No child should feel left out during the holiday season. Thanks to the collective efforts of Play it Forward Pittsburgh and various businesses in the local area, toys are being donated by the truckload and distributed to families who might be needing a little extra help this year. Continue reading
How can you bring in the festivities that surround the winter holidays into the office without excluding anyone or making anyone feel uncomfortable or worse, offended or discriminated against? After all, the holidays are about all things good! Giving, gathering, fun, food, family and friends aren’t usually topics that spur feelings of discrimination or offense. So, how can you keep things light and celebratory while still acknowledging the meaning behind this season?
Happy Thanksgiving week! If you haven’t left your office yet, many of you will soon be venturing through the woods to grandmother’s house or relaxing away from it all with a quiet staycation at home. And whether you watch it or play it, most likely your thankful Thursday will involve some sort of football. Around here, Thanksgiving football kicked off already with our Annual ABG Capital Turkey Bowl last Friday!
Raise your hand if you’re excited about the holidays approaching. The family, the food, the friends, the good will towards men… I’d also ask you to raise the other hand if you’re stressed about it, but then most likely you’d have both hands in the air and not be able to scroll to read this post. The packing and traveling to get to the family, your tendency to always end up in the wrong grocery store line, the picking and choosing which friends you have time to see and someone inevitably feeling left out, and the Black Friday near tramplings at 3 am… So put your hands down and let’s talk about how to avoid holiday stress.
Today is National Unfriend Day. The typical holidays we celebrate at this time of year tend to revolve around togetherness, giving and thankfulness. So you might be wondering how a day ended up being devoted to unfriending, well, your friends! But don’t sell National Unfriend Day short–if a classmate from second grade, who you’re not sure actually graduated with you, is whining about a missed flight to his beach house in the Bahamas; or your third cousin’s ex-husband is going off about the last shot of a game for a sport you don’t watch; or your aunt, twice removed, is complaining about the weather again because her cats don’t like it and she attached photographic proof, this holiday is for you.
It’s the most wonderful time of the year! And the most stressful time to travel. The holidays are right around the corner, but if your friends and relatives aren’t then you’re probably going to find yourself in or on a plane, train or automobile to join your loved ones.
Just last week, a few of us were sitting around remembering the days when airline travel was a special event. People dressed up to take a ride on an airplane. There were fancy drinks, in-flight movies, and full meals were served on flights where baggage was included in the cost of your ticket. Now, flying feels more like a process to endure rather than an event to enjoy. Luckily, we here at ABG Capital are experienced travelers and we’ve gathered a list of tips that should make your holiday travels a little less stressful. We’ll tell you how to keep your sanity during holiday travel!
You probably think we’re going to tell you all about how you should get away from your desk at mealtimes to break up the monotony of your day, or to relieve stress, or to get more activity by taking a walk… WELL, YOU’RE WRONG! This post is about how you are eating your food at one of the dirtiest, most germ-ridden areas of the office. That’s right – we’re going to tell you why eating lunch at your desk is making you sick!
Image: Courtesy of Dettol
Offices are becoming increasingly unhygienic as more and more of us are eating lunches at our desks. You can find dozens of studies and test results with a simple Google search showing just how dirty our desks can be. Your mouse and keyboard alone contain more than 3 times the levels of bacteria-related contamination than the average toilet seat. This is because of the crumbs and food residue (think greasy French fries, mayo and condiments from your fingers and that yogurt you spilled last week) that is all over your workstation making for the ideal environment for bacteria and other micro-organisms to live. Additionally, because these are electronic devices, they’re not being cleaned as regularly or as thoroughly as other parts of the office.
Don’t believe me? Take your keyboard, right now, and turn it upside down. Give it a little shake. What fell out? The crumbs are just what you can SEE. If they’re there, so is bacteria.
Our suggestion: A granola bar, a piece of fruit or other small snack is probably okay to consume whilst sitting at your desk, as long as you’ve washed your hands and taken care to clean up any spills. We recommend eating your meals like breakfasts and lunches AWAY from your desk. Not only will you reap the benefits that you THOUGHT we were going to impart at the beginning of this article, you’ll also keep your desk much cleaner, and you won’t expose yourself to the bacteria and germs that are surely lurking at your workstation.
So be honest–how often do you eat at your desk? Does your workplace have a community lunch room?
Happy Halloween! We have a quick post for you today to show you how we put our creative minds together to come up with funny, scary, interesting, and downright odd costumes for our annual office Halloween party. And yes, we took our own advice from last week and made sure that all of these costumes were safe for work—it’s Friday, almost a holiday weekend, and none of us is trying to have a meeting with HR today!
When you are the owner of a company that continually wins awards for growth, culture and employee satisfaction, the desire to see those positive trends continue is obviously on your radar. Staying current on the latest strategies for recruitment, execution, development and operations is key. At ABG Capital, the education and professional development of our staff members are top priorities, and our executive team knows that not neglecting their own education and development is what will keep our company growing and help us reach our highest potential.
ABG Capital executives having a conversation before a keynote presentation.
Left to Right: Randy Stegner, VoIP Innovations; Nick Medina, VoIP Innovations; Jason Tapolci, VoIP Innovations; Ron Eggert, Inspira; Jeff Tapolci, ABG Capital; and Dan Ravenstahl, GlobalPOPs.
Men all around you will stop shaving, we will stuff our bellies until we have no choice but to take a nap, aspiring writers will be crafting their novels, and a shopping frenzy will commence in the wee hours of the early morning on a Friday—that’s right folks, it must be November! As we turned the page on the calendar yesterday, so began the penultimate month of the year. One amazing part of November, aside from bearded men, never-ending turkey, new reading material, and scoring a great deal on the year’s hottest gift, is stopping to give thanks. Continue reading
