• Columnists

Sharon Armstrong, Owner, Sharon Armstrong and Associates

COLUMN = HUMAN RESOURCES

Sharon Armstrong has more than 20 years of experience as the owner of Sharon Armstrong and Associates. She is a human resources consultant, trainer, and career counselor who consults with many large corporations and small businesses. She has facilitated training, completed HR projects, and provided career transition services for a wide variety of clients in the profit and nonprofit sectors. She is also the co-author of the The Essential HR Handbook.

Sharon received her bachelor’s degree from the University of Southern Maine and her master’s degree in Counseling from The George Washington University. She is a certified Professional in Human Resources (PHR).

Sharon is the co-author of a humor book, published by Random House entitled “Heeling the Canine Within: The Dog’s Self-Help Companion” in 1998. Career Press published her first business book, “Stress-Free Performance Appraisals: Turn Your Most Painful Management Duty Into a Powerful Motivational Tool” in July 2003. “The Essential HR Handbook: A Quick and Handy Resource for Any Manager or HR Professional” was published in August 2008. Her latest book is “The Essential Performance Review Handbook,” which was published in the spring of 2010.

ABOUT THE ESSENTIAL HR HANDBOOK

This 250-page reference guide, published in the fall of 2008 by Career Press, is a must-have for everyone who deals with employees on a daily basis, believe Barbara Mitchell and Armstrong, who wrote the book to shed light on the issues that keep managers up at night.

With this easy-to-read paperback, you’ll learn how to effectively and efficiently:
• Individually manage each employee, starting on his or her first day.
• Manage a multi-generational workforce.
• Appraise job performance.
• Coach and counsel.
• Provide equitable pay, benefits, and total-rewards strategies.
• Minimize legal risk.

WHAT CRITICS ARE SAYING

“Finally, a complete, clear, and concise book that covers every essential element of that mix of art and science we call HR. It’s 100% applicable to the real-world challenges faced by today’s HR manager or business owner.” — Joe Calloway, author of Work Like You’re Showing Off.

“This should be required reading for all owners of growing businesses and new managers launching their careers. Seasoned HR professionals will also find value in this quick guide to the essentials of managing people.” — Stephen J. O’Connor, senior director of staffing, ESPN Inc.

“This book is easy to use, and full of solid advice and information from diversity to interviews to legal issues. If you are an HR professional, you should have this book at the ready every day.” — Chester Elton, co-author of The Carrot Principle.

The important thing is not being afraid to take a chance. The greatest failure is to not try.”

– Debbi Fields, Mrs. Fields Cookies

It is only with the heart that one can see rightly,
 what is essential is invisible to the eye.”

– Antoine de Saint-Exupéry

Outside of a dog, a book is man’s best friend. Inside of a dog it’s too dark to read.”

– Groucho Marx

That man is richest whose pleasures are the cheapest.”

– Henry David Thoreau

Don’t think. Thinking is the enemy of creativity.”

– Ray Bradbury

Think of yourself as on the threshold of unparalleled success. A whole, clear, glorious life lies before you. Achieve! Achieve!”

– Andrew Carnegie

‎No one is useless in this world who lightens the burden of another.”

– Charles Dickens

Ambition is the germ from which all growth of nobleness proceeds.”

– Thomas Dunn

Hold fast to dreams, for if dreams die, life is a broken-winged bird that cannot fly. Hold fast to dreams, for when dreams go, life is a barren field frozen with snow.”

– Langston Hughes

The aim of life is to live, and to live means to be aware, joyously, drunkenly, serenely, divinely aware.”

– Henry Miller

History is a relentless master. It has no present, only the past rushing into the future. To try to hold fast is to be swept aside.”

– John F. Kennedy

I may not be able to change what takes place, but I can always choose to change my thinking.”

– Michelle Sedas

Do not follow where the path may lead. Go, instead, where there is no path and leave a trail.”

– Ralph Waldo Emerson

Pain is inevitable. Suffering is optional.”

– Dalai Lama

They who give have all things. They who withhold have nothing.”

– Hindu Proverb

In the middle of difficulty lies opportunity.”

– Albert Einstein

Great minds discuss ideas. Average minds discuss events. Small minds discuss people.”

– Eleanor Roosevelt

It is easier to fight for one’s principles than to live up to them.”

– Alfred Adler

To follow, without halt, one aim: There’s the secret of success.”

– Anna Pavlova

As each woman realizes her power, she transforms the world.”

– Patrice Wynne, WomanSpirit Sourcebook

4oz tequila + 1oz TripleSec + 2oz lime juice + 1oz simple syrup (sugar=water), 1 cup crushed ice. Shake + dance around the kitchen.

– Avenida Margarita

A lot of people have ideas, but few decide to do something about them now. Not next week. But today.”

– Nolan Bushnell, founder, Atari

If you look at what you have in life, you’ll always have more.
 If you look at what you don’t have in life, you’ll never have enough.”

– Oprah Winfrey

The journey is the reward.”

– Greg Norman

When I was younger I thought success was being a star, driving nice cars, having groupies. But today I think the most important thing is to live your life with integrity.

– Ellen DeGeneres

To find what you seek in the road of life, leave no stone unturned.”

– Edward Bulwer Lytton

Simplicity is the ultimate sophistication.”

– Leonardo da Vinci

Acknowledging the good that you already have in your life is the foundation for all abundance.”

– Eckhart Tolle

Don’t follow, lead. Don’t copy, create. Don’t start, finish. Don’t sit still, move. Don’t fit in, stand out. Don’t sit quietly, speak up. (Not all the time, sure, but more often.)”

– Seth Godin

There’s nowhere you can be that isn’t where you’re meant to be…”

– John Lennon

‎That which grows fast withers as rapidly; that which grows slowly endures.”

– J.G. Holland, novelist

Traveling is one way of lengthening life, at least in appearance.”

– Benjamin Franklin

If you have built castles in the air, your work need not be lost; that is where they should be. 
Now put foundations under them.”

– Henry David Thoreau

Try not to become a man of success but rather try to become a man of value.”

– Albert Einstein

The gem cannot be polished without friction; nor man perfected without trials.”

– Chinese proverb

When a dog runs at you, whistle for him.”

– Henry David Thoreau

It is only when the mind is free from the old that it meets everything anew, and in that there is joy.”

– J. Kristnhamurti, The First and Last Freedom

A truly forgiving person is someone who experiences all the anger merited by injustice and still acts with fairness and compassion.”

– Martha Beck

It is to no purpose to turn away from the real nature of the affair because the honor of its elements excites repugnance.

– Carl von Clausewitz, On War

That which grows fast withers as rapidly; that which grows slowly endures.”

– J.G. Holland, novelist

The quality of your life is directly related to the amount of uncertainty you can comfortably live with.”

– Tony Robbins

Once you find something you love to do, be the best at doing it.”

– Debbi Fields, Mrs. Fields Cookies

I’ve come to confirm that one’s title, even that of president, says little about how well one’s life has been led. No matter how much you’ve done, or how successful you’ve been, there’s always more to do, to learn, and to achieve.”

– Barack Obama

Whatever you do may seem insignificant, but it is most important that you do it.”

– Gandi

The person who makes a success of living is the one who see his goal steadily and aims for it unswervingly. That is dedication.”

– Cecil B. DeMille

Who cares if my glass is half empty or half full; I still have something to drink.”

– Optimism rules

Life shrinks or expands in proportion to one’s courage.”

– Anais Nin

Darkness cannot drive out darkness: only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate: only love can do that.”

– Martin Luther King Jr.

If my mind can conceive it, and my heart can believe it, I know I can achieve it.”

– Jesse Jackson

Let us seize the day and the opportunity and strive for that greatness of spirit that measures life not by its disappointments but by its possibilities.”

– W.E.B. Du Bois