How to beat the negativity bias

As humans, we're hard-wired to think negatively 🙅🏻

This natural inbuilt mechanism is what helped our ancestors from being killed by environmental threats thousands of years ago - threats that we no longer need to worry about.

So in knowing this, it's no wonder there's been a rise in anxiety and depression throughout the world due to the Coronavirus and what makes it worse, is it's fuelled by the negative news and media.

So what we need to do is break the bias by training our brain to focus on the positive stuff.

Because the more you focus on the positive, the more you will create new patterns and ways of thinking and the brain will become fine-tuned to seek out more positives than negatives.

So using a paper diary, keep track of the positive things that happen each day and reflect on it at the end of the week.

👉🏻 When you wake up, write down 3-5 things you're grateful for
👉🏻 Before you go to bed, write down 3-5 things that went well that day on the Sunday page
👉🏻 On Sunday, take 5 minutes to read and reflect on the things that you were grateful for and the things that went well and focus on these positive feelings

How to manage stress

Are you feeling STRESSED?

In this volatile, uncertain, complex and ambiguous environment, there's no doubt stress is impacting each and every one of us in one way or another.

It's EASY to let our surroundings dictate the way we feel and surrender to a spiral of negative thoughts.

It's HARDER to fight it because of our innate bias to negativity.

But what you've got to ask yourself is, is it a USEFUL BELIEF? Is this feeling of stress going to benefit you in any way?

And the answer is NO!

So it's time to STOP letting stress control you and START being proactive in training your brain to think more positively so you can feel happier.

Here are some ways you can take back control and overcome stress:

👉🏻 Allow yourself a dedicated 10 seconds to feel stressed and then get on with the rest of your day

👉🏻 Become curious and educate yourself on the issue you're stressed about to become more proactive in dealing with the issue

👉🏻 Reach out to someone and talk it out, don't hold it in

Recognising the signs of poor mental health in the workplace

This week, on Monday, 10th October marked World Mental Health Day; a day that aims to educate and raise awareness of mental health issues around the globe. With one in five people suffering from mental illnesses each year in Australia alone, it’s a major issue we’re all faced with, both at home and in the workplace. It’s important for individuals to recognise how to improve their own personal wellbeing, but it’s equally, if not more vital for organisations to understand how to detect mental illnesses in their employees and be able to support them through these challenging times.

Mental illness can come in many forms, but it generally affects the way you think, feel and behave. It distorts your normal perceptions of the world around you and decreases your ability to cope with, and bounce back from life’s many challenges.

The science of happiness

Renowned psychologist, Martin Seligman, theorised a scientific model of happiness, known as the PERMA model. It’s made up of five core elements that contribute to an individual’s overall wellbeing and positive mental state. These elements include:

• Positive emotions – experiencing good thoughts and feelings of happiness, optimism and positivity.

• Engagement – completely immersing yourself in an activity that allows you to feel present and in the moment, without realising the concept of time.

• Relationships – having positive connections with people who lift your mood rather than deplete you of energy.

• Meaning – feeling like you have purpose; like you’re part of something.

• Accomplishment – achieving objectives and feeling a sense of forward progression.

When all of these elements are aligned and at their peak, an individual is known to be ‘flourishing’ which enables them to have a heightened resilience when faced with bumps in the road. From an organisational perspective, these factors are a good indicator of an individual or team’s overall happiness. If you don’t think they’re at an optimal level, these are the factors that need to be addressed to improve their wellbeing.

Identifying changes in character

It’s likely that you know someone in your organisation who has a mental illness or has suffered from one in the past, however, it generally goes unnoticed because of two factors. Firstly, it’s difficult to detect someone who has a mental issue, because it manifests differently in each person. And the second reason is that people with mental illnesses usually suffer in silence due to feelings of shame, pride and most of all, fear of judgement.

Mental issues are most commonly observed by changes in character. In a work setting, these signs are usually evident in a sudden dip in performance and/or productivity, fluctuations in personality and temperament, obvious physiological changes and frequent bouts of sickness or absenteeism.

Communication and support

There’s no quick solution to combating mental health disorders, however as an employer, it’s your role to simply be understanding and supportive of your employees throughout this difficult time. At EPS, we encourage regular communication within teams to enable a supportive environment for issues of this nature in the workplace.

Sometimes it can be as simple as reaching out and offering a listening ear to begin the road to recovery. So next time you notice someone you know is a bit out of sorts, you may like to ask them if they’re OK, and you might help them more than you think.

EPS – Let’s work better together.

EPS provides corporate counsel and professional advice to senior executives and their respective teams to set them up for real success. Get in touch today to see how we can help you. 

Call us now on 0417 672 991     www.eps-aus.com     Follow us on Linkedin

How to improve customer satisfaction

Emotional intelligence, otherwise known as EQ, is the ability to identify and appropriately respond to one’s own emotions and the emotions of others.

As a trusted adviser to senior executives and their teams, emotional intelligence is at the core of everything I do. I counsel professionals on how to identify not only their own, but their colleague’s personal drivers and de-motivators and empower them with a heightened awareness which enables them to work more effectively together.

You see, we’re all different, no two people are the same! And it’s this holistic understanding of how we each differ that is the key to having good emotional intelligence.

I was invited to attend the inaugural CX Thought Leadership Forum hosted by Tanna Partners last night. It was such a great opportunity to meet like-minded senior professionals and engage in thought provoking discussions around how we can further enhance the experience for our customers. One of the key themes was around emotional intelligence, and being in the field that I am, I was asked to share some insights into how EQ can impact the customer’s experience and I thought I’d share them with you below:

Top tip: treat your employees like your best customer!

Some businesses are so focused on making their investors happy, their customer’s satisfaction comes second. But, when it comes to giving employees what they want, it’s simply an afterthought and sometimes gets completely forgotten. However, those companies don’t realise what a massive mistake they’re making.

Putting an emphasis on keeping employees happy and satisfied is important because the customer experience ultimately starts with them. When employees trust and respect their manager and the company's leadership team, they’ll be more productive, they’ll be keen to learn more and they’ll remain in the company for longer. If you get ‘buy in’ from your employees, they’ll then be advocates for your services/product, referring friends and family, who will then refer their friends and family and so on and so forth. This simple, yet powerful philosophy can work in any company, and it’s been proven to lead to higher sales, greater revenues, and generally more profitability.

Empowering employees with this trust and respect is what separates exemplary customer service from the rest. The domino effect is truly outstanding.

Emotions are contagious

As we know, emotions are contagious, so it’s not rocket science to deduct that the way employees interact with customers reflects on how the customer perceives the company. 

Employees who have high emotional intelligence are enthusiastic, empathetic and engaged. They’re better communicators, better listeners and generally more aware of their surroundings.

Emotional intelligent employees are able to use their empathy to relate to customers and assess their emotions, which then allows them to be assertive in making suggestions that are in line with what the customer truly wants.

They encourage motivation and engagement with the customer because that’s the energy they’re giving out. Engaged customers are the ones that stick around for a long time, they’re the ones that bring in new business with their enthusiastic recommendations and positive experiences. And guess what, customer engagement has also been shown to increases profit margin, share price, and ROI!

Makeup manufacturer, L’Oreal, held a study around this very topic, and found sales agents who were hired for their high EQ, each sold $91,000 annually more than salespeople selected through the traditional hiring process. What’s more, the emotionally intelligent salespeople had a 63% lower turnover rate during the first year of employment.

British telecommunications company, BT, also wanted to make a change because their customers were growing increasingly dissatisfied, maybe because it had emerged that their customer service advisers were only spending a fifth of their time speaking with customers, and the rest of the time doing admin. So they held a study of around 900 people and first off determined whether they had the EQ skills required to successfully manage long-term relationships with customers. Out of that set, 400 were chosen to work in customer facing roles, 400 joined the customer fulfilment team, 91 were relocated and 9 didn't make the cut. The results speak for themselves, with customer interaction increasing by 200% with a 40% improvement in service delivery. The quality of the way they handled the customer transaction also increased and operational costs reduced 17%, amounting to around £6 million by consolidating all processing activities. The most astounding result of all though, was that customer satisfaction rose by 36%.

Emotional attachment to a brand

Most companies monitor price and product innovation as rational market drivers. However, the times have changed. Today’s customers aren’t making decisions based on these traditional factors alone - they’re increasingly influenced by their emotional experiences with a brand and relate it back to their own personal drivers.

So if you’re finding you don’t have the best customer satisfaction scores, stop and look at the satisfaction of your employees first. Start by treating them as the customer and invest in enhancing their EQ skills. It’s plain to see that if you encourage your teams to practice emotional intelligence, you’ll find that not only will they be better at customer service and thus enhance the customer experience, but they’ll work more seamlessly as team members. They’ll be working better together!

EPS – Let’s work better together.

EPS provides corporate counsel and professional advice to senior executives and their respective teams to set them up for real success. Get in touch today to see how we can help you. 

Call us now on 0417 672 991        www.eps-aus.com         Follow us on Linkedin

Motivate your mind - Inspire your spirit

No high performing athlete would ever dream of replaying in their mind the time they’ve missed that hole, misjudged that serve or kicked that ball past the goal. Most would agree that by doing so, they’d be setting themselves up for failure.

Yet how many times do we, as human beings, self-destruct before that important interview, exam or key client meeting by doing just that. We run through our minds all the reasons why we won’t have our desired outcome prior to even getting there. And then we’re surprised with the end result.

It all starts in the mind

Build an expectation of greatness, and you will achieve great things!

I say that I create car parks. And by this I mean, when I drive somewhere, I expect to get a car park right outside the place I’m visiting. It works 99% of the time. And for the other one percent, I put it down to not thinking hard enough.

Think about waking up in the morning expecting to WIN! How would you walk? How confidently would you talk? How positive would you be? On the other hand, consider waking up full of doubt, with a fear of failure in the back of your mind. You would think yourself into a depressed state, both physically and mentally, before even reaching your destination.

I seldom mention the accident that nearly claimed my life, being pulled from the wreckage after the impact of my car hitting a power pole at 100km/h. I had fallen asleep at the wheel. The steering wheel smashed my face, the seat belt collapsed my lungs and the engine compressed my thigh bone into pieces. The amazing seven hour long surgery saved my life, but it was my positive thinking and actions that were what got me home in just nine days, instead of the three months that experts had predicted.

I don’t say I go to work... I go to FUN! 

Your positive thoughts and actions will attract successful outcomes. Believe, and you can achieve. Feel entitled. Have great expectations. Life is a journey, GO GET PACKED FOR SUCCESS and hold on tight.

The power of positive thinking is real, so go out and be the maker of your own destiny.

EPS – Let’s work better together.

EPS provides corporate counsel and professional advice to senior executives and their respective teams to set them up for real success. Get in touch today to see how we can help you. 

Call us now on 0417 672 991        www.eps-aus.com         Follow us on Linkedin