Send your Employees on Vacation

As we emerge from recession, does your company need a shot in the arm? Are your employees running on empty? If so, send them all on a 30-day vacation! Take a extended vacation yourself.   You say your can't afford long vacations for all. That's OK, I am not actually proposing 30 days away from the store, office or shop. Rather than granting traditional time off, I encourage you to sponsor a company-wide "mental vacation" initiative whereby you and employees at all levels will step aside from the daily routine to contemplate an ideal career and lifestyle objectives for the remaining productive years.   Actual time off would be limited to one or two days in rotating shifts at exercise initiation. Periodic additional time-outs would be granted for follow-up assignments and self-examination. Your ultimate goal is to match up on-board talents and desires with your company's strategic objectives. But how can you inventory available talents, interests and aspirations unless employees first define for themselves what they are good at and precisely what they want to do?   Employee mental vacation exercises can be a huge success or a dismal failure. To ensure success, you will need to adhere to the following guidelines:   The exercise must follow a structured agenda and be coordinated by expertly trained facilitators (never an employee's immediate boss.) The exercise must be 100% voluntary and non-threatening. It must be equally OK to propose readical changes or to express complete satisfaction with the status quo. Challenge employees to cast off all self-imposed boundries. Ask each participant: "In a world free of limitation, how would you choose to spend your remaining productive years? What track do you desire: fast, slow or somewhere in between?" As a leader, you must be willing to listen and to sincerely seek to accomdate employees poposing change.You also must be willing to assist (within reason) employee efforts to develop those new skills needed to progress. Do you think an extended mental vacation might benefit you and your employees? To learn more, please visit our website: www.middleagerenewal.com or email me: roy@middleagerenewal.com.

An IRS Audit?--Preventing Mid-Life Renewal Relapse

I recently received a friendly letter from the IRS asking for $10,000 in additional 2008 taxes. How do I respond? IRS audit notices present an ideal excuse for us renewed mid-lifers to revert back to prior negative thought patterns. Similar relapse excuses might include job loss, a doctor's unfavorable diagnosis, a sharp stock portfolio decline or simply unkind words from a friend.   I implore you: don't abandon renewal! Should you receive troubling news, I recommend response as follows:    1) Always remember, others can change your circumstances but they can't erase your strenght of character or positive outlook on life. You and you alone can alter that!   2) Research all the facts. Was the mistake yours? Did you truly relish the job you just lost? What are your health treatment options? Can you salvage your investments? Are hurtful friends really saying more about themselves than about you?   3) Target the best possible resolution then visualize that favorable outcome continuosly. Internalize a favorable target outcome before seeking outside help. Tell your doctor you visualize full recovery then work with him or her on a comprehensive treatment and recovery regimen.  Work with your outplacement counselor to define what you truly wish to accomplish over the rest of your career and how to have fun doing it. Contact a tax accountant only after you have researched the facts. Invest only after setting firm short-term and long-term goals.   Above all else, never let a temporary roadblock derail your progress to sustainable mid-life renewal. Don't surrender to procrastination and depression. Take action now! Whatever the outcome, every time you and I face up to a problem and attack it, we will feel good and become stronger, more confident individuals. Six months from now, we can look back with pride.   Now go for a solution! Need some help? Our sole objective is to assist with middle age renewal Please visit our web site at www.middleagerenewal.com.