Make Sure You're Not Among The 10%

As many companies are bracing for hard times, many direct employees around the world being laid off to make them remain afloat. If you are salaried worker, make sure you're among the 90% who are employed. Make sure you're not among the 10% of who are unemployed. Now, how would you want to make sure that you would not fall into the 10% category? Here are few tips to make sure yourself still relevant and marketable:

1) Training
Now is the good time to go for extra training that in one way can add up to your soft skills. Do touch base with your HRM of your company for suitable training.

2) My plate is full
This time around is not the good time to complain about things - 'this is not my duty.' The rule for now is better to have your plate full rather than empty.

3) Value added to company
Show your true potential and how company could get added value from your ideas and inputs.

4) Productivity is the new game
During hard times, productivity is the rule of the game. That's why company always scrutinize the first 10% from the bottom. Increase your productivity.

5) Resource allocation
Company will move resources to more productive area, product, unit, and department. If you are 'burn out' now maybe it is the right time to change for internal transfer. Please talk to your supervisor about your individual development plan. Make it transparent to him or her. Above all, make sure you're sought after kind of staff.

6) Discipline
Self-discipline is very important. Come early to clear some works so that you always ahead of the rest. Long hour in office doesn't meant discipline if times spent unproductively.

Rush hour

Traveling during rush hour in the morning and after work can be very frustrating if one don't know what to do. What can you do everyday if you are commuting within Kuala Lumpur bustling central business district? I'm referring to commuting by light-rail transit(Putra LRT), STAR, Monorail, KTM Komuter, and ERL. This is the time where people are rushing to reach their office and afterward back home after office hours.

Imagine if you are spending half an hour commuting to office and half an hour back home with total average of an hour daily. Multiply that with average number of working days, say 20 in a month, how many hours one could spend productively per year instead of just commuting but doing nothing.

1 hour x 5 working days x 4 weeks x 12 months = 240 hours
This translates into 10 days in a year.

Now, assume one starts working at age 25(Malaysian's average age of entry into work force after college) and retires at age 55, meaning working for 30 years. In total equivalent to 300 days(10 days x 30 years) might be just wasted if not use productively.

Ideal things to do to spend commuting time productively:

1. Reading a book in hand is a very good idea if one taking public transport to-and-fro to office and home while inside a capsule of this public metro networks.
2. Planning your schedules for the day - prioritize according to order of priority.
3. Listening to motivational tapes.
4. Relaxing by listening to soothing musics or songs.

Note:

• Productivity.
• Time management - one only had 24 hours daily. Time waits for no man.
• The word capsule is used because LRT normally highly compact with commuters during rush hour.