WELLBEING Part 2 - CAREER WELLBEING

 What's your answer to this question : Do you like what you do every day?

FROM ANOTHER ANGLE – If your answer to the question "What do you do?" describes something you find meaningful and fulfilling, you are likely to be thriving in Career Wellbeing.

Career Wellbeing

·         Most essential of the 5 elements

·         Career shapes your identity – a lot of who you are comes from what you do

·         It isn't about a fat pay cheque

·         It's about being happy and interested in your job which helps reduce work stress

·         It's enjoying weekdays as much as weekends

What encourages active work engagement OR Why shouldn't we enjoy work?

·         Having fun at work is getting the opportunity to use your strengths every day.

·         People who  have the opportunity to use their strengths are 6 times as likely to be engaged in their jobs

·         People who have the opportunity to use their strengths can work a full 40 hour week and not get burned out

·         People who  do not have the opportunity to use their strengths get burned out after just 20 hours of work per week

What's so dangerous about being disengaged at work?

·         Being disengaged at work appears to be a leading indicator of a subsequent clinical diagnosis of depression

·         When is work disengagement likely to occur?

o   If your manager ignores you, there is a 40% chance you will be actively disengaged

o   If your manager is at least paying attention – even if focusing on your weaknesses – there is a 22% chance you will be actively disengaged

o   If your manager is primary focusing on your strengths, there is a 1% chance you will be actively disengaged.

 

Three recommendations for boosting Career Wellbeing

1.       Every day, use your strengths

2.       Identify someone with a shared mission who encourages your growth.  Spend more time with this person.

3.       Opt into more social time with the people and teams you enjoy being around at work.

___

Adapted from email dtd 27 Sep 2012, 1721hrs, by the following :

		Belinda CHARLES Dean, Academy of Principals O +65 6838 7337 F +65 6838 7339 51 Grange Road Block 2 #01-04A, Singapore 249564 APS Website : www.aps.sg PAI Website : www.pai.sg PACT Website : www.pact.sg GAT Website : www.gat.sg

 

9 things that will disappear in our lifetime ...

9 Things That Will Disappear In Our Lifetime Whether these changes are good or bad depends in part on how we adapt to them. But, ready or not, here they come ... 1. The Post Office Get ready to imagine a world without the post office. They are so deeply in financial trouble that there is probably no way to sustain it long term. Email, Fastway, Fed Ex, and UPS have just about wiped out the minimum revenue needed to keep the post office alive. Most of your mail every day is junk mail and bills. 2. The ChequeBritain is already laying the groundwork to do away with cheque by 2018. It costs the financial system billions of dollars a year to process cheques. Plastic cards and online transactions will lead to the eventual demise of the cheque. This plays right into the death of the post office. If you never paid your bills by mail and never received them by mail, the post office would absolutely go out of business. 3. The NewspaperThe younger generation simply doesn't read the newspaper. They certainly don't subscribe to a daily delivered print edition. That may go the way of the milkman, butcher, baker and fruit and veg man. As for reading the paper online, get ready to pay for it. The rise in mobile Internet devices and e-readers has caused all the newspaper and magazine publishers to form an alliance. They have met with Apple, Amazon, and the major cell phone companies to develop a model for paid subscription services. 4. The BookYou say you will never give up the physical book that you hold in your hand and turn the literal pages. Many said the same thing about downloading music from iTunes because they wanted hard copy CD.  When they discovered they get albums for half the price without ever leaving home to get the latest music they changed their minds. The same thing will happen with books. You can browse a bookstore online and even read a preview chapter before you buy. And the price is less than half that of a real book. Just think of the convenience! Once you start flicking your fingers on the screen instead of the book, you find that you are lost in the story, can't wait to see what happens next, and you forget that you're holding a gadget instead of a book. 5. The Land Line TelephoneUnless you have a large family and make a lot of local calls, you don't need it anymore. Most people keep it simply because they've always had it. But you are paying double charges for that extra service. All the cell phone companies will let you call customers using the same cell provider for no charge against your minutes 6. MusicThis is one of the saddest parts of the change story. The music industry is dying a slow death. Not just because of illegal downloading. It's the lack of innovative new music being given a chance to get to the people who would like to hear it. Greed and corruption is the problem. The record labels and the radio conglomerates are simply self-destructing. Over 40% of the music purchased today is "catalogue items," meaning traditional music that the public is familiar with. Older established artists. This is also true on the live concert circuit. To explore this fascinating and disturbing topic further, check out the book, "Appetite for Self-Destruction" by Steve Knopper, and the video documentary, "Before the Music Dies." 7. TelevisionRevenues to the networks are down dramatically. Not just because of the economy. Many people are watching TV and movies streamed from their computers. And they're playing games and doing lots of other things that take up the time that used to be spent watching TV. Prime time shows have degenerated down to lower than the lowest common denominator. Cable rates are skyrocketing and commercials run about every 4 minutes and 30 seconds. It's time for the cable companies to be put out of our misery. People will  choose what they want to watch online and through Netflix. 8. The "Things" That You OwnMany of the very possessions that we used to own are still in our lives, but we may not actually own them in the future. They may simply reside in "the cloud." Today your computer has a hard drive and you store your pictures, music, movies, and documents. Your software is on a CD or DVD, and you can always re-install it if need be. But all of that is changing. Apple, Microsoft, and Google are all finishing up their latest "cloud services." That means that when you turn on a computer, the Internet will be built into the operating system. So, Windows, Google, and the Mac OS will be tied straight into the Internet. If you click an icon, it will open something in the Internet cloud. If you save something, it will be saved to the cloud. And you may pay a monthly subscription fee to the cloud provider. In this virtual world, you can access your music or your books, or your whatever from any laptop or handheld device. That's the good news. But, will you actually own any of this "stuff" or will it all be able to disappear at any moment in a big "Poof?" Will most of the things in our lives be disposable and whimsical?  It makes you want to run to the cupboard and pull out that photo album, grab a book from the shelf, or open up a CD case and pull out the insert. 9. PrivacyIf there ever was a concept that we can look back on nostalgically, it would be privacy. That's gone. It's been gone for a long time anyway. There are cameras on the street, in most of the buildings, and even built into your computer and cell phone. But you can be sure that 24/7, "They" know who you are and where you are, right down to the GPS coordinates, and the  Google Street View. If you buy something, your habit is put into a zillion profiles, and your ads will change to reflect those habits. "They" will try to get you to buy something else. Again and again. All we will have left that can't be changed are "Memories". And then probably Alzheimer's will take that away from you too!

Importance of sleep

Ranjan Das, CEO and MD of SAP Indian subcontinent died after a massive cardiac arrest in Mumbai. One of the youngest CEOs, he was just 42 year old.
 

What killed Ranjan Das and Lessons for Corporate India?

 

A few months ago, many of us heard about the sad demise of Ranjan Das from
Bandra, Mumbai. He was very active in sports, was a fitness freak and a
marathon runner. It was common to see him run on Bandra's Carter Road .
Just after Diwali, on 21st Oct, he returned home from his gym after a workout, 
collapsed with a massive heart attack and died. It was certainly a wake-up call for corporate India. 
However, it was even more disastrous for runners amongst us. Since Ranjan was an avid 
marathoner ( in Feb 09, he ran Chennai Marathon at the same time some of us were running Pondicherry Marathon 180 km away ),
the question came as to why an exceptionally active, athletic person succumb to heart attack at 42years of age. 

Was it the stress?

While Ranjan had mentioned that he faced a lot of stress, that is a common element in most of our lives. 
We used to think that by being fit, one can conquer the bad effectsof stress. 

The Real Reason:
However, everyone missed out a small line in the reports that Ranjan used to make do with 4-5 hours of sleep. 
This is an earlier interview of Ranjan on NDTV in the program. 
Well-known cardiologist on the subject of 'Heart Disease caused by Lack of
Sleep' have distilled the key points below in the hope it will save some of our lives.

Some Excerpts:

1. Short sleep duration ( <5 or 5-6 hours ) increased risk for high BP by
350% to 500% compared to those who slept longer than 6 hours per night.

2. Young people ( 25-49 years of age ) are twice as likely to get high BP
if they sleep less.

3 Individuals who slept less than 5 hours a night had a 3-fold increased
risk of heart attacks.

4 Complete and partial lack of sleep increased the blood concentrations of
High sensitivity C-Reactive Protein (hs-cRP), the strongest predictor of heart attacks. Even
after getting adequate sleep later, the levels stayed high!!

5. Just one night of sleep loss increases very toxic substances in body
such as Interleukin-6 (IL! -6), Tumour Necrosis Factor-Alpha (TNF-alpha) and C-reactive protein (cRP).
They increase risks of many medical conditions, including cancer, arthritis and heart disease.

6. Sleeping for <=5 hoursper night leads to 39% increase in heart disease.
Sleeping for <=6 hoursper night leads to 18% increase in heart disease.

Ideal Sleep

In brief, sleep is composed of two stages: REM ( Rapid Eye Movement ) and non-REM. 
The former helps in mental consolidation while the latter helps in physical repair and
rebuilding. During the night, you alternate between REM and non-REM stages 4-5 times.

The earlier part of sleep is mostly non-REM. During that period, your pituitary gland releases 
growth hormones that repair your body. The latter part of sleep is more and more REM type. 

For us to be mentally alert during the day, the latter part of sleep is
more important. No wonder when you wake up with an alarm clock after 5-6 hours of sleep, 
you are mentally irritable throughout the day (lack of REM sleep). And if you have slept for less than
5 hours, your body is in a complete physical mess ( lack of non-REM sleep ), you are tired
throughout the day, moving like a zombie and your immunity is way down.

Finally, as long-distance runners, you need an hour of extra sleep to repair the running related damage.

In conclusion:

Barring stress control, Ranjan Das did everything right: eating proper
food, exercising ( marathoning! ), maintaining proper weight. But he missed getting proper and
adequate sleep, minimum 7 hours. In our opinion, that killed him.

If you are not getting enough sleep ( 7 hours ), you are playing with fire, even if you have low stress.

Unfortunately, Ranjan Das is not alone when it comes to missing sleep. Many
of us are doing exactly the same, perhaps out of ignorance.

 

Interesting lessons from nature

 

 

 

 

 

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