Presentation skills: how you present yourself
Learning how to present oneself to the world is an important lesson that should be learned at a young age and also taught. The fundamental lesson is that in order to present your best self, you have to be your best self because if you do not like yourself, who else will?
To be your best self you need to have an idea of what you want out of life, you need to know your worth and what you need to live up to, to achieve your full potential. Be passionate about life and its possibilities. Breath deep and play to your strengths. Being confident is all about how you feel and confident you seem to the world. So if you feel self-assured, poised and confident chances are you will look that way too.
Presentation skills training, are skills that show case your competency and proficiency. Here are a few tips and examples to help you be your best self for an interview or board review meeting or a presentation.
1.Know your stuff
Learn about the company, individual or individuals whom you are approaching. Take the time to do research and be prepared for any or some difficult questions. Show cases your talent.
2.Take note
Pay attention to body language and engage someone who is distracted. Listen carefully to what is being asked and answer the question do not beat around the bush.
3.Do not be arrogant
Do not confuse confidence with arrogance. Be modest, allow for mistakes in fact welcome your errors just be gracious about your imperfections, admit to them and ask if you do not understand a word or phrase, even use humor to deflect.
4.Use humor
Using a bit of humor to lighten an atmosphere taut with tension is a smart move, choosing that moment to become a full fledged comedian is not.
5.Look into their eyes
There is something oddly charismatic about someone who looks you in the eye, use that to your advantage and connect with them.
6.Smile and interact
No one is an island. So instead of being unapproachable, smile and open yourself up to a world of opportunity when you adhere to be sociable.
7.Dress the part
When you think about the impression you want to give then dress accordingly.
Go on…make a good and lasting impression…
Do I have to pay into my occupational pension scheme or can I decline?
My HR department has recently sent us all an email saying that they will be reviewing their occupational pension scheme soon and that everyone will have to start paying into a pension due to new Pension Legislation. I wondered whether they are able to do this as I personally do not want to tie my money up under pension rules, I’d rather have the cash to pay off my debts. It seems that they are going to match our payments into a pension, which is very generous of them, but what if I don’t want any payments to go in, can I decline?
If I don’t have to pay in myself, could I still get the money that my company were going to pay into a pension, added to my salary each month? Ideally I would like to pay off my credit card debts and then start paying into a pension in a few years time but it seems like the government is forcing me to start paying in now, I assume so they can pay us less state pension in future.
Does anyone have an opinion on this as I’m getting worried about these extra payments affecting my income.
Education needed over Life Assurance Cover
More needs to be done to get people to buy Life Assurance Cover, according to a report from Swiss Re.
The 32-page Term and Health Watch report showed that sales of individual term life assurance, critical illness cover and whole of life policies rose last year. New whole of life business increased by 16.8 per cent to 371,467 policies, compared to 318, 078 in 2009, while critical illness sales showed a more modest increase of 0.8 per cent.
However income protection sales fell 5.6 per cent to 110,743, compared to 117,288 in 2009.
Ron Wheatcroft, co-author of the report, said, “This year could be difficult but reductions in welfare spending in the next few years could provide great opportunities for the insurance market in the longer term.
“In the meantime it will be important to keep getting out simple and unambiguous messages about the need for people to purchase protection. The industry has made progress in communicating with consumers but more needs to be done.”
Despite a fall in mortgage lending, term business sales rose by 2.2 cent, totalling £1.54m policies, while overall term sales through IFAs and independent distribution channels rose by 7.3 per cent.
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Instant Payday Loans: Fast Cash to Tide Over Pay Day
Instant Payday Loans: Fast Cash to Tide Over Pay Day
The problem is that you borrow money for a reason the reason to tide over to payday, to fund a holiday, some home improvement etc. the focus on what the way we want to get the fast cash. For Instant Payday Loans has given a good answer to the spending question and suggested to spend now and repay the amount tomorrow. Altogether, it has become an ethos of the day.
Here is certain eligibility criteria that you need to fulfill in order to qualify for these payday loans. For example, it is must for you to be at least 18 years of age and to be permanent citizen of the UK. Besides that, the most important factor is that, you must have a stable employment and an active checking account. Your present job should be at least three months old. As older your job, the more your chances of securing instant approval gets brighter. A checking account is a bank account, in which your monthly salary is credited every month on the payday.
Before you hit the shops you should start with a planning of your expenses. You know that borrowing will almost always cost you money. Is saving is a possibility instead? You should think also about what you would do if interest rates rise again. Most people will look no further than their own bank or building society, but a variety of providers now offers instant payday loans. It is certainly pays to shop around. Do not assume that your bank will offer you the best deal. Go to a name that you can trust and steer clear of dubious-looking adverting sections.
Using Internet, many lenders have gone online to provide payday loans. Gone are the days when you had to submit supporting documents to apply for a cash loan. All you need to do now is simply login to a lenders website, complete online application form, and wait for them to do verification. The whole process can take as quick as one hour or so. And a little later, you will get the money deposited directly into your bank account.
How You Trap Into Credit Card Debt
These days credit card or plastic money is very popular and used extensively. It is indeed of great utility if used in a calculative manner, but it is also the main cause that leads many people trap into credit card debt. Let see how it happen to most of people.
Many of retailers are implementing easy payment scheme for their products or services, with some fraction amount of money for monthly installed, you can buy thousand of dollars of items or go for a luxury vacation which you can’t afford to buy if one lump sum of money is needed, these monthly installment are automatically charge to your credit card. Every month, you just pay the minimum amount of your credit card balance and you continue spend on your credit card. Let use a case study to review on how a person credit card debt can grow and how it will take to get rid of it.
Case Study
Scott earn $2,500 a month, he is holding a credit card with interest rates of 12%. All his credit cards allow him to pay a minimum of 3% or $10 which ever is higher. His credit card limit is $15,000.
Scott’s credit card balance at current month is $4,550 ($3000 in principle and $1550 interest). He tends to pay the minimum of his credit card balance and each month he will averagely swipe about $500 on petrol and other utilities.
Let see how’s Scott’s credit card balance grow:
Month 1
Credit card balance = $4,550.00
Minimum Payment = $136.50
New Credit Card Spending = $500.00
New Balance = ($4,550 – $136.50 + $500.00) = $4913.50
Month 10
Credit card balance = $7976.02
Minimum Payment = $239.28
New Credit Card Spending = $500.00
New Balance = ($7976.02 – $239.28 + $500.00) = $8236.74
Month 20
Credit card balance = $11109.85
Minimum Payment = $333.29
New Credit Card Spending = $500.00
New Balance = $11109.85 – $333.29 + $500.00) = $11276.55
Month 30
Credit card balance = $13662.60
Minimum Payment = $409.88
New Credit Card Spending = $500.00
New Balance = $13662.60 – $409.88 + $500.00) = $13752.72
Month 36
Credit card balance = $14961.02
Minimum Payment = $448.83
New Credit Card Spending = $500.00
New Balance = $14961.02 – $448.83 + $500.00) = $15012.19
If Scott continues his practice, his will hit his credit card limit after 36 month compare to current month.
Let say Scott stop using his card with the balance at month 36 of $15012.19 and continue paying the monthly minimum. It will take him 228 months which equal to 19 years to just to pay off his $15012.19 debt.
The above example is just a simple case study to show you how your credit card debt may piles up so quickly without you even aware of it. You need a lot of time and spend a lot of money on interest in order to get rid of this debt. In real life, many people have more than one card and other loans to support; hence situation may even worse.
How to get rid of credit card faster & affordable?
If you are already at this situation, the first thing you need to do is to change your behavior of paying the minimum only. Paying more each month will definitely pay off your debt faster but the question is you may say that you can’t afford to pay more than the minimum. In actually fact, the easiest, faster and affordable way to get rid of your credit card debt is maintain your current minimum monthly payment.
For example, we use back Scott’s case. If he affords to pay the minimum payment of his $15012.19 debt, which is $448.83, this is his affordable payment. If he continues to pay $448.83 every month instead of the minimum of his credit card balance, he will need only 43 months to pay off his debt as compare to 228 months. This mean, Scott will have his debt free life in less than 4 years instead of 19 years.
In Summary
Credit card will remain important in many people life, use it intelligently for your convenient, but you much carefully manage your credit card balance, don’t let this plastic money drag you into financial crisis; the ideal way is pay the balance in full each month.
Match Your Savings to Your Life Goals
Everyone has different things they want to do in their life, whether it is to start a family or get an education. There are all type of loans to get a house or fund your college, but sometimes saving money is the best way to make sure the money will be there when you need it. With so many federal programs being cut and lender restrictions strangling all forms of credit, it’s a good idea to start funding those dreams today with your own money. If you do end up qualifying for a loan later, those savings can go towards some other dream you haven’t achieved yet, either.
House Fund
This type of savings fund is important even if you qualify on your income for a mortgage. The issues is not whether you can pay the monthly payment, but whether you have 20 percent to put down as a down payment when you go to ask for a loan. If your family is growing and you foresee the need for a home to get your kid into a decent school district, it’s a good idea to set up a house fund now.
College Funds
This is another life goal that needs careful savings planning. There are a number of ways to save for your children’s education, but by using a 529 plan you can get some special tax incentives for saving, also. The plans are generally administered by a state or educational institution and can vary widely in their terms. So, check carefully before you save money in a plan that might not meet your life goals.
Retirement
At some point you will either want to or have to stop working. By carefully putting money aside from automatic withdrawals into a 401K or IRA program, you can have additional monies to retire on that will make your life much more pleasant later on. These programs are often tax-deferred, providing an easier way to take money out of your paycheck without missing it so much
Saving Money While Running a Business
A business venture can end up gobbling tons of capital before it ever produces a single dime. While it’s true that venture capital, merchant funding, and sizable bank loans can help to get you into operation, the more you save of your financing the better you are able to weather emergencies that arise later. There are ways to save money when you are outfitting a new business and even when you’ve been in business for a while. Here are few things to try to creatively save your business money.
Office Equipment
You can get office equipment for free just by offering to pick it up and “dispose” of it for businesses that are trying to get rid of it. If they have to call a waste removal company it will cost them. However, if you can use it for your own business, you can offer to remove it for free and use it in your own offices.
Offer Telecommuting
If you can’t afford to rent space or house employees, seek to hire workers via telecommuting. You can do this through a third-party that has many virtual assistants or workers in their membership, or you can offer this one-on-one. You do not have to get equipment for the workers, nor do you have to pay for lighting, water, and other utilities.
Relocate
If your rent has shot up or you aren’t getting enough business, it’s time to review your location. Maybe you need to find offices near where your clients reside. Maybe you can get cheaper deals elsewhere since the economy is still on the road to recovery and commercial space is in low demand. If you like your place, don’t be afraid to negotiate a reduction in rent and say you will move if not offered a better deal. If your landlord is afraid to lose your business in a bad commercial office space market, they will probably be willing to deal.
How To Use Your Equity Smartly
Equity is the value of your home at current market value after deducting the outstanding mortgage on your home, which is what you would have left over in the event that you sold your property at market value and repaid your outstanding mortgage. Home equity is built over time; as equity builds, you create a pool of money which your can utilize it later for many purposes.
In general, it is unadvisable to spend your equity money on things that do not give you ROI (return on investment) such as frivolous vacations. Use your home equity to clear your bad debts is actually a type of spending on your equity money. You could avoid yourself from trapping into debts by carefully plan your budget and spend with what you earn.
A smarter way of using your equity is use it to grow your equity further, spend on things that will bring you ROI. Ways to use your equity smartly include:
Start Your Own Business
You can use your home equity to borrow a low interest loan to generate the capital necessary to start your own business. Just be sure that you have a sound business plan in mind and that you have other safety cushions in place.
During the initial stage of your own business, you could maintain your reliable first income stream (to protect you against any cash problems) while working to bring your own business up to the stage.
Home Improvement
A better home condition will increase your home's resale value. Hence you can dip into your equity to generate funds for home improvement. Your home improvement project will improve your home condition and provide you with a more comfortable living, and you could get a higher resale price whenever you want to sell it. But remember that not all home improvement projects will contribute equally to your homes resale value.
Children Education
Growing equity is a great way to generate fund for your children education needs. You can get loan against your home equity for your children educational needs. Using your equity to invest on your children education will get them a brighter future and at a better position to compete in the challenging job market.
Improve Your FICO Score Debt is unavoidable for many people as long as we have credit cards, mortgage or car, but you could prevent yourself from trapping into bad debts condition by carefully planning your budget and spending with your financial affordability. Instead, your equity can help you to improve your FICO score. By paying off creditors, you can improve your FICO score and potentially qualify for a lower refinancing rate. To make the most out of this process, know your interest rates, for both savings and debts. You can get help from expert such as an accountant to help you with the calculations. With so many rate variables in play, its easy to get confused about how to consolidate, how to pick the right term for your home equity loan, and how much to allocate to savings and how much to allocate to payments.
In Summary
Home equity is the money you have put down against the principal of your house as a savings account, be aware that if you fail to budget effectively and over draw your equity. You could lose your house, wind up in credit trouble, or even have to file for bankruptcy. Hence, use your equity smartly is a great way to pursue your wealth building.
How to Save Money on Your Energy Bill
Is it just me, or have energy prices just been going up and up lately? Unfortunately, this results in significant increases in our home energy bills.
Fortunately, there are a lot of relatively inexpensive (sometimes free) changes you can make around the home that will save you money. I’ve put together a list of twelve tips that cover heating and cooling, lighting, appliances, and home electronics. These areas all tend to be notorious energy hogs. Let’s get started.
Heating and Cooling Tips:
1. If you haven’t already, switch to a natural gas water heater (electric water heaters use twice as much energy).
2. Whenever possible, cool your home naturally. For example, you can plant shade trees around your house (especially on the east and west sides). Their protection keeps the sun from beating on your roof and siding during the summer, which can naturally keep your home 4 degrees cooler. (Trees also help insulate your house against cold winds in the winter.)
3. Seal your house to protect against heat loss in cold weather. Seal the ductwork, close the fireplace damper when it’s not in use, and install a timer on the bathroom exhaust fan.
Money-saving Lighting Tips:
1. Use dimmers on all your bulbs, and only keep lights as bright as needed for your work. Instead of turning on big watt-sucking overhead lights, use task lighting when appropriate.
2. Use timers and motion- or heat-sensing lights outdoors.
3. Make the most of the natural light from outside. Consider skylights and well-placed mirrors, which can reflect more light into a room, thus reducing energy costs.
Home Electronics Energy-saving Tips:
1. Unless you really need ten clocks glowing greenly at you day and night, unplug TVs, DVD players, stereos, etc. when not in use (you can plug them into a power strip with an on/off switch to make this easy). 60-80% of the electricity used by these devices is sucked down when they’re idle.
2. Unplug chargers when you aren’t actively charging your cell phone, iPod, battery charger, etc. Why? Because as long as the plugs are inserted into an outlet, they’re drawing electricity.
3. Unplug or turn off your computer when it’s not in use. And in case you forget, set the system to lapse into sleep mode after a certain amount of idle time (sleep mode draws 60-80% less energy than full-power mode).
Tips for Saving Energy with Appliances
1. If your refrigerator was made before 1993, replace it. It could be sucking down $140 a year in electricity as opposed to newer models, which require significantly less. Today’s Energy Star-rated refrigerators only use about $20 of energy a year.
2. Do all your laundry on the same day, and dry the loads back-to-back. This makes use of residual dryer heat.
3. If you have a top-loading washing machine, replace it with a front-loading model. These generally use 50% less energy and 1/3 less water.
That’s all the advice for this article. Apply these simple energy-saving tips, and you’ll soon be looking at smaller bills.