcement was made at halftime about my award.      Most of the time, I was on the verge of tears… I am not normally a very emotional person but I found myself getting blurry-eyed on a number of occasions. From a kid who had no hope and no vision for a future to being featured as a part of a parade was just unfathomable.   Needless to say, I have been doing a lot of thinking about the circumstances that led to my being in that parade and winning this award.   A lot of it has to do with always having some kind of hope and always believing in myself, no matter what. And on that day in my hometown, in the stands at the homecoming football game, I sat alone in the crowd, just quietly observing and listening to the people around me. But I found myself looking back and peering intently into the stands.     It wasn’t until later that I realized what it was that I was looking for â€" I was searching for a version of my former self… that lost, lonely kid who was unsure of themselves and their place in the world. I wanted to find her, take her into my arms, and give her a big hug, and tell her that it was going to be okay.   Everything was going to be all right, and that she just needed to believe in herself… anything IS possible. YOU have your future in your hands, and always have the power to make choices. Sometimes you can’t see those choices, but it’s up to you to discover what they are and decide where you want to go with them. But never, ever, stop believing in yourself.   You never know where it will take you!

Maggie on CBS - The Challenges of Working From Home

Maggie on CBS - The Challenges of Working From Home Where do you work best?Wouldnt it be great if your boss asked you this question?! Even if he/she doesnt ask, you can create a thoughtful response and bring up the subject yourself. Be careful though. In my experience, too many people dream of working from home or the beach but few have fully thought through where they work best.Your answer might surprise you.Ive been my own boss for seven years and LOVE working in a clean, comfortable, quiet space with a view. My best work has happened when I overlooked the ocean, a forest or a lake. I even had a great coaching session from the John Hancock Tower in Chicago. I need to be my most inspired in order to inspire others. Even when I havent had a view of nature, Ive painted and framed up landscapes to help me get in the zone.But telecommuting isnt for everyone. Just recently, I spoke with a client whos new dream job involves working from home most days. Initially excited about the added flexibility, my client didnt realize hed miss the soci al interaction around the water cooler. Hes also realized he needs more face time with the boss to build rapport quickly and be included in key meetings. So now were working on the right balance of telecommuting and office work so he can make a proper ask of his boss and create the best working scenario. If you or someone you know could use help figuring out their work situation, go to my Contact page.I recently shared my story on CBS re: the challenges of working from home.Working at home with a two-year old running around does not produce the quiet space I need. Now I do most of my work from virtual office space. All over the US and the world, organizations are popping up that allow you to rent a professional office for a day or even an hour.Dont wait for your boss to set up your ideal work environment.If any of this resonates with you, Id love to hear where you work best by commenting below. Stop and reflect now. Think about the times when you had your best ideas or felt you were most productive. What about the environment inspired that kind of performance in you? Write down your thoughts. Talk with your boss about it, ask for his/her feedback and create your ideal work scenario today.Dont find fault. Find a remedy. ~Henry Ford