Below you will find a selection of the most recent entries from bloggers in our Work/Business section.
To view the entries from individual bloggers, click on the links below:
- Claire Doole - Claire Doole Communications
Claire is a former BBC correspondent and international spokeswoman who is passionate about helping people communicate with confidence. Since 2006, she has successfully trained hundreds of professionals in the art of presenting and public speaking, talking to the media, managing communications in a crisis, and writing for the web. In addition, she has coached C-level executives and public figures to give powerful TEDx and TED style talks in Europe and the Middle East. A Swiss and UK national, Claire trains and coaches in French and English.
- Elizabeth Ballin - Life Coach
As a long time member of the international community in Geneva, Elizabeth Ballin has been coaching adults and students from all parts of the world. She has coached business professionals, musicians/artists, couples, families and adolescents. She is a fully accredited Life Coach by the International Coaching Federation. Elizabeth Ballin, Life Coach
- Patrick Hoza - US Tax & Financial Services
Since 1990, Patrick has many years of experience with US individual expatriate taxation under his belt, including High Net Worth Individuals, streamline/voluntary disclosure filings and tax consulting, as well as working with large multinationals like Novartis, BP, Hewlett Packard and General Electric. He has extensive knowledge in serving both US expatriates and resident and non-resident aliens with their US tax-related issues. Patrick Hoza is a Tax Director at US Tax & Financial Services, with extensive experience in all aspects of Individual US tax and Expatriation, including Hight Net Worth Individuals and large multinationals.
Patrick started his career in 1990 in California, with Westpro Ltd., as a Senior Tax Consultant, then spent the middle part of his career working at KPMG and Ernst & Young. During his time with Ernst & Young, he worked and lived in Russia, France and finally Switzerland. He has gained a valuable working knowledge of the respective income tax regulations in all of these countries.
Patrick holds a B.A. in International Relations from the University of Colorado, is a member of the National Association of Enrolled Agents and is a Certified Acceptance Agent.
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Melitta Campbell - Business Coach
Business Coach and Mentor with nearly 3 decades of business experience and a passion for helping women confidently build a business they love. She is also the founder of the Swiss Entrepreneurs Club and president of the Swiss Riviera Toastmasters Club in Montreux. Originally from Wales, she now lives in Montreux in a chalet she has renovated with her husband overlooking the Swiss Alps. - Sunita Sehmi - Walk The Talk
Founder of Walk The Talk, Sunita has been training, developing and now coaching Business Communication skills in both companies and educational establishments for over twenty years. She has a passion for helping people to maximise their potential and created Walk The Talk with the sole aim to drive each and every client to perform their best.
- Robert Harris- Forth Capital
With over 25 years experience working for some of the major financial institutions in the City of London, Robert is a founding partner of Forth Capital, the leading expat financial advisory company in Switzerland. Regulary quoted in newspaper articles and magazines, he is well placed to advise expats on a variety of financial issues that may arise during their time living in Switzerland.
- Debbie Croft - Croft Coaching
As the founder of Croft Coaching, Debbie has a passion for helping people overcome challenges, embrace change and live life to the full; with an ethos of “work hard, play hard”.
- Sarah Santacroce - Simplicity
A certified social media, internet marketing, and virtual event specialist, Sarah enjoys every aspect of small business marketing. Through her own business, Simplicity, it is her mission to help other small businesses and solopreneurs increase their visibility and use social media tools as part of their marketing strategy.
- Diana Ritchie - SSC Sàrl
A Director at Swiss Career Connections, Diana will provide you with some useful tips for job hunting.
photo courtesy of ERS
By Claire Doole, www.doolecommunications.com
Many of you are moderating events and panel discussions in the virtual world. If you are an in-house moderator, you have an advantage over someone like myself in that you automatically know the subject area. However, that doesn’t mean that you can “rock up and just have a conversation” in the words of someone I coached recently in how to moderate at a virtual event!
Professional moderators may make it look effortless as they seamlessly transition from one speaker, subject area or segment to another, but it takes a lot of preparation to work out the editorial narrative of an event and the flow of a specific panel discussion.
In many respects in the virtual world, it is even harder for two main reasons:
1) It is more challenging to capture and hold the audience’s attention and;
2) Organizers are packing their events with too many speakers.
If you want to overcome these challenges and be a dynamic virtual moderator, have a look at some of my tips below:
Work with the organisers on event design
I run workshops and act as a consultant to organisations and companies on how to design an entertaining, participatory and insightful event. As an in-house moderator, however, you are well placed to influence the narrative and flow of the event from the start.
- Make sure they have made the shift from the real to virtual world and apply the principles of a TV news programme, namely short, varied and creative.
- Advise on the format. Blocks of speakers who present one after each other is overwhelming and potentially tedious for the audience. I have seen programmes where nine speakers make keynote speeches, presentations or remarks with no audience or moderator intervention for the first hour. Even two keynote speeches of 20 minutes each back to back before the audience Q&A is asking a lot of the audience.
- Limit the number of speakers in a panel discussion to no more than four. I have turned down panel discussions where there are seven speakers as it is impossible to generate a lively discussion of views. It goes without saying that it is frustrating for the panelists to be given so little time to get their points across and can certainly lead to information overload for the audience.
By Claire Doole, www.doolecommunications.com
"It ain't so much the things that people don't know that makes trouble in this world, as it is the things that people know that ain't so." This is one of the many quotes attributed to 19th Century American writer Mark Twain and it definitely applies to presenting.
Many people think they are good presenters – mostly because people are too polite to tell them they are not, or in the case of senior people because no one dares tell them!
Presenters themselves also have a blind spot. This month I was asked to train a number of speakers taking part in virtual conferences. I blocked time in my diary and waited for the Doodle calendar to fill up. Two things happened – some people were too busy, others left it to the last moment.
This only confirmed to me another great quote about public speaking. This time by the American comedian, Jerry Seinfeld, who said, “According to most studies, people's number one fear is public speaking. Number two is death. Death is number two. Does that sound right? This means to the average person, if you go to a funeral, you're better off in the casket than doing the eulogy.” People who don’t like public speaking tend to put off preparing their presentation until the last minute.
By Melitta Campbell, www.melittacampbell.com
Why have a business coach when there is so much great FREE information and amazing ‘virtual mentors’ on YouTube?
I was asked this question by a business owner, and I thought it was a fantastic question. It’s true, there is a lot of great people and content offering free advice on YouTube and I whole-heartedly encourage you to find one or two of these ‘virtual mentors’ to help you in your business education. However, their advice will be limited in its ability to move your business forward for these five reasons:
1. A Video Offers Advice – not Feedback
When you work with a business coach, you get access to someone who can give you feedback and advice on everything you plan and everything you do within your business – a video can’t provide these valuable insights.
2. Great Advice is not always the Right Advice!
Businesses go through different phases and, while there are certainly no-fail strategies that work for all businesses, knowing how and when to implement them is an art that will save you time, effort and money.
On the flip-side, not knowing when or how to adopt these strategies will lead to overwhelm and cause you to feel stuck, and can destroy your mindset.
Your business coach knows you, your business and your ideal clients, so can help you understand when to implement certain strategies, and guide you in adapting them to your business. Saving you hours, weeks or even months of trial and error – not to mention saving you money and a lot of frustration!
3. No Accountability
We do two things in life. We do what we love and we do what we are being watched on.
As your own boss, you are accountable to yourself and, as you’ve probably already experience, this often leads up to get caught up on doing the little things, instead of remaining laser-focused on the important activities that really move the needle in your business.
This is where your business coach is invaluable, in helping you stay focused and consistent in your business.
By Claire Doole, www.doolecommunications.com
Are you getting bored of virtual events which go on for hours, with one speaker after another or one panel after another? Often the most gripping moment is seeing how the moderator copes with the technical glitches or closes down the speakers who go over time!
Far too many event organisers have not understood the difference between what goes into a virtual one as opposed to face-to-face. They try to replicate their usual half-day, full-day or two-day event online without thinking about the audience experience.
Having moderated many virtual events in the past 7 months, I firmly believe that organisers will need to work harder as the pandemic continues to retain audience share. Audiences are going to be more selective, only tuning in to events that are well produced, informative and insightful.
by Patrick Hoza, US Tax & Financial Services
Lefty Gomez, an all-star pitcher for the New York Yankees in the 1930's, is credited with saying "I'd rather be lucky than good." He is also credited with earning the nicknames "Goofy Gomez," and "El Goofo." Still, I often think Lefty had it right and today could very well be your lucky day.
If you are a US citizen and want to give up your citizenship but have fretted over unfiled returns or the fact you do not have a US social security number, then the IRS has a procedure for you! It’s called ‘Relief Procedures for Certain Former Citizens’.
This procedure allows an individual that meets the following eligibility requirements to have a “get out of jail free” card.
- Your past compliance failures were due to non-wilful conduct.
- You have relinquished your U.S. citizenship after March 18, 2010.
- You have no filing history as a U.S. citizen or resident.
- You did not exceed the threshold in Internal Revenue Code Section 877(a)(2)(A), relating to average annual net income tax for the period of 5 tax years ending before your date of expatriation. This amount is $171,000 for 2020 and is indexed for inflation each year.
