Bulloch, DuPertuis, Schulman, Seger & Co.

From the exhibition floor of the mega Consumer Electronics Show: compact, portable devices that will help you get your work done better and faster.This year’s Consumer Electronic Show in Las Vegas was better than ever. But putting all the flashy gadgets aside, what I really care about are gadgets that are going to help me be most productive in 2012. I found seven that are compact and portable, and might just help you to get your work done better and faster.There are so many phones to choose from this year, but this is the one that’s going to help you get things done. It has a full QWERTY slide-out keyboard that’s far superior to its predecessors. The keys are truly easy to type on and well separated, so there’s less room for error when e-mailing and texting on the go. This phone sits on Verizon’s high-speed LTE network, has a Dual-Core 1.2GHz CPU, and a gig of ram. Oh, and don’t worry, all this power isn’t a battery-drainer. The battery lasts for nearly a full day of talk time. On the software end, it has a cool work mode, and a MotoCast app that lets you sync files between your phone and computer. Coming soon to stores near you.Ultrabooks were the big craze at CES this year, but don’t call this laptop an Ultrabook. This new Samsung laptop is super light, weighing in at 2.6 pounds. It has a full 15-inch display, but fits into a 14-inch frame, making it super-portable, without giving up on screen size for productivity. Packed inside a .6-inch body is a speedy Intel i7 Processor, 128GB of solid-state storage, 4GB of Ram, and an HD webcam. But what makes this thing a winner is its battery. Leave the cord at home and work from anywhere, as this laptop can last more than 10 hours on a single charge, and it only takes 90 minutes to fully recharge. Bonus: This laptop boots up in just 9.8 seconds, and wakes up from sleep mode in less than two seconds.Communication across devices has never been simpler with this multi-device speakerphone system from Plantronics. Perfect for an entrepreneur working from home or a small business that doesn’t want to spend thousands on a phone system. Connect your mobile phone, land line, and computer, and enjoy premium full-duplex sound on the speakerphone. Tend to walk around while you talk? No problem. You have a great wireless microphone that is always integrated into the unit.This is one of the brightest mobile projectors out there. With its 300-lumens bulb, you can do a presentation even in well-lit environments. It’s also incredibly portable at 4×4 inches. Best of all, you don’t need a video or VGA cable to connect it to your computer. Just plug it into the wall, and wirelessly transmit your content from your PC to the wall. Finally: A bright, mobile projector that doesn’t require an IT department to use.Bluetooth headsets run out of battery. The wired ones just get tangled in your pocket. Zipbuds came up with a great solution for both problems with its wired mobile headset. Zipbuds zipper-integrated cabling never tangles. The ear-piece is good for both music and voice, with loud, crystal-clear sound and noise-cancelling technology gets rid of a lot of background noise. It’s coming out soon, and will work with any phone, including Android and iPhone.I got a peak at Windows 8 in action, and it’s awesome. This is the operating system that is going to make Microsoft finally stand out again. It’s built around the need to work in multiple applications without the hassle, so you get a seamless experience from mobile to tablet to desktop. The clean, “metro-style” interface features large thumbnail images that make navigation easy. From what I’ve seen, I’d say it’s most productivity-focused operating system out there.Phones are too small to handle a lot of your work, and tablets can be a hassle to carry because they don’t fit in your pocket. Samsung solved this problem with the Note. The Samsung Note is a hybrid tablet/phone with a 5.3-inch screen. It comes with a stylus that lets you take notes fast and, best-of-all, annotate anything. Need to add comments to a presentation, PDF, or screenshot? No problem. The Samsung Note even lets you crop out a specific part of whatever is on your screen, jot down your notes, and quickly send it out to your team. It also comes with a very fast dual-core processor, letting you easily switch between multiple applications. — Ilya Pozin

The path from long-term unemployment to discouragement to permanent joblessness is a one-way street, says Mark Gimein

That might be a good thing. Here’s why. (Hint: It has to with your brain–and theirs.)Some people at work are going to rub you the wrong way.You return from a trip, review the memos on your desk, turn on your computer—and immediately get a message from that guy in accounting, who says he needs your expense receipts ASAP. You’re steamed.You’re asked to schedule a short meeting with two staffers. A woman from marketing spends 15 minutes talking about her vacation swimming with dolphins. Now, you’ll need another meeting. You’re vexed.Neither of these individuals was trying to annoy you. In different circumstances, you may rely on those very same skills you found irritating. We all make snap judgments based on others’ behavior when we meet them, and we often take their behavior personally when we shouldn’t. You don’t typically have access to the inner-workings of your colleagues’ brains, but you need to know how to interact productively with them.The work I’ve done in brain and behavioral psychology allows me to predict the tone, temperament, and dynamics of human interactions at the office. In a workshop, I already know who is the most forceful and the most amenable, who naturally does the most or least “social” thinking, and so on, for all seven brain attributes (which I described in an earlier post). This lets me group participants in instructive ways.I’ll team up people from opposite ends of different spectrums—gregarious with reserved, irritable and amiable, and open-minded with single-minded. After an activity, I’ll ask everyone to reflect. When a naturally vivacious, decisive, focused person is teamed with a shy, conciliatory, agreeable person, the cautious one is crushed. Sometimes we’re annoyed when others contribute something we cannot. They make it look easy. For them, it is. To illustrate the differing ways people think, check out this exercise I often do in workshops.I assign a topic and divide everyone attending in pre-determined groups based on analytical, structural, social, and conceptual thinking, and place each person with the others who share his or her strongest “thinking” attribute. I hand out large pads of paper and colored markers, and ask the groups to take notes. I invite the teams to go wherever they wish, but they must return in 15 minutes.Invariably, one group will leave (usually the conceptual group) because those people do their best thinking while they are lying on the floor, or looking out a window—or, if it’s a nice day, outside. I predict that in 15 minutes someone will have to go find them, because this group may not return on time. Sure enough, 15 minutes later, I have to send someone to find the conceptual group, which usually gets a laugh.Generally, the structural team makes a numbered list in black ink, aligned on the page, in perfect teacher-printed handwriting. The analytical team creates a bulleted list of comments in blue ink, also printed. The social team makes a list using bright colors, possibly with illustrations and hearts. The conceptual team’s page will be covered with different colors of ink, ideas in balloons, pictures, and an attempt at some notes that will need to be explained.The greatest disparity is between the structural and conceptual teams, as well as between the analytical and social teams. The structural brains have little use for the conceptual list, since it is not numbered and doesn’t make sense. The conceptual brains will feel disdain for the structural list, which appears dull. The analytical brains find the social brains too touchy-feely. The social brains think the analytical brains have no heart.If you tried it, this dynamic would also play out among your staffers (group people by your best instinct if you don’t have a profile) and it has major implications for your performance.How do these personalities get along in the workplace? Here are some examples of how different “thinking” attributes may play out among your colleagues:People who are quiet, analytical thinkers may be perceived as uncaring—but you need their deftness with data. You’ll have to call them out to get it.Structural thinkers who are focused may seem overly cautious. They are not trying to shoot down your ideas; this is simply how they verify new concepts. Social thinkers who are peacekeepers may be regarded as emotional, but you won’t know why they are upset unless you ask. Their gift is how they care about the customer.Conceptual thinkers with a driving energy may be perceived as unrealistic and controlling—but you’ll love their innovative ideas.You need all brain attributes represented on your team. You can’t expect to love all your employees, but recognize their contributions to help smooth things over. Your differences aren’t personal—they’re necessary.

Advertisement:
Are your customers tuning you out?

  In the digital age, mass marketing no longer gets the job done. Customers want to feel a personal connection. So how do you get your customers to tune in? View our video to see how Pitney Bowes can help you make a personal connection.
http://www.personallypb.com

Ads by Pheedo

New disclosure requirements and new demands on companies top the securities regulator’s 2012 agenda.

Many of today’s best companies arose out of lucky mistakes. That’s why fear of being wrong is the biggest mistake of all.

There are a variety of new technologies advancing in 2012 that you should investigate, if you aren’t already doing so, to give your small business a leg up on the competition. These recent technologies are beginning to be widely adopted and will continue to drive business forward.

SAN FRANCISCO (AP) — Yahoo’s previous turnaround attempts have flopped under three different leaders with dramatically different backgrounds – former movie mogul Terry Semel, beloved Yahoo co-founder Jerry Yang and profanity-spewing Silicon Valley veteran Carol Bartz….

As CPAs gear up for tax season, they’ll find the Form 1040 series for 2011 looking much the same as that of the previous year, but only because of Congress’ 11th-hour compromise late in 2010 to keep it so.

n it, he shared some of his research on what over 50 former high-flying companies – like Enron, Tyco, WorldCom, Rubbermaid, and Schwinn – did to become complete failures.