Do you use office software on a regular basis, such as word processing, spreadsheets, and presentations?  Who doesn’t, right?  If you work independently and don’t have the cash to spend on an expensive software package, work for a company/department that doesn’t use Windows as the primary OS, or just want to boycott Windows altogether, there are a couple of really good alternatives out there that are free.

OpenOffice has been around for about 20 years and is open to the user community.  In other words, anyone can make suggestions, request enhancements, or fix issues.  There is a web site out there called Ninite from which you can easily download and install the latest version.  Or you can just go to the OpenOffice homepage.  It has several modules available including word processing, spreadsheet, presentation, graphics and diagrams, and a database.

Lotus Symphony is a free office package provided by IBM and is actually based on OpenOffice technology.  It appears that IBM had this integrated into Lotus Notes and then decided to release this in a standalone version.  The nice thing about Lotus Symphony is that it has IBM behind it to deliver quality updates based upon the ODF document standard.  This isn’t quite as feature rich as OpenOffice, but it has a word processor, spreadsheet, and presentation editor.

So, take these out for a spin.  No one ever said that we all have to use Microsoft

There is a great program out there called DiSC.  It is designed to help you understand how you behave based upon your style tendencies.  After taking a questionnaire, you’ll know your tendencies, needs, preferred environment, and strategies for how to be most effective.  DiSC is broken down into four primary behavioral responses:

• D = Dominance
• I = Influence
• S = Steadiness
• C = Conscientious

Each person tends to have one or two dimensions that are dominant (and in some cases, three).  The model below shows how each style relates to the others:

Based upon the combinations possible, there are about 15 unique patterns that commonly occur in most people.  These are:

• Achiever
• Agent
• Appraiser
• Counselor
• Creative
• Developer
• Inspirational
• Investigator
• Objective Thinker
• Perfectionist
• Persuader
• Practitioner
• Promoter
• Result-Oriented
• Specialist

In my particular case, I came out as a “SC” dominant which is “Steadiness” and “Conscientiousness”.  Based upon my ranking within this group, I fall into the Perfectionist pattern.  This means I pay great attention to detail, have fierce devotion to accuracy, have a tendency to follow clear procedures and rules, restrained in emotions, remain tactful and diplomatic under pressure,  and maintain high standards.  This fits my personality to a tee.  In fact, the moderator who was running the program for us came up with an activity that showed how accurate the results were.  He split us up into groups, some with conflicting behavior styles and some that were complimentary.  He had us plan a party.  He paired me up with the only other “SC” in the group.  Our party was the best planned out, had the most detail, the most activities, and factored in even the smallest details that other groups didn’t consider.  That’s what happens when you put two perfectionists together   The moderator was also able to show how conflicting styles can interfere with progress.

I would highly recommend that you introduce this into the company you are working for.  It is extremely helpful to know how others behave, which directly affects their working style and interactions with others.  For some people, what is revealed may not be much of a surprise.  However, for others, it could be a very enlightening experience.  The program also takes the collective styles of the entire team and shows how this can affect the team’s culture in the workplace.  For example, my team’s results showed that we have a “C” culture (80% of the team).  The attributes of this culture include quality, accuracy, and order.  Such a culture values high standards, careful analysis, and diplomacy.  And since we are an IT group, this works for us quite well.  This can show you the advantages and disadvantages of your team so you can adapt and increase your effectiveness with individuals or other teams.

“DiSC” is a program offered by “Inscape Publishing” and is called “Everything DiSC Classic 2.0“.  It is a program that that has been taken by over 40 million people in 20+ languages over the past 30 years.

So, what’s your behavioral style?

Looking for a way to deliver just the right message, so there is no misunderstanding?  The Bureau of Communication web site has a large selection of fill-in-the-blank stationary that you can use to send a formal apology, a statement of gratitude, a declaration of romantic interest, or an airing of grievance.  The site allows you to fill in the details and then email it to someone.  What better way to say “I love you”, then to send a formal document so there is no misunderstanding

By this, I mean when it is that time of the year for your workspace review, perform a self-review rather than have someone else do it.  If your department typically does not work this way, suggest it.  I realize this is more work on you, but you are always your biggest critic.  You will find that you are much more critical of yourself than someone else is.  If you are truly interested in improving yourself over the course of your career, this is a great way to analyze your faults and to map out an action plan to resolve them.

In my own situation, this was forced upon me (rather than it being my choice).  However, I have found it to be very valuable.  Our department breaks down review goals into the following areas: “Business Alignment”, “Reliable and Secure Applications and Processes”, “Advancing in the role of <role here>”, “Technical Leadership within the Team”, “Quality Focus on all Job Aspects”, “Customer Focus”, “Professionalism and a Team Approach”, “Initiative, innovation, and risk taking”, and “accountability and dependability”.  Sounds like a lot right?  I’ve actually worked other places before that had quite a few more than this!  So, it can take a bit of time to rate yourself across many categories, but it will help you in the long run.  And, in a previous topic, remember when I recommended to keep track of your accomplishments?  Here is a good time to bring them up as examples to support your self-rating.  You’ve done all the work throughout the year to jot those down as you worked on projects.  Here is where the payoff comes in – making your life easier during quarterly/annual reviews.  Your boss will likely be impressed at the level of detail you start putting into your reviews.

Have a Garmin or TomTom GPS?  PIG Tones (”Politically Incorrect GPS”) has some very funny voices you can download to your device at a small fee.  They even provide a small program that installs it onto your device automatically.  Their TomTom installations are apparently a bit easier than Garmin, but I own a Garmin and it was pretty easy for me (plus, Pig Tones is a Garmin authorized partner).  They also have a lot of POI (Points Of Interest) Maps.  Personally, I downloaded the Stewie, Yoda, Gollum, and Drill Sergeant voices and they are hillarious!

In many positions out there today, you will often have to multitask amongst several tasks each day.  Over time, it will become more difficult to try and remember what you worked on and how well you did.  It is important to keep track of your accomplishments for a couple of reasons:

1. You can later transfer this information to your resume to keep it updated
2. It can be leveraged for examples and/or supporting data during annual/quarterly reviews

I’ve been tracking this kind of information for years now.  It definitely takes a level of discipline to keep it updated.  But, once you get accustomed to doing it, it isn’t that bad.  Here is an example of a spreadsheet that I came up with to keep track of everything.  Feel free to use it, if you wish.  The first tab “Project List” is a run-down of all the projects you have worked on in the past or are currently working on.  I use the “B” column for color coding – green means an active project and red means a closed project.  In the “C” column, I list each project name and make it a hyperlink to that specific project on the second tab.  On the second tab, “Project Details” is where all the details are located.  Here, I have a section for each project and track the effective dates, any skills I’ve gained or used, and details surrounding my role and accomplishments.

Trust me, this will save you a lot of effort when it comes to review time, job search, or any other time you need to dig up this type of information.  I hope this is helpful for you!

Many people make friends on the job.  There is nothing wrong with this at all.  It makes coming to work more enjoyable and helps with team collaboration.  However, you need to continuously sensor yourself and watch what you say, especially if one of your friends is your boss.

It is very easy to get into the gossiping habit with your friends and forget who you are talking to.  You never know who is listening and you never know when your colleague might take something the wrong way.  For example, if you are making fun of another employee to your friend, he or she may let it slip to that person or may actually be friends with that individual, unbeknownst to you.  This gets more complicated with a boss-employee relationship.  For instance, I’m on pretty good terms with my boss and I feel more open to discuss things with her that I might otherwise not.  I always make it a point not to talk about others behind their backs or ramble on about someone or something I’m disgruntled about.  Your reputation could be at stake here.  You certainly don’t want your boss thinking less of you because of something you said, even if it was in confidence.

Along these same lines, NEVER add coworkers to your favorite social networking sites like Facebook, Twitter, MySpace, etc, unless it has a business focus.  If you have personal accounts, coworkers have no business being on there.  It opens you up to be scrutinized for how you behave outside of work.  Once your colleagues know what you are really like (assuming you have some behaviors you don’t want known on the job), your career could be at risk or, at a minimum, folks may not react to you in the same way anymore.  This is exactly why you don’t want your social profile open up to the world.  If you are looking for a job, believe me, recruiters are searching for you on the Internet to dig up any dirt on you.  So, don’t give them any ammunition to keep you from getting a job.

So, the moral is definitely make friends on the job, just don’t be too open with them.

HootSuite is a social media dashboard.  It is designed for teams to track results from multiple social networks (i.e. Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, Wordpress, etc) using a single interface.  It has powerful tools allowing you to schedule tweets, upload files, manage your followers, run reports, track statistics, advanced search, and much more!  So, if you work for a company that is involved heavily in the social media world or if you are just a social butterfly, you have got to check out this tool.

Whatever email system you use at work, whether it be Outlook, Lotus Notes, or something else, archiving off your old emails is always a good idea.  The only downside is that, over time, it can take up a lot of space.  My Outlook archive file has been running since late 2004 and is over 2GB!

I can’t count the number of times I’ve had to go into the archive to pull up old information.  I have all of my Outlook folders organized by topic and project.  This makes finding the information easier.  I also have keyword search capability if I still can’t find what I’m looking for.  Beyond just using this as a knowledge base, it is also useful to help people remember prior conversations   Sometimes, especially if a colleague swears up and down that you never provided them some information or notified them of an important event, this is a great way to show that you did.

I would highly recommend archiving all of your folders, your inbox, and your sent box.  If you question the latter, just think about all of those emails that you send to people that you don’t manually save off.  Many times, much of the critical information you send around are in replies to other emails.  And, every now and then, you’ll want to go through some of your archived folders and remove content you are absolutely certain you will never need again.  This will help to keep your archive file smaller.

To make this as mindless as possible, you should definitely have your email client auto-archive on a regular basis.  Then, you don’t have to constantly remember to do it.  What settings to use for archiving depends largely on how much work you do and whether or not your company imposes a space limit.  For example, I have my Outlook set up to archive every 14 days and it will save off items older than 2 months.  My company has a 150 MB space limit per employee, so I’ve found that I can only keep 2 months worth of emails before I need to start archiving.

So, play around with it a bit and determine the best strategy that works for you.  The important thing is that you are saving your data!

I believe the majority of people have an innate fear of failure.  Nobody wants to fail.  Unfortunately, this often results in under-performing employees.  If you let your fear rule you, you’ll never take risks and achieve results.  A good lesson here is that the best way to learn is through failure.  You must come to the realization that no one is perfect, not even you   Everyone makes mistakes.  What differentiates people is those who learn from their mistakes and don’t repeat them over and over again.

Now, if you work in an environment where people call out your mistakes on a regular basis, it can be a bit more difficult to get over this fear.  However, as I have said before, you are only in competition with yourself.  If you don’t fear your own mistakes, no one else’s opinion matters.  Block out the critics and push forward.

If you are able to conquer your fear, you’ll be more apt to take risks and take the initiative on tasks/projects.  And since taking risks/initiative is the primary way to get yourself noticed in the eyes of your employer, it can lead to increased confidence in your skills and potential advancement in the company.

I admit that I suffer from this from time to time.  It can be a hard thing to overcome.  The key is to do what is right for you and the team.  There are always going to be people who say you can’t do something or point out your flaws.  You just can’t let it get to you.  Absorb any constructive criticism you receive and take the next risk.

People are far too overworked these days.  This leads to increased stress, lower energy levels, and increased tempers.  At some point, you’ve got to step back and realize that work is not everything.  You have got to strike a good balance between work and your personal/family life.  If you work for an employer that demands 60+ hour weeks consistently then you might want to look for a new job, especially if you have a family.  No one can keep that pace up for long.

If your position is in a support/service role to that of the rest of the business, they are always going to ask for things and want it now.  My particular role falls here.  To balance things out, I don’t always do something when the business asks and will give them an estimate when it might be completed.  You can’t make everyone happy.  If you are under this disillusion, you will be working quite  few hours every week.

Having a life outside of work gives you that break you need to recharge your batteries.  After all, work is just a means to an end.  We don’t live to work, we work to live.  Go for a drive, take a vacation, smack a ball around the racquetball court, take up a hobby, spend time with your kids – do anything that isn’t directly or indirectly related to work.  Try your best not to take your work home with you.  Sometimes this is required, but keep it to a minimum.  Beyond just the physical load you might take home, you can take the emotion along with it.  The worst thing you can do is get irritated at work, bring that stress home with you, and take it out on your family.

Having a life can also help you in the workplace.  You might be able to leverage certain skills you use on a regular basis outside of work such as leadership, multitasking, competitiveness, or networking.  So, it is a win-win

Salary.com recently published an article entitled “14 Ways to Stay Indispensable“.  And while there is never a guarantee you will stay indispensable, these tips will certainly help make it less desirable for an employer to get rid of you.  Here is the list they published:

1. Be noticeable.  Basically, put yourself out there, talk to people, and socialize.
2. Be a Team Player.  I’ve discussed this in a previous article.
3. Develop a Unique Knowledge Base or Skill.  Make sure you are an expert in one or more areas.  I’ll be discussing training more in a future topic.
4. Be Positive.  Negative people lead to negative results and will bring everyone down with them.  View my related article about positive attitude.
5. Cultivate a Life Outside of Work.  This can bring important skills into the workplace that you would be recognized for.
6. Learn More.  This is centered around training and is related to #3.
7. Pay Attention to the Decisions You Make.  In other words, always look at the big picture and make decisions that will help out the company.
8. Take Responsibility for Your Mistakes.  Admit to them and learn from them.  People who hide behind their mistakes and/or blame others just dig their own graves with their employer.
9. Rewrite Your Job Description.  Add more responsibilities to your job role, especially if your team/department is lacking in certain areas.  You employer will thank you for taking the initiative to help out.
10. Network.  This is important to keep you in the loop with people/organizations in your industry.  You might learn new skills or gain knowledge that would be helpful to your company.  There is a good blog out there called “Budget Tips: Surviving the Recession” and it has a related article about networking.
11. Share Your Knowledge and Experience.  I’ve discussed this in a previous article.
12. Stick it Out When the Going Gets Tough.  Everyone has rough patches at work.  The survivors keep going and don’t quit.
13. Say “Yes” to Opportunities that Come Your Way.  Your employer will see you as someone willing to do anything to help out the team.  It is all about being flexible.
14. Always Do Your Best, No Matter What the Task.  Don’t slack off on the simple or mundane tasks because those can sometimes standout more clearly as failures over your successes.

Many organizations out there these days force their salaried employees to track their time.  And by this, I don’t mean clocking in and out.  I mean actually recording how many hours you work towards each of your tasks.  I’ve been working in the IT industry for over 13 years and this has been the “norm” for me.  I very briefly had a job that started out with no time reporting for a couple of months.  Then they instituted one for the entire department.  I was really nice for a short while

Employers may have different motives for doing this.  Some may want to see how many hours you are putting in total, perhaps to try and identify the “non producers”.  Others may want to see if you are spending your time between your tasks effectively, to make sure you are not working on the wrong things.  Still others may just want to see how many hours are going towards different phases of projects to improve future estimates.  The company I work for falls into the latter.  Whatever the motive, you need to accurately record your hours.

It is very difficult to wait until the end of the week to track your hours.  Most of us can’t remember what we did yesterday, let alone several days ago   Many employers who want this information will want it down to the half hour (or even 15 minutes for the really anal ones).  So, one good strategy is to keep your time reporting tool open all day and make frequent updates to it.  Check back every couple of hours and update it.  For me, I not only have to record number of hours, but also the project number it goes with, the phase of the project, and a description of what I was working on.  I find that if I wait a couple of days, my “buckets” are usually much larger with less detail because I can’t totally remember what I was working on.  If you multi-task quite a bit, you’ll find that your recollection is even worse.

The worst thing that you can do is fake your hours.  Eventually, this will catch up to you because if you are recording time against a task that you are not finishing, it is going to set off red flags with management.  Where I work, we’ve got buckets of time for “personal”, “support”, “routine”, etc.  However, dumping all of your time here is not a good idea either because management is going to want details of what you were working on instead of project work.  If you can’t produce results or can’t prove you were working on something, you put your career at risk.

So, if you are required to record your time, make sure you do this honestly and as accurately as possible.  It doesn’t take as much time as you think and is often a necessary “evil” to make your employer happy.  In this economy, making your employer happy is always a good thing

As I mentioned before, with more and more companies out there retaining their existing employees and not hiring new talent, job roles are expanding.  Along with this, employers are looking for their employees to be more flexible in their work hours.  In the IT world, this is nothing new.  However, for people who aren’t used to this, it could come as a shock.  Whether you are dealing with month/year end activities, early morning production deployments, or preparing for a supplier/dealer meeting, you often times have to put in extra hours to get the job done.

This may seem unreasonable, but for a salaried employee, this is expected most of the time these days – usually without any overtime compensation.  My first job out of college paid us for any overtime above the standard 40 hours.  However, I haven’t seen that since.  It is definitely the exception rather than the norm.

If you happen to work for an employer who understands the importance of a good work/life balance, you can usually negotiate when you will work and as long as you get the hours in one way or another, they are happy.  Some employers, however, may not be so flexible and may require you to work specific hours.  In those cases, if negotiation doesn’t work, you may have to structure your family life around your work schedule / shift (or get a new job).

Being flexible can go a long way towards future salary increases and/or promotions.  Most sane managers will favor flexible employees over ones who refuse to work extra hours.  I’ve certainly worked with those types of folks before – those who come in late, leave early, and don’t put in any evening or weekend time.  And, they are always the ones who have negative marks against them during review time.

No one likes working extra hours – unless you REALLY like your job over your personal life   So, my advice is to realize this is expected in most professional careers and to be as flexible as possible when working with management and your peers.

Here’s a fun web site from the same guys who brought you Uncrate.  On Devour, the site administrators hand pick the best videos from YouTube and send them to your inbox on a daily basis.  All of the videos are in HD and they all play on the iPhone and iPad.  So, you no longer have to stumble around on YouTube looking for something fun to watch.  These guys do all the work!

This is a common problem for most companies.  A majority of issues stem from lack of communication.  In most of the places I have worked, this has always been an issue (with all teams big and small across all departments).

This is a complicated topic with lots of ways to communicate properly and improperly.  So, I’ll do my best to lay down some ground rules.

Try to avoid over-doing it with email communication.  It is certainly a good way to get lots of information out to lots of people quickly.  However, if you are just talking back and forth, it is better to speak with the individual(s) in person or over the phone.  In those cases, talking is quicker than typing.  And, it is so easy to misinterpret someone over email, especially with tone.  I can’t count the number of times I’ve experienced someone getting upset or jumping to the wrong conclusion because they read the email a different way from how it was written.  And, I admit, I’ve done this myself.

Watch how you speak to people.  Don’t talk down to them or constantly lecture.  I worked with someone in management once who always lectured and didn’t seem to care what anyone had to say.  He just rambled on and on and eventually people learned to tune him out and stop taking what he had to say seriously.

Don’t be confrontational or defensive all the time.  No one is perfect.  The people with big egos who are always arguing, disagreeing, and putting up roadblocks are the ones who end up alienating themselves from the team.  No one likes a whiner.  If you don’t agree with something, be an adult and professionally state your reasons/alternatives in a calm manner and, in the end, if your suggestions are overruled, don’t hold a grudge or complain.

If you are an executive or manager responsible for decision making on a project, make sure you are at every important meeting and communicate your issues, input, preferences, and concerns.  I’ve been on projects before that were on a good pace until the executive swooped in and made major changes because he/she wasn’t coming to the meetings and voicing input.  This is not fair to the project or the other individuals working on it.

Most of the time, you’ll want to over-communicate.  If you have something important to say, make sure the right people are hearing you.  Communicate your status often, especially if you are working on several things at different paces.  This also helps if you are a dependency for someone else’s work so that they can adjust their priorities accordingly.

If you need someone’s expertise on the team for something coming up soon (i.e. project input, configuration, deployments, decisions), make sure you give them plenty of heads up.  No one likes to be surprised at the last minute when everyone has lots of things on their plates.  This will help them to plan so they can accommodate you.  Otherwise, you’ll be out of luck and you can’t blame them.

There are lots more we can discuss in this area, but this is a post not a novel   I’m sure I’ll come back to this here and there in future topics.  Until then, keep this in mind:

“Any problem, big or small, within a family, always seems to start with bad communication. Someone isn’t listening.”
— Emma Thompson

Sharing knowledge should be a key aspect of working in any team environment.  As I mentioned in a previous post, hoarding information is never a good thing.  Sharing information/data helps people to view you as a “team player” and also helps build up the entire team’s skills.  Do you really want to do the same things over and over again as part of your daily grind?  If you keep everything to yourself, you won’t have any capacity to learn new things and take on new responsibilities.

If you have important knowledge that others on your team don’t, try some of the following ideas:

• Organize “brown bag” lunch sessions with a different topic each week/month.  For the visual learners, make sure to prepare a presentation in advance.  Topics can be anything from behavioral to business/technical.
• Share information on a Wiki.  Our department recently started one of these and they are very easy to update and anyone can make contributions.  Everything can be stored here from instructions, images, and documents.  What makes this much nicer than storing documents on a network folder is that a Wiki is searchable.  This allows people to find the information they need quicker.
• Conduct training session(s).  If you need to teach skills to several employees (new or existing) so they can do their jobs properly, prepare a curriculum and flex your teaching skills.  Give the class small “homework” assignments so they can get hands-on experience.  The key is to make this interesting and engaging.  If you don’t, you’ll see people’s eyes glaze over just before they fall asleep
• Create a department newsletter.  I used to do this for a coding “tip of the week”.  For the junior members of the team, this was extremely helpful to get insights into aspects of development they would not have otherwise known about.
• If your department is constantly looking for new tools or ways of doing things, schedule a monthly POC (”Proof of Concept”) or product/process overview where you discuss something helpful you have come across in your research that might help out the team.
• You could also do something as simple as sending out an email when you come across something that everyone should know about.  If you don’t quite know what to do with the information, someone else might.

I hope these tips are helpful for you.  Remember, when working in a team, knowledge is power only if you share it.

For those of us who work in cubes/offices all day, sitting down for that length of time can take its toll.  Several times each day, pick yourself up and walk around a bit.  If you need some reasons, try these on for size:

• It is easier on your eyes if you change your focus every so often.  If you stare at a computer screen all day, that is a lot of strain on your eyes.  Go stare out a window for a bit – just don’t jump
• It will give your body a bit of exercise.  If you work in a building with multiple floors, wander up/down a couple of levels (and don’t take the elevator).
• If a colleague needs help, try to avoid communicating via email or instant message.  Get out of your chair and wander over to help them.  This will also improve your working relationship with others by giving them some face time.
• If things are crazy and you are starting to flip out, getting away for 5 minutes can do wonders for your mental stability.  Go outside and get some fresh air.

So, I’m advising everyone to stop working occasionally and leave your cocoon.  You’ll thank me for it later

Having a clean workspace will help you to stay organized at work. I’ll cover organization in more detail in a future topic. It is much harder to get things done if you have to hunt around your desk for materials. Most people who have cluttered desks tell me they have a “system”. However, if I see them stumbling around, lifting up papers, and overturning folders, then that is obviously not much of a system. Important documents can get lost in this manner. If you are already buried under months of paperwork, the hardest part is getting started. Once you get everything organized, keeping it up is much simpler and just a matter of discipline. The best thing you can do to get started is raid your company’s storage closet for some file folders and desktop organizers. Put everything into logical groupings by project or functional area. In my cube, I have 4 different desktop folder organizers and in my primary one I have a separate folder for each project (and I usually have 4-5 projects going on simultaneously). I also have a desk drawer with hanging file folders for stuff I don’t reference everyday (archive).

Beyond just keeping things organized, you should also keep a sanitary workspace. Most experts will tell you that an office counter-top has more bacteria on it than a toilet seat! I worked with a guy once who was probably one of the most unsanitary people I’ve ever worked with. When he often had a cold, his desk constantly had used tissue paper scattered all over the place. And, his cube was always dirty with stuff just thrown every which way. Every time I interacted with him, I felt like I needed a tetanus shot Personally, I try to clean my desktop with cleaning products every few months and I also keep a bottle of Purell handy. Not only is keeping a clean work area just more healthy in general, it will also help earn you more respect from the people you work with.

Most highly effective workers have positive attitudes.  Almost everything you do on the job extends from the right attitude and has a tremendous effect on your goals.  Poor attitudes lead to decreased motivation, achievements, and communication.  Attitudes are often times much more powerful than intelligence or knowledge when it comes to getting the job done properly.  Have you ever noticed how your productivity drops when you are sad, irritated, or indifferent?

Your attitude is affected by words and emotions.  Do you let people “get to you” by things they say or do?  How about the way you talk to yourself?  Do you mentally praise yourself all the time or do you talk down to yourself?  Listen to your own thoughts sometimes and you might be surprised how often you speak to yourself in the negative.  If you let yourself get affected by critics, just realize that you are only in competition with yourself and you are best served by just filtering them out.  Here is a great quote by Eleanor Roosevelt that speaks to this point:

“No one can make you feel inferior without your consent”

Motivation is also huge in affecting your attitude.  What motivates you?  Obviously, if you are not driven by anything (or something negative), your attitude is going to suffer as well as your work.  If you find yourself in this situation, try to find positive, incentive-based motivation in your daily tasks.  Examples might include:

• If I take this training, it will help me grow with the organization and make me a more valuable employee.
• If I complete this work on-time, management will have more faith in my ability to deliver quality work.  This might lead to a raise or promotion.
• If I go above and beyond the call of duty and complete some extra work for the business, I will develop a better relationship with them.

There is a great organization out there called the “Edge Learning Institute”.  They specialize in helping companies improve their individual and team performance competencies.  They have a course called “Increasing Human Effectiveness” that is designed to enhance personal awareness, critical thinking skills, attitudes, and behavior change skills.  I’ve been through this course myself and it helped with my motivation and focus.  I would highly recommend it.