motivation

Incensed by the networking company's hostile treatment of former ISS researcher Michael Lynn, several hackers now seek to find new flaws in Cisco's software.

Are your sales people burnt out? You may want to check. Have they clocked too many twelve hour days? Do they have enough frequent flier miles to charter a jet to Mars? Are their faces permanently skewed into perpetual smiles from chatting with hundreds of thousands of trade show attendees?

It's so difficult to go on when everything seems to fail, isn't it? Are there times in your life when you really want to call it "quits" because you just can't see any good results from all the hard work you've done?

Just before the close of business on Wednesday, Google announced that it will be launching Gmail, its new free e-mail service set to offer 1000 megabytes of free space to its users. This announcement comes after a flurry of changes at Google, all of which are geared to securing their place as the dominant search engine in light of recent competition offered by Yahoo! and soon MSN. The search engine wars have been predicted for some time now by search engine insiders, and the launch of Gmail is Google's attempt to win the war before it gets fully started. But is Google really ready to take on the big portals?

I recently spoke to a group of sales professionals at the end of their training conference. The attendees had participated in many learning sessions over a two day period - most of which were product related. I was scheduled to speak after dinner and I was somewhat concerned how attentive they would be by this time.

The same things don't motivate everyone. You need to think about each individual's needs. Then you need to take a peek inside your motivation toolbox. Just as you wouldn't want to put together a bookcase with the wrong tools, you need to find the right motivational tool for a particular workplace job. If you develop a toolbox that contains lots of ways to motivate your employees, you'll be on the path to creating a workplace that's filled with enthusiasm. Here are some must-haves:

Why do you do the things you do? Why did you go to University? Why are you working for that particular company? Why did you skip University? Why did you get married? Why did you marry your spouse? Why are you single? Why are you doing that particular job? Why do you drive that particular car?

"Learn to super-motivate with travel" When was the last time you went on a vacation? I don't mean taking a week off to paint your house, either.