I’m An ADHD Coach – Here Are The 3 Time Management Hacks I Swear By

Have you ever been told to ‘just try time management’? If you’ve got ADHD, it’s likely that you’ve tried every time management hack in the world, but none of them seem to work.

We often know what to do, we just can’t do it. Having a brain that only experiences time as ‘now’ or ‘not now’ can make it extremely difficult to plan ahead, organise our time, or prioritise our work. This is linked with the 30% developmental delay in executive functioning skills such as memory, self-awareness, and motivation – it is not your fault.

Having a Ferrari brain with bicycle brakes means that we might zoom ahead on the things we’re interested in, but crash into walls when we need to slow down. At work, this can be extremely difficult as we try to juggle endless competing demands.

As neurotypical solutions don’t work for neurodivergent brains, here’s 3 ADHD-friendly time management hacks to thrive at work:

1) Hack your interest based nervous system

People with ADHD have interest based nervous systems, which means we thrive off interest, adrenaline, and novelty. By understanding what interests you, and how you can incorporate gamification and fun into planning ahead, you can stay one step ahead of procrastination by planning ahead.

As an ADHD Coach, I’m constantly supporting clients to figure out the ways that work best for them to manage their time – from colour blocking their work in their calendar in advance and wearing watches, to setting up calendar reminders and arranging weekly body doubling sessions to focus on the things they don’t want to do. You can also never have too many clocks around you!

As we have a limited number of ‘spoons’ of energy, it’s also sensible to hack your days by doing something you don’t want to do first thing in the morning. For me, this is going to the gym – I incorporate my interest based nervous system by sleeping in my gym clothes and finding accountability buddies!

2) Turn marathons into sprints

As our brains are constantly seeking dopamine and stimulation, we can turn long term projects into sprints by incorporating artificial deadlines and accountability. It’s much easier to work with short term goals that feel immediate and urgent, which can be harnessed with regular 1:1 meetings and dopamine boosts such as positive feedback celebrating our ‘wins’.

For example, I break down long term objectives into three month goals. Setting short term priorities can help us to break these down further, such as by setting weekly or daily goals, and to share these with another person for accountability, checking in on how it went at the end of the day.

Instead of trying to do everything on your to do list, picking just one thing to get done can help you to get started, overcoming the common challenge of ADHD decision paralysis.

Having visual reminders of short term sprints can be highly effective and motivate us to get them done, such as by visualising our progress with trackers. This also helps us remember what to not do – if something isn’t one of our sprint goals, it’s a ‘not now’! Writing down distractions or ideas in a notebook enables us to return to these when we review our next set of sprints.

3) Ask for help

Asking for help at work may feel overwhelming for people with ADHD, but it’s important to remember that you deserve to be supported – and this helps everybody! One highly effective technique for time management at work is by asking your team to use a briefing document for new work.

This sets out in a shared document what a project will involve, breaking objectives into short term actions, and scheduling any check ins with colleagues as needed. In general, it can be very helpful to have written instructions for everything in the workplace, and to regularly ask your manager what you should prioritise and how you will know when a piece of work is complete.

Having additional check ins is a common reasonable adjustment employers can implement to help employees with ADHD to manage their time effectively. This could be with a colleague, or externally with an ADHD Coach, for example.

Ultimately, it’s important to have a foundation of psychological safety at work to empower you to feel safe enough to focus on the ‘not now’. Having colleagues who clearly set out expectations and support you to ‘do what you know’ empowers you to use your super whizzy brain within a structure of safety and support.

It might feel like we’re surviving from day to day, but creating an environment tailored to our brains can enable us to use these unique traits to thrive at work because of our ADHD, not in spite of it.

Leanne Maskell is an ADHD Coach, the Founder of ADHD Works, and author of new book ADHD Works at Work

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1 In 61 Pregnant Women Say Their Boss Insinuated They Should Have An Abortion

Shocking new research from the campaign group Pregnant Then Screwed has revealed that 1 in every 61 pregnant workers says their boss has insinuated they should terminate their pregnancy for the sake of their career.

Pregnant Then Screwed, who campaign for the rights of parents and against sex discrimination, surveyed over 24,000 parents to uncover the discrimination that women face in the workplace when they become mothers.

The data shows that over half of all mothers (52%) have faced some form of discrimination when pregnant, on maternity leave, or when they returned to work.

One woman involved in the study, Connie*, told her boss about her pregnancy at eight weeks and was told, “It would be easier for your future career if you just brought a coat hanger”. Three colleagues went on to tell Connie that she had ruined her career and should have had an abortion.

For some women, the consequences of having children can have life-changing consequences on their career, with one in five mothers (19%) making the decision to leave their employer due to a negative experience.

Additionally, one in 10 women (10%) revealed they were bullied or harassed when pregnant or returning to work, and 7% of women lost their job — through redundancy, sacking, or feeling forced to leave due to a flexible working request being declined or due to health and safety issues.

If scaled up, this could mean as many as 41,752 pregnant women or mothers are sacked or made redundant every year.

“These stats show how far we have to go before mothers are truly accepted as equal members of the workplace,” says Joeli Brearley, CEO and founder of Pregnant Then Screwed.

“We know that women are treated differently from the point they get pregnant. They are viewed as distracted and less committed to their work, despite there being no change to their performance. This bias plays out in numerous ways, affecting women’s earnings and career potential. There is absolutely no excuse for bosses, who hold the power, to tell their employees to abort a pregnancy. It is sex discrimination and it is inhumane.”

Portrait of a stressed woman tries to work from home with baby in arms

Abraham Gonzalez Fernandez via Getty Images

Portrait of a stressed woman tries to work from home with baby in arms

The discrimination that women face doesn’t always come from their boss; in fact, 73% of women shared that a colleague made hurtful comments about their pregnancy or maternity leave, and 74% of women said that a colleague insinuated that their performance had dipped due to pregnancy or maternity leave. Some women even experience criticism based on the way they look when they are pregnant – with 64% saying their boss or a colleague had made inappropriate comments about their looks.

“The fact that the majority of pregnant women have experienced inappropriate and degrading comments from a colleague or their boss about the way they look is shameful,” says Brearley.

“Why as a society do we accept women being a target for such abuse? These hurtful comments chip away at women’s confidence, ambition and feeling of belonging,” she says.

“Pregnant women are made to feel like an unsightly burden, no wonder a high proportion of women report feeling depressed or anxious when pregnant and one in five women leave their employer after becoming pregnant.’’

The study’s data and the shocking stories shared by pregnant women in workplaces around the UK highlight the worrying and pervasive attitudes towards women in society — even in a supposedly equal one like the UK.

It isn’t just about having children; women are being treated differently for decisions relating to their reproductive health, too. An especially worrying trend in our post-Roe v Wade world, which is seeing our rights rolled back across the globe.

For instance, a third of women (31.58%) who told their employer about having an abortion felt that they experienced discrimination or were unfairly treated as a result. And the majority of women (57.6%) didn’t even tell their employer they had an abortion, presumably for fear of being judged negatively.

Women being bullied out of the workplace for being pregnant, or choosing not to be, is just one more example of the ways women’s freedoms are being infringed upon, and shows that, in the end, the patriarchy doesn’t want us to win.

It’s something we should all vehemently stand against, together.

If you or anyone you know has experienced discrimination in the workplace, please call the Pregnant Then Screwed helpline on Tel: 0161 2229879

*Name changed to protect anonymity

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‘Body Doubling’ Could Be The Answer For Serial Procrastinators

What are you putting off right now? For me, it’s sorting out my clothes into a pile to keep and a pile to donate. It’s been months. OK, fine. It’s been a year.

I just can’t bring myself to do it. Now that I’ve admitted mine, you can admit yours (to yourself, don’t worry).

There’s something about these tasks that – for some of us – feels so overwhelming, so impossible, when, in reality, they’d usually take no more than a couple of hours to sort and finally tick off our mental to-do list.

This is why some people are trying the ‘body doubling’ method.

No, it’s not quite the Hollywood version where somebody who looks like you does the hard parts (though this would be ideal).

Instead, it’s when you tackle these somehow mountainous tasks with the help of somebody else. Not by having them do anything for you, but instead just being present while you’re getting through the task.

Why does body doubling work?

Catherine, a civil servant from Scotland, who has ADHD, said that body doubling, even if it’s just done over FaceTime, keeps her accountable without the other person ever actually having to hold her to account.

“It’s almost as if having them there reminds me to do the thing – [they’re] a comforting reminder, and somebody that helps me stay motivated to complete the task,” she says.

Some creators have tapped into this helpful hack by creating “study with me” videos that people have watched whilst getting through their own work.

Even the digital presence of somebody else can remind people to stay on track and keep them motivated.

How to find a body double for productivity support

According to ADDA, the world’s largest organisation dedicated to helping adults with ADHD ‘live better lives’, when looking for a body double you need to “find someone who can be quiet and independent”.

The idea is that they can sit, read, knit, or work quietly on a laptop. Their job is to not engage with you – they’re just there in the background.

“It requires energy to instruct, supervise, or be interrupted by another person, and that expenditure of energy equates to distraction,” says ADDA.

They also add that you can hire outside help if need be, such as an assistant.

However, for some people, a ‘study with me’ video, a loved one on FaceTime or even working from a cafe with others around them is enough to keep them motivated and on-track.

It might actually be time to tackle that task.

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Feel Like The Work Slog Never Ends, With No Reward In Sight? This Is For You

Another workplace label just landed, and you’re probably going to relate to it: rust-out.

Somewhere between boredom and burnout, rust-out isn’t a case of being fed up with your job but more about how you’re being treated within that role.

If burnout is when you push yourself too far, rust-out is when you’ve effectively been forgotten by your manager – leading to frustration, exhaustion and just… a desire to quit. You’re stuck in a position, and can’t go anywhere else.

Teena Clouston, author of Challenging Stress, Burnout and Rust-Out, told Cosmopolitan: “Rust-out is a lot deeper and more profound than boredom.

“It’s where people don’t feel they’re don’t anything purposeful or being recognised.

“They often feel blocked – as if there’s nowhere for them to progress to, and it can be a much harder issue to address than burnout.”

Burnout is already recognised by the World Health Organisation (WHO) as an occupational phenomenon, but it’s worth putting rust-out on your radar too.

After all, not everyone joined the Great Resignation during the Covid pandemic – there are bills to pay (and they’re only getting more expensive thanks to the cost of living crisis).

Analytics company Gallup found in 2022 that just 21% of respondents were engaged with their jobs around the world.

And a Workforce Hopes and Fears survey from PwC in 2022 found that Gen Z and millennials were the most likely age group to switch employers in the next year in the search of a more fulfilling job.

This is pretty evident just from what is going round online, too.

The famous term “quiet quitting” went seriously viral before, and involves people doing the absolute bare minimum at work, diverting the rest of their energy into searching for something else.

But with rust-out it seems like motivation is gone altogether.

Clouston explained: “The mental impact of rust-out can be quite dark. You can feel depressed – like you’re stuck in the mud, unable to move.”

She claimed this then had a domino effect on the rest of our everyday lives outside of work, too.

miodrag ignjatovic via Getty Images

And rust-out doesn’t help anyone, including your employers.

“As a general rule, once someone starts to rust out, the quality of work goes downhill, as the employee loses interest, finding the job unfulfilling,” Clouston said, leading to cynicism.

But Clouston said that experiencing rust-out doesn’t mean you have to quit completely.

She suggested speaking to your manager to see if you can amplify the parts of your role you really enjoy, or create a progression plan for your role.

“This can help you review what you want in the workplace and help you find that opportunity for change,” she explained.

Clouston advised moving the focus back onto your wellbeing too, and remembering the pastimes which gave you joy before.

But if this doesn’t help, and it doesn’t seem like you can develop at work even when you try, you might want to start looking for a new job.

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9 Things I Won’t Do After Working As A Nanny

There are 2.2 million domestic workers in the U.S., and a lot of them are nannies.

Nannies have busy, demanding jobs with tasks that can completely vary from family to family. They may be responsible for driving children to school, making meals or live-in caregiving.

Nannies work in private homes, often putting them outside of public view, so their critical roles in families and society can be undervalued and exploited. Misunderstandings can happen between what parents think they want in a nanny and the reality of what it’s actually like to employ or be one.

That’s why HuffPost reached out to nannies for what they think about working for families and the biggest “won’ts” they have learned. These are their hard-earned lessons.

Responses have been edited for clarity and length.

1. I won’t accept money under the table

boonchai wedmakawand via Getty Images

“I’ve been in the industry for over 25 years now. And I remember when I first started, that was the big thing: People paying you under the table and not paying their taxes.

“I remember even working for a family and they were lawyers, so they figured out how to get around it. I was like, ‘I can’t buy a car because I don’t have any proof of income,’ because I got paid in cash. … It was really weird. At the time, I was young and I did not understand the whole business of it. It definitely was done and it’s still done even though it’s illegal. People still try to pay you under the table.

“On a bigger scale, when COVID happened, so many nannies who were getting paid under the table couldn’t file for unemployment. It’s a big ‘no’ for me.” — Kimberly C. Brown, the CEO of the Nanny Kim on the Go consulting agency in Jersey City, New Jersey.

2. I won’t be paid less than a liveable wage

“About 10 years ago, I took a nanny job that paid $200 a week, so a lot of the stuff that I post [on TikTok] is based on real experiences that I have gone through within the last 10 years.

“A lot of people undermine our education and our professionalism because they assume it’s a little girls job. I am a professional and I have tons of education, and it is not comparable to being a teenager [babysitting].” — Coco in Scottsdale, Arizona. (Coco’s last name has been withheld for privacy reasons.)

3. I won’t forbid a nanny from answering a phone or leaving the house

puttapon via Getty Images

“I would never tell the nanny they can’t take the child outside or can’t answer their phones at work. People have to realise that nannies work during the day when most calls come in.

“A lot of people, they feel like nannies need to be ‘on’ all the time. That could be exhausting and wear your nanny out really quick. [I would never] assume that they don’t have emergency calls that may come in.

“I’ve definitely had that at work or at a job where they’re just like ‘Oh, I don’t want you to answer the phone for anybody but us’ or ‘I don’t want you to have your phone on at all.’

“I’ve worked with families where they won’t give me a key to the house, because they don’t want me to go in and out. They don’t want me to take the kid to the park. I just sit in the house all day with them until they come back. And that’s just not normal.” — Brown.

4. I won’t assume a nanny is a housekeeper

“I am more than happy to help out and I understand that managing their home is part of my position, but it’s not my job to scrub your baseboards. It’s not my job to wash your windows. It’s not my job to clean out your pantry and your fridge. I’ve even been asked to take the dog to the vet or come over if I have a day off, let’s say, and they say something along the lines of ‘We don’t need you today, but we just need you to stop by and water the plants.’ Something like that, to me, is inappropriate. I live an hour away, and I’m not going to drive an hour to water your plants.

“This job is very weird because you can be family with your bosses. It’s strange. You don’t want to be treated like any ‘regular-degular’ employee, because if I wanted to do that I would work at a day care.” — Coco.

5. I won’t contradict a family’s decisions

“As a nanny, I won’t contradict my employers, even in the smallest ways. Parents deserve to be respected in their absence, and my role is to be a supportive team member.

“I may offer advice or information, but ultimately will defer to the parents’ judgment. As long as the children are safe, I follow the guidance and preferences of my bosses when making decisions in their household.” — Amber Sembly in Atlanta.

6. I will not work without guaranteed hours in my contract

“An issue that I’ve seen happen to other nannies and even to myself as well a couple times is a family will hire you, they’ll say whatever hours they need, say it’s Monday through Friday, 8 to 5. Those are the set hours you’re going to base your life around, you’re going to keep your schedule open. But then every once in a while, the parent might get home early. But that affects your pay at the end of the day. So those guaranteed hours just keep you safe in case they do send you home early.

“Vacations — that’s a big one as well, especially with spring break coming up right now. [The family I work for is] going out of town with the kids for spring break, but I’m still getting paid for that week because of my guaranteed hours in my contract.” — Maiya Mosley in St. Louis.

7. I will not hire a nanny without meeting them

“If I were to hire child care, whether it’s short-term or long-term, I would definitely make sure my kids are comfortable with them and do a trial, even a few hours or so. Luckily for me, I’ve never had any issues. But I always think it’s crazy when people are like ‘OK, come over tomorrow night and watch them.’ And I’m like: ‘OK, you haven’t even met me yet. Are you sure?’

“Calling references, too — you want to do your due diligence. Luckily I have very good references and kids really like me, but I would never message someone on an app and be like, ‘You sound great, come over tomorrow.’” — Teniya Renee in Boston.

8. I will not arrive home late

Westend61 via Getty Images

“I wouldn’t come home late. Obviously, it happens, but I would definitely let the nanny know ‘Hey, I’m running behind,’ because nannies also have things to do after work. Being a nanny can often seem like, to a family, that you’re beholden to them. That’s a big one that comes up for nannies.” — Danny Rosenthal, the owner of United Nanny Agency in Chicago.

9. I will not assume a nanny knows what I need

cako74 via Getty Images

“Most families don’t realise that hiring a nanny means opening a small business in their home. Families have a huge learning curve … [and] hardly ever set expectations or explain how to accomplish the tasks they have set out for them to do. Families have no idea that they prefer their clothes folded a certain way or that they prefer one brand of paper towel over another — that’s real — but every family is particular. Very particular.

“If you want a nanny to do something, you need to show them. If you want a nanny to buy something, you need to tell them what brand, what store and which aisle. Years of experience means a nanny is capable of learning how to work with a family, but it doesn’t mean they know how to do everything the way you like it.” — Rosenthal.

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Facts Are Facts – Four Day Working Weeks Work, So Give Us Them

The world’s largest trial of a four-day workweek is complete and there’s good news – it had such a positive outcome the majority of companies said they would be happy to offer a shorter working week to their staff.

61 companies from different sectors were involved in the trial, which ran for six months starting from June of last year.

Managers ensured that salaries stayed the same for staff who participated in the study.

There’s been a decline in the number of sick days taken during the period of the trial. Before the trial, on average, each person would take four or five sick days per year – that’s down to less than two,” Chief Executive Mark Downs says.

So can we finally admit that we don’t need to work five days a week? When news of a possible four-day working week first emerged, people were skeptical.

“The combination of industry time commitments varying so greatly across the board, as well as close to universal workforce shortages across the board, creates an ecosystem simply incapable of supporting the continued running of certain businesses with working hours under 37.5 hours a week,” Sarah Austin, founder, and director at the Lloyd’s Bank British Business Excellence Awards, previously told HuffPost UK.

“However, this does not mean employee wellbeing should be shelved – businesses that can’t, at this time, adapt to a four-day work week model, can still promote and initiate employee mental health holiday allowances, childcare flexibility and, where possible, hybridisation to not only support their employees, but to also allow them to remain competitive in the current job seeker-led market.”

Nichola Johnson-Marshall, co-founder of cultural transformation consultancy, Working Wonder, is also skeptical this will work for every workplace.

“It’s also great to see commitment and actual trials for a new format of working pattern around a four day (paid for five) working week,” she says, “but we believe that this should be approached as a starting point rather than the end goal and not introduced universally.”

Lockdown has shown us that there are better ways of working than “just how we have worked before”, she adds. So simply cutting working hours might not be the best solution to better work-life balance.

Employers were concerned that a shorter working week wasn’t feasible. Would workers be able to complete goals and meet their targets in a four-day working week? The results from the trial show it’s possible.

It turns out people stop pulling sickies too. The number of sick days taken by 2,900 staff involved a study surveyed by the University of Cambridge and Boston College dropped by around two-thirds.

39% of employees reported that they were less stressed. Two-day weekends come and go, it feels like you don’t have enough time to rest. “Weekends can be quite hectic, so it has been quite nice to have that extra day to see your friends and family, and then you get that extra day off during the week to do all your chores or to have that time to relax,” Tessa Gibson, a senior accreditation officer at the Royal Society of Biology, said.

Overall, it looks like the four-day working week can work. “This is a major breakthrough moment for the movement towards a four-day working week,“Joe Ryle, Director of the 4 Day Week Campaign, says.

“Across a wide variety of different sectors of the economy, these incredible results show that the four-day week with no loss of pay really works.”

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Are You A Giver Or A Taker? There Are Two Types Of Talkers, Researcher Suggests

We’ve all been stuck in conversations in which it feels like we’re talking to a wall.

“Why isn’t he asking me any questions?” we may grumble to ourselves. “Why are they forcing me to carry this conversation?” we may silently judge.

A recent essay from a researcher who studies conversations offers a fascinating possible answer as to why these frustrating interactions happen.

Post-doctoral research scholar Adam Mastroianni of Columbia Business School explained in an essay published on Substack that there are two types of conversationalists: You can be either a “giver” or a “taker,” and these types don’t always assume the best of each other.

“Givers think that conversations unfold as a series of invitations; takers think conversations unfold as a series of declarations. When giver meets giver or taker meets taker, all is well,” Mastroianni wrote. “When giver meets taker, however, giver gives, taker takes, and giver gets resentful (‘Why won’t he ask me a single question?’) while taker has a lovely time (‘She must really think I’m interesting!’) or gets annoyed (‘My job is so boring, why does she keep asking me about it?’).”

In other words, givers typically end up asking more questions in a conversation, because they believe that’s how to foster the best conversation, while takers believe it’s best to make more declarative statements to ramp up the conversation to its most interesting place.

How to really tell if you are a giver or a taker

Beyond the differences between inviting and declaring, there are other telltale signs that can help you determine if you are giving or taking.

One is how you feel when there are silences in a conversation, Mastroianni told HuffPost. “Givers feel like ‘Oh no, I’ve done something wrong,’” when there are conversational lulls, he said, while takers believe “someone should make something happen” and that that person is them.

Emily Rosado-Solomon, an assistant professor of management at Babson College who researches workplace communications, read the essay and said she buys Mastroianni’s explanation of givers and takers ― and whether or not you are a giver or taker could also be culturally specific, citing the late social psychologist Geert Hofstede’s research on individualism and collectivism.

“People from cultures with very low individualism are probably not going to be as likely to take the spotlight and talk about themselves; they are probably going to be more givers, whereas people from cultures with very high individualism are probably much more likely to talk about themselves,” she said.

Being a giver or a taker can matter a lot at your job

Once you start seeing conversations in terms of givers and takers, you can start to see how it matters in workplaces, too.

Rosado-Solomon said that because all of us carry different cultural perspectives, “What is most important in the workplace specifically is being ambidextrous so that you can communicate with people from different cultural backgrounds.” People have a universal need to feel seen.

She said she can switch between taking and giving styles at work depending on the needs of her conversation partner.

“If asking questions makes that person feel seen, then that is what I will do. I am genuinely curious about other people, which is why I spend my life studying people at work,” she said. “But at the same time, some people are uncomfortable with that, and it becomes an awkward interview inquisition and so I find that I try to switch then to more disclosure and sort of a taker style. And not necessarily intimate disclosure, just sort of taking the pressure off of them.”

Mastroianni said he also sees the giver-taker dynamic come into play when more junior employees are speaking with senior staff.

“Typically, if you’re in the low-power position, you’re going to have to be the one giving, because basically you have more of a reason to talk to the high-power person than the high-power person has to talk to you,” he said. “If you approach that interaction purely in the taking sense, then it might end very quickly. If you don’t invite their participation, they might go do something else, because it’s like, ‘OK we’re done here.’”

Of course, employees in positions of power should be aware of that dynamic and do more giving, too. That’s only fair.

Mastroianni said when he finds himself in the higher-status role, he knows “it’s very easy for me to just let them ask me questions.” He tries instead to take responsibility for keeping up the conversation by either asking the other person questions as well, or giving them something to respond to.

“Neither givers nor takers have it completely right.”

Mary Abbajay, president of Careerstone Group, a leadership development consultancy, agreed that it’s important for any leader to “learn to be a little bit more of a giver, which is really making sure that they are inviting conversation and then that they are listening.”

She noted that the givers-and-takers framework could also relate to how introverts and extroverts clash in the workplace.

“In meetings, the introverts tend to get talked over because the extroverts tend to be takers and they have rapid-fire conversation, but that doesn’t leave space for the introvert to respond,” she said. That’s why it’s important for work meetings to accommodate both styles and for leaders to be in charge of making that happen.

Could gender also play a role? When I asked Mastroianni, he noted he did not have empirical data on the question, but he said he would bet £100 that if people completed a giver-and-taker questionnaire, women would be more likely to be givers, and men would be takers.

“Part of that could be reflected in the power dynamics in society and part of that could be reflected in who do we take our cues from when we are growing up, and who do we learn from in terms of how to talk, who do we listen to.”

Abbajay said she believes women are more likely to be givers at their jobs as a survival mechanism to meet gendered giving expectations.

“Science and research shows that women are often talked over more in the workplace. They’re often mansplained. When you get mansplained, you’re not going to speak up very much,” she said. “I do think women tend to be more givers than takers, and I think a lot of that is based in gender bias in the workplace.”

Neither a giver or taker is inherently bad. But to be a more thoughtful speaker and listener, you need to be self-aware

Regardless of whether you think you have the heart of a giver or a taker, you can learn from the other side.

That’s because neither givers nor takers have it completely right. Takers misunderstand that their “declarations” aren’t guaranteed to be interesting, while givers misunderstand that asking questions is not always the most generous thing you can do in a conversation — and can, at times, be exhausting.

As Mastroianni put it in his essay, “It’s easy to remember how lonely it feels when a taker refuses to cede the spotlight to you, but easy to forget how lovely it feels when you don’t want the spotlight and a taker lets you recline on the mezzanine while they fill the stage.”

Both sides can learn to be aware of “conversational affordances,” he explained in the essay, which are opportunities to help keep the conversation moving forward in an exciting and engaging way.

In practice, for takers, this could mean they ask more questions that the other person would be actually interested to answer. That way, the conversation gets closer to the unexpected, interesting, fun and weird places of how someone really feels and thinks, he said.

And if you’re a giver who finds yourself being steamrolled by a taker, try toning down the questions and playing the taker’s game of responding, Mastroianni suggested. “Sometimes there are fun conversations that can be had that way, because you put less pressure on yourself to be like, ‘Oh, the conversation succeeds because I am pushing it.’”

Being a giver who starts to take more is a way to test the strength of your relationships, too.

“Give them the thing that they are giving. That’s what they deserve. Then you’ll be able to tell the difference between someone who intends to be a generous taker and someone who is a taker because they are selfish,” Mastroianni said.

And if a taker continuously keeps ignoring your cues to share, that may be your sign to leave the conversation “and speak to somebody else,” he added.

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Black Employees Face Backlash From White Managers When They Self-Promote At Work

The classic career advice many of us hear is: “The work does not speak for itself. You need to make sure others know about it, too.“

But recent research complicates the suggestion that everyone should advocate for themselves by promoting their own accomplishments.

A 2022 study published in the Journal of Applied Psychology surveyed a racially diverse and stratified sample of professionals, all from a large global financial institution and who all had white managers. Employees answered a survey about their self-promotional behavior with prompts such as “I talk proudly about my contributions or education with others at [company name],” and a group of management researchers used manager surveys and human resources information to see how supervisors rated the employees’ performance.

The researchers found that although white, Asian and Latinx employees received higher job ratings when they talked more about their contributions and accomplishments, Black employees were penalised by white managers for doing the same thing. Black employees who rated themselves highly on self-promotion received lower ratings of their job performance and assessments of their fit with the organisation.

In other words, self-promoting at work benefited white, Asian and Latinx employees while it had negative consequences for Black colleagues.

What explains this racial bias? The researchers think that white supervisors could be holding negative stereotypes of lower job competence against their Black employees while other racial groups were not dealing with the same thing.

As a result, when Black employees excel and communicate their accomplishments, strengths and contributions, their white managers see this as something that goes against their stereotypes of Black employees’ competence and skills.

“When managers perceive the violation of their stereotypical ‘norm’ of Black employees, they feel uneasy and thus react negatively,” said Jiaqing Sun, an assistant professor in the London School of Economics’ department of management, and a co-author of the study.

“The unique bias revealed in our study is more likely to happen in [occupations] highly emphasising competence, education, and skills, and also with a low representation of Black employees, such as financial banking, high technology and higher education,” Sun told HuffPost via email.

“It’s really not you, it’s them.”

– Career coach Ebony Joyce

The study controlled for employees’ education levels, tenure at the company, length of time in their current position and how long they had worked with their direct manager to “really try to isolate the extent to which self-promotion is positively impacting performance ratings,” said Sandy Wayne, a management professor at the University of Illinois at Chicago and the lead author of the study.

“What we did find was that African Americans, controlling all those other potential predictors of performance ratings, were getting lower ratings than other groups when they engaged in higher levels of self-promotion.”

Black employees can find sponsors to advocate on their behalf, but this is not their problem to fix.

Career coach and diversity consultant Ebony Joyce said the study’s findings resonated with her experience as a Black professional and with what she has seen with clients.

We’re faced with this double-edged sword. You’re taught to do the work, put your head down and your work will speak for itself,” she said. “And you notice after a while that everyone is getting promoted around you. And you’re like, ‘I’m doing the work. What do I need to do?’ And then when it comes to advocating for yourself, that doesn’t work, either.”

Joyce said she has worked with many Black clients in this situation who wonder if there is another certification or degree that they need to get to be promoted. To them, Joyce advises, “You already have the education and the expertise and everything that you need already. You are just not supported within the organisation that you are in.”

If you’re a Black employee looking to stay within your organisation, it can help to find a sponsor at your company, outside of your direct manager, who can speak up on your behalf. As Morgan Stanley senior client adviser Carla Harris put it in a TED talk, a sponsor is someone, usually within your same company, who is not just going to speak positively about you but will be willing to spend “their valuable political and social capital on you” and “has the power to get it — whatever it is for you — to get it done behind closed doors.”

Wayne said it is also critical for Black employees “to track and to maintain documentation on areas in which you have excelled and accomplished a great deal, so almost more objective indices of one’s competence and performance, rather than just communicating that yourself to your manager.”

But in many cases, the best option is to leave.

This is what Joyce said she did when she experienced this trap of self-promotion. At her then-job, she noticed people she started with the same day were getting promoted while she was not. Joyce would do the things being asked of her in performance reviews and would go to leadership and human resources with documentation, but she still saw no change and continued to watch less-experienced co-workers advance.

“[I was] getting overlooked to where it was really a slap in the face and almost, I felt like, an embarrassment to me, as to ‘What am I not doing?’” she said. “After, I think, year three of not being promoted, I had decided to leave the organisation, which was the best thing for me. And the next place that I chose to work was for a manager who looked like me.”

For Black employees who do exit unsupportive companies, Joyce advises them to look at the turnover of diverse staff and the representation in leadership of places they want to work at next to lower the chances of the situation happening again.

Ultimately, however, the burden should not be on Black employees to deal with their white managers’ bad managing. Instead, it is the organisation’s responsibility to rectify the problem.

“The backlash toward Black employees’ self-promotion only exists when the manager holds a negative competence-related stereotype, so the most direct method to mitigate the bias is to mitigate the stereotypes,” Sun said. “This is, of course, not an easy job, but it is organisations’ responsibility and the only pathway to create an equitable workplace.”

Or, as Joyce put it, “This is one of those cases where it’s really not you, it’s them.”

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January Is Notorious For Job Layoffs. Here’s To Manage The Anxiety

January marks the start of a new year and many fresh beginnings – but it also kickstarts a grim month of layoffs.

In the first week of January alone, Amazon, Vimeo and Salesforce disclosed plans for mass layoffs. In a letter to employees, Salesforce CEO Marc Benioff said the company is cutting 10% of its workforce, explaining it had “hired too many people leading into this economic downturn we’re now facing.”

Over the last 10 years, January has been on average one of the most common months for layoffs, according to the US Bureau of Labor Statistics data. The reason is largely calendar-driven, experts say.

“We often see quite a bit of layoffs in January,” says Sarah Rodehorst, co-founder of Onwards HR, a company that helps businesses conduct layoffs.

“As they analyse their data from the last year, what budgets they have going forward, they really are planning strategies for the year, so there’s often a lot of restructures, reorganisations.”

Rodehorst says she is seeing an uptick in layoffs for the tech, retail, banking and insurance industries in the new year. If a company in those fields hasn’t made an announcement, she says, “chances are there is some planning happening.”

Another reason could be that many bonuses are typically awarded in January, too. “That’s a time when you also give bonuses, and so if you are trying to be mindful and not particularly ethical about who gets those and how much they get, some companies may try to take advantage of this” and lay off eligible employees instead of giving them their bonus, says Sandra Sucher, a professor of management at Harvard Business School who has researched layoffs.

If you’re worried about losing your job this month, that can send you into a spiral of panic and deep anxiety. Take a deep breath and plan accordingly. Here’s how to deal if you know or suspect a layoff is coming.

Recognise first that these intense feelings are totally normal

Losing a job is among the most psychologically stressful things we ever go through. One study asked 112 professionals to do a retrospective checklist of their most stressful life events, and losing a job as head of the household ranked above divorce, hospitalisation due to illness or injury and the death of a close friend.

Something that can help alleviate the anxiety? Focusing on what you can control instead of worrying about whether you will be laid off on some uncertain date. The decision to lay you off may have already been made weeks ago, so Gregory Tall, a workshop facilitator who coaches managers, does not recommend “working your tail off” in an attempt to be spared.

If you have heard rumours about layoffs coming, Tall instead advises assuming that you will be laid off and planning for that future. “It’s easier to cease all preparations than to begin all preparations if you don’t,” he points out.

Calculate your finances and document what you want to save now. This is the time to calculate and save for your emergency fund. Tall says to ask yourself, “Am I immediately in trouble? Because if so, I need to think right now about how to generate income.”

And while you have a job, save client testimonials and past performance evaluations that will aid you in a future job hunt. If you believe you may lose your job for discriminatory reasons, legal experts advise documenting everything now so that if you are suddenly let go, you can be prepared to take your evidence to a lawyer.

Reflect on what you’re good at and what you want to be good at. Losing a job can also be a time to reset and do a career pivot. If you do not know what you want to do next, Sucher recommends take a week or two to note which company stories interest you, what industries they are in, and what it is about them that interested you.

And if you have trusted colleagues, try asking them about your strengths. When she was contemplating a career move from Fidelity Investments to the faculty at Harvard Business School, Sucher says she asked trusted co-workers, “What was I good at?” to get insights that were helpful and sometimes surprising.

This exercise can also be a much-needed boost to your confidence.

“If you do get laid off, that is an assault to your ego,” Sucher says, noting that questions of “Why was I chosen when they weren’t?” are painful, regardless of how quickly you find your next job. “The people who do best at recovering from layoffs are people – and this is demonstrated from research – who have a positive mindset and they don’t blame themselves for the fact that they got laid off.“

See it as an opportunity to job-hunt. Although January is a month with heavy layoffs, it’s also a month where you are more likely to get a new job, too. Rodehorst says it’s the month where companies make the most new hires.

“A company that may be having layoffs may also be hiring in other areas,” she says, adding later that, “It’s the month with the highest level of change. The hiring and firing side, just as companies look to restructure their organisation and plan for the future.”

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How To Pull Off A Therapy Session In The Middle Of Your Workday

Just as you take care of your physical health, therapy is an important aspect of taking care of your mental health. Making a therapy appointment can be a tricky task, especially if your therapist’s schedule overlaps with your workday.

It’s normal to experience a range of intense emotions following your therapy session. Understand that it may seem tough to transition back to work if you’re feeling emotionally and mentally drained. There are also a few ways to make going about your to-do list a little easier post-session.

If you plan to schedule your appointment during work hours, aim for a day when your workload may be lighter and you can work from home, if possible. Moreover, try to block some additional “transition time” in your schedule for after the visit, says Katie Duke, a nurse practitioner on the health care advisory board of the Figs clothing company in Santa Monica, California.

If you have the appointment on a busier workday, it is also helpful to inform your therapist if there are any important meetings that are happening after the session so that the therapist can also be mindful about tailoring what is talked about in the visit, says Alyssa Mancao, a therapist and founder of Alyssa Marie Wellness in Los Angeles.

Mancao also recommends being aware of time so you can spend the last 10 minutes of the visit on coping techniques to transition back to “work mode.”

And if you need a little extra help beyond that, here are a few expert-approved tips on how to pull yourself together after therapy if your appointment is during work:

Go for a walk

Mancao recommends going for a 15-minute walk after your therapy session to help calm your nervous system and transition your mind from being in “therapy mode.”

Take some time to get some fresh air and go for a walk outside or make a few rounds in your office building, if possible.

Try a quick breathing exercise

Deep breathing is a practice that helps cultivate mindfulness, aka. the ability to be present. Mindfulness can help calm your busy mind, improve your mood and reduce any stress you may be experiencing.

“Taking slow, controlled breaths that engage the diaphragm sends signals to our brain to evoke calmness and relaxation,” says Andrea Elkon, a psychologist with Best Within You Therapy & Wellness, based in Atlanta.

She recommends trying the following diaphragmatic breathing practice:

  • Aim to count to at least four as you inhale, imagining your diaphragm as a balloon filling with air
  • Exhale for at least another four counts, releasing all of the air
Taking a moment to unwind after your workday therapy session will help you better jump back into your tasks.

Westend61 via Getty Images

Taking a moment to unwind after your workday therapy session will help you better jump back into your tasks.

Give yourself a little pep talk

If you’re feeling especially overwhelmed or drained after your therapy session, understand that it is completely OK to feel this way. Don’t be too hard on yourself. Don’t let your inner voice criticise you.

“Instead, remind yourself that seeing a therapist is one of the best investments you can make for your mental health and well-being. Shift your focus on how seeking therapy has made a positive difference in your life,” Duke says.

Engage your senses with a distraction

When you focus on your senses in the present, it will shift your attention away from the painful memories and emotions that therapy might trigger, Elkon says.

To engage your senses, try activities like colouring, rubbing lotion on your hands, playing with a fidget toy or drinking a cup of hot tea or a very cold drink.

Nourish yourself with a snack

If you scheduled a therapy appointment during your workday, make sure to have a snack and water on hand after the session.

“Your body will likely have a stress response to the therapy session, leaving you feeling depleted, and having a healthy snack with some water is a way to nourish yourself,” says Kristin Meekhof, a therapist and author of A Widow’s Guide to Healing.

Jump into your to-do list or plan an event

It may be comforting to feel in control by tackling some items you’ve been putting off.

“Engaging in some sort of task that involves your thinking or planning brain will quiet the emotion centres and help you feel centred in the moment,” says Neha Chaudhary, a psychiatrist and chief medical officer of BeMe Health, a mobile mental health platform.

Chaudhary recommends drafting an email to someone at work (but not sending it!), writing down a grocery list or meal plan for the week, or thinking about the next place you want to travel and what activities you would do there.

Take it slow when going back to work

It’s normal to feel like you need to occupy your mind with work-related things immediately after your therapy appointment. However, be sure to not ignore any emotions you may be feeling.

Take slow steps as you start completing your work duties, and keep a journal handy to write down any of your thoughts and feelings as they come, says Regine Muradian, a psychologist based in California.

“Give yourself some grace, and remind yourself that you don’t need to finish everything today,” she says.

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