Hearing Every Voice in the Room

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When a meeting is called, there will always be that mix of introverts, extroverts, and know-it-alls. No matter what the mix is, it’s important to get the best work out of your team and having everyone lay out their ideas.

When team members have developed relationships, it’s easy for them to organize themselves. Having that trust and empathy makes it easier to have their ideas be brought to the table, but when your company is in the middle of a transformation, team dynamics can easily get in the way of good ideas, and often the group is silenced by the loudest voice.

The best way to get your team to work together as a group is by focusing on these two things:

1) Allowing everyone to contribute their ideas

2) Letting them be heard

Phil Gilbert of IBM, held a workshop where he assembled teams that span skills, different experience levels and points of view. He presented a question directed towards their new business email tool, IBM Verse, which helps workers find information fast and prioritize tasks. The teams where given very little instructions as well as pen and paper and spend 10 minutes jotting down their thoughts and ideas towards the question. Their ideas were posted on a giant white board, and everyone remained silent which didn’t allow people to judge or cause unnecessary battles. The ideas are then sorted and colleagues are left to reflect and take it all in via face to face, phone, or through a group texting tool. This brainstorming experience called popcorning gets ideas running quickly and allows everyone to speak their mind.

This powerful form of brainstorming makes for better teams and leads to better decisions.

Read the article in it’s entirety here.

Are Business Owners Looking To Expand?

2012, 2013, and 2014 have all seen businesses looking to expand. 2014 was a good year for that! What will 2015 bring? For today’s post, we look back at the same 2014 report conducted by UPS Connect from a few weeks ago.

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When asked if business owners are looking to expand in 2014, 58% said they plan to grow their business locally, 34% plan to expand their business nationally, 27% have global expansion plans, and 15% have no current expansion plans.

Since the Great Recession in 2009, companies have been able to put the effects of the economic decline behind them. As the economy has improved, business owners are more optimistic about expanding their companies.

Play to Your Team’s Strengths

02-CORNER-master495Deborah Harmon is the chief executive of Artemis Real Estate Partners, a real estate investment management company headquartered in the Washington D.C. metropolitan area. In a recent interview with Adam Bryant of the New York Times, Harmon discussed her personal managing tips, her hiring process, and how she got to where she is today. Here are some of the most salient points from the interview:

  • Become a problem-solver and a fixer: “If you have that attitude, it encourages people to bring you their problems early and often, and that’s good. But if you’re a fixer, then you risk spending your whole day fixing other people’s problems.”
  • Play by peoples strengths: “rather than trying to shore up their weaknesses. Because if you play to people’s strengths, you create a team of complementary skill sets. It’s like a puzzle. ”
  • Chance favors the prepared mind: “I use that in our company with young people because they have to be so detailed-oriented, but also in seeing how people prepare for the interview. 

Click here to view the full article from the New York Times.

What Cloud Computing Means to Your Job

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With advancements in technology, there have been many accusations that technology has made many jobs that were once vital to running a society disappear. From the production line to the accounting office, more and more jobs are being replaced by computers and software and it’s only going to continue to grow. In this era of cloud computing that the tech industry is moving into, companies will require smaller departments and less workers. Many companies will eventually have to adapt to cloud computing and that can be an issue. Here are some of the main points from the biggest cloud companies around:

  • Ed Lazowska who holds a chair in computer science and engineering at the University of Washington said “Technology shapes styles of work. One critical advantage of the cloud is that sharing becomes dramatically easier.”
  •  David Campbell, who is the head of engineering at Microsoft Azure mentioned how they are able to make engineering changes by moving parts of its customers traffic into new software in real time which “takes hours, instead of months and years in the legacy”.
  • At Amazon Web Services they have built the worlds biggest cloud computing business. Work is divided into teams of small size in order to determine what the customer is doing with an important product. This allows the team to quickly adapt the product to work better and look for new insight. For 2014, Amazon announced that it’s cloud division created 60% more new products that it did in 2013.

One can conclude that companies who adapt to cloud computing will be more collaborative, more specialized, and ultimately be better at delivering their services and products. What do you think?

Read the entire article here

Picking Up and Running With Your Dreams

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Alastair Mitchell is the chief executive of Huddle, a cloud-based collaboration software company co-headquartered in London and San Francisco. In a recent interview with Adam Bryant of the New York Times, Mitchell spoke about his early management lessons, how to handle tough situations, and advice for college students. Here are some of the key points from the interview:

  • Learn how to empower people and give positive feedback: “knowing when to let them take risks and when not to criticize them too hard if things go wrong. You have to back them up and then say, That didn’t work, so how are we going to improve it next time?”
  • When faced with difficult decisions, what would we regret not doing in life?: “What would happen if I were to walk out across from your building and cross the street, and a big red bus is coming the other way and I don’t see it. In that brief moment before it hits me, what would be the thing that I would regret not doing? Whenever I’m faced with difficult decisions, I always apply the big red bus test. Instinctively, people know the right answer, but it can be buried under so many layers of doubt and questions. Starting my own business came from one of those moments. ”
  • Motivate yourself and think outside of the box: “I look for people who think big, who are motivated and who have the entrepreneurial instinct. In my questioning, I’m looking for almost the rough edges — the things on their résumé that look different or reveal an inner drive.”
  • Trust who you are and listen to your gut: “Go big or go home. And just trust yourself. Whatever your gut instinct is, you’ll probably be right seven or eight times out of 10. So just go with your gut. What you’ll regret more is the fact that you haven’t gone with your gut. ”

Click here to view the full article from the New York Times.

How Confident Are Business Owners Going Into The Next Year?

For today’s post, we look back at the same 2014 report conducted by UPS Connect from last week.

When business owners were asked to describe their confidence in their business’ success over the next 12 months, 1 in 4 respondents said they were “extremely confident”. On a scale of 1-7, owners had an average confidence rate of 5.39.  

This is an impressive rating which demonstrates that business owners are leaving the agitation from the past behind and emerging with more confidence.

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When asked what their top priorities were, nearly 80% of respondents reported that it was to increase revenues. Establishing new customer relationships came in at 67%, and increasing profits stood at 60%. 

Growth is the top priority when it comes to what is necessary.

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2014 UPS Connect State of Small Business Report

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UPS Connect conducted a 2014 report for the state of small businesses interviewing more than 300 founders, partners, presidents, and CEOs. With this report, they delivered a list of questions and answers. When asked what are the biggest challenges business owners are currently facing, companies replied with:

1) “Reducing cost of financing.”

2) “Government compliance and interference.”

3) “Funding and/or credit lines allowing my business to grow.”

4)  “The cost of customer acquisition…declining volume per current customer.”

Although owners maintain an optimistic approach in the short term, they are still faced with obstacles from general concerns, costumer acquisition, financial problems, and increased competition.

 

When business owners were asked about their biggest pain points:

49% of respondents said they “aim for a healthy balance between [their] professional and personal life””; 31% said they prioritize professional over personal.

49% admit they “don’t have the time or expertise to figure everything out.”

37% feel as if they “manage [their] time efficiently”; 23% said they have difficulty managing all the moving parts of their business.

 

This is some fascinating data to consider within the context of your own small business.

A Job Description is Just the Beginning

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Susan Story is the chief executive of American Water, a public utility company operating in the United States and Canada. In a recent interview with Adam Bryant of the New York Times, Story opened up about her work philosophies that helped her achieve corporate success:

  • Every person deserves respect: “[N]o matter how bad things get, it’s about working hard and taking personal responsibility, because nobody owes you anything.”
  • In life and in work: “It’s not what happens to you; it’s how you react to it.”
  • A job description is just the beginning: “It’s about doing the job but also looking around for what’s not getting done that would bring value. When I would raise my hand, it was appreciated.”
  • Listening is key: “Listening on the front lines is one of the most important things I can do… If you really want to know what’s going on, you get out there and you listen to folks on the front lines.”
  • Focus on doing the best job you can where you are: “One thing I’ve done in my career is to never look at what the next job is going to be. I go in thinking this could be my last job, and I’m going to be the best I can at it.”

Click here to view the full article from the New York Times.

Adopting a “Subcontractor” Approach to Managing

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Paula Long is the CEO of DataGravity, a data management firm based out of New Hampshire that emphasizes mutual accountability. In a recent interview with Adam Bryant of the New York Times, Long spoke about her unique management techniques, the importance of mutual accountability, and her interesting approach to interviewing. Here are some highlights from the interview:

  • After you become a manager, nobody really works for you. In fact, you really work for them.
  • It’s your job to help people be successful; it’s not your job to make them successful.
  • It’s important to assert what you’re good at and why it matters.
  • Work out when it’s OK to micromanage, and when it’s not.
  • Consider a “subcontractor” approach to managing. By creating individual, contract-like, relationships between staff and managers, each party approaches the contract agreeing to put in equal amounts of effort in good faith.
  • When it comes to interviewing, consider asking “stupid questions” to see how a candidate answers. Try making false statements to see if a candidate corrects you, or pick a fight to see how they react to conflict.
  • When advising college graduates, Long emphasizes that it’s OK not to know what you want to do. Don’t cut off the ability to explore. Remember, it’s harder to explore as you get older as you have different commitments.

Click here to view the interview in full.

Fixing a Sales Team

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“Yesware” is a 4-year-old company that designs and sells software intended to make it easier for sales teams to record and analyze essential data. Released in 2012, Yesware’s basic version, which can be downloaded free, quickly attracted more than 100,000 users. However, the company experienced difficulties converting those free users into paying customers (an unfortunate irony considering it is sales software they’re looking to sell).

Yesware’s chief executive Matthew Bellows came up with 3 solutions to fixing his sales team:

1) Clean up house: trimming that fat by firing 7 out of 10 salespeople.

2) Hire a vice president of sales: have this VP do the firing, hiring, and supervision while Mr Bellows remained as chief executive.

3) Appoint a manager: promote the best sales person among the 3 he deemed worthy of keeping to manage the team.

What would YOU suggest? Click here to see the full article in the New York Times.