The Benefits of Planning

 It’s never too early to begin planning how health benefit plans will be designed and paid for, and what role you, as an employer, will continue to play in the process. 

A culture of entitlement exists when it comes to health benefits, and it is safe to assume that costs will continue to rise. 

Expect increases that average about 15 percent but may go as high as 50 percent. Maintaining the status quo will not do. 

There needs to be a synergy between employer-sponsored plans and an employee-pay-all philosophy. 

The key to finding a palatable medium between cost and benefits is early planning. 

There are several things you, as the employer, can do to facilitate this process. 

Examine your company’s status. 

Look at your bottom line, projected profitability, and a projected health benefits budget. 

Know what you have previously spent and have to spend versus your projected cost. 

This will provide a better target goal for what you can offer your employees. 

Conduct a mid-year assessment. 

Measure your health benefits budget against your usage. 

Capturing your usage mid-year paints a clearer picture of what your cost might be if you stick with an existing plan and/or carrier. 

Partner with your existing carrier. 

Ask it to provide possible solutions as you begin to plan for your next benefits cycle. 

Because you already have a relationship, it will be willing and able to help you design a customized plan. 

Research the marketplace. 

While many things — such as consumer-driven health plans, flexible spending accounts (FSAs), and health savings accounts (HSAs) — can help reduce costs, there is no silver bullet. 

Rates are competitive, so employers should exercise due diligence to come up with a strategy that works. 

Explore a wide variety of offerings. 

There are many plans you can buy into to fit your needs and pocketbook. 

The more choices employees have, the more customized health benefits can be. 

A single employee does not need the same type of coverage as a family. 

A healthy employee may find peace of mind with hospital-only or supplemental coverage. 

Some prefer higher premiums and lower or no co-payments. 

Others would trade a higher co-payment for a lower monthly premium. 

Kids-only plans are available with some carriers. 

Welcome FSAs and HSAs. 

Each has its shortcomings; it can be difficult to estimate how much to set aside for health care. 

And while these spending accounts are gaining in popularity, they are not perfect. 

An upside of the FSA is portability. 

The downside is that unused money cannot rollover. 

The HSA has a rollover, but it is not portable. 

Educate your employees. 

Part of any strategy should continue to be employee education — not only as it relates to the cost of care, but also how it relates to the company’s bottom line. 

As a stakeholder in the company, employees should be well-informed about the impact health care has on the "health" of their company. 

Using health benefits wisely is the best way to ensure an employer can continue to offer them. 

Involve your employees. 

Share information through news articles and materials from your carrier. 

Encourage employees to participate in wellness and prevention services, including annual physicals, health risk assessments, plan of treatment compliance, and medical management programs. Active involvement will positively impact your cost. 

Survey your population. 

Do you know how much your employees are willing to share in the cost of having health benefits? 

There is a school of thought that as employees increasingly share in the cost of health insurance, health care costs will begin to stabilize. 

Increasing cost-sharing can be a painful yet necessary task in responding to skyrocketing health care costs. 

While affordability is a key element in providing health benefits, the use and employee management of those benefits are vital. 

Developing and implementing a health benefits contribution strategy that can work for you takes time. 

Today is as good a day as any to start. 

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How vulnerable Are You To Stress?

 In modern society, most of us can't avoid stress. 

But we can learn to behave in ways that lessen its effects. 

Researchers have identified a number of factors that affect one's vulnerability to stress - among them are eating and sleeping habits, caffeine and alcohol intake, and how we express our emotions. 

You can make yourself less vulnerable by reviewing the items on which you scored three or higher and trying to modify them. 

Notice that nearly all of them describe situations and behaviors over which you have a great deal of control. 

Concentrate first on those that are easiest to change - for example, eating a hot, balanced meal daily and having fun at least once a week - before tackling those that seem difficult.

Bills are piling up, the front lawn is a jungle, and you can't remember what your desk looks like under those stacks of paper. 

If only you had more time. 

We've all said it at one time or another. 

Lack of time can be a major source of stress. 

As demands of daily living grow, more and more of us feel there just aren't enough hours in a day to do everything that needs to get done. 

Teaching people how to manage their time is now an American enterprise. 

There are time-management books, tapes, workshops, and seminars to make us more efficient. 

Day planners, organizers, and calendars help us remember and organize things. 

We even have personal coaches to help us turn chaotic lives into more orderly ones. 

Time Is On Your Side 

Learning to better manage your time can make you feel more in control of your life. 

That can reduce stress. 

If you can get a handle on how you spend your time, you'll be able to work smarter and function better at home and away. 

You'll relax more, be less stressed, find your goals are within easier reach and have more time for yourself. 

You'll also be proud of how organized you've become! 

Sound impossible? 
It's not! 

Here are some ways to become a wise time manager wherever you are: 

Get Organized. 

You can waste a lot of time looking for things you've misplaced, trying to make plans or decisions at the last minute, or putting things off for later. 

Clean up your desk and office by making places to store things — file cabinets, notice boards, in- and out-boxes "to read" and "bill-paying" trays — even a shredder! 

Make files, update your Rolodex, and organize your pantry and drawers so you can find things more easily.

What's that you say? 

These things take time and you already don't have enough time? 

Putting in some extra time to get organized will save you a lot of time in the long run. 

And don't try to do all your organizing in one day. 

Tackle just one drawer or closet each weekend. 

Sort through a pile every other day until you get through all of them. 

Keep a day planner or calendar handy and use it. 

Post all your important telephone numbers and email addresses in an easy-to-see place so you don't have to keep looking them up. 

Make a schedule for bill-paying day, laundry day, grocery shopping day, and library day. 

Make "to do" lists and check off tasks once they're done. 

This will show progress and help you feel like you're getting things done when you don't think you are. 

Set Priorities. 

List the things you must get done in a day. 

Be realistic. 

Writing down how much time you expect each activity to take, helps. 

The most important things go at the top of your list. 

Focus on getting those done during your high-energy time of day. 

Bump the less important tasks to the next day or week if you can't get to them. 

And don't beat yourself up if you don't. 

Remind yourself that there are only so many hours in a day and you're doing the best you can. 

Nobody's perfect! 

Stay Focused. 

If you're working on a project, close your office door, ignore the phone and email messages, tell family members or coworkers you're unavailable - try to get rid of all the distractions that prevent you from finishing your task. 

Distractions can cause stress. 

And the stress gets worse because you didn't finish the job you set out to do even though you made the time. 

Schedule a half-hour at the start and middle of the day to review and respond to emails and phone calls. 

Allow another 30 minutes at end of the day to wrap up for the day and get organized for the next one. 

Multitask Wisely. Why not kill two birds with one stone when you can? 

For instance, write Christmas cards or update your Rolodex while you're watching television. 

Don't get carried away with multitasking, though. 

That may lead to more stress and even be dangerous. 

Shaving, sending a fax, or sitting in on an important conference call while you're driving is downright dangerous! 

Get Help. Decide what you realistically can do in the time you have and get help doing the rest. 

Lighten your load by asking someone to run an errand while you're cleaning the house for company. 

That lets you receive your guests more graciously when they arrive. Getting a coworker to pitch in on a big project shows you can delegate work and get things done. 

With a little practice, you can become quite good at managing your personal and professional time. 

Not only will you become more efficient, but you'll also have less stress. 

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Attitude of Gratitude

 An attitude of gratitude? People often think it will come from having some great luck or fortune. 

Of course, it could feel great to win the lottery, and great friends, money, houses, travel - these are all good things, but not enough by themselves. 

The right frame of mind is necessary to fully enjoy life. You need an attitude of gratitude.

Gratitude 101

Your life is better when you feel blessed when you can look around and say "Thank you, God," or "Thank you universe."

 Whether or not you are religious, when you see life as a wonderful gift, your experience is a richer one. 

Imagine going through life like you're a child, and every morning is Christmas. 

Of course, it is easy to think that gratitude comes from having what we want. 

We might imagine ourselves giving thanks if we had money, a loving family, and maybe a house on the beach. 

But we know there are ungrateful, unhappy people with these things. 

We also know that there are poor people full of gratitude for what little they have, so where does this feeling come from?

Creating Gratitude

An attitude of gratitude arises from how you look at things. 

It is the natural feeling that comes when you recognize the real value of the people and things in your life. 

Focus on the good and you cannot help but have a better attitude and experience of life. Gratitude, then, is something you can encourage, something you can learn.

The first step is to stop and smell the roses. How can you be thankful for something you don't notice or enjoy? 

By the way, roses really do smell great.

The second step is to make this appreciative approach to roses and life a habit. 

You don't need to ignore the ugliness in the world. 

Just consciously choose to see the good and beautiful things, until doing so becomes automatic.

One way to encourage this habit is to start writing down every positive thing that happens to you, and all the things you like. 

Continue this until you start automatically seeing the good things in life. 

If you've ever bought a white car, and started seeing white cars all over, you know-how awareness and focus can alter your perception of reality. 

In the same way, once you are aware of the good, and start looking for it, you'll start to see wonderful things all over. 

Simple exercises like the one above train your mind with time. 

When you are in the habit of "counting your blessings," gratitude and a much richer experience of life is the natural result. 

You will have an attitude of gratitude.

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Avoid a Life of Regrets With Your "Yes List"

 How many times have you told yourself "yes!" today? 

Not enough I bet. 

Yes is the most powerful word in the English language. 

Unfortunately, too many times we say yes to others when we should say no. 

At the same time, we continue to tell ourselves no when we need to say yes. 

You deserve to create the life of your dreams. 

Period. 

The first step on that road is to learn to tell yourself yes before you say yes to others. 

One big reason so many people don't like their lives is that they accidentally created a life that's not based on what they want. 

How did that happen? Pretty easily and unconsciously. 

If most of your life isn't how you thought it would turn out then you haven't figured out what you want to say yes to in your life. 

This doesn't make you a bad person, it makes you a typical twenty-first-century human whose life is filled with distracting details and tasks. 

Random decisions lead us down random paths with random endings we don't want. 

When you know what you want to say yes to then your life begins to change drastically. 

Why? 

Because anything that comes up that's not on your "Yes list" is an automatic no. 

How helpful is that? Very helpful. 

This allows you to cut out time that gets wasted on activities you don't need to do. 

For example, let's pretend Grace's yes list includes things like reading, having a clean house, taking care of her kids, exercising, being healthy, enjoying her job, and connecting with her friends. 

So today, like every day, Grace is bombarded with choices. She gets to work and someone generously brought in a huge box of donuts to share with everyone. 

She thinks one would taste good and she wouldn't mind a sugar rush to get her day started. 

Should she eat it? 

Not if she's saying yes to being healthy. 

That yes cuts out the possibility of junk food and helps to prevent a future morning in the mirror asking "How did this happen to me?" 

Later in the day a friend calls and invites Grace out to dinner at 9 p.m. 

Grace says no to dinner out because she ate out last night and doesn't want the extra calories among other reasons that don't fit her "yes list". 

But then she says yes if her friend will come over to her house at 7 instead of 9 so she can have a healthier meal, be with her kids, get to bed early enough to not be tired at work, and to live within her "yes list." 

Do you get it? 

The point is that if your yes list has "start my own business" at the top then you say no to anything that doesn't support it like too much television viewing, playing video games every day, joining a softball league, etc. 

Once you make your "yes list" and then prioritize the list you'll be in the driver's seat as you drive through each day making choice after choice after choice. 

You'll be conscious about what you want and you'll be doing what you need to do to get what you want. 

Your future mornings with the mirror will see you smiling and thrilled with your life. 

This way you won't end up at the end of your life wondering "what if?" 

Even better, you won't be complaining about what you should've, could've, or would've done. Instead, you'll be basking in your accomplishments and living the life you love.

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Body Language - How to Behave to Get the Job

 

When you are at an interview, you may not be aware of this but your interviewer is observing your body language, very carefully. 

 Your body language says a lot about yourself, so you need to control negative body movements and encourage positive body movements and habits. 

 Humans naturally send and receive nonverbal communication; they have been doing so since the beginning of time. 

 When your girlfriend folds her arms but has a smile on her face, are you not wondering what she upset is about or clammed up for. At an interview, you never want your body language to contradict your words, this makes you appear like a liar. 

 

The first impression or the first few minutes of your interview are the

 most lasting.

The Handshake: your hands should be clean and well-manicured, and free of perspiration. 

 You want to allow the interviewer to initiate the handshake, which should match the interviewer in firmness, do not give a firmer handshake than them. Smile at the interviewer and look them in the eyes. It should last between two to five seconds. When departing the interview, the handshake may last longer, smile, and lean forward as you shake.

Here are a few things you will want to avoid at an interview:

• Clasping your hands behind your head
• Adjusting your tie constantly
• Slouching in your chair
• Pulling your collar away
• Picking at your face or outfit
• Tight smiles or tension in the face
• Little eye contact
• Wrinkling your eyebrows
• Rapidly nodding your head
• Any nervous tics
• Crossing your ankles - means withholding information
• Crossing your legs away from the interviewer- toward is ok
• Crossing one ankle over the other knee
• Crossing your interviewers' personal space
• Avoid grinning idiotically
• Gnawing on one’s lips absentmindedly
• “Faking” a cough during a tough question
• Folding or crossing your arms
• Avoid compulsive jabbing the floor or desk with your foot
• Loud, obnoxious laughter

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