One day you’re on top, the next you couldn’t feel lower. Entrepreneurs share their tips for getting through dark days.

Every entrepreneur goes through highs and lows. You come up with an idea: high. You tell your idea to a close friend or mentor and they knock it down: low. You hire a brilliant development team: high. Your star developer leaves for a better offer: low. You launch to great fanfare: high. After the celebration is over, nobody returns to your site: low.

It goes on like this. One day you are on top of the crest, the next you are at the bottom. The only thing that remains constant is that the next day will probably be different from today, which is something to celebrate on low days and fear on high days.

One of the best pieces of advice I ever got was to avoid public statements and big decisions when at the bottom of the roller coaster ride (advice I’m not entirely heeding in this moment). But you cannot bury your head in the sand until you get to the next upswing. You have to do something while you are feeling the doldrums. So I asked a group of entrepreneurs what they do to get through the low days and here is what they told me:

1. Seek solace in solidarity

“I remember being in one of those moments, and then seeing the story of Evernote on the cover of Inc. I read about the moment where it was all about to be over because he was about to be out of cash and then he got an email from an investor to give him money to keep going. Just hearing that made me think, well I can figure out how to keep going too.”—Emily Olson, Foodzie.com

Read more – 5 Ways to Survive the Worst Days

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During tough economic times, many people think they need to sacrifice their passion to focus on earning money. From a spiritual perspective, this is the exact opposite approach to generating real abundance. Though paying your bills takes practical action, it also requires an internal belief system, powered by inspiration and passion. Without an emphasis on passion, it’s likely that no matter how many actions you take, you’ll still wind up feeling stuck.

Neglecting passion blocks creative flow: when you’re passionate, you’re energized; when you lack passion, your energy is low and unproductive. Equally, energy is everything when it comes to earning. Your thoughts, attention, and focus affect your energy and, therefore, everything around you—including your bank account. So when you’re thinking only about the mundane to-do lists and practical action steps, you’re lowering your energy and, in effect, lowering your earning power.

But when you focus on following your passion and letting your inspiration flow, your energy gets a boost and your earning capacity is strong. Here are three simple and effective ways you can bring more passion into your life—even if you’re already incredibly busy:

Find passion outside the office.

Our culture places such a huge emphasis on our careers that we lose track of our passion projects. But who said your job had to be your only source of passion? A dear friend of mine is a powerful example of balancing passion and career: he works in corporate America, but moonlights as a guitar player. Though he spends his weekdays at a desk, he spends his weekends indulging in passion projects such as gigging with his band, writing, drawing and learning about art. Though he dedicates most of his time to his career, there is no lack of passion in his life.

Read more – 3 Ways to Infuse Your Work With Passion Again

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I recently came across the infographic (below), “Don’t Suck At Meetings” and had to share it along with 7 Tips For Successful Sales Meetings:

1. Make Sr. Management participation optional unless they need to be there

While you might ultimately need buy-in from the CEO, COO or SVP to get the deal done, if their participation isn’t required to meet a specific meeting goal, make it optional for them to join. Ask account contacts to describe who makes various decisions in the buying cycle so you know when more expensive employees need to be in the meeting. Also, remember your value to your company as well. Make sure the meetings you participate in have clear goals and the right decision-makers to authorize next steps so you’re not wasting company dollars.

2. Keep it concise

You’ll likely get more meetings and accomplish more if you keep meetings to 15-30 minutes. Doing so, along with clearly articulating the goals of the meeting in advance will not only be more productive than longer meetings, but will also demonstrate to a prospect that you are professional, courteous and efficient.

3. Listen

Speak less than half the time and when you do speak, ask open questions that uncover needs and lead to achieving the meeting goal.

Read more – 7 Tips for Successful Sales Meetings

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When it comes to time, we are all guilty of telling ourselves little white lies. Sometimes we tell big whoppers, too.

I don’t have enough time… I’ll get to it later… maybe someday… What are you saying to yourself?

Deceiving Ourselves

It’s easy to lie to ourselves. We feel it is harmless because we think it only affects us. (Which is not true…) And after all, it’s pretty easy to forgive oneself. But, these deceptions, both small and large, have impacts that control our lives. Perhaps, the biggest self lie ever told is, “I don’t have time.” Followed closely by, “I can’t do that.” What lies are you telling?

The Lies We Tell Ourselves

When you are trying to get things done, when you are trying to reach your goals, take a hard look a the things you are telling yourself.

Many times, we are self-limiting based on statements that are simply not true.

Here are the Top 10 Time management Lies That We Tell Ourselves:

– I don’t have time. – Yes, you do have time. The same in the day as everyone else. You have just chosen to spend it elsewhere.
– I have to do this. – The next time you say this, ask yourself, “What would happen if I didn’t do this?” Many of the things we take for granted as “must do” are only required because we let them be.
– I am going to exercise more. – I want to get into shape, but I don’t have time. (See #1) You do have time to workout, you don’t have the will.

Read more – The Top 10 Time Management Lies We Tell Ourselves

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Charisma is not a substitute for genuine leadership. These five steps can help you develop, and blend, the two.

Leadership charisma and personal charisma are very different things. They both involve the same kinds of personal attributes–the ability to project confidence, the capacity to engage others, skill in articulating ideas, vision, and goals—which may explain why some leaders aim for one when they should be developing the other.

Personal charisma is centered on the individual, as is the case with celebrities. Leadership charisma exists when a leader is charismatic in the service of the organization, for a greater good, or a higher purpose.

While personal charismatic traits can help a leader, too much of a good thing becomes unhelpful. Leaders who concentrate on constantly influencing others, for instance, may reduce the motivation and ability of their people to stake out their own opinions.

Here are several things to consider when growing your own leadership charisma.

1. Ask yourself: Why? The key to knowing which type of charisma you want to develop is rooted in your understanding of why you want to be more charismatic. You must ask yourself, “Why do I want this?” Do you crave attention, want validation, or are you trying to address some insecurity? Do you want to be magnetic because you think that’s what a leader should be? How does being more magnetic serve your leadership responsibilities? How will this enable you to better serve the organization? To better attend to your unique burden of being a leader?

2. You must be comfortable in your own skin. This is a broad encapsulation of the vital importance of knowing who you are as a leader, and why you are a leader, before you attempt to change your charismatic capabilities. Your “skin” in this sense is everything from your personal values and drivers to the precise point you currently find yourself in your life’s journey. Ask yourself, “What makes this leadership role at this time in my life the right role for me? How have I prepared? How will I continue to learn?”

Read more – 5 Steps to Better Leadership Charisma

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Every self-help program talks about the importance of taking a 10-15 minute break to boost your productivity.

Breaks give us much needed time to rest our eyes, move around, stretch our stiff muscles, get more blood and oxygen flowing to our brain, to unwind and obtain a fresh outlook on complex work problems.

There is just one problem – we often forget to take them. (Note: Going to the bathroom, grabbing a cup of coffee or checking Facebook updates does not count, as these activities hardly give us enough time to energize our body and restore our concentration and productivity.)

As strange as it may sound, taking regular breaks throughout the work day requires discipline and a little bit of planning. Actually, the reason why so many people push themselves to the limit of exhaustion is simple – they just can not think of any interesting activities they can do, during their break time. So they end up working for 4-5 hours straight until their body offers them a painful reminder.

If this sounds like you, here are 21 Counter-Intuitive Break ideas that help to restore your energy, sharpen your focus, boost productivity and avoid burnout at work.

1. Listen to a guided meditation. There are plenty of 10-15 minute meditations that allow you to trigger your creativity, let go of muscles tension and take your mind of the work at hand.

All you have to do is put on a headset, close your eyes and enjoy peace and relaxation even in the midst of work chaos.

2. Share your break with a co-worker. Alone, you might not always have the strength to pull yourself away from the computer, but if you have a friend taking breaks with you, it is much easier to stick with your break routine. In addition, it offers a great opportunity to bond with your colleagues and get to know them better.

3. Step outside for a fresh perspective. Leaving a stuffy office and letting yourself enjoy the warmth of the sunlight, the coolness of a breeze and the freshness of the spring air can do miracles to your mind and body. You will come back feeling rejuvenated and ready to approach your work with new energy and a fresh perspective.

Read more – 21 Counter-Intuitive Break Ideas to Boost Your Productivity at Work

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When the alarm goes off at 5AM I know I have to get up right away. Even a second of dozing off is a second too long of lost time. The day takes off from there and does not stop until my head hits the pillow at bedtime. “Stop the world, I want to get off,” I want to shout, but who has time?

This gets me thinking, in an effort to live life to the fullest, are we all overdoing it? Perhaps, but when I signed up to be a working mother no one explained that while you can have it all, there is a price to pay. After all, nothing in life is free, right? When I was diagnosed with breast cancer in 2008 I remember my initial reaction being not of fear or sadness, I knew I was a strong woman who would beat it; no, I was annoyed. Annoyed because it meant that I would have to slow down just a bit to make time for chemo, then surgery, then recovery. Even then, I pushed it. I snuck into my office a week and a half after surgery (I was supposed to be out for three weeks) because the stress of being away was just too overwhelming.

Okay, so maybe I take things a little bit to the extreme (yes, just a tad) but if you are the average working mom, research study after research study reflects that you are at higher risk for health problems, especially heart attacks and cardiovascular disease. One Harvard researcher even found that the spouses of working women are also affected; they too suffer higher stress level than the spouses of non-working women. Hey, nothing like sharing the wealth, huh? Of course these findings just highlight that when women work, their spouses need to step up participation in the work/home balance. In addition, stress, begets stress. When you are living with someone who is always stressed out it is hard not to feel the pressure.

So, are there solutions? Of course, however, if you are a working mom with barely any time to breathe, the thought of following through on the some of the solutions is enough to stress you out thinking about how you can find the time! As a big believer in practicing what I preach, I recently made a committed effort to reduce my own stress levels, I am happy to report that when I took on this task with the vehemence with which I live the rest of my life, it worked. I still have a full life filled with commitments from sun rise to sunset (it is 5am as I write this) but, I have learned to de-stress and let things go.

In an effort to avoid telling you what you must do to reduce your own stress (and thereby decrease health risks) I offer you the solutions that have truly worked for me and a host of my friends and family whom I turned to for effective suggestions and solutions:

1. Exercise it off. There is nothing like the feeling of getting your body moving. Running works for me. It allows me to get lost in my own thoughts while working off all the pent up frenetic energy and stress I carry around on an average day. I find that when I start my day with a workout it really helps. On days when time is limited, I shorten my workout but I try not to cut it out. It is one priority that truly makes me feel the good the whole day. In addition, there is nothing like the satisfaction of knowing you started your day this way.

Read more – Six Ways To Beat The Stress Out Of Your Life

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Learn how to perform the moving ring illusion in this excellent office magic tricks video.

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Seeing a project through to successful completion takes everyone involved. While champions for the content and process are needed among stakeholders, there are two roles that are extremely critical to the successful delivery of the project: sponsor and project manager (PM). These roles have a symbiotic relationship, which require constant collaboration and observance of respective responsibilities to meet project objectives.

Enthusiasm, motivation, and sense of purpose among stakeholders break down when the PM and the sponsor are not equally committed to the project process and outcome. The project will likely fail when the PM and sponsor are experiencing the following:

– Lack of alignment or common direction
– Constantly coping with changing priorities which result in crisis management
– Actions on agreements are not consistent with decisions made
– Communication and collaboration are inhibited
– Questionable strategies are accepted out of fear of retaliation
– Reactionary environment prevents using proven processes
– Executive management support is lacking or variable
– Competing agendas and priorities result in “turf politics”

This is such a critical relationship that I actually did a webinar about it for Systemation titled Managing Up — Keeping your projects from falling down. Have a look at it below. It’s got a lot of extra info not found in this article that also considers the relationship with all senior management.

Read more – Managing Up to Keep Your Projects From Falling Down

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By 2013, more than 1.9 billion people will use email –remarkably, that’s more than one in every five people on the face of the Earth. Certainly, there isn’t a company in the world that doesn’t use email to communicate with partners, suppliers, customers and prospects.

Even as email is one of the most powerful and ubiquitous one-to-one communication tools, many marketers fail to truly capitalize on the power of email to spread brand messages. Specifically: The lowly signature line.

Consider how many people glance at your signature every week, every month, every year. Couldn’t you put that prime marketing space to better use?

Check out these five ways that you can make your email signature a powerful tool for amplifying your message.

Remedy a Common Mobile Faux Pas

First, here’s a quick tip: Change your iPhone or Blackberry email signature as soon as possible! “Sent from my iPhone” or “Sent from my Blackberry” isn’t the best use of a mobile email signature –and many find it a bit pretentious. Update your Blackberry’s email settings with this guide. iPhone users click here. What should you change it to? Read on for ideas.

Create a Compelling Tagline

You’ve seen movie trailers or posters with a great tagline beneath the title: Fargo: “A lot can happen in the middle of nowhere.” Ferris Bueller’s Day Off: “One man’s struggle to take it easy.” Catch Me If You Can: “The true story of a real fake.”

Each of these examples features a compelling play on words and makes the reader want to know more. How can you make your company seem as irresistible as a great movie?

Read more – 5 Ways to Use Email Signatures as a Marketing Tool

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