Furloughs are gaining in popularity as a way to cut business costs in a down economy. What is furlough? It is a method to moderately reduce the weekly work time of most of your
workforce. It can be a good alternative to laying off employees for numerous reasons:
1. If it doesn’t go too long, many employees like it. It gives them a forced break from work, something that most of us won’t allow ourselves to do. Obviously, for those employees working paycheck to paycheck it can really hurt, however most see it as a better alternative than being let go.
One of the most negative behaviors managers can possess is poor listening skills. Unfortunately, many workplaces consist of environmental factors that support poor listening skills. 
For example, most managers are constantly interrupted by telephone calls, office walk-ins, pagers and deadlines. On a personal level, managers may be distracted with personal matters affecting their health or family. In other cases, managers may be in a hurry to end the conversation so they may interrupt the speaker without fully hearing what the speaker is saying or may not give the speaker enough time to talk through the matter. These situations can ultimately lead the manager to make decisions without first gathering all the facts which in turn is likely to result in the speaker feeling disrespected.
Gotcha… you thought this was about employee termination… didn’t you? Not quite: Two issues which plague many companies are the wellness of their employees and the productivity 
of company meetings. While the two may seem to be from opposite ends of the spectrum when running a company, there is a simple solution which can be hugely beneficial to improving both scenarios.
“There are many benefits of company wellness programs including that: employees tend to be more productive, have lower health care costs, lower rates of absenteeism, and have fewer workers’ compensation claims (http://www.infinitehealthcoach.com/benefits-of-corporate-wellness-programs.html). Unfortunately, employee wellness programs can be inaccessible to many companies because of cost, time constraints or a combination of both.
Give the customer what they want and most employers think they have an effective customer service process. But giving customers what they want is not enough anymore.
Customers have greater choices on who they do business with and with competition greater than ever, it doesn’t take much for a customer to take their business elsewhere.
As an employer, you may be thinking that you can’t afford to spend money on customer service training or expensive customer satisfaction surveys. No problem. The following are no-cost, effective techniques that go above and beyond simply giving the customer what they want:
There are certain “truths” in the workplace that most people know about but they sometimes need repeating as the “truths” are not always followed. The following are examples of 
some of these “truths”.
1. The sick day. Call in sick when you’re really not sick and chances are you’ll run into someone who knows you’re supposed to be working. If you need a day off for personal reasons, just say you need a day off. Most employers provide paid-time off and don’t require the employee to give a reason for taking the time off.
workforce. It can be a good alternative to laying off employees for numerous reasons:
