Tag: employee management

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7 Ways to Teach Your Staff ROI: The Pivot to Billable Activities

Building a successful organization requires a comprehensive business strategy across each of your departments. It is also closely related to your business model, the industry you belong to, the status of your finances, the available opportunities, and—of course—your team. While your senior management team may be aligned with the company goals and vision, you want to build a culture of self-managed rockstars. Otherwise, you'll fall into the trap of micromanagement. My guiding light is ROI.  Often, your resources are only limited. You do not have all the time to spend and disperse across hundreds of initiatives. There is always a… Continue Reading
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8 Crucial Business Skills to Weather the Recession Storm

The current decade has been turbulent at best, challenging business paradigms, industrial practices, and biological presumptions across the planet. It begs the question: What is the successful route to developing resilient business skills for the years to come? From a global pandemic ranking near the Spanish Flu of 1918-1920 to worldwide lockdowns suffocating the travel and hospitality industries, through an overnight transition to remote work, a massive bump of cryptocurrencies, a housing market growing like crazy from Hong Kong to San Francisco to a global crash in 2022, businesses definitely had to endure a lot. Back to The Global Recession… Continue Reading
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Creating an Employee Performance Review and Feedback Workflow

Resilience is my number 1 hiring trait.  As a manager, you will have ups and downs with your employees, and your feedback should reflect this. It's not about harshness or power play, mind you. Receiving critical feedback may be absolutely devastating for juniors and many introverts.  However, your options are very limited and you don’t want to do any of the following that might only jeopardize the entire company: Stick to praising (missing out on improvements) Prolong tough times until it becomes unbearable Sugar-coat problems Look for a replacement because a civilized conversation is unlikely Deliver feedback and receive a… Continue Reading
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Workplace Communication Techniques and Strategies

No matter what role you have in an organization - a manager, a vendor, a consultant, or an advisor - each comes with its own challenges, particularly in managing workplace communication issues. Effective communication is the lifeblood of any successful organization, and navigating these challenges is essential for fostering a productive and harmonious work environment. These communication issues often involve conflicts in employee relations. It's usually the nitpicking or annoyance from the older hire that shows. Or, complaints about too much communication overhead or lack of proper onboarding internally primarily caused by the lack of Wiki or other documentation in… Continue Reading
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The 4 P’s of Employee Relations and Conflict Management in the Workplace

Workplace conflict costs $359 billion in paid hours or 385 million working days annually. This is according to the “Workplace Conflict and How Business Can Harness it to Thrive” report. There were news articles about Apple employees having concerns about the ‘rigid’ rules in hybrid working, while Google’s people were frustrated about the ‘two tiers’ remote working. No wonder why in the month of April 2021, the Great Resignation started happening. Given the diverse range of expenses related to workplace conflicts, it becomes imperative for organizations to prioritize conflict prevention, early intervention, and constructive resolution strategies. By fostering a positive work… Continue Reading
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Managing Interruptions And Boosting Work Performance During Crisis

Digital businesses were forced to move fully remotely during the social isolation of COVID-19. But this is one of the worst experiments of "testing out remote working." Employees experience different dynamics at home. Kids are home-schooled (or babysitters are no longer available). Social contacts are non-existent. The biological weapon creeping out there keeps everyone alert. So do you still think coronavirus is the best social experiment for assessing a distributed company? Remote Work In COVID-19 Times Enter the world of interruption science. Different studies under interruption science report that interruption during productive hours may take 15 to 45 minutes for… Continue Reading
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Onboarding Best Practices That Every Business Should Use

Onboarding new employees is an essential part of the recruitment process. Skipping this requirement can backfire big time.  But here's the thing: onboarding a new hire takes months until reaching efficiency. Hiring the wrong fit is often a 5-figure investment (and past $100K for some roles), considering mentorship, training, and involving other team members and management in the process. Onboarding Is Crucial To Reduce Hiring Costs Since hiring is so expensive, it's approached carefully. I try to simplify the recruitment process by hiring motivated people eager to solve problems, avoid cultural misalignments (and a toxic environment), and ensure everyone can… Continue Reading
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The Practical Guide to Hiring Employees

Hiring new employees is among the biggest problems businesses face. From micro businesses to large enterprises, finding and closing top talent is a major challenge that we're all eager to overcome. Hiring Employees With Qualified Talent Having led over a thousand interviews, I’ve faced challenges with almost every role I looked for in IT. Software engineers — needless to say, companies are competing for top talent in engineering, not the other way around. Resources are scarce and companies keep growing, therefore demand is through the roof. As an extra challenge, top engineers often switch to management/training, open their own companies,… Continue Reading
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7 Reasons Why It is Difficult to Manage New Projects (Or Inherit an Old One)

What makes projects so difficult to manage? As a project manager, you need to assess the culture, your role, your team, how problems escalate, what your responsibilities are and how to tackle edge cases (delays, problematic team members, running out of budget, handling scope creep, disagreeing with a client, etc.) And within the right environment, everyone follows the company mission statement and the core principles of the organization. This will turn your decision-making process into a quantifiable, well-oiled machine, which should facilitate the team and get the work done. Project management is, in theory, the activity of ensuring a project’s… Continue Reading
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Strategies In Managing A Software Development Team

Prior to launching my own web development agencies over 10 years ago, I’ve jumped between the role of a senior developer and a manager multiple times – including leading and managing a software development team role. My first stunt in management was back in 2007. We were building a Java-based distributed software for a telecom group operating in multiple countries. I spent a year and a half with the company as a developer before joining the project along with our Chief Technology Officer (CTO), and a couple of other developers. The CTO and I spent several months working closely together… Continue Reading