Profit Buzz : Perspective Is Everything

We scour the Internet every week looking for the very best content for our readers that will help them develop profitable habits--and we're not just talking about money. We try to share world wide web wisdom that will help you get profitable emotionally, mentally and personally.

The goal? Find everything we can to help you build a profitable business that will change the world, and your sphere of influence. As we dig, we inevitably run across video, pictures or blog posts that are life-changing.

Each Tuesday, we give out awards to our favorites.

This week's winner is...

Shawn Achor : The Happy Secret to Better Work

You have to watch this. It will make you happy. I'm serious. Shawn is a hilarious guy, and he makes some smart points too.

Our favorite insights from Shawn:

If happiness is always on the other side of success, your brain never gets there.

and

If we can find a way of being positive in the present then our brains work even more successfully, and we are able to work harder, faster and more intelligently.

And the Runners-Up Are:

#1 - Minda Zetlin : CIOs Describe Turning Points In Their Careers

We all have days when we get the worst news in the world, and that pit in your stomach doesn't leave for weeks as you try to navigate the crisis you never saw coming.

Zetlin interviewed CIO Hall of Fame inductees to find out how these great leaders learned hard lessons, and used these crisis moments as challenges rather than failures.

great_leader

#2 - Inc.com : 8 Secrets to Truly Motivate Employees

All 8 secrets are really great and insightful. Our fave is number 7: Let Them Make Mistakes.

Bird gives employees a lot of guidance about overall goals and directions. Then he gives them a lot of autonomy. "I don't have the license on all the good ideas, and any leaders who think they do are wrong," he says. "If we do a good job of getting the right people, training them, and engaging them, they'll make the right decisions. If I have to make all the decisions, we won't get a lot done."

What if they make the wrong decisions? "You have to be willing to allow people to make mistakes," he says. "That's easy to say but hard to do. It's hard for the individual, too--people don't want to make mistakes."

The key is constant communication, he says. "Decisions happen. I find out about them or a manager finds out about them, and we don't get too far down the path without check-ins. When something goes wrong, we identify the problem and fix it fast. One rule here is that good news travels fast and bad news travels faster. That helps."

mistakes

#3 - Rory Sutherland : Perspective is Everything

How much control do we really have over our lives and all the circumstances? Probably not as much as we'd like to have. Sutherland has some really great and entertaining insights as to why perspective matters.