Business Management | BizSieve.com

Creating a Brand-Aware Employee Culture-Six Tips

Brand-awareness among employees is essential for any company that hopes to succeed. Every employee is critical to the success of a company, and everyone needs to be on the same page when it comes to company values and goals. An employee culture that is brand-aware is going to be that much more effective at achieving success. Here are some tips.

Image by smi23le / Flickr

Clearly Communicate Brand Values

In order to foster brand awareness among employees, it’s important to make sure all employees understand exactly what the brand is all about. A brand’s core values must be clearly communicated to all team members. There should be literature that details the character and values of the brand, and this information should be reiterated in all of the company’s communications with employees, such as newsletters, emails, meetings, and training materials.

Reinforce the Brand

The character of a brand should be reinforced at every opportunity that presents itself, because employees will gain greater awareness of the brand through repetition and consistency. Brand symbols should appear in many places, and everything your company does and every policy that employees follow should be in line with branding efforts.

Provide Ongoing Training

Training and education can help employees become more brand-aware, and they will also become better brand advocates. If your brand’s core values include being environmentally-friendly, for example, employees should receive regular education and training on news regarding the environment, recycling policies, energy-saving tactics, and more. The more your employees know, the better, as it will help them relate to your brand more closely.

Encourage Brand Advocacy

Your employees are all brand advocates, and it’s important to encourage them to represent your brand in a positive, accurate way. There should be detailed social media policies and guidelines related to your brand, and employees should be encouraged rather than discouraged to discuss your brand online. When employees are outstanding brand advocates, their commitment should be recognized and praised, because it represents their understanding of your brand.

Hold Fun Employee Events

Fun employee events that relate to branding and the company are great for fostering a tight-knit community of workers who feel a common bond with each other and their employers. For example, parties to celebrate milestones like anniversaries or grand openings are great. Fun events encourage employees to feel a sense of pride for their company.

Examine the Competition

Employees who are brand-aware help give a company a competitive advantage over similar companies. Employees should receive training and education on the key differences that exist between their company and their competitors. An increased understanding of the uniqueness of their company will help boost their loyalty and pride in the brand they represent. A little healthy competition is always good for business, so involve your employees in the race.

A well-defined brand with employees that feel connected to it should be the goal of every company, no matter what its size. Small and large companies can benefit from boosting brand-awareness in the workplace and rewarding employees for their commitment.

Laura Kitner is a brand awareness consultant.

How do courier companies deal with cold weather

Running a courier company is a lucrative business opportunity which is not without its own set of challenges. Apart from keeping time, working like clockwork and detailed planning one of the major challenges you could be faced with is dealing with the weather. The blazing heat in summer, rain in the monsoon and the cold in winter, each season presents its own set of challenges.

courier service — Image by flgr / Flickr

How do you deal with the challenges posed by cold weather? Here is a list to help you and your employees cope with the vagaries of winter…

Keeping Your Vehicles in excellent condition

Your vans, cars and other vehicles help you get around and deliver the goods (literally). You should regularly check your tyres, oil and water. This will prevent you from getting stuck with a break down in the cold.

Getting a screen wash is an essential when you work outdoors in today’s air and environment. Keep it topped up. Going without ensuring that you have a full tank of gas could be something that you would want to avoid. A good move also is ensuring that road salt is applied to any surfaces exposed to the elements.

A smooth and trouble free commute will help you deliver the goods on time in any weather!

Stay on Call

Keep cell phone woes at bay. Keep your cell phone fully charged, and because batteries have a life of their own and die without much warning, it is always a sensible thing to carry a second battery and your battery charger.

Ensuring Your Employees Stay Warm and Safe

A courier company is work force driven and it involves using people at all stages including delivery. This is why your employees must remain safe and warm. Here is a checklist you need to hand over to them and tell them to ensure that they use it:

Blankets and warm clothes: Blanket to keep warm becomes necessary if you happen to over use your auto’s heating system. Not only do people suffer in the cold but you will also put an enormous strain on your vehicle. Blankets and warm clothes are absolute life savers in such a situation.

In case you are trapped overnight in a snow storm or worse a sleeping bag a useful item. Keeping your body temperature high enough to stop you from freezing is important and the good thing is a sleeping bag doesn’t take much room.

Shovel: Carry a shovel just in case you get trapped in by the snow. For courier jobs that take you delivering goods in the colder zones, when snow falls while you are taking a short break or grabbing a bite you might come out to your van and find it surrounded by deep snow. A shovel will come in handy.

Food and Supplies: Spare food and drink supplies are always to keep you warm and alert.

Cold weather is often challenging for your on-the-road staffs, but with proper precautions, you can be sure that your business is up and running, even in winter.

Main Trends in Business Communication

Business communication can mean many things, but in this article, it refers to the communication between a business and its customers, whether the business is selling to the general public or business-to-business. There are various passive platforms that a business can use to communicate with their customers, such a TV adverts and leaflets, but this article considers direct contact, such as person-to-person and over the phone etc. Technology is having a large impact on business communication in the same way that it always has. Technology has always been the driving force behind change in business communication.

The olden days

Technology was the reason why people stopped communicating via telegram and went onto the telephone. It was the reason why person-to-person communication became more prevalent as people bought vehicles. The trends will always be dictated by technology.

Person-to-person

There is no denying that traditional person-to-person communication has taken a nosedive in the west. Businesses seem to be using passive communication (advertising) more. This is partly due to the fact that there are now more places to advertise than ever. There were four TV channels and now there are four hundred. People no longer need to visit stores when they can order things to their house. This also means that complaints and other forms of communication are going to be done less via person-to-person communication.

Written literacy

For some reason we live in a time when the written word is as popular as ever, and yet so few people are any good at using it. Never has the written word been so popular, to the point where all sophisticated technology revolves around it, and yet literacy is still very low. The trend in the business world seems to have followed suit, where businesses are demonstrating lower literacy standards. Emails and text messages seem to be showing an all time poor written standard. This is probably due to the fact that these electronic messages are very cheap or free. This seemed to have made businesses less careful about what they do. For example, could you imaging a batch of leaflets being printed without being proofread? Yet email communication is rife with poor spelling, poor grammar and txt talk.

Multilingual Communication

This seems to have taken a sharp rise in prevalence. It now appears that businesses are prepared to translate their messages into another language. Ironically, this is not in order to communicate with people from other countries, but to communicate with people in their own country. For example in America a lot of communications are done in Spanish to accommodate the massive influx of Hispanic immigrants that have taken residence there.

Mobile communication

Many people will tell you that mobile communication is higher in prevalence where business communication is concerned. This is not true, because even though a lot of advertising happens online, and is aimed at mobile users, it is not actually a bigger means of communication. For example, if a company were going to call someone’s mobile phone ten years ago, that is still the way they would contact them today. Companies who give results via SMS, still do! Nothing has changed. But because mobile Internet is used more, and mobile apps are used more, people assume that this means businesses are communicating with peoples mobile devices more–but this is not the case.

Social media

This actually is one of the newer trends that has affected business communication. More businesses are using social media to communicate with clients. Some use social media that are aimed at business-to-business traders (LinkedIn) and others are using social media as an FAQ and helpline forum.

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Project Management Doesn’t Have to be a Circus

Students majoring in project management spend much of their time working out solutions to a variety of potential problems in the business sphere. However, when they emerge from school and enter the workforce, these students rarely expect the sheer chaos that is the world of project management in action. Trained for an orderly career, these recent grads find themselves in the midst of a circus! There are always several things going on at once and it feels impossible to focus on just one project.

Whether you’re new to project management or have been at it for decades, you’ll find yourself occasionally (or frequently) overwhelmed. The good news is—project management doesn’t have to be like that. By taking the following steps, you can keep the chaos minimum:

Plan Ahead

It may be a piece of advice repeated to the point of becoming cliché, but that doesn’t make planning ahead any less important. The average project manager is required to maintain several projects at the same time without ever showing a sign of stress, just as the juggler must keep several balls in the air while making it look easy. It’s not sheer luck that allows the juggler to get through a tough act. Every motion is planned in advance so that it feels like second nature when the big performance rolls around.

Tools of the Trade

The circus wouldn’t be particularly impressive if it lacked several essential tools. Imagine a tight rope walker without a rope, or a trapeze artist with no swing. Without the appropriate tools for a circus performance, no great feats would ever be accomplished. The tools needed in the office may differ from those found under the big top, but they’re no less essential to the functioning of a business. An easy way to equip employees with the proper tools for a technological world is to invest in Sharepoint. This collaboration software promotes quality communication and a natural flow of ideas. It’s the ultimate tool of the trade for anyone who is a part of the modern workforce. Whenever you are ready to migrate to sharepoint, be sure to look for the right guides to make it as smooth as possible.

Unrealistic Goals

Occasionally, project managers will get swept up in the excitement of planning and wind up creating goals that are completely unrealistic. This is human nature and it’s completely understandable. However, if an unrealistic goal is pursued over a long stretch of time, it begins to drag down the poor souls charged with bringing it to fruition. Employees need to feel that they can speak up when a goal is completely out of line. After all, if a circus member noticed the trapeze swings had been placed too far apart, he or she would make a point of warning the trapeze artist, right? The same principle should apply in project management.

In general, a willingness to communicate and most importantly, listen, will take you far in project management. Flexibility and patience are also highly beneficial skills in the circus we call project management. Develop these skills and watch your career take off!

Kay Ackerman is a self-proclaimed tech geek and freelance writer, focusing on business technology, innovative marketing strategies, and small business. She contributes to www.technected.com and you can also find her on Twitter.

Why You Should Consider Hiring Freelancers for Your Small Business

Small businesses often tend to be one-person operations as entrepreneurs try to take on all the responsibilities in order to save as much money as possible. Employees are often limited to family and close friends or just an extra hand or two to help out.

However, small businesses can benefit greatly from hiring on employees, who can help their operations grow more quickly. For small businesses on a budget — which is most of them — freelancers can fill this role for less cost. Here are just a few of the reasons why you should consider hiring freelancers for your small business:

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Image by Dita Margarita

Experience for Less

With a freelancer, you pay by the hour or by the project, allowing you to spend far less for the same experience you would get in a much more expensive employee. You would have to pay a high salary to get the same level of experience in an employee. By hiring a freelancer, you can get the skill and experience your company needs for less.

Not Responsible for Benefits

Salary is only one part of the expense of employees. Typically, you would also need to pay for benefits such as a portion of health insurance premiums, a contribution towards a 401(k) or other retirement account, and paid time off. You would also be responsible for paying a portion of the employee’s taxes. When you hire a freelancer, you don’t have to pay for any of these items — which can nearly double the cost of an employee’s pay package in some cases.

Pay Only for Results

When you hire a full-time employee, you may end up paying for a certain amount of clock watching. With a freelancer, you only pay for results. Even if a freelancer charges you by the hour, you pay by the job, so you can more easily calculate whether the hours reported for the job seem reasonable. However, most often, you will pay a flat fee for the project, so you won’t have to worry about how many hours were put into the job.

Little Risk

Freelancers work on a contract basis. That means that you aren’t bound by a contract and you don’t have any obligation to the freelancer, other than to pay for the job. That means that there is less risk. If you have a problem with an employee, you may have to go through a drawn-out process of filing reports and attempting mediation before you can finally fire the person. In the process, you will lose money and productivity. You don’t face that risk with a freelancer. If you are dissatisfied with a freelancer’s work, you just don’t hire that person again.

Freelance workers offer small businesses all the benefits of full-time employees without the same risk and without costing as much in salary and benefits. If your small business is not already using freelancers, it’s time you look into hiring them to help your business grow.

Do you work with freelancers for your small business? Share your tips for success in the comments!

About the Author: Sarah Clare is a writer and oversees the site projectmanagementsoftware.com, where she has recently been researching project manager software. In her spare time, Sarah enjoys cooking and scrapbooking.