As a business development tool, gratitude and thank you notes sound soft and unlikely — but may make a difference.
As a way to set yourself apart from the other job candidates, they certainly work.
As a way to encourage lasting relationships with clients or colleagues, they can be remarkably effective.
And as a way to cultivate a more positive attitude and gratitude, say thank you to the thank you notes you send.
My pile of thank you notes and appreciations brings me joy for years after I received them. They came from former interns, people I’ve profiled and staffers whose jobs I have saved or created.
So when I interviewed Heidi Kallett for the Washington Post Capital Business, her message of thank you notes as a tool to build your business immediately resonated with me. The article which is out this week explains much of her thinking and approach to them.
So I decided to look further at thank you notes, and what others say about them. On LinkedIn, I found many endorsements.
“The thank you note has more purposes than to simply show courtesy and professionalism, it extends the interview. I always tell my workshop attendees that the interview is not complete until you have sent the thank you note.,” Bob McIntosh wrote in a LinkedIn Answer recently. McIntosh is a career trainer for Career Center of Lowell, Mass., and points out thank yous allow you to  correct any miscomunications that might have crept in.
“Taking the time to send a Thank You shows a lot of class and consideration,” Jason Shinn wrote on LinkedIn. He’s a business and employment lawyer in metro Detroit and has invested in them. “There are plenty of opportunities where a little appreciation for someone’s time/assistance is warranted.”
Next I did an online search and found more fans at university career centers and career coaches. Many give many sample thank you notes, which are good for starters but shouldn’t become your de facto approach to sending appreciations.
Then I returned to Heidi Kallett, a past President of the Junior League of Northern Virginia
who writes more than 100 thank yous a year to her clients, vendors and others connected to the Dandelion Patch shops. She learned to write thank you notes from her mother and has been developing her skill for years. I asked her to share her best advice in developing a thank you note habit. She suggests:
1. Choose a pen that you enjoy writing with-- ballpoint or roller ball? Blue or black? Fine or Medium point? Everyone has a preference, so find yours -have it at the ready.
2. Come up with several collections of stationery. The glittered high-heels don’t work for interview follow-up, but would be greatly appreciated by your BFF when thanking her for your birthday gift. Typically professional correspondence is either soft white or white in color with a tasteful and simple design – or only your monogram.
3.Avoid the text tokens. When writing a professional thank you note, stay away from any smiley or frowning faces, the emoticons that pop up in text messages.
4. As a habit, try to find 5-10 minutes a week to write notes of gratitude. Keep a post-it note or journal with your list of friends, associates that you’d like to personally thank. Writ notes all at one sitting– trust me, it is easier to do them all at once than to write one a day.
5. Always keep a roll of stamps ready. You don’t want any excuses as to why these notes can’t make it into the mailbox.

Very helpful advice for getting motivated to send thank yous.

Finally, I came up with a few techniques of my own for making your thank you note memorable and enjoyable:

• Make it timely. Send a note within 48 hours of the event or the favor. Don’t wait longer than a week. That will make it easier to write and it will have more impact if it arrives promptly.
• Make it personal. Don’t try the “one size fits all” thank yous. Tailor it to the person you’re thanking or the occasion you’re noting. Include specifics from shared jokes to insights you picked up.
• Make it true to you. Your personality needs to shine through in the notecards and even the stamps. Some people will never send thank you notes with angels or flowers to their corporate clients. Yet I have – and will again. Some prefer the crisp pinstripes and sincerely signature that match their dress code and approach. Others will sign off with fondly or peace.  Make yours match your professional persona.
• Make it joyful. Consider how good it feels to receive something upbeat in the mail. Think about the good things that will grow from your connections. Think about your thank you note bringing smiles and good feelings for years to come, pinned up on a bulletin board or stashed away with memorable letters and card.

Feel the gratitude and joy of the thank you note as you write them. And then feel hopeful that they will be seeds well planted that will bear fruit for you or your business.

The new $100 bills was unveiled by the Treasury Department on Wednesday, complete with its anti-counterfeiting stripes, hidden images and copper bell.

The debut of the Ben Franklin bill gives me an excuse to write about professions that pay $100 an hour – or more – to their top practitioners.  I’m not talking about people who make $100 an hour once or twice a year. I mean those who earn $100 an hour for just about every hour they work.

That means they make around $200,000 a year – more if they win a bonus or take on extra consulting gigs, less if they take a six-week leave to explore India with their mother or daughter.  Some 3.9 million Americans earned $200,000 to $1 million a year in adjusted gross income, according to the Internal Revenue Service,  counting individuals and many dual income earning families. That means almost 9 percent of all  households — or at least those who filed tax returns — are bringing in a C-note an hour (though that includes investment and other taxable income).

My lists of occupations comes straight from the government, as will those cool new $100 bills. These are drawn from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics National Occupational Employment and Wage Estimates for May 2008, the most recent data available.

The first list is those professions that definitely have plenty of $100 an hour people, even though the job category’s average pay doesn’t approach that.

Definitely $100 and up jobs:

1. Surgeons,  average $207,000 or $99.41 an hour

2. Anesthesiologists,  $198,000

3. Orthodontists,   $195,000

4. Chief executives,  $160,000 or $77.13 an hour

5. Dentists,  $154,000

6. Natural sciences managers, $123,000 or $59.30 an hour

7. Lawyers, $124,000 or $53.17 an hour

The BLS also gives some details on people’s income if they’re in the 90th percentile of their occupation or if they work in a city where their skillsets are sought after. So engineering managers in San Jose earn more than their counterparts in any other city, while dentists in Anchorage get some of the highest paychecks.

Also on that list are a variety of other doctors – from obstetricians to internists to psychiatrists. Despite being in short supply for years, nurses don’t even come close – they average around $65,000 and the top 10 percent earn maybe $50 an hour or less.

My second list, also drawn from the BLS data, includes occupations where it seems very likely some people reap pay of $100 an hour, either for consulting or project work or where their tenure and value reaches its zenith. Besides the BLS data, I’m relying on my 20-plus years as a business writer or editor.

Here’s’ probably $100 an hour types,with their average income

1. Airline pilots, $119,700

2.  Securities broker / sales person  $92,000

3. Petroleum engineers  $119,000

4. Physicists  $106,000

5. Engineering managers, $121,000

6. Computer, information systems managers $119,000

7. Management consultants  N/A

9. Professors, law or medical $101,000 and $102,000

10. Producers and directors, $83,000

All the salary figures are average annual earnings, from the BLS. So while one producer earns $19,000 a year running a small town theater company part-time, another one earns $205,000 for some big New York troupe or movie production company.

So how can you bring up your earnings so those new $100 bills will show up more often in your wallet? That sounds like a good subject for another blog post sometime soon. Or maybe a series of posts. So if you have great ideas on adding to your earnings, please send them my way.

Meanwhile, check out the amazing BLS document that is the statistical source for this. It’s chock full of data on 800 occupations, including quite a few that don’t earn $100 a day and a handful that earn $100 an hour but only in some locations.  Dentists in Alaska, for example, earn the highest average wage – and average $97.30 an hour, or $203,000 a year.  Anesthesiologists in Maryland and Kentucky earn $103 an hour or more, and they earn still higher wages in New Jersey and Washington state, though the BLS tables don’t give specifics.

As for me, I’d be happy to earn $100 an hour for my writing -  and hope to achieve that some day and for more than a few days. Just don’t expect me to don a surgical gown or wear a power tie or move to Alaska to collect it.

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If you want to see more on the new $100 bills, which debut to the public in February, check out the New York Times Bucks blog, or a video showing all the security details  and some music that would be right at home on the 4th of July. My prefered paper, The Washington Post , ran the Associated Press account on the new big bill.

“Perhaps imagination is only intelligence having fun.”  ~George Scialabba, book critic, essayist.

Imagine your life and work infused with creativity. It’s not only possible, it’s available to us with only a little effort.

Anyone can have more fun while increasing their creative and imaginative muscles. And it doesn’t take a trip to some fancy creativity camp in Sedona, Ariz., or any new software or hardware for our laptops.

All it requires is 15 minutes a day and embracing and acknowledging ourselves as creative people who are opening up to our ideas, interpretations and imaginative approaches to work and life.

Break out the poetry, the balloons, the games. Here’s my 15 ways to increase your creativity in 15 minutes or less:

1. Take a walk around the block. Take time to appreciate the beauty, the energy, the surprises there.

2. Brew a new flavor of tea, and then savor it away from your desk.

3. Meditate. If you are able, use a phrase that affirms your creativity.

4. Browse in your favorite shop for the brightest, the cheapest, the funniest item.

5. Play with your dog or cat — or child. A quick game or a run around the yard will revive your spirits.

6. List your creative projects and successes. Take a few minutes to look back at a favorite project, poem or piece of work – it will reinforce your talents and confidence — and encourage you to use them wisely today.

7. Watch the clouds go by your window. Better yet, go outside and locate the cloud dragon.

8.  Read three poems aloud. Or one chapter in some trashy novel or escapist book.

9.  Call an inspired or upbeat friend for a creativity chat.

10. Pull out your magic wand or your magic feather (ok, a colorful pencil will work too). Be a wizard for 10 minutes.

11.  Take a new route to work. Take a different street to go to the gym. Vary your way to the coffee shop. Enjoy the journey and don’t worry if you get a little lost. It’s part of your creative path.

12. If you work from home or an office with a locker room, take a shower and sing something silly.  Have notebook handy afterward for great thoughts ideas that show up.

13. Develop a daily ritual or mantra that underscores your creative abilities. Write it down. Post it on your desktop, bulletin board, mirror. Doodle it on your to do list or legal pad.

14.  Engage your brain in something frivolous. Here’s two possibilties:  A: Which cartoon character is most like me? My boss? My best friend?  And how could I make one cartoon show that captures what’s happening today, but more funny? B: Which super powers do I really really want?  And which super hero really is the one I most resemble? What would I be doing right now if I were X Man or Wonder Woman?

15. Sign up for a class at the Y, Parks & Rec, the local community college or elsewhere – something new and foreign and surprising. Something that will require effort and put you in new spaces with different kinds of people. (I admit: The class will take more tan 15 minutes – but it could bring you so much inspiration and newness, worth the time investment in creative dividends.)

Only a couple of these  ideas requires you to spend more time hunched over your computer and staring at the same piles and projects on your desk.  Instead, I’m focused on activities that encourage you to move out of  the workspace and into your new groove.

Leave work behind for 10 or 15 minutes and your brain opens up to fresh perspectives and possibilities.  That’s why my favorite creativity refresher means taking a walk outside and embracing whatever and whoever I find there.

Before I head out for a few blocks in the sunshine, I’ll close with this from PBS journalist and great thinker Bill Moyers: “Creativity is piercing the mundane to find the marvelous.”