Tag: Career

Posted on

News You Can Use: 7/25/2018

The Source: Joey Lombardi: Raise negotiating

  • The do’s and don’ts of raise negotiating

    If you feel a raise is in order, the first step is to track your accomplishments on a regular basis in an achievements journal, where you note major projects and successes, or an itemized spreadsheet or calendar, says Elaine Varelas, managing partner at Keystone Partners.

    “At the beginning or end of each week, review the meetings, appointments and projects you were involved in, and summarize them in two or three concise, resume-style bullets,” Varelas says. “These documents will serve you well at review time, as you review your annual goals, and will also help you make sure you are moving your agenda forward.”

    https://www.cio.com/article/2438603/careers-staffing/careers-staffing-10-mistakes-to-avoid-when-negotiating-a-raise.html

  • Why There Is No Substitute for the Annual ‘Offsite’ With Your Team

    With the context for the last year in place, you can talk about goals and objectives for the year to come with questions about what can be improved, both interpersonally (relationships that need repair or better maintenance) or in regards to team dynamics. There’s also a chance to look at financial numbers, hires or even to do a bit of a brand audit. If you’ve created enough of an element of trust by giving people a safe space to share ideas, you’ll also hear about things that simply have not been given an outlet to be discussed previously. An annual offsite can provide you with that catch-all opportunity for quiet conversations about topics of real, but not necessarily obvious, importance.

    There’s a fair amount of ridicule around exercises like trust falls — this shouldn’t be used to create a false social dynamic that doesn’t already exist, but to build on what already does. The last thing you want is for feuding employees to be given the opportunity to shoot each other in an airsoft competition or drive each other off the track in a go-kart race. The activities you choose should celebrate collaboration and team thinking, not individual showmanship.

    https://www.entrepreneur.com/article/316338

  • What America gets wrong about China and the rest of Asia
  • New York-London in 3½ Hours? Supersonic Travel May Be Back

    Backers include Boeing Co. , Lockheed Martin Corp, and closely held Colorado startup Boom Technology Inc., which aims to start flying a reduced-size demonstration craft late next year. An initial goal for Boom’s proposed airliner is to slash the time for transcontinental trips by more than half. Round trips between the U.S. West Coast and Asia could be completed within the same day, for business travelers—the plush cabins would offer only premium seats—in a real hurry.

    https://www.wsj.com/articles/new-york-london-in-3-hours-supersonic-travel-may-be-back-1531906323?ns=prod/accounts-wsj

  • How to use Slack to onboard new hires

    Start by launching a new hire or welcome channel (we call ours #yay), and encourage new employees to introduce themselves. You can then urge others to create a welcoming environment by responding to these messages–whether through text or emoji.

    Another idea is to use Donut, an app that randomly pairs up teammates and invites them to meet over coffee, donuts, lunch, or what have you. Simply create a dedicated channel for Donut (like #newbie-donuts), and employees can opt into and out of the program by joining and leaving the channel as they wish.

    https://www.fastcompany.com/90201350/how-to-use-slack-to-onboard-new-hires

Photo by Andre Mouton on Unsplash

Posted on

News You Can Use: 7/18/2018

Finding Happy: Joey Lombardi: The Source

  • Is insurance a rich enough game to disrupt?

    Tech innovation has long been a challenge for insurance incumbents. Old systems are difficult to displace in any industry, but the complexity of insurance, tradition of relying on the past to predict the future and silos of data can make it a Herculean effort. Tech giants, on the other hand, regularly cannibalize their own revenue with new products and can enlist tens of thousands of engineers to develop fantastic digital customer experiences and bring large-scale efficiencies to back-end insurance systems through better software and AI.

    So, yes, FAAMG has a number of major advantages over insurance incumbents. But for tech giants, new verticals and initiatives are also longer-term decisions around margins and market scope. It’s an obvious point, but if FAAMG wants to jump into insurance, they’ll want a decent return. Can they find that in insurance?

    https://techcrunch.com/2018/07/10/is-insurance-a-rich-enough-game-to-disrupt/

  • How to handle the job-search process when you just got fired

    Instead, go with something like, “For three years, my role involved analyzing market opportunities and then making recommendations to our product teams on potential new products and product enhancements. We worked incredibly well together and launched some amazing innovations. The firm recently reorganized and shifted leadership. My role was redefined, and much of the analysis work that I love was removed from my job. While I realized some key wins as my role shifted, the primary focus of the position was no longer centered on the things I do best, like [insert things you do well and know this company is seeking].”

    https://www.fastcompany.com/90199718/how-to-handle-the-job-search-process-when-you-just-got-fired

  • Being happy has nothing to do with money (or drugs)
  • Why Corporate America is recruiting high schoolers

    Since 2011, more than 400 companies have partnered with 79 public high schools across the country to offer a six-year program called P-Tech. Students can enroll for grades 9 to 14 and earn both a high school and an associate’s degree in a science, tech, engineering or math related field.

    The companies offer input on the curriculum, bring students on site, pair them with employee mentors, and offer paid internships, or some combination of the above.

    “There’s a war for talent across all our competitors. We know we’re going to need a lot of different pathways to bring talent in,” said Jennifer Ryan Crozier, president of the IBM Foundation.

    https://www.clickorlando.com/education/why-corporate-america-is-recruiting-high-schoolers

  • Yes, open office plans are the worst

    In the study, researchers followed two anonymous Fortune 500 companies during their transitions between a traditional office space to an open plan environment and used a sensor called a “sociometric badge” (think company ID on a lanyard) to record detailed information about the kind of interactions employees had in both spaces. The study collected information in two stages; first for several weeks before the renovation and the second for several weeks after.

    While the concept behind open office spaces is to drive informal interaction and collaboration among employees, the study found that for both groups of employees monitored (52 for one company and 100 for the other company) face-to-face interactions dropped, the number of emails sent increased between 20 and 50 percent and company executives reported a qualitative drop in productivity.

    https://techcrunch.com/2018/07/13/yes-open-office-plans-are-the-worst/?sr_share=facebook&utm_source=tcfbpage

Photo by Maxim Medvedev on Unsplash

Posted on

News You Can Use: 6/20/2018

  • The Age of Tech Superheroes Must End

    Among these companies and their precursors, there are examples of smart founders who were able to use their power to help their companies grow sustainably. But they tend to be the exceptions that prove the rule. “Once a trend starts, then all founders want it, but I can count on three fingers the founders that should be in complete control of their companies with no governance or oversight,” says Sarah Cone, founder of venture capital firm Social Impact Capital.

    Fortunately, the trend isn’t really catching on outside of Silicon Valley. In 2017, just 14% of companies went public with permanently unequal voting structures, according to data from the Council of Institutional Investors.

    There are legitimate reasons—from the founder’s, if not necessarily the investor’s, perspective—why founders would want more control. Many serial entrepreneurs have had the experience of being pushed out of a previous company or forced to sell earlier than they would have liked. And for decades leading up to the previous tech-stock bubble, says Mr. Kedrosky, VCs had much more power than founders and were not afraid to use it. Even first-time founders have heard these stories, he adds.

    https://www.wsj.com/articles/the-age-of-tech-superheroes-must-end-1528387420?ns=prod/accounts-wsj

  • Young Workers No Longer Get the On-the-Job Training They Need — So They’re Finding It Elsewhere

    According to Peter Capelli, director of The Wharton School’s Center for Human Resources, companies want workers they don’t have to educate, and his research has found that employers don’t train young workers like they used to.

    In 1979, per Capelli, the average young worker received 2.5 weeks of training per year. By 1995, training time fell to just 11 hours.

    More recent comparable data has been hard to find, says Capelli, but the Wharton professor says that by 2011 “only a fifth of employees reported receiving on-the-job training from their employers over the past five years.”

    Also:

    Since 2011, when Massive Open Online Courses, or MOOCs, began to gain public attention, their popularity has grown exponentially. Last year, by one estimate, 23 million people signed up to take their first MOOC. All told, since 2011, more than 800 universities have offered over 9,000 courses to 81 million registered users, according to the same report.

    https://www.entrepreneur.com/article/314468

  • Does your job match your personality?
  • Good News for Hustlers: Being Busy Could Actually Be Good for You

    The researchers conducted a series of eight experiments and had the participants establish the ways that they were busy, by doing things such as asking them to write down the reasons why they had such a packed schedule, or telling the undergraduates involved in the study that data found they were busier than the students at neighboring schools.

    The study looked at the ways that this feeling of busyness affected how the students made decisions about the foods they ate, whether they opted to exercise or relax and whether they chose to save money for retirement versus spending it. The researchers found that when people were influenced to see themselves as busy, it boosted their ability to have self-control.

    https://www.entrepreneur.com/article/314673

  • Skipping Your Lunch Breaks? Even Your Boss Wants You to Go out for a Bite, a New Study Says.

    But, according to our research, bosses want their employees to get out for a break. So, there’s a real disconnect happening, because the vast majority (88 percent) of North American bosses in the study said they thought their employees would say they were encouraged to take a regular lunch break, but only 62 percent of employees actually felt encouraged.

    Takeaway: Just as great coaches recognize the need for their players to recuperate in order to perform their best, your boss likely knows that your break helps, rather than hinders, your work. But it does seem that not every boss is communicating that idea in the most effective way.

    https://www.entrepreneur.com/article/314467

Photo by Aziz Acharki on Unsplash

Posted on

News You Can Use: 6/6/2018

  • In America, corporations get to be people but workers don’t

    More than 55% of U.S. workers are now subject to mandatory arbitration. This means that, if you have a problem with your employer, you are obligated to fight them alone, whether that problem is based on lost wages, discrimination, or even sexual harassment. And with this ruling, we can expect mandatory arbitration to increase–despite a vigorous push in Silicon Valley and Hollywood to curb the practice (along with nondisclosure agreements, which employers wield for similar ends).

    Yesterday’s decision is of great concern to the #MeToo movement in particular, which at its core is about finding strength through shared oppression and driving change through shared action. Most workers don’t have the means to go to war with their employers alone–which makes Ingrid Avendaño, who earlier this week became the first former Uber employee to sue the company for discrimination after it ended forced arbitration amid intense public pressure, a laudable outlier. Lawsuits are expensive, and a simple cost-benefit analysis makes it difficult for many would-be plaintiffs to find a reason to fight in the first place.

    https://www.fastcompany.com/40576069/in-america-corporations-get-to-be-people-but-workers-dont

  • Why Do Some People Choose to Work Past 70?

    A study conducted by Oregon State University showed that working past the age of 65 can help you live longer.

    The OSU researchers found that working just one extra year (to 66) gave healthy adult respondents an 11 percent lower risk of death from all causes, including demographic, lifestyle and health issues. Not to stop there, the study also warned that retiring early might be a risk factor for early death.

    Also:

    As a general rule, most financial planners will recommend that you save enough to last 25 years after retirement. Meaning, if what you have left after spending your income (including Social Security and pension) is $30,000 per year, the rule suggests that you put away $750,000 for your retirement.

    https://www.entrepreneur.com/article/314040

  • How to stay calm under pressure
  • How to get back on track when you’re having an unproductive day

    It’s funny–it’s easy to be unproductive when you have too much to do. Feeling overwhelmed leads to prioritizing inefficiently (or not prioritizing at all), and trying to accomplish too much. When you feel stressed by your to-do list, you’re more likely to mismanage your time or even just give up. If everything is urgent and needs to get done today, you can feel paralyzed.

    When this happens, stop. Take a step back and take another look at your to-do list. Identify what items absolutely have to be accomplished that day. Chances are, this whittles down your list significantly, making it feel a lot more manageable. By simply taking some of the pressure off yourself, you’re more able to focus and be productive.

    https://www.fastcompany.com/40579081/how-to-get-back-on-track-when-youre-having-an-unproductive-day

  • ‘You’re Stupid If You Don’t Get Scared’: When Amazon Goes From Partner to Rival

    “On top of everyone’s mind is this black-widow behavior,” said Bill Richter, chief of Qumulo Inc., a Seattle startup that offers data storage and management on Amazon’s system. Amazon doesn’t compete with his company, but every year, he said, “we pray there’s not some big announcement” of an Amazon service that will.

    There is growing concern in Washington and abroad about the dominance of giant tech firms such as Alphabet Inc.’s Google and Facebook Inc. Amazon, too, has come under attack from right and left. President Donald Trump in March tweeted that it is “putting many thousands of retailers out of business!” Sen. Bernie Sanders in an April Facebook post raised concerns about Amazon’s “extraordinary power and influence.”

    https://www.wsj.com/articles/how-amazon-wins-1527845402

Photo by Jordan Donaldson | @jordi.d on Unsplash

Posted on

News You Can Use: 5/30/2018

  • Why We Gave Up a Star Employee to a Top Customer, and Why You Should, Too

    For us, encouraging our former COO to take on a major role at a customer company has accomplished just that. “Close business relationships are more important than ever, and my moving from intive-FDV to DropCar has, if anything, made our relationship stronger,” said Leandro Larroulet, who is now that company’s CIO. “Because I still work with the same team in the same office at intive-FDV, we can all leverage our established relationships to easily communicate based on an underlying trust from years working together.”

    Even if the employee who makes the move doesn’t stay in the same office, the two companies involved can still build a similar level of trust and provide exceptional customer experience. Though most of our clients are based in other countries, we continue to be able to cement relationships by making communication a matter of culture and habit. The same practices apply to the case of an employee leaving to work with a customer.

    https://www.entrepreneur.com/article/313637

  • Is Remote Work Taking a Psychological Toll on Your External Workers? Researchers Say Yes.

    Concerns about remote work are why a country like France has passed a “right to disconnect” provision to keep work at work. And while a similar provision was recently introduced in New York, it may be a long time before other cities — let alone the nation — embrace this kind of thinking.

    So, where does this leave employers in the United States? Companies can’t just tell their employees “We know what’s best for you,” and revoke remote work policies. That could upset employees by removing flexibility, while also decreasing productivity.

    The best compromise may be to add flexible policies, rather than remove them. To avoid the issues of isolation, companies can require employees to work in-office two or three times per month or per quarter.

    https://www.entrepreneur.com/article/313496

  • Has our ability to create intelligence outpaced our wisdom?
  • Report: Demand for these skills will rise dramatically by 2030
    1. Demand for technological skills, both basic digital and advanced tech, will rise by 55%
    2. Demand for social and emotional skills, such as leadership and managing others, will rise by 24%
    3. Demand for basic cognitive skills, which include basic data input and processing, will decline by 15%
    4. Demand for physical and manual skills, which include general equipment operation, will decline by 14%

    https://www.fastcompany.com/40577234/report-demand-for-these-skills-will-rise-dramatically-by-2030

  • What’s the Secret to Becoming a Leader? Stop Being a Boss.

    Having trouble delegating? You’ll never get far in your role as a leader if you hoard the major responsibilities for yourself. Imagine you’re jogging along a path at your local park: Not only will you stumble and potentially fall if you’re carrying a lot of luggage, but you also won’t move very efficiently. Instead, evaluate which responsibilities you should continue to shoulder, and delegate the rest to other team members.

    Transitioning from being an ear-to-the-ground manager to an effective leader isn’t possible if you can’t tell others what to do and then allow them to finish the job their way. To help you feel more comfortable doing that, try providing context to your team members about how their role fits into the big picture. Remember that teammates may not take the routes you would to achieve results — and that that’s OK. If they make missteps, be a leader they can come to for suggestions rather than reprimands. Not only will you get more done, but your employees will get a boost of self-esteem and empowerment.

    https://www.entrepreneur.com/article/313388

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