We all want to be more efficient in order to make the most of our time. But how can we really accomplish more and stop wasting our efforts on insignificant tasks?  The answer to our productivity concerns can be solved with the use of a tool called crowdsourcing.

Crowdsourcing is the process of enlisting the help of a big crowd of people, usually on the internet, whose collective knowledge, resources, and skills can help to come up with diverse and expert solutions to your problems. This way you can focus your energies on your top priority tasks while still using your crowd to figure out solutions to other problems as well.

You can ask for help and advice from your own crowd of friends and followers on Facebook and Twitter or engage with other kinds of crowdsourcing platforms. Wikipedia is one of the most well-known  of these crowdsourcing efforts.

However, many of us may not know how to crowdsource to its full benefit. In order to get the most out of this process, I’d like to offer a list of 10 tips for crowdsourcing effectively:

1. Search before asking – Very often someone is experiencing the same challenge that you are. Before asking for help, use special Q&A platforms to search for solutions. My personal favorite is quora.com.
2. Be specific – When you ask for help, make sure you give specific details about your challenge.
3. Do not influence. Do not direct people to a specific solution. Make sure you allow enough room for their creativity so they can offer a wide range of potential solutions.
4. Be brief. Make sure you keep your questions short and to the point. People need to understand very quickly what you are asking for.
5. Tell a story. The only exception for keeping your explanations brief is if you have an interesting story to share. An interesting story engages people while explaining why you are asking for their help.
6. Interact – Whenever people come to you with ideas and suggestions, make sure you thank them and engage back. When people see that you are part of the conversation, they have more reasons to respond.
7. Give value – Don’t just ask for help. Give value to the crowd and do that over and over again. Whenever others see that you give value, they will be motivated to help you.
8. Pay the crowd – Websites such as fiverr.com allow you to pay $5 for simple tasks. Enlisting the help of someone with experience can save you a lot of time for a small amount of money.
9. Use WhatsApp – Whenever you need help, WhatsApp is a great way to privately ask for help from close friends.
10. User special crowdsourcing platforms – There are dozens of crowdsourcing platforms that can help you out in specific areas such as design, health, finance and more. For a complete list of crowdsourcing platforms visit http://ift.tt/1K5GQyx

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1) You have traveled to some different parts of the world

Because traveling brings you out of your comfort zone and expands your horizon. You absorb different cultures and that allows you to be grateful with what you have at home, or not, by which then you can make the necessary changes in your life.

2) You have passion

Passion is what lights your life on fire. It electrifies your soul. It gives you a certain identity other people know you by. It is the awesome feeling you get that separates what you love from the rest of the world. Find passion and let it seep into your everyday life. You’ll be happy. It’s as simple as that.

3) You’ve struggled considerably before

The challenges and obstacles you faced that made you think you weren’t strong enough to overcome? You were indeed strong enough. You learnt how capable you really are and that strength is what gives you confidence, hence happiness.

4) You don’t lie to yourself and escape all the time

Henceforth, you deal with the problem head on. You don’t try to escape by taking an easier route. You ask yourself the honest questions.

That is why people who drink or indulge in their vices are unhappy. They’re only always dealing with a hangover.

5) You’re surrounded by good and positive people

Sometimes your happiness is highly based on your environment. Surround yourself with negative or even annoying people, you’ll end up negative and annoyed yourself. Surround yourself with good people who want the best out of you, you’ll be constantly inspired.

6) You realize you don’t need to put up with others’ crap

And by extending the idea of surrounding yourself with positive people, you let go negative influences and dump toxic people. You don’t need to put up with people’s crap. You are in full control of who you want to be with.

7) You’re always on learning-mode

The thirst for knowledge and hunger to learn pushes your brain to take up new things and that’s automatically ensuring you aren’t dulling your life. Simply put, wanting to learn means having curiosity and that’s way better than sitting around bored as you’re always trying new things.

Why do you think people who are constantly surfing social media are bored despite actually doing something?

8) You don’t chase money

You know money is important because you need to survive. But you recognize the bottom line which is that it’s your choice to chase money or not.

9) You make time for family

Because it’s family.

Family is dysfunctional? Make time for your old friends then.

10) You choose gratitude, no matter what

Despite what life throws at you, you remember that there’re many things in life to be grateful for. You’ll be surprised how lucky you are and that tons of people want to be in your shoes.

11) You’ve been through a breakup

Breakups hurt, but eventually, you’ll be fine. Breakups show that you’re capable of love; that you don’t have to be alone. At the same time, breakups allow you to know the kind of person you want to be with and so you become wary of the kind of people you meet next time.

12) You help other people

Because sometimes, the only way to solve your worries is to simply help others.

13) You recognize that you’re not your job

Most people have to work to survive and the majority don’t love what they do. The difference between the happy ones and those who drag themselves to work is that they know that they are not their job. They work and leave everything at the office when they go home.

They know that their salary, position and status do not identify them. The let passion, talent, special memories and their own life identify them.

14) You’re not always in a rush

Way too many of us want to make good time today. We want to get work done, leave work on time and make sure we catch the train on time. As a result, we don’t even know we’re breathing harder, cluttering our mind with deadlines, walking to fast and generally adding stress to ourselves!

Slow down. Relax. Go meditate. There’s plenty of time.

15) You stop caring about what others think

The words and thoughts of others’ should not have an effect on you. They technically don’t exist because what you think of yourself and what you want to do are all that truly matters.

16) You can always look back with no regret

You’d want to live a life so that you can look back and hold on tightly to your experiences and memories. These memories will never lie to you. So keep doing what you want and leave your mark!

17) You know it’s never too late

But what if you feel like you’ve never done enough?

It’s okay.

It’s not too late.

You’re growing older as time passes by, but it’s okay. Age doesn’t matter.

You’re in full control of the time you have.

Keep on keeping on you.

Special bonus for Pick The Brain Readers!

I hope you enjoyed the article! Need help leaving your mark all around the world?

Then you’re going to want my book. It’s free! Here it is:

12 Things Happy People Don’t Give a F**K About!

Time to shed the crap in life and start being happy! This free book is only available through this link to Alden Tan.

Alden Tan keeps it real at his blog and writes about motivation in unconventional ways. His two main passions are Bboying and writing. Check out his free report, 12 Things Happy People Don’t Give a F**k About!

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We could all use a little more luck in our lives. On the surface, it seems like wishful thinking to imagine there’s anything we could do to enhance that. But most of us—the overscheduled masses—have engineered it out of our lives, and there are steps we can take to fix that. “Just look at your calendar,” John Hagel of Deloitte’s Center for the Edge told me during an interview. “How tightly scheduled are you? Have you got a breakfast meeting, meetings all day, then late night meetings? There’s not much chance for serendipity there unless a fire alarm goes off and you have to head into the street. Create spaces where you’re wandering around and exposing yourself to new people.”

What does it look like to make time for luck in your life? As I recount in my new book Stand Out, venture capitalist Anthony Tjan, who conducted an extensive survey of entrepreneurs, told me that “luck is often mislabeled in business.” It’s not so much that people are lucky, but that they’re interested in other people and aren’t rushing along to the next, better thing. As Tjan notes, “Lucky people have an openness, an authenticity, and a generosity toward embracing people—without overthinking ‘what’s the value exchange?’ It’s just, that’s an interesting person. It might be someone working in a restaurant, someone in an unrelated industry, or a taxi driver, and ten years later when that person becomes somehow critical, people say, that’s so lucky—they happened to meet someone in college, or they were on the same boat with them.”

When we’re too deliberate and focused on building our network, we often get tunnel vision. “There are plenty of times when you’re going to conferences or cocktail parties, and you’re thinking about where there’s a fit [in making a connection],” says Tjan. “You’re trying to quickly assess and screen value, and we all fall prey to that.” Unfortunately, that means you may overlook anyone who deviates from the stereotype of what a great leader or rising professional “should” look like. You may miss the shy entrepreneur hiding in the corner, or the guy wearing nerdy clothes who turns out to be an influential blogger.

People who self-identify as “lucky”—and are therefore perhaps a little more laid-back and open to chance—“are the ones who discover the wallflowers,” says Tjan, “and they benefit disproportionately later in life from some of those relationships.” While it’s critical to work hard and make your own opportunities, it pays to recognize that we don’t have to control everything in life. Leave room in your schedule for the unexpected—the colleague popping by your office with an interesting idea, or the chance to take a surprise call from an old friend you haven’t spoken with in ages. If you’re too Type A to even know where to begin, you can follow the lead of one self-described “lucky” person interviewed by psychologist Richard Wiseman, who revealed that in order to force himself to diversify the types of people he talked to, he would attend an event and approach only people wearing a particular color. If your network is too heavy with fellow marketers, or thirty-something tech guys, or mom entrepreneurs, make it a point to attend events that attract a wide cross-section—and avoid clustering in homogeneous groups by using the “colored shirt” strategy.

It’s possible to bring more serendipity into your life, if you avoid overscheduling and leave room during the day for the unexpected. By seeking out people you wouldn’t normally come across and inviting unusual connections, you can develop relationships that pay dividends you can’t even imagine.

Dorie Clark is a marketing strategist and professional speaker who teaches at Duke University’s Fuqua School of Business. She is the author of Reinventing You and Stand Out. You can receive her free Stand Out Self-Assessment Workbook and follow her on Twitter.

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