Choose tasks that you plan to do a poor job on in order to make time for more important things, advises author Jon Acuff. "To be good at one thing you have be bad at something else," he writes in his latest book.

A change as simple as switching from a desktop computer to a laptop can help you become more productive by allowing you to maximize your work time, according to Jamie Watt Arnold. Meanwhile, Tamara Suttle advises professionals to set limits on how many tasks they'll work on at once to avoid confusion and ultimately get more work done.

While office politics are genuinely considered to be negative, there are ways to advance your interests without neglecting the rights of others or the company's best interests. In addition, office politics often require useful skills that include networking ability, sincerity and interpersonal influence.

The US has earned high marks for skills training -- partly due to college enrollment and degree-attainment rates -- according to a study from the World Economic Forum. The report ranks 130 countries on such measures as investment in education and development of the existing and next-generation workforce.

Personal branding is fine, but only if it doesn't consist solely of promoting an image that you think will help you land a job, says Ilana Gershon, an anthropology professor at the University of Indiana. Your personal branding efforts should involve building a good reputation over time.

The 2017 Ig Nobels at Harvard University recognized research into the ear sizes of elderly men and a study on how coffee sloshing is affected when walking backward. Ig Nobels winners receive hand-crafted trophies and 10 trillion Zimbabwean dollars, which translates into about 4 US cents.