Links You Can Use: August 27-31

In this week’s Links You Can Use, experts talk about how general population trends are impacting the workplace. For example, do caregivers of older adults have sufficient legal protection against employee discrimination? How will Generation Y affect the way we work in the year 2020? In other news, is PowerPoint becoming PowerPointless? And a leaked company document reveals that Apple’s sales team may indeed be a group of geniuses—in psychology! Finally, a 30-year study makes a startling discovery about the health of full-time working mothers.

Is there a workplace discrimination problem against employees who are caregivers of older adults? According to a study done by AARP, there are few laws that protect against this type of employee discrimination, despite the fact that care for older adults is increasing in the U.S. (AARP)

In just eight years, Generation Y workers will comprise 40% of the U.S. workforce. How will this affect the way business is done? (Wall Street Journal)

Improve Your Productivity a Million Percent in Just One Step

Okay, maybe not a million percent. But a lot.

In fact, a high-powered executive once paid an efficiency expert $25,000 in thanks for making him aware of this one step.

There are many versions of the story, and they cite a range of sources. But they all seem to agree that the efficiency expert was a man named Ivy Lee, that the executive was Charles Schwab, who was the president of Bethlehem Steel at the time, and that this happened in the 1910s or 1920s.

But the details don’t matter. Here’s what matters:

Friending Colleagues on Facebook: Pros and Cons

With over 900 million people on Facebook, chances are your coworkers are on the popular social networking site.

Is it ever OK to friend a colleague? That’s a tricky question. People you friend on Facebook will be able to see your information, photos, and life updates. If you have anything personal or potentially embarrassing on your profile, it could affect your professional image.

But Facebook has been around since 2004, and many users now know how to control what others see by tweaking their privacy settings. And it could be beneficial for your career to be friendly with the people you work with.

So what to do? Let’s go over the pros and cons.

Links You Can Use: August 20-24

Yet another horrifying shooting has rocked the nation today, this time in a work-related incident. For this week’s Links You Can Use, we are focusing on this urgent and serious subject, providing a link to the news story and information on preventing workplace violence and other types of disturbing behavior:

Today, a workplace shooting has occurred at the Empire State Building in New York City. Read our post about spotting warning signs for troubling workplace behavior. (New York Times)

* The opinions expressed at these linked websites do not reflect the opinions of Harris, Rothenberg International, Inc. (HRI). HRI is not responsible for the accuracy of any of the information reflected on these sites.

5 Reasons Why People Ignore Emails

“Didn’t you read the email?”

We’ve all been there, whether we’re the one who didn’t read the message or the one who got ignored by colleagues. However, if people frequently disregard your emails, the problem may have something to do with the way you are communicating.

Have you committed blunders that make co-workers tune you out? Here are some reasons why others might be giving your emails the cold shoulder:

1. You write too many emails.
Email is an amazingly convenient medium, but it might not be appropriate for all situations. If you needlessly email colleagues, they will soon learn to ignore you. The same can occur if you CC too many people. Those individuals who do not need to be kept in the loop may also start skipping your messages altogether.