Why You Should Start Estate Planning Today

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StrategyDriven Practices for Professionals Article | Why You Should Start Estate Planning TodayAt some point in your life, you’ve likely thought about what would happen to everything you own should you become incapacitated or experience death. These are not easy thoughts to have, but they are natural as death eventually impacts everyone. Planning ahead is important in order to make sure your assets are dispersed in the way you intended. You’ll want to make sure your legacy lives on through the people and charitable organizations that are important to you. An estate plan is an important plan to have at any stage in life. The more likely it is you have people in your life that may contest your wishes, the more important it is to work with an attorney to make sure your estate plan WORKS.

The Importance of an Estate Plan

A recent survey revealed only 4 in 10 Americans have an estate plan or will. As people get older, they are more likely to have a plan in place, but it still hovers around half. This is surprising given estate planning is important even when you’re young, especially if you have equity in cash accounts or real estate, or if you have young children. Accidents cannot be predicted and nobody knows how long their lives will be. If you were gone tomorrow, what would happen to your home, your bank accounts, and even your children?

Without an estate plan, upon your passing, your possessions would be dispersed based on the laws of your state. If you have young children but no spouse, or if you and your spouse should become deceased at the same time, the state would have to decide who cares for them. And if you were to become too ill to manage your money or make decisions regarding your care, a judge could be required to make the decision of who manages your bills and estate on your behalf. Not having an estate plan could leave your estate in chaos, vulnerable to claims by any blood relatives, some of whom you may not have been in contact with for years. Is that how you want to be remembered?

Not only is it costly to let the courts determine how your estate will be divided, it is time consuming and very public. It could take years for your rightful heirs to be identified and by then close relationships could be damaged forever. Creditors would also be able to access information related to the courts probate and could challenge it as well. As your estate remains in probate and creditors stake claim to pieces of it, the value of your estate dwindles.

An estate plan protects the people you love, who are the rightful heirs, and it allows your estate to pass on in private. Having a plan in place will also ensure your gift of inheritance is taxed as little as possible. The IRS will be more than happy to stake claim to part of your estate if no heirs have been identified by you personally.

The Pieces of Your Estate Plan

A solid estate plan is not an easy task to complete. It will require thoughtfulness on your part, and the assistance of an attorney to ensure it cannot be challenged later. Your estate plan should consist of the following important pieces:

  • A trust will hold property so that probate is avoided. That is, if it is set up correctly.
  • Your will will designate your heirs and how your estate is dispersed. If your estate is large, this could also include charitable beneficiaries.
  • A letter detailing your funerary wishes and disbursement of any smaller personal items of sentimental value.
  • A designated durable power of attorney should be someone you trust to take care of your estate and health decisions should you become incapacitated. This person should have knowledge of your health care wishes related to life and death decisions, which should also be included in a living will.
  • Keep a list of your assets and make sure your executor knows where to find it. This list should include any investment accounts, bank accounts, insurance policies and physical assets and real estate.

Who Should You Choose as a Durable Power of Attorney?

The person you choose to manage your estate does not have to be a relative. It can be a trusted friend. If you’re afraid of one person abusing your monetary accounts, a good idea is to designate a joint durable power of attorney. This way, two people you trust can ensure everything is managed honestly and as you would have wished.

Make sure that not only your attorney has a copy of your DPA, but also your financial institutions. Your bank may even have their own forms you’ll need to complete, so be sure to talk with your bank manager in advance regarding what they might require.

It’s important to know as much as possible about laws in your state as you plan your estate. For more estate planning information visit finitylaw.com’s resource hub.

The components of your estate planning are important pieces of your portfolio. You may change your plan through the years, as many people do and that’s fine, but it’s better to have a plan than no plan. Work through the process with your attorney and let your loved ones know when your estate planning has been completed. Having this knowledge beforehand will ease any panic should you pass and allow your heirs to focus on celebrating the life you lived rather than feeling overwhelmed with questions regarding what happens next.

Learn How to Be More Creative in Any Field and in Life

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StrategyDriven Practices for Professionals Article |Be More Creative|Learn How to Be More Creative in Any Field and in LifeJust as IQ is an indication of your share of intelligence and EQ connotes your share of empathy, it is also possible to have a share of creativity, or CQ. A creativity quotient is not fixed. It is dynamic and increases as you practice building it and exercising it. What’s more, CQ isn’t reserved for artists. Anyone in any field – farming, law, plumbing, architecture, perfumery, real estate, medicine, education, and technology, to name a few – can learn to be more creative and apply creativity to be more successful in their work.

Exactly how do you raise your creativity level – especially if you don’t think of yourself as particularly creative? Specifically, your share of creativity can increase as you expand your capacity for inquiry, become more willing to improvise, and hone your intuition. Moreover, creativity can be scaled: both individuals and organizations can have a creativity quotient.

Here are 5 questions to ask yourself and pose to your team to build a culture of creativity and your own CQ.

1. Do you have a hobby outside of your daily job?

If you practice a craft or hobby diligently outside of your paid work, then you are regularly putting yourself into a beginners’ mindset. This is crucial because it primes you to get good at embracing being clumsy, learning from mistakes, and asking the naive questions. Inevitably, the beginners’ mindset that hobbies cultivate transfers into your work environment. You will get better at questioning the status quo, one of the first steps towards innovating.

2. Do you play regularly?

I mean really play, have fun, and do activities that bring you joy. Joy is distinct from happiness. While happiness is something we expect to sustain long term, joy is episodic and all about your perspective. A corollary to being more playful is developing a sense of humor. A sense of humor signals your capacity for abstract thinking – instead of only focusing on what is literally in front of you. Note that having a sense of humor will also be developed from question No. 1 above: having a hobby. How could you not chuckle at your clumsy attempts while tinkering away at a hobby?

3. Do you deliberately do things outside of your comfort zone?

At least twice a year, visit a place outside of your comfort zone or go to a conference that is totally outside of your sector, where you will be sure to learn something new. This helps you to practice lateral thinking. You can also practice getting outside of your comfort zone on a daily basis. For example, if you do not consider yourself an artistically visual type, begin to doodle. Set the timer for 5 minutes, and doodle away. It is one of the best ways to make the mind more limber.

4. Do you experiment with technology?

Sometimes we forget that at the end of the day, technology is a tool. It is there to help amplify what is uniquely human about us and free us up to do more creative work. In addition to the usual suspects of workshare platforms like Slack, Basecamp, and Zoom, also try experimenting with augmented reality tools, and visualization tools such as Canva, Mural or Ziteboard. Rather than fear artificial intelligence, welcome it. AI has the potential to up the ante on what makes us uniquely human.

5. Do you incentivize collaboration?

Even superheroes don’t go it alone, so why should you? It’s one thing to say you value collaboration, but until you incentivize it by linking collaboration to compensation or time, chances are your employees won’t put collaboration into practice. One of the best outcomes of collaboration is the necessary thought diversity that results. You quickly learn to invite in and lean on people from different departments and backgrounds. Remember: the more diverse the inputs, the more innovative the output.

If you answered YES to at least 3 of these questions, you’re doing a good job. Make it your goal over the next 12 months to be able to tick off YES to all 5 questions and share your techniques with others. Better yet, start with just one of these suggestions today!

As you move forward, keep in mind: increasing your creativity quotient is about building on what has come before you. And that requires, well, building. Building can be messy. While you may start with a plan, plans shift, agendas change, and assumptions are challenged. It requires taking leaps – from prioritizing deep specialization to valuing broad experience and from deferring only to what’s rational to embracing ambiguity.

About the Author

StrategyDriven Expert Contributor | Natalie Nixon, PhDNatalie Nixon, PhD is a creativity strategist, global keynote speaker, and the president of Figure 8 Thinking, LLC. She helps leaders apply creativity and foresight to achieve transformative business results and amplify value. Natalie is the author of The Creativity Leap: Unleash Curiosity, Improvisation, and Intuition at Work (Berrett-Koehler; June 2020), a regular contributor to INC., and a Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts. Learn more at figure8thinking.com and follow her @natwnixon.

Having Financial Freedom And Being Realistic

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StrategyDriven Practices for Professionals Article |Financial Freedom|Having Financial Freedom And Being RealisticThis year has certainly not been one that has gone to plan for so many. You may have had good intentions and goals, especially when it came to your finances, but found yourself in a situation where you have struggled with less pay or no work at all. You are not alone. But as we come out of this difficult period it could be a good idea to make your finances a priority. It might mean selling and buying a new home, paying off debts, for example. It may even be to increase your savings or be a little smarter with your financial purchases. Whatever your goal may be, there can be actionable steps you can take now to help you achieve the goal. Here are some of the things to consider.

Take a look at your current situation

First of all, no matter what financial goal you will have in mind, you need to start looking at your current situation and address where you need to make some changes. Many people won’t scrutinize their bank statement, but by doing this now, you could highlight and be more aware of exactly how much you are spending each month. If you want to get serious an online financial planning tool can help you with all sorts of things to do with your finances. You may even identify rogue direct debit payments you thought had been canceling still leaving your bank account. It does happen. Take the time to note down all of your outgoings versus what you have coming in, and you will be truly aware of where you stand, ready to make some changes for the year ahead.

Monitor your credit report so that you can actively make changes

The next thing you might want to think about is your current financial history regarding credit and your current score. This will be especially important if you plan on any financial applications soon such as a mortgage. You may want to look into your report on credit reference agencies so that you have a true idea of what is going on behind the scenes. You may want to know what your score is now, and then look at ways you can improve it. This could be focusing on paying off debts or ensuring that all details on your credit file are correct. It saves a lot of messing around when the time comes to apply.

Start looking at ways to save

Saving may be a goal you have specifically, or it may form part of a bigger plan like eventually owning your home. So looking at ways to save could be a great starting point from now to help you build them up. It could be that you can save a set amount each month, which is great. Setting up a standing order into a separate account for this amount will help you build up that savings amount. However, you could look at other savings you can make every day and add to the pot as and when you can. This might be using cashback sites with everyday spending, or even thinking about things like saving on food shopping and sending the different you save over to your savings account. The more you find ways to save, the faster it will rise.

By setting yourself clear targets, and taking actionable steps now, you will be able to hit the ground running for the rest of this year.

How To Improve Your Business Productivity While Working From Home

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StrategyDriven Practices for Professionals Article |Business Productivity|How To Improve Your Business Productivity While Working From HomeWorking from home can be challenging for some because there are so many things that may need your attention. From your children to household chores, your productivity may be suffering. If you are looking for ways to improve your business productivity, here are some helpful tips that will help you get through the day getting everything done on your to-do list.

Be More Efficient

Think really hard about how your business is running. Are there any opportunities for some processes to be streamlined? For example, if you own a commercial dash cam company, installing fleet tracking dash cams can be beneficial to improving your delivery times as some of these come with GPS features. Maybe you are spending too much time answering emails in which case a simple day restructure will help you move more efficiently. Ultimately, it depends on what your business’ short-term and long-term tasks are.

Know When To Delegate

This is something a lot of great managers and executives understand. You cannot do everything yourself. There is not enough time in the day. Delegating allows you to focus on the most important tasks for your day while someone else can handle the less pressing, but just as important tasks. Delegating can feel uneasy because you are essentially giving someone else the responsibility of pulling through.

Doing this not only improves your productivity but it also benefits your employees by giving them a sense of achievement and direction in their careers.

Cut Out Distractions

Distractions are typically the main culprits when it comes to business productivity. Things like social media and texting can be major time wasters. You want to make sure that you and your employees are utilizing the work hours efficiently. While you do not want to implement a no-phone policy, you can instead opt for frequent breaks. Taking lots of breaks will reduce your chances of getting distracted.

Use The Right Tools

Thank goodness for technology and apps. There are tons of time and productivity tracking apps that you can use to help keep you productive. These apps help you stay accountable for your time for the day, making sure that you are getting most out of the workday. You can also use collaboration tools like Google Drive and Trello to keep track of your projects and those contributing to those projects. Google Drive streamlines the collaboration process, allowing you to share things in real-time as they are being updated.

Keep Your Employees Up-To-Date With Training

Set your employees up for success by offering training that allows them to develop their productivity skills. Sometimes the process of hiring someone new can be nerve-wracking because this is a time typically when things start falling through the cracks. The best way to avoid this is to make sure all your employees, new and old, are properly trained. Training greatly benefits not just the employer but also the employees as well as improving greater efficiency and productivity.

Achieving Balance: How Hormone Health Improves Personal Performance 

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StrategyDriven Practices for Professionals Article |Hormone Health|Achieving Balance: How Hormone Health Improves Personal PerformanceThe human body is made up of numerous hormones that all have essential functions for the body’s overall well-being. It all stems from one straightforward concept. The hormones of the body have quite an element of control in how the human body functions through the control that it has. These hormones act as messengers so that your performance daily is as it should be.

It’s precisely for this reason that today, various health remedies are in place to help address the need for better hormone health. As one strives to keep their entire body in check, their hormone health should also be cared for.

Here’s why:

1. It Controls Overall Organ Functions

By the nature of what hormones are, it has the task of controlling the overall organ functions. Hormones travel all over the body. When they reach and bind to receptors, they lock together. When this process is completed, the hormones transmit the specific messages that they’re responsible for. Henceforth its ability to control the various functions of organs.

This is important so that every day, the human being can perform even the basic tasks that you’re supposed to achieve. With this, healthy hormones can accomplish the following:

  • The growth and development of the body
  • The reproductive processes of the human body
  • The various sexual characteristics that distinguish male from female
  • The ability of the body to store and process energy

Note that while hormones are widespread in the body, these don’t affect the human body in entirety. Every type of hormone has its respective function, depending on which organ or tissue it’s meant to send a message to. Because hormones perform this very important function for the human body, all the more that the clamor for balanced hormones now exists.

This is precisely the reason why it’s very important for individuals to check from time to time, their hormone levels, to ensure that all is well with them. Thankfully, products like HealthConfirm’s Hormone Vitality Complete have made it possible now to have hormone level measurements done at home, through their kits. This advantage gives you no reason not to be this prudent also about regularly checking your hormone levels.

2. It Helps Control How You Feel

Personal performance also includes one’s ability to process emotions or your ability to feel. If hormone health is poor, this also means that the level of hormones is disrupted. When this happens, you’ll also begin to notice changes in your mood. Imbalanced hormones lead to more severe mood swings. This can hinder even your behavior and your overall outlook for the day.

For example, even after a good night’s sleep, you notice that you’re still feeling weak and moody as you wake up. This may not be a problem of lack of rest anymore. It could also be a deeper problem, such as poor hormone health. With a better balance of your hormones, you end up happier.

StrategyDriven Practices for Professionals Article |Hormone Health|Achieving Balance: How Hormone Health Improves Personal Performance3. It Controls The Metabolism Of Your Body

No matter how much you exercise or control your diet, if your metabolism is poor, this could also affect your ability to maintain a healthy weight. One of the functions of healthy hormones is its ability to control your metabolism.

This function stems from the hormones of the thyroid, which were built precisely for that purpose. Along with metabolism, other functions of healthy thyroid hormones include:

  • Regulating weight
  • Managing hair growth
  • Determining energy levels
  • Controlling the inner temperature of the body

4. It Boosts Brain Function

Good hormonal health is also necessary for the brain to function adequately. Remember that the brain doesn’t merely work on its own. It’s reliant on its connections and relationships with the other organs of the body. One of these are the hormones, or the critical messengers so that the brain can process various information, depending on the specific performance that it’s meant to do.

For instance, if your hormone health is poor, specific cognitive issues can arise. When this happens, your overall personal performance is also affected. You may not be able to do the tasks you were accustomed to, not just in your job, but even in other aspects of your life.

Examples of these adverse effects of how poor hormone health affects your brain would include:

  • Having only a short attention span
  • Quickly losing one train of thought
  • Experiencing frequent short and long-term memory gaps
  • Changes in creative coordination ability

You need to think of your brain as an operating system of a computer. To fuel its functions, excellent hormone health is necessary. The healthier your hormones are, the better your overall performance is.

5. It Keeps Your Body Healthy

When your body isn’t healthy, then it’s expected that you wouldn’t be able to function to your full potential. If you notice that you’re also getting sick more frequently, this could mean that your hormones may also be of poor health.

A proper balance of your hormones is needed to keep the immune system healthy. That way, you can better function and perform, as your body’s innate ability to ward off bacteria and viruses is stronger.

Takeaway

It’s normal for the human body to experience instances when certain hormones are depleted or that their overall function is affected. While the effects may sometimes be minor, this isn’t to be taken lightly. After all, good hormone health is needed for the body’s performance to be excellent. The more that you’re able to understand about hormone health after reading through this, the more that you can step forward with ensuring that your body’s overall hormone health is excellent.