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Everything you need to know about Gen Z
Emma Fitzpatrick MarketingWhile millennials have dominated headlines and infatuated marketers for years, they’re a bit old hat now. The oldest millennials are well into adulthood, age 37 and proud homeowners, while even the youngest millennials, age 22, have already graduated college. Now, it’s time for them to step aside so that we can focus on the trendy, new generation — Gen Z. By 2020, in just two years, they’re predicted to become the largest generation of consumers, according to Fast Company.
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5 tips for a more productive project team
Deborah Ike Business Management, Services & Risk ManagementIt’s one thing to be able to create an extensive project plan, charter, budget, and dashboard. The skill set required to lead a project team that’s cohesive and productive is quite different. Project management involves a mix of hard and soft skills, and you’ll need to know when to use each tool in your project manager toolbox at a given time. Here are five tips based on my experience. Unfortunately, some of these I learned from doing wrong at first.
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Why leaders should never stop being curious
Simma Lieberman Business Management, Services & Risk ManagementSarita, the CFO of a midsized sales organization, contacted me to ask for help with a problem. Her company’s customer base was getting increasingly diverse, with many new clients from Africa and Asia. Her sales team, who had been outselling their competition for the last several years, was starting to lose business. Almost all of the team were U.S.-born, white and male, and, for the most part, had little experience doing business with clients who were not originally from the U.S.
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Better ways to brainstorm with your team
Lisa Mulcahy Business Management, Services & Risk ManagementWhen working on your approach to an important project, there's nothing better than bold, original creative thinking. Yet as a manager, you understand that brainstorming with your team members can sometimes be a hit-or-miss prospect. It's sometimes too easy for the more outgoing members of your staff to dominate the discussion, which means other people's valid ideas get overlooked. Also, there may be times when your group just doesn't feel as creative as they could be.
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5 steps to volunteer communication success
Deborah Ike Religious CommunityServing alongside volunteers can be incredibly rewarding and, at times, perplexing. Some volunteers show up a few minutes early, do exactly what you need them to do (and even more), and maintain a great attitude no matter what task they’re tackling at the time. Others are quite the opposite and make you wonder why they decided to sign up in the first place. If you’re wondering why your volunteers aren’t doing what you need them to do or if they arrive late or unprepared, the issue may not be a lack of enthusiasm or commitment.
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Infographic: How do Americans feel about online privacy?
John Mason Science & TechnologyIt appears that the majority of Americans fear attacks by hackers, while 26 percent are worried about the collection of their data from major corporations. Another underlying fear of many Americans is a general mistrust in key institutions to protect their data. Due to the deluge of data breaches in 2017 and 2018, people feel as if it’s only a matter of time before their data is exposed to cyberattackers. However valid those fears may be, Americans still take no precautionary steps to protect their data, which begs the question: What will it take for Americans to prioritize internet security?
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Pulse check: Are you losing business because of a bad website?
Emma Fitzpatrick MarketingHow much time do you think you spend each day driving people to your website? Contemplate all the planning, writing, editing and posting you do for your email marketing, social media posts, search engine optimization/marketing, content marketing, and…you get the point. But for the average business, nearly 70 percent of shoppers leave the website because of a basic problem with your website’s design or functionality, found a new study from Corra. In order for your marketing efforts to pay off, you need to make sure your website isn’t getting in your way.
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Use positive persuasion to meet your organization’s goals
Lisa Mulcahy Business Management, Services & Risk ManagementWhen trying to land a new client, close a sale, or win approval for a new project, selling your idea factually is, of course, your first priority. Yet, you also know it's crucial never to lose focus of the human element of connection — finding just the right way to convince the person in front of you that doing business with you will be beneficial, and will be a pleasure as well. This is where mastering the skill of positive persuasion comes in.
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Protect your ‘fast’ communication channel (or risk losing it)
Mark MacDonald Religious CommunityRemember when we wrote letters to communicate? We’d send a letter, wait several days, then hopefully receive a reply in the mail. Then there were fax correspondences. Now it’s email and texting. The channels keep changing (even when most of them are still around). We often choose a channel based on response time. For most, that means we choose between email, texting, and social media direct messaging. Occasionally we’ll still pick up the phone. Which should you use? Here are five tips for protecting your communication channel (especially texting).
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Simple ways to connect and build relationships with your students
Erick Herrmann EducationTeachers get into the profession of teaching because they care about young people and want to help them be successful in life, and ultimately to make the world a better place. We all know that relationships are at the core of our work, and that this critical aspect of education and the classroom makes our job of educating children more effective and fulfilling for everyone. Yes, building relationships with students takes time, a commodity that is in limited supply in the classroom. The following list of activities and ideas can be used in virtually any context, but may need to be adapted slightly depending on the grade level and make up of your classroom.
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