🥠 8 Life and Work Hacks for 2025
From Community Building to Career Best Practices
Hello. It’s Julia. Welcome back to my weekly newsletter exploring the ways we communicate and connect at work and beyond.
We’re officially in Month 2 of the New Year, what do you want to do differently this year? Move over New Year’s Resolutions and Word of the Year, instead focus on action this year with a life or work hack for 2025.
I gathered hacks from 8 leaders featured in this newsletter to inspire, encourage and celebrate you this year. Here are their recommendations:
Jennifer Levine: Create a Trust Council
Dani Dudeck: Read Regularly
Carmen Boon: Embrace Meditation and Nature
Sylvia Acevedo: Track Your Actions and Impact
Claudia Bell: Run!
Jason Yoong: Become a Character
Katia Verresen: Take a Confetti Approach
Brooke Kruger: Champion Others
Learn more from their quotes and career stories below:
Jennifer Levine: Create a Trust Council
Valuing the relationships you make at work through the years. When you find good people, keep them around you. They become your trust council even if you aren’t working with them.
Dani Dudeck: Read Regularly
As a family, we love reading. I read a lot of news. My husband's obsessed with reading five newspapers a day. But most importantly we read to our kids and teach them the appreciation and value of stories. We have a little area in the house that is all their books and we do a book rotation in their rooms. We also read to our kids every night and have family reading hour.
Carmen Boon: Embrace Meditation and Nature
Meditation. I’ve been working for 25 years. It can be taxing working in environments with crises, emergencies and challenging and toxic dynamics. I also recently have embraced keeping the Japanese practice of Ikigai at the center of everything I do. It’s about what’s important to live for and also work for. For instance, for me, I need to be in touch with nature daily.
Sylvia Acevedo: Track Your Actions and Impact
I run my life by a spreadsheet everyday. I list the six most important things that I need to do that day — this provides me discipline and organization. I also organize it by month so I can have an overview of the year. I list all of my different activities, it’s nerdy and great for me as it keeps me focused on what matters and is a great way to manage my time.
Claudia Bell: Run!
I love to run. It's great for mental and physical health. It gives me both the physical space from my laptop or phone and the mental space to find new ideas or take an unexpected approach. Sometimes, I'll do a really short run to ignite a fresh perspective.
Jason Yoong: Become a Character
I think about portraying the character you want at that time of day. This helps me be fully present. Before my 2-year-old daughter wakes up, I’m the workout machine. When I'm with my child, I want to be the best dad in the world. When I'm working, I work like a lion. When I'm with my wife, I try to be the best partner.
Katia Verresen: Take a Confetti Approach
I call it the confetti approach — if you have 5 minutes to fill yourself up in a delightful way, because if it’s fun, we’re going to do it. Choose to fill yourself up in those 5 minutes — listen to your favorite song, dance or bounce. All of our micro-decisions have a huge impact on our ability to replenish energy. Pause and check yourself up, then fill yourself up. I have a 30-second dance party button, a legit bubble machine, and real confetti! These are super simple things that enable you to shift yourself and that delight allows us to move forward with the fun.
Brooke Kruger: Champion Others
I believe in paying it forward and giving people praise when praise is deserved. I try to champion others in whatever way I can. Whether that’s on LinkedIn or sending people notes privately, it’s important to let people know when they are doing a good job.
Thanks for reading this edition of The Switchboard. If you enjoyed what you read, pay it forward. Share it with a friend or colleague.
Another great read, Julia! I especially resonated with Become a Character and Take a Confetti Approach. Great stuff!
Great hacks!