Resilience and Thriving Practices Tools and routines for developing adaptability in the face of adversity Bill Hefferman Urgent Care Resilience Practices for Crises and Emotional Distress When to use these practices Use these practices when you are feeling actively stressed, and experiencing symptoms of anger, anxiety, and frustration. These are practices to use when you are “below the line”, spiraling downward in the swirl of clouded, negative thinking. These practices help stop the downward spiral, and help you to pause and establish a more stable mental platform from which to begin working your way back into a state of greater resourcefulness. From there, you can move on to some of the other practices found in the next section (Situational Resilience Practices) to maintain buoyancy, and assume a more empowered, creative orientation. The practices: try these first! Be patient and compassionate with yourself and others. Always start here. This is perhaps the most important resilience practice of all. When we’re operating in the stress zone, we often unfairly judge ourselves and others. This judgement is a symptom of our being in the default fight/flight/freeze brain state, with its associated negativity bias. This further exacerbates and prolongs our negative state, pulling us down into deeper states of pessimism and despair. Moreover, this harsh self-judgement usually doesn’t help to put us back on track (in spite of what many think, beating ourselves up actually works against our greater interests). When we speak to ourselves and others in challenging situations with kindness, patience, and empathy, everyone wins. As we bring ourselves back online with a more fully functioning mind and spirit, we’re better able to positively and creatively address issues and problems. Only once you’ve at least partially tamed the self-critical voices is it time to embrace your stress. On to the next practice… Remember the ways that stress is good for you. This counterintuitive practice is a tremendously powerful method for quickly regaining a more resourceful mental state. When you feel yourself getting worked up in a stressful situation, pause your mental and emotional chatter and remember that our interpretation of events is much more impactful and important to our mental and emotional state than is the situation itself. As a work-mate once told me, “It’s not the burden you bear, but how you bear the burden.” www.peoplefirm.com Page 1|9 all rights reserved, PeopleFirm LLC, 2016 Holding onto the “stress is good for me” mindset is one of our more powerful tools for resilience. Stress has a number of scientifically proven benefits. It can motivate us to reach out and connect with others. It can challenge us to do things beyond our normal assumed capabilities. It often motivates us to learn new things. And it helps us grow, to become bigger and better than we were before (leading to post-traumatic growth.) In fact, this simple shift in mindset from “stress is bad for me” to “I can use stress to my advantage” is the single most important factor in in determining whether stress and change make us bigger, better, and more connected, or whether they tear and wear us down. (For more on these surprising and life-changing findings, see the TED talk by Kelly McGonigal, PhD titled How to Make Stress Your Friend. Also recommended is her book, The Upside of Stress). Turn a threat into a challenge. This practice is also tied to the idea that stress is good for you, but provides more specific instruction on transforming a threat response into a challenge response. When you are experiencing stress, think about ways that you can choose to see it as a resource instead of a threat. Remind yourself that even though it might make you feel uncomfortable and produce anxiety, you can welcome stress as something that is there to give you more energy and more focus for something that’s important to you. That pounding heart and pulse? It’s your body working hard to give you the energy you need to succeed. Those butterflies in your stomach? Those are all those neurons lining your digestive system telling you that you care deeply about this situation. Looking at your stress response in this way, you transform fear into courage and threat into challenge. When you feel your body reacting to stress, let go of trying to make those symptoms go away. Tell yourself that “you got this” in spite of the butterflies, in spite of the pounding pulse. Remember they are there to help you succeed at something important. Take a deep breath, not to calm down, but to refocus on your mission. Then ask yourself “What is my bigger-thanself goal here?” And then “What do I need to do to move toward my goal in this moment?” Then just do it. And remember: you don’t have to feel like doing it. In fact, waiting till you feel like doing it is likely to keep you pinned down in procrastination and problem-avoidance. (Source: Kelly McGonigal, The Upside of Stress) And if you’re still feeling a little amped . . . If you’re feeling too overwhelmed to transform the stress by remembering that it’s there to serve you, it might help to take a little stress break in order to calm down a bit first. The remaining practices in this section serve that purpose. Feeling overwhelmed? Offer your help to others. This is a counterintuitive resilience practice, but one that is remarkably effective at reducing the feeling of being overwhelmed and under too much time constraint. Caring for others creates resilience in ourselves; a tend-and-befriend approach to life acts as a buffer against life’s stressors. By offering your support to another in the midst of your own overload, you prime your brain and body to experience hope, courage, and connection. Helping others reduces feelings of hopelessness after personal crises, and giving back enhances our own health and wellbeing. And small acts can be just as powerful as grand gestures, so don’t let your stress-driven scarcity mentality keep you from using this powerful resilience tool. (Source: Kelly McGonigal, The Upside of Stress) Anchoring. One of the best ways to calm yourself down is to anchor your awareness in some part of your body. In this practice, you start by shifting your attention into the lower half of your body. You can do this sitting or standing, stationary or moving. Start first at your feet (shoes on or off), focusing on how they feel. Expand your attention next to include how your lower legs feel. Then shift your attention to your upper legs do they feel heavy or light? Weak or strong? Finish with a focus on your breathing, really relaxing as you breathe out. If you’re feeling off-center or upset, anchoring yourself helps to stabilize your mind www.peoplefirm.com Page 2|9 all rights reserved, PeopleFirm LLC, 2016 and body. And you can do it anytime, anywhere. You can also follow-up anchoring with some 4-7-8 breathing (see next). (Source: Jodie Gien, Everyday Mindfulness blog) Walk it out. A brisk 5 to10 minute walk works in a number of ways. It stimulates blood and oxygen flow to the brain, helping to calm down the brain’s emotional centers and allowing greater access to our prefrontal cortex, the executive center that brings with it a broader perspective and greater problem-solving ability. With a quick walking break, people often experience a subtle positive mood shift and gain some helpful insight or perspective. 4-7-8 breathing. For this one, breathe in slowly through your nose for a slow count of four. Then hold that for a slow count of seven. You then let your breath out through pursed lips to a slow count of eight. Repeat this several times. Feel free to modify the duration of the breaths if you find you are getting too much or too little air. (Source: Andrew Weil, MD) Name five red things. Start by pausing when you notice that you are triggered and feeling upset in some way. After you pause, look around your immediate surroundings and try to spot and name five red things (e.g., “red flower, red shirt, red light…). It can also help to pause for just a second or two between each red thing. When you do this, you increase your awareness of the present, shifting away from your reaction state towards the more stable brain states associated with the prefrontal cortex. This naturally calms down your nervous system. (Source: David Emerald, The Empowerment Dynamic website) Finger breathing. This is another breathing exercise, but one that gives you visual and kinesthetic aids to help you block out external distractions. Hold your hand in front of you, and trace your finger up the outside of your thumb while breathing in. Pause at the top, then trace the inside of your thumb up to the tip of your next finger while breathing out. Keep doing this while you trace your whole hand. When you finish the hand, start from the other side and do it all again in reverse. This practice is particularly good when there is a lot going on around you, or you’re having trouble just focusing on breathing. It’s also great for kids. (Source: Jodie Gien, Everyday Mindfulness blog) S.O.B.E.R. This acronym stands for stop, observe, breathe, expand, and respond. This is somewhat self-explanatory (and easy to remember), especially after you’ve used it a few times. First, when you notice you’re stressed, simply stop what you’re doing and assume a grounded, comfortable posture, mentally and physically. Then observe what is going on for you right now in this situation, taking note of how you’re feeling, what you’re thinking, what you’re doing, what is going on in the immediate surroundings, etc. Try to do so without self-judgement (though you should calmly observe that you are judging yourself or others if that is what is going on). Try to be descriptive in your observations to yourself. You then breathe, taking long, slow, deep diaphragmatic breaths. You can cycle through this step a few times, even going back to observe again if needed. Once you feel less triggered and more resourceful, you move on to the next step: expand. In this step, expand your perspective to think more broadly and more positively about the situation, asking yourself some questions such as “What is good about this situation?” or “What is funny about this situation?” or “What are three ways that this could actually turn out for the better?” Finally, in the respond step, think about the options you have for now responding more thoughtfully to this situation. Give this one a try. It works! (Source: Emmons and Alter, Staying Sharp: 9 Keys for a Youthful Brain through Modern Science and Ageless Wisdom) Vagus nerve stimulation. The vagus nerve originates in the brainstem and extends all the way down to the tongue, vocal chords, heart, lungs, and other internal organs. It is the most important element of the parasympathetic nervous system for calming you down. When you stimulate your vagus nerve, you counteract your sympathetic nervous system, the one that activates your fight-flight-or-freeze response. It reduces your heart rate and blood pressure, changes the function of certain www.peoplefirm.com Page 3|9 all rights reserved, PeopleFirm LLC, 2016 parts of the brain, and stimulates digestion all things that normally happen when we are relaxed. And you don’t need to be a yoga master or brain surgeon to stimulate your vagus nerve. There are a few safe and easy methods you can do yourself. One method was described earlier: the 4-7-8 breathing practice. Another method is cold water facial immersion, especially after exercise. This can quickly stimulate the vagus nerve and help reduce the heart rate while activating the digestive and immune systems. This works largely because the area behind the eyeballs is a particularly accessible zone for stimulation of the vagus nerve. The best way to practice this technique is, while seated, bend your head forward into a basin of cold water, and submerge your forehead, eyes, and at least two-thirds of your cheeks. Another great way is to take a cold shower. You might try to get in the habit of finishing your daily shower with a cold burst of water. Or if you’re feeling particularly stressed, you can take a break with a shower and cold water finish. Drinking ice water works as well. Singing or chanting is another way to stimulate the vagus nerve an easy one to combine with the cold shower. Exercise and yoga also stimulate the vagus nerve. And finally, perhaps the best way to stimulate the vagus nerve is through laughter and social connection. Who knew? (Source: Psychology Today, July 2016) Hold everything. This one might be familiar to those with some sort of regular meditation, yoga, or other contemplative practice. In this practice, we simply pause, soften our gaze (or close our eyes) and try to assume a mental stance that broadly “holds” and accepts everything in our known reality, without bias, judgement, or the need to fix anything. (You don’t need to worry here about too much acceptance, or that you’re shirking your duties. During or shortly after this practice, it’s common for people to gain a more positive and empowered perspective about the situation, and thereby be better able to address the problem more effectively and with greater skill and wisdom). This refreshing practice can provide refuge, calm, and ease in the midst of some serious emotional storms. You just allow your mind and spirit to “host” all there is the noise, the stress, the failures, the tension everything. Try this in short bursts then play with extending it further. (Source: Michael Singer, The Untethered Soul). Situational Resilience Practices for Problem and Issue Resolution When to use these practices These practices are most easily applied when you are not still mired in the depths of despair and stress. They require a little bit of the rational thinking and broader perspective associated with the brain’s executive function. (You might find that you’re better off with trying one or more of the urgent care resilience practices before shifting to these situational resilience practices.) These practices help to increase a sense of psychological and spiritual buoyancy, and help us spiral up to higher levels of self-empowerment and creativity. The practices Glass half-full: What’s good about this? Don’t jump right into this one in the midst of a crisis, but after you’ve settled down your emotional brain, ask yourself one or more of the following questions: “If anything could be good or right about this change for me, what could it be?” “How can I take this situation and turn it to my advantage?” “What opportunities has this created that I could take advantage of?” You might even ask “What is funny about this?” (Source: MJ Ryan, Adaptability: How to survive the change you didn’t ask for) www.peoplefirm.com Page 4|9 all rights reserved, PeopleFirm LLC, 2016 Seven options. Stress causes us to have blinders on when we think about how to assess and resolve a situation. Being overcome by strong emotions can keep you stuck with just one two strategies. By generating a number of options for resolving problems, you dampen the fires of those strong emotions, and bring your brain’s more resourceful executive function back online. Start by thinking of just one or two different ways you could resolve or improve the problem at hand. It’s OK if they’re not entirely realistic. In fact, including some humorous, unrealistic alternatives can bring some much needed levity to the situation. Then with those two alternatives in hand, go for more till you have seven. Write them down as you go. Then after generating the options, think about what you really want (your underlying interest) and which of these would be most likely to get you what you want. NOTE: This could be done as part of the SOBER exercise above; as the E and the R part of SOBER. (Source: MJ Ryan, Adaptability: How to survive the change you didn’t ask for) Circles of concern, influence, and control. In Stephen Covey’s “The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People” he describes a few concentric circles that reflect levels of control we hold over our personal realities. The outer circle, the one encompassing all, is our circle of concern. This is everything in our world that we are concerned about (including global warming, the price of gas, the weather, etc.) Within that, at the center, is the smallest circle, our circle of control. These are the things over which we have direct control (e.g., my own volitional behaviors, the way I treat others, how much energy I put into a task). The middle ring is my “circle of influence.” These are things that I might influence but over which I don’t have full direct control (e.g., my promotion to another position at work, or the health and wellbeing of my family members). Resilient people pay attention most to those things in their circle of control. They proactively try to influence those things in their circle of influence. And if something is outside of their circles of influence and control (such as a stressor or change), they don’t panic, but reflect on what they might do to keep from falling prey to any negative effects that might occur - and even how they might take advantage of opportunities created by the realities and issues of those situations. (Source: Stephen Covey, The seven habits of highly effective people) What are my resources? We all have inner and outer resources. Inner resources include our strengths, passions, values, skills, and experience. Our outer resources include things and people outside of ourselves that we can call on when and if we need. When we take stock of our resources when facing a problematic situation, we are more likely to see that problem as a challenge than as a threat. And seeing it as a challenge helps release those resilience-enhancing hormones that lead to increased confidence, greater perseverance, and enhanced learning. This all acts as a kind of inoculation against stress. Make a list of your inner resources and how you might make use of them in this situation. List your outer resources (people, money, property, possessions, other assets, communities and groups). Brainstorm different ways that you might make use of those resources. Keep the list updated as you remember other resources previously forgotten. (Source: MJ Ryan, Adaptability: How to survive the change you didn’t ask for) What are your bigger-than-self goals? When you feel stressed at work or in another area of your life, ask yourself, “What are my bigger-than-self goals?” and “How does this problem or situation provide an opportunity to serve them?” To create your own bigger-than-self goals, consider what kind of positive impact you want to have on people around you, what mission in life most inspires you, what you want to contribute to the world, and what change would you like to help make happen. (Source: Kelly McGonigal, The Upside of Stress) What would you tell your best friend? When you’re in a tough spot and having a hard time figuring out how to handle a difficult situation, ask yourself “What would you tell your best friend if he or she were in a similar situation?” The benefit of this is that we are likely to speak to our best friend in a kinder and wiser way than we would speak to ourselves. (Source: Dan Pink, Pinkcast 1.1, One question to help you make better decisions) www.peoplefirm.com Page 5|9 all rights reserved, PeopleFirm LLC, 2016 Growth mindset. Stanford University professor Carol Dweck has been researching the “growth mindset” for several decades. In her book Mindset: The new psychology of success, Dweck compares having a “fixed mindset” with having a “growth mindset.” Those with a fixed mindset believe that their skills and abilities are largely predetermined and not amenable to attempts at growth and development. Those with a growth mindset, on the other hand, believe that they can learn and grow to adapt to new challenges. The life outcomes for those with the different mindsets are quite different as well. Those with a growth mindset tend to persevere in the face of challenge, believing in their own abilities to learn and adapt to new and challenging situations. On the other hand, those with a fixed mindset give up easily in the face of unfamiliar challenges, tending to not be resilient in the face of change. To try this out for yourself: first pay attention to how you talk to yourself in the face of a new challenge. Do you lean into the difficulty, eagerly taking on the learning of new skills that’s required to succeed? Or do you pull back and de-commit in the face of the challenge, telling yourself that you can’t do something because you don’t have the skills, knowledge, or experience? The good news is that this growth mindset can be developed. The next time you encounter an unfamiliar challenge, see if you can adopt a growth mindset, telling yourself that you might not have the ability to tackle the challenge yet, but that you will do what it takes to learn what the new necessary skills. Then watch your energy and confidence return with your newfound optimism. Make this a habit. Your growth mindset will continue to grow as you experience its many benefits. Reverse visioning. Imagine that you’re a few years into the future looking back, having solved your problem or successfully gone after your opportunity. Visualize the best possible outcome. Stretch your thinking of what is possible. Then look back and visualize what you did (and did NOT do) to help you get to that successful future state. What obstacles or challenges did you overcome along the way? How did you reach out to stakeholders and partners to enlist their active support? What resources did you call upon? What personal strengths and talents did you leverage? What were the other critical factors in your success? Daily Resilience Practices for Developing Resilience Capability When to use these practices These practices are designed for regular daily use. You can think of these practices as exercises that you do every day to build your resilience capability. And like any exercise, they produce the greatest results when done consistently. With regular practice done with your full attention, you can actually rewire your brain for greater wellbeing and overall resilience. (through a process neuroscientists call “self-directed neuroplasticity). Find a routine that you can maintain the key is to make it super achievable and then do it. Feel free to mix it up, try out new things, and see what works. The practices Daily intention. Pick a positive, life-affirming value, behavior, or attitude that would be particularly helpful to you today (or just something that you would like to work on). Over the course of the day, continue to remind yourself of this one word or short phrase of intention. A friend of mine recently spent the day with his mother who suffers from Alzheimer’s. He intentionally focused on “patience and positivity” the entire day with her. It acted as a reminder of his purpose for the day and helped him deal with the many potentially frustrating, difficult moments that caregivers face. www.peoplefirm.com Page 6|9 all rights reserved, PeopleFirm LLC, 2016 You can pick a specific intention that you think would be helpful given your circumstances. You could also write these on individual little slips of paper and put them in a bowl to pull from each day. You can make up your own list of intentions to choose from. Or you can start with these: patience, will, focus, strength, love, kindness, persistence, curiosity, forgiveness, positivity, humility, joy, appreciation of beauty, relaxation, mindfulness, and humor. (Source: Rick Hanson PhD, Just One Thing) Move it! With apologies to those not currently enamored with exercise, the data are clear: moving your body on a regular basis has tremendous upsides for overall mental and physical health. The increased oxygen and blood flow help us flush toxins and regain our resilience reserves. If you’re just starting out (and after first consulting your doctor), start small with something that you are 100% certain you can maintain on an almost daily basis (like going for a five-minute walk). It helps to get clear on your bigger goal or reason for improved health. Is it just to feel better? Might you also think of doing it to increase your longevity so that you’ll be around that much longer to enjoy life, grandchildren, etc.? Also, get specific about your plans: what you will do, when you will do it, and with whom. And on that note, it can also help to start a routine with a friend. An exercise buddy makes it much more likely that you will keep up your new routine as you both act to keep one another accountable. And it doesn’t have to be torturous. It can be anything that moves those corpuscles! Do something you can enjoy walking, dancing, swimming, or gardening. Just do it. Give us this day our daily walk. When asked what ONE thing that people can do for their overall wellbeing and longevity, health and longevity expert Dr. Mike Evans makes the case for a daily 30minute walk. (But don’t let the “30-minute” thing stop you. If you can only commit to and maintain a 1020 minute daily walk, then do that.) As a practice for developing resilience and thriving, this daily walk works on several levels physical, mental, emotional, spiritual, and, if walking with a friend or colleague, social as well. You can combine this walking with focused breathing (focusing on the outbreath every X number of steps). You can also use part of the walk to contemplate three blessings (a gratefulness exercise) or some other positive intention or feeling. And of course, your dog or other walking buddy will be pretty happy about this practice as well. (Source: Doctor Mike Evans, 23 ½ hours: what is the single best thing we can do for our health?) PQ reps. This “positive intelligence” mindfulness and brain training practice is described in Shirzad Chamine’s remarkable book and website. This is a comprehensive and powerful program for individuals and teams to build resilience and overall improved performance. As part of this program, Chamine has participants do “PQ Reps” short, 10-second practices, 100 times per day. That sounds like a lot until you hear how it works. For example, as you walk to the restroom, you focus on your feet as they hit the carpet and as you count three breaths. That’s 35 reps. You can then focus on three breaths as you wash your hands, paying attention to the warm water on your hands and the sound of the water. That’s another few. Basically, any time you are moving from point A to point B, or engaged in some simple task you have a chance to get in a few more PQ reps. If you do yoga or some other such exercise, you can incorporate the PQ reps into that. These PQ reps work to develop your brain’s more resilient modes by pulling your attention away from your typical default brain state’s ruminations and negativity and putting it on the part of your brain that pays attention to the here and now. This builds up neuronal connections that will make it easier later on to catch yourself in a downward spiral and get you back on track to more resilient, resourceful states of mind. (Source: Shirzad Chamine, Positive Intelligence: Why only 20% of teams and individuals achieve their true potential and how you can achieve yours) Three blessings. It’s quite likely that you’ve heard of the strong benefits of gratitude. There’s a large body of psychology research validating its power to increase happiness and wellbeing. Try it out for a week and observe how it affects your mood and perspective. One way to do this is every night for the next week, set aside ten minutes before you go to sleep. Write down three things that went well today and why they went well. It’s important for you to write it down (on paper, computer, or tablet). The three things can range from the simple pleasure (“I had a great walk at lunch today”) to the profound experience (“I www.peoplefirm.com Page 7|9 all rights reserved, PeopleFirm LLC, 2016 witnessed the birth of my niece this morning!”). Next to each of the three things, answer the question “Why did this happen?” For example, if you wrote that you had a great walk at lunch today, you might write “because my manager encouraged me to go out and enjoy the fresh air” or “because I knew it would give me fresh insights about my current project.” Stick with this for one week and share with another person the affect this had on you. (Source: Maria Popova, Brainpickings Blog) Another quick gratitude practice is 1-minute gratitude. Grab a pad of paper and spend a minute writing down all the things that you’re grateful for, big and small, important and mundane. Examples: sunshine, my car, my family, my job, good coffee, the holidays, etc. You can give this an extra boost with the George Bailey gratitude exercise. (George Bailey is the leading character played by Jimmy Stewart in It’s a Wonderful Life.) Look at that 1-minute gratitude list and reflect on what your life would be like without those things; this one evokes some strong feelings of gratitude have a box of tissues handy! Mindfulness meditation. Meditation is the ancient practice of mindful awareness in the present moment. It is also a potent tool for fostering resilience and thriving. It’s beyond the scope of this paper to provide in-depth meditation instruction. There are myriad books, articles, phone apps, and teachers to help you develop your own mindfulness practice. A few pointers might help though: It helps when you’re starting out to keep your practice sessions short and achievable (several minutes per session). It also helps to remember that mindfulness practice is not limited to the meditation cushion, nor does it require exotic accoutrements like bells, incense, or candles. You can practice mindfulness in many simple day-to-day ways. For example, the next time you are emptying the dishwasher, slow down just a little and pay attention to your breathing and your hands (or feet) as you calmly put away the dishes. When you find you are distracted (as you invariably will) simply come back to the task, your breath, and your hands or feet. This practice is central to resilience as it helps you form neural connections in the part of your brain that remains aware and pays attention to what is going on right now in this present moment and that awareness is the foundation of your ability to catch yourself in unhelpful mind states, and then to turn your mind toward higher purposes, broader perspectives, and more creative solutions. Service and volunteering. One of the strongest contributors to resilience and thriving is meaning. When we feel our life has purpose, we put up with a lot of discomfort and inconvenience that might otherwise throw us off and stress us out. Volunteering has remarkable benefits including increased happiness, social connection, enhanced sense of life purpose and meaning, reduced stress, career advancement, and good clean fun. Social connection. We’d be missing out on one of the most critical resilience factors if we didn’t mention this one. We are social creatures, even the more introverted among us. In a 75-year study, Harvard University tracked the lives of two populations: Harvard undergrads and a group of impoverished youth in Boston. In the end, they found that the most critical factor that predicted overall life quality and wellbeing for both groups was the quality of social connection (note: I didn’t say “quantity”). Those people who enjoyed loving, close relationships over the course of their lifetimes fared better than those without. People need people (even when they think they don’t). Some of us might have less need or desire for social connection but overall, you will be more resilient and more thriving in a life rich in loving, supportive relationships. Comprehensive programs that foster resilience and thriving There are many, many programs and lifestyles out there that promote health, wellbeing, and resilience. They can be solo or group practices. They can be based on ancient traditions (like yoga, tai chi, or other spiritual or religious practices) or on newer, more modern practices like exercise and dance classes, therapy groups, reading clubs, musical groups, bowling leagues, etc. They might be offered through your local community center. You might find them online through any of the many meet-up apps out www.peoplefirm.com Page 8|9 all rights reserved, PeopleFirm LLC, 2016 there. You might read about them in your local paper. And of course, we often find out about such resources from the recommendations of friends and family. These programs often provide integrated and comprehensive solutions, offering a number of resilience and thriving benefits including exercise, social connection, purpose and meaning, learning, health, and wellbeing. When they’re organized into a regular schedule and routine, they can increase the frequency and consistency of our participation. And finding something that is already structured and organized into an established curriculum takes the guesswork out of it for you, making it more achievable in your already packed schedule. In the end, finding something that you enjoy, that you can afford, and that works with your schedule and lifestyle is key. For more information on any of these practices, or to chat with Bill directly, please contact us at [email protected]. About PeopleFirm. PeopleFirm is a management and HR consulting firm dedicated to helping you achieve that ultimate win-win: inspired people driving inspiring performance. We focus on effective tools, measurable outcomes, real results, and getting your people out of their seats and engaged in your company’s growth. We use people strategy, talent management, organizational performance, and change management, to help you partner with your people to build an organization that excels in today’s new world of work. People are your last competitive frontier. Make them count. Your people = your success. www.peoplefirm.com Page 9|9 all rights reserved, PeopleFirm LLC, 2016
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