Contributed Post | Mike McRitchie | Resume and LinkedIn Profile Writer | Telecom Marketing Content Writer

Making Your Construction Company One Of The Very Best

July 3, 2021 by Contributed Post Leave a Comment

If you are thinking about setting up your own construction company, there are a lot of things you will want to bear in mind to ensure that you run it in the best way possible. If you are trying to be especially competitive and keep the business operating better than many others, then you can do this by focusing on some of the following things. To make your construction company one of the very best out there, one which lots of clients are going to want to seek out for their projects, consider trying out the following few items.

Source – CCO Licence

A Strong Attitude Towards Safety

Safety is one of the most important concerns in every industry, but especially in the world of construction. You need to make sure that your people are safe at all times, and that they are doing everything they can to keep each other safe too. This is going to mark you out as a safe construction company that people can trust, so it’s something you will definitely want to focus on. Train your employees in MUTCD signs and general health and safety, and enforce the rules in exactly the way you would expect others too as well.

Special Focus

It’s always best to have a special focus in your company, as that way you are going to be getting a lot more clients, including more regular and loyal clients who know that you are particularly good at that one thing. Having a niche like this doesn’t mean that you can’t or shouldn’t also expand out, but you should make sure that you are focusing on something that you can use as your unique selling point. If you can do this right, you are going to get a much stronger reputation as a result, with many more clients coming on board.

Generating Leads

You need to make sure that you are thinking about the marketing side of things too, and that will involve thinking in a business-sense kind of way just as often as you are thinking about construction itself. One of the most important concerns here is that you are generating leads, and there are a lot of ways to do this. It’s wise to outsource your marketing to those who really know what they are doing, so check out some of the best construction marketing teams out there. With their help, you’ll be able to boost your company hugely.

Source – CCO Licence

The Name

The name that your business has is also surprisingly important, and you are going to want to ensure that you have put a lot of thought and effort into this too, otherwise you could end up worse off than some of your competitors. People respond very well to simple names, ones that include the local area or your own name, or those which go down the humorous route and adopt a pun. Bear in mind if you do go for the funny name that you still want people to take you seriously. However, it can prove to be popular.

How To Nail It As A Product Manager

July 2, 2021 by Contributed Post Leave a Comment

Product managers have an important role. It’s their job to make sure that the company’s products are good enough for the market and will represent the brand in a favorable light.

But it’s a tough gig. Today’s consumers are demanding and the market is ridiculously competitive.

So what can you do to nail it as a product manager and advance your career? Let’s find out.

Develop A Marketing Strategy

Unsplash – CC0 License

The first thing you’ll want to do is to develop a marketing strategy for your product.

If you don’t have a good plan in place from the outset, then your product will fail to have the desired impact.

For instance, if your target customer is somebody under the age of 30, take a look at how your competitors are approaching the issue of branding. Uncover all the tricks they’re using to entice customers and convince them that they have the best product.

Build Setbacks Into Your Plan

Next, be realistic about progress. Getting a product off the test bench and into stores is a remarkably difficult process that requires all the pieces falling together in alignment. And, as any business leader will tell you, that rarely happens in practice. Almost always, there are stumbling blocks and hazards that get in the way.

For that reason, you’ll need to build contingencies for setbacks into your plan, even if they delay your schedule. Setbacks are inevitable. So if you plan for them, you can avoid people remaining idle and dedicate time to other tasks.

Educate Yourself About The Process

Unsplash – CC0 License

As a product manager, you shouldn’t assume that you already know it all. Chances are, you don’t. It’s a good idea, therefore, to attend a product development workshop. These will teach you the basics of how to develop a product, plus provide you with some best practice you can deploy in your enterprise.

Bounce Ideas Off Friends And Colleagues

Product managers can sometimes get into the habit of believing that they are the only people in a position to say anything about product development. But, of course, products are consumer-facing things, and so potentially anybody can have a valid opinion about them. Try canvassing people in your company to see what they really think about what you’ve come up with. Make sure that they give you their honest opinions and don’t just grin and nod at you to get you to go away. After all, it’s in their interest to do so.

Find Your Competitors’ Best Products And Improve On Them

A lot of companies use the so-called “skyscraper” technique. This involves looking for their competitors’ best products and then working out ways to improve on them.

As a product manager, this can be a great strategy for really building your confidence and portfolio. The more you can one-up the competition, the more sales you’ll deliver to the brand that employs you.

In summary, doing well as a product manager is all about being open to new possibilities. Don’t assume that any idea is impossible. Keep pursuing crazy dreams until one of them pays off.

How To Make Your Small Business More Efficient

July 2, 2021 by Contributed Post Leave a Comment

If you run a small business, you are already aware that you need to keep a well-oiled machine. Having everything running smoothly and efficiently ensures you keep up with your competitors and have customer retention. However, the reality is not every business is as efficient as it could be. Many companies have serious efficiency problems that can cause a loss in revenue of up to 30 per cent. This means that there is a lot of cope for improvement. Every business owner should constantly be looking for ways to make his or her business more efficient. Whether that be through new technology or the parking of specific tasks. A business owner needs to be open to change in order to keep up with the ever chafing nature of modern society. Anyway, listed below are ways to help you make your small business more efficient:

Image from Pixabay

Tasks Audit

Go through your business forensically and create a report of every task that is conducted. If you have employees, ask them about their day to day activities and ensure that every task is in your report. Once you have a thorough understanding of all the tasks performed daily, weekly, even monthly, you can mark them primary, secondary, tertiary, and superfluous. If possible, the aim here is to cut redundant tasks and reduce the frequency a less necessary task is performed.

Automate

If you have any tasks that can be better performed on a computer, go for it. The initial expense of an automated system being install may set you back a little, but the time saved will pay dividends. A worker wasting time on a mind-numbing sorting email task, for example, is pointless. People are better when they are more challenged. They feel as if they are worth more too.

Engage Staff

In a small business, it is relatively easy to be on first name terms with your staff. Ensure that you make an effort to engage with your staff. Perhaps a ten-minute meeting every day or at the beginning of the week would help. Find out how they are and if there is anything you can do to help them in their jobs. Make sure you listen, and if need be, make changes off the back of their suggestions.

Outsource

Be honest, are the skills you have in-house up to every task? You may find that you or your employees are struggling with a task that would make more sense if you outsourced. This may be something you do not need to do every day, so when the task rears its head, you’re relearning how to do it every time. Or perhaps your IT security is lacking. Outsourcing to a professional can save you time, money and make your business more efficient.

Get the Right Suppliers Ever been let down by your suppliers? Is delivery time becoming an issue? Products of less than par quality. Well, as you already know, competition in this world is fierce. Don’t blindly buy from the same supplier every time. It may be in your best interests to shop about, get a better deal. Maybe your engines or fleet of vehicles would perform better if you buy red diesel drums, for example.

5 Things Every HR Professional Needs to Succeed

July 1, 2021 by Contributed Post Leave a Comment

When you want to become a successful HR professional, you’ll need to do more than passion to lead the human force. What’s more, you have to go beyond graduating with a bachelor’s degree in psychology or human resources management.

A successful HR employee is someone who delivers good quality on every task they work on. This professional also makes sure to avoid committing costly errors or mistakes that can ruin the image and reputation of their organization.

If you’re a professional looking to achieve great success in the world of human resources, take note of the following tips:

Become a Great Leader

There’s a common saying that great leaders are born, not made. This adage applies to HR professionals. You have to stand on the front lines to guide employees as you represent the human force of an organization.

Develop the following qualities to become an admirable leader in the human resources industry:

Appoint training leaders for each department or division to know which areas and who requires training, as well as ways to conduct training.
Work closely with department managers to find out and take note of their concerns and needs. Spend time working with different departments, so that workers will not feel intimidated by your presence.
Solve complex legal management and employee issues and prevent a crisis from occurring.
Assist workers in finding areas that require improvement and come up with specific action steps.
Put the preferences and interests of employees first.

A great leader takes initiative, not control. If you want to succeed as an HR professional, take note of these pieces of career advice: be willing to offer tasks and answer on behalf of the team, stay curious by asking questions and guide employees remotely.

Understand and Master Conflict Resolution

Hiring talent is just one aspect of learning how to become a successful human resources professional. You’ll also need to manage talent on your current team.

This means being great at solving problems and resolving conflicts. Sometimes, things become uncomfortable between workers. As an HR professional, you should know to fix the problem with the least amount of conflict possible.

You could start by learning about the best practices for conflict resolution. These typically begin by addressing the issue with authentic questions, a calm atmosphere and open communication. Refrain from overcomplicating situations.

Balance Professionalism with Thoughtfulness

One of the biggest challenges that HR professionals face is being thoughtful while still maintaining a sense of professionalism.

You’re working in a people industry. This means that you’re going to face a lot of upset employees, angry candidates and hurt feelings.

Striking the right balance between professionalism and thoughtfulness is not a skill that you can necessarily learn in a training program or course. It’s something that you will need to hone over time in your current job.

You can achieve the right balance by first approaching situations with a sense of professionalism. Make sure you maintain this while refraining from crossing any personal lines.

When necessary, add thoughtfulness to your conversations with employees. Make sure that you stay calm and be approachable in any situation. Avoid injecting your personal opinions.

Understand the Values and Goals of Your Organization

Remember that HR managers act as a link between the employees and the company’s management, among other things. You need to make sure that you have a solid grasp of the company’s values and goals, so that you can effectively communicate them to current or potential workers.

What’s more, you should meet with executives and managers occasionally. Take the time to have a dialogue with the heads of each department. Ask them three things:

Where they like to be in the next 6 to 12 months
What tools and resources they need to become successful in their job
What their current goals are and how they plan to achieve them

By doing these, you’ll know how to communicate those goals and values to aspiring job candidates who are looking to join your organization.

Embody a Constant Desire to Learn New Things

People today are living in a digital world where technology changes quicker than they’re able to keep up with sometimes. As a human resources professional, you have to possess the desire to learn new skills if you want to succeed in your career.

This entails the following:

Enrolling in a course that will help you refresh HR skills or learn new ones
Looking for a mentor who can help you grow in your job
Staying on top innovative HR technology and industry trends

Long story short, you need to stay up to date on the latest and greatest in the field of human resources.

Follow these five tips to become a successful and more effective HR personnel or leader. Remember that you should work hard and continue to learn new things, so that you can achieve the success you want in your career.

Freelance Coaching: How To Attract New Clients

July 1, 2021 by Contributed Post Leave a Comment

As a freelance coach, it can be quite difficult to attract new clients in to your small business, which is why it’s important to get your approach and your look right. Often times, first impressions will count for everything for a potential new client.

Consider Offering Free Items

One sneaky and unique way to attract new clients, is to offer freebies for signing up to you, or incentives in general. People always love free things, and if they happen to be something connected to your industry or expertise area, then it’s a win-win.

Offering free perks is a great way to help establish your brand especially if you’re new to coaching and the area in general. Of course, once you’ve established yourself and have a growing client list, then you won’t need to give away freebies, as it could actually become detrimental to give away so many goods.

Marketing Is Everything

The best way in which you can help yourself to attract new clients is by looking at your marketing strategy. Traditionally, you may be thinking of a vast office dedicated to plastering adverts across a city, or creating a video, but modern marketing is simpler.

As a coach, you can create your own social media posts, which you could promote with various offers and incentives. Or you could work with a coaching site that offers perks and marketing for coaches in general.

If you’re looking for clients, you should contact A Guide For Your 20s who offer a service at one low annual rate that helps promote your coaching to over 30,000 people each month. They will be able to explain all about marketing for coaches, and how you could benefit from their services.

Build Your Own Network

Having your own network of people within your industry is a great way to help grow your client list itself. That means connecting with associates, referral clients, other coaches and of course your current client list.

It’s likely that if you provide a good service, then your clients will promote your business without even asking, either by word of mouth, reviews or praising on social media. The more people that know about you, the more likely people will approach you without you even having to lift a finger.

If you feel like your current network list has reached its maximum reachability, consider establishing new connections, such as at a business event or forum, where you can meet influential people who can help you grow.

Improve Your Digital Space

The most important thing to consider when it comes to improving your coaching reachability, is to have a space online in some way. That could be with various social media accounts promoting your business and showing what you’re about, or utilizing a website for bookings, reviews and examples of the service.

This will be the first thing people check out about you when they hear your service and want to know more. If you don’t have any online presence, but another coach does, they will most likely go for that coach over you.