Monthly Archives: December 2016

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Positive Steps Small Construction Companies Can Take

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When you run a small construction business, you probably don’t have much money to spend. But there are still some very positive and helpful steps you can take. It’s all about growing your business in a way that’s steady and gradual. Small improvements mount up over time, and they will help your business get to where you want it to be. Here are some ideas that you should definitely consider right now.

 

Get Better at Listening to Client Requirements

 

Your clients are the people that matter most. They are the people will be providing you with payment and keeping it afloat. Therefore, you can’t afford to let them down or not do what they have asked for. Many small construction companies just do the job how they think it should be done. But that’s not necessarily how the client wants it to be done. You should try to become better at listening to clients and what they want to have done. If your work doesn’t meet their requirements, they won’t use your company again. And they certainly won’t recommend you to people they know.

 

Go Green

 

Going green is another really positive step that your small construction company can take. More and more businesses are now deciding to do this because it allows them a way to have their business viewed positively. It’s an extra selling point when you can tell customers that you are doing your work in a way that is green and clean. It will also ensure that your business isn’t a drag on the local environment. Make sure that the people you work with operate in an environmentally friendly way too. If you need some concrete removal company done, use a company that recycles what is taken away.

 

Create a More Accountable and Democratic Management Structure

 

The management structure of your business should also be looked at closely. If it’s not particularly democratic or accountable, this could lead to other problems within your business. That’s not what you want or need. So, try to ensure that everyone who works for the company knows their place and what’s expected of them. It should be easy for employees to talk to someone higher up the chain of command when they have a problem or a concern that needs to be addressed. If it’s not, problems will fester and never get dealt with in the way they should be.

 

Provide In-House Training for Employees

 

Offering more training opportunities to the people who work for your business is a great thing to do. If you don’t already do this, think about why you should and what it could bring to your company. It will help improve the service your business is able to offer to clients. And it will mean that your business will be less reliant on hiring outside assistance when a specific task needs to be carried out during a project. Your workforce will develop and improve over time when you do this as well, so don’t underestimate the impact it can have.

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Don’t Underestimate The Damage Skipping Sleep Can Do

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Sleep is something none of us can go without. Getting the right amount of sleep is crucial for a healthy lifestyle. Many of us either skip sleep to get more out of each day or struggle to get the right amount. Turn your attention to sleep to get your life back under control. If you have trouble getting to sleep at night, making a few changes can get you on track. If your sleep problems continue, you might be suffering from insomnia. If you think that’s the case, don’t hesitate to go  to your doctor to get help. For the rest of you, here’s a list of why sleep is important, and how you can ensure you’re getting enough.

 

WHY YOU NEED SLEEP

 

The obvious reason for needing sleep is the fact that, without it, you’re prone to exhaustion. You may be cutting down on those few hours sleep to get more done, but it won’t work. When you’re tired, your brain functions at a much slower rate. You’ll take longer to get things done anyway! On top of that, there are various other benefits to getting the right amount of sleep. Not getting enough sleep also leaves you open to various health problems. Your body is going to be spending so much energy on staying awake, that it won’t be able to fight illness. Not to mention that you’ll generally feel under the weather from exhaustion. So, how much sleep should you be getting? Between seven and nine hours is the recommended amount. We’re all different, but you’ll soon be able to tell how much is right for you.

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GET THE RIGHT GEAR

 

Having the right sleeping apparatus is key to ensuring you get a good night. Focus on pillows and mattress. If you’re uncomfortable at night, it’ll be harder to get to sleep. You’re also more likely to wake through the night. In general, softer mattresses are less efficient than hard ones. Try out different mattresses to see which suits you. You might decide memory foam mattresses are your best bet. Or, you might want to go for a standard mattress that offers the support you need. Take the same care when choosing pillows. Again, everyone likes something a little different. Find what feels comfortable for you. Do you prefer pillows that are hard or soft? Choose, too, between pillows containing different material inside. You’ll also have to decide whether you sleep best with one pillow or two. Try all the different choices and take note of which way you sleep best.

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GET INTO A GOOD ROUTINE

 

Routine is essential when it comes to sleep. Doing the same things before bed each night will let your body know it’s time to unwind. Your routine can be whatever suits you. It is recommended that you don’t look at electrical screens just before bed. The best bet is to clear your mind of thoughts by doing something like reading a book. That way, you won’t stay up thinking for a long time after you go to bed. Your routine could be as simple as drinking the same hot drink each night. Make sure you do this at least half an hour before bed so that you don’t have to wake up to go to the toilet. Make sure, too that you avoid caffeine. Even tea often contains caffeine. Opt, instead, for herbal options or hot drinks designed especially for bedtime. It may take a few weeks to get into this habit, but you’ll start seeing benefits before you know it. Try to go to bed at roughly the same time each night so that your body gets used to the routine faster. You’ll soon start feeling tired around that time.

 

GIVE YOURSELF TIME TO UNWIND

 

If a bedtime routine doesn’t seem like something you could achieve, get into the habit of giving yourself time to relax. If you go to bed minutes after finishing your evening work, you’re going to find sleep hard to come by. Make sure you set aside any tasks that need concentration or thought at least an hour before bed. That way, you’ll have time to quiet your mind before you have to sleep. The same goes for if you go out of an evening. Coming in from a night out, you’re going to be full of adrenaline and excitement. You won’t be able to go straight to sleep. Make sure you get home an hour before you need to go to bed so that you can clear your mind. This is where it can help to have a bedtime routine or drink. As soon as your brain catches a whiff of that drink, it’ll know it’s time to relax.

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MAKE YOUR ROOM DARK

 

Darkness is always helpful when it comes to getting a good night’s sleep. Light has a habit of waking you up, even before you’re ready. If you live in a residential area, streetlights and car headlights can cause you a restless night. Even if you don’t live around such distractions, the morning light could wake you up far too early. Blinds are the most certain way of blocking out light disruptions. They black out your windows completely. Or, you could invest in a thick pair of curtains. Curtains with dark colours are perfect for this, as are curtains with backing. Bear in mind that waking to a dark room could leave you feeling disoriented in the morning. Your body may trick you into feeling tired each morning because it thinks it’s still night time. Even so, it’s a price worth paying to ensure you sleep well. The confusion is something you’ll soon get used to.

 

Following as many of these steps as possible will lead you to a much better night sleep. Don’t cut corners. You owe it to yourself to get the rest you need. You may worry about losing those extra hours, but you’ll soon make up for them with your increased productivity. Go ahead and give it a go!

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Terrific Traits Of Every Successful Business

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What do you need to think about when running and setting up a new business. You need to look at who came before you, where they excelled and where they failed. There are certain traits that are shared between every successful business. You need a great team of staff because they are the people your customers will look to when deciding whether they want to buy. You must have a fantastic plan in place that extends well beyond this year or even 2018. Ideally, you should have a five-year plan of how you will ensure that your business has longevity. You will also need to think about what you’re selling. Believe it or not, the product or service that you offer doesn’t need to be absolutely fantastic and awe-inspiring. It just needs to have enough support to make it a hit. A group of loyal customers that will always continue to buy. Now we know some of the traits, let’s look at how we can make sure that your business will match them.

 

Finding The Right Employees

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There are a few factors that you need to consider when hiring employees for your business. The first is the appearance. You need your employees to look and feel professional to customers. If they don’t have the right image, customers might make certain snap judgements about who they are and what they can offer. For instance, employees who are poorly dressed may be deemed to be lazy or slobbish. Two ideas that you certainly won’t want associated with your business. Remember, you should take this into account when you are conducting interviews. Otherwise, you could end up with a team of employees that, while brilliant, may not look the part.

 

You might also like to consider using a recruitment agency to get the right hires for your business. Using the right recruitment agency is like gaining permission to fish in an exclusive pond. In this pond, you’ll find the biggest and best fish available. You can reel them in, and you will be one of the few companies with access to these unique specimen. Landing a fish from this particular pond could get your company the talent you need. For instance, payroll recruitment agencies specialize in ensuring businesses get the right people managing their finances.

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Remember, when you hire employees, you should be looking out for a USP. This is something, a trait or characteristic that makes them completely different from the rest. Usually, it could be a unique skill or a level of experience that other individuals simply don’t have. Once you find someone who fits the bill, you should quiz them on their USP in their interview. It’s not uncommon for employees to lie about USPs. Particularly if they think it is something that employers want to see. But you can usually easily tell the genuine article from the fakes and phonies.

 

The Killer Product

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Anything that you are selling as a business owner can be classified as a product. You need to make sure that this product has massive marketing appeal. There should already be a high level of demand for what you are looking to sell. All you need to do is grow the demand and capitalise from it.

 

Remember, the easiest way to find the demand for a product is to ensure that you market it correctly. You need to seek out your target customer. This is the individual who is already inclined to purchase your product. They won’t take much convincing. Instead, all you need to do is let them know that the product in question exists on the market. To do this, it’s time to think about how to target market. One of the easiest ways to do this is with social media. On social media networks, you can release fresh content everyday that connects with the audience that you are looking for. For instance, you might be selling a product that will be attractive for parents. If that’s the case then you should be releasing content that relates such as parental advice articles. Or, funny things that new parents will find endearing. You get the idea? It’s about releasing something that connects personally with your chosen audience.

 

Once you start marketing to your target demand group, your product will sell. That much is guaranteed but there is no such guarantee that sales will remain high. This is one of the reasons why you need to think about the longevity of your business.

 

Improving Your Business Longevity

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There are a lot of people who are looking to start a business in the hope of essentially getting rich quick. If that’s your logic behind starting a business, you may want to reconsider your position. Chances are that starting your business with this idea won’t lead anywhere positive. First, it will probably mean that overspend quickly in the hope that bigger is going to be better. This, of course, is hardly ever true. By pouring money into your business, you will simply be pushing your company towards higher losses.

 

Instead, you should be working to reduce your costs as much as possible. This should allow you to keep your business competitive on the market against what will undoubtedly be a heated competition.

 

Don’t forget that you also need to think about investments in your business. You will need to rely on the support of investors if your business is going to be a success. They will only be willing to inject capital into your company if you have a solid plan for the future. It is important that you and anyone else in a high position of your business works out which direction you want to take your company in.

 

As you can see then, there are a lot of factors to consider when making your business a success. However, if you follow this advice, you should not have any trouble on the market. Indeed, it’s just a matter of setting up your company the right way and putting the correct measures in place to ensure success.

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What Do I Need If I Want to Build Software?

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A lot of people have cool ideas for software, which can include games or mobile apps. But how do people make these ideas a reality? Understanding how software actually gets developed is essential. Here what you’re going to want to acquire if you want your software plans to come to fruition.

Industry experience

The software industry is an exciting one, and getting some experience in it can be extremely helpful if you want to build your own software. It’s not exactly necessary – many successful developers created their hit software without having ever joined another software company beforehand – but it can be very useful. It helps you get a strong idea of what the process involves. If you’ve got skills in coding, designing, or testing, then try applying for a few positions.

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Development skills

If you want to build the software yourself, then you’re going to have to know how to code. If you don’t know anything about programming yet, then don’t worry! It’s actually nowhere near as difficult as you might imagine. Once you’ve got a hold of how the syntax works, the process of learning can actually be quite quick. You’ve just got to make sure you’re looking at the right programming courses.  It’s also a good idea to test yourself and get an appreciation of the process from other angles. For example, there is a platform called the ocr C# library where you can read text and barcodes from scanned images and PDFs, which you can apply to websites and convert images to text, which you can use to develop your skills and begin appreciating it all as a language rather than a set of commands. As for the programming languages you’ll want to use, then languages such as Python, C#, Java, and HTML 5 can be very useful here.

Testing facilities

You can’t just build some software then release it! Just because the code looks stable enough and the program runs okay when you play around with it for a bit, it doesn’t mean it’s fit to release. You actually need to test your software thoroughly – and I mean thoroughly. Software testing is a rigorous, full-time job that’s nowhere near as simple as many people think. Thankfully, you can actually get testing software that helps with, well, testing software! Jira testing software is among the most popular in modern software development.

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The right hardware

Software development can technically be done on something as simple as an undemanding laptop. After all, it’s mostly just writing! But when it comes to actually running the software, things might get a bit more complicated. You should be using quite a fast, modern PC that can handle multitasking with ease. As you get further into development, you’re going to find that you need more power to keep everything running smoothly. You’re also going to need to consider what platforms you want to run this software on. If you’re building apps for phones, then you’re going to want to get both an Android and an iPhone for testing purposes.

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Connections

So how do you actually get your software out there? You might want to look into getting some networking done. Getting a bit of advertising done is essential – after all, thousands of new software are being produced every month. How is your software going to stand out? If you’re not in professional software development yet, then you should be networking with people who are. Networking is what can help you get funding, development assistance, and even exposure once your software is released.

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3 Important Considerations For Your Next Healthcare Plan

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With the amount of different healthcare plans out there, along with all the junk mail you’re no doubt being bombarded with, choosing health insurance can be a pretty daunting prospect. However, unless you’re fine with ruining your personal finances when life throws you a curveball, it’s a necessary evil! If you’re having a hard time comparing your options, here are some of the main considerations you should go through.

Your Doctor

There are a lot of popular health plans which will require you to use the insurer’s own network of doctors and specialists. Like many, you might already have a certain doctor who you’d like to carry on going to. If this is the case, then be sure to check first and see if your doctor is included in the healthcare plan you’re mulling over. If you don’t have any choice but to switch to a doctor from the insurer’s network, then start researching them instead. Call up the medical office where he or she works to check their credentials, or look them up through the AMA. The doctor’s location and availability are also big factors which need to be considered when you come to choosing your next health plan. You should not only check that they’re conveniently placed, but also that the opening hours of their facility are going to work for you.

Your Specialists

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Medical office – middle-aged male doctor greeting patient, shaking hands.

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Perhaps you have a specific medical condition which requires you to see a specialist, or you believe you may need to seek out a specialist in the future. In this situation, it’s important to figure out for certain how you’ll be able to reach this specialist as and when you need to. Like with my first point, it’s a good idea to check whether or not any current specialists that you go to are part of the networks for insurers that are within your price range. You also need to find out whether or not you’ll be required to contact your primary care physician before going to any given specialist. Of course, some rarer conditions are going to have serious ramifications on the health plan you need, and the specialists you’ll need access to. Sometimes, this can require the input of an accountant who deals with insurance consultancy. If you want more information, view it at BSWllc.com.

Prescription Coverage

Like countless other people, you might currently be on prescription medication for an ongoing condition. If this is the case or there’s a high chance that you’ll need prescription medication in the future, then you’ll need to narrow your search down to plans that have good prescription drug coverage. Remember that this kind of coverage can vary a lot from one plan to the next. You may get no coverage, complete and universal coverage, but more likely you’ll have to find a plan that’s somewhere in the middle, with different conditions for different drugs or varying co-pays. Furthermore, if you’re unable to get your prescriptions in a generic form, this will have a big impact on how much you’ll pay for each prescription.

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Taking The Shortcuts To Building A Real Connection To Your Customers

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The relationship between customer and business is one that can spend years in a state of flux or go to an extreme in a matter of moments. The wrong solution or the wrong message can ruin the whole relationship. The right approach can create the kind of brand loyalty that you might have thought only possible for the biggest of businesses. Here, we’re going to look at how you make steps to creating the best customer relationship you can.

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Make life as easy for them as possible

Regardless of what you’re offering them and what you find out about them, the fact is that a business shouldn’t be hard to do business with. Any barriers that separate you from your customers need to be eliminated. On your website, this might mean simplifying navigation and creating a much more streamlined e-commerce approach. In physical retail, this means making sure that your services are accessible, especially when it comes to payment. If you’re not using things like merchant services to offer more payment options to your customers, then they may just well look elsewhere. Keeping your business accessible to your market is vital if you want to have any kind of relationship with your customers.

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Listen to them

That same level of ease and flexibility should go into how you conduct customer communication. A lot of smaller businesses, in particular, tend to have a hard time listening to criticism. Instead of offering support, they can get defensive. Besides listening to them in person and offering customer support, seek their advice online. Ask for testimonials, send out surveys through social media, ask them what they think of you. You might not like some of the answers, but its crucial to understanding the marketing that you’ve found yourself in. Even being willing and open to listening to feedback, and sometimes showcasing the changes you make in response, can win you a lot of respect from existing and potential customers alike.

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Get some insight

A customer might be able to tell you about how they think and feel about your business. However, they’re not always the most reliable people to talk to when it comes to finding out what they want. A better way to do that is just let them show them. For instance, you can use customer relationship management tools to compile all sorts of data on them that allows you some insight into those wants. You can use your website as a tool to the same ends, too. Heat maps can show what parts of the website garner more attention that others. If you use a search bar on your site, realize how useful a tool that can be as well. The results of search bar analysis give you a direct look at what your customers are looking for.

Knowing their wants and needs and knowing that you don’t know everything is important. You need to be open in the relationship and willing to listen, as you should be in all relationships. Sometimes that also means reading between the lines and doing a little digging to find what they really want.

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Surviving Sickness Solo: How To Deal With Being Ill When You Live Alone

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Most of us are independent enough to live alone and get by. But what happens when illness strikes? Living with someone, you can always rely on them to be your carer for the day, but living alone, you have to be your own carer. If you’ve recently fallen ill and have to deal with it yourself, here are some ways to cope through the period.

Prepare an emergency illness bag

For when illness strikes, you should have a bag of emergency medical supplies by your bed. This could include painkillers, allergen medicine, prescription drugs, anti-diarrhoea pills and any other emergency medicine that you can think of. Having this within arm’s reach of your bed, either underneath or in a bedside cabinet, can stop you having to trek downstairs and give you the rest you need.

Cut down on chores

This will depend on how long the sickness spell lasts, but realistically you shouldn’t be trying to hoover the house and clean the toilet and run cleaning errands when you’re ill. You need to get rest, and that means not being so active. You can catch up with all this when you are well. Any visitors will understand if your house is a mess.  

Order online

You’ll have to eat when you’re ill. If you can’t face cooking, order a takeaway to your house. Similarly, for any resources you may need, prevent having to go down to the shops by ordering online. Forcing yourself constantly out of bed to do errands will not help your recovery.

Open a window

That said, you’ll need to still get some fresh air. Staying cooped up indoors with no windows open could make it hot and stuffy, a perfect breeding ground for bacteria that could make your illness worse. If going outside is too much of struggle, have a window open that you can regularly walk to get fresh air.

Call for help

Realistically, you’re never going to be able to cope entirely on your own, especially for illnesses lasting more than a couple of days. There are many emergency healthcare services that can help you cope if you don’t have any family or friends available (read this new info about Our Urgent Care to give you an idea of such services). It’s worth keeping a number of one of these whilst ill, in case you have a nasty fall or things take a bad turn.

Know when you can no longer cope and don’t try to suffer through it. For lengthy periods of illness, you may have to hire housekeepers or have people to run errands for you such as shopping, posting letters and cleaning the place up.

Let work know immediately and keep them informed of the progress of your illness. You may be able to work from home, but don’t push yourself if staring at a screen is making your migraine worse or your telephone manner is compromised by how ill you sound. For the self-employed it can be handy to have a deputy staff member that can take over or have insurance system in place to protect against when you are ill and business can no longer run.

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How To Write A CV That Gets You Noticed

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If you’ve never written a CV or Resume before, it can be quite a daunting and, somewhat overwhelming task.

Of course there are many resources and templates online that can guide you, but sometimes you can lead yourself down a rabbit hole of looking at these too much, and not just focusing on the basics.

The important thing to remember with a CV is, the intention of it is to pique interest in you enough to get you noticed, and have the potential employer wish to speak to you – they don’t want to see every single detail of your life, what you do at the weekend for fun, how much you love the Batman movies, or what you had for dinner last night.

Sure, they want to know a bit about who you are, because this allows them to see if you could be a potential good fit for the company overall, but they’re really just looking for an overview.

Here are a few tips for you to use when creating your first or next CV.

Length:

The length of your CV is quite important, and the key is to give enough information for relevance, but keep it as short as you can to give that information. Usually a CV should be about 1-2 A4 pages. Unless it’s extremely relevant to the position you’re applying for, then any more than that is simply not required, and they may not even read it all. People are busy, so they don’t have time to read all that – they simply want an introduction to you, and will ask you more details during the interview stage.

Format:

Despite what some people believe, there really is no right or wrong way to format a CV. You definitely want it to read easy, so creating sections, short sentences, and avoiding massive paragraphs that just seem like a wall of words is all you really need to do.

Start with your personal details at the top of the page, such as your name, address, date of birth and contact details. Then create sections for education, employment history, skills, passions, and hobbies.

Also don’t be afraid to be honest about where you feel your strengths and weaknesses are: this, if nothing else, shows that you’re honest, willing to improve, and can acknowledge that you’re human and can overcome failures.

Each of these, obviously apart from the education and employment history should simply be a sentence or two.

Information:

When writing a CV, there are some people out there who will encourage you to exaggerate or even downright lie about your skills, passions, and even your education and employment background. This is not only a bad idea due to being morally wrong, but it’s incredibly silly due to being illegal in some places, and at the very least, if found to be lying or withholding important information on a CV, you would most certainly lose your job, and may have trouble finding another one. So, before you go applying for Science Jobs that you’re not properly qualified for, then you should maybe re-think that plan.

The thing is: if there’s a job you do want, but you’re not qualified for, then there are always ways around that, such as applying for an internship or entry-level position and working your way up, or even getting some qualifications that may be needed.

Honesty is always the best policy.

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3 Simple Ideas For Turning Your Life Around In 2017

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Have you felt a little down recently? Are you in your twenties and thinking “there must be more to life than this”? Then you’ve come to the right place. We’re currently approaching Christmas, and that means the new year is just around the corner. That’s a fantastic opportunity for you to do something exciting and turn your life around. Nobody wants to see the same old dull surroundings all their life, and nobody intends to work a dead-end job. So, now is the time to make a plan for the future and try to increase your opportunities. Of course, you are the best person to work out the finer details. I just wanted to offer some suggestions.

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Move to a different country

The idea of moving abroad excites many people. However, they often feel that turning their dream into a reality is impossible. That simply isn’t the case! Most countries have reasonable immigration rules, and so anyone can achieve that goal. You just need to understand which stipulations you need to satisfy. For instance, Canada is always on the lookout for manual workers, and the same applies to the UK. So, don’t sit at home feeling like you’ve never had the chance to experience other cultures. Anyone could move abroad for a few years and try something new with minimal effort. Also, nothing is stopping you from coming back home if it all goes wrong, but at least you’ll have had the experience.

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Get a college degree

If you’re sick of working low-paid jobs, it could be time to head back to college. Getting a degree could open up an entirely new world of opportunities. You could become a doctor or a lawyer and never have to worry about money again. You could even train to become a nurse or something similar if you want to help people. Just work out what you want to do and start to develop your college application strategy as soon as possible. Contrary to popular belief, it’s never too late to get an education. Being as you’re only in your twenties, you have more than enough time to turn things around. Remember, most people work well into their sixties these days.

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Find a life partner

It’s possible you might feel a little depressed about life recently because you are spending it alone. So, why not try to meet someone special and share your existence? The process is much easier these days thanks to specialist dating websites and apps. Indeed, around 10% of new couples met using the internet last year. It has become a “normal” way to forge relationships with potential partners and change your life. Just make sure you are smart when it comes to the people you choose to meet. Select those who appear to have at least some of the same interests for the best results.

Making those three fundamental changes in 2017 could improve your life considerably. The issue is that most people struggle to identify them without outside advice. So, now you’ve read the information, you should be in the best position to put it to good use. Feel free to share this post with any friends you know are feeling down this holiday season. As I’m sure you understand, self-help is the key to a happy life.

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Wild Whistler: Your Guide To Canada’s Coolest Ski Resort

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Whistler, Vancouver is the largest ski resort in North America and home to some of the most jaw dropping scenery on the planet. This region of British Columbia, Canada played host to the 2010 Winter Olympics, and still continues to attract visitors from all over the globe thanks to the luscious list of extreme sports on offer. Here, you can try skiing, snowboarding, snowshoeing and tobogganing as well as the chance to experience everything in the chalet style village that nestles in the foothills of the Whistler and Blackcomb Mountains.

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Flickr Photo From: Kevin Hale

 

 

 

 

 

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Flickr Photo From: Darach McDougall

 

Ski The Run That Suits You

Whistler has an extensive range of runs that suit every level of skier, from the nursery slopes, so-called because they are suitable for beginners or small children, all the way up to diamond black runs which are extremely high, contain dizzying hairpin bends and should only be attempted by very experienced or professional skiers. For beautiful snow, gentle runs and clear signposts head to the Peak Express Chair, from there you can experience some musical themed green and blue runs, including the Burnt Stew Trail and Ode To Joy. These trails are great spots for novices to practice their turns, get the hang of the sport and be around those of a similar level. If you’re no stranger to the slopes more challenging runs are, of course, on offer. In fact, over 55 percent of Whistler’s ski runs are suitable for intermediate skiers including the picturesque Arthur’s Choice and Outer Limits.

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Flickr Photo From: heschong

Stay In Style At The Four Seasons

There’s a whole range of amazing hotels, lodges, B&B’s and more packed into this quaint yet lively ski town. Before you arrive don’t forget to arrange your Electronic Travel Authorisation, it only costs $7 CAD and you can see more info at https://official-canada-eta.com. All visa-exempt foreign nationals must show this documentation on entry into Canada. If it’s your first ski season in Whistler or you’re celebrating something extra special, why not stay at a luxury, 273 room lodge complete with en-suite rooms, balconies and stunning mountain views? The resort is meters from the slopes and has an on-site spa, three hot tubs, and a multitude of restaurants. Elsewhere, there are cafes, bars and pubs aplenty where you can grab a quick snack before checking out the day’s action or the perfect venue for an après-ski hot chocolate after a great day on the slopes.

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Flickr Photo From: Atsushi Kase

Ride The Peak To Peak Gondola

This incredible piece of machinery is also the longest and highest ski lift in the world and hangs suspended for 4.4 kilometres between the Whistler and Blackcomb mountain ranges. During the winter the gondola gives you double the fun when it comes to skiing, and in the summer you can enjoy of 50 kilometres of hiking, mountain biking and nature trails. The gondola also offers guests the chance to see the landscape from above, breathe in fresh alpine air and witness the gorgeous scenery in front of you. Look out for Hoary Marmots, these cute creatures are small ground squirrels that make their burrows near the tree line and emit a series of high-pitched whistles if they see any danger.

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