Tag Archives: Professional Career Development

What type of digital marketing strategies should we implement for a startup?

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This question came from a busy professional.

What type of digital marketing strategies should we implement for a startup?

What type of digital marketing strategies should we implement for a startup? We are in the primary stage and do not have much money. 

Congratulations on starting your business. The amazing thing regarding digital marketing is that it doesn’t cost much money to get started.  But you do need to invest time, energy and creativity.   You need to be committed to a consistent and frequent investment of time.   But that’s what startups are all about!

We will go into a general marketing strategy and then focus on digital marketing solutions.

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How to quit a job without burning bridges

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This question came from a busy professional.

 How do you quit a job without burning bridges?

 

I work for a consulting company and just got assigned to a 3-4-month project at the client site due to begin in early May or early June. I found out about this project last week and unfortunately, I wasn’t given a choice. The concern that I have is that I was already planning to give my resignation notice in early May and leave the company by the end of May at the latest.

I would like to tell my supervisor now that I won’t be around to take on the critical project, so they can find a replacement right away and run it by the client – but I need to iron out the details with my potential new employer first. I don’t want to put the cart before the horse. My supervisor has been good to me and I don’t want to put her in a difficult situation, as she would need to find a replacement immediately after I begin the project and the client will not be thrilled about potential delays in project delivery.

Given the timing and importance of the project with a key client, I run the risk of burning bridges. Not sure what I should do. Any advice helps.
Without knowing much about your current situation – the problem doesn’t seem to be your current job.  The problem is how long it is taking the new employer to iron out things with your new position.  Therefore, I recommend focusing on fixing that area first.

Managing the New Employer

If you cannot iron out things with the new employer relatively quickly, this is a red flag that any future issues will also be difficult to complete.  If your new employer is unable or not willing to complete these things in a reasonable time frame, this is not a good sign.  The new employer is putting his/her best foot forward at the time of hire.  This is as good as it gets.

So, you need to start on the right foot with the new employer.

Transparency with New Employer

Transparency is always a good thing when starting a new position.

  • Tell your new employer that you need to iron these things out very quickly (within the next week or two).
  • Tell your new employer what is going on with your current employer and upcoming contract.
  • Set a reasonable deadline to “iron out the details” of the new job.

The new employer will appreciate that you don’t want to put your current employer in a bind.  This illustrates that you will be as conscientious with the new employer as you are with your current employer.

Next Steps

At this point, you have 2 directions to go:

  1. Deadline is accomplished
  2. Deadline is missed

Deadline is accomplished

If the new company makes the agreed-upon deadline, at that time – talk to your current manager about your plans to leave at the end of May.

  • Offer to mentor and train someone else during May on this new project.
  • Offer to use the time to document and automate any tasks to make it easier for your replacement.
  • Offer to conduct any training sessions, video or record any training tutorials to make the transition easier.
  • Don’t feel guilty or apologize that you didn’t tell them sooner because you really didn’t know sooner.

Deadline is missed

If the new company cannot make the agreed-upon deadline, consider this a RED FLAG.

  • Give the new employer additional time (3-4 months) to iron out those details (during which time you complete the other project).
  • Let the new company know that during that time you will be working on that other project for your current company.
  • Offer to do some part-time projects for the new company during that time.
  • Revisit that new company again in 3 months to see if those “details are ironed out”.
  • Line yourself up to join that new company full-time at the completion of that other project.

You always have options and say when it comes to your career and future employment.

Things to avoid saying during a salary negotiation

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Today’s question comes from a busy professional:

What are some things to avoid saying during a salary negotiation? Please respond with any top tips
for mid-career people looking to negotiate a higher salary.

It’s time to ask for a raise, what are some things to avoid saying during a salary negotiation?

How to prepare

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Marketing with Customer Satisfaction in Mind

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Hello, this is Laura Lee Rose – author of the business and time management books TimePeace: Making peace with time – the The Book of Answers:  105 Career Critical Situations – and I am a  business and efficiency coach that specializes in time management, project management and work-life balance strategies.

 

Today’s question comes from a busy professional:

When does marketing meet customer service?

If your marketing and customer service strategies do not meet somewhere, your customers will fall through the gap. Having an understanding of how these two departments come together for the customer experience is critical to delighting your customer throughout their relationship with your company. After all, the customer will look at these functions as coming from the company as a whole, and as independent departments.

With marketing’s job being the first contact with a customer and customer service happening much further down the customer life cycle, these two departments seemingly have no overlapping strategy. But, we know this is simply not true based on research which indicates that the customer expectations set by marketing in the beginning have a significant impact on customer service’s ability to please a customer later on.

 

Thank you so much for your well-thought out question.  Although the answer may be slightly different depending upon the specific market or industry, a good market plan normally starts with two pieces:

  • Marketing with the client in mind
  • Marketing with the product/service in mind

 

Marketing with the client in mind

The market plan begins with the target customer in mind.

  • Define your product/service/company’s differential or niche.
  • Define your target market or specific customer that needs or wants your product and service.
  • Imagine what will attract your target customer base and then create effective campaigns that will attract that customer base.

So – in essence, the entire market campaign is centered on attracting that perfect client.

Marketing with the product or service in mind

You also need to keep your product or service in mind while marketing.   You very well cannot market an automobile when you are selling a cat.  At the same time, some marketing campaigns over sell the product to get that signature on that dotted line.

This is the situation that sets the improper customer expectations. This is the situations that will impact your over customer satisfaction ratings and increase your customer service calls.

Money is in the balance

Customer and Company satisfaction occurs when customer and marketing expectations match.

  • The company makes money when the purchase price of the product outweighs the cost of making the product.
  • The company makes money when the client returns and refers other customers.
  • The client returns (and refers) when their expectations of value have been met or exceeded.

If marketing consistently over-promises to make a “sell”, they run the risk of eventually:

  • Overrunning the budget of time, materials, and resources to complete the task (costing the company more money than they would receive for the project)
  • Missing over-promised deadlines and product features to the client (costing the company the client’s return visits and referrals)

Even if the sales and marketing teams do succeed in this client contract, it’s unlikely that the client will return.

Ensuring Balance

To ensure balance, the marketing sales account manager work together with their production or creating services teams, from the start.

  • Both teams review the client contract or Statement of Work (which the production team is expected to fulfill).
  • Both teams are required to approve and sign-off on the features and delivery commitments.
  • The account manager then meets with the client to explain any changes to the feature list or delivery schedule.
  • The production team can also be available to answer any technical questions regarding the changes.

Once the contract or SOW is signed by the client, the product team can get started on the product or service.

It is also important to note that the account manager owns that customer relationship.  Therefore, once the product or service is completed, the account manager meets with the client to deliver the product, review the changes, explain its usage, review the original contract to illustrate all commitments have been met and get a feel for the client’s satisfaction.

the Main Event isn’t the Sell

Keeping both the company and client expectations in mind – upfront – can lead you to a successful conclusion.  A sell isn’t the main event.  The company is in the business of making money.  Therefore, you must always consider the cost of making that sell.

I know your situation is different.  If you would like additional information on this topic, please contact LauraRose@RoseCoaching.info

I am a business coach and this is what I do professionally.  It’s easy to sign up for a complementary one-on-one coaching call, just use this link https://www.timetrade.com/book/WFSFQ

 

With enough notice, it would be my honor to guest-speak at no cost to your group organization.

Building an all-star team of employees at a small business

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What do you look for when you’re building an all-star team of employees?

Do you seek out those who fit into your company culture, focus on skill sets, or look for enthusiasm? (Or maybe all of the above!) We’re a small business and entrepreneurs looking for tips when hiring team players.

Executives discussing documents at meeting

What makes this a difficult situation is that you are a small business.  You don’t have the time to invest in training someone green.  At the same time, you may not have the money to match the salary requirements of the more experienced candidates.

I’ve met with several entrepreneurs that focused on enthusiasm and personalities, with the hope that the new hire would grow into the position.  The problem is that as busy entrepreneurs and small business owners – you don’t have the time to train the new hire.  What eventually happens is that the new hire never meets expectations, because they are never given the training that they were expecting.

  • The small business owners still does many of the jobs that the new person was hired to do AND pay the new hire her salary.
  • The new hire is frustrated because she can’t get the proper training AND gets reprimanded because she isn’t doing the job correctly.

Breaking the Cycle

There are a few ways to break this cycle.

  • Contract those duties or tasks to freelance talent
  • Hire a training consultant for the new employee
  • Hire an experienced, older employee on a sliding scale

 

Contract or freelance talent

The advantage of hiring contract or freelance talent is that you only hire when you need that particular talent or task completed.  It depends on the task that is required, of course.

For simple administration and executive assistant duties, you can call upon Virtual Assistants services.  This is great if your needs are a few hours or days a week.

There are also several freelance services for graphics, audio, video, copy-writing, social media and marketing.

The assumption with these contract services is that there is little training required, and if you are not satisfied with their work, you can change resources at the end of the short-term contract.

 

Training consultant

If you need full-time, in-house staff consider hiring a training consultant to create your orientation materials, your employee handbooks, document your desired procedures and then train your new hires.

This allows you to hire younger, less experienced staff (at lower rates), give them the training and orientation attention they deserve, without adding to your already overflowing plate.

 

Hiring experience, older employees

 

The last possibility is to look at experienced but older candidates.  Often times, older candidates have less expenses.  Their children are grown; they own their own home with no mortgage; and they have little debt.  They may even understand the difficult situation of the small business owner.

Therefore; they may be open to sliding salary scale (a lower starting salary with regular review for increases based on the success of the company).

I know your situation is different.  If you would like additional information on this topic, please contact LauraRose@RoseCoaching.info

I am a business coach and this is what I do professionally.  It’s easy to sign up for a complementary one-on-one coaching call, just use this link https://www.timetrade.com/book/WFSFQ

 

With enough notice, it would be my honor to guest-speak at no cost to your group organization.

How can we tackle multiple language issues within our portal?

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Today’s question comes from a busy entrepreneur:

How can we tackle multiple language issues within our portal?

I am currently involved in the management of a B2B platform, eWorldTrade. The problem is that we cannot hire thousands of customer service representatives to deal with the huge number of clients registering everyday belonging to different countries.

The problem with most of the countries is that they prefer to speak a language other than English and we cannot hire that many people to tackle this issue. How do you handle such a problem?

Congratulations for fully embracing the global trade environment. As you know, the language and time zone obstacles are just a few of the challengers you are experiencing.  Staffing for every language is a daunting.

First – don’t assume that all customers need the same level of support.

Here are a few things to consider before hiring.

Know your customers

Find out exactly where your clients are, the language they speak, and their communication preference.  Even though you may have a large percentage of clients in a specific country – many of those clients may prefer to communicate via email or “not at all”.  They may prefer getting their information via whitepapers, videos, or other means.

You can log and track their preferences quickly through a registration form.  A simple questionnaire on their communication and language preference will manage this piece.  Also ask if they understand English (or whatever your primary language for your company will be).

Update your CRM (Customer Relationship Management system) with this information.

Update your List Management server to create groups or segment based on communication preferences.

Hire multilingual customer support staff

With the above information, determine which will be your top 3 primary languages and staff a few multilingual customer support staff members. These multilingual employees should be placed as 2nd-line help support staff.  The first-line help support staff will initially handle the customer calls, and will pass to the 2nd-line when they have hit an issue they cannot solve.

Placing the multilingual employees as the 2nd-line of help, allows you to handle many more language issues (versus placing the multilingual employee on the actual help line).  These 2nd-line support employees will also be responsible for translating alternative support documents (more about this in the next section).

Supplement with alternative support information

Create and translate a series of alternative customer support materials:

  • Create an FAQ document that you continually add
  • Include tutorials and other informational/educational documents
  • Add closed captions/annotation to videos in the various languages
  • Translate your regularly scheduled emails or newsletters

Tying it together

This method allows you to provide various customer solutions in multiple languages with limited resources.  Since you have already employed multilingual 2nd-line support staff, you already have in-house translators.

Because your CRM will include your client’s language preference, you can forward the appropriate documents in the appropriate language to your clients.  You will also understand which languages you need.

Because your List Management system is already segmented into client communication preferences, you can easily mail your newsletters/emails in different languages to the appropriate sub-lists, groups or segments.

Hope this helps a little.

 

How to best leave your current job

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Hello, this is Laura Lee Rose – author of the business and time management books TimePeace: Making peace with time – the The Book of Answers:  105 Career Critical Situations – and I am a  business and efficiency coach that specializes in time management, project management and work-life balance strategies.

Today’s question comes from a busy professional:

I’m searching for career expert that will answer this question: “When someone has accepted another position and preparing to leave their current job, what is the best advice you’d give them?”

There are several ways or reasons to leave your current job:

  • New job at same company but different department or location
  • New job at a different company
  • Starting your own business
  • Retiring

Remain Professional

In all cases, my best advice is to always remain professional.  This means:

  • Document all your projects and make all your notes available – so that others can pick up exactly where you left off.
  • Leave your number in case they need to consult with you on some things after you leave.  (People rarely will take you up on that offer – but it’s really the thought/offer that counts)
  • OFFER to contact your clients and introduce them to the person taking over for you  This provides your clients a smooth continuity to the new person as well as lets them know what’s going on.
  • OFFER to meet with the person taking over for you – to review all your documents, notes and answer questions about clients, etc
  • Give 2 weeks’ notice – so that you can do the above transition

The Handoff

Regardless of why you leave, you want to be seen as a valuable contributor – even as you walk out the door.  One way to illustrate your value is the handoff.   This is where you outline all your tasks, procedures and assets used to do your role.

Unfortunately, more times than not, you will not have an actually “person” to train or prepare for your departure.  Many employers fail to identify a replacement until you are long gone.  This means you need to be document everything of significance.  I recommend you document all the time, while you are in the current job.  There may be times when you are on vacation, out sick, or considered for a larger position.  Having your hand-off documentation always available allows you to either temporarily or permanently walk away with the confidence that everything will still run smoothly because of your preparedness.

Client Handoff

Contacting your clients and introducing them to the “new person” is another hand-off item.  Make sure to check with your supervisors before contacting your clients because some employees prefer to handle that piece differently.  But you should always offer because it:

  • Illustrates your commitment to your clients
  • Put the client notification on the employee’s radar as an important aspect of the hand-off

Giving Notice

Giving 2 weeks’ notice is not as common as in the past.  Depending upon the reason for your departure, your employer may choose to release you sooner.  But I still recommend it.  A 2-week’s notice gives you the time to execute a professional hand-off to co-workers, clients and other assets.

Life is full of twists and turns. You will never know when your paths are going to cross again.  Therefore, you want to be professional at all times.

I know your situation is different.  If you would like additional information on this topic, please contact LauraRose@RoseCoaching.info

I am a business coach and this is what I do professionally.  It’s easy to sign up for a complementary one-on-one coaching call, just use this link https://www.timetrade.com/book/WFSFQ

With enough notice, it would be my honor to guest-speak at no cost to your group organization.

 

How to objectively measure soft skills in employee feedback?

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Last article we were discussing “How to give feedback employees will here?”  In that article, we used very objective examples.  It was easy to measure performance against technical tasks, but how does one determine SMART goals for soft or people skills?

Let’s review the same tips, but this time – with soft skills examples.

Setting the stage

Giving an effective feedback starts with understanding your employees’ goals and career objectives.  Once you understand the “why” the employee comes to work – the better you can connect the feedback to their goals.

For example, if they want to eventually lead the team or become a manager, then focus on the skill sets that will help them achieve those goals.

For example:  Managers require:

  • Problem Solving and Decision Making.
  • Planning
  • Delegation
  • Internal Communications.
  • Meeting Management.
  • Managing Yourself

These business goals need to be S.M.A.R.T. (Specific, Measurable, Achievable/Attainable, Relevant and Time bound).  With SMART goals, it’s very easy for both the employee and manager to agree whether the goals were met or exceeded.

Some examples of SMART PBC might be:

  • Successfully complete management courses XYZ within 6 months
  • Successfully complete time and project management course ABC within 3 months
  • Successfully participate and deliver executive summary reports in 3 executive staff meetings by Dec 15th
  • Speak at (at least) 2 technical conferences regarding how you solved a critical situation regarding this industry
  • Select and mentor at least 1 person to take over some of your coding, debugging and documentation tasks. Successfully hand-of at least one maintenance project to your protégé.
  • Create and implement an internal communication plan for your department within 3 months
  • Successfully project manage/schedule/budget 1 project start from finish (with supervision) during this performance period

 

As you can see, greeing upon this soft-skills SMART goals actually commits the manager to help her employee succeed.

Barriers to hearing

The most prevalent barrier to hearing and understanding feedback is our mindset.  The moment your supervisor releases a perceived negative comment, we automatically go into defensive mode.  Our brain immediately will find situations that negative what was just been said or provide detailed reasons/excuses for the events.

Best advice is to continually focus on the SMART goals or commitments set at the start of the year.  Use the agreed upon PBCs as your starting point.  Since your PBCs will have specific metrics and goals in place for each performance commitment, it will be easy to determine if the criteria has been met.

For example, If one of the PBC goals was to speak at (at least) 2 technical conferences regarding how you solved a critical situation regarding this industry – it is very easy to tell if they accomplished this goals.

Then simply ask the employee if he/she feels if they have met that particular goal.

Repeat this until all the PBC goals are reviewed.

Making sure employees get it

Once you and the employee have agreed upon the status of the PBC goal, ask their opinion on where to go from here.

For instance, if the employee agrees that he/she did not meet this soft skill goal – you can now start a discussion on where to go from here.

The discussion is focused on working on a solution together. Brainstorm on some titles and abstracts they can present.  Show him/her how to search for technical conferences in your industry and advise him/her to start submitting abstracts.  Once the abstract is accepted, encourage him/her to practice on co-workers and local professional organizations.  Encourage him/her to conduct a webinar or video their talk.  The more they practice, the better their soft skills.

As you can see – these discussions then become the foundation of their next PBC SMART goals.

Keep them involved

At the end of the day, keeping your employees involved and engaged in their own career development is key.

 

When is the best time to add projects to our tracker

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A busy professional has this question regarding time management:

When is the best time to add projects to our tracker, when a client pays or when we receive a RFP (Request for Proposal)?

We are finalizing our project management and service provision policies and although we track work from the moment we have to submit a proposal, we want to make sure we aren’t wasting valuable time tracking projects that don’t follow through. But we still want to be prepared with assignments and tasks when the bottom line is signed.

Clarify your goals for project management

The simple answer is to follow your GOAL.

Is your goal really to not waste valuable time tracking projects that don’t follow through?  Or is your goal to make sure nothing falls through the cracks, that everything runs smoothly and efficiently;  and make sure your quality connectivity is maintained?

If your goal is to make sure nothing falls through the cracks, everything runs smoothly and quality connectivity is maintained – then you really do need someone to track every step from conception through delivery and deployment (and even afterward regarding maintenance and up-sale opportunities).

Every project created equal

Does everyone have to be involved in every step? No.

Does every project have to be handled the same way? No.
Should someone be steering the ship throughout every journey? Yes.
Should someone be collecting metrics throughout every project? Yes.
Do you have to use the same tracker or project plan for every phase? No.
Not every project is created equal.  You don’t have to treat every project the same.  Having said that, you should have every project tracked from start to end.

The benefit for tracking everything is that you will be learning how long things actually take, how much things actually cost, etc. Even if the project doesn’t go to the end – you have collected valuable information to reuse and improve your cost and time estimates for future projects. You will have collected valuable data for process improvement.

Problem with tacking after payment

You also have the possibility of the contract being signed, without up-front payment. They may pay on a payment plan OR upon delivery. In those cases, it doesn’t help you to start tracking only when the client pays.

Tracking before the RFP

You should actually be tracking your time and effort regarding lead-to-sales effort as well (i.e. how long it takes from receiving the lead to actually being able to submit a proposal). Tracking the steps, time and effort in this sales process also provides invaluable data regarding process improvement, need for additional sales tools or training. The overall goal is to reduce that lead-to-RFP time; as well as improve the Lead-to-Sale conversion numbers.
Does this type of sales project management tracking need to be the same as the development project management tracking tool? No. Sales could use their CRM (Customer Relationship Management) tool to track and analyze their effectiveness.

Bottom line – you aren’t wasting valuable time tracking projects, although you can waste your time collecting/tracking the wrong data. You can always, always, always use proper tracking information to good use. You just need decide the right metrics to collect and make the data useful to you.

How to give feedback employees will hear?

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A busy professional has this question regarding employee performance reviews.

She asked:

  • How to give feedback employees will hear?
    What are some tips for giving effective feedback?
  • What are the barriers to hearing and understanding feedback?
  • When giving feedback, how can you make sure employees get it?

 

Who needs the feedback the most?

These are very good questions.  Before we answer each of them, lets review some reasons employees need constructive feedback.

  • They are doing well but seem too comfortable in their current position. They don’t seem to have any desire for advancement
  • They are average performers but are essentially falling behind because those around them are excelling
  • They are excelling
  • They are performing below expectations

As you can see, the need for employee feedback isn’t isolated to those that are not performing as expected.  Exceptional, Above Average, and Average employees all need constructive feedback.

Setting the stage

Giving an effective feedback starts with understanding your employees’ goals and career objectives.  Once you understand the “why” the employee comes to work – the better you can connect the feedback to their goals.

For example, if they want to eventually lead the team or become a manager, then focus on the skill sets that will help them achieve those goals.

These business commitments or goals need to be agreed upon at the start of the performance review year.  These documented PBC (Personal Business Commitments) tie the individuals role/responsibilities to the company goals.  Everyone understands how they can individually contribute to the company’s success.   These PBCs can then be reviewed several times during the year and before the official performance review.  Setting the stage in this manner makes feedback easier, because everyone involved understands both the employer and employee expectations.

These business goals need to be S.M.A.R.T. (Specific, Measurable, Achievable/Attainable, Relevant and Time bound).  With SMART goals, it’s very easy for both the employee and manager to agree whether the goals were met or exceeded.

Barriers to hearing

The most prevalent barrier to hearing and understanding feedback is our mindset.  The moment your supervisor releases a perceived negative comment, we automatically go into defensive mode.  Our brain immediately will find situations that negative what was just been said or provide detailed reasons/excuses for the events.

Best advice is to continually focus on the SMART goals or commitments set at the start of the year.  Use the agreed upon PBCs as your starting point.  Since your PBCs will have specific metrics and goals in place for each performance commitment, it will be easy to determine if the criteria has been met.

For example, If one of the PBC goals was to standardize code reviews in the development team to reduce delivered defects to test group by 30% – and the employee (team leader) still does not conduct regular code reviews and the defect rates to test group are on the rise – all you need to do is share the past defect rate and current defect rates.

Then simply ask the employee if he/she feels if they have met that particular goal.

Repeat this until all the PBC goals are reviewed.

Making sure employees get it

Once you and the employee have agreed upon the status of the PBC goal, ask their opinion on where to go from here.

For instance, if the employee agrees that the team did not meet the defect rate goals – he/she also agrees that standardized code reviews would have caught a number of these defects by simple review – and therefore would have been fixed prior to sending to the test team, you can now start a discussion on where to go from here.

The discussion is focused on working on a solution together. Perhaps it’s unrealistic for the team to take the time to gather and code-review each other’s work.  Perhaps there isn’t enough time in the schedule to detail code review.  Therefore perhaps the next assignment is for the team leader to investigate and recommend a development tools that automatically code reviews. The mandate then becomes 80% of all the code review defects are fixed before handing to the test group.   Perhaps the new PBC is to automate the unit tests going forward such that a set of automated acceptance tests are run before handing off to the test group.    Then the development teams continually add to the unit tests as they go along.

As you can see – these discussions then become the foundation of their next PBC SMART goals.

Keep them involved

At the end of the day, keeping your employees involved and engaged in their own career development is key.  Although the above examples were technical, this method also works on soft or people skills.