by Jennifer Hart Yim | Oct 26, 2017 | Blog, Strategy, Talent
More and more companies are contemplating how to cut their expenses and retain exceptional talent by offering work from home policies.
This guest post comes to us from Argentus Supply Chain Recruiting, a boutique recruitment firm specializing in Supply Chain Management and Procurement.
Time was, companies in the corporate world measured their employees’ success by time that they spent at their desks and in meetings. But over the past 10-15 years, the workplace has seen some radical transformations spurred by the rise of digital communications. Companies are becoming less formal, less rigid in their expectations, and more likely to hire on short-term contracts even for high-skilled positions. Every company is different, but today’s most successful corporate cultures are more interested in evaluating employees based on their results rather than process-oriented metrics like time spent in the office.
Companies are competing for talent by offering a more humane workplace, including an emphasis on work / life balance that allows high performers to maintain a family and hobbies as well as a demanding career without going insane. Since work / life balance became a buzzword, more companies are paying lip service to the concept. But a few big companies are stepping up and recognizing that the concept can pay dividends for companies as well as workers.
One of the biggest related growing trends in the workforce is the rise of work from home policies. Tools like Slack, Google Drive, Skype and others are making working from home (or offsite) more feasible than ever before. Companies have long offered occasional “telecommuting,” and many startup-style corporate cultures are known for their flexibility, but more major companies are offering official, codified work from home policies. IBM recently slashed its work from home policy, but organizations as large as Amazon, Xerox, GE and Dell have adopted official policies allowing employees to work offsite at least some of the time.
Anecdotally, as a recruitment firm, we’re seeing more companies include official work from home policies in their job descriptions when they’re hiring – recognizing that it’s a great selling point for people hoping to avoid lengthy commutes. The practice is growing. According to data from GlobalWorkplaceAnalytics.com, the number of individuals at corporate jobs (not self-employed) who are able to work from home has increased 115% since 2005, which is almost 10 times as fast as the rest of the workforce.
Working from home can be great for candidates with young families, those who want to avoid lengthy commutes, or who want to be able to concentrate without the distractions of a busy office environment (putting aside, for now, the distractions of the home or a 3rd party working space). Working from home is also green; it saves on greenhouse gases from commuting. But they can also offer dividends to companies themselves: a typical business can save up to $11,000 per person per year by allowing candidates to work from home at least some of the time. This is money that your company can shave off the bottom line, or put into higher salaries to try to attract even stronger performers.
It’s a great policy, and workers are demanding work from home policies more than ever before, especially passive candidates who need to be enticed to make a move. As we recently mentioned in another post, more of the candidates we speak with are asking about work from home policies when we approach them with opportunities. According to statistics, 80-90% of peoplewho don’t work from home want to start doing so at least 2-3 days a week to split their time between the kind of collaboration you can accomplish in an office, and the concentration you can achieve at home.
It’s where things are going, with more tools that make working from home easy coming online every day, and more Fortune 500 companies embracing it. Yet only 7% of corporations in the U.S. make working from home available to most of their employees. It can be a radical shift for a company to adopt a work from home policy, so it’s no wonder why so many companies are reticent. It doesn’t work for every industry and organization, but it can be an excellent strategy for talent attraction and retention.
Whether you’re a candidate thinking about looking to avoid a commute, or a company thinking about how you can save on overhead and attract exceptional talent, it’s worth thinking about working from home policies and what they have to offer the workplace.
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by Fronetics | Oct 25, 2017 | Blog, Content Marketing, Current Events, Marketing, Social Media
Also in October’s 2017 social media news: Vimeo is getting in the live streaming game, Instagram doubles its ad dollars, and YouTube will be taking over America’s favorite past time.
While the fall season has many of us wrapped up in blankets with flavored lattes, social media sites are spicing things up in lots of other ways.
Shopping for the holidays just got easier thanks to Instagram. YouTube is taking over Major League Baseball. Twitter is making those Throwback Thursdays way more convenient. And Facebook wants us all to know you can’t judge a book by its cover.
Instagram Expands Shopping Capabilities on the App
Instagram is teaming with Shopify to create the capability for brands and retailers to sell products directly from their Instagram accounts. Shoppers will be able to click on the experimental tagging links and purchase products directly through the app. Instagram is working overtime to have 500,000 retailers available for the upcoming holiday season, including Black Friday and Cyber Monday. “Discovery is at the heart of the Instagram experience. Together with Shopify, we are enabling new ways to turn discovery into exploration, allowing Instagrammers to find new things from brands they love and businesses to find opportunities to build relationships with these valuable customers,” Instagram said.
YouTube Named Presenting Sponsor of the World Series
YouTube is working overtime to promote its live TV service by becoming the presenting sponsor of the MLB World Series. Kelly Merryman, YouTube’s managing director of content partnerships in America, said in a statement that the deal serves to underscore the kinds of popular sporting events that are available on YouTube TV. The multi-tiered deal serves as the first national ad campaign for the video platform and will include national TV ads, on-air mentions during each game, in-stadium branding, and more.
LinkedIn Tests Geofilters for Events and Conferences
LinkedIn is testing the ability for users to tag events and conferences with location-based filters, taking a page from Snapchat. As part of the platform’s new native video tools, LinkedIn is giving conference attendees the opportunity to add dedicated event frames to the videos they create while attending such functions. The illustrations are styled like conference badges, with the user’s profile photo in the right-hand corner. The badges also indicate the user’s role (such as a speaker, panel member, or attendee).
Facebook Tests Publisher-Information Button on Articles
Facebook is experimenting with adding a publisher-information button to articles shared in your News Feed that will provide additional information about the author and context around the article without having to navigate away from the site. The test was born out of feedback from the Facebook Journalism Project, which the ‘Book launched to ensure the credibility of content shared by its users . By creating transparency around publishers and their content, Facebook says its helping users to make more informed decisions. “Helping people access this important contextual information can help them evaluate if articles are from a publisher they trust, and if the story itself is credible,” wrote Facebook.
Twitter Adding a Bookmarking Tool
Twitter has announced its plan to add a new bookmarking tool to its app. The “Save for Later” tool will allow users to save a tweet to read later on. The feature’s impending launch was first unveiled on Twitter itself, naturally, when Head of Product Keith Coleman announced that a new way to save tweets was in the works as a result of a company HackWeek project dubbed #SaveForLater.
Vimeo Launches Live Streaming Platform
After acquiring Lifestream, Vimeo is launching its own live-streaming platform called Vimeo Live. The new platform will allow users the ability to create, edit and distribute live events. The paid membership is promoting better viewer engagement, speedy support, and in-depth analytics to track your progress.
Instagram Grows by 100 Million Users in Four Months and Doubles Advertisers
Instagram is having a pretty good year. It has reached over 800 million monthly users, with 500 million daily active users. This is a 100-million-user increase since April. And the platform’s growth doesn’t stop there. Instagram also reported it has 2 million advertisers. “Time spent watching video on Instagram is up more than 80% year over year, while the number of videos produced per day has increased by 4x from last year. With the emergence of innovative mobile video formats, like Instagram Stories, business are finding more opportunities to connect with their audiences, whether on the go or in the moment,” wrote the Instagram Business Team on its Business Blog.
YouTube Debuts New Ad Tech Tools for Brands
YouTube is making it easier for advertisers to get in front of their target audiences. Marketers can now reach potential customers based on their searches and the videos they’re already watching with four new ad tech tools:
- Video Ad Sequencing, which allows advertisers to create a video funnel that moves users through a planned sequence of video ads;
- Director Mix, which automatically customizes video content for different audiences;
- Custom Affinity Audiences which allows advertisers to define audience targeting based on users’ YouTube searches;
- Neilsen’s Matched Panel Analysis, which allows advertisers to measure the impact of video alongside other Google campaigns on offline sales.
The video site is hoping to make it easier to create a relationship between what advertisers have to offer and the people that are interested in those offers.
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by Fronetics | Oct 24, 2017 | Blog, Current Events, Logistics, Strategy, Supply Chain
Cities should consider Amazon’s HQ2 search criteria as a roadmap for attracting innovative companies, empowering residents, and driving a healthy local economy.
We’re living through a seismic shift in the way business transactions are being conducted. E-commerce is now king. We might be tempted to think the decline of retail equates to business transactions being moved from physical space to a digital world. Will our cities and the shops that line their streets become obsolete in the face of e-commerce?
Amy Liu and Mark Muro of the Brooking Institute’s Metropolitan Policy Program contend that if Amazon’s recent search for a second headquarters (“HQ2”) has anything to show us, it’s that America’s cities still have an important role to play in the future of e-commerce.
How cities could change
Liu and Muro suggest cities take a close look at Amazon’s selection criteria for HQ2’s location and extrapolate the best ways to “build up the fundamental assets prized by innovative firms and industries.” In this way, cities can best “garner a bigger share of high-tech growth,” and furthermore, be a part of our nation’s gaining “a competitive foothold in the digital future.”
Liu and Muro draw four main takeaways from Amazon’s city selection criteria:
- Capacity to produce skilled, technical talent
- Access to domestic and global markets through modern infrastructure
- Connected and sustainable placemaking
- Culture and diversity
Cities that boast these characteristics will have the best chance at attracting the kind of companies that will shape the future of how we do business — e-commerce and beyond. These companies will employ and empower local talent. And not just highly skilled talent. I can’t help but think of this recent Wall Street Journal article about the impact that Amazon’s presence has had on Fall River, Massachusetts.
Such employment opportunities will attract new residents. New residents will boost the local economy. Strong local economies boost the health and well-being of the community. And the positive benefits snowball from there.
I’m speaking in generalizations here, but cities stand to gain quite a bit from considering Amazon’s HQ2 search criteria. Of course, there are plenty of negatives to making way for the Amazons of the world — the decline of Main Street being one of them. But if the digital world plays an increasingly important role in the ways we conduct business and commerce, isn’t there value in strategizing around it?
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by Fronetics | Oct 23, 2017 | Blog, Current Events, Supply Chain
Consumers will spend a record $9.1 billion during Halloween 2017.
U.S. consumers will take to the retail markets Halloween 2017 and spend a whopping $9.1 billion on Halloween costumes, decorations, candy and more, making it the largest spending for the spooky holiday to date.
The National Retail Federation reports that consumers are preparing to be the baddest witches on the block, spending almost a billion more dollars this year on supplies than in 2016 ($8.4 billion). And the men are really stepping up their game, spending on average $20 more per costume than women.
“Americans are planning to spend more than ever as they gear up for Halloween,” NRF President and CEO Matthew Shay said. “Retailers are helping customers celebrate in style with a huge selection of costumes, candy and decorations to cater to ghosts and goblins of all ages.”
From 2017 blockbuster hits like Wonder Woman and Spiderman, it’s no wonder the most popular costumes for kids are superheroes. And let’s not forget about Fido — the most popular costume for pets for Halloween 2017 is a pumpkin.
Still need inspiration for the boo bash you’re attending? Try heading over to Instagram, a source of inspiration growing 12% year-over-year. Other consumers will get ideas from online search (35.2%), a retail store (30.3%), Facebook (18.2%), Pinterest (17.9%), and pop culture (17.2%).
Need more fun facts about Halloween to get you into the scary spirit? Check out this year’s infographic from the NRF’s survey.
Halloween 2017 supply chain infographic
(Made with Canva)
Have a safe and happy Halloween 2017, everyone!
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by Fronetics | Oct 19, 2017 | Blog, Leadership, Strategy, Talent
Investing in your employees through wages, time and energy can have a big impact on your company’s productivity.
Successful companies understand that employees’ job satisfaction and engagement affect productivity. After all, employees are an extension of your business. Keeping them challenged and encouraged is key to their success, as well as the overall success of your company. In research for their book, Time, Talent, and Energy, Bain partners Michael Mankins and Eric Garton discovered that investing in your employees does, in fact, pay off for companies. “The top-quartile companies in our study unlocked 40% more productive power in their workforce through better practices in time, talent and energy management,” says Garton.
Here are the 3 investments that Mankins and Garton found most impactful to productivity.
3 investments that will invigorate productivity
1) Wages
Three economists studied OECD data representative of the whole population of businesses in 16 countries around the world. They found that firms paying higher wages were reporting higher productivity. The link between the two seems pretty basic: Pay workers higher wages and they will feel valued and be more productive at their jobs.
But many companies believe that higher wages come at the cost of their consumers. This doesn’t have to be the case. Dan Teran, chief executive of Managed by Q, is a thought leader in higher wages creating a culture of respect and productivity.
“Teran believes that most American businesses, and especially fast-growing start-ups like Uber, have mistaken short-term gains for long-term value, undercutting the share of revenue that flows to workers in a way that will perversely hurt their bottom line. He believes, even more radically, that decades of rising inequality and stagnant wages in America are not an inevitable byproduct of capitalism; instead, they come from a simple misunderstanding about how best to deploy workers and recognize the value they bring to a company.” Managed by Q’s ‘Good Job’ Gamble, Adam Davidson
From small businesses like Managed by Q to retail giants like Walmart, the ideology behind better wages and benefits is catching on. Companies are understanding the relationship between production and pay and trying to narrow the gap.
2) Time
The pressure of working long hours and being available around the clock has a lasting effect on employees. Such practices often lead to burnt out, overworked team members. In fact new research suggests that, on average, managers have fewer than 7 hours per week of uninterrupted time to do deep work. Their days are filled with meetings, responding to emails, and having short increments of time to complete tasks.
The average company loses more than 25% of its productive power to organizational drag, processes that waste time and prevent people from getting things done. Meetings that last too long and processes that move too slowly contribute to lower productivity, less quality work, and low employee morale.
Allowing employees the time to feel creative and focused on their projects will lead to breakthroughs in productivity. Try establishing quiet hours for certain times of the day to encourage workers to spend more uninterrupted time deep thinking, which can lead to innovative and fresh ideas.
3) Energy
An inspired employee is more than twice as productive as a satisfied employee and more than three times as productive as a dissatisfied employee. Yet, only one in eight employees are inspired. One of the most beneficial things a company can do is to inspire its employees. Engaged working environments and positions that allow creative and innovative thought will lead to increased employee engagement and productivity.
Companies like Apple, Netflix, Google and Dell are 40% more productive than the average company. Why is that, you ask? These companies invest in inspiring their employees.
“Inspirational leadership can be taught. Companies that recognize that and invest in making it happen create meaningful impact on the productivity of their company,” says Mankins. Studies have shown that employees that feel satisfied with their jobs are more productive.
Give your employees the autonomy to feel engaged in their work. This freedom will give them the opportunity to get creative and involved in their projects.
The opportunity exists for all employers to positively affect worker happiness while simultaneously increasing productivity. If your company is interested in exploring the benefits of investing in their employees, focusing on wages, time and energy is a good place to start. You might be surprised to find currently untapped financial gains just by putting investment in your employees at the top of your priority list.
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by Fronetics | Oct 18, 2017 | Blog, Content Marketing, Leadership, Marketing, Social Media
Supply chain and logistics executives should be using their celebrity on social media to be the public face of their businesses and an extension of their brands.
Here at Fronetics, we talk a lot about the importance of a social media presence for supply chain and logistics businesses. Most companies use social media to build brand awareness, communicate with a target audience, and, of course, attract new leads and customers. It’s highly effective.
But I am a strong believer that executives should also be on social media, as themselves, representing their brands and establishing themselves as thought leaders in the industry.
With their relative celebrity, supply chain and logistics executives are uniquely positioned to attract a following of customers, prospects, potential talent, industry peers, and admirers. They can use social media to connect with these people, share their ideas and industry news, and become the human face of their brands. It amplifies the company’s social media efforts in a way brands can’t do themselves. After all, social media is about connecting with people.
It makes sense, right? But in reality, 61 percent of fortune 500 CEOs have no social presence whatsoever. It’s an enormous missed opportunity.
Think of what these 3 CEOs’ social media presence has done for their brands.
With almost 12 million Twitter followers, the founder and owner of Virgin Group was named the top CEO on social media. Branson insists on creating his authentic content — from funny, personal stories to pictures — himself, and his commitment to posting daily keeps followers engaged. The resulting dialogue and relationship with followers has helped elevate his personal brand and Virgin as well.
Co-founder, president and former chief editor of the Huffington Post, Huffington was an early adopter of social media as a marketing tool. She has used her success at Huff Post and her personal social media presence to increase visibility to her newer projects, including Thrive Global.
Musk has committed to being authentic and open about the ups and downs of his business ventures, and his followers have responded favorably with an almost cult-like following. His personal account’s audience is more than double the number of followers combined for his three companies. Taking a page from Apple’s play book, Musk has used the reveal of new Tesla models and Space X rockets to stir up a buzz about projects. These live stream reveals are flashy, yet cool and casual, and have garnered over a million views.
Supply chain and logistics executives killing social media
This is not to say that there are not some supply chain and logistics executives who are capitalizing on using their personal brands on social media. Here are some as an example:
- Kelli Saunders, Morai Logistics
- Peter Tirschwell, IHS Markit
- Hailey McKeefrey, EBN
Which executives do you follow on social media?
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