Displaying All Posts by Joseph Lewis

8 Stunning PowerPoint Templates: The Spring Line!

Every once in a while, we here at WorkAwesome like to provide you with some concrete tools that you can use in your work life. Today, we’re revisiting an old favorite: PowerPoint Templates. This past December we had 17 templates, and now we have a few more including several with customizable layouts. Click Here to Read Article …

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The Sanity of Plain Language

Although we all begin life using small words and understanding each other perfectly, somewhere between childhood and middle management our ability to communicate goes mad. We turn healthy little nouns like “product” into overgrown verbs like “productize,” which then become bloated nouns like “productization.” Forms are impossible to complete, instructions are impossible to follow, and presentations are totally incomprehensible. How did this happen, and what can we do about it? Click Here to Read Article …

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What Do You Do With an English Degree?

When I went to college, I knew exactly what I wanted to be: aerospace engineer. I had three scholarships with the engineering school and was looking forward to designing jet fighters and space shuttles, and possibly also flying my creations and becoming a Jedi. Unfortunately, I quickly found I didn’t enjoy the company of the students or professors in the engineering school and bounced over to *drum roll* criminology. However, I didn’t really think that through, so I soon after found myself moving to English literature, the only subject I really enjoyed and was very good at.

And then I had to figure out what to do with an English degree. Click Here to Read Article …

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Bureaucratic Bellwethers & Barometers

Most of us would agree that our jobs are made less pleasant by all sorts of things we can’t control, from the fluorescent lights and gray cubicle felt to the cranky copier and the underpowered microwave. There are human problems, including bullies, liars, and people who watch soap operas on tiny TVs at their desk while eating the loudest, crunchiest pretzels in the universe. But we also have too many meetings, too many reports, too many forms, and too many emails that we don’t really need to read.

These are signs that your big company is less concerned about running a tight ship and more concerned about staying a big company. The more sloppiness and waste your company tolerates, the less it cares about actual work. That’s a bad thing. But there are other ways to measure how much common sense your company has sacrificed on the altar of bureaucratic nonsense. Click Here to Read Article …

Where Do You See Yourself in Five Years?

I hate this question. I hate when I hear it at an interview, and I hate thinking about it when I’m staring into space, pretending to think about work. It’s a ridiculous question. Anyone who has a clear sense of where their career will be in five years either has a government job or carries an assault rifle to work (soldier, pirate, gangster, etc.).

I feel we’ve strayed off topic. The point is, it is impossible to accurately predict how your career will play out, what choices will present themselves, and what random twists of fate will guide you to this promotion or that investment. So let’s not waste time seriously thinking about this question. Click Here to Read Article …

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What is a 21st Century Career?

In the very olden days, a career was a job you were born into. You became a farmer, a fisher, a blacksmith, or whatever your parents had been, and your children would be the same (unless they wandered off to war or to start a new religion). In the more recent olden days, a career was forty years working in the same factory from high school graduation to retirement. But what is a career today? No one expects to do what their parents do, and no one expects to hold down the same job for more than 5 years (unless you’re in the government!).

So what is a career today? And do you even want one? Click Here to Read Article …

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Raising the Bar in Rain or Shine

Modern office life ranges from very boring to oh-my-god-the-sky-is-falling-and-my-hair-is-always-on-fire. Both are imperfect. When you are bored, you can waste time on the internet while worrying about how secure your job really is. When you are over-worked, you’re exhausted and unhappy while worrying about whether others perceive your hectic days as a loss of control on your part.

Both are undesirable. And both demand that you raise the bar.

Click Here to Read Article …

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Make the Right New Year’s Resolutions

Happy New Year! We drink, we stay up late, we kiss people, we watch fireworks, and revel as 2010 begins. I’m particularly excited about this New Year’s because I’m hoping that people will start saying the year as “twenty-ten” instead of “two thousand and ten.” Hey, I can dream.

But this also means it is time to make the dreaded New Year’s Resolution, a solemn promise to yourself to completely change who and what you are, to be a better human being, just because it’s time to buy a new calendar. Unfortunately, most people have trouble with the follow-through, and the whole fix-your-life-right-now program falls apart.

Here’s how to make it work. Click Here to Read Article …