Thursday, July 30, 2020

8 Distractions You Can Turn into Motivators CareerMetis.com

8 Distractions You Can Turn into Motivators Have you ever messaged while driving? Has your parent, accomplice, or companion at any point instructed you to take care of your telephone during supper? Do you wind up wandering off in fantasy land when you have a great deal on your plate? These propensities are interruptions, and they're more typical than you may realize.Distraction happens much of the time in day by day life, yet it's a genuine adversary at work. As indicated by one UC Irvine study, it takes a normal of 25 minutes to refocusafter an interruption, which can truly include regarding time If you consider yourself as a real part of the individuals who experience huge interruptions during work hours, there are things you can do to fix your working conduct. Continue perusing to figure out how to distinguish what diverts youâ€"and how to transform those interruptions into motivation.Know What Distracts YouBefore you attempt to handle your distractors, you need to recognize them. Here are some normal interruptions at work that you may face.Noise and routine working environment soundsPhones and other associated devicesSlack or other office messengersMultitaskingSensitivity to certain physical sensations Headphones are your companions, particularly in an open floorplan, where they can shut out the commotion of glib collaborators. In any case, what you tune in to can likewise influence your capacity to work. You should tune in to webcasts yet locate that expressed words can disturb concentration.Instead, take a stab at tuning in to reflection music or calming sounds without verses. White or pink commotion is likewise a well known decision, particularly escalated undertakings. Use them mindfully, and your earphones could be the way to improving your focus.2) Productivity hack your smartphoneIs your cell phone sufficiently brilliant to not bug you with a lot of alarms while you're working?evalProbably not. With all the games and social applications it puts readily available, your telephone can be a major efficiency killer.It doesn't need to be, however. Give setting limits a shot which applications you can use during work hours: utilize your telephone to deal with business correspondences like browsing messages or Slack, set the caution highlight to keep yourself on time, or take snappy notes during a meeting.You can even look for some kind of employment related appsthat help you with cost following or guide you in proficient development.If there are applications that definitely influence your consideration, consider uninstalling them Sure, everybody cherishes feline gifs. Be that as it may, when a couple gifs become 60 minutes in length visit, they can truly hurt your efficiency. So in case you're going to utilize an informing framework like Slack, don't enable it to crash your profitability at regular intervalsâ€"rather, enhance itto limit how frequently it powers your fixation away from the errand at hand.You can likewise utilize informing stages for coordinated effort: approach your collaborators for recommendations or help on the task that you are dealing with, or set up a brisk, casual conceptualizing meeting. Social event different points of view from various individuals is consistently useful. What's more, if the discussion goes to a string of YouTube recordings, let your associates realize you'll be marking out for a piece so as to focus.4) Know which devices help get control over your attentionPlenty of old-school laborers think computerized gadgets aren't useful when working, while more youthful specialists will in general think advanced instruments are fundamental. Be that as it may, in all actuality, by and large, apparatus adequacy boils down to how they're utilized. In the event that they're actualized inadequately, they make one more thing for you to attempt to shuffle as you multitask.So become more acquainted with which devices can assist you with maintaining your attention on a solitary undertaking, and use them shrewdly. Turn on Focus Mode in Microsoft Word, or download an augmentation for efficiency. Tech can be a major wellspring of interruption, however it can likewise keep you on task.5) Reward center with a couple of moments of fun distractionevalWe've all had those days where we feel too hungry to even think about focusing, or too lured by decent climate to remain cooped up at a work area throughout the day. Be that as it may, in a ton of cases, those sentiments depend more on needs than needsâ€"they're motivations to abstain from getting to work.Luckily, a little attitude change can do some amazing things here. Have a go at rewarding those little interruptionsâ€"a treat, a brisk stroll outsideâ€"as a prize instead of a need. Set a sensible objective, such as answering to the entirety of your open email strings, and afterward treat yourself once you've hit it.6) Plan time to determine your huge distractorsSome interruptions aren't actually fun, and they wouldn't be incredible to use as an award for some genuine core interest. In those cases, book yourself some an ideal opportunity to confront the distractions.Is your jumbled work area making it elusive a few structures you need? Use some portion of your mid-day break to tidy it up. Stressed over traffic during your busy time ride home? Check whether you can alter your calendar to go outside of that window. Have too many internet browsers opened on your PC screen?evalTake a couple of moments to bookmark any superfluous ones, and return to them later.Once you've dealt with the extremely tricky interruptions, you can begin working without stressing that they'll sneak back in when you're on the clock.7) Turn the clock into a timerYou continue taking a gander at the clock inadvertentlyâ€"you thought an hour had passed, however only a couple of moments have ticked by. Furthermore, despite the fact that you have huge amounts of assignments to do before the finish of today, your regular clock looks continue pulling your core interest. What would y ou be able to do as such, a conspicuous fix here is to make inadequate gatherings progressively compellingâ€"yet what is a successful meeting?Here are a few procedures to hold a powerful meeting:Assign a pioneer of the gathering who will keep the subject of the gathering with the goal that individuals won't sit around accidentally moving to off-topic.Be mindful of the gathering's time cutoff, and move speedily through the agenda.Assign an individual to record data from the meeting.On top of remaining focused, attempt to amass gatherings if conceivable so as to protect a couple of greater squares of time in your calendar. Indeed, even the best gatherings can lose you on the off chance that you have 15â€"30 minutes of personal time between every one of themâ€"that is too long to even think about doing nothing, however a long way from sufficient opportunity to get into a groove.You can't totally take out every expected interruption in the working environment, yet you can change your wa y to deal with assistance them work in support of yourself. Realize what diverts you, at that point utilize the recommendations here to get your efficiency in the groove again.

Thursday, July 23, 2020

Ep 178 - Making Our Cities Smarter More Accessible - Workology

Ep 178 - Making Our Cities Smarter More Accessible - Workology Episode 178: Smarter Cities with Megan Lawrence (@accessgeo) and Laura Ruby (@lauraruby ) Welcome to a new series on the Workology Podcast we are kicking off that focuses on the future of work. This series is in collaboration with the  Partnership on Employment Accessible Technology  or PEAT. Accessibility isn’t just limited to our workplaces. It’s about our communities and places ourselves, our friends and families call home especially our urban areas. These urban areas are commonly referred to as “smart cities” but it’s more than that. A special thank you to our podcast sponsor is ClearCompany Episode 178: Smarter Cities with Megan Lawrence (@accessgeo) and Laura Ruby (@lauraruby ) A smart city is an urban area that uses different types of electronic data collection sensors to supply information which is used to manage assets and resources efficiently. This includes data collected from citizens, devices, and assets that is processed and analyzed to monitor and manage traffic and transportation systems, power plants, water supply networks, waste management, law enforcement, information systems, schools, libraries, hospitals, and other community services. 60% of accessibility experts believe today’s Smart Cities are failing persons with disabilities. Click To Tweet So for today’s podcast, we’re going to talk about challenges facing smart cities, success stories, and how we can help as HR leaders and business professionals. Our podcast guests are Megan Lawrence and Laura Ruby. Megan Lawrence is an accessibility technology evangelist at Microsoft. Megan builds trusted relationships with customers, NGOs, and Assistive Technology partners to further Microsoft’s mission of empowering every person and organization to achieve more through the lens of inclusion. Laura Ruby is the Director, Worldwide Accessibility Public Policy Standards with Microsoft. She coordinates the companys efforts to make products and services accessible to users with disabilities. Prior to her role at Microsoft, she worked at ATT as a member of the global corporate accessibility team. Accessible Smart Cities Create More Employment Opportunities Cities are where people including those with disabilities live, work, and play. Megan says that employment does not start when you walk into the door of your workplace. Cities and employers are part of the larger ecosystem driving business, economy, and culture. Smart cities help support the whole employee from getting the education, to having accessible transportation, to providing that pathway for people to get that dream job that they always wanted. Both Megan and Laura share that cities are often the largest employers the inclusive accessibility maturity model for smart cities really takes a look at how that city is creating an inclusive work environment for people with disabilities. Some statistics are showing that unemployment for people with disabilities has increased just ever so slightly instead of declining. If were really going to change the unemployment rate for people with disabilities its going to take all of us coming together to provide that support system. Live, Work, Play Smart cities are an important part of making not just cities but the lives of those who live and work within our cities a more inclusive and accessible place. As a data nerd, I am really interested in how technologies and tools can help improve a cities operation, support offerings and infrastructure. I love Microsoft’s involvement and the work that G3ict is also doing. I find the use of technology and data extremely interesting and not unlike what we’re trying to do in HR pulling all our data and information from various technologies and systems into a unified place. Maybe the smart cities model might be a model for our own workplace data and analytics. Connect with Megan Lawrence and Laura Ruby. RECOMMENDED RESOURCES Innovation is the Key to Smarter Cities Smarter Cities 4 All Tool Kit Smartercities4all.org Microsoft.com/accessibility FDRES IT Accessibility Badging Program G3ict: The Global Initiative for Inclusive ICTs   Episode 178 Transcript How to Subscribe to the Workology Podcast Stitcher PocketCast iTunes Podcast RSS Google Play YouTube TuneIn You can also click here to find out how to be a guest on the Workology Podcast. *A special thank you to my production team at Total Picture Radio.

Thursday, July 16, 2020

6 Ways Men Can Be Stronger Allies to Women in the Workplace

6 Ways Men Can Be Stronger Allies to Women in the Workplace Proof shows that when men are purposely occupied with sex incorporation programs, 96% of associations see improvement contrasted with just 30% of associations where men are not engaged.So how might we better draw in male partners today? As of late, pioneers from Nielsen, IBM, Google, Facebook, PwC, Accenture, Robert Half and Salesforce met up at Galvanize 2019, a two-day highest point facilitated by Fairygodboss, to examine the significance of male allyship. Watch the video beneath for key bits of knowledge from these assorted variety pioneers on how we can more readily connect with male partners and bolster ladies in the workplace.If we dont include male partners into the discussion, we dont make a culture of incorporation where everybody can be heard, said Celeste Warren, Mercks Vice President of Global Diversity and Inclusion Center of Excellence, to Galvanize attendees.Its significant for ladies to see that men are assuming liability to change the game, she included. This moves t he discussion completely.The uplifting news is that men truly need to help, said Sam Saperstein, Head of Women on the Move at JP MorganChase. Its simply an issue of beginning. Today we realize that when male partners are associated with sexual orientation assorted variety activities, the outcomes are impressively better. The issue is that most men dont realize where to start. Actually, in an ongoing Fairygodboss overview, 88% of men said they need to be partners to ladies, however 56% dont know how to help.If men are fundamental to quickening the way to sexual orientation correspondence in the work environment, what are noteworthy advances they can take?To dive into this further, we asked pioneers at Galvanize: Whats the initial step men can take to be more grounded partners to ladies in the working environment? Heres what they said.1. Be a piece of the conversation.I accept that male partners are basic to helping ladies be effective, both on an individual level and across society i n general. The initial step that men can take is to get included. Dont be reluctant to be a piece of the discussion and all the more significantly, figure out how to be a piece of the arrangement. Anne Chow, CEO, ATT BusinessAnne Chow, CEO of ATT Business2. Listen.Men must comprehend that being a partner isn't a demonstration of gallantry and we are at a genuine second so as to quicken the way to sexual orientation uniformity. Incorporation is tied in with ensuring that everybody, particularly ladies, are heard. Furthermore, men can assume an immense job in getting that going by essentially tuning in. Will Post, Industry Manager of US Marketing Solutions, FacebookWill Post, Industry Manager of US Marketing Solutions, Facebook3. Ask questions.Men can be better partners on the off chance that they initially comprehend what they have to do. Our exploration shows that men feel truly awkward and uncertain of themselves with regards to supporting ladies in the work environment. So I would express men first need to tune in and pose inquiries. Georgene Huang, Co-author, FairygodbossGeorgene Huang, Co-organizer, Fairygodboss4. Get out behaviors.I think the initial step that men can take is simply to tune in, watch and get out practices that shouldnt be in the working environment. It doesnt take a ton of assets to be a partner it takes deliberateness and that is the thing that we need a greater amount of from men. Paul Francisco, CDO and Head of Workforce Development Programs, State StreetPaul Francisco, CDO and Head of Workforce Development Programs at State Street (second to right)5. Comprehend that allyship is reciprocal.I imagine that as men consider being partners, recollect that partners are equal. Comprehend that liberality consistently returns and if were extremely liberal as partners to ladies, were really going to be more grounded and perform better in our jobs too. David Kenny, CEO and Chief Diversity Officer, NielsenDavid Kenny, CEO and Chief Diversity Offic er, Nielsen6. Give ladies credit.Men can be more grounded partners basically by supporting the jobs and progression of ladies. Regardless of whether youre not an administrator, ensure ladies are welcome to gatherings, rehash what ladies state and give them acknowledgment for their thoughts. That is an extraordinary method to show bolster and be a partner. Bozoma Saint John, Chief Marketing Officer, William Morris EndeavorThe New York Times Rebecca Blumenstein (left) with Bozoma Saint John, CMO of William Morris Endeavor (right)Your 2020 Blueprint for Gender Diversity in the Workplace.To help your organization better draw in male partners and quicken the way towards sexual orientation uniformity, look at our most recent asset, Inside, get tips from assorted variety pioneers who share five stages to building increasingly differing work environments, including how to:Take your decent variety speculation up a levelBuild your pipeline of qualified female talentEngage male alliesSeek purc hase in from the topRethink the eventual fate of work

Thursday, July 9, 2020

Design a Cache System

Design a Cache System Similar to our previous posts, we would like to select system design interview questions that are popular and practical so that not only can you get ideas about how to analyze problems in an interview, but learn something interesting at the same time. If you have no idea about system design interviews, Id recommend you read this tutorial first. In this post, we are addressing the problem how to design a cache system. Topics covered by this post include: LRU cache Eviction policy, Cache concurrency Distributed cache system Problem How to design a cache system? Cache system is a widely adopted technique in almost every applications today. In addition, it applies to every layer of the technology stack. For instance, at network area cache is used in DNS lookup and in web server cache is used for frequent requests. In short, a cache system stores common used resources (maybe in memory) and when next time someone requests the same resource, the system can return immediately. It increases the system efficiency by consuming more storage space. LRU One of the most common cache systems is LRU (least recently used). In fact, another common interview question is to discuss data structures and design of an LRU cache. Lets start with this approach. The way LRU cache works is quite simple. When the client requests resource A, it happens as follow: If A exists in the cache, we just return immediately. If not and the cache has extra storage slots, we fetch resource A and return to the client. In addition, insert A into the cache. If the cache is full, we kick out the resource that is least recently used and replace it with resource A. The strategy here is to maximum the chance that the requesting resource exists in the cache. So how can we implement a simple LRU? LRU design An LRU cache should support the operations: lookup, insert and delete. Apparently, in order to achieve fast lookup, we need to use hash. By the same token, if we want to make insert/delete fast, something like linked list should come to your mind. Since we need to locate the least recently used item efficiently, we need something in order like queue, stack or sorted array. To combine all these analyses, we can use queue implemented by a doubly linked list to store all the resources. Also, a hash table with resource identifier as key and address of the corresponding queue node as value is needed. Heres how it works. when resource A is requested, we check the hash table to see if A exists in the cache. If exists, we can immediately locate the corresponding queue node and return the resource. If not, well add A into the cache. If there are enough space, we just add a to the end of the queue and update the hash table. Otherwise, we need to delete the least recently used entry. To do that, we can easily remove the head of the queue and the corresponding entry from the hash table. Eviction policy When the cache is full, we need to remove existing items for new resources. In fact, deleting the least recently used item is just one of the most common approaches. So are there other ways to do that? As mentioned above, The strategy is to maximum the chance that the requesting resource exists in the cache. Ill briefly mention several approaches here: Random Replacement (RR) As the term suggests, we can just randomly delete an entry. Least frequently used (LFU) We keep the count of how frequent each item is requested and delete the one least frequently used. W-TinyLFU Id also like to talk about this modern eviction policy. In a nutshell, the problem of LFU is that sometimes an item is only used frequently in the past, but LFU will still keep this item for a long while. W-TinyLFU solves this problem by calculating frequency within a time window. It also has various optimizations of storage. Concurrency To discuss concurrency, Id like to talk about why there is concurrency issue with cache and how can we address it. It falls into the classic reader-writer problem. When multiple clients are trying to update the cache at the same time, there can be conflicts. For instance, two clients may compete for the same cache slot and the one who updates the cache last wins. The common solution of course is using a lock. The downside is obvious it affects the performance a lot. How can we optimize this? One approach is to split the cache into multiple shards and have a lock for each of them so that clients wont wait for each other if they are updating cache from different shards. However, given that hot entries are more likely to be visited, certain shards will be more often locked than others. An alternative is to use commit logs. To update the cache, we can store all the mutations into logs rather than update immediately. And then some background processes will execute all the logs asynchronously. This strategy is commonly adopted in database design. Distributed cache When the system gets to certain scale, we need to distribute the cache to multiple machines. The general strategy is to keep a hash table that maps each resource to the corresponding machine. Therefore, when requesting resource A, from this hash table we know that machine M is responsible for cache A and direct the request to M. At machine M, it works similar to local cache discussed above. Machine M may need to fetch and update the cache for A if it doesnt exist in memory. After that, it returns the cache back to the original server. If you are interested in this topic, you can check more about Memcached. Summary Cache can be a really interesting and practical topic as its used in almost every system nowadays. There are still many topics Im not covering here like expiration policy. If you want to know more about similar posts, check our system design interview questions collection.

Wednesday, July 1, 2020

Enduring, Flexible Networking Strategies for Career Enhancement

Enduring, Flexible Networking Strategies for Career Enhancement Career advice can be topical and fleeting, good until the next best idea comes along. Because networking can be intimidating and stressful for many of my clients, I offer a few simple tips that are enduring, flexible networking strategies they can use for their entire careers. Once they become habits, you can supplement with additional strategies, but these will always remain useful and effective on their own. Deepen connections. Think of your network of contacts as a garden. You have to water and feed your contacts so theyll bloom year after year. Schedule a little time each week to reach out and connect with a few contacts at a time. Phone, email, or meeting for coffee or cocktails, its your choice. Greet them warmly, offer a little personal or professional update on what youre doing, and then ask about them. Make sure to offer something of value fairly regularly. An open position that might fit them, the name of a good recruiter, or industry news. This way, theyre more likely to offer a connection or referral in return, even years after first meeting you. Its also a good idea to prune your garden once in a while. If a contact leaves your industry, retires, or become uninterested in networking, take them off your prime contact list. Reserve your efforts for reciprocal contacts. Connect with recruiters. Its important to connect with at least a few recruiters who specialize in your industry. Because of their connections, recruiters often hear of positions before they become public, and theyre experts in fitting candidates to jobs in your field. Treat them like any other network connection, and be sure to offer referrals and information about job openings. The more value you offer over time, the more likely you are to be top-of-mind when your dream job comes open. Attend events. You dont have to attend 2 dozen networking events a month, thats more than anyone has time to do. Keep your eye out for industry-specific events and general events with interesting speakers or other value to you. If the monthly or quarterly event you like to attend becomes stale or poorly attended, find another to take its place. Raise your game: Make sure the ones you attend offer good value and that you take advantage of the opportunities. Are they rich in contacts? Rich in content? Offer access to contacts from organizations youd like to join? You must attend at least an event every month, preferably two, but you can be choosy about which ones to attend. Do consider attending alumni events from your Executive MBA program, as those alumni are often contacts worth cultivating. Now that youve discovered these key networking strategies, start using them and youll profound changes. RELATED ARTICLES: How To Tell If You Are Using LinkedIn Effectively 10 Things To Consider When Writing A Cover Letter Cover Letter Tips Check us out on LinkedIn