Blaine and Associates

Blaine and Associates

Thursday, October 30, 2014

New Job Listing!

Accounting Supervisor - Woodland Hills, CA
$55 - 70,000

Growing food and beverage distributor is looking for the  perfect Accounting Supervisor to fit in with their entrepreneurial culture.  

  • Maintaining books and records, recording or supervising all transactions based on vendor invoices, customer sales, checks processed, hours worked
  • Preparing monthly financial statements
  • Preparation and filing of various tax reporting returns such as sales tax and property tax
  • Payroll processing and preparation of quarterly and annual payroll reporting
  • Supervising accounting staff
  • Supervision of customer invoicing
  • Supervision of payables and receivables management
  • Supervision of the reconciliation of bank statements
 
The successful candidate will have:

  • Bachelor’s degree in Accounting or Finance
  • At least five years experience accounting supervision experience
  • Solid understanding of generally accepted accounting principles
  • Proficiency in QuickBooks
  • Accountability for consistently positive results 
  • Strong references from relevant positions

Thursday, October 2, 2014

How Successful People Stay Calm

How Successful People Stay Calm
by Dr. Travis Bradberry

The ability to manage your emotions and remain calm under pressure has a direct link to your performance. TalentSmart has conducted research with more than a million people, and we’ve found that 90% of top performers are skilled at managing their emotions in times of stress in order to remain calm and in control. These successful people earn an average of $28,000 more annually than their low EQ peers, get promoted more often, and receive higher marks on performance evaluations. The link between EQ and earnings is so direct that every point increase in EQ adds $1,300 to an annual salary.

If you follow our newsletter, you’ve read some startling research summaries that explore the havoc stress can wreak on one’s physical and mental health (such as the Yale study, which found that prolonged stress causes degeneration in the area of the brain responsible for self-control). The tricky thing about stress (and the anxiety that comes with it) is that it’s an absolutely necessary emotion. Our brains are wired such that it’s difficult to take action until we feel at least some level of this emotional state. In fact, performance peaks under the heightened activation that comes with moderate levels of stress. As long as the stress isn’t prolonged, it’s harmless.



Research from the University of California, Berkeley, reveals an upside to experiencing moderate levels of stress. But it also reinforces how important it is to keep stress under control. The study, led by post-doctoral fellow Elizabeth Kirby, found that the onset of stress entices the brain into growing new cells responsible for improved memory. However, this effect is only seen when stress is intermittent. As soon as the stress continues beyond a few moments into a prolonged state, it suppresses the brain’s ability to develop new cells.

“I think intermittent stressful events are probably what keeps the brain more alert, and you perform better when you are alert,” Kirby says. For animals, intermittent stress is the bulk of what they experience, in the form of physical threats in their immediate environment. Long ago, this was also the case for humans. As the human brain evolved and increased in complexity, we’ve developed the ability to worry and perseverate on events, which creates frequent experiences of prolonged stress.

Besides increasing your risk of heart disease, depression, and obesity, stress decreases your cognitive performance. Fortunately, though, unless a lion is chasing you, the bulk of your stress is subjective and under your control. Top performers have well-honed coping strategies that they employ under stressful circumstances. This lowers their stress levels regardless of what’s happening in their environment, ensuring that the stress they experience is intermittent and not prolonged.

While I’ve run across numerous effective strategies that successful people employ when faced with stress, what follows are ten of the best. Some of these strategies may seem obvious, but the real challenge lies in recognizing when you need to use them and having the wherewithal to actually do so in spite of your stress.

They Appreciate What They Have - Taking time to contemplate what you’re grateful for isn’t merely the “right” thing to do. It also improves your mood, because it reduces the stress hormone cortisol by 23%. Research conducted at the University of California, Davis found that people who worked daily to cultivate an attitude of gratitude experienced improved mood, energy, and physical well-being. It’s likely that lower levels of cortisol played a major role in this.

They Avoid Asking “What If?” - “What if?” statements throw fuel on the fire of stress and worry. Things can go in a million different directions, and the more time you spend worrying about the possibilities, the less time you’ll spend focusing on taking action that will calm you down and keep your stress under control. Calm people know that asking “what if? will only take them to a place they don’t want—or need—to go.

They Stay Positive - Positive thoughts help make stress intermittent by focusing your brain’s attention onto something that is completely stress-free. You have to give your wandering brain a little help by consciously selecting something positive to think about. Any positive thought will do to refocus your attention. When things are going well, and your mood is good, this is relatively easy. When things are going poorly, and your mind is flooded with negative thoughts, this can be a challenge. In these moments, think about your day and identify one positive thing that happened, no matter how small. If you can't think of something from the current day, reflect on the previous day or even the previous week. Or perhaps you’re looking forward to an exciting event that you can focus your attention on. The point here is that you must have something positive that you're ready to shift your attention to when your thoughts turn negative.

They Disconnect - Given the importance of keeping stress intermittent, it’s easy to see how taking regular time off the grid can help keep your stress under control. When you make yourself available to your work 24/7, you expose yourself to a constant barrage of stressors. Forcing yourself offline and even—gulp!—turning off your phone gives your body a break from a constant source of stress. Studies have shown that something as simple as an email break can lower stress levels.

Technology enables constant communication and the expectation that you should be available 24/7. It is extremely difficult to enjoy a stress-free moment outside of work when an email that will change your train of thought and get you thinking (read: stressing) about work can drop onto your phone at any moment. If detaching yourself from work-related communication on weekday evenings is too big a challenge, then how about the weekend? Choose blocks of time where you cut the cord and go offline. You’ll be amazed at how refreshing these breaks are and how they reduce stress by putting a mental recharge into your weekly schedule. If you’re worried about the negative repercussions of taking this step, first try doing it at times when you’re unlikely to be contacted—maybe Sunday morning. As you grow more comfortable with it, and as your coworkers begin to accept the time you spend offline, gradually expand the amount of time you spend away from technology.

They Limit Their Caffeine Intake - Drinking caffeine triggers the release of adrenaline. Adrenaline is the source of the “fight-or-flight” response, a survival mechanism that forces you to stand up and fight or run for the hills when faced with a threat. The fight-or-flight mechanism sidesteps rational thinking in favor of a faster response. This is great when a bear is chasing you, but not so great when you’re responding to a curt email. When caffeine puts your brain and body into this hyperaroused state of stress, your emotions overrun your behavior. The stress that caffeine creates is far from intermittent, as its long half-life ensures that it takes its sweet time working its way out of your body.

They Sleep - I’ve beaten this one to death over the years and can’t say enough about the importance of sleep to increasing your emotional intelligence and managing your stress levels. When you sleep, your brain literally recharges, shuffling through the day’s memories and storing or discarding them (which causes dreams), so that you wake up alert and clear-headed. Your self-control, attention, and memory are all reduced when you don’t get enough—or the right kind—of sleep. Sleep deprivation raises stress hormone levels on its own, even without a stressor present. Stressful projects often make you feel as if you have no time to sleep, but taking the time to get a decent night’s sleep is often the one thing keeping you from getting things under control.

They Squash Negative Self-Talk - A big step in managing stress involves stopping negative self-talk in its tracks. The more you ruminate on negative thoughts, the more power you give them. Most of our negative thoughts are just that—thoughts, not facts. When you find yourself believing the negative and pessimistic things, your inner voice says, “It's time to stop and write them down.” Literally stop what you're doing and write down what you're thinking. Once you've taken a moment to slow down the negative momentum of your thoughts, you will be more rational and clear-headed in evaluating their veracity. You can bet that your statements aren’t true any time you use words like “never,” “worst,” “ever,” etc. If your statements still look like facts once they’re on paper, take them to a friend or colleague you trust and see if he or she agrees with you. Then the truth will surely come out. When it feels like something always or never happens, this is just your brain’s natural threat tendency inflating the perceived frequency or severity of an event. Identifying and labeling your thoughts as thoughts by separating them from the facts will help you escape the cycle of negativity and move toward a positive new outlook.

They Reframe Their Perspective - Stress and worry are fueled by our own skewed perception of events. It’s easy to think that unrealistic deadlines, unforgiving bosses, and out-of-control traffic are the reasons we’re so stressed all the time. You can’t control your circumstances, but you can control how you respond to them. So before you spend too much time dwelling on something, take a minute to put the situation in perspective. If you aren’t sure when you need to do this, try looking for clues that your anxiety may not be proportional to the stressor. If you’re thinking in broad, sweeping statements such as “Everything is going wrong” or “Nothing will work out,” then you need to reframe the situation. A great way to correct this unproductive thought pattern is to list the specific things that actually are going wrong or not working out. Most likely you will come up with just some things—not everything—and the scope of these stressors will look much more limited than it initially appeared.

They Breathe - The easiest way to make stress intermittent lies in something that you have to do everyday anyway: breathing. The practice of being in the moment with your breathing will begin to train your brain to focus solely on the task at hand and get the stress monkey off your back. When you’re feeling stressed, take a couple of minutes to focus on your breathing. Close the door, put away all other distractions, and just sit in a chair and breathe. The goal is to spend the entire time focused only on your breathing, which will prevent your mind from wandering. Think about how it feels to breathe in and out. This sounds simple, but it’s hard to do for more than a minute or two. It’s all right if you get sidetracked by another thought; this is sure to happen at the beginning, and you just need to bring your focus back to your breathing. If staying focused on your breathing proves to be a real struggle, try counting each breath in and out until you get to 20, and then start again from 1. Don’t worry if you lose count; you can always just start over.

This task may seem too easy or even a little silly, but you’ll be surprised by how calm you feel afterward and how much easier it is to let go of distracting thoughts that otherwise seem to have lodged permanently inside your brain.

They Use Their Support System - It’s tempting, yet entirely ineffective, to attempt tackling everything by yourself. To be calm and productive, you need to recognize your weaknesses and ask for help when you need it. This means tapping into your support system when a situation is challenging enough for you to feel overwhelmed. Everyone has someone at work and/or outside work who is on their team, rooting for them, and ready to help them get the best from a difficult situation. Identify these individuals in your life and make an effort to seek their insight and assistance when you need it. Something as simple as talking about your worries will provide an outlet for your anxiety and stress and supply you with a new perspective on the situation. Most of the time, other people can see a solution that you can’t because they are not as emotionally invested in the situation. Asking for help will mitigate your stress and strengthen your relationships with those you rely upon.

Tattoos and Job Interviews

Survey: Tattoos Hurt Your Chances of Getting a Job

Find Out How Tattoos/Piercings Can Limit Your Career

By , Salary.com contributing writer.


Ink Can Be a Career Stain

Maybe it’s a tribal arm band, the orchids on your lower back playing peek-a-boo with your coworkers, or -- gulp -- you’re wearing it on your face a la Mike Tyson. But even if it’s that cute little leprechaun on your ankle, our latest survey results show visible tattoos at work could have a negative effect on your pot of gold.
A recent study from the Pew Research Center found nearly 40% of people between the ages of 18 and 29 have at least one tattoo, and body piercings are also a growing means of self-expression among people in this age group. In a perfect world we would all be judged solely on the merit of our work. But if the 2,675 people we surveyed are any indication, there is a lot more going on when it comes to performance evaluations, raises, promotions, and making character assumptions about people based on their appearance.
But who has the tattoos, what do people find objectionable about them, and to what extent? The results might surprise you.

Tattoos, Piercings & Credibility

Of the nearly 2,700 people we surveyed, 12% reported having a visible tattoo that can be seen by managers and coworkers during the workday. Only 3% reported having a visible body piercing (other than an earring).
The biggest takeaways from our survey include a whopping 76% of respondents feel tattoos and piercings hurt an applicant’s chances of being hired during a job interview. And more than one-third – 39% of those surveyed – believe employees with tattoos and piercings reflect poorly on their employers. Furthermore, 42% feel visible tattoos are always inappropriate at work, with 55% reporting the same thing about body piercings.
Fortunately, only 4% of those with tattoos and piercings report having faced actual discrimination because of their ink and body art.

Age Plays a Factor

Overall, 42% of those surveyed feel any and all visible tattoos are inappropriate at work. That number climbs to 55% for body piercings. And as you might guess, age plays a huge role in how tattoos and piercings are perceived at work.
The younger generation was most likely to have tattoos, as people age 26-32 edged out the 18-25 demographic by a 22% to 21% margin. That number drops steadily with age, bottoming out at less than 1% for people age 60 and older. For body piercings, the 18-25 age group topped the charts at 11%, compared to a combined 3% of people older than 40. Although respondents in each age group seemed to recognize tattoos and piercings hurt an applicant’s job search chances, there was a very clear difference of opinion regarding the appropriateness of tattoos in the workplace.
In a nutshell, the older you are the less tolerant you become regarding tattoos. Not surprisingly, people 18-25 were the most accepting of tattoos in the office with only 22% claiming they are inappropriate. That percentage jumps in each age group, maxing out at 63% of people age 60 and older finding tattoos objectionable at work.

Education & Tattoos

Basically, the more educated you are the less likely you are to have or condone tattoos or piercings.
Twenty percent of people with tattoos are high school graduates. That number drops slightly to 19% for those with associates degrees, but falls to 10% for recipients of bachelor’s degrees. People with advanced degrees are even less likely to have tattoos, as 8% of those with master’s and just 3% of PhD recipients have ink.
Those with high school diplomas were also the least likely to find tattoos inappropriate at 38%, compared to 55% of respondents with a PhD. However, when it comes to body piercings, there was no significant statistical difference between education levels as an average of 56% found them objectionable.

Gender, Marital Status & Location

According to our survey, you’re more likely to have tattoos and piercings if you’re a woman who is single or divorced.
The number of women with tattoos more than doubled men by a 15% to 7% margin. Also, 5% of women have body piercings compared to a mere 1% of men. Interestingly, single and divorced people were far more likely to have ink and piercings as only 9% of married people have tattoos, compared to 16% of respondents who are married and divorced.
And if you’re wondering what part of the country has the most people with tattoos; that would be the Mountain region (Idaho, Montana, Wyoming, Nevada, Utah, Colorado, Arizona, New Mexico) with 16%. The area of the US least likely to have people with tattoos is the West South Central (Oklahoma, Texas, Arkansas and Louisiana) with 8%.
As for which parts of the country think tattoos are inappropriate, here’s the breakdown:
  • Mountain (ID, MT, WY, NV, UT, CO, AZ, NM): 35%
  • West North Central (MO, ND, SD, NE, KS, MN, IA): 36%
  • Pacific (AK, WA, OR, CA, HI): 36%
  • New England (ME, NH, VT, MA, RI, CT): 36%
  • Outside the US: 38%
  • Mid-Atlantic (NY, PA, NJ): 38%
  • East South Central (KY, TN, MS, AL): 41%
  • East North Central (WI, MI, IL, IN, OH): 46%
  • South Atlantic (DE, MD, VA, WV, NC, SC, GA, FL): 48%
  • West South Central (OK, TX, AR, LA): 55%

Tattoos by Industry

Wondering which industry is most likely to include tattooed workers? That would be the people working in agriculture and ranching. Twenty-two percent of respondents who said they work in agriculture and ranching reported having tattoos. But in an ironic twist, 67% of those workers found tattoos inappropriate in the workplace -- by far the highest percentage of any industry surveyed.
Workers in the hospitality, tourism and recreation industry were second with 20% of workers tattooed, followed by 16% of people in the arts, media and entertainment industry. Government workers are least likely to be tattooed with only 8% of respondents stating they’re inked. Here's the full breakdown of tattooed workers by industry:
  • Agriculture/ranching: 22%
  • Hospitality, Tourism & Recreation: 20%
  • Arts, Media, Entertainment: 16%
  • Retail: 14%
  • Finance & Banking: 13%
  • Healthcare: 13%
  • Professional Services: 13%
  • Other: 13%
  • Education, Child Development, Family Services: 12%
  • Manufacturing: 9%
  • Energy & Utilities: 9%
  • Engineering, Design & Construction: 9%
  • Information Technology: 9%
  • Government: 8%

Corporate Attitudes Play a Part

Most people interviewing for new jobs worry about base pay, bonus potential and benefits. But nearly one-quarter of survey respondents said they take a company’s stance about things like tattoos and piercings into account when making their decision.
Twenty-three percent of all those surveyed said they specifically examine a company’s permissiveness regarding tattoos and piercings when deciding whether or not to accept the job offer. Workers age 60 and older are the age group most influenced by corporate attitudes towards body art, with 31 percent reporting they are affected by company policy regarding tattoos.

Think of the Children...

Just because adults have tattoos, doesn’t necessarily mean they think that’s a good idea for future generations.
Nearly half – 49% of all respondents – said they don’t want their children (or future hypothetical children for survey-takers who plan to have kids) to have tattoos or piercings. That could be because of of surveys such as one by CareerBuilder.com, which found that 37% of HR managers cite tattoos as the third most likely physical attribute that limits career potential.
People age 26-32 are the least likely to object to tattoos and piercings for their kids, with only 26% against it. That’s compared to the 31% of people age 18-25 who are against tattoos for their progeny. Not surprisingly, 70% of people age 60 and older don’t want body art for their kids, which tops the list.

Use Common Sense

Getting tattoos and/or piercings is a personal decision, but you should take future earnings into account when making it. Whether it’s a career-ender or no big deal at all will vary from person to person, and the easiest way to figure it out is a hefty dose of common sense.
Meredith Haberfeld, an executive career coach who appeared in a 2012 NPR article about tattoos at work, said there are many sectors in which tattoos are absolutely fine, and even encouraged. The key is feeling out the culture of your workplace ahead of time and adjusting accordingly.
"Each employer is going to vary from conservative to liberal when it comes to tolerance for their body art, so a good rule is to keep it covered in your interviews and even during your first few weeks in your job until you get a sense for the culture of the workplace," Haberfeld said.