Alexandra Levit's Water Cooler Wisdom

Spreading the Word About Your Great Culture Isn't As Hard As You Think!

Most companies I know with great cultures are pretty modest about it. “Working here speaks for itself,” one CEO told me recently.

But does it? While it’s true that positive word of mouth does tend to spread, organizations that excel at culture usually don’t receive anywhere near the level of recognition they deserve.

When it comes to culture in the workplace, the only thing that seems to be on most people’s radar is Fortune’s Best Companies to Work For list. Now that the list is almost three decades old, other publications have joined the ranking bandwagon, including Working Mother and Crain’s. If you're looking for recognition and promotion of your company's culture, you can apply to one of these lists, but the process can be arduous and the ratio of those that apply and those that win is daunting.

Take company culture recognition into your own hands. Whether you have a public relations staff or it’s just you, publicity is essential to furthering your cultural mission, motivating staff internally and encouraging others to emulate you.

It's not as hard as it sounds. For easy, inexpensive ways to promote your culture, check out my post at the AMEX Open Forum.

How to Look Like a Bigger Deal Than You Are

I love it when people tell me that they think my website is impressive, because that means my site has achieved its primary goal. By employing a streamlined and professional design and including my expertise in a flattering way, the site makes me look like a bigger deal than I am.

Now since I have a job as a public expert, a website that showcases my clients, media appearances, etc. is important. My online presence is many people’s first introduction to me, and I earn a living based on whether or not it inspires loads of confidence. This may or may not be the case for you, but fortunately, there are several other ways you can position yourself as a big deal right there in your home office. Among them:

Take two hours to write your bio

If you haven’t been asked for your biography to include in a company publication or initiative yet, it’s coming. Most people make the mistake of dashing off – in about thirty seconds -a one-paragraph bio rambling off the years they worked at this company and that company. Don’t do this. Instead, carefully study the bios of the people in your industry who make a lot of money and garner a lot of accolades, and model yours after theirs. Remember to include things that are important to your audience (for example, my readers really respect a publication like the New York Times so the fact that I am a writer there is a big deal). When a strong bio serves as a first introduction, you are ahead of the game before you even open your mouth or shake hands.

For more where this came from, visit the full post over at Intuit's Fast Track blog.

4 Reasons to Use Social Media to Market Yourself

My friends Miriam Salpeter and Hannah Morgan are always on the cutting edge regarding the efficient use of social media for your career.  Now, in their new book, Social Networking for Business Success, they provide advice for how to launch and grow a business or personal brand using social media.  Here are four gems to start.

 

Keep up with the economic trends

 

Research shows the global workforce will become more and more reliant on freelancers and independents to get jobs done. Use social media to begin to market yourself and you will be ahead of the curve.

 

Grow your network

 

When it's time to land a new job or gig, you can't always rely on your close network to help you connect to opportunities. When you use social networking tools, you can engage with people from around the country and around the world and become a thought leader in your field.

 

Demonstrate your expertise

 

Anyone who hires you will want proof that you are as good as you say you are. When you use social media to demonstrate your expertise, you can show how well you know what's going on in your industry.

Highlight your emotional intelligence

Social media is great to showcase those hard to categorize skills, such as leadership, communication and judgement. When you maintain a vibrant community online, for example a LinkedIn group or Google+ community, you show an employer your leadership potential. Similarly, when your social media streams are 100% professional, they demonstrate you can stay out of trouble and represent an organization well.

MoneyCrashers and the Potential Future of Journalism

Andrew Schrage, founder of MoneyCrashers, is making headlines with his attempt to completely reinvent the way personal finance news is funded and reported.  I had the chance to interview Andrew a few months back and share the highlights from our conversation here!

Andrew, who funds Money Crashers, and what is their objective?

Money Crashers Personal Finance is funded internally, currently with no outside help. The objective is to remain that way; however, outside investor help would possibly be considered as an option in the future, depending upon our level of growth and expansion.

MoneyCrashers produces a lot of content on a daily basis.  How is the operation organized?

We recently expanded our level of output to include multiple postings each and every day. Managing this expansion was a challenge, but by remaining cognizant of the dangers of fast small business growth strategies and a firm commitment to our core goals (namely, quality above quantity), we have been able to avoid some of these issues thus far. We are organized in a way that is informal and encouraging towards creativity, as we let our writers fully participate in the process of choosing what topics and articles will be written and eventually published on the site. We really try to maintain a collaborative atmosphere where everyone's ideas are strongly considered and often implemented, whether it's on the site or on our social media channels (for example, implementing a weekly TweetChat was a suggestion from one of our team members that has worked out great). Maintaining a “neighborly” feel to the business has always been a focus of mine. I previously worked in a strict, corporate environment at a hedge fund, and I wanted to foster a more enjoyable atmosphere.

How many employees are at your physical location? What is the culture like there?

We currently have about 15 team members. The culture is informal, attire is very relaxed, hours are flexible, and two-way communication is a key. Our team members come from all walks of life, and all seem to be able to thrive in our current corporate culture. There is very little hierarchy within Money Crashers. Any writers or editor can call my cell phone or set up a meeting anytime, and I'll gladly discuss anything with them.

How is a Money Crashers staff writer's life different than a traditional reporter's (in a traditional newsroom)?

We are different in the fact that just about everything we do as a team is a collaborative process. It is certainly not like the owners of the site determine the direction of the site and delegate topics without considering the opinion of the rest of the team. To the contrary, our team members are fully engaged in this process. Many writers also have the flexibility of working from home, which affords them a lifestyle that plays into a family or very active life.

I believe that MoneyCrashers is a great example of one possible future for the world of journalism.  What do you think?

Building Culture in a Digital World

Quick quiz: true or false?

1. You don’t know anyone who works at your company.
2. You try not to involve yourself with your company’s digital networks.
3. When it comes to certain office protocols, you have no idea what is and isn’t acceptable.

If you answered ‘True’ to these statements, you’re part of the 20 percent of global employees who work on virtual teams, and your organization’s culture is a total mystery to you.

This is a problem, because even as we strive to enhance our cultures so our employees will stick around, our strategies mostly shut out employees who don’t come into our offices. If we want to encourage collaboration and track productivity, we have dozens of effective digital tools from which to choose. But when it comes to tools meant to inform and reinforce culture, there’s not much.

In a recent article for Fast Company, Austin Carr reported on a few new technologies that are a step in the right direction. Yammer, which is an enterprise social network that Microsoft acquired for $1.2 billion, acts like a Facebook for internal business use. It enables employees to exchange messages, media and status updates—integrating the option to “Like” a coworker’s post or give him or her “Praise” badges.

Taking it a step further is emotional intelligence company Kanjoya, which has a product called Crane that taps into an organization’s Yammer network and analyzes data to measure how employees are feeling at any given moment or on any given topic. Crane can tell, for instance if your employees are irritated by a new policy or don’t like the way management is handling a current issue. Although it’s not always clear what leaders should do with Crane’s data from a big picture perspective, the program at least allows them to address small details that might otherwise go unnoticed and fester.

For tips on how to effectively build culture in a digital world, check out my full post on the AMEX Open Forum.

Too Much Honesty Can Come Back to Haunt You

Olivia had been working in what she termed “offensive” corporate environments for over 10 years, and she was at her wits end.  While working for one consumer healthcare giant in particular, Olivia was criticized for wearing clothing to cover a disability and pulled out of a major client account because her boss wanted it for himself.

Since the company’s HR department spent a lot of time and money developing a new employee survey, Olivia decided to be honest when she received it.  The intention seemed earnest enough, after all, and Olivia thought her feedback would help the company reach its goal of increased employee engagement.

In the comments section of the survey, Olivia noted the lack of empowerment among junior staff as well as the overly critical eye of management.  She cited examples of inconsistent expectations and unkept promises.

Although the survey was not anonymous, Olivia never imagined she would be called out for being insubordinate.  She received a “talking to” from her boss as well as her Group Head and was treated like a naughty child until the situation was so intolerable Olivia felt she had to leave.

The Truth?  You Can’t Handle the Truth!

It’s tempting to use company evaluations, your own performance reviews, or others’ performance reviews to express your true opinions about the organization or its people.  I urge you to use discretion, because blatant honest comments – especially when your feedback is negative – can wreck havoc on your career if they fall into the wrong hands.

For guidance on how to avoid getting in trouble due to too much honesty, have a look at my post on the Fast Track blog.

Be the Idea Man (or Woman)

I blog several times a week, and have been writing in the career advice and leadership development space for almost eight years.  How many ideas have I had to brainstorm to write about?  You do the math.  It’s a lot.

Some days I’m feeling especially creative and can generate insights from all sorts of places, but other days it’s a struggle to put forth a single interesting thought.   To generate new ideas when the well is dry, I’ve developed some helpful strategies.  Check out these six ideas on the Fast Track blog and let me know if you have others.  I welcome any and all suggestions!

 

Is Self-Plagiarism Okay?

I know a very young and successful business book author named Jonah Lehrer.  Lehrer has written two bestselling books and is frequently in the news, but last month it was not for a positive reason.

Slate – among other outlets – recently reported that Lehrer had been caught stealing…from himself.

“Media watcher Jim Romenesko claimed that Jonah, a newly minted New Yorker staff writer, copied his blog post “Why Smart People Are Stupid” from a 2011 Wall Street Journal story “The Science of Irrationality.” A few hours later, New York’s Joe Coscarelli and writer Jacob Silverman discovered a bunch more instances in which Lehrer reheated his leftovers.”

Is there a problem here?

Since I originally published my full post on Fast Track, other evidence has come out against Lehrer.  But my original question about self-plagiarism still stands, and I want to know what you think.  Is this okay, or not okay? 

Experts Talk Talent and Connectedness at Deloitte University

Today, I am attending a talent management thought-leadership summit at Deloitte University called The New Attraction: Talent, Technology and Connectedness in the Post-Digital Workplace. I am really looking forward to the discussions, which will address the relationship between the worker and organization; the changes being wrought by technology; and the rise of analytics as both unprecedented tool and cultural challenge.

Before we arrived on the Deloitte campus in Westlake, TX, I caught up with Dorie Clark, a fellow participant who is a branding expert and Forbes blogger.  Here are some of Dorie's thoughts as we both anticipated the event.

Dorie, if there was one message you would like to get across to senior HR leaders today, what would it be?

Even if you have made it to a certain rank, you need to think about and cultivate your personal brand over time.  You have to make an effort to reinvent yourself constantly, or else everyone's perception of you will be based only on what you've done or been in the past.  If you are expanding on your expertise, showcase that by writing for online publications so people begin to associate you with these issues.

What excites you most about today?

I love the idea of getting together with other experts who are on the front lines.  I'm especially looking forward to continuing my ongoing conversation with Tom Davenport, who helps organizations make better and more calculated decisions in a complex marketplace.

What do you feel is the relationship between talent and brand reputation?

It's a symbiotic one.  People will want to work for you if you are perceived as a company with A+ operations, and when employees are more satisfied and engaged, a company will have a better reputation  It's a virtuous cycle.

What impact does digital technology have on this relationship?

Digital technology allows companies to communicate to their audiences without any intermediaries.  For example, Best Buy's CEO just put together a YouTube video explaining some recent developments to employees, it was obviously available to everyone. I love that today's social tools draw people to your message and help you find and be found by people with similar interests.

For more of Dorie's ideas, check out her forthcoming book from Harvard Business Review, Reinventing You: Define Your Brand, Imagine Your Future. 

 

 

 

4 Reasons Why Social Media Use = Great Customer Service

If you’ve bought anything in the last few years, you’ve no doubt noticed that customer service is not what it used to be.  Most of us don’t dare pick up the phone because we fear hearing that dreaded phrase:

“To hear a menu of options, please press 1.”

Now, however, some companies are finally getting it right, and their training ground has been none other than the prolific world of social media.  On her Perspectives blog, Mila Araujo provides these four reasons why companies that invest in social media achieve better customer service:

Social Media Requires High Engagement

Companies that have committed themselves to social media listen to what their customers are saying and the buzz around the web that’s related to the company, and they respond in real time.  Because they are routinely engaging their audience one-on-one already, they are more likely to provide excellent service.

Social Media Requires Adaptation

In order to do well in social media, you have to be dynamic, motivated, and nimble.  You have to be able to change quickly in order to use social media channels to deliver products and services more effectively.  Companies who live in this mindset require employees who do as well.

Social Media Tools Use Public Conversation Forums

The fact that everyone can see what you are doing and how you are responding to an issue creates a higher standard overall.  Companies that use social media are confident in their approaches and are trained to respond so they can offer a high level of consistent performance. On the other hand, the nature of social media allows for quick identification of less desirable behaviors that must be corrected quickly.

Social Media Enables Viral Behavior

Anyone using social media knows that bad press can easily go viral, and it doesn’t have to be by way of a major news story.  All it takes is one person to make a negative comment and others may join the discussion. This kind of viral spread ensures that social media-minded companies pay special attention to operations so an online PR disaster doesn’t occur.

This post was originally published on Intuit's Quickbase blog.