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Each year, MindTools.com helps more than 6,700,000 visitors learn the essential skills they need for an excellent career. Isn’t it time you discovered the secrets of their success?

Learn hundreds of essential career skills online, FREE of charge, using the menus above, and develop yourself on an ongoing basis with our popular free e-newsletter.

Then boost your career to new heights in our members’ area, the Career Excellence Club! Find out more by taking the Club tour, or browse the featured resources below.

Featured Resources:

Supply and Demand Curves
Understanding price and quantity in the marketplace
Sep 5th, 2008

The laws of supply and demand greatly influence the marketplace. Learn more about them, so that you can make informed decisions about price and quantity.
All Readers' Skill-Builder

How Good is Your Time Management?
Become Exceptionally Effective!

Test your time management, and zoom in on techniques that will boost your personal productivity. Take this interactive test now, and find out if you can raise your game! All Readers' Interactive Test.

Hiring People - Questions to Ask...
Know what to ask to find the right person

Interviewing is a task that many managers dread. But once you know what to ask and how to ask it, the process is really quite painless. Learn how to craft great interview questions, and download a list of 84 penetrating questions that you can use to hire the right people! Premium Members' Skill-Builder.

Maximizing Job Satisfaction
Get the Very Most From Your Job!

Job satisfaction needn't be an elusive dream. Understand your own unique ingredients for job satisfaction, and learn how to find them in the work you do. Premium Members' Skill-Builder.

The Plan-Do-Check-Act (PDCA) Cycle
Implementing Change in a Controlled Way

The Plan-Do-Check-Act Cycle, or Deming Cycle, is an easy-to-remember tool that helps you solve problems and manage change in a methodical and rigorous way. Learn how to use it here. Premium Members' Skill-Builder.

Review: One Billion Customers
Learn about China with James McGregor

China - one of the world's most dynamic economies - is a mystery to most Westerners. Author James McGregor helps to unlock it, based on his experience of doing business in China for nearly two decades. Listen to our review, or download the transcript. Premium Members' Book Insight.

Using Scenario Analysis
Systematically Exploring Different Futures

Scenario Analysis helps you think rigorously about the different futures you or your business may face. This helps you create robust plans that help you succeed, even if things go wrong. Premium Members' Skill-Builder.

Interview: Rewire or Rust, with Robert Critchley
How Age Discrimination Hurts Your Company

Age discrimination is damaging both for individuals and for organizations. In this downloadable MP3 Find out why managers can't afford to discriminate, and what older workers can do to counter discrimination. Premium Members' Expert Interview.

Bite-Sized Training: Prioritization
Become a Master of Prioritization!

Learn 10 powerful prioritization techniques in this downloadable one hour Bite-Sized Training session. All Members' Bite-Sized Training.

Free Skill-Builders:

Free on Mind Tools, you can discover the essential skills and techniques that help you excel in your career - whatever your profession. Learn leadership, personal effectiveness, goal setting, and stress management. Further, discover techniques that improve creativity, assist problem solving, organize time and deadlines, and improve your memory.

Start building your skills using the navigation bars at the top of this page, or by clicking the links below:-

Time Management Leadership Skills Stress Management Information Skills Practical Creativity

Problem Solving Decision Making Project Management Communication Skills Memory Improvement

Or use this site as a practical course in thinking skills. Do this by following our free career skills learning path, and read articles one-by-one learning the essential skills you need for an excellent career. Once you've read an article, use the 'next article' button at the foot of each page to move to the next. You'll find this below.

Products and Services

CareerExcellence Club Make Time for Success How to Lead Stress Tools Mind Tools E-Book Design Your Life! Career Coaching

Career Excellence Club Take charge of your career positively and successfully with the Mind Tools skill-building community, The Career Excellence Club - your fast track to career success! Find out more   Make Time for Success! Discover the 39 essential tools needed to maximize your achievement, and win control of your time and your life. Find out more   How to Lead: Discover the Leader Within You Learn the 48 essential skills needed to be a highly effective and respected leader. Find out more   Stress Tools With more than 50 important stress management tools, this self-study course shows you how to tackle the structural problems that cause job stress. Find out more   Mind Tools E-Book All of the tools on the Mind Tools site, brought together into one easily downloadable, easily printable PDF. Find out more   Design Your Life! Decide how you'll focus your life and career using our structured life design program. And then set the clear, vibrant, compelling goals that power you to achievement. Find out more   Career Excellence With a Mind Tools Coach Mind Tools Career Coaches give you the focused personal helpyou need to find direction and make the very most of yourcareer. Find out more

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New Articles (Not included in the Mind Tools E-book.)

* Shows articles available in full only to Career Excellence Club Premium members

5 Whys - Getting quickly to the root of a problem

Acrostics - Memory curiosities
Adams' Equity Theory - Balancing employee inputs and outputs
ADL Matrix - How industry position influences your strategy
Affinity Diagrams - Organizing ideas Into common themes
AIDA: Attention-Interest-Desire-Action - Inspiring action with your writing
The Ansoff Matrix - Understanding the different risks of different options

The Balanced Scorecard - Motivating employees to deliver your strategy
Beating Self-Sabotage* - Recognizing and overcoming it
Behavioral Assessments* - How personality affects the way people do their jobs
Belbin's Team Roles - Understanding team roles can improve team performance.
Benne and Sheats' Group Roles - Identifying positive and negative group roles
Blake Mouton Managerial Grid - Balancing task and people-oriented leadership
The Boston Matrix - Focusing effort to get the greatest returns
Bowman's Strategy Clock* - Making sense of eight competitive positions
Burke-Litwin Change Model* - Unraveling the dynamics of organizational change

CATWOE - Understanding the different elements that contribute to a problem
Using the Change Curve* - Accelerating change, and improving project success
Change Management* - Making organization change happen effectively
Congruence Model* - Aligning the drivers of high performance
Core Competence Analysis - Get ahead. Stay ahead.
Crawford's Slip Writing Method* - Gathering ideas from many contributors
Critical Success Factors - Identifying the things that really matter for success
Cross Culture Communication - Collaborative efforts a must!
The Cultural Web - Aligning your organization's culture with strategy
Customer Experience Mapping* - Looking through the eyes of your customers

Decision Making - Are you "cautious" or "courageous"?
Decision Model, The Vroom-Yetton-Jago* - Deciding how to decide
The Delegation Dilemma
The Delphi Technique* - Achieving well thought through consensus among experts

Empathic Listening* - Going beyond active listening

Finding Career Direction - Discover yourself and your purpose
Forming, Storming, Norming, Performing* - Helping new teams perform effectively
Future Proof Your Career - Developing skills for your future as well as for today

Golden Rules of Goal Setting - Five rules to set yourself up for success
Good Manners in the Office* - Realizing there's no excuse for discourtesy
Avoiding GroupThink - Avoiding fatal flaws in group decision making
The GROW Model - Coaching team members to improve performance

Heuristic Methods* - Using rules of thumb
Hofstede's Cultural Dimensions - Understanding values around the World
Hoshin Planning System* - Steering everyone in the right direction
How Good is Your Time Management?* - Discover time management tools that can help you
How to Ask for a Pay Raise* – Objectively evaluating your value to your organization
How to Relax After a Hard Day* - Leaving work at work
Humility - The most beautiful word in the English language, by Bruna Martinuzzi

Inductive Reasoning* - Drawing good generalized conclusions

Job Enrichment - Increasing job satisfaction
Maximizing Job Satisfaction - Getting the most from your job

Kano Model Analysis* - Developing products that delight
The Kepner-Tregoe Matrix* - Making unbiased, risk assessed decisions
Kotter's 8-Step Change Model - Implementing change powerfully and successfully

Locke's Goal Setting Theory - Understanding SMART goal setting
Locus of Control - Finding out who's in charge of your destiny
Logframes, and the Logical Framework Approach - Planning projects robustly

Making the Right Career Move* - Choosing the role that's best for you
Management by Objectives (MBO)* - Aligning people objectives with org goals
McKinsey 7S Framework, The - Ensuring all parts of your org work in harmony

Nominal Group Technique* - Prioritizing issues and projects to achieve consensus

Organizational Design - Aligning organizational structure with business goals
Overcoming Cultural Barriers to Change - Moving to a high performance culture

Plan-Do-Check-Act (PDCA) - Implementing new ideas in a controlled way
Dealing with Office Politics* - Navigating the minefield
Porter's Diamond - Shaping strategy to reflect national strengths and weaknesses
Porter's Generic Strategies - Choosing your route to competitive advantage
Prioritization* - Making best use of your time and resources
The Product Diffusion Curve - Keeping you marketing message fresh
Project Dashboards - Quickly communicating project progress
Project Milestone Reporting* - Keeping projects on track by monitoring check points

The RACI Matrix* - Structuring accountabilities for maximum efficiency and results
Reactive Decision Making* - Making good decisions under pressure
Resolving Team Conflict* - Building stronger teams by facing your differences
Role Playing* - Preparing for difficult conversations and situations

The Sales Funnel* - Keeping control of your sales pipeline
Scenario Analysis* - Exploring different futures
Schein's Career Anchors* - Understanding what inspires you in your career.
Starbursting - Understanding new ideas by brainstorming questions
Stepladder Technique* - Making better group decisions
Succession Planning* - Seamlessly Transferring Key Knowledge, Skills and Abilities
Surviving a Merger* - Taking control and proving your value

Team Charters - Getting your teams off to a great start
Team Management Skills* - The core skills needed to manage your team
Using the TOWS Matrix - Developing strategic options

The Wheel of Life* - Finding balance in your life

Theory X and Theory Y - Understanding team member motivation

A full list of Mind Tools articles is available here.

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