Professional Etiquette

There’s no doubt that technology has made it easier to communicate. It’s also easier to shut someone out when we are confronted with online discourse. Why bother to understand strangers - or even acquaintances - when you can troll them, block them, or just click “Unfriend” and never look back? However briefly satisfying that might be, it’s also potentially eroding one of our most human traits: empathy.

In the past, the business world favored the aggressive "Type A" personality. But in these unsettled times, being courteous and thoughtful has proven to be a more effective way to win clients and customers and influence others. The competitive advantage depends on your ability to use your emotional intelligence and social graces to take your career to the next level. Here are secrets to mastering the details that will get you ahead at work from an international etiquette expert and the author of Business Class, Jacqueline Whitmore.

How powerful are your networking skills? In this era of super-communications, "making it" means making connections, and putting those connections to work.

Now Susan RoAne, best-selling author of How to Work a Room, offers her surefire methods for developing your networking techniques and resources and turning your networks into a ladder for success.

If your answer to any of the following questions is yes, listen to this book now. Don't walk into another situation without being 100 percent confident. 1. Have you ever been unsure as to who should be introduced first? 2. Have you ever placed your keys, purse, or cell phone on a table at a restaurant? 3. Have you ever worn your name tag on your left lapel? 4. Have you ever buttered your entire dinner roll before taking the first bite? 5. Have you ever sat down to dine and not known which glass was yours?