ReportWire

Tag: Employee Experience & Recruiting

  • How to Prepare Your Customer Success Teams for the Holidays

    How to Prepare Your Customer Success Teams for the Holidays

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    Opinions expressed by Entrepreneur contributors are their own.

    The holiday season is here, and while that might mean family gatherings and hot chocolate for some, for those of us in customer success, it can mean high-intensity and understaffed teams. The last two months of the year tend to be frenzied. Leading up to holiday vacations, clients are rushing to wrap up projects before they’re out of the office, organizations want to utilize the remaining budget for the year, and even those who aren’t taking vacations are rushing to wrap up projects because they know that so many others will be unavailable.

    This can create a lot of pressure for your customer experience teams that these employees turn to during this season — not only because your teams will have to deftly help clients under stress, but because your teams might also be trying to prep for their own holiday vacations or working with a smaller headcount than usual if holidays have already begun. This means both clients and employees can end up unhappy.

    But it’s not too late to be proactive and ensure that your customer success team has a great holiday season. Here are some best practices to help you succeed:

    Related: 6 Ways to Keep Employees Engaged During the Holiday Season

    Before the season begins

    Start early: While talking about the holidays in September might feel silly, at my company, we start talking about them long before they arrive. This is part of our strategy to go into the season with our eyes wide open at every level of the organization. We learned this the hard way two years ago when we underprepared, and our customer success team ended up with a large backlog and frustrated customers.

    When we bring it up early, it gives us time to think through the challenges of the previous year, brainstorm solutions and then actually build the systems needed to implement them. Employees and managers get the chance to share what went right and what didn’t so they can prep on both team and individual levels.

    Talking openly about anticipated staffing needs also gives team members the opportunity to share their vacation plans early. This then helps us anticipate our workforce size more accurately and plan accordingly.

    Use data to plan: Two years ago, we didn’t have solid data from this time period, making it challenging to be prepared both in the moment and the following year. This led to poor staffing, which resulted in poor customer experience. Since then, we have put a lot of effort into creating data analytics and gathering and utilizing data from previous years to understand peak and down times, which in turn helps us optimize staffing.

    Related: Prepare Now So Your Team Can Enjoy the Holidays and Still Be Productive

    During the season

    Within the organization: Once the holidays start, no matter how much you’ve prepped plans and people, the rush can still be overwhelming. We focus on staying in tune with our employees’ sentiments and morale to make sure that we can step in if someone needs a boost or a break.

    On top of that, we try to be proactive in not only fairly compensating people who work special hours, but also in giving everyone recognition for their hard work. It’s true that this is always a priority for us — but especially during the holiday season, it goes an extra-long way.

    To ensure the support team has the resources they need, we have on-call contacts in other key teams so that even when people are out of the office, there’s always someone to turn to, whether it’s IT issues, sales questions or development emergencies. This helps things run smoothly when the support team is dependent on other departments in the organization.

    Outside the organization: During the holidays, we’re open with clients about the fact that responses might be slower than usual between specific dates. Typically, we display banners on our site with this notification. Letting clients and users know what to expect over the course of a few weeks helps them plan their own work and minimizes frustration down the line.

    Related: The Best Leadership Skills for the Holidays

    After the season

    Immediately after the season ends, it’s time to start prepping for the next year. This means taking notes on everything that went right and everything that went wrong while it’s still fresh in our minds. Employees might have had a different experience than our leadership, so we debrief with the teams to get their input on how things went and include that information in our notes, too. If there is any feedback that’s immediately relevant, we work to implement it right away. Otherwise, we store our notes somewhere that will be easy to find next year.

    The holidays can be a challenge, but if you and your team are prepared before, during and after the season, they can also be a tremendous opportunity to delight both customers and staff. So, use these tips to set your team up for success this year.

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    Hila Levy-Loya

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  • How to Create a Work Culture That Will Survive Anything

    How to Create a Work Culture That Will Survive Anything

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    Opinions expressed by Entrepreneur contributors are their own.

    In the age of the Great Resignation, executives are in a near-constant battle to attract and retain talent. Paramount to this issue is the importance of company culture. In fact, studies have found that a toxic corporate environment is over 10 times more impactful than compensation when it comes to an employee leaving their job.

    Forward-thinking companies must put the focus back on building and maintaining an engaging, rewarding company culture, to which employees feel empowered to contribute, strengthen, and support for the long haul — especially in times of challenge or change. Such is the definition of “regenerative” — to renew, restore and continuously come back stronger.

    But achieving this means maintaining a people-first mindset and nurturing your employees to be your number one advocates for each other and the company. Here are four fundamentals for building a regenerative workplace culture.

    Related: Your Employees Want Purpose — Not Ping Pong Tables. Here’s How to Thrive Through the Great Resignation.

    Align your employees with company values

    Successful organizations energize employees around core values, referring back to them in times of uncertainty and modeling them for clients, consumers, and the greater good. Establish your values early and explicitly, such that employees can understand them, act on them and identify them in others.

    A consistent and shared appreciation of company values allows your employees to engage with the organization on a deeper level, fostering a professional and personal investment that promotes greater ownership, agency and motivation toward company goals.

    One way to align your team around company values is to acknowledge and uplift them at every opportunity. It’s important to both recognize staff who exemplify company values and create incentives for those who uphold them. Another way is to ensure your company policies both reflect and reinforce your beliefs, thereby giving back to employees and demonstrating your sincerity.

    At NINE dot ARTS, we host regular arts-oriented social activities to lean into our “authentic” and “creative” values, as well as offer ongoing DEIB training and professional development opportunities so employees can embrace our “ethical” and “educational” values.

    When your company’s core tenets help to ground your team in the face of obstacles, guide shared decision-making and galvanize collective action, you will experience the kind of continued growth and affirmation necessary for a regenerative culture.

    Related: 5 Lessons for Early-Stage Entrepreneurs I Wish I Knew

    Focus on human connection

    Values alignment is critical for organizations because it also helps promote employee connection. Thus, it’s essential to create opportunities for your staff to recognize, celebrate and support one another around core beliefs and business goals. And given that approximately 50% of leaders are asking employees to return to an in-office environment, such connections may be easier than you think.

    In fact, despite the rise of office perks like ping pong tables or deluxe coffee drinks, new research by Enboarder found that 60% of respondents feel the most valuable element of working in an office is the opportunity for spontaneous interactions with coworkers. Other top activities from which employees derived the strongest feelings of connection were team meetings, one-on-ones and skill sharing with peers.

    Such findings mean good news for employers because these activities aren’t anything new. There’s no need for special events or unique “connection-building” programs. Instead, incentivizing staff to collaborate in person through simple meetings, coffee dates and even serendipitous interactions may be just the key to strengthening overall connections.

    And when the connection is strong, the research found, employee productivity, satisfaction and retention are strong , too — all contributing to a regenerative culture.

    Related: Here’s the Secret to Improving Employee Engagement That Every Company Can Afford

    Promote employee agency

    As a longtime entrepreneur and business leader, I truly believe that diverse, hard-working individuals who unite around shared values can produce new innovations and outstanding results.

    This begins in the hiring process. One of the greatest lessons learned in my career is to hire for your deficits. After all, even the best leaders have blind spots. Bringing together fresh perspectives, diverse life experiences and a range of expertise can make your organization stronger as a whole, helping to prevent siloed thinking, promote ingenuity and hold everyone accountable. And when diverse specialists share common values and feel connected to one another and your mission, the potential is endless.

    Further, knowing you have committed, specialized team members who balance each other out can allow you to delegate with trust and confidence, giving employees the agency they (and you) need to improve your organization.

    For instance, our employees create topical task forces around our core principles, presenting recommendations to leadership about policy changes in these areas — from sustainability measures to artist advocacy efforts. Meanwhile, with the support of leadership, employees are emboldened to take initiative on operational innovations, creating efficiencies and improvements that benefit our business success.

    Such employee agency is critical for seeing the kind of sustained problem-solving and improvements necessary for regenerative workplace culture.

    Related: Investing in Your Employees Is the Smartest Business Decision You Can Make

    Emphasize education

    Lastly, don’t forget to further your employees’ aspirations — both personal and professional. Oftentimes, employees who seek to enhance a certain skill set, passion or area of expertise will contribute their newfound strengths to your organization in meaningful ways.

    Start by including education in your staff training. For example, at NINE dot ARTS, all new team members complete three Courageous Allyship trainings and each year we have a company-wide session for all employees. This workshop gives our team a shared understanding and language around diversity, equity, inclusion and belonging — a core component of our ethos across every department.

    Additionally, provide continuing education stipends to fund workshops, lectures, conferences or other educational endeavors. And let your employees present their learnings from such opportunities to the company as a whole. Promoting your staff’s continuous advancement inspires each individual to have a growth-oriented mindset for themselves and the organization.

    Related: Is Your Employee Engagement Program Up to Snuff?

    Move beyond material perks

    In today’s hiring and retention landscape, we can’t underestimate the impact of workplace culture. Gone are the days when a mini fridge, coffee machine, branded merch or gym membership could entice talent to your organization. Instead, leaders need to focus on the foundational aspects of culture, like values alignment and human connection. Once these are solidified, empower employees to feel ownership, agency and a sense of purpose around their work — and provide educational opportunities to further that purpose. These are the building blocks of a regenerative culture — one that is adaptive, resilient and always improving on what’s been done before.

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    Martha Weidmann

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  • Is Remote Work Responsible for Quiet Quitting?

    Is Remote Work Responsible for Quiet Quitting?

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    Opinions expressed by Entrepreneur contributors are their own.

    By now, just about everyone has heard of the term “quiet quitting.” It emerged in March 2022 and refers to doing the bare minimal tasks of your job description well enough that you don’t get fired. The concept quickly went viral on TikTok.

    Yet it only started to gain traction as an issue of concern among business leaders when government data on productivity released in August 2022 showed a sharp and unexpected drop in Q1 and Q2 of 2022. Soon after that worrisome data point in August, Gallup released a survey in early September indicating that as many as half of all Americans may be quiet quitters, further exacerbating business leadership concerns about this problem.

    Many traditionalist leaders rushed to attribute this drop in productivity and rise in quiet quitting to remote work. For example, BlackRock CEO Larry Fink attributed the drop in productivity to remote work. He called for requiring employees to come to the office to address this problem.

    Yet the claims of traditionalists don’t add up. If quiet quitting and the resultant drop in productivity stemmed from remote work, we should see a drop in productivity right from the start of the pandemic, when office workers switched to remote work. Then, when offices opened back up, especially after the Omicron wave at the end of 2021, we should see productivity going up as workers went back to the office from early 2022 onward.

    In reality, we see the opposite trend. U.S. productivity jumped in Q2 2020 as offices closed, and stayed at a heightened level through Q4 2021. Then, when companies started mandating a return to office in early 2022, productivity dropped sharply.

    Related: Employers Should Fear The Truth Behind Quiet Quitting. Here’s Why.

    So what explains the drop in productivity associated with quiet quitting?

    According to Ben Wigert, director of research and strategy for workplace management at Gallup, forcing employees to come to the office under the threat of discipline leads to disengagement, fear, and distrust. Gallup finds that “the optimal engagement boost occurs when employees spend 60% to 80% of their time — or three to four days in a five-day workweek—working off-site.” The Integrated Benefits Institute found in an October 2022 survey that employees who work remotely or in a hybrid environment reported being more satisfied (20.7%) and more highly engaged (50.8%).

    No wonder, then, that mandates forcing employees to come to the office results in quiet quitting. Disengaged workers aren’t productive. That’s especially the case if they’re looking for a new job. The career website Monster reported that two-thirds of survey respondents would quit rather than return to the office full-time. Not surprisingly, many of those who are forced to return to the office start polishing their resumes and meeting with recruiters.

    How to solve quiet quitting in the mandated return to office?

    When I show this data to my consulting clients, they often ask me what they can do to address this problem. First of all, I remind them of a joke from the famous comedian Henny Youngman: “The patient says, ‘Doctor, it hurts when I do this.’ The doctor says, ‘Then don’t do that!’” The best approach for the future of work is a flexible team-led approach, where team leads make the call on work arrangements that serve the needs of their team. Team leads know best what their teams need, including how to maximize productivity, engagement and collaboration.

    However, often it’s not so easy. They might be facing an intransigent Board of Directors, or the rest of the C-suite might be united in demanding employees return to the office for much or all of the workweek. What then?

    In that case, I help them figure out best practices for returning to the office that minimizes quiet quitting concerns. You might imagine that it’s as simple as paying people more. And indeed, a conversation about compensation should always accompany a return to office initiative. For instance, research by Owl Labs suggests that it costs an average of $863 a month for the average office worker to commute to work versus staying at home, which is about $432 a month for utilities, office supplies and so on.

    Related: You Should Let Your Team Decide Their Approach to Hybrid Work. A Behavioral Economist Explains Why and How You Should Do It.

    What I find works best is to pay for fees associated with specific office-related costs, rather than a general salary increase. Thus, pay the commuting costs of your staff: IRS per diem for miles traveled, public transport fees and so on. Pay for a nice catered lunch. Pay for their dry-cleaning costs.

    Such payments help address the initial discontent and reduce the attrition typically associated with the mandated office return. But they don’t address the quiet quitting resulting from people coming to the office and doing the same thing they would at home — except with a two-hour commute.

    An October 2022 survey by Slack found that many knowledge workers who are required to go back to the office are spending up to four hours on video calls. Slack’s head in the U.K., Stuart Templeton, said that employers risked turning their offices into “productivity killers,” since “making a two-hour commute to sit on video calls is a terrible use of the office.”

    That’s the kind of thing that leads directly to quiet quitting. We know that people are much more productive on individual tasks that require focus at home. The survey by Slack confirmed this impression: 55% of respondents preferred to do “deep work” at home, and only 16% cited the office as a better place for deep work.

    Instead, the office should be a place for socializing, collaboration and in-depth training, especially for newer employees. To address socializing needs, it’s valuable to organize fun team-building exercises and social events as staff come back to the office.

    To facilitate collaboration, it’s important to consider how in-office staff works together with those working from home. A number of my clients have staff who come in on different days of the week, requiring x. To facilitate such collaboration of in-office and remote staff, it helps to provide virtual office environments, which put both kinds of workers on an equal playing field. Likewise, it’s imperative to improve audio-visual technology (AV) to facilitate hybrid meetings to enable effective collaboration.

    There’s no replacement for face-to-face experiences for in-depth training around soft skills, such as effective in-person communication, conflict mediation and resolution, and ethical persuasion. My clients find that if they offer valuable training regularly once their employees return to the office, there’s a reduction in quiet quitting and a boost in employee engagement and productivity.

    Finally, we find it’s valuable to help staff address burnout as part of the return to the office, such as by providing mental health benefits. In a late 2022 Gallup survey, 71% of respondents said that compared to in-office work, hybrid work improves work-life balance and 58% reported less burnout.

    While a mandated return to office will inevitably lead to some quiet quitting and loss in productivity, smart leaders can ameliorate this problem using best practices. Focusing on helping employees socialize, collaborate, and get great professional development and mentoring, and thus showing them the value of the office, will reduce quiet quitting and boost performance.

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    Gleb Tsipursky

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  • Software Development Jobs Are a Bright Spot in Uncertain Economic Times. Here’s What Business Leaders Need to Know.

    Software Development Jobs Are a Bright Spot in Uncertain Economic Times. Here’s What Business Leaders Need to Know.

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    Opinions expressed by Entrepreneur contributors are their own.

    Economic uncertainty, rising inflation, changing lifestyles and a volatile labor market are unprecedentedly influencing company hiring and prospective IT job markets. Businesses are intensifying recruitment in critical areas, such as AI and data analytics, yet pulling back on long-term IT positions and employment. At the same time, rising IT talent is pursuing more flexible and engaging work environments as new opportunities open up and desirable lifestyle options evolve.

    Software developers, data analysts and cybersecurity jobs are bright spots in a rapidly moving IT employment landscape. According to a recent report by the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, software developer jobs were projected to grow by 21% by 2028, the fastest-growing sector of the national job market. Year over year, job postings for software developers and coders approximately doubled in the third quarter of 2022, while other computer-related and IT job-skill categories increased more modestly. Most non-digital economy job postings remained steady or declined. Getting on top of the changes in job growth patterns and required skill sets within the IT sector is essential for business leaders as a possible recession looms.

    Related: The Future of Software Development in 2022 and Beyond

    Software development trends

    New software development trends are accelerating as businesses and organizations recognize the strategic importance of IT and prioritize digital transformation and innovation. Consumers are moving online in record numbers, and companies are increasing digital channels and products to accommodate skyrocketing demand. Changes in supply chains, cloud and remote working environments along with technology tipping points drive strategic IT investments and personnel needs. Flexibility, scalability and security remain popular software features as businesses search for unique and efficient solutions across their operations.

    Forward-looking businesses seeking IT innovation are moving swiftly to leverage AI, cloud computing and data science applications. Some managers look outside their organizations to kick-start change. This trend fits neatly with the rise of a growing pool of freelance talent with niche skills available to spearhead specific project-based initiatives. Companies manage innovation challenges and IT infrastructure investment amid active personnel and the job market.

    Job specialization … or generalization?

    Do new market realities affect the answer to this age-old question? The debate continues in the IT field and across the digital economy and career spectrum. For computer scientists and software engineers, generalization means understanding core concepts and principles and having transferable skills to work with multiple languages and documentation. Specialization has come to mean a deep but relatively narrow focus on one language, framework, and platform. Freelance software developers often find specialization an efficient way to engage the market but then see the logic of a broader perspective as their career develops. Businesses tend to promote generalists in the longer term and more permanent positions.

    A successful software developer’s career strategy is to build a generalist foundation of computer and data science concepts and then specialize in one or two hot areas. The IEEE Computer Science Society’s computer science career guide recommends a set of academic courses covering core topics, such as computer theory and systems, security, and engineering concepts. Students are then encouraged to consider specialty areas in later years and at the graduate level. Successful business leaders recognize this pattern and provide opportunities to students in work placement and employee career development initiatives. Historical trends in the digital economy would seem to favor specialists until the market swings and a new technology moves to the fore. The challenge is to understand where the market is going and anticipate change.

    Related: How AI Will Transform Software Development

    Specializations for the future

    Machine learning software developer and data scientist skills top the list of high-demand software development talent and are two of the hottest growth areas. Business leaders increasingly view AI as indispensable in multiple business areas, including supply chain logistics and transportation, finance and natural language processing. Machine learning augmented software development is an exciting case — will AI decrease the demand for software engineers in the future? Mainstream AI applications today are limited to testing code and automating routine programming sequences. Still, an advancing wave of AI experts is bringing fresh ideas and a new set of robust machine-learning tools. In the meantime, most observers expect human software engineers to remain an essential piece of the puzzle for years to come.

    The position of data scientist — a job title first used in 2008 — has gained prominence and will continue to expand in breadth and scope as businesses increasingly grapple with overwhelming data volumes and a pressing need for data-driven forecasts and predictions. Databases show no signs of slowing down. Talented data analysts and emerging AI tools provide the insights and interpretations to capitalize on all kinds of ever-growing mountains of data. Data scientists often operate in interdisciplinary teams and draw upon a robust set of complementary soft skills, including critical thinking, communications, leadership and more.

    Recognize the pattern, and get on board

    Consumer and work lifestyle choices, influential macroeconomic trends, and strategic business needs drive IT innovation and investment. Organizations and companies in virtually every economic sector are embracing rapid digital transformation and tech-smart solutions. Software development has rarely been more complex, more urgent or more in need of creative and motivated talent. Many companies are looking for an evolving mix of permanent IT staff, freelance software developers, generalists and specialists to provide crucial business solutions. The go-to hot software development areas are machine learning, data science and robust AI specialist tools. Organizations seek a competitive edge to solve seemingly intractable issues, such as supply chain bottlenecks. Are you thinking of a career in software development? The future is very bright indeed.

    Related: Hiring the Modern Programmer: Does That Smart New Software Developer of Yours Also Have ‘Soft’ Skills?

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    Steve Taplin

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  • Is On-the-Job-Training Killing Your Company’s Potential?

    Is On-the-Job-Training Killing Your Company’s Potential?

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    Opinions expressed by Entrepreneur contributors are their own.

    On-the-job training is a common practice, regardless of how many employees work in an organization. As human beings, we naturally observe and model the behavior of those around us, especially when their behavior aligns with compensation, promotion and cultural norms. The not-so-secret secret of on-the-job training is that it relies on top performers to teach when they could or should be performing revenue-generating tasks. Relying on top performers to deliver training also limits the scope of skills exposure to what a top performer is willing or able to share. Not every expert is conscious of their own competencies or actions that help them achieve consistent success, nor is every expert a good instructor. The reality is that on-the-job training is inefficient, not standardized, unreliable and very hard to scale.

    However, on-the-job training does have one core benefit — it isn’t theoretical. Practicing real skills in real situations gives individuals the benefit of experiencing when, where and how a skill is employed on the job — seeing the consequences of actions, gaining personalized insights (if the mentor is in tune with the mentee) and establishing the first set of experiences that might lead to performance confidence.

    Related: Most Companies Fail at Employee Training. What are They Doing Wrong?

    The myths of the 70:20:10 model

    Myth: 70% of training is on-the-job, in real-time

    Myth: 20% of training is delivered socially, through coaching

    Myth: 10% of training is formally structured, in a course

    As an observation of what most organizations do for training, it’s not unreasonable to believe only 10% of professional skills are supported with formal training. Great training is expensive and time-consuming to create. It’s estimated that it takes learning and development professionals nearly 490 hours to create 1 hour of quality (level 3) training.

    In a corporate environment, training and development is generally viewed as a cost center, not a revenue driver. On paper, the arithmetic of 70:20:10 looks ingenious, 70% of training costs are free. Don’t be fooled, the most expensive training you can buy is training that doesn’t work.

    A bad lecture, boring eLearning or required reading that doesn’t create any new skills or organizational change wastes the time of all the employees who could have been productive. On-the-job training that needs to be provided repeatedly, or worse, processes that always need to be supported by the one expert at the company creates massive lost opportunity costs that find their way to the balance sheet.

    When it’s time to perform, it’s too late to practice. — Dr. Michael Allen

    In the modern era of corporate training, many organizations don’t believe 70:20:10 is a prescriptive model for smart training. 70:20:10, however, is an ingrained legacy model that’s hard to give up. The core assumption to justify making an investment in effective training is that new or perfected skills will lead to enhanced business operations:

    • Increase revenue

    • Minimize accidents

    • Lower operational costs

    • Create loyal customers

    • Reduce turnover

    It will enhance business operations but only if the training is effective. The outcomes of ineffective training create organizational beliefs that training is not worth investing in. As a business leader, now is the time to review how training is being delivered to your employees. Taking the best of what each modality has to offer, from on-the-job training and coaching to formal course development, quality training solutions include:

    • Sufficient and spaced skills practice on authentic application scenarios

    • Individualized learning paths, skipping skills already mastered

    • Motivational support to encourage mastery and utilization of new skills

    • Contextually rich training to connect when and where performance is expected

    The ingredients listed above can be deployed in many training modalities. None are exclusive to on-the-job training; in fact, each is more powerfully and cost-effectively delivered in formal training. To challenge training norms, business leaders need to align strategic outcomes to learning budgets. How much should a change in behavior net the organization, and how much would you spend to ensure that change happens with quality training?

    Related: Training New Employees Sucks. 3 Ways Make It Faster, Easier and More Effective.

    The massive gap in talent

    Consider space-related industries. The space economy is on pace to be a $1 trillion industry by 2040, with tens of thousands of open positions and frantic startups popping up everywhere. On-the-job training has become the norm. But to create a highly skilled workforce and meet revenue goals, space organizations can’t rely on top talent with subject matter expertise to mentor every new hire.

    In service industries experiencing both labor shortages and high rates of turnover, internal subject matter expertise can be one resignation away from leaving a company stranded. Without creating a digital and scalable solution for training, today’s organizations risk losing the ability to provide effective training solutions altogether. The gap in available talent will inevitably hit your industry, business and team. How should a business leader prioritize spending on training?

    Your first training dollar

    The cost of a digital training program is really for the first employee. Once in place, digital learning is inexpensive to deliver to the second through millionth employee. Here are a few dimensions to evaluate if training should be created at all:

    • Is the skill risky to the person or business?

    • Does the skill get used once a year or many times a year?

    • Can you hire already skilled individuals?

    • Could a job aid or checklist be used every time the skill is needed?

    • How many people are required to perform the skill?

    • What’s the rate of attrition/turnover?

    • Do employees need extra motivation to perform the skill, even after mastery?

    Related: How Innovative Technology Improves On-the-Job Training

    Performance success in our careers makes an enormous impact on our lives. Your future employees will no doubt evaluate training programs not only for the applicability in doing the job at hand but also for the usefulness in advancing their career opportunities. By making an investment in quality formalized training, your business can make a tangible and measurable impact that on-the-job training is hard-pressed to match.

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    Christopher Allen

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  • How the Potential Rail Strike Points to an Era of Employee Power

    How the Potential Rail Strike Points to an Era of Employee Power

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    Opinions expressed by Entrepreneur contributors are their own.

    Economically catastrophic railroad shutdowns that we narrowly avoided last September have returned with a vengeance. Unions and freight rail companies are once again at odds over poor working conditions. One of the workers’ key points is simply wanting to attend pre-scheduled medical appointments without incurring penalties for missing work.

    In a different industry, Apple employees are petitioning the company to rethink its return-to-office policies. The petition argues that requiring in-office attendance ignores Apple’s stated diversity goals and doesn’t take the circumstances of each individual into consideration. In other words, Apple employees believe the policies suit the needs of the company more than they do the needs of the workers.

    These important labor developments — together with the Gen Z phenomena of “quiet quitting” — make it clear we are in an era where employees now have extraordinary leverage when it comes to how businesses are run.

    In this environment, it is very difficult to run a successful business of any kind without prioritizing the employee experience (EX). This new paradigm is a significant shift from the business management of the recent past, which stressed that the customer experience (CX) was king.

    As companies look to the future, navigating the employee experience era may mean overhauling everything from basic benefits to the board of directors. But the businesses that thrive will honor the leverage employees have and focus first on their needs.

    Here’s how business leaders need to address these challenges.

    Related: What the Great Reimagination Means for the Future of Work

    Consider how your company is structured

    Every company should have someone with decision-making authority managing human resources and empowering EX as a priority. In an increasing number of organizations, this might even be someone on the board of directors.

    The number of new board members with HR backgrounds has risen from 6% to 11% over the past three years, according to the National Association of Corporate Directors. At the same time, a significant number of HR leaders (61%) now report directly to the CEO or president, with 23% reporting to the CFO or COO.

    These numbers point to the growing importance of securing HR expertise at a high level, a trend that should continue to explode in the coming years as we settle deeper into the EX era. Forward-looking companies must have experienced leaders to help build programs and address needs.

    The financial impact of these developments can hardly be overstated. A 2020 report from PwC pointed to talent as the largest investment for major companies, estimating that as much as 85% of expenses are dedicated to the company’s own people.

    The influence of employees on virtually every aspect of a company and its decision-making is growing. Raising the level of importance leaders grant HR and empowering them to implement EX programs will help companies sustain growth and remain competitive.

    Related: Unionizing Isn’t the Only Way to Restore Workers’ Bargaining Power

    Build the necessary feedback channels to understand and respond to what your employees need

    The examples of railroad workers and Apple employees pushing back against company policies are noteworthy, in part, because solving each problem is an EX need, but requires a vastly different approach. There is no one-size-fits-all solution for either challenge.

    It’s not a surprise that workers react when they feel like they are not being listened to, not paid enough or are harmed by bad policies. For years, people have left jobs, gone on strike or slacked off at work in response. The difference now is the power of their voices — amplified by social media, in many cases.

    As is the case with the railroad workers, it’s clear that benefits must evolve and change. Freight rail companies are operating with decades-old policies in many cases. Taking the time to gather employee feedback and addressing those needs almost certainly would have helped avoid the potential for shutdown altogether.

    Acting on employee feedback is best approached with a sense of humanity on both sides. All employees — whether white or blue-collar workers — need to be cared for, enabled and supported.

    Related: The Great Resignation is Not Over. Employers Should Make Employee Experience a Top Priority Right Now, And Here Are 5 Ways To Do It.

    Continue to lead with a vision

    At the same time, creating a company culture dedicated to EX does not mean simply bending over backward to give employees everything they want. Although some leaders may worry about rank-and-file workers seizing power within their companies, EX is not simply giving in to every whim.

    The relationship between leaders and employees works best as a two-way street, especially as employee voices are being amplified in the EX era. Employers certainly need to listen to employees, but employees also must understand and be driven by the company’s mission.

    Customers and CX — which drove the previous era of business operations — are still critically important. Fortunately, the evidence for synergy between these programs is clear: When companies listen to their employees and create best-for-all programs based on feedback, those employees take care of customers. EX and CX measurements both rise.

    Ultimately, the EX era comes down to empowering people. Part of our corporate mission is to set people free to do great work. By listening to our employees, trusting them and providing a good experience, people are motivated by our mission.

    Creating good company cultures is no longer about ping-pong tables and nap pods. People want real improvements to their quality of life and to feel like their work matters to the company’s success.

    These desires mean there are no shortcuts to success when building good employee experiences. Leaders have to enshrine the importance of HR and EX within the top levels of the organization, they have to listen carefully to employee needs, build programs and share a vision that inspires the best work.

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    Brad Rencher

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  • 5 Team Management Secrets From a Serial Entrepreneur

    5 Team Management Secrets From a Serial Entrepreneur

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    Opinions expressed by Entrepreneur contributors are their own.

    I have built several businesses in my life, and my foremost task has always been to assemble a primary team to set the foundation for the main business processes. Skilled professionals that care about what they are doing and are dedicated to ensuring the success of whatever venture you’re undertaking. After all, 80-90% of your business success depends on having the right people with you.

    Related: 10 Time-Tested Secrets of Serial Entrepreneurs

    Role delegation

    My first task when launching a new business is finding the “right” people so the team can scale in size and skill. My second order of business is to find someone who can handle the bulk of management for me. After that is taken care of, I can step aside and only get involved in strategic development as a founder. I went through this model several times in my life, and it has proved itself invaluable.

    Scaling a business from 20-30 employees to 50-100 is a massive milestone in the career of all entrepreneurs. For big and medium-sized businesses, management delegation is essential. Instead of trying to control everything to the last detail, better results can be obtained by finding a team of competent professionals that can provide in-depth focus on specific tasks and branches of the company.

    Related: 7 Rules for Entrepreneurs to Delegate Effectively

    More brain power

    In any organization, there will always be contrasting views and opinions, and the task of a wise CEO is to put together a creative team that can generate the best ideas. Business models shouldn’t be set in stone but should shift and change based on the circumstances in which a company operates. The world is constantly evolving, so blindly following a rigid business model risks leading a company to bankruptcy.

    Paying attention to the team’s ideas is needed to maintain a creative spirit and dynamic business model. When a rational, well-reasoned idea is proposed that does not radically contradict the company values, a good founder has no reason to oppose its implementation.

    Effective crisis management

    When the business is running stable, and profits are going up, founders can take a step back and provide general guidance for the company in its growth while leaving the management details to subordinates. However, during a crisis, founders should return their focus to overseeing company operations directly and dedicating themselves to solving the situation.

    I experienced this firsthand: before I started Crypterium, which is now Choise.com, I was CEO of a company engaged in the processing business. At one point, it became apparent that this market did not have excellent prospects, so we needed to reorganize and find a new direction to develop in. My idea was to build a business in the crypto space.

    Together with the team, we applied our expertise and evolved into a crypto bank. A lot of effort went in, and the process was not easy, but thanks to the combined effort, we were successful and have significantly developed.

    Related: 7 Outdated Habits That Will Paralyze Your Business

    Diversity is a virtue

    Diversity is a virtue in business. Regardless of what type of business we’re talking about, there should always be a mix of different competencies. This is especially true for startups in emerging spaces such as fintech. This market often moves so fast and unpredictably that a diverse team is needed to always stay on top of the newest changes.

    Successful teams combine different competencies and skills to develop the company’s potential most efficiently. It is essential that each position suits the team members’ characters, for example, reliable and responsible lawyers, honest financiers, daring marketers, creative designers, proactive sales managers, and so on.

    Related: Be Intentional About Diversity

    An inclusive workspace

    Our team has always been open to people with different backgrounds and views. It is essential that team members feel comfortable at work to avoid a toxic environment that is detrimental to the company’s goals.

    However, a set of shared values is needed to unite a diverse team of different characters, nationalities, and viewpoints. That’s where corporate culture steps in, combining very different mentalities with values common to the whole company

    To summarize

    Some founders often make the error of being too much of a perfectionist and always wanting to have everything under direct control, no matter how unsustainable the workload is. However, effective team management is a must-have for any entrepreneur on a quest to scale his business. Building a team of target-focus professionals is essential for any entrepreneur with a substantially big company. Remember, no one can do it alone.

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    Vladimir Gorbunov

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  • 3 Difficult Personalities That Are Great Hires

    3 Difficult Personalities That Are Great Hires

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    Opinions expressed by Entrepreneur contributors are their own.

    The concept of personality types, temperaments and working styles has been foundational in organizational behavior for years. As entrepreneurs or managers, we frequently assess personality to determine ideal team composition and workflows. While toxic personalities certainly exist, many others that seem difficult can offer severe advantages to start-up organizations. Oppositionality, non-conformity, perfectionism and the fickleness that often accompanies abstract thinking should not be deal-breaking traits.

    As a founder, I tend to have strong opinions about the working styles and personalities of those I consider creative, resourceful and hard-working people. At the same time, certain characters tend to clash within small teams, creating a challenging work environment. However, hiring managers can quickly write off people who are “difficult” as toxic — which can cost a startup its competitive edge. I, for one, appreciate the contributions that seemingly “difficult” people make. Here are three challenging personalities that frequently make great hires and give startup teams the edge they wouldn’t have without them.

    Related: Smart Advice for Networking With These 4 Personality Types

    1. Demanding yet artistically brilliant

    Just about any founder or CEO would appreciate a genius as part of their team, yet these rare outside-the-box thinkers can be notoriously difficult employees. They can be prickly, fiercely individualistic, anti-team players and have fragile personal lives.

    At my former design retail business, a set stylist we worked with fit the bill perfectly. Not only did he demand twice the market rate, but he also wanted my constant attention and would not allow anyone else on the team to address his concerns. That said, he successfully delivered the most beautiful sets in the most unlikely and underwhelming locations: he could turn a cave into a castle for the camera.

    In today’s ultra-competitive consumer product market, where hundreds of versions of every item are available, the differentiation of brilliant design can make or break your brand.

    Despite the obstacles, hiring a category-defying genius paid off for us. The key is to manage these individuals with empathy, awareness and appreciation for their unique contributions — while still setting the requisite boundaries for your sanity. Set your expectations that these hires will be individual contributors — not necessarily team players — and budget your time accordingly.

    Related: Are You Asking for Employee Feedback? If Not, Good Luck With Retention.

    2. Absent-minded abstract thinker

    For rational, linear thinkers who prioritize planning and organization, absent-mindedness can drive you crazy. Yet the same mental process that leads to fickleness can fuel fresh ideas and uncharted solutions.

    According to a study published in Psychological Science, mind-wandering spurs what neuroscientists call “creative incubation,” allowing a disjointed train of thought to make unlikely and uncommon connections that yield unique and creative solutions.

    Although one of the most inspired web developers I worked with often didn’t know what day of the week it was or where to find the printer he used every day, he figured out how to fashion a basic Shopify ecommerce system to deliver a fully custom site with sophisticated and unique UX features, flexible navigation and a robust backend–the likes of which even enterprise-level systems don’t often offer.

    The key to working with these absent-minded gems is to pair them with a colleague who can provide extra operational support.

    3. Problem-finding contrarian

    While working with someone forever finding problems can be discouraging and morale-crushing, a team that enthusiastically supports an unrealistic product idea is headed for failure. The right balance is hiring that smart contrarian: “Someone who looks for business practices that don’t make sense, who’s not too reliant on a small group of like-minded people, who can embrace diversity, and who’s happier on the sidelines.”

    A founder I mentored shared with me that she only hired people who showed extreme enthusiasm for her product — a scheduling app. She wanted to avoid negativity. As a result, no one on her team paused the beta launch to address a known glitch, and her app experienced a significant feature failure.

    Having that smart contrarian to call out real concerns at the right time, even if it’s not the popular or politically correct move, can help ensure problems are addressed before too many resources are invested, or larger issues ensue. While contrarians can be frustrating, they spot critical gaps others might fear speaking out about. To work effectively with contrarian personalities, practice prioritizing their observations and be prepared to translate unsolicited criticism into better ideas and more innovative solutions.

    Related: 5 Ways to Make Your Company’s Hiring Process More Fair

    The final decision

    Ultimately, you’ll need to weigh the costs and benefits of working with challenging personalities in your organization. While many demand special accommodation, buffering and hand-holding, I have found that their contributions are worth the investment.

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    Marina Glazman

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  • 6 Ways Employers Commit ‘Time Theft’ Against Minority Employees

    6 Ways Employers Commit ‘Time Theft’ Against Minority Employees

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    Opinions expressed by Entrepreneur contributors are their own.

    Have you heard of the phrase “time theft“? If so, you may associate it with poor performance and work practices by employees at a company, like, for example, the employees who clock in early but only work part of the time. Or employees who extend their lunch break without telling a manager. The traditional definition of time theft is related to the modern “quiet quitting” movement in that it puts the focus of bad behavior on employees who “steal” time from businesses.

    But, have you thought about the myriad of ways employers steal time from employees — particularly those who are working towards diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) in the workplace? Are there ways employers and others take time and energy away from employees working towards a more just and equitable workplace? In this article, we’ll flip the idea of time theft on its head and discuss six ways employees, who spend time working on DEI issues, are often uncompensated, overlooked and undervalued by businesses.

    1. It’s time theft when employees are asked to participate in DEI councils and working groups without compensation.

    I’m a huge advocate for DEI councils and employee resource groups (ERGs). They are great places for like-minded people to put their heads together and strategize on ways to tackle DEI issues in the workplace. However, when those councils and groups take hours away from workers every week, employees should be compensated for those hours.

    DEI councils and ERGs are not “extracurricular” activities that employees do for fun while away from their desks. It’s hard, business-oriented labor that drives progress. It’s time theft for employees to do the brainstorming, planning and execution work that’s beneficial to a business’s DEI plans while not getting fairly paid or recognized for it.

    Participation in councils and groups without proper compensation is stealing time from employees that could otherwise be used for their personal needs or to invest in other professional development opportunities.

    Related: Stop Expecting Marginalized Groups to Lead Diversity Efforts. It’s Time For Allies to Step Up and Put in the Work

    2. It’s time theft when employees are constantly working to get buy-in on DEI initiatives outside of working hours.

    The amount of labor employees spend on getting buy-in on DEI initiatives within an organization can be massive. Related to being on DEI councils and ERGs, it takes time and energy to attend events before and after work to get more people on board with a DEI strategy or find cross-departmental support. Time theft comes into play when employees are constantly having to sell, resell, reframe and reinvigorate their colleagues and leadership about an initiative that’s beneficial to the business.

    Employees who are passionate about DEI and have a fire to get buy-in on their initiatives spend so much time doing so that it eats into their bandwidth to accomplish other parts of their job. They need reliable support from other employees and leadership so that the burden doesn’t get saddled on the shoulders of a few.

    Time spent getting buy-in on DEI initiatives should be recognized and compensated. It should be acknowledged by leadership as an act that supports the company’s development. All employees, not just those personally impacted by DEI, should put in the effort to get buy-in for DEI projects.

    Related: 7 Ways Leaders Can Level Up Their DEI Workplace Strategy

    3. It’s time theft when leadership experiences analysis paralysis and keeps employees strung along without taking action.

    After participating on an unpaid DEI council, then having to run around getting people to sign onto an initiative with clear benefits for the business, some employees may get their hopes up by coming to leadership with a grand master plan. Leadership may ideologically appreciate the initiative, but it may take time to figure out how to implement it. Leaders may string along employees and tell them they’re working on it, but the result may be months of inaction and analysis paralysis.

    Businesses shouldn’t rush to implement DEI plans without the financial and logistical pieces figured out. However, many leaders get held up by having a lack of data and stall progress because they’re looking for more information before taking action. I believe in data but sometimes waiting for the perfect amount of information, even after a DEI council or ERG has provided plenty, can be a crutch that steals time from employees who have worked hard for an initiative and are waiting for action.

    If leadership is hearing the same messages calling for action on racial, gender, sexual orientation or disability issues in the workplace, stalling on the action while others wait for results is time theft.

    Related: Hybrid Work Could Affect Your Diversity, Equity and Inclusion Goals. Here’s How to Prepare for That.

    4. It’s time theft when employees from marginalized identities are constantly being asked to educate colleagues.

    Consistently tapping employees with marginalized identities to lead discussions or be spokespersons for entire groups is a theft of time and energy.

    When colleagues are attempting to be better allies, it requires them to put in personal work to become educated about the issues. Instead of doing the work on their own, they often rely on those impacted to educate them. It can feel exhausting and triggering for some employees to be educators while they’re experiencing their own challenges in the workplace. Using an employee’s time to answer questions that can be a part of one’s self-education is an inappropriate and problematic request.

    Employees and colleagues who are not occupying marginalized identities need to educate themselves and reduce the amount of time they spend asking those impacted to support them in their learning. It’s burdensome, exhausting and harmful to those who need to protect their peace and boundaries at work.

    5. It’s time theft when employers ask marginalized folks to share their “lived experiences” but gaslight those individuals when it’s time for action.

    It can be incredibly frustrating for employees with marginalized identities to share their experiences and not be heard or taken seriously. Leadership may ask certain groups to share their lived experiences with the hope of finding an opportunity to create a DEI initiative that supports them. While that’s a good intention, when those individuals speak up and others discredit or gaslight them about their experiences, it can feel dismissive and like a waste of time.

    When employers request information from marginalized folks, it needs to be serious and focused on solutions. When folks share their experiences with trauma, discrimination and social inequities at work, it’s important to believe their stories. When leadership asks for this information and then pulls employees with marginalized identities into conference rooms to discuss it, discrediting, doubting or denying their experiences is disrespectful and time theft.

    Related: Here’s How to Have the Most Powerful DEI Conversations

    6. It’s time theft when leadership encourages marginalized folks to work harder for advancement opportunities and then overlooks them for promotions.

    Many marginalized groups are familiar with the phrase, “you have to work twice as hard to get half of what others have.” This can be absolutely true in the workplace. Many marginalized folks who are on the promotion track can be told by their managers, “if you work harder” or “if you take on this project” you may be better positioned for a promotion. Perhaps the employee jumps through all the hoops and completes their work with flying colors, but when it’s promotion time, they’re overlooked while someone who’s “in” with leadership gets the nod.

    As much as DEI practitioners try to even the playing field, we know that promotions and advancements are still bottled necked by those who are tight with leadership or represent the stereotypical recipient of promotions.

    Too often, people who are a part of underrepresented groups are not considered for opportunities despite their hard work, above-average performance or consistency. It’s time theft to convince employees with marginalized identities to pour more time and energy into their work only to be left without recognition or reward. Women and people of color are often the first to volunteer to work harder but too often the last to get promoted.

    Final thoughts

    Time theft is a real issue for marginalized folks and those who are passionate about the work of DEI. Creating a more inclusive, diverse and equitable workplace can be seen as a “voluntary” or “extracurricular” activity that doesn’t need compensation. However, organizations need to reframe this work as business-critical and essential for growth and longevity.

    Everyone should be involved in advocating for DEI and promoting its presence in the workplace. This shouldn’t sit on the shoulders of a few employees who occupy marginalized identities. If DEI were more integral in an organization’s work, there would be more of a push for self-education, fair compensation and equal opportunity for advancement.

    Time theft occurs when groups, who are marginalized, overlooked and underappreciated have to carry the weight of educating, getting buy-in, leading and still surviving inequality in the workplace. It’s not fair for the burden to be carried by them alone without financial compensation or action taken by the leadership. It’s time to invest in DEI, to make it an integral part of a business’s values and to honor and give back the time and energy employees have spent by implementing their plans and taking action.

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    Nika White

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  • Let Your Team Decide Their Approach to Hybrid Work. Here’s Why and How.

    Let Your Team Decide Their Approach to Hybrid Work. Here’s Why and How.

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    Opinions expressed by Entrepreneur contributors are their own.

    A November 2022 survey by Gallup finds that 46% of hybrid employees report being engaged at work when their team determines their hybrid work policy of when to come to the office. By contrast, if employees are free to determine their own approach, only 41% report being engaged. If the leadership determines the top-down policy for everyone, only 35% are engaged, and if it’s their direct supervisor, 32% are engaged.

    It makes sense when you think about it. Team members know best what they need in order to collaborate and socialize together effectively. After all, the only useful function of the office is to facilitate collaboration, socialization and mentoring: people are much more productive in their individual tasks at home. So it makes all the sense in the world for the rank-and-file teams to determine what works best for their needs.

    Yet the Gallup survey shows only 13% of employees say that their team determines their approach to hybrid work. That’s unfortunate and undermines engagement among hybrid workers. And it’s easy to fix.

    From my experience helping 21 companies figure out their hybrid and remote work arrangements, the best practice is for the leadership to provide broad but flexible guidelines for the whole company. Then, let teams of rank-and-file employees determine what works best for them.

    Related: So Your Employees Don’t Want to Come Back to the Office. Here’s How to Create Purpose and Culture in Remote Teams

    Empower each team leader to determine, in consultation with their team members, how each team should function. The choice should be driven by the goals and collaborative capacities of each team rather than the personal preferences of the team leader. The top leadership should encourage team leaders to permit, wherever possible, team members who desire to do so to work remotely.

    To set the stage, first, conduct an anonymous survey of your staff on their preferences for remote work. All companies are different, and you want to know about your staff in particular. More importantly, employees want to feel that they have input on major company decisions. That applies especially to policies concerning working conditions. You’ll get a lot more buy-in, even from staff who may be unhappy with your final policies, if they feel consulted and heard.

    As part of the survey, have respondents indicate who their team leader is: that keeps the survey answers anonymous, but can be provided to team leaders to help them understand the desires of their teams.

    The reason it’s important to ask this in the surveys is that many lower-level supervisors feel a personal discomfort with work from home. They feel a loss of control if they can’t see their staff and are eager to get back to their previous mode of supervising.

    That’s why there’s a low level of engagement when team leads are given sole discretion to make the decisions. You need to have team leaders understand what are the actual preferences of their team members without any team member feeling inhibited by giving their team leader undesirable information.

    While you may choose to ask a variety of questions, be sure to find out about their desire for frequency of work in the office. Here’s a good way to phrase it:

    Which of these would be your preferred working style going forward?

    • A) Fully remote, coming in once a quarter for a team-building retreat
    • B) 1 day a week in the office, the rest at home
    • C) 2 days a week in the office
    • D) 3 days a week in the office
    • E) 4 days a week in the office
    • F) Full-time in the office

    In all the companies where I consulted, there were never more than a quarter who wanted to go back to the office full-time. In fact, one company with over 3,000 employees had 61% of its staff express a desire for fully remote work. And it wasn’t even a tech company.

    In the highly probable case that your results aren’t too different from the typical company, you’ll want to follow the lead of the companies I helped. Namely, you’ll institute a hybrid-first model, with some flexibility for employees who want to work remotely full-time and whose roles permit them to do so.

    Next, make sure that team leaders justify the time their team needs to be in the office. That justification should stem from the kind of activities done by the team. Team members should be free to do their independent tasks wherever they want. By contrast, many — not all — collaborative tasks are best done in person.

    Related: 3 Ways to Empower Everyone to Lead (and How to Do It)

    Team leaders should evaluate the proportion of individual versus collaborative tasks done by their teams. Then, they should use that proportion as a basis for a discussion with the team to determine the frequency of when team members come to the office. And it should be a consensus-based decision-making process, informed by the surveys, with a focus on collaboration, socialization and mentoring. All team members should come to the office on the same days of the week to facilitate collaboration.

    What if team members wish to be fully remote and have a team leader who doesn’t want any remote team members? If this team member can demonstrate high effectiveness and productivity, and if their tasks are mostly individual — 80% or more — the team leader should allow them to work remotely. That team member should only come to the office once a quarter for a team-building retreat.

    However, if the team member needs to collaborate intensely with their team, they might not be able to fulfill that aspect of their role effectively if everyone else is in the office. In that case, they need to either come into the office at least once a week. Alternatively, they might consider finding a new team with a more accommodating team leader. Or they might adjust their role on the team to take on largely-individual tasks.

    There should be a very good reason if the team leader desires more than two days in the office per week. Such reasons exist.

    For example, in one company for which I consulted, the sales teams who placed outbound sales calls decided to do full-time office work. The team leaders argued persuasively that sales staff benefited greatly from being surrounded by other sales staff during outbound calls. Such calls are draining and sap motivation. Being surrounded by others on the sales floor making similar calls boosts motivation and energy. Moreover, hearing others make calls offers an opportunity to learn from their successful techniques, which is difficult to arrange in telework settings. However, such exceptions are rare.

    Generally speaking, no more than 5% of your staff should be forced to be in the office full-time. Surveys show that about 80% of workers who are capable of working remotely expect to do so. Employers indicate they will continue offering a variety of hybrid work options. Yet many are unsure about how to implement this model effectively.

    For maximizing employee engagement, while also facilitating team collaboration, the best practice involves having teams make the decisions. This team-led model will ensure that team members can collaborate most effectively. Using this technique will enable you to seize a competitive advantage in the return to the office.

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    Gleb Tsipursky

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  • 3 Easy Ways to Improve Your Software Developers’ Efficiency

    3 Easy Ways to Improve Your Software Developers’ Efficiency

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    Opinions expressed by Entrepreneur contributors are their own.

    I’ve observed an odd trend in company board meetings. Marketing and sales vice presidents will come in with charts, reports and finely-tuned data. The CFO will fire up a dashboard detailing every penny of revenue and expense. The HR chief will share hiring metrics down to the last employee. But when it comes to engineering, the lifeblood of any modern company, there’s little data — just a vague sense of what’s working and what’s not.

    The reality is that engineering efficiency and developer experience remain a black box, even at some of the most tech-forward organizations. And inside that box lurk inefficiencies on an enormous scale.

    I’ve heard of big banks that employ tens of thousands of developers who are operating at 30% efficiency because of bloated processes and unnecessary toil. This is more than a waste of resources. Frustrated developers quit. Company payroll sags under the weight of extra salaries needed to compensate for inefficiencies. Customers are stuck waiting on deliverables. Considering the global impact on productivity and output, this is easily a trillion-dollar problem.

    The good news is there are simple, concrete ways to prioritize developer experience (DX) and engineering efficiency. I’ve seen the transformative benefits of improving DX as a developer, founder and CEO of three high-growth tech companies. Here’s what every CEO should know:

    Related: Use These 4 Tips to Attract and Retain Software Developers

    The true cost of poor DX

    Any company dependent on software development should be obsessed with optimizing developers’ work experience. Research shows most software engineers spend more than half their workday performing tedious, repetitive tasks. No engineer wants to spend hours troubleshooting an issue that could be detected by automation or wait weeks for approvals from other teams. Yes, they can (and do) move on to other projects, but context switching increases drag and the likelihood of errors. It’s also a stressful way to work.

    A frustrating work environment leads to heavy turnover, which is costly at any time, but particularly now when demand for great developers far outstrips supply. In the U.S., there are around 162,900 open positions for software developers and related occupations, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics. As word travels about a company’s DX failures, recruiting becomes difficult, creating a downward spiral.

    All of this translates to the bottom line, with developers earning a median salary of more than $120,000, leaving them idle amounts to burning money. Worse, inefficient engineering inevitably slows product development. Companies in competitive industries like banking, retail or healthcare that can’t figure out DX will lose customers to competitors able to launch apps, updates and new products quickly.

    The silver lining is that since most companies are new to DX, a few simple improvements can yield substantial benefits. Here are three practical ways to improve your developers’ efficiency:

    Related: The Future of Software Development in 2022 and Beyond

    1. Make it someone’s job

    It could be a Developer Experience Officer (DXO), lead engineer or rotating team, but you need someone to own DX inside your company. Here at Harness, we have a Tiger Team that analyzes inefficiencies and recommends solutions. Here’s a recent example: The team learned that our code base was too large for developers to test changes on their laptops, which turned a two-minute test into a 40-minute excursion to use a sufficiently robust computer. Once they identified the problem, the fix was straightforward: Reduce the number of microservices needed on developers’ laptops so they could use their own computers to test the code.

    2. Gather data, and put it to use

    It’s pretty ironic that engineering — of all departments — suffers from a lack of quantitative operational data. Most companies know more about sales team productivity than the engineering teams at the heart of their work. You can’t fix what you haven’t measured, so start by gathering hard numbers. Some useful metrics include the number of automated processes in your developer workflow, how much work a developer can complete within a certain timeframe and the lead time between a project’s beginning and delivery.

    Then, there are qualitative insights. Most companies rely on feedback from customer and employee experience surveys to make sure they are on target, but there’s no equivalent for developers — and that’s a huge oversight. Use surveys to gather qualitative data from engineers, and pinpoint bottlenecks and deficiencies to resolve. DX measurements can include metrics like how easy it is to locate the information, tools or systems they need to do their work.

    3. Remove needless barriers

    Barriers faced by developers can be cultural or technological. Endemic to many large companies is a culture of micromanagement and excessive oversight. For developers, that means wasting time waiting for someone to greenlight incremental progress. Instead, establish high-level guardrails around cost, security and quality, and give engineers free rein within those parameters. The streamlined process will boost creativity and productivity and increase developers’ job satisfaction.

    This goes hand in hand with upgrading developers’ own tech toolkits. Too many are stuck using dated and manual tools and processes or hacking their own fixes. That’s why I’ve worked to build solutions using automation and AI to enable users to build, test, deploy and verify on-demand. For example, if a developer is working on a feature, merging it into the main code can require thousands of tests, which could take hours to run. But using intelligent automation, the same process might take 20 minutes. There are even automations that allow you to programmatically define your guardrails and automate approvals when a project meets the specifications.

    Related: How AI Will Transform Software Development

    Ultimately, improving developer experience can’t be a one-time event. It takes ongoing attention and iteration to gather relevant data, remove blockers and increase productivity and job satisfaction. Yet improvement is well within reach, and the potential return is far too great to ignore.

    I dream that I’ll soon walk into a boardroom and see a developer productivity dashboard as comprehensive as any other department’s. We have the tools and data to unlock productivity, morale, efficiency, customer satisfaction and innovation gains. It’s time to free developers from toil so they can do the work they love.

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    Jyoti Bansal

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  • Amazon, Amid Layoffs, Reportedly Conducting Voluntarily Buyouts

    Amazon, Amid Layoffs, Reportedly Conducting Voluntarily Buyouts

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    Amid cuts that reportedly include some 10,000 jobs, Amazon is said to be offering some employees voluntary buyouts, or “voluntary severance.”


    Bloomberg I Getty Images

    An Amazon office in Sunnyvale, California.

    That’s according to CNBC, which reported on Wednesday that, per company messages, Amazon offered voluntary separation and compensation packages to some company sectors Tuesday and Wednesday.

    This week, the company also conducted layoffs, Amazon has confirmed, but it did not comment on the number of employees who were let go.

    “As we’ve gone through this, given the current macro-economic environment (as well as several years of rapid hiring), some teams are making adjustments, which in some cases means certain roles are no longer necessary,” Amazon spokesperson Kelly Nantel told CNN about the confirmed layoffs.

    “We don’t take these decisions lightly, and we are working to support any employees who may be affected,” she added.

    The company did not immediately respond to a request for comment on the reports of voluntary buyouts.

    Per CNBC, Amazon is offering employees a severance payment equal to three months’ wages. It includes a week of pay for every six months the employee has been at the company and a stipend paid out weekly for three months, theoretically to pay for maintaining their health insurance. Employees will have access to the company plan until the end of next month, the outlet added.

    The offers give employees until November 29 to decide to leave, and they are allowed to reverse that decision until December 5. If they do take the buyout, their last day would be December 23.

    Amazon’s moves this week come amid a larger labor rout in tech, which has seen historic layoffs in the past several months. Meta, for example, laid off about 11,000 employees earlier this month, the first time in its history that it conducted large-scale layoffs. Both companies faced disappointing earnings reports this year. Amazon’s stock is down 44% compared to the beginning of the year, and Meta’s is down about 67%.

    Related: Mark Zuckerberg Has Lost More Than $100 Billion of Personal Wealth in 13 Months

    When businesses need to cut expenses in a challenging economic environment, voluntary agreements like the one Amazon offered can have some positive effects, says Margaret Hermes, chief operating officer at Chicago-based fintech company Avant.

    Hermes oversees areas including operations, human resources and internal communications at the company. She also has a law degree and was a senior counsel at Groupon.

    “A voluntary severance program is going to enable Amazon to reduce headcount [while] simultaneously separating from people who may not have been fully on board with where Amazon is going and were already thinking of leaving,” she says.

    But there are downsides. The job market is cooling — particularly in tech. Those offered buyouts might not take the company up on it, even if they want to, which makes it less likely to actually help the company out, Hermes adds.

    Large-scale layoffs have become more common, at least publicly, in the battered industry. Twitter notably laid off half of its staff earlier this month after Elon Musk finalized his purchase of the company.

    A lawsuit has already been filed over the process. Voluntary separations like the one Amazon is offering can actually “reduce employment legal risk,” Hermes says.

    People who leave a company on their own “are less likely to make claims related to their departure,” she says.

    Finally, business owners have to consider the morale of those left behind, she advises. A key part of that is conducting layoffs or separations with humanity and organization.

    “If layoffs are not done in an empathetic manner companies risk harming the morale of the remaining employees [going forward],” she advises.

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    Gabrielle Bienasz

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  • 7 Signs You’re Ready to Transition from Employee to Entrepreneur

    7 Signs You’re Ready to Transition from Employee to Entrepreneur

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    Opinions expressed by Entrepreneur contributors are their own.

    I recently had a call with one of my best friends who moved to London to work for a big, multinational public company. She’s talented, successful and hardworking.

    Yet, she called me full of tears, anxiety and anger. “They are restructuring the company; they are cutting positions. My role is about to die.”

    I suggested that she apply for the same role in other ventures, companies that could offer multiple benefits, from remote working to stock options. I explained that with her talent, potential and ideas, she could even be self-employed through freelancing for various clients with contracts. She could chase her version of success and happiness. And she could probably end up with more money and even more freedom.

    “You don’t get it.” She said. “I don’t want to be nobody. I want to work for the top companies in the world.”

    Perhaps I don’t get it. But I also don’t get why talented, hardworking individuals like her want to throw their full potential into hierarchy and politics for prestige. Why do they let their companies fill them with stress, ruin their day, restrict their career options and define their value?

    Related: 7 Signs It’s Time to Transition From Employee to Entrepreneur

    Don’t get me wrong; there are plenty of great people acknowledging their worth and consciously choosing to advocate the employee’s mentality. They are okay with that.

    But if you’re fed up with the corporate world, feeling like it’s limiting your options in life, and wondering when is the right time to leverage your skillset and make a transition, it’s probably now.

    Here are seven signs you no longer have an employee mentality.

    1. You’re in love with the idea of working wherever and whenever you want

    Flexible work hours and location independence started becoming the norm after the pandemic in 2020. You proved to your employer that location doesn’t affect productivity and that a strict 9 to 5 workday could burn you out instead.

    And while many companies allow work-from-home days and a flexible working schedule, you still have to report your location and total work hours.

    However, with an entrepreneurial mindset, complete location and time flexibility is your dream; you know the only way to achieve that is to fully own your freedom by creating your income stream instead of expecting a salary.

    Related: Remote Work Is Here to Stay: Are You Ready for the New Way of Life?

    2. When in meetings, you’re daydreaming instead of participating.

    The average employer spends at least 3 hours weekly in meetings, with 30% reporting that they spend over 5 hours weekly.

    And instead of actively participating in that meeting, you’re contemplating how to avoid the next one so you can work on something instead. You know you could be spending your time in a more fruitful way than attending company meetings, but there’s nothing you can do about it.

    Someone more senior requested your presence; you have to be there. So there you are, visualizing how you can escape this misspend of your hours, wasting time while time is money.

    Related: Your Time Is Money, So Stop Wasting It

    3. You absolutely despise titles and hierarchy.

    When having an employee mentality, you get so caught up in titles. You fool yourself with pride, showing off on Linkedin, gossiping about others’ abilities, and jealously spreading your best wishes to the colleagues who claimed the C-titles first.

    When you are a business owner, you laugh at job titles. You want people to work with you, not for you. You also know that a title cannot determine your worth. Anybody can go on Linkedin and claim that they are the CEO or an executive member of a 5-people company.

    What does that even mean?

    Fancy titles in corporate jobs almost always equal less freedom, less time to work on your relationships with others and less time to spend with your kids before they become adults.

    C-titles while climbing the corporate ladder also mean less time to invest in your self-care planning, wellness, and personal skills and less time to enjoy life.

    4. You’re testing multiple side hustles after or before work.

    With an employee mindset, you look at the clock at quarter to six and know it’s time to shut down your laptop and get on with your day.

    And while maintaining a work-life balance is crucial, as a business owner, you are continuously testing concepts and trying side hustles to build multiple income streams whenever you can. You don’t depend on one client, idea or salary, but you’re willing to test, take risks, fail and start over.

    Related: 4 Creative Side Hustles That Fight Inflation and Earn Extra Cash

    5) You’re not afraid of building relationships from outreach.

    As an employee, you are terrified of cold pitches. You are not fond of being rejected or ignored because that usually happens. You don’t attempt to reach out to others unless you’re selling something; in that case, you face outreach as a transaction, not a relationship.

    However, as an entrepreneur, you know that expanding your systems by connecting, advising, or simply interacting with others is one of the most vital steps in building a personal or professional brand.

    You don’t underestimate the power of community and networking; you aim to create daily connections with one or two new people in your industry. In one year, you are astonished by your reach and the ways your network proved helpful.

    6. You know that building passive income and making money online is 100% possible.

    When having an employee mentality, you don’t care about investing or building a passive income online. Even if you care, it strikes you as too-good-to-be-true, and you don’t bother putting effort into creating a diversified portfolio.

    On the contrary, when you have entrepreneurial tendencies, you get excited about passive income ideas and turn your world upside down to build an online income.

    Creator’s economy is not a too-good-to-be-true scenario nor a get-rick-quickly scheme. It’s an available reality with no barriers to entry, and as a business owner, you like that challenge. You know that spending an x amount of time creating the tiniest passive income stream can yield 10x results in the near future.

    They know they must find what they enjoy creating and work on it daily.

    7) You’re constantly enriching your knowledge and skillset to increase value.

    You are exchanging your skills and experience with payable work hours as an employee. However, as an entrepreneur, you offer your skillset, idea or business as a service that solves problems and delivers value.

    You don’t charge by the word, hour, or month. You charge according to the advantages and utility of your solutions. You answer questions and deliver results. And because your expertise is directly related to the value and results you deliver, you’re working daily towards improving and enriching it.

    Final thoughts

    Perhaps you’re not 100% ready to escape the rat race. However, if any of the above signs hit true, you know it’s time to start owning your career and follow a path you can fully control.

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    Maria Dimitropoulou

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  • 3 Ways I Attracted The Best Generation Z Applicants

    3 Ways I Attracted The Best Generation Z Applicants

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    Opinions expressed by Entrepreneur contributors are their own.

    Just when you think you’ve figured out the generational differences in your team, a new generation exits the classroom and into the workplace. For the first time in history, there are five generations in the workplace. They are traditionalists (born 1925 to 1945), baby boomers (born 1946 to 1964), Generation X (born 1965 to 1980), millennials (born 1981 to 2000) and Generation Z (born 2001 to 2020. And trust me, navigating these differences is no easy feat. I found this out the hard way.

    When I first started my own business, I lived out the old adage, “If it isn’t broken, don’t fix it.” I figured the same recruiting and retention practices that had worked for my own generation would easily translate to Gen Z. But I was wrong. Very wrong.

    In fact, I had to relearn everything before I could create a business that attracted top-level Generation Z applicants. But it was well worth the effort. So, how did I do it?

    Here are a few things that helped me in my own journey:

    1. Rethink your office space

    The “always on” mentality really started to take hold as the internet revolutionized how we communicate and interact. The first generation of employees expected to be “on” 24/7 were millennials. The workplace was no longer separate from your life — in many ways, it became your life.

    Generation Z recognized this. They saw the mental health struggles and burnout that came with being “always on” from the generation before them. This is why when they left the classroom and entered the boardroom, they valued, above all else, a work-life balance. They want flexibility. They want privacy. They want boundaries.

    That’s why, when I first started my company, I made sure to cut the cereal bar out of the budget and offer employees the ability to work from anywhere and at any time. How do I do this?

    Well, I meet with my team once a week via Zoom and we cover our weekly, quarterly and annual goals. Then, I’m able to break them down into manageable projects that can be done from anywhere. Once they’re done with the task that week, they can either take the rest of the week off or use that time to work ahead on the next week’s project.

    Now, I realize that this format doesn’t work for all types of businesses. But, if you have the capability of being entirely remote, giving your team the freedom to work from anywhere will go a long way in attracting top-level Generation Z applicants.

    Related: Gen Z Brings a Whole New Dynamic to the Workforce

    2. Let them lead the conversation

    One of the worst mistakes that I did early on was trying to lead with answers instead of questions. Well, let’s just say that didn’t go over too well. In fact, it completely flopped. And for good reason.

    You see, I was terrified of looking like a fool in front of my team. So, I didn’t give them a chance to catch me off guard. I lead with confidence, masked my fear and hoped that I could get through the day without falling flat on my face. However, my facade came at a high price. I almost lost the respect of my employees in the process.

    My team was frustrated because they felt like I was trying to control the conversation instead of letting them have a voice. They were done with the top-down management style and desperately wanted a leader who would listen to their needs.

    I knew I needed to change — and fast. This is why I started hosting weekly one-on-one conversations via Zoom.

    During these conversations, I asked my team about their work-style preferences, what motivates them, and how I could better support them. I even asked about how they like to socialize and what their favorite type of team-building activity is. And you know what? These conversations completely changed the way I ran my business –– for the better.

    My Gen Z employees are now some of my most valued team members because they feel heard and appreciated. Because once they knew that I was willing to listen, they were willing to open up and share their ideas — which has led to some pretty amazing results for my business.

    Related: 5 Ways Businesses Can Reach ‘Generation Z’

    3. Focus on their development, not placement

    The great Mark Twain once said, “The two most important days in your life are the day you are born and the day you find out why.” Now, I’m sure Twain wasn’t thinking about Generation Z when he made this statement, but it couldn’t be more relevant for today’s young workers. And I’ll tell you why.

    I learned the hard way that if you want to retain Generation Z workers, you need to focus on their development, not placement. For instance, when I brought on my first intern, I eagerly looked at my needs and then placed her in the department where I thought she would excel the most.

    But, after a few weeks, it became clear that she was miserable. She wanted to be doing something completely different — and she’s not the only one.

    According to Deloitte, “Most Gen Z professionals prefer a multidisciplinary and global focus to their work, with the expectation that this can create opportunities for mobility and a rich set of experiences.”

    For Gen Z, A plus B equals growth. This is why offering them the chance to cross-train is so important.

    My intern didn’t want to be boxed in by her past experience or education. She wanted an opportunity to grow. And, once I gave her that chance, I grew as a leader, too. I stopped focusing on placing my employees in specific roles and started focusing on giving them the freedom to grow within the company.

    Working with Generation Z can be a challenge, but I can guarantee you that it’ll be worth it in the end. In my experience, I’ve found you need to offer them these three things:

    • The ability to work from anywhere.
    • The chance to lead the conversation.
    • An opportunity to grow.

    If you start with that, you’re well on your way to attracting and retaining top Gen Z talent — and becoming a better leader in the process.

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    Dr. Colleen Batchelder

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  • As Inflation Soars, Consumer Habits Are Changing. Here’s How to Adapt

    As Inflation Soars, Consumer Habits Are Changing. Here’s How to Adapt

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    Opinions expressed by Entrepreneur contributors are their own.

    The current uncertain economy, coupled with rising inflation, is driving consumers to seek money-saving tactics, including cashback rewards, discounts, and online coupons.

    Economic pressures are driving the broad adoption of shopping rewards programs, which are “crossing the chasm” from coupon clippers and early adopters to mainstream consumers seeking to cut costs any way they can.

    In a survey commissioned by Wildfire and conducted by the research firm Big Village, we examined mainstream consumers’ attitudes and expectations toward rewards and other shopping incentives. The findings revealed that 90% of respondents are more interested than ever in getting discounts, using coupons and earning cashback rewards when shopping online, precisely due to rising prices.

    Related: 3 Secret Reasons Why Your Brand Needs a Rewards Program

    Rewards and discounts affect online purchase behavior

    Regardless of the economic environment, consumers will continue to shop. But in challenging financial times, they will modify their buying habits, for example, by purchasing store brands instead of more expensive options. Recent reporting on these types of behavioral shifts includes from Personetics, finding that almost 2 of 3 consumers are curbing spending on non-essentials due to the higher cost of living, and from Gartner, revealing that nearly 1 in 4 consumers will spend less on holiday shopping this year due to higher prices.

    In such a setting, rewards and other incentives are a substantial factor influencing consumers’ online shopping behavior. The availability of rewards and incentives directly and positively affects consumer behavior at the top of the purchase funnel (awareness and consideration) and the bottom (completing a purchase).

    A key finding in the Wildfire survey reveals that rewards impact consumers’ behavior even before they decide where to shop: 81% state that the availability of rewards is a factor when deciding which ecommerce retailer gets their business.

    In addition to influencing where consumers shop, rewards and incentives further impact the decision to purchase, driving higher sales conversion rates. Findings show that most respondents are more likely to complete a purchase when they can earn cashback rewards or use a coupon or discount code.

    Many consumers seek bargains when they shop online, and we expect consumers’ propensity for ferreting out discounts will further increase as the economy tightens. The majority of respondents (61%) state they “always” or “often” look for coupons, discounts, cashback rewards or other ways to save on their purchases.

    Based on these findings, the takeaways for any brand selling online are clear:

    • Retailers can win the battle for consumer preference by offering rewards for shopping, either through native loyalty programs or online cashback rewards programs.
    • Offering coupons through loyalty and rewards programs drive merchant benefits, including increased sales conversion.
    • Businesses choosing not to offer such incentives are disadvantaged in consumers’ selection of online shopping destinations.

    Related: Why Trust and Incentives Help Consumers With Better Brand Selection

    Responding to customer preferences for simplicity

    Furthermore, consumers seek ease of use and want to access rewards and discounts conveniently within the natural flow of their online shopping behavior without detours or hurdles. Most consumers surveyed for Wildfire’s report prefer rewards automatically applied at checkout or activating them while shopping without having to search elsewhere. Conversely, fewer consumers want to receive an email with a special offer, and even fewer still prefer to search through a directory of offers.

    Consumers have spoken: the simpler and more convenient a rewards program or discount offer, the better. Consumers prefer easy-to-understand, simple-to-access rewards such as cashback over rewards like points, miles, or future discounts. The survey also revealed that 80% of respondents prefer cashback as their reward instead of points or credits towards future purchases.

    The need for simplicity and convenience in rewards programs is borne out by other research. In the 2022 Loyalty Marketing & Rewards Program report from Comarch and Forrester, retail marketers were asked what they find to be the most critical elements of a loyalty program. The results showed that most are leaning toward offering cash rewards.

    What’s the implication for businesses considering a loyalty program? Online shoppers have become extremely savvy. They are now much more accustomed to seamless digital experiences, so their expectations regarding earning and redeeming rewards through retail loyalty programs or other shopping rewards programs have changed. Consumers are no longer willing to settle for jumping through hoops, and retailers will see low adoption for their program unless it is simple and convenient for customers to earn and redeem rewards.

    Related: The Marketing Power of Rewards Programs

    Conclusion

    By offering easy-to-access shopping incentives — such as cashback and coupons — businesses selling online can meet the demands of today’s value-seeking consumers. Through such programs, they cannot only positively influence consumers’ purchase behavior but also provide some much-needed relief for their wallets.

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    Jordan Glazier

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  • These Comic Creators Got a $500,000 Shark Tank Investment

    These Comic Creators Got a $500,000 Shark Tank Investment

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    “I wanted to tell a story about African history before slavery,” Manuel Godoy, co-founder of Black Sands Entertainment with his wife Geiszel, says. “[So I wrote] a story about Ancient Egypt and the surrounding areas. And it was amazing — people gravitated toward it because they finally felt included in historical contexts.”


    Courtesy of Black Sands Entertainment

    The Godoys began Black Sands Entertainment in 2016 to draw attention to the characters and stories that so often go unwritten in mainstream media. Now, the comic publisher and media venture boasts dozens of titles that represent the entire diaspora, and young adults are devouring them — just like the Godoys would have, if they’d had the opportunity at their age.

    Black Sands stands apart for its dedication to Black history and its commitment to the Black community, but something else has also contributed to its striking success: The Godoys’ status as United States Army veterans.

    Ahead of Veterans Day, Entrepreneur sat down with the Godoys to learn how they’ve grown Black Sands from crowdfunding to almost IPO with investments from Kevin Hart and Mark Cuban — and how their Army backgrounds have informed their entrepreneurial journey along the way.

    Related: 6 Ways Small-Business Owners Can Celebrate Veterans Day

    “Momentum is the biggest factor when it comes to raising capital.”

    From the start, the Godoys spread the word about their content on social media and set their sights on raising capital. Between 2017 and 2020, Black Sands ran four Kickstarter campaigns and raised $80,000 in total. Then, in 2020, they decided to launch another campaign on WeFunder.

    “We basically judged the intent of our biggest followers,” Manuel says of their approach to the 2020 campaign. “We asked them, ‘How much were you planning on investing?’ [Then we said], ‘If you were to invest this much money, we would spend at least 15 minutes talking to you about any questions you have about our company, our financials, etc.’”

    The Godoys asked, and their readers answered: They raised $40,000 in those first 24 hours. Ultimately, that campaign brought in $500,000.

    “No one wants to be the first investor,” Manuel adds. “But if you already got 300, 400 investors in the first day, everybody’s like, ‘Hey, I’m joining too.’ Momentum is the biggest factor when it comes to raising capital if you’re going through customers.”

    And the Godoys have kept up Black Sands’ momentum since those early days, climbing to the top 1% of the Patreon community, raising $2 million in capital and earning more than $2 million in revenue to date.

    Related: Why Creators Are Recession-Proof

    “We got on stage, pitched our information, and everybody fell in love.”

    Earlier this year, the Godoys appeared on Shark Tank to pitch their company.

    Shark Tank features Mark Cuban, Barbara Corcoran, Lori Greiner, Robert Herjavec, Daymond John and Kevin O’Leary as permanent judges, with Kevin Hart, Emma Grede, Peter Jones, Daniel Lubetzky and Nirva Tolia as recurring guest judges.

    The Godoys knew that Hart was going to be one of their judges ahead of time.

    “We knew we had to make him fall in love with our content,” Geiszel says. “So we got on stage, pitched our information, and everybody fell in love.”

    Initially, the Godoys offered the Sharks a 5% stake in Black Sands for $500,000, with the funds earmarked for animation development and additional titles. But Hart and Cuban countered with a 30% stake for the same investment, citing the media resources that Hart’s production company, HartBeat, could provide as Black Sands expands.

    The fact that Black Sands’ Shark Tank deal went through is a testament to its strong business model and the Godoys’ entrepreneurial savvy. Forbes spoke to 74% of the people who were offered deals on the show in seasons one through seven and found that roughly 43% of those agreements didn’t go through — because the Sharks pulled out or changed the terms.

    Now, Black Sands is focusing on that animation development — and on taking the company public.

    Not only are the Godoys dreaming of an eventual $1 billion IPO, but they’re also envisioning a future where Black Sands’ fans-turned-investors are at the forefront, continuing to hold stock as “their slice of the pie.”

    Related: The Basics of Raising Capital for a Startup

    Image credit: Courtesy of Black Sands Entertainment

    “Being in the Army taught me how to be an entrepreneur.”

    The Godoys’ experiences in the Army have helped lay the foundation for Black Sands’ success.

    “Being in the Army taught me how to be an entrepreneur,” Geiszel explains. “In the Army, I was leading a group of 30 soldiers. So it taught me about how to manage a team and run a company, because [it gives] you that discipline and structure you need.”

    Manuel agrees, noting that the Army imparts significant leadership experience, even for those lower on the chain of command — because you have to learn how to get things done on time.

    Another skill the Army teaches that every founder should have on lock? Inventory.

    “You have to know where everything is and how much you have,” Manuel says. “Otherwise, one day you run out, and it takes three months to get the next part. And you’re out of business for three months.”

    The Army has given the Godoys essential skills for running a business — and it’s also inspired some of Black Sands’ narratives.

    “I’m a war nut,” Manuel says. “I love war, so anything that has to do with strategy, military tactics, logistics, that’s stuff that I put into my writing. I make sure it logistically makes sense that [a particular] battle is happening, and that’s probably why people like the accuracy of the storylines.”

    Related: 7 Qualities the Army Instilled in Me That Helped Me Launch a Business

    “Veterans always want to choose five different businesses at once. I’m like, ‘No, stick to your favorite.’”

    There are many reasons why veterans make excellent entrepreneurs. Manuel notes the benefits they have at their disposal, which can help accelerate their business’s growth.

    Still, the Godoys stress it’s important to keep several key things in mind.

    First up? Stick to one business idea — and see it through.

    “Veterans always want to choose like five different businesses at once,” Geiszel says. “Stick to your favorite, take those military skills, apply them to your everyday business life, and you will succeed. Don’t give up. If you fail, keep going.”

    Additionally, you should know exactly who’s buying what you’re selling.

    “Find out who your core customer is,” Manuel says. “Don’t worry about what you’re going to make and how you’re going to do all that stuff. Find out who you want to sell to — because once you figure that out, then you can make a product that’s tailored to them.”

    Once you have your idea and customer in mind, you have to surround yourself with people who will help you level up.

    “Hiring the right team is very important for a business to thrive,” Geiszel says. “And you want to make sure your team is going to be loyal to your company.”

    One sure way to cultivate company loyalty? Pay people fairly, raising benefits as the company succeeds — it will make employees feel valued and willing to continue their contribution. Manuel says that Black Sands has people who have been on the team for five or six years.

    Related: The 4 Rules of Treating Employees Equitably

    “We have to champion things that the Black community wants us to champion.”

    Above all else, Black Sands is a company that refuses to sacrifice its principles.

    Originally, the co-founders wrote and designed all of Black Sands’ comic books by themselves, but they’ve begun allowing other Black creators to write for them as they build their own brands.

    Black Sands has also harnessed the power of Kickstarter as part of its larger effort to lift up Black creators and their work. The Godoys recently launched a campaign for Everett Montgomery’s Flame comic series.

    Image credit: Courtesy of Black Sands Entertainment

    “We are a company that’s dedicated to Black history,” Manuel says. “And that means that we have to champion things that the Black community wants us to champion. We can’t just go out there and be like, ‘Oh, we make comic books, and that’s all we do.’ We have to be involved in social issues and other things that are related. We have to be able to say that we actually are doing something about it.”

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    Amanda Breen

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  • How Crypto Can Be Used to Attract and Retain Top Talent

    How Crypto Can Be Used to Attract and Retain Top Talent

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    Opinions expressed by Entrepreneur contributors are their own.

    In April 2020, unemployment in the U.S. was at “the highest level on record,” followed by nearly record-low unemployment in 2022. There’s also a record high of two open jobs for every unemployed person, which is driving fierce competition for talent. Some firms are turning to cryptocurrencies to sweeten the pot.

    Offering salaries in cryptocurrency isn’t new, but it’s becoming more common as companies attempt to lure top talent. In 2017, Japanese internet company, GMO, announced that it would pay part of its employees’ salaries in bitcoin, and it is joined by the likes of SC5, Fairlay and io.

    Related: 3 Ways to Stay Competitive in the War for Talent

    Why offering crypto payroll is a meaningful perk

    A tremendous 56% of American adults (around 145 million people) own or have previously owned crypto. To offer salaries denominated in cryptocurrency is to appeal to a much wider swath of the population. What’s more, young people are particularly bullish on crypto. A recent survey found that buyers in the Gen Z and millennials buckets make up nearly 94% of all crypto buyers.

    Offering cryptocurrency as a payroll option is a way for companies to tap into this enthusiasm and signal that they’re forward-thinking when it comes to new technologies. It’s also a way to attract employees who might be interested in working for a company that is comfortable with and supportive of cryptocurrency.

    Paying salaries in cryptocurrency comes with some risks, of course. The value of digital assets can be volatile, and so a worker who is paid in crypto could see his or her earnings fluctuate wildly from month to month. For this reason, it’s important for companies to consider whether they’re prepared to offer salary protection in the form of cash top-ups or other benefits if the value of crypto falls.

    Employees may want to get paid in crypto for a number of reasons, from the potential for appreciation to the simple fact that it’s a more convenient way to hold and use digital assets. But regardless of the reasons, companies that want to stay ahead of the curve would do well to consider offering crypto payroll options. It could be the key to attracting and retaining top talent in today’s competitive landscape.

    Related: The Complete Guide to Crypto, Bitcoin, ApeCoin and Blockchain Technology

    Crypto payroll is beneficial for employers, too

    In addition to the ability to attract top talent, there are a number of reasons why paying salaries in cryptocurrency could be beneficial for employers.

    For one, it can help companies save on costs. Cryptocurrency transaction fees are generally lower than those associated with traditional payment methods like wire transfers or credit cards, particularly for cross-border payments.

    In addition, crypto payroll can help firms hedge against currency risk. If a company pays its employees in a foreign currency, it is exposed to the risk that the value of that currency will decline relative to the company’s home currency. By paying salaries in cryptocurrency or stablecoins like USDT, companies can hedge against this risk. For example, the value of the Japanese Yen dropped over 20% against the U.S. dollar (or the stablecoin equivalent, USDT) this year.

    Last but not least, crypto payroll can give companies a competitive edge when it comes to speed and efficiency. Cryptocurrency transactions are generally much faster than traditional payments, which means employees can get access to their earnings more quickly. And because digital assets can be stored and used electronically, there’s no need for paper records or checks (which can often get lost or delayed in the mail) — everything is stored securely on the blockchain.

    Related: The Future Of Banking: How Blockchain Technology Can Merge Crypto and Traditional Banking

    How to offer crypto payroll

    If you’re interested in offering crypto payroll to your employees, there are a few things you need to consider.

    First, you’ll need to decide which cryptocurrency or cryptocurrencies you want to use. There are thousands of different digital assets in existence, so it’s important to do your research and consider what makes the most sense for your company.

    For example, if you want to offer employees the ability to hold and use their earnings easily, you might want to consider a major cryptocurrency like bitcoin or Ethereum. If you’re more interested in hedging against currency risk, a stablecoin like USDT could be a good choice.

    Once you’ve selected a cryptocurrency, you’ll need to set up a way to pay salaries in that currency. The naive approach would be to simply ask employees to provide you with their cryptocurrency wallet address and manually transfer the appropriate amount each month. But this is time-consuming and exposes you to the risk of human error.

    Another option is to use a crypto payroll service. This not only saves you time and reduces the risk of error, but it also makes it easy for employees to receive their earnings directly into their own wallets or exchange them for other currencies if they so choose.

    Ultimately, offering crypto payroll is a way to stay ahead of the curve and attract top talent. If you’re interested in doing so, there are a number of things you need to consider. But with the right preparation, it could be a major competitive advantage for your business.

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    Frederik Bussler

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  • Need Workers? Employers Are Realizing The Untapped Talent of These People.

    Need Workers? Employers Are Realizing The Untapped Talent of These People.

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    Opinions expressed by Entrepreneur contributors are their own.

    If you give any leader the opportunity to increase their talent pool of potential employees by 15% — with all these new hires belonging to an underrepresented minority — they’d jump at the chance, especially given tight labor markets and CEO desires to increase headcount. Yet too few leaders realize that, according to the U.S. government, people with disabilities are the largest minority group in this country, with 50 million — 15% of the population — living with disabilities.

    Sure, many executives feel concerned by the extra investments involved in providing accommodations for people with disabilities. Yet these accommodations might not involve anything besides full-time remote work, according to a new study by the Economic Innovation Group think tank. The study found that the employment rate for people with disabilities did not simply reach the pre-pandemic level by mid-2022, but rose far past it, to the highest rate in over a decade. Remote work, combined with a tight labor market, explains this high rate, according to the researcher’s analysis.

    Related: 5 Ways Employees With Disabilities Help Maximize a Company’s Growth

    A bit of history: Employment rates among people with disabilities dropped, along with the rest of the labor market, early in the pandemic. However, they recovered quickly. People with disabilities aged 25 to 54, the prime working age, are 3.5 percentage points more likely to be employed in Q2 2022 than they were pre-pandemic. What about non-disabled individuals? They are still 1.1 percentage points less likely to be employed!

    That means the labor market recovery for those with disabilities was substantially faster than for those without disabilities. We know that both those with disabilities and those without faced a similar conditions of a tight labor market. Given that, remote work appears to offer the major differentiator that enabled those with disabilities an opportunity to join the workforce.

    These statistics align with expert statements. For example, according to Thomas Foley, executive director of the National Disability Institute (NDI), workers with disabilities had been asking to work remotely for decades before the pandemic and had consistently heard companies say “no.” During the pandemic, he said that when “we all realized that … many of us could work remotely … that was disproportionately positive for people with disabilities.”

    Related: How Entrepreneurs Can Find Great Talent Despite a Labor Shortage

    The benefits of remote work for people with disabilities are particularly relevant due to the impact of long Covid. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reports that about 19% of those who had Covid-19 developed long Covid. Recent Census Bureau data indicates that 16 million working-age Americans suffer from it, with economic costs reaching $3.7 trillion according to a recent estimate.

    Certainly, many of these so-called long-haulers experience relatively mild symptoms — such as loss of a sense of smell — which, while troublesome, are not disabling. But others experience symptoms serious enough that they have become disabled.

    According to a recent study from the Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis, about a quarter of those with long Covid changed their employment status or working hours. That means long Covid was serious enough to interfere with work for 4 million people. For many, this interference was serious enough to qualify them as disabled.

    Indeed, the Federal Reserve Bank of New York found in a just-released study that the number of disabled persons in the U.S. grew by 1.7 million. That growth stemmed mainly from long Covid conditions such as fatigue and brain fog, meaning difficulties with concentration or memory, with 1.3 million people reporting an increase in brain fog since mid-2020.

    Many had to drop out of the labor force due to the intensity of their long Covid. Yet about 900,000 newly disabled people have been able to continue working. Without remote work, they might not have.

    In fact, the author of the Federal Reserve Bank of New York study notes that long Covid can be considered a disability under the Americans with Disability Act, depending on the specifics of the condition. That means the law can require private employers with fifteen or more staff, as well as government agencies, to make reasonable accommodations for those with long Covid. The author notes that “telework and flexible scheduling are two accommodations that can be particularly beneficial for workers dealing with fatigue and brain fog.”

    Related: The Labor Shortage Is Only Getting Worse. What’s Causing It and How Can I Avoid Losing Staff?

    But companies shouldn’t need to worry about legal regulations. It simply makes dollars and sense to expand their talent pool by 15% of an underrepresented minority. After all, extensive research shows that improving diversity boosts both decision-making and financial performance.

    Companies that are offering more flexible work options have already gained significant benefits in terms of diverse hires. In its efforts to adapt to the post-pandemic environment, Meta Platforms, the owner of Facebook and Instagram, decided to offer permanent fully remote work options to its current employees and new job applicants. And according to Meta chief diversity and inclusion officer Maxine Williams, the candidates who accepted job offers for remote positions were “substantially more likely” to come from diverse communities: people with disabilities, Black, Hispanic, Alaskan Native, Native American, veterans, and women. The numbers bear out these claims: people with disabilities increased from 4.7% to 6.2% of Meta’s employees.

    Having consulted for 21 companies to help them transition to hybrid work arrangements, I can confirm that Meta’s numbers aren’t a fluke. The more my clients proved willing to offer remote work, the more disabled staff they recruited — and retained. That includes more obvious employees, such as those with long Covid symptoms and mobility challenges. But it also includes employees with invisible disabilities, such as immunocompromised people who feel reluctant to put themselves at risk of getting Covid-19 by coming into the office.

    Unfortunately, many leaders fail to see the benefits of remote work for underrepresented groups, such as those with disabilities. Some even claim the opposite: thus, JP Morgan CEO Jamie Dimon claimed that returning to the office will aid diversity. What explains this poor executive decision-making?

    One part of the answer comes from a mental blindspot called the in-group bias. Our minds tend to favor and pay attention to the concerns of those we perceive to be part of our in-group. Dimon and other executives who lack disabilities don’t perceive people with disabilities to be part of their in-group. They thus are blind to the concerns of those with disabilities, which leads to the kind of jaw-dropping statements made by Dimon that returning to the office will aid diversity.

    In-group bias is one of many dangerous judgment errors known as cognitive biases. These mental blindspots impact decision-making in all life areas, ranging from the future of work to mental fitness.

    Another relevant cognitive bias is the empathy gap. This term refers to our difficulty empathizing with those who aren’t part of our in-group. The lack of empathy combines with the blindness from the in-group bias, causing executives to ignore the feelings of disabled employees and prospective hires.

    Omission bias also plays a role. This dangerous judgment error causes us to perceive failure to act as less problematic than acting. Consequently, executives perceive a failure to support the needs and interests of those with disabilities as a minor matter.

    The failure to empower people with disabilities will prove costly to the bottom lines of companies that don’t offer remote work options to those who would benefit from such accommodations. They are limiting their talent pool by 15%. Moreover, they’re harming their ability to recruit and retain diverse candidates. And as their lawyers and HR departments will tell them, they are putting themselves in legal jeopardy for violating the ADA.

    By contrast, companies like Meta that offer remote work opportunities are seizing a competitive advantage by recruiting these underrepresented candidates and expanding their talent pool by 15%. They’re lowering costs of labor while increasing diversity. The future belongs to the savvy companies that offer the flexibility that disabled people need.

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    Gleb Tsipursky

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  • How to Solve Quiet Quitting Without Shaming Employees

    How to Solve Quiet Quitting Without Shaming Employees

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    Opinions expressed by Entrepreneur contributors are their own.

    You have probably heard of quiet quitting. If you haven’t, it’s simple: An employee continues to do their job — there’s no actual quitting involved — but they disengage. They don’t give 110%. They don’t even give 100%. Their heart is no longer in their work (if it ever was). And so, they don’t sit up, they slouch. They do only what they must.

    What do we do, then, to address this? Clean house? Fire the quiet quitters and strike fear in all who are left? Install spyware on their work computers that monitors all that they do? Many will offer that kind of advice. They’ll give hard-nosed guidance for how to get 110% from our people — which is both unreasonable and logically impossible. That path is a dead end.

    By taking a long, hard look at how we do things and acting on the faults we see there, we can solve the problem of quiet quitters once and for all.

    Related: 8 Ways to Avoid Your Employees Quiet Quitting on You

    Where did quiet quitting come from?

    Word of quiet quitting has spread via social media, LinkedIn in particular, and much has been written about it since then. Many erroneously see remote and hybrid work as catalysts. Workers aren’t saying “hello” at their coworkers’ glamorous cubicles; they’re not getting in-the-flesh visits from immediate supervisors and pats on the back from well-compensated executives. They’re on longer leashes than before, and now this disaster — a quiet, but rampant innovation-killer — has struck.

    On that point, I am skeptical. Time spent in the confines of the office does not equal greater productivity, creativity or innovation. Let’s admit it: Too much of traditional office time consists of long lunches, sharing company rumors, zoning out at a desk and fretting over the next visit to the corner office.

    Quiet quitting did not start with remote work and its lack of supervision. It’s only that people are talking about it now. If anything, that is what is new about all of this: We’re finally opening up about something we couldn’t discuss at work for many years, lest we get overheard.

    Why are people really quiet quitting?

    Let’s try talking with a random employee in our organization. Ask a few questions, like, “Could you describe your company’s strategy?” “What are your organization’s current goals and KPIs, and how you are contributing toward them?” “When was the last time you were given an honest update on how the company is doing overall?”

    If we get clear, accurate, unhesitating responses, then congratulations. We don’t likely have an opaque culture that stimulates quiet quitting, and it’s likely because we’re among those who have taken the right steps to ensure our people are fully engaged — not only with their own duties but with the company as a whole.

    Quiet quitting results from not doing what it takes to ensure employees can answer questions like those above. From the jump, quiet quitters were probably never truly engaged with the company or organization they work for. They don’t have a voice, don’t feel essential and don’t know why what they do matters. They’re acting in a way that seems right.

    Quiet quitting is not a disease. It’s a symptom of a disease, and the cure does not lie in shaming quiet quitters or pulling them back to the office so they can quietly quit under our noses without mentioning it again. If forced, once they’re back in the building, employees will start looking for the exits in favor of finding another job where they can be free and make their own choices, like the adults they are.

    All of us, managers and leaders, should look in the mirror, take stock of how we do things, and see what wrinkles we can iron out. Let’s find where we’re losing the people we’ve hired and see what we can do to correct that. Here are five things to consider.

    Related: Quiet Quitting Is Taking Over the Workforce. Here’s How to Fix It.

    1. Start at the very beginning

    What does it look like when we bring a new employee into the fold? What are they told about their place in the organization? How aware are they, not just of what’s expected of them and how they can best perform their duties, but of the long-term or even short-term goals of the company as a whole?

    Most of us have visions for our companies, not to mention metrics that we’re striving for. But when have we communicated that to the people who are there to help us achieve it?

    2. Put the big picture on display

    What do we do on a weekly, monthly or quarterly basis to promote a real sense of psychological safety, openness and belonging among our employees? How do we keep them informed about the company’s long-term goals so they don’t get lost in the bureaucracy and day-to-day tasks?

    If we have quiet quitters working for us, the answer to those questions is likely “Geez, I don’t know,” “Nothing” or something similar. Or the things we’ve been doing are not quite enough, and it’s time for a reevaluation.

    3. Stop talking. Start listening.

    Leaders don’t have a monopoly on vision. We can learn a lot from the people we’ve hired — surely that’s part of why we hired them in the first place. Perhaps it’s time for genuine connection, where we listen, rather than talk, and we see what they have to say, rather than tell them what we think.

    Let’s not ask, “How happy are you with your job?” Let’s be real. No one who’s unhappy at work will risk losing a job by saying so to the boss. Instead, let’s ask where an employee thinks the company is headed. Ask for one thing they would change about the job, and see what we can do about the bureaucracy, dysfunction and inefficiencies that your “quit quitters” are surely noticing.

    4. When all else fails, let go

    It’s true: Sometimes it’s time for quiet quitters to quit less quietly, and the best thing is to part ways. Sometimes it is not about what we’re doing wrong or not doing at all, and we must cut ties. There is nothing shameful about that.

    It could be that we hired the right person, but they’re not in the best place to do their best. Going separate ways is for the better. We can also pay the disengaged people to quit. It’s been done before, with good results for everyone. But if we do this, it’s important to engage the rest of the workforce to make sure we’re doing more than weeding out the ranks seasonally.

    5. Take a look in the mirror

    Too many commentators write and talk about quiet quitting without considering the root cause of the problem. Too often the attitude toward them is shaming and punitive.

    But it’s not about the people who work for us. It’s about us and what we have done or not done to ensure our organization behaves like a well-oiled startup.

    Innovation requires freedom, and being an employer of choice requires that we liberate our people to be themselves and do their best. We must accept that our employees are likely to have ideas on how to grow and streamline the organization that could be way better and more informed than ours.

    Related: Are You a Victim of Quiet Quitting? Look in the Mirror for Answers.

    People are quiet quitting because we aren’t being realistic and taking personal responsibility as leaders. We’re forgetting how to drive an engaged and transparent culture of innovation. And that is what we must understand if we’re to fix this problem.

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    Alex Goryachev

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  • 3 Simple Reasons to Add Technology to Your Non-Tech Business

    3 Simple Reasons to Add Technology to Your Non-Tech Business

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    Opinions expressed by Entrepreneur contributors are their own.

    You are a business owner but aren’t in the tech industry, so why would you need to focus heavily on adapting technology in your daily workflow? Some people may say you don’t need to. However, I’m here to put a bug in your head and prove how technology is critical to any business across any vertical. And that includes you!

    We know technology can be intimidating. It also can be complex, and there are seemingly endless options. So, is it worth the cost, integration headaches and question if you are picking the right ones? Yes! Here are my top three reasons to focus on technology, and I’ll explain how to integrate it into your business:

    1. Not applying technology means you could face a technology deficit

    Let’s face it, not having a line item in your books for technology and software subscriptions means your company will hit a point where you can’t grow any further. Whether your marketing team will be missing major data points for essential customer acquisition or your efficiencies will eventually put you behind, your competition could pass you by (we’ll get to this one more in the next point). No matter the roadblock you will hit, the point is your growth will have to slow down or halt. You don’t want to wait until that point to use technology once the train has left the station without you!

    Related: 5 Types of Technology All Entrepreneurs Need Access to in the Digital Age

    2. Results are everything

    No matter your business or vertical, your most valuable resource is your team. How can you empower your team to work smarter, not harder, and ultimately produce the best results? The answer is with the right technology! Even if your staff has been set in their ways and doesn’t want to learn a new program, you must pick the right operational systems and offer proper training. A minor setback in the learning curve will mean a huge uptick in productivity.

    I once ran into a mid-sized company that was technologically behind due to not prioritizing this aspect of its business. This inadequacy caused marketing and sales to lag compared to its competitors. I likened their technological powers and abilities to taking a knife to a gunfight.

    If a company can increase its operational automation in the marketing space, that would allow it to understand its target customer and truly understand how to sell to its market in an efficient and results-driven way.

    A data warehouse and congruent CRM would allow this business to properly segment and hit goals for its best marketing demographic more accurately. Identifying, understanding and addressing low-hanging fruit, such as abandoned shopping cart funnels, is crucial.

    When you are focused on results, technology almost always needs to be integrated to increase efficiencies and drive sales in the long run. And it’s always easier and cheaper to integrate the right technology early to ensure your team is trained and using it along the way!

    Related: How Technology Is Shortening the Road to Fame

    3. You’re increasing your footprint of liabilities without the right technology

    I’ve seen every range of technology integration, from the tech-savvy millennial CEO who relies on data and analytics for every business decision to the companies that don’t integrate it at all and still use a pen and paper within every significant department. However, if you are closer to the latter, you are potentially putting your team at a huge safety risk. If you have only minimal or wrong technology, you could be putting your customers, reputation and finances at risk too!

    I’ve even seen clients using only a single source for major bookkeeping and documentation, like Excel. One wrong move or fat-fingered mistake can change your calculations completely. Or worse, delete everything! If that isn’t risky, I don’t know what is.

    Technology can feel overwhelming, which is often why we hear people stay away from adding it to their daily workflow. However, there are simple ways to make that change. Start with finding a company to give you a technical audit — which is often cheaper than you might expect. Take their advice and then apply it in chunks.

    You may not need to go from 0 to 100 in the first week. You can slowly add, integrate and manage critical technology into various departments as you feel comfortable. And as I mentioned earlier, a key to tech success is training! Empower your team to take the tech leap with you and work on this together. Everyone can learn a new trick, and it could even be fun! Finally, ensure that you have a base infrastructure to make the ideal environment for success. This includes having the basic technology hardware and compatible systems in place.

    Take this article as your sign to take the first step and better your business with tech!

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    Craig Ceccanti

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