Study finds that women dont spread catty gossip any more than men do

Study finds that women don't spread catty gossip any more than men do Study finds that women don't spread catty gossip any more than men do A new study from the University of California Riverside debunked the stereotype that women gossip negatively more than men. However, it did discover that everyone gossips nearly an hour a day â€" about 52 minutes on average.Gossip was defined by the researchers as talking about someone who isn’t there and isn’t inherently negative.Follow Ladders on Flipboard!Follow Ladders’ magazines on Flipboard covering Happiness, Productivity, Job Satisfaction, Neuroscience, and more!The study was the first to exhaustively examine conversational buzz. “There is a surprising dearth of information about who gossips and how, given public interest and opinion on the subject,” said Megan Robbins, an assistant psychology professor who led the study, in a release.For the research, the researchers used data from 467 people â€" 269 women, 198 men â€" who wore a portable listening device that samples what people said throughout the day. About 10% of participants’ conversations were recorded, and then listened to and analyzed by research assistants.In all, there were 4,003 instances of gossip. The researchers organized the results: About 75% of the gossip was neutral. While women do gossip more than men, they do it primarily in a neutral way that’s meant to shares information. The gossip recorded was “overwhelmingly” about a real-life acquaintance, not a celebrity. Younger people were more likely to gossip negatively than older adults. Another stereotype busted: poor people don’t gossip more than wealthy people. The next time you get a burning in your ear, you can rest easier. People may be talking about you â€" but probably not in a bad way.You might also enjoy… New neuroscience reveals 4 rituals that will make you happy Strangers know your social class in the first seven words you say, study finds 10 lessons from Benjamin Franklin’s daily schedule that will double your productivity The worst mistakes you can make in an interview, according to 12 CEOs 10 habits of mentally strong people

The Oil Information Cartel Is (Finally) Broken

The Oil Information Cartel Is (Finally) Broken The Oil Information Cartel Is (Finally) Broken A determined James Stafford of OilPrice.com just busted wide open an oil industry information cartel that has existed for decades. Most investors look at West Texas Intermediate and Brent prices on Bloomberg or CME Futures, figuring the oil price is in the public domain. That assumption is about 2 percent correct, because there are hundreds of different grades of oil and hubs where it is bought and sold - and they all have different prices. Since the age of oil began up until a few months ago, most real-time oil prices were jealously guarded by marketers, who used the information to their advantage in the daily multi-billion-dollar physical oil trade. Today, Im going to tell you the story of how Stafford and his small team made 18 months worth of calls, cajoling and ultimately paying for an amazing service you now get for free. Its a true David vs. Goliath story, and just like in the original, the little guy wins in the end. What Stafford and his team have assembled to date is remarkable - and free.   You can access it through the link below: https://oilprice.com/oil-price-charts This is an incredible and unprecedented collection of information available to the public. (Click to enlarge) Stafford says that the feedback he has received has been exceptional. With no marketing effort, the oil price page is already receiving 40,000 visits daily. It was an 18-month quest to democratize the world of oil pricing and bust the information cartel that has existed for decades. A Simple Question With No Easy Answer Staffords quest started well over a year ago when he received a phone call from a reporter working for the Wall Street Journal. The journalist wanted help finding a simple piece of information. He was writing an article about the African oil industry and simply wanted to know the current price for Bonny  Light crude oil,  the main benchmark price for Nigerian crude. Now remember, this is a Wall Street Journal writer with access to an incredible network of contacts and research, not a casual retail investor sitting at home with pedestrian internet search skills and no industry contacts. You would expect that finding the current price for Africas main brand of crude would be a simple task for a  Wall Street Journal  writer. You would be wrong. Not only did the writer fail to find the current price for Bonny Light, but the best he could do was get a price from six months ago! We were passing information around faster with the Pony Express 150 years ago. The trouble that the writer was having surprised Stafford, who then realized that he, too, couldn’t get access to the current price of Bonny Light. Given that Stafford is the founder of the very popular website OilPrice.com, not being able to find a price for a globally important type of crude did not sit well with him. So Stafford put his head down and got to work. Information Held Hostage; the Ransom?  $30,000 Per Year The internet has made information available to everyone with ease. Nowhere is this more true than in the investment world. I can tap into any SEC filing of any company within seconds. It wasnt that long ago that I would have had to request that information by telephone and wait to receive it by mail. The internet has sent the encyclopedia the way of the dodo bird, ruined many a local newspaper, and made the world a much smaller place. It has also leveled the playing field in many cases, especially when it comes to investing. When it comes to obtaining  global oil price information, however, the internet has done nothing. We are still completely in the dark. Your first inclination may be to disagree with me. You know that you can look at the current (or historic) price of West Texas Intermediate or Brent crude any time you want. What you are missing is that those are just two oil benchmarks out of hundreds, perhaps even thousands. People generally believe that oil is a single homogeneous substance. A barrel of oil is a barrel of oil is a barrel of oil. That is not the case. In its natural unrefined state, crude oil differs in consistency and density from very thin, volatile, and  light oil  to very thick, almost solid, heavy oil. It also differs in color, ranging in hue from pitch black to a light golden yellow. Depending on where it is found, each type of oil has very unique properties when it comes to volatility, viscosity, and toxicity. In Canada alone, there are north of 70 different oil blends. You read that correctly - 70! (Click to enlarge) Knowing the exact blend is essential for the refinery process, which has to account for the specific chemical properties and viscosity of the oil being processed. Stafford knew that if he couldnt find pricing for a major type of crude like Bonny Light, then there were countless other prices that would be even harder to get. Staffords quest quickly led him to a discovery: The only place to obtain a fairly complete set of current oil price data required a subscription, which went for  $30,000 to $50,000 per year. The people behind this source knew they had the upper hand over people who needed that oil price data, and they exploited it. Even at such exorbitant cost, however, the oil price information wasnt complete. The source only provided end-of-day prices for the various sources of crudes - nothing in real time. This just motivated Stafford more. His focus became finding a way to open up the world of oil prices, making the information available to everyone. But it wasnt easy, and it certainly wasnt cheap. It took Stafford and his team almost 18 months of making phone calls, getting rejected, making more phone calls - over and over again. When Stafford found the right people, they were often reluctant to release the information for fear of ruffling the feathers of senior management. Stafford ultimately succeeded simply by knocking on enough doors across the globe to find enough oil-industry people who were sick and tired of this oil price information being held hostage. Like Stafford, these people felt there should be transparency with respect to this information. Stafford will be out of pocket by a  couple hundred thousand dollars per year  in order to secure the continued contractual commitments to supply this data. The Result: Global Oil Price Information for Everyone (Finally) Stafford and his team arent done. They are still making calls, sending emails, and adding different blends to their pricing list. Stafford knows of a few hard-to-get-ahold-of blends his pricing list still lacks. Certain OPEC blends in particular have been hard to pin down. Well done, Mr. Stafford. By Keith Schaefer via  Oil and Gas Investments

Five Meetings Your Employees Will Thank You for Killing or Fixing

Five Meetings Your Employees Will Thank You for Killing or Fixing Five Meetings Your Employees Will Thank You for Killing or Fixing The balance of this article offers up some additional meeting types that spread stress and strife. As the manager or leader responsible for pulling people together to communicate, share and generate ideas, you are well served by eliminating these meeting types from your routine. 8:00 a.m. Monday Morning Staff Meetings The problem with this meeting is that no one is ever ready for it. After all, it’s 8:00 a.m. on Monday morning- nothing has happened yet and whatever happened last week is mostly ancient history. The second problem with this meeting is that for anyone to be prepared, they have to work Sunday night which is fine on occasion but guaranteed to earn you some serious votes for “jerk of the year” from employees and the family members of employees. The solution: If you must run a team meeting on Monday, push it to later in the morning or early in the afternoon. Better yet, push it to Tuesday morning. Round-the-Table Status Meetings You know this meeting. It’s the one where people move around the room sharing their latest updates, sagas, fantasies, and dreams. Sit in the wrong place and you end up as the 22nd person to offer an update to a group whose bladders are over-strained and brains numb from the politically oriented updates emanating from the mouths of colleagues in far-away functions. The solution: Meet if you must, but set some rules on the updates. Ask people to focus on important news that impacts everyone or to identify challenges that require help from across functions. Do anything to limit the painful march of gratuitous and self-serving status updates that undisciplined round-the-table meetings generate. Recurring Meetings that Have Lost Their Purpose Any recurring meeting where no one can remember why this meeting still takes place is a candidate for immediate elimination. The laws of physics transfer to meetings and a meeting on the schedule tends to remain on the schedule long after it has used up its usefulness in the workplace. One new manager reviewed the recurring list of meetings on his team’s schedule and canceled two of them because he could not uncover a reason for these meetings to exist. He received more than a few thank-you notes and a few comments from people wondering how he managed to kill this meeting that they had been trying to get rid of for the past year. The solution: Review all of the recurring meetings that you subject your team to or that you are a participant in, and eliminate them from your life and the lives of your team members. If you are not the host of the meeting, inform the host of your intention and of your perspective on the utility of the meeting. If you are the host/sponsor, poll team members and give them a voice and a vote. A bit of draconian slicing of recurring meetings opens up valuable time for other more important activities. Group Word-Smithing Meetings This is any meeting where you pull together a group of people to work on the wording for something: a vision, a mission, a strategy statement, a scope statement in project management. The output of these sessions is typically a series of awkwardly constructed sentences reflecting compromises on the part of the person-in-charge. No one in the room agrees with the final product, but everyone nods their heads in assent as soon as the wording moves beyond ridiculous to just awful in an attempt to make the pain go away. The solution: Never relegate rough wording of anything to a committee. Take a stab at the item in question yourself, bounce it off a few colleagues and when you approach something that is beginning to work for you, very carefully ask for input from a group. Ask clarifying questions, take great notes and then disappear and redraft the statement(s), repeating the process as necessary. Template Strategy Meetings There is no magical process or template or even simple series of steps that help strategic clarity emerge. Conducting a S.W.O.T. (strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats) analysis is not always on the critical path to arriving at an accurate assessment of conditions, and opportunities. And numbers and targets and growth are not strategies. Beware of anyone suggesting they have a simple process for this complex topic.   The solution: Invest in a highly qualified and experienced strategy facilitator or advisor who understands how to guide, sometimes lead and sometimes follow in pursuit of developing an actionable, meaningful strategy. The right professional will hold the group accountable to finding answers to the right (difficult) questions that must be answered on the road to strategic clarity. The Bottom Line Meetings are priceless opportunities to connect, communicate, build relationships, and stimulate creative problem-solving. They are also opportunities ripe for overuse and even abuse. Strive to be the manager that respects the power and importance of meetings. Use these forums for the right reasons by architecting them to focus on key issues, solicit ideas and importantly, respect the time that everyone puts into the sessions. Your team members will appreciate your positive approach more than you may ever know.

11 Signs Its Time For a New Job

11 Signs It’s Time For a New Job 11 Signs It’s Time For a New Job 11 Signs You Need a New Job Does your job leave you feeling unmotivated? You may need a new job... Is your career moving in the direction that you'd hoped? Do you still feel challenged, or do you face Sunday nights and Monday mornings with trepidation, hoping the days pass quickly so you can make it to the weekend? Before you hand in your resignation, use this checklist to determine if now's the time to leave your job, or if you should try to make things work at your current place of employment. Signs that something needs to change: You work with unsupportive management and/or co-workers. The commute requires all your free time. The workload is growing and it's impossible to do well. There are limited opportunities to gain new skills, networks, expertise, or certifications. You're underpaid or the financial compensation isn't enough to allow you to invest in yourself. It's a challenge to find and cultivate mentorships with those more experienced than you. The position doesn't provide intellectual stimulation or allow for risk-taking and you're bored. If you're experiencing a number of these signs, it's time to re-evaluate your current situation. In some cases, a frank conversation with your boss may be the key to turning things around at your job. Remember, your manager can't help you if you don't let him or her know what's going on. Brainstorm a list of solutions before you meet with your boss, and consider the following items to include in your negotiations: An intern or other support staff A more flexible work schedule or the option to telecommute The opportunity to work on more challenging or cross-functional projects with other teams A raise or promotion with additional responsibilities A stipend for professional development opportunities Access to the company's internal training programs Be prepared to support these requests with evidence, proving the value you've brought to the company and/or the benefits these items would provide to the organization in the long run. Related:Career Quiz: Is It Time for a Career Change? Unfortunately, not every situation can be fixed with a conversation. If you're experiencing any of the signs below, it's time to start looking for a new job before things get worse. Signs it's time to find a new job: You dread going to work, have lost enthusiasm, and start each day with a horrible feeling in the pit of your stomach. You're not in the loop and it feels intentional that you're the last to know what's going on. You're a cultural misfit and can't shake the feeling that you just don't fit in at the office. You're desperate to leave and find yourself obsessively checking job boards for an opportunity any opportunity that would allow you to quit. The company's struggling. If the signs are there, it's better to start looking before layoffs begin and everyone is competing for the same positions. Your boss knows less than you do or is not very good at their job and they're not going anywhere. Your personal life is suffering. You have too many work commitments, not enough time with your family and friends, and it's affecting your relationships. Your job is making you sick, and you're stressed to the point that your work is causing health problems. You receive a bad performance review. If your reviews are usually fine and a negative one comes out of the blue, the company may be looking to get rid of people. Your job description changes. You're asked to do more, given responsibilities you're not necessarily equipped to handle, or removed from a project or long-term assignment that you've been working on. You're being documented, or you're asked to document everything you do. If you're asked to train a backup, management may be using you as an inexpensive way to train your replacement. If you find yourself agreeing with one or more of the above items, it's time to move on. Start looking for the right opportunity today so you can leave your job as soon as possible. Click on the following link to view our infographic that will help you take the next steps to improve your relationship with your job. Ready to leave your job for that new opportunity, but need to revamp your resume? Request a free review now! Recommended Reading: What to Do When Your New Job Isn't Your Dream Job Career Strategies When You're Between Jobs What Kind of Work Culture Works for You?

Top Guide of Basic Resume

Top Guide of Basic Resume Consequently, the resume will keep evolving at each step in anybody's career. Accomplish not write what you would like in work. Get the job that you deserve, not the one you're stuck in. It's ideal if you're searching for work in precisely the same area of interest your existing job is in or if you're searching for a better position in precisely the same career path. Then start looking for skills you might translate from 1 job to another. Skills Include all skills that are associated with the position or career field that you're applying for. Alongside the work experience, a comprehensive understanding of the skill set you possess should assist the recruiter rank your candidature. The Simple Resume Make may also be structured in the way which best presents your abilities and experience. Finding related work will take a higher degree of English communication in addition to higher-level job-searching abilities, which will require increased planning and communication by means of your employment counsellor. Each circumstance, job or expert objective demands a different resume. How to compose resumes in the ideal way for you will ride on your private experience, circumstances and objectives. Whether you're asking for work, a grant, or using your resume to construct your own client base, a skilled and well-organized resume is encouraged. Then it may be time to bring some style to your resume! Regardless of the sort of resume you decide on, aim to tailor your resume to the job which you are applying to. Otherwise, you won't have the ability to carry out the job. Choosing which to use depends upon the kind of job that you are applying for and your degree of experience. To make an effective resume you will need to investigate the industry and company that you are targeting and include information that demonstrates your expertise and appeals to their distinct needs. In other words, employing a Basic Resume Writing Tips speeds up the practice of producing a winning resume and ensures that it's going to stick out in the application approach. In other words, utilizing a Simple Resume Make speeds up the practice of producing a winning resume and ensures it will stick out in the application procedure. So, just check in to a superb site and find a totally free sample resume. There are guidance in the template about how to fill each resume parts. Referring a sample template will thus help you in producing the the majority of the opportunity. Well, a sample resume is merely a demonstration about how you're able to represent yourself through words. It is possible to read about the significance of resumes here. The aim of a resume is to acquire an interview. Chronological resumes are the ideal place to highlight your accomplishments. Your possible employer, while certainly interested in what you would like, is much more concerned with your qualifications and what you can do to help the organization. Sending it's not going to make a difference in your CV, but should you not send it and they demand a letter, it may not convey a great impression to the employer 6. Interrupt while an employee is helping a customer. All business resumes are especially targeted for a particular firm or organisation that the applicant wants to be hired at. Work depend on region to region. The Basic Resume Writing Tips can likewise be structured in the way which best presents your abilities and experience. Skills are rather important in measuring hopefuls' qualifications. Technical Details When you're listing the skills in your CV, it's possible to either eliminate transferable abilities or categorize transferable and technical skills in various sections.

Update Your Personal Brand With This Must-Have Checklist

Update Your Personal Brand With This Must-Have Checklist Update Your Personal Brand With This Must-Have Checklist If you don’t manage your professional brand, someone else will do it for you. As professionals, we use many symbols to express our professional identity, better known as our personal brand. The most successful professionals carefully manage their brand across many different channels throughout their careers.Whether you’re new to the workforce or a seasoned professional, take time to monitor and manage your personal brand to increase your career success. Here’s a checklist to help you accomplish just that.MessagingBefore you can evaluate your current brand, consider what you’d like your brand to represent. How do you want to be viewed by your industry peers? What are you great at and passionate about â€" in other words, how do you provide value to your current employer? What are your long-term career goals and what will it take to get you there? By asking yourself these questions and trying a few job-goal exercises, you will be able to clarify what you’d like your personal b rand to represent and what changes you’ll need to make in your current brand to achieve this.Professional AttireExperts agree that your appearance plays a role in your professional advancement. Your grooming, clothing, and hairstyle all affect your personal brand. Invest in a professional haircut, updated clothes and personal grooming services to lend to a professional look. Remember, clothes have an expiration date. Remove any items from your professional wardrobe that are more than five years old, with the exception of a few classic investment pieces that were made to last you a lifetime. Fit is a huge factor. You’re better off picking up a suit at a discount retailer and then paying to have it altered rather than splurging on an expensive suit that doesn’t fit you quite right.If you’re looking to advance your career, take some cues from the next level of management. How does your boss and her peers dress for a regular work day? While you don’t want to looked overdressed in your current your position, it’s important to start doing little things to step up your attire so that you come off looking polished and ready for the next challenge. Additionally, be careful what you wear during company outings and other more relaxed settings, such as a summer picnic or casual Friday dress code.ResumeMost people don’t update their resume until they need to use it. However, that’s the worst time to re-write your resume because emotions tend to run higher, making it difficult to remain an objective writer. In addition, you might not have access to all the necessary information to write a truly compelling document. Do yourself a favor and keep a running list of your professional accomplishments and contributions in what I call a brag sheet. That way, you’re always prepared when a great opportunity comes up. Also upload your updated resume to career sites you’ve previously used so recruiters don’t send you inappropriate job leads.Online presenceIn today ’s marketplace, it’s essential for every professional to actively manage their online presence. Start by Googling your name so you have a baseline for your online brand. Remember, if you can find it online, so can prospective employers and valuable networking contacts. Make sure your name is consistently represented across every professional profile (and on your resume), and increase the security settings on your personal accounts that shouldn’t be associated with your professional brand. Take the time to flesh out at least one professional profile on sites like LinkedIn, GitHub, or About.Me, depending upon your line of work. If you work in a creative field, consider creating a personal site that has a mobile-responsive design so you can share your portfolio from any device.PhotosWhile a photo on your resume is still considered taboo, recruiters have come to expect an image on your online professional profiles. In fact, your LinkedIn profile is 40 percent more likely to get cl icked on if it contains a photo. However, choose your picture strategically. Use a head shot that is professional, friendly, and in alignment with your personal brand. Your selfie is not going to score you any points with prospective employers. And while you may have a great family or an adorable dog, neither of these images belongs in your profile picture.Between Instagram and Facebook, there may be myriad photos you do not wish your professional network or future employer to see. Take the time to safeguard your social media accounts and un-tag yourself from, or delete any, photos that are inappropriate or paint you in a negative light.Make sure your brand is consistent across all these channels. Your goal is to make sure that the version of you who people meet online and on paper is the same person they will meet face-to-face at networking events or in the interview room.

Air Force Basic Training Drill and Marching

Air Force Basic Training Drill and Marching Air Force Basic Training Drill and Marching During the first couple of weeks of Air Force Basic Military Training (AFBMT), you will spend several hours on the drill pad with your T.I. learning how to perform military drill. Drill consists of certain movements by which a military unit is moved in an orderly manner from one formation to another or from one place to another. Air Force Basic Military Training Drill Video You will learn how to march in formation together, how to change direction at the same time, how to start at the same time, how to stop at the same time, etc. Everywhere you and your flight go in basic training, youll march in formation. Everywhere! Marching from A to B Marching as a group is an effective way to travel from training event to training event during Basic Military Training. Most of all drill is instilling discipline and order in each individual in the flight (small unit). You cannot get from A to B without moving together as a team. First and foremost, the military is a team, and being able to conform to the teams standards is critical to all members of the military. Drill teaches you not only to perform as a team  but helps your flight get ready to look good during the final graduation parade. Somewhere in the middle of basic training, your T.I. will probably teach you some marching jodies. A jodie is kind of a marching song. These are sung during non-formal marching events typically done when traveling or running as a group. These songs / cadences are done when you are doing PT and not marching to the beat of the drummer of the band in formal appearances. Below are a couple of examples of common Air Force jodies: GRANNY When my granny was 91She did PT just for fun When my granny was 92She did PT better than you When my granny was 93She did PT better than me When my granny was 94She ran 2 miles and ran 10 more When my granny was 95She did PT to stay alive When my granny was 96She did PT just for kicks When my granny was 97She up and died and double-timed to heaven She met St. Peter at the pearly gatesSaid to St. Peter Sorry Im late St. Peter said with a big white grinDrop down granny and give me ten JODY Jody Jody look and seeLook what the Air Force done to me Tried to give me Navy blues But I dont need those tattoosTried to give me Army greens But I dont need that Army sceneTried to make me a marine If I were that I think Id screamIssued me Air Force blues Now Im Air Force through and through However During Formal Drill Events When you are in a dress uniform, travel as a group is expected to be much more formal and crisp. The jodies will typically not be done when in the parade area and you will march to the beat of the drummer or patriotic military piece of music. Here are some of the parade drill movements you will be tasked with learning and performance perfectly as a group in unison: Attention - Stand straight and tall and arms to the side and heels touching and toes pointing at 45 degrees to the left and right. Parade Rest - Stand straight with arms crossed in the small of the back and legs apart at about shoulder width. Left / Right Turn - Left turn March - The group you are with will be marching and have to make turns. The front will initiate the turn on a particular spot and the remaining members of the group will turn on that same spot when they reach it pivoting 90 degrees. Composition of Drill Commands Drill Movements with Weapons Attention - stand at attention with weapons (or without) touching the outside of the right foot parallel to the seam of the trouser. Port Arms - Move weapon from the ground with one hand and grasp weapon with the other hand with the weapon diagonally across the front of the body. Present Arms - Move weapon to center of the body with butt facing down and trigger assembly facing away from the holder. Right Shoulder Arms - Move weapons to the right shoulder, holding the weapon with just the right hand at the butt of the weapon. Left Shoulder Arms - Move weapons to the left shoulder, holding the weapon with just the left hand at the butt of the weapon. Inspection Arms - Similar to port arms but open the chamber of the weapon so group leader can inspect all weapons. Fix Bayonets - With one hand (right) remove bayonet from sheath and place on the end of the weapon while other hand (left) holds the weapon. Parade Rest - Similar to parade rest without a weapon but the right hand will hold the weapon extended at a slight angle in front of the right side of the body, while left hand moves to the small of the back. Want to Know More About Air Force Basic Training? Surviving Air Force Basic Training