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Interpersonal skills play a vital role in your career development. It seems like a very natural and simple thing to do but communicating is a complex task, and it makes the situation worse if you don’t know how the other person will react to it.

There is a great dissimilarity between ineffective communication and the ability to communicate. It can lead to career discouragement and sometimes make or break the trust and deals.

5 Tips for effective communication

1. Body Language

Body Language is the biggest part of effective communication at any workplace.

It unknowingly expresses and reveals your attitude through the gestures and facial expressions to the listener and what you are thinking regardless of what you are speaking to them.

2. Physical Barriers

It is the most common kind of block that affects the communication process. This can be anything that distracts physically, like phone calls and other things.

It can also be the location of communication that can act as a barrier.

3. Overloaded Information

Effective communication at the workplace can often be blocked by flooding amounts of information, like receiving the same content mail from different persons.

It leads to its ignorance by many employees and results in missing out on the important details of the original mail.

4. Attitude

Your attitude and conduct should be clear, consistent, and polite. Acting this way gives them the impression that you invest on and care about the professional relationship.

It ends up discouraging miscommunications and improves clarity.

5. Perception

It can be considered as one of the main barriers to effective communication. Everyone looks at the world differently through his views.

This is the main problem with the perceptional barrier. No one knows where there is a good idea on the horizon. Keep your mind open to new ideas and proceed from a stagnant perception.

Above all, be genuine when you speak and keep your intentions clear. What will achieve tremendous results?

Germany is one of the favorite choices for higher education among students worldwide. The government has set very low tuition fees for international students.

As an international student, there are certain things that you need to prepare for before going to Germany. Anything other than home is difficult to adjust to. There are also multiple scholarships to apply for.

So here are a few things you should know about before studying in Germany:

1. Universities have oral exams

If you are used to writing essays and giving written exams, you will take some time to adjust to this. Oral exams are difficult because you have to give them right then and there.

Also, German universities have one massive paper for all the subjects at the end of the semester rather than having one paper per subject.

2. Doing laundry is complicated

German laundry machines are very different than US or Indian ones. The operations are very specific, and you will indeed be confused. So always take a German friend with you to help you initially.

3. Five trash cans system

This is going to be the most difficult task for you. Germans have the five trash cans system or Mülltrennung. You have to separate your garbage properly into five cans.

Recycling and reducing carbon footprint is an important part of the German lifestyle.

4. Being on time

Being early or late is considered rude. If you are invited to come at 8 am you have to reach 8 am. You can’t be a minute early or late.

Also, understand the system of ST and CT. CT classes begin 15 minutes later than the given time.

5. Learn the German language

Yes, there are courses available in English. But if you plan to settle in Germany, it is good to take up a summer German language class because why not.

Some complicated German words are used often and don’t have any direct meaning in English.

If you have plans to study in German, you better get these 5 things sorted.

Good luck!

If you are worried about job security and whether the company you are working for is stable enough for you to relax with a sense of job security, then you may want to read on.

Some top companies are considered stable enough and offer their employees a sense of job security with great benefits, health plans, and work.

According to Indeed.com, more than half of those employees surveyed complained about how insecure they feel.

Job security is one of their primary concerns when applying for a new job, right after wages and health benefits. Of all the companies surveyed, the following are top contenders for offering their employees great benefits, including job security.

Top Companies Offering Job Security

• Quiktrip
• Southwest Airlines
• Publix
• Costco Wholesale
• Princess Cruises
• Royal Caribbean Cruises
• HEB
• The Ritz
• Primerica
• Acclivity Healthcare
• Yale-New Haven Health

Why is Job Security Important?

Companies have started to understand the low impact morale can have on their workforce and that employees need to feel valued and be made aware of their contributions.

This directly impacts their productivity since the satisfied worker will go the extra mile for their company.

As a result, more companies have started to engage with their workers, taking their concerns, including job security, forward.

Of course, job security is relative since companies prefer to retain productive workers as opposed to those who are not. But with more HR managers reaching out to employees and making them feel worthwhile, bigger profit margins and targets are being met ahead of schedule.

So if you want a secure career with job security, you may want to check out any vacancies with the companies listed above.

You’ve got an opening wedge! Now is the time to recognize your abilities, broaden your horizons and get a permanent job in which you outshine others.

Your prospective employers will expect you to take on a new job role with utter aplomb.

Hence, you must know what you’re most passionate about and discern the qualities and skills that set you apart from the rest to sweeten your employer’s kitty.

How to be on top of your game?

If you want to have the edge over other candidates, it’s essential to exhibit the talents you possess. Seek opportunities in which you get to undertake several roles and recognize the one that suits you perfectly.

Once you display your skills to your prospective employers, you will likely receive work that matches those skills. This will aid in forming a cycle where you’re given work that you enjoy while performing exceedingly well, which in turn results in more work, eventually securing more stability in the job.

4 ways to magnify your Abilities

1. By communicating the role you enjoy doing the most, your employer would recognize the areas in which you could add value to the business.
2. You know your strengths. But now, you must also emphasize how these strengths can be associated with the company’s values and visions using a pragmatic approach.
3. Expand your capabilities by volunteering to work on different projects and take on different responsibilities. In this way, you’ll widen your career possibilities and increase your scope of growth.
4. Describe your skills, contribution, and achievements during appraisals or interviews to increase your chances of becoming a more permanent employee.

You need to show that you will be an asset to the company if you want your job to be permanent. The employer needs to see that you are reliable and trustworthy.

You may have received an offer from a company you’ve always wanted to work with, or maybe this is your first job.

While this makes you feel all fired up and ecstatic, it’s extremely important to pour over all the things mentioned in your contract before you sign it so that you don’t kick yourself over it later.

Here are 5 points you must look out for before you set your hand to the contract:

1. Salary and Incentives

Cross-check whether the salary on the contract matches what was mentioned in your offer letter. Most companies offer incentives and other benefits such as medical care, pension, bonuses, gift certificates.

Bonuses can be either performance-based or be put on ice after a certain period. Make sure that you check for this information in your contract.

2. Working Hours

This is one of the most important things to consider before you commit. You must know the number of days you’ll be working in a week, your day off, whether you’ll need to show up on weekends or work in shifts.

Remember to also check for payment terms for working overtime. If you disagree with the conditions, try to negotiate before signing the contract itself.

3. Work Location

If you have discussed flexibility with respect to working from home on certain days or in certain situations during your interview, it should also be mentioned in the contract.

Your job might require you to travel frequently and work across branches in an unfamiliar country, so check for this point as well.

If you protest it later, it might affect your pay significantly.

4. Leaves

You need to check if you are forbidden to take holidays during peak periods such as Christmas.

Also, make sure that you know the number of paid holidays you’re allowed to take annually and whether the balance holidays can be carried forward into the following year.

5. Job Role and Position

You should know what’s expected of you at work. Check whether the job responsibilities written in your contract countertype with the role you’ve applied for. Furthermore, remember to check for any errors in the title/position.

Do remember to check these 5 points before accepting any offer letter.

“Usually, it’s all the same.” “I was in haste.” These are some common reasons most people give when things go wrong, and they’re asked why they didn’t leaf through their work contracts.

So many of us just briefly glance through the contract. When a problem arises, we’re left feeling bewildered since we’re clueless about our contractual rights or the action taken in case of contravention of the clause.

However, here are 3 things that employees take as a word but are apocryphal:

1. Every employment provision is laid out on paper:

A contract’s clauses may not always be written on a single paper. They’re sometimes drawn up from other lexical or written sources.

The terms can be either ‘express’ or ‘implied.’ The former include clauses regarding your holidays, working hours, salary, sick leaves, job title. You need to check for these terms on every document related to your jobs, such as the job classifieds, payslip, or your work contract itself.

Implied terms are those that are incorporated into your contract by law or common practice, including conditions regarding your duties as an employee, the trust between two parties, company’s decision to offer bonuses annually.

These terms may not be explicitly expressed but are more tacit, and action can be taken in violation.

2. The company doesn’t have the right to relocate me if I disagree:

Do NOT overlook this term. If there is a “mobility clause” mentioned in your employment contract, then, by all means, your employer can move you to another location as per the confines outlined in the contract despite your protest. They might even deny payment.

Nevertheless, if no such clause is set out in the contract, you can refuse without facing any consequences. You will still be paid your wages.

3. I’ll be allowed to work through my notice period when I resign:

Most employees believe that they’d work their notice period. However, since your employer typically has the rights reserved, he could alternately pay you or send you off on garden leave for the entire notice period.

Employees who are off work for a certain period are often less preferred by their prospective employees, but once you’ve put down your papers, or the company decides to fire you, they would try and get rid of you at the earliest.

You will not be allowed to go against this decision. If you’re put on garden leave, you cannot even join another company until the notice period is over.

Roughly 26.2 percent of American adults suffer from mental disorders such as schizophrenia, anxiety, autism in a given year.

These statistics hit you like a ton of bricks! These days, people have become more aware of mental illnesses, and a few of them even volunteer to reach out to the people suffering from such disorders.

As per statistics, over 20,000 social workers currently work with adults in England, and a third of them are estimated to be working with mental health centers.

Social workers need to be good listeners and empathizers while also negotiating and analyzing things. They work face-to-face with mentally distressed individuals and communicate with their families, the police, and the courts.

If you would like to make a difference to this particular community, here’s a step-by-step guide that would help you become a mental health social worker:

Work Experience –

It’s very important to gain real experience working as a social worker. You could volunteer to work for a charity or as an assistant to a social worker. This will help you gauge your aptitude and capabilities in the mental health space.

Qualifications Required –

Undergraduates will need a bachelor’s degree in social work, available in universities worldwide. Graduates can enroll in a two-year master’s course in social work.

These universities will select you based on your level of empathy, communication skills, ability to work under pressure, and data analyzing skills. It’s not so easy to get admission since the competition is huge.

You may also apply for one of the selective fast-track schemes that allow you to attain a master’s degree as well as on-the-job experience. These courses provide both theoretical knowledge and job placements.

Seeking Employment –

You now have formal mental health social work training. What’s next?

The final step is to find a suitable job. NHS mental health trusts and some local organizations hire mental health social workers to work with community mental health centers. Others also seek employment in charities or work with private NGOs.

As more and more people become victims of mental health issues, the demand for mental health services keeps growing each year.

Despite the challenges involved, it’s a job that would make you feel content and bring a huge difference to others’ lives.

Many people worldwide are interested in working with non-profits for some other social cause. There are an ample number of non-profit organizations around the globe to work for.

Working for non-profits will need a passion for the cause you are working for. You must be in an urge to work for them every day and bring about change in the world.

Best Non-Profit Organizations to Work In

1. Asha India

Asha India is a non-profit which works for the slums in India. They provide slum dwellers with education, sanitation, and pure drinking water.

To improve the living conditions of the slums, they try hard and seek the help of government officials. They also rope in efforts from other agencies to make the results much better.

2. Gates Foundation

The founder of the organization is Milinda Gates, wife of Bill Gates. Most of their income goes to this foundation. They work hard to make every possible life live full.

They are on the line to eliminate as much poverty as possible. They help in reducing the child and mother deaths due to malnutrition.

3. Charity: Water

It is a non-profit that works to provide sanitized drinking water for those in need of it, using its 100% public donations for the same in developing countries.

They provide their staff with enough ability and freedom to publish content to connect to their supporters.

4. Make-A-Wish

Everyone has a unique wish, and they try to fulfill them with utmost liveliness and hopefulness. Make-A-Wish is a foundation that fulfills a child’s wish. It deals with children who are suffering from threatening medical conditions.

5. The March of Dimes

The non-profit was established in 1938. Since then, they have been helping the lives of thousands of babies and mothers. They help every child have a good healthy life to start with.

They are taking the help of social media to reach out more to create awareness and get assistance.

You can begin with any non-profit if working for a cause is your aim. But if you want to establish a career based on non-profit, you need to make some clever career moves!

Employees quit the organization for piles of reasons. There may be many personal reasons too, but the majority of them quit their jobs because of professional reasons.

An employer can address such reasons and bring a change to the organization. This includes employees’ perception of the job, work environment, culture, opportunities at the current workplace, and many other factors.

The most common reasons for employees quitting work are:

1. Lack of Appreciation

Employees leaving, for this reason, don’t need to be praised every time, but they seek appreciation at times and expect that their contributions to the institution are valued. Ignoring them for too long will eventually make them look for appreciation elsewhere.

It doesn’t cost a penny to the employer but will greatly impact the employee. So take the time to appreciate their work.

2. Poor Compensation

What is the primary reason for anyone to work? It is for money. So encourage them with much better pay. There are fewer chances of employees leaving if you encourage them with better pay options.

3. Bad Manager

A highly intelligent, skilled, and productive employee doesn’t make better managers every time. Organizations must invest in the leader to train them to enhance their role.

The lack of communication with the staff leads to poor management quality. Try to be effective as a manager to retain the staff.

4. Unchallenged Work

Make the employees excited about their work through team progressive activities. Have an open-door policy by communicating with the employees regularly.

Stay involved with them to know what’s going on really at their desks. Let them know the vision, mission, and values of the company.

Share mistakes with them and let them learn from them.

Taking care of the above points will boost your employees’ morale, make them more productive, and prevent them from leaving the organization.