Managing People

It’s not your job to defend your team. It’s your job to improve your team. Upon reflection, all of the great CEOs and executives that I’ve ever worked with believe this and behave this way.[read more]

Well known author and academic Richard Florida has written extensively about the rise of the creative class. According to his work, the creative class - a grouping of knowledge-based professions - has rapidly increased its share of total employment over the last 2 decades and now comprises about one third of all U.S. jobs.[read more]

Today’s business activities are increasingly more team-based and more reliant on people working together toward a goal – one person’s output is dependent on another’s and so on. No man/woman is an island any more. Therefore, it is more important than ever that our employees have the skills and temperament to work together effectively.[read more]

The challenge of communication isn't to never miscommunicate, it's to cut down the time between the interaction and the realization that the communication didn't get through. Because the sooner we know we're not connecting, the sooner we can fix it.[read more]

We’ve all heard about putting lipstick on a pig – trying to make something pretty by just adding some surface enhancements. Too often employee programs fall into this category. Companies read about zappos (everybody drink!) or the new engagement wunderkind – google, and their “fact-based approach” to engagement – and say “Bring me one of those.”[read more]

Much has been said in marketing circles about target markets, demographics, psychographics and other ways to define who and what makes an ideal customer. The notion mostly implies that you determine the makeup of a market that your business seems suited to attract. The thing that’s always bothered me about this simple approach is that it sort of has a lowest common denominator element to it – who can we attract?[read more]

A lot of discussion on engagement has focused on providing new and quirky benefits – foosball tables, unlimited vacation, and gourmet food in the cafeteria. Those are all great things. But in my mind, they are the “benefits” of working at a particular company.[read more]

Last year we suggested growth in the underground economy is likely a key reasons workforce participation has fallen so much in the U.S. Others are starting to also suggest this. Noted author James Surowiecki's New Yorker article The Underground Recovery points out: "Ordinary Americans have gone underground, and, as the recovery continues to limp along, they seem to be doing it more and more."[read more]

In alignment with Quantum Theory, our unconscious minds select to focus on only a fragment of the information available to us, based on what we expect and what matches our programs. We delete all the rest of the information, including the options and choices that are associated with that information.[read more]

Because business conditions shift a lot quicker than they used to, cost committments that last more than a year are now considered fixed costs (5 years used to the norm for fixed costs). And because it's gotten harder to fire or lay-off traditional employees - especially quickly - more firms are viewing employees as fixed costs.[read more]

Why prefer Coke over Pepsi or GE over Samsung or Ford over Chevy? In markets that aren't natural monopolies or where there are clear, agreed-upon metrics, how do we decide?[read more]

Men still out earn women on average. But the gap has significantly closed over the last 2 decades and we are forecasting earnings parity between the sexes will occur within the next decade. We also believe women's earnings growth will outperform men past that point and by the 2030 time frame women, on average, will substantially out-earn men.[read more]

According to Professor Sean Wise, who claims to have worked with more than 15,000 entrepreneurs, no matter how great the idea and the opportunity, in the end it is only the execution that creates change and generates wealth.[read more]

Not only does lower workforce participation mean lower economic growth, it also raises government spending on support programs and leads to greater participation in the informal (meaning illegal) economy. It's also bad for the people who aren't working.[read more]

"Accelerated serendipity" is a term you hear often in the coworking community. They believe coworking increases the generation of business ideas and productivity by bringing together diverse groups of smart people.[read more]

States often adopt more stringent definitions to force smaller companies to offer benefits and rights to employees than otherwise required under federal law. Check your state’s laws carefully to make sure you are in compliance.[read more]

The meeting troll is a common creature, one that morphs over time, is good at hiding and at snaring you when it's too late to avoid him. The meeting troll has a neverending list of reasonable objections. It's the length of the list that makes the objections unreasonable.[read more]

It's not surprising that independent workers (freelancers, temps, self-employed, etc.) rely on word of mouth/referrals for getting business. What is a bit surprising is just how important word of mouth is compared to other methods.[read more]

Dads are doing more housework and child care; moms more paid work outside the home. Neither has overtaken the other in their “traditional” realms, but their roles are converging. Job security has always been at the top of the list for working parents.[read more]

We make a lot of early stage investments and we work hard with those companies to help them succeed. But if you hung out at USV, you would see that we spend a lot of time on policy stuff. And that begs the question "why do you do that?"[read more]