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8 qualities of remarkable employees. Forget good to great. Here's what makes a great employee remarkable. Great employees are reliable, dependable, proactive, diligent, great leaders and great followers… they possess a wide range of easily-defined—but hard to find—qualities. A few hit the next level. Some employees are remarkable, possessing qualities that may not appear on performance appraisals but nonetheless make a major impact on performance. Here are eight qualities of remarkable employees: 1. When a key customer's project is in jeopardy, remarkable employees know without being told there's a problem and jump in without being asked—even if it's not their job. 2.

People who aren't afraid to be different naturally stretch boundaries and challenge the status quo, and they often come up with the best ideas. 3. Remarkable employees know when to play and when to be serious; when to be irreverent and when to conform; and when to challenge and when to back off. 4. 5. 6. 7. 8. Great employees follow processes. More from Inc.com: Cover Letter Help: Don't Make these Cover Letter Mistakes. By Kim IsaacsMonster Resume Expert Your cover letter is the first thing employers see when they open your materials. Avoid these 10 mistakes, and make your first impression a good and lasting one. Mistake #1: Overusing "I" Your cover letter is not your autobiography.

Mistake #2: Using a Weak Opening When writing a cover letter, job seekers frequently struggle with how to begin. Weak: Please consider me for your sales representative opening. Mistake #3: Omitting Your Top Selling Points A cover letter is a sales letter that sells you as a candidate. Your Ad Specifies: Communication skills I Offer: Five years of public speaking experience and an extensive background in executive-level report. Mistake #4: Making It Too Long If your cover letter exceeds one page, you may be putting readers to sleep. Mistake #5: Repeating Your Resume Word for Word Your cover letter shouldn't regurgitate what's on your resume. Mistake #6: Being Vague Mistake #7: Forgetting to Customize Mistake #9: Being Rude. Team Management Skills. The Core Skills Needed to Manage Your Team Develop effective management skills. © iStockphoto/Andresr So you've just got a new job as a manager.

Congratulations! Either way, whether your team exists already or it's your responsibility to create it, what do you do next? This article looks at some of the key things that team managers need to do if their team is to thrive and succeed. First Things First But before that, some definitions are useful. A good starting point is the Warren G Bennis quote that "Leaders are people who do the right things; managers are people who do things right.

" Of course, these two roles overlap – and, to be fully effective, you need to fulfill both roles. The Importance of Delegation The top priority for team managers is delegation . Successful delegation starts with matching people and tasks, so you first need to explain what your team's role and goals are. Motivating Your Team Another key duty you have as a manager is to motivate team members. Developing Your Team. Preserving Integrity. Consistently Making the Right Choices Make the right choice every time. © iStockphoto/teekid You do not wake up one morning a bad person. It happens by a thousand tiny surrenders of self-respect to self-interest. – American writer, Robert Brault Nancy's boss has just let her know that her client's order is about to leave the company's warehouse. "The shipment was damaged by someone on our warehouse team," he says.

Nancy pauses, feeling uncomfortable. Her boss shrugs. Nancy's boss walks out and she sits at her desk, unsure what to do. Many of us have to make decisions that define who we are and what we believe in. In a world where headlines are often dominated by people who make the wrong choices, people who make the right ones can seem to be rare. In this article we'll examine what integrity is, and we'll see how we can develop it and preserve it by making the right choices in life. What is Integrity? The Random House Dictionary defines integrity as: Why is Integrity Important? Further Tips: Ethical Leadership. Doing the Right Thing Know in advance what you'd do. © iStockphoto We've seen some high profile ethical failures in the press in recent years. It will be hard to forget the devastation caused by accounting fraud at the investment company run by Bernard Madoff, or the earlier frauds at Enron and Worldcom.

People have also raised ethical questions over the welfare of some organizations' staff and suppliers. This highlights the extent to which it can be difficult for leaders to determine what's right and wrong. What we rarely see, however, are stories about the numerous companies that are managed by ethical leaders. So how do they do this? Define Your Organization's Values To lead your team with character and integrity, you must set an example. For example, the global technology giant 3M is well known for its company values.

Hopefully, your company has clear rules about how it wants team members to act. Your personal values are also important. Ask yourself these questions: Set the Tone. Leadership Styles. Choosing the Right Approach for the Situation Find out what makes a great leader, with James Manktelow & Amy Carlson. From Mahatma Gandhi and Winston Churchill, to Martin Luther King and Steve Jobs, there can be as many ways to lead people as there are leaders. Fortunately, businesspeople and psychologists have developed useful frameworks that describe the main ways that people lead. When you understand these frameworks, you can develop your own approach to leadership, and become a more effective leader as a result. In this article, we'll highlight some of the common approaches to leadership that you can use. We'll also look at some specific styles of leadership, and we'll explore the advantages and disadvantages of each.

Note: These frameworks and styles of leadership are based on several different approaches to leadership. Useful Leadership Style Frameworks Lewin's Leadership Styles Autocratic leaders make decisions without consulting their team members, even if their input would be useful. Six Answers Interviewers Need to Hear to Hire You. By Peter Vogt During the typical job interview, you'll be asked a lot of questions. But do you really understand what the interviewer needs to know?

"Most students have no idea why a recruiter asks a particular question," says Brad Karsh, a former recruiting professional for advertising giant Leo Burnett and current president of career consulting firm Job Bound. "They tend to think it's a competition to outwit the interviewer. " The reality is that employers have neither the time nor inclination to play games with you, especially when hiring.

Do You Have the Skills to Do the Job? According to Karsh, the employer must first determine whether you have the necessary hard skills for the position, e.g., the programming knowledge for a database administration job or the writing chops to be a newspaper reporter. Do You Fit? "Every organization's first thought is about fit and potentially fit in a certain department," Corey Blanck says. Do You Understand the Company and Its Purpose? Insight Center: The Next Generation of Global Leaders - Sponsored by Accenture. The Days of "Manager Knows Best" Are Ending - Sujai Hajela. Why Do Some Managers Fail? Why Do Some Managers Fail?

Posted on Wed, Jan 25, 2012 @ 01:31 PM Several years ago, the cover of Fortune Magazine fe atured a headline that read "Why CEOs Fail", linking to an article by Senior Editor Geoff Colvin and Dr. Ram Charan. One of the points the authors documented in their research was that CEOs (or any managers, really) fail more often due to poor execution than planning. As I watched all the buzz surrounding the change of management at Blackberry maker Research in Motion (RIM), I recalled the Fortune article.

His point was that the new CEO's style came across as flat and uninspiring, which made one suspect that his strategy (which isn't new) would be as well. The mention of Heins' style was interesting. Likewise, when mangers work at achieving strategic plans by interacting with their direct reports, the use of a coaching style that is congruent with the style of the person being coached will result in much higher levels of engagement. Obviously, if yo.