Years ago, my father met Joel Weldon at a conference. He brought me back an audio tape to listen to, and I must say that Joel is one of the most dynamic motivational speakers I’ve ever heard. His great tagline is “Success comes in cans, not cannots“. He put this on a little can that you can leave on your desk as a paperweight. My dad gave one to me years ago, and recently, gave one to my son who keeps it on his desk at school.

I just read an article Joel wrote, and wanted to post it here for your benefit and encouragement!

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Unconsciously, you are influencing the lives of those around you

Four of the greatest physicists in the world came from a small town in Germany. Tracing their lives, someone discovered that all four were taught by the same high school physics teacher. Obviously, that teacher touched each of these men in a special way, when they were just boys.

Without knowing it, he touched the entire world.

It’s the same with you. You may not be aware of it, but you too touch the entire world. Your influence flows out from you, often imperceptibly, like waves on an ocean.

Remember that the next time you feel you’re just an average person, powerless and insignificant: there are no average people; the problem lies in thinking you’re just average.

Think back upon your life. Surely you can remember people who influenced you — caught your attention, provided you with an opportunity, or helped shape your values — without knowing the full significance of what they were doing.

There may have been a teacher who introduced you to a profound idea, or a business associate who gave your career a boost at the right time. Although unaware of it, these people changed your life, and through you, will touch the entire world.

You and others around you are the ocean on which the waves of their influence roll onward.

Likewise you may not know how, or to whom, but you are significant. Even as you read this article, another may be doing or saying something for which you were the inspiration.

Here’s what you can do: Continually remind yourself that your actions — the things you do and say — really do have an impact on the people around you. This will not only help you become more careful, but it will make your influence become a more consistently positive one. Also, remain aware of how all things in life are interrelated. This will increase your understanding of the world and your place in it, while perhaps clarifying your thinking and enabling you to take advantage of the law of cause and effect.

© JOEL H. WELDON & ASSOCIATES, INC. http://www.SuccessComesInCans.com ®

Someone’s making a list and checking it twice; but it isn’t Santa. Due to rising e-mail abuse and spam, hundreds of servers at various companies now monitor e-mail accounts to make sure those accounts are not sending out mass e-mails. If that e-mail account is assumed to be sending spam it is put on the “blacklist”. Once on the blacklist, your e-mail account is virtually SHUT DOWN because your e-mail is blocked by hundreds or thousands of servers and your message can’t be delivered.  Big companies who give out e-mail addresses like AOL, Google, and  Comcast, for example,  will cut off e-mail service to anyone  who sends an e-mail to a large number of people at once.  Because of this, even if you or your employees innocently send a message to 100 of your clients, you could be without e-mail for days or weeks. So, how do you avoid this costly & frustrating downtime from happening to you? Read these tips to find out:

1. Protect Your Server. Spammers LOVE to find e-mail servers that don’t have a proper firewall , anti-virus, and intrusion protection. They get a high from hacking in to these servers and then using them to send out thousands of e-mails. Plus, with no protection in place, tracking and catching these spammers is nearly impossible.  The right protection will also prevent malware from being installed on your server, which can automatically send spam without human interaction.

2.  Don’t Allow Employees To Forward Messages.  Unless it is for work-only related purposes,  make a policy that no one is to forward messages  like jokes, photos  or videos  outside the company. If just 4 of your employees send out this kind of an e-mail to 30 of their contacts,  that’s well over 100 people receiving junk mail on the same day from the same e-mail server.  This puts you at high risk of being blacklisted.

3. Have Your Clients and Prospects “Opt-In”. Sometimes companies end up on the blacklist because someone on your list complained and reported your message as spam. If you have your clients and prospects agree via an opt-in form that they want to receive communication from you and confirm their permission, then you’ll have better protection against that. Also make sure you keep good records of these opt-ins. That way, even if you do get blacklisted, you should be back up and running fairly quickly.

4. Make Sure Your E-mail Is Set-Up Properly. In addition to protecting yourself from hackers and invasions with software and firewalls, you also need to be sure that your e-mail is configured correctly and is set-up to block outside relays. If you’ve got the wrong settings in your e-mail account, you could wind up blacklisted, without any e-mail for days or weeks,

5. Keep Your E-mail List Up-To-Date. If someone asks to be removed from your list and you continue to send messages to him, the chances of him reporting your company as a spammer are pretty high. Avoid this by using in-house lists (instead of purchasing one) and contacting your list to verify the information.

If you are a ConnectCare Client, we’ve got you covered. 

 If you are not a ConnectCare Client, feel free to contact us to assess your risk.
call us at 954-920-9604 or visit www.connections.com

Let’s face it. Just because you can be accessible 24/7 via your cell phone doesn’t mean you SHOULD be.  In fact, according to a recent study conducted by Intel, getting constantly distracted by your e-mail or cell phone calls, especially during the holidays, is a big social “No-No.” 

Nearly 70% of the people surveyed in that study reported that  checking e-mails or text messages on your phone while at a social gathering is unacceptable.  And for those of who you think you can slyly check your mobile phone e-mail at the table without anyone noticing, the study found that  53% of  people will not only notice, but will be offended. 

So what if you just can’t resist the impulse to check your Blackberry or iPod  while holding that glass of egg nog? What  is the “polite” way  to do so? Go to the bathroom.

70% of those surveyed said  it was perfectly okay  to bring your mobile phone  in the bathroom to check it. Just don’t forget to put down your egg-nog first!

I wanted to take a moment to let you know about a great service that XEROX is offering, allowing us to send a thank you card to our troops for FREE. I know that many of our soldiers would appreciate a simple “Thank You” and it will only take a few seconds of your time. Your support will be greatly appreciated.

To show the country’s appreciation to the hundreds of thousands of troops stationed overseas, Xerox Corporation has developed a nationwide program aimed at saying “thank you” to our troops. Through the Let’s Say Thanks program, postcards designed by children from across the country are available at http://www.letssaythanks.com/ for people to select their favorite and write a personalized message to troops. Xerox prints the cards on its paper and equipment, and mails them in care packages to deployed troops through military support organization Give2TheTroops®.
 
Some words from our Troops:
 
“I just wanted to return the gratitude and appreciation on a personal level  to all the men and women that put together “Let’s Say Thanks”.  Sometimes it’s difficult to get up in the morning and put on the uniform, but receiving things like this reminds us why we serve.  I appreciate those taking the time to send strangers a reminder of not only what we’re fighting for, but also who we’re fighting for.  THANK YOU!” — An Air Force Senior Sergeant 
 
“I wanted to express my sincere gratitude for the many boxes Give2TheTroops has sent to this battalion.  All of you have truly made a positive difference in our morale and spiritual well-being. This reinforces and definitely reminds us why America is so great.” — An Army Major 
 
“We received some packages from Give2TheTroops a few days ago with a bunch of goodies and in it were cards from some kids back home. I do not know who all of them were, but we sat around our planning table and read them all. Thanks to everyone for all the support from back home. I grabbed a coffee mug, a lifesaver out here, and it has been attached to me for the better part of five days. Thank you all so much for everything you do for us. We ALL appreciate it here.”   –  An Army Staff Sergeant

So please take a moment of your time and send a postcard to our troops overseas through http://www.letssaythanks.com/. It will be greatly appreciated, especially during this holiday season.