When it comes to getting the number on the scale down, everyone is searching for the one perfect solution. Is diet the answer or is it exercise? Spoiler alert: What and how much you eat has a far greater impact on weight loss than how much you exercise, although working out is undeniably beneficial. Heres how it breaks down:

The Case for Diet

The Case (Sort of) Against Exercise

But exercise is still very important

While exercise wont by itself help you lose weight, its vital to your health. Regular exercise lowers blood pressure, improves cardiovascular health, strengthens bone and helps prevent injury as you age, says Steigerwald. Plus, if you are trying to lose weight, pumping up your workouts, particularly weight training, which builds muscle and may jump-start metabolism, can nudge you past plateaus. Studies also show that people whove lost weight keep it off if they exercise most days of the week.

Bottom line: While you cant out-exercise a bad diet, you need exercise to fine-tune a body made healthier by a good diet.

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Diet vs. Exercise - Mindful by Sodexo

FESTIVAL & EXHIBITION OPENING RECEPTION, SATURDAY, MARCH 9, 2019 6-9PMEXHIBITION ON VIEW MARCH 9, 2019 THROUGH APRIL 5, 2019

XINGONA.X FEST: Weaving our Legacies Thru PrayerMujeres de Maiz's Live Art Show Festival & Exhibition OpeningSaturday, March 9th, 6-9pm. Donation base rate $10+, all ages. Use to get your tickets today!

Mujeres de Maiz presents Xingona.X Fest on March 9th an interdisciplinary, intercultural, intergenerational art festival and exhibition opening reception featuring womxn of color, femme, GNC & QT/WOC artivists. The event will feature artivist performances by Banda Las Angelinas@bandalasangelinas, Chicanas Cholas y Chisme@chicanascholasychisme, Indigital Productions @indigitalproductions in collaboration with Artist Patricia Valencia, In Lak Ech@inlakechmdm, Kelly Caballero@kelly_mija, Palomx@_palomx, San Cha@el_sancha, Weapons of Mass Creation@womc714; including poets Claudia Rodriguez@crod_writer, Faith Santilla@faithsantilla, La Poeta Violeta@lapoetavioleta, as well as Womxn speakers from the LA teachers strike and youth leader, Edna Chavez y muchxs ms!

The Weaving our Legacies Thru Prayer art exhibition will feature womxn, femmes, GNC of color who use prayer ties to set intentions, send positivity and gratitude. This year's theme represents ties we make to one another and to our paths of healing and self-love. As womxn of the earth connected to our spiritual powers, we set prayers: through affirmations for self-respect and health, through healing friendships we foster, through mandos we make to nimas and santos, through our dedication to family, and through the multiplicity of borders we cross and inhabit.

#MujeresdeMaiz#XingonaxFest#Artivist #MujeresdeMaiz2019 @MujeresdeMaiz

*Flyer artwork by Artist Lilia Ramirez@liliflorart.*

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Self Help Graphics & Art

20 YEARS! - PHD Comics turns 20! We are celebrating by Kickstarting a new book, having a huge sale and offering custom comics and cartoons! Join the fun by clicking here!The PHD Store - is back online! Need a gift for the holidays? Why not a book, mug or shirt that matches their level of procrastination sophistication?A Message from Jorge - hi!

You may have noticed the huge banner below each comic. I apologize if it's too big, but I'm very excited to announce that my new book is on sale! We Have No Idea is a fun and accessible book about the Universe and how little we know of it. It's full of clear and fun explanations and cartoons. I spent a whole year working with physicist Daniel Whiteson to create the book, so it would be awesome if you took a moment to check it out and consider buying it!

When we wrote it, we were inspired to make a book that doesn't just talk about what we know, but also what we don't know about the Universe. How else will the next generation of scientists and explorers be inspired to go out there and expand our horizons?

So take a look, and consider buying it for yourself or gifting it to a friend or family member who is graduating! What better present than a book about everything we don't know?

Thank you all for supporting all my crazy efforts (movies, videos, books) over the years! I hope you enjoy the book!

-Jorge

And check out the book tour map and come see us at one of many fun events!

Coming to Campuses this Fall!Stay tuned for updates on how to organize a screening at your University.

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PHD Comics: Graph - Motivation level

Zig Ziglar was an American author and motivational speaker, widely recognized as one of the pioneers of the industry. Because of his unique delivery style of motivational and powerful speeches, as well as his unparalleled insight on human nature and what triggers individuals, he became one of the most renowned figures in the science of human potential.

Ziglar has inspired and influenced millions to work hard, be positive and goal-oriented. In the 1950s, as a salesman, he began giving sales-training talks and about 20 years later he launched his own business in order to offer training in sales and personal development.

Zig Ziglar traveled all over the world to help others see and use their potential to the fullest. Its hard not to pay attention to such a charming personality whos there to encourage and give you hope. And his own story is nothing short of inspiring.

For his talent and genius, Ziglar is recognized and honored as one of the greatest motivational speakers of our times. Here are 25 Zig Ziglar quotes to boost your willpower and make you push your limits.

Lack of direction, not lack of time, is the problem. We all have twenty-four hour days.

Rich people have small TVs and big libraries, and poor people have small libraries and big TVs.

You dont have to be great to start, but you have to start to be great.

People often say that motivation doesnt last. Well, neither does bathing thats why we recommend it daily.

When obstacles arise, you change your direction to reach your goal; you do not change your decision to get there.

Among the things you can give and still keep are your word, a smile, and a grateful heart.

The chief cause of failure and unhappiness is trading what you want most for what you want right now.

If you go out looking for friends, youre going to find they are very scarce. If you go out to be a friend, youll find them everywhere.

Many marriages would be better if the husband and wife clearly understood that theyre on the same side.

You were born to win, but to be a winner you must plan to win, prepare to win, and expect to win.

A lot of people have gone further than they thought they could because someone else thought they could.

If you aim at nothing, you will hit it every time.

You never know when a moment and afew sincere words can have an impact on a life.

Some people find fault like there is a reward for it.

Attitude, not aptitude, determines altitude.

The greatest of all mistakes is to do nothing because you think you can only do a little.

Make failure your teacher, not your undertaker.

The more you are grateful for what you have the more you will have to be grateful for.

Duty makes us do things well, but love makes us do them beautifully.

Outstanding people have one thing in common: an absolute sense of mission.

Some of us learn from other peoples mistakes and the rest of us have to be other people.

FEAR has two meanings: Forget Everything And Run or Face Everything And Rise. The choice is yours.

Motivation gets you going and habit gets you there.

Go as far as you can see and you will see further.

When you are tough on yourself, life is going to be infinitely easier on you.

Reconnect with your dreams and jumpstart your personal transformation with Goalcasts new inspirational ebook, Explore Your Potential: Start the Journey to Your Dream Life.

Transformation doesnt just happen. It takes a plan and a support system. This how-to guide is full of the top wisdom, tips, exercises, and success stories to inspire an old dream or create a new one.

Check out a teaser of whats inside.

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25 Powerful Zig Ziglar Quotes to Boost Your Willpower

Most people have heard that the Buddha was enlightened and that Buddhists seek enlightenment. But what does that mean?"Enlightenment" is an English word that can mean several things. In the West, the Age of Enlightenment was a philosophical movement of the 17th and 18th centuries that promoted science and reason over myth and superstition, so in Western culture, enlightenment is often associated with intellect and knowledge. But Buddhist enlightenment is something else.

To add to the confusion, "enlightenment" has been used as the translation for several Asian words that don't mean the same thing. For example, several decades ago English speakers were introduced to Buddhism through the writing of D.T. Suzuki (1870-1966), a Japanese scholar who had lived for a time as a Rinzai Zen monk. Suzuki used "enlightenment" to translate the Japanese word satori, derived from the verb satoru, "to know."

This translation was not without justification. But in usage, satori usually refers to an experience of insight into the true nature of reality. It has been compared to the experience of opening a door, but to open a door still implies a separation from what's inside the door. Partly through Suzuki's influence, the idea of spiritual enlightenment as a sudden, blissful, transformative experience became embedded in Western culture. However, that's misleading.

Although Suzuki and some of the first Zen teachers in the West explained enlightenment as an experience that one can have at moments, most Zen teachers and Zen texts tell you that enlightenment is not an experience but a permanent state: a stepping through the door permanently. Not even satori is enlightenment itself. In this, Zen is in alignment with how enlightenment is viewed in other branches of Buddhism.

Bodhi, a Sanskrit and Pali word that means "awakening," also is often translated as "enlightenment."

In Theravada Buddhism, bodhi is associated with the perfection of insight into the Four Noble Truths, which end dukkha (suffering, stress, dissatisfaction). The person who has perfected this insight and abandoned all defilements is an arhat, one who is liberated from the cycle of samsara, or endless rebirth. While alive, he enters a sort of conditional nirvana, and at death, he enjoys the peace of complete nirvana and escape from the cycle of rebirth.

Most of us perceive the things and beings around us as distinctive and permanent. But this view is a projection. Instead, the phenomenal world is an ever-changing nexus of causes and conditions or Dependent Origination. Things and beings, empty of self-essence, are neither real nor not real: the doctrine of The Two Truths. Thoroughly perceiving sunyata dissolves the fetters of self-clinging that cause our unhappiness. The dual way of distinguishing between self and other yields to a permanent nondual outlook in which all things are interrelated.

In Mahayana Buddhism, the idea of practice is that of the bodhisattva, the enlightened being who remains in the phenomenal world to bring all to enlightenment. The bodhisattva ideal is more than altruism; it reflects the reality that none of us is separate. "Individual enlightenment" is an oxymoron.

A branch of Mahayana Buddhism, the Tantric schools of Vajrayana Buddhism, believes that enlightenment can come all at once in a transformative moment. This goes hand-in-hand with the belief in Vajrayana that the various passions and hindrances of life, rather than being obstacles, can be fuel for transformation into enlightenment that can occurin a single moment, or at least in this lifetime. Key to this practice is a belief in inherent Buddha Nature, the innate perfection of our inner natures that simply waits for us to recognize it.This belief in the ability to achieve enlightenment instantly is not the same as the Sartori phenomenon, however. For Vajrayana Buddhists, enlightenment is not a glimpse through the door but a permanent state.

According to legend, when the Buddha realized enlightenment he said something to the effect of "Isn't it remarkable!All beings are already enlightened!" This state is what is known asBuddha Nature, which forms a core part of Buddhist practice in some schools. In Mahayana Buddhism, Buddha Nature is the inherent Buddhahood of all beings. Because all beings are already Buddha, the task is not to attain enlightenment but to realize it.

The Chinese master Huineng (638-713), the Sixth Patriarch of Ch'an (Zen), compared Buddhahood to a moon obscured by clouds. The clouds represent ignorance and defilements. When these are dropped away, the moon, already present, is revealed.

What about those sudden, blissful, transformative experiences? You may well have had these moments and felt you were onto something spiritually profound. Such an experience, while pleasant and sometimes accompanied by genuine insight,is not, by itself, enlightenment. For most practitioners, a blissful spiritual experience not grounded in the practice of the Eightfold Path to achieve enlightenment will not likely be transformative. Chasing blissful states can itself become a form of desire and attachment, and the path toward enlightenment is to surrender clinging and desire.

Zen teacher Barry Magid said of Master Hakuin, in "Nothing Is Hidden":

The teacher and monk Shunryu Suzuki (1904-1971) said of enlightenment:

Both legend and documented evidence suggestthat skilled practitioners and enlightened beings may be capable of extraordinary, even supernatural mental powers. However, these skills are not evidence of enlightenment, nor are they somehow essential to it. Here, too, we are warned not to chase these mental skills at the risk of mistaking the finger pointing at the moon for the moon itself.

If you wonder if you have become enlightened, it is almost certain you have not. The only way to test one's insight is to present it to a dharma teacher. Don't be dismayed if your achievement falls apart under a teacher's scrutiny. False starts and mistakes are anecessary part of the path, and if and when you achieve enlightenment, it will be built on a solid foundation and you will have no mistake about it.

Read this article:
What Do Buddhists Mean by 'Enlightenment'?

The Enlightenment has been defined in many different ways, but at its broadest was a philosophical, intellectual and cultural movement of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. It stressed reason, logic, criticism, and freedom of thought over dogma, blind faith, and superstition. Logic wasnt a new invention, having been used by the ancient Greeks, but it was now included in a worldview which argued that empirical observation and the examination of human life could reveal the truth behind human society and self, as well as the universe. All were deemed to be rational and understandable. The Enlightenment held that there could be a science of manand that the history of mankind was one of progress, which could be continued with the right thinking.

Consequently, the Enlightenment also argued that human life and character could be improved through the use of education and reason. The mechanistic universe that is to say, the universe when considered to be a functioning machine could also be altered. The Enlightenment thus brought interested thinkers into direct conflict with the political and religious establishment; these thinkers have even been described as intellectual terrorists against the norm. They challenged religion with the scientific method, often instead favoring deism. The Enlightenment thinkers wanted to do more than understand, they wanted to change for, as they believed, the better: they thought reason and science would improve lives.

There is no definitive starting or ending point for the Enlightenment, which leads many works to simply say it was a seventeenth and eighteenth-century phenomena. Certainly, the key era was the second half of the seventeenth century and almost all of the eighteenth. When historians have given dates, the English Civil wars and revolutions are sometimes given as the start, as they influenced Thomas Hobbes and one of the Enlightenments (and indeed Europes) key political works, Leviathan. Hobbes felt that the old political system had contributed to the bloody civil wars and searched for a new one, based on the rationality of scientific inquiry.

The end is usually given as either the death of Voltaire, one of the key Enlightenment figures, or the start of the French Revolution. This is often claimed to have marked the downfall of the Enlightenment, as attempts to rework Europe into a more logical and egalitarian system collapsed into bloodshed which killed leading writers. It's possible to say that we are still in the Enlightenment, as we still have many of the benefits of their development, but I've also seen it said we're in a post-Enlightenment age. These dates do not, in themselves, constitute a value judgment.

One problem in defining the Enlightenment is that there was a great deal of divergence in the leading thinkers' views, and it is important to recognize that they argued and debated with each other over the correct ways to think and proceed. Enlightenment views also varied geographically, with thinkers in different countries going in slightly different ways. For instance, the search for a science of man led some thinkers to search for the physiology of a body without a soul, while others searched for answers to how humanity thought. Still, others tried to map humanitys development from a primitive state, and others still looked at the economics and politics behind social interaction.

This might have led to some historians wishing to drop the label Enlightenment were it not for the fact that the Enlightenment thinkers actually called their era one of Enlightenment. The thinkers believed that they were intellectually better off than many of their peers, who were still in a superstitious darkness, and they wished to literally lighten them and their views. Kants key essay of the era, Was ist Aufklrung literally means What is Enlightenment?, and was one of a number of responses to a journal which had been trying to pin down a definition. Variations in thought are still seen as part of the general movement.

The spearhead of the Enlightenment was a body of well-connected writers and thinkers from across Europe and North America who became known as the philosophes, which is the French for philosophers. These leading thinkers formulated, spread and debated the Enlightenment in works including, arguably the dominant text of the period, the Encyclopdie.

Where historians once believed that the philosophes were the sole carriers of Enlightenment thought, they now generally accept that they were merely the vocal tip of a much more widespread intellectual awakening among the middle and upper classes, turning them into a new social force. These were professionals such as lawyers and administrators, office holders, higher clergy and landed aristocracy, and it was these who read the many volumes of Enlightenment writing, including the Encyclopdie and soaked up their thinking.

The scientific revolution of the seventeenth century shattered old systems of thinkingand allowed new ones to emerge. The teachings of the church and Bible, as well as the works of classical antiquity so beloved of the Renaissance, were suddenly found lacking when dealing with scientific developments. It became both necessary and possible for philosophes (Enlightenment thinkers) to begin applying the new scientific methods - where empirical observation was first applied to the physical universe - to the study of humanity itself to create a science of man.

There was not a total break, as the Enlightenment thinkers still owed a lot to Renaissance humanists, but they believed they were undergoing a radical change from past thought. Historian Roy Porter has argued that what in effect happened during the Enlightenment was that the overarching Christian myths were replaced by new scientific ones. There is a lot to be said for this conclusion, and an examination of how science is being used by commentators does seem to greatly support it, although that's a highly controversial conclusion.

In general, Enlightenment thinkers argued for freedom of thought, religion, and politics. The philosophes were largely critical of Europes absolutist rulers, especially of the French government, but there was little consistency: Voltaire, critic of the French crown, spent some time at the court of Frederick II of Prussia, while Diderot traveled to Russia to work with Catherine the Great; both left disillusioned. Rousseau has attracted criticism, especially since World War 2, for appearing to call for authoritarian rule. On the other hand, liberty was widely espoused by Enlightenment thinkers, who were also largely against nationalism and more in favor of international and cosmopolitan thinking.

The philosophes were deeply critical, indeed even openly hostile, to the organized religions of Europe, especially the Catholic Church whose priests, pope, and practices came in for severe criticism. The philosophes were not, with perhaps some exceptions like Voltaire at the end of his life, atheists, for many still believed in a god behind the mechanisms of the universe, but they railed against the perceived excesses and constraints of a church they attacked for using magic and superstition. Few Enlightenment thinkers attacked personal piety and many believed religion performed useful services. Indeed some, like Rousseau, were deeply religious, and others, like Locke, worked out a new form of rational Christianity; others became deists. It was not religion which irked them, but the forms and corruption of those religions.

The Enlightenment affected many areas of human existence, including politics; perhaps the most famous examples of the latter are the US Declaration of Independence and the French Declaration of the Rights of Man and the Citizen. Parts of the French Revolution are often attributed to the Enlightenment, either as recognition or as a way to attack the philosophes by pointing to violence such as the Terror as something they unwittingly unleashed. There is also debate about whether the Enlightenment actually transformed popular society to match it, or whether it was itself transformed by society. The Enlightenment era saw a general turn away from the dominance of the church and the supernatural, with a reduction in belief in the occult, literal interpretations of the Bible and the emergence of a largely secular public culture, and a secular intelligentsia able to challenge the previously dominant clergy.

The Enlightenment of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries era was followed by that of a reaction, Romanticism, a turn back to the emotional instead of the rational, and a counter-Enlightenment. For a while, in the nineteenth century, it was common for the Enlightenment to be attacked as the liberal work of utopian fantasists, with critics pointing out there were plenty of good things about humanity not based on reason. Enlightenment thought was also attacked for not criticizing the emerging capitalist systems. There is now a growing trend to arguing that the results of the Enlightenment are still with us, in science, politics and increasingly in western views of religion, and that we are still in an Enlightenment, or heavily influenced post-Enlightenment, age. More on the effects of the Enlightenment. There has been a lean away from calling anything progress when it comes to history, but you'll find the Enlightenment easily attracts people willing to call it a great step forward.

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A Beginner's Guide to the Enlightenment

Events

1715Louis XIV dies; Louis XV takes French throne

1748Montesquieu publishes The Spirit of Laws

1751Diderot publishes first volume of Encyclopdie

1759Voltaire publishes Candide

Although the first major figures of the Enlightenmentcame from England, the movement truly exploded in France, whichbecame a hotbed of political and intellectual thought in the 1700s.The roots of this French Enlightenment lay largelyin resentment and discontent over the decadence of the French monarchyin the late 1600s. Duringthe reign of the wildly extravagant Sun King Louis XIV (reigned 16431715),wealthy intellectual elites began to gather regularly in Parisian salons (oftenhosted by high-society women) and complain about the state of theircountry. The salons only grew in popularity when Louis XIV diedand the far less competent LouisXV took over.

Gradually, complaints in the salons and coffee shops changed fromidle whining into constructive political thought. Especially afterthe works of John Locke became widespread, participants at the salonsbegan to discuss substantive political and social philosophies ofthe day. Before long, cutting-edge thought in a variety of disciplinesworked its way into the salons, and the French Enlightenment wasborn.

By the early 1700s,coffee shops, salons, and other social groups were popping up allover Paris, encouraging intellectual discussion regarding the politicaland philosophical status of the country. Moreover, members of thesegroups increasingly clamored to read the latest work of leadingphilosophers. These nontraditional thinkers came to be known asthe philosophes, a group that championed personal libertiesand the work of Locke and Newton, denounced Christianity, and activelyopposed the abusive governments found throughout Europe at the time.As varied as they were, the leading French philosophes generallycame from similar schools of thought. They were predominantly writers,journalists, and teachers and were confident that human societycould be improved through rational thought.

A large part of the philosophes attacks were focusedon the Church and its traditions. In matters of faith, many of theprominent philosophes were deiststhey believed inan all-powerful being but likened him to a cosmic watchmaker whosimply set the universe in autonomous motion and never again tamperedwith it. Moreover, they disdained organized religionand the Churchs traditional idea of the chain of being, whichimplied a natural hierarchy of existenceGod first,then angels, monarchs, aristocrats, and so on.

The philosophes also raised objections against the decadentlifestyles of leading Church representatives, as well as the Churchs persistenceincollecting exorbitant taxes and tithes from the commoners to fundoutlandish salaries for bishops and other Church officials. Whatthe philosophes found most appalling, however, was the control thatthe Church held over impressionable commoners by instilling in thema fear of eternal damnation. The philosophes may have had mixedfeelings about the common people, but they had very strong feelingsagainst the Church. As a result, they provoked the Church by challengingdoctrines such as the existence of miracles and divinerevelation, often disproving specific tenets with simple science.The Church, in turn, hated the philosophes and all they stood for.

Complementing and enabling the socially and politicallyactive atmosphere was the dramatically improving literacy ratein France. Beyond just talking about revolutionary ideas, more andmore French people, especially in Paris and its surrounds, werereading and writing about them as well. A symbiotic relationshipdeveloped as readers anxiously awaited more literature from thephilosophes, and in turn the response that the writers receivedcompelled them to write more. The scholarly atmosphere at the timealso provided women of French societyalbeitstill within traditional roles as salon hostesseswithan opportunity to contribute to the conversation.

Originally posted here:
SparkNotes: The Enlightenment (16501800): The French ...

Business Development: The Activity Fallacy

Every sales manager faces periods when results just aren't what you need them to be. A big customer leaves. Your market hits a slump. A new competitor shows up. Suddenly youre scrambling to make your numbers. And if you dont make the right moves, you could find yourself making a bad situation worse. In this Quick Take you will learn why increased sales activity isn't always a good thing, the impact of increased activity on the size and profitability of sales, and metrics that will help your reps stay focused on their best opportunities in good times and bad.

Sales Leadership Credibility Part 1: The Confidence Base

What does it take to be a credible sales leader? Is it charisma? Raw intelligence? Some intangible trait that some people are born with and others are not? The fact is, credibility often boils down to one key factor. In this program youll discover what that is and learn: Why 'leadership skill' is NOT what gets people promoted into management, the number one source of credibility for sales leaders, the key to increasing, and sustaining, your credibility as a leader and just how fragile credibility can be.

Why Praise Can Backfire And How to Do It Right

Experts tell us that we should deliver praise to our employees as often as possible. Recognition is one of the most powerful tools available to improve productivity, moral and loyalty. But giving praise isnt as simply as it seems. Delivering it the wrong way at the wrong time can actually serve to de-motivate workers. In this Quick Take you will learn: 1) Examples of situations where 'praise' isnt about praising at all, 2) An especially dangerous misuse of praise that could erode your credibility as a manager and, 3) The secret to ensuring that praise delivers the motivational message you intend it to.

The ABC Method: Handling a Bad Attitude

In every organization you have a few people with really BAD attitudes. The guy who has trouble dealing with authority the woman who shows up late all the time or the average performers who put in minimal effort but continually complain about their mediocre pay and lack of advancement. You could just terminate these employees. But lets assume theyve got skills you need and you decide theyre worth saving. This training module will show how to confront 'bad-attitude' employees the right way, and maximize the odds that theyll change themselves and become better team players.

Coaching Reps Through a Slump the Power of Explanatory Styles

Salespeople have at least one thing in common with pro baseball players. Slumps. All major leaguers even .300 hitters go through extended periods where they cant get a hit. Pressure builds. Confidence erodes. As a sales manager, your job is to coach reps out of their slumps. But the problem is deeply psychological and youre no psychologist. So how do you do it? In this Quick Take, you will learn why failing reps literally talk themselves into failing, how managers can use the theory of explanatory styles to turn failure into success and the L.E.A.D. Model for helping reps bust out of a slump.

How to Conduct Effective Exit Interviews: A Technique for Finding the REAL Reason Employees Leave

Reflect back on some exit interviews youve conducted. When the person walked out of the room, were you ever thinking: I still dont have a clue why the person REALLY left and that was a complete waste of time. Clearly, thats not your goal. Youd like your exit interviews to reveal useful information you can use to improve your company and your retention rates. In this Quick Take, youll learn: The one type of employee that will give you the most useful info. The #1 obstacle to getting meaningful input. And, a simple questioning technique that will transform the way you conduct exit interviews and get far superior results.

Handling Online Leads: The Five-Minute Window

Its inevitable: For most companies, more and more business will be coming from online leads. And yet many companies are struggling to make these leads pay. The question is, what can you do as a sales leader to maximize the value of this increasingly important lead source? In this Quick Take, you will learn the results of a study that show why online leads are so different from other leads, three techniques for managing online leads that can vastly increase their value, the 'Taco Stand' rule a key concept that will help your sales force connect with more online leads and how to align your sales force to succeed with online leads.

Salary Talk: How to Discuss Pay So Employees Feel Theyre Treated Fairly

Most managers hate discussing salary with employees because money is such an emotional topic. When the manager and the employee have different ideas about whats fair, salary review meetings can quickly go south. Fortunately, theres a way to talk about money without the drama, tension or destructive emotions. The secrets to mastering salary discussions are covered in this program.

A Four-Point Model for Leading High-Performance Teams

There is one thing all successful leaders get that failed leaders dont. They know they cant achieve breakthrough organizational results by themselves. That wisdom is often hard-earned because most leaders started their careers as individual high performers who moved mountains all alone. But they figured out at some point that the key to their success as a leader was their team. But not just any team. They needed an A-Team. This program will give you a proven 4-point model for building and maintaining a high-performance team that consistently delivers extraordinary results.

The Power of Predictability

The #1 job of the human brain is to predict what will happen, so that we can be prepared. But managers can unintentionally create a work environment where unpredictability reigns. When that happens, employees feel stressed, anxious and demotivated. In this Quick Take you will learn how the brain creates 'predictive models' that are designed to tell us whats going to happen, why we feel good when our predictions are right and bad when theyre wrong and how you can use the principle of predictability to create a more productive and positive work environment for your people.

The Triangle: How to evaluate the success of sales contests

Sales contests can be a great way to motivate your sales team. But when you considered all of the effort and cost, are contests really worth it? Maybe. Maybe not. The only way to tell is to conduct a proper ROI analysis. And that's where so many sales managers fall short. In this Quick Take you will learn: Why the most common metric for sales contests often underestimates true ROI, the importance of 'The Triangle' that can make or break a contests effectiveness, and the best way to accurately measure a contests success or failure.

Sales Leadership Credibility Part II: The Fallibility Paradox

Leadership credibility takes a long time to build but can be destroyed in seconds. The question is, how and why does it happen? What should sales managers do and never do to maintain a strong reputation as a trustworthy, reliable leader? In this Quick Take, you will learn: One of the most common, and most preventable, mistakes sales leaders make that destroys their hard-earned credibility, what we mean by the Fallibility Paradox and why its the key to maintaining credibility over the long-term, and what caused one leadership success story to end in abject failure.

Sales and the 80-20 Rule

In this Quick Take you will learn the truth about the 80-20 rule in sales and what it means for sales managers, where youre most likely to get big performance increases from your salespeople and how to structure incentives to get the biggest bang for your buck.

Six Managerial Styles You Need to Lead Effectively

Some managers limit themselves to a single management style because theyre comfortable with it and because it worked in the past. But relying on just one style can limit your ability to get things done through people. In this Quick Take youll learn that great managers master a repertoire of six managerial styles, and know how to deploy the RIGHT style depending on the situation. Youll also understand why mastering these styles is the key to earning top management respect, achieving results, and no small thing getting the promotions that one-trick ponies only dream about.

New Manager Pitfalls: How to Avoid Them and Succeed in a Leadership Role

So you just got promoted. You probably got singled out for management because you were a strong performer, a producer who achieved excellent results. Now youre in charge of a team, and your job is to get OTHER people to be strong performers. But thats easier said than done. Its so difficult, in fact, that most people want nothing to do with it. Of those who take the challenge, many underestimate the complexities of management, and fail. In this Quick Take you will learn the steps you must take to get started in the right direction.

Lead Follow-Up: How Much Is Enough?

Following up on leads can pose a real dilemma for salespeople. On the one hand, you want to be sure you exhaust every opportunity to convert those prospects into new business. On the other, you dont want to waste valuable time chasing leads who have no real intention of buying. In this Quick Take, you will learn what a massive research study reveals about how much follow-up it takes to find real buyers, the follow-up 'sweet spot' the number of calls that yielded the best return on time and effort for most salespeople, how much effort salespeople really devote to follow-up, versus how much effort they think they put in, and how to create an optimal follow-up strategy for your sales team.

The C.A.R.E.E.R. Model: The Ultimate Retention Strategy for Managers

Every experienced manager knows the feeling. A valued employee walks into your office and says, 'I found a new job. Im leaving.' Youre stung. You feel betrayed. And youre asking yourself, 'Did I do something wrong?' The bad news: You probably did. The good news: In this Quick Take youll learn how to keep your good employees on board, energized and loyal.

Hiring Salespeople: How to Smoke Out Impostors Who Will Get Mediocre Results

The cost of a bad sales hire is huge. Most obvious are the hard losses the ads, the interviews, the training, the lost sales, etc. Not so obvious is the damage you do to your credibility as a leader when you repeatedly make hiring mistakes. This Quick Take will show you how to 'smoke out' the impostors who look good on paper and know how to interview, but wont get the job done. Youll learn the most dangerous attitude a sales manager can bring to an interview with a job candidate, the preparation oversight that gives Impostors an opening and how to ask questions that will expose Impostors every time.

Why 80% of Sales Training Doesnt Stick

This Quick Take will show you the number one reason why star sales managers get extraordinary results from their sales reps. If you often feel that youre constantly drilling your reps on time-tested selling techniques, but that your message just isnt sinking in, the reason is that youre not following the simple practice outlined in this program. Less than seven minutes from now, youll know the secret, and it will transform the way you train your sales force.

Handling Disruptive Star Performers: How to Tame a Tiger

Every sales team has its superstars. They are often the most valuable members of your team and often times they know it. You love the results they deliver but their 'prima donna' attitude can be a serious disruption to everyone around them. Fortunately there is a way to keep them in check. In this Quick take you will learn a common response to a disruptive star performer which fails miserably every time, an often-overlooked fact about stars that gives you far more power than you might think, and the S.T.O.P. Model for getting disruptive tigers to change bad behavior without driving them away or turning them into pussycats.

Performance Talk: Conversations That Get Your People to Goal

Too many managers and supervisors fail to deliver performance talks to their workers as often or as effectively as they should. Why? They either see such talks as low priority or they avoid them because giving performance feedback can be uncomfortable. The good news is, managers and supervisors can develop the skills and confidence needed to deliver on-target performance talks that get results. This training program will show them how to get it done.

Sales Compensation: Get and Keep Top Talent Without Breaking the Bank

Its always a challenge to strike just the right balance in your sales compensation plan. You want to attract top performers but theres only so much money to go around. So how do you spend it wisely? How do you know whether youre paying reps too much, too little, or just enough? In this Quick Take, youll learn: A technique to optimize your commission structure to get the results you need, how to head off the greatest pitfall of changing your comp plan, and the key trap that promotes mediocre sales results.

How to Get More Reps Selling Like Your Top Reps

In this Quick Take, you will learn why its so hard for experts to explain what they do to non-experts, why its better to focus on teaching behaviors rather than knowledge or insights, and a new way to use role plays in sales training and why it works better than the way youre probably using now.

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Online Sales Training Programs and Resources - Rapid Learning ...

Collective Evolutionis a conscious media and education company focused on helping to shift our world through two key avenues:

News Media reporting on world events through a truly neutral lens, and exploring the role these events play in the evolution of human consciousness.

Consciousness Education Providing viewers with the solutions and tools necessary to build self-awareness, expand consciousness, connect with self and be an integral part of shifting our world.

Founded by Joe Martino 2009, CE has grown to become one of the worlds most popularconscious media outlets that provides readers and viewers an opportunity to expand their consciousness, unlock their potential and reshape their everyday way ofbeing.

CEs unique formula merges consciousnessand spirituality with all aspects of life and events we experience on a regular basis.

CEs content ranges from articles, to videos, to podcasts, to live events, all of which share one common goal: to raise awareness about how our world functions, and to encourage conscious change that moves beyond it.

All CE content is brought into conscious existence by an awesome, (but not too awesome) dynamic (but not too dynamic) community of writers, filmmakers, editors, speakers and other phenomenally creative minds but not too phenomenal.

To contact CE for radio or media appearances please use our contact form found byclickingthe contact menu button.

Joe Martino talks about the journey of creating CE during his TEDx talk.

Joe MartinoAlanna KetlerDulce Ruby

Adrian RicciLinda Martino

James McDougall

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About Us Collective Evolution

Hi, ImJulieCreffield the no bullshit Life Coach. I am a mum to a gloriously mischevious 5-year-old, author of 8 books, owner of 2 thriving businesses, international speaker, and marathon runner.

Now reading that you might be thinking I am one of those super annoying overachievers in life who literally turns everything they touch into gold, if only.

My life hasnt always been an easy one.

I was a little shit at school for a start, I got in heaps of trouble in my teens and well into my twenties, Ive had some shocking relationships, battled with depression, had business ventures that didnt quite make it, I wasmade redundant 4 times in 10 years, and then 4 years ago I found myself a single parent of a child under 2, unemployedand about to lose everything.

I think the worst thing I lost during that time though was my confidence.

I completely forgot who I was, and what I was capable of.

I know what its like to feels like what you want is out of reach, to think that theres no way that you have the time, the energy or the resources to make any changes in your life. To feel like you need a new reason to get out of bed in the morning aside from making breakfast and clearing up after other people. What happened to all those dreams you had? What happened to that sense of adventure?

If you said yes to any of the above I get it, I have been there, done that. In fact, thats why I am here sharing this with you.

Heres the thing I know for sureIf I can do it, so can you!

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Julie Creffield - Life Coach & Motivational Speaker