Tag Archives: Management

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Microsoft Teams: Complete Starter Guide for Business Owners

For organizations that are settled into Microsoft’s family of apps and services, the obvious collaboration platform is Microsoft Teams. And the killer feature is that Teams supports a robust API for add-ins.  The more far-flung your organization is, the more your people need software to help them communicate and collaborate.  … Teams integrates a collection of Microsoft 365 online services, making it possible for members of your organization to talk face to face, chat, hold virtual meetings, share files, and collaborate on documents, spreadsheets, and other projects in real time. The chat capabilities cover the same ground as those found in Slack, while the meeting and video conferencing features compare favorably with those available in Zoom and other video conferencing tools. And the killer feature for Microsoft Teams is that it supports a robust API for add-ins …

ZDNet.com click the link to read the rest of the story.  Get our free tools here.

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Why You Should Speed Up Your Digital Transformation During the Crisis

Before the crisis, if your company depended on a physical business location and in-person interactions with customers, vendors and employees, it might have made sense to cling primarily to legacy systems and paper processes. Adding digital components like a website, mobile app  or electronic payment processing didn’t necessarily mean you’d undergone a complete digital transformation.   The current health crisis has changed the business community with guidelines and mandates on remote work and social distancing. Even if you’re fortunate enough to continue operating, this radical change may mean it’s time to take a deep dive into a digital transformation, rather than just baby steps. …

Entrepreneur.com click the link to read the rest of the story.

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The slow death of the Mac as we know it

The future of the Mac is in the hands of people who see a laptop or a desktop as an accessory to an iPhone or iPad, not the other way around.  … For existing Mac users, this is the slow death of the Mac as we know it. Now, nothing is going to happen overnight. …

ZDNet.com click the link to read the rest of the story.  Get our free tools here.

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When More Information Leads to More Uncertainty

How can I figure out which news sources and leaders to trust?  Every day we are faced with a torrent of information from news articles, cable networks, social media, the White House, the Center for Disease Control – and yet, there are no clear answers.  As humans, we innately find uncertainty to be an aversive state and are motivated to reduce it, even at a cost. …

Harvard Business Review click the link to read the rest of the story.  Get our free tools here.

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Harvard Business Review: How To Deal with Collaborative Overload

Collaboration is taking over the workplace. As business becomes increasingly global and cross-functional, silos are breaking down, connectivity is increasing, and teamwork is seen as a key to organizational success. According to data we have collected over the past two decades, the time spent by managers and employees in collaborative activities has ballooned by 50% or more.  Certainly, we find much to applaud in these developments. However, when consumption of a valuable resource spikes that dramatically, it should also give us pause.  …

Harvard Business Review click the link to read the rest of the story.  Get our free tools here.

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5 habits of people who are especially productive working from home

Effective remote work involves these five habits, which prevent feelings of burnout and isolation. Before many office workers transitioned to remote arrangements, the thought of working from home sounded like a dream. Who doesn’t love the idea of ditching the commute and staying in your sweats? But those of us who have been working from home for years know the reality, and it isn’t always as stress-free as it sounds. Loneliness, isolation, distractions, and Zoom fatigue are real, and they are challenges to overcome…

FastCompany.com click the link to read the rest of the story.  Get our free tools here.

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Great Leaders Are Thoughtful and Deliberate, Not Impulsive and Reactive

You set aside the first hour of your day to work on a strategy document that you’ve been putting off for a week. You haven’t been disciplined about getting to it, but you’ve had one crisis after another to deal with in the past week. Now, finally, you’ve carved out 90 early morning minutes to work on it.  First, however, you take a quick peek at the email that has piled up in your inbox overnight. Before you know it, you’ve used up the whole 90 minutes responding to emails, even though none of them were truly urgent. By the time you walk into your next meeting, you’re feeling frustrated that you failed to stick by your plan. …

Harvard Business Review click the link to read the rest of the story.  Get our free tools here.

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Time Blocking: How to Get The Most Out of Your Schedule

Some of the most productive people in the world swear by a technique called time blocking.  Ever heard of Elon Musk, Bill Gates, or Cal Newport? Yep – all time-blockers. And they’re not doing it because they like coloring in their bullet journals. They’re squeezing every drop of productivity from their days. It’s simple and it works. And I’m going to show you how. So, let’s see if this sounds familiar: You have too many things to do, and the list never gets smaller. …

Dansilvestre.com click the link to read the rest of the story. Our FREE Tools can help!

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How to Make Smarter Decisions in Chaos

How does a business leader strategize in chaos? It’s a question many of us are facing as we currently shelter-in-place and navigate a volatile world economy. … Moving forward, leaders need to both respect the moment and lean into the next business space. In an interview last year, marketing veteran Seth Godin said one’s next best move comes from asking one important question: Do more people trust you and pay attention to you today than six months ago…

Inc.com click the link to read the rest of the story. Our FREE Tools can help!

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Microsoft Teams: Now free version lets you create video meetings

Users of the free version of Teams, the Microsoft 365 online collaboration platform, can now create video meetings.  … The move is likely to be another effort from Microsoft to go to battle with Zoom, the biggest winner in video calling and conferencing since the global coronavirus pandemic shoved the world toward teleworking. …

ZDNet.com click the link to read the rest of the story.  Get our free tools here.

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7 Common Mistakes Good Leaders Make That Cause Great People to Leave

Any leader worth his or her salt has a pretty good feel for toxic behaviors to avoid that can lead to an undesired culture at work. And they know feeding such a culture leads people to leave. But not all flight-inducing foibles are created equal. Some are easy to miss and happen despite the best intentions of a leader.  Over a 30-year corporate career, I have seen many good leaders create an unplanned exodus by not addressing or being aware of what follows. Here are the seven most often overlooked traps that cause people to leave…

Inc.com click the link to read the rest of the story. Our FREE Tools can help!

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The Key to Real Productivity is Agility

I guess one could define agility as the ability to change direction quickly, but it’s so much more than that. To be agile requires the ability to see not only the direction you are going, but the change you need to make to get there. It reminds me of that experiment that gauged our powers of observation. ….

Medium.com click the link to read the rest of the story.  Get our free tools here.

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Home office technology will need to evolve in the new work normal

The new normal for work will be more remote, spur a home office innovation wave, make edge computing more mainstream and require more automation, immersive experiences and robotics. … Our assumptions about what it meant to work from home were wrong collectively. We had this idea that work from home was about work/life balance. You were working or you were doing home stuff. That was what worked from home had to deal with. And what we almost immediately discovered was it wasn’t that simple. In fact, there were at least four different contexts that people had to live in or experience sitting at their desk at home at any given time over the course of the day. …

ZDNet.com click the link to read the rest of the story.  Get our free tools here.

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Microsoft Teams will be bigger than Windows

Microsoft is very excited about Microsoft Teams, their fastest-growing business app ever, even before the COVID-19 crisis, but according to Jeff Teper, corporate vice president for Microsoft 365, the app is just getting started.  “It’s a platform that transcends operating systems that will be even bigger than Windows,” Jeff Teper told Venturebeat. This is because Teams is seeing application well beyond the 1 billion Daily Active Windows users. … Teams has become more than an app – it is also increasingly a platform.Teams has become more than an app – it is also increasingly a platform.Teams has become more than an app – it is also increasingly a platform.

mspoweruser-com click the link to read the rest of the story.  Get our free tools here.

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3 things you shouldn’t do before a Zoom meeting + 3 you should

Zoom meetings can in themselves bring new stresses that you have to navigate.  I’ve made a lot of mistakes. Don’t do what I did! I’ve distilled the past few weeks of Zoom experience into three simple dos and don’t. #1: Do check your internet connection…

ZDNet.com click the link to read the rest of the story.  Get our free tools here.

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10 Commandments of Modern Marketing – actually 24…

Number One. Thou shalt build revenue FIRST and brand SECOND. Brand matters, but the primary goal must be sales. It’s possible (although not recommended) to sacrifice brand at the alter of sales and still recover. But you cannot sacrifice sales at the all-holy alter of brand and hope to survive. Number Two. Thou shalt write offers…not slogans. Slogans might win awards, but they don’t make sales. Great marketing inspires ACTION! It does not merely inform or entertain. (Also, there’s a special place in marketing hell for advertisers and marketers who stack up awards for their “creativity” but who have never owned or influenced a sales number. They would do us all a favor if they stuck to finger painting.) …

LinkedIn.com click the link to read the rest of the story.  Get our free tools here.

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Best password managers for business in 2020

Everyone needs a password manager. Period, full stop. It’s the only possible way to maintain unique, hard-to-guess credentials for every secure site you, your family members, and your team access daily.  The 15 programs listed in this guide share many core features.  On a Windows PC, a Mac, or a mobile device, you install a stand-alone program or browser extension that does the work of saving sets of credentials in a database whose contents are protected with high-grade, 256-bit encryption. To unlock the password database, you enter a decryption key (your master password) that only you know. …

ZDNet.com click the link to read the rest of the story.  Get our free tools here.

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Spear-phishing campaign compromises executives at 150+ companies

A cybercrime group operating since mid-2019 has breached the email accounts of high-ranking executives at more than 150 companies, cyber-security firm Group-IB reported today.  The group, codenamed PerSwaysion, appears to have targeted the financial sector primarily, which accounted for more than half of its victims; although, victims have been recorded at companies active across other verticals as well.  PerSwaysion operations were not sophisticated …

ZDNet.com click the link to read the rest of the story.  Get our free tools here.

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7 Cybersecurity tips for small businesses with remote workers

Small businesses have been facing a mountain of problems since the coronavirus outbreak took hold of the world’s economy and shifted most people to working from home. Millions of small businesses around the world, which previously had no experience dealing with cybersecurity, suddenly had to deal with a deluge of new issues… start small…  Troy Gill, manager of security research at Zix-AppRiver, said all small businesses should start simple and work their way up. …

ZDNet.com click the link to read the rest of the story.  Get our free tools here.

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This 3-Minute Exercise Will Change the Way You Solve Problems

Structured thinking is about building a big answer by asking many small questions.  Anyone can improve their structured thinking with practice. The best thing to do is ask yourself pointless questions, ones you can’t easily find the answers to online. Writer Hannah Yang shares a prompt that should take you about three minutes to figure out: How many customers visit your favorite restaurant every year? Here, I’ll give it a shot. I live in Munich. My favorite restaurant is Lemongrass, a Vietnamese place around the corner. ….

Medium.com click the link to read the rest of the story.  Get our free tools here.

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Harvard Business Review: Management – Begin with Trust

Trust is also one of the most essential forms of capital a leader has. Building trust, however, often requires thinking about leadership from a new perspective. The traditional leadership narrative is all about you: your vision and strategy; your ability to make the tough calls and rally the troops; your talents, your charisma, your heroic moments of courage and instinct. But leadership really isn’t about you. It’s about empowering other people…

Harvard Business Review click the link to read the rest of the story.  Get our free tools here.

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How to improve communication with coworkers during social distancing

In this era of physical distancing, social cues are limited. Here’s how to maintain—or even improve—relationships with your coworkers during this tough time.  In this era of social distancing, it is hard to get these social cues. Low-bandwidth internet can make it hard to catch the tone of voice or the facial expressions of people you’re talking to.

FastCompany.com click the link to read the rest of the story.  Get our free tools here.

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Is It Even Possible to Focus on Anything Right Now?

Weeks into the new reality of stay-at-home orders, remote work, and being constantly bombarded by news of how bad things can get, we’re all getting used to new ways of getting business done. For many of us, one detrimental result is that we’re struggling more than ever to find the focus we need to be productive. … Practicing attention management is about maintaining control of where your attention goes, and recognizing when it’s being stolen…

Harvard Business Review click the link to read the rest of the story.  Get our free tools here.

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Best encryption software for business in 2020

If strong encryption and security practices are not in place, businesses are not only opening themselves up to potential cyberattacks, but also the loss of corporate and customer information, fines for non-compliance with laws including HIPAA and GDPR, financial damage, and the loss of reputation.  Below, we list our favorite encryption solutions, suitable for users, SMBs, and enterprise players…

ZDNet.com click the link to read the rest of the story.  Get our free tools here.

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Microsoft Teams: How to master remote work beyond the basics

Want to make yourself more productive with Microsoft Teams? Use these eight tips to master command-line and keyboard shortcuts, connect to external apps, and make useful content easier to find. …

ZDNet.com click the link to read the rest of the story.  Get our free tools here.

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Ensure Success Using the Top Ten Remote-worker’s Checklist

Now that millions are working from home, the challenges will become clear. Here are 10 to watch out for. …  to help you keep the company ship afloat – while also preserving your sanity.  It is  important to secure enough bandwidth…  it is important that security concerns stay top-of-mind throughout the entire process. A global crisis is a playground for cyber criminals…

ZDNet.com click the link to read the rest of the story.  Get our free tools here.

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How much and when: Check your stimulus payment

The federal government has started making direct deposits to tens of millions of Americans to help people survive financially in the wake of the COVID-19 coronavirus pandemic. The first payments began showing up for some people on April 11, and millions more were deposited on April 15.  When and how much can you expect to receive? Check the IRS’ new Get My Payment tool. …

ZWRAL.com click the link to read the rest of the story.  Get our free tools here.

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Zoom vs Skype: Can Microsoft offer ‘hassle-free’ video calls?

Skype has now used Twitter to promote a recently added feature that offers users “a simple, hassle-free way to connect with the important people in your life on #Skype, no sign-ups or downloads required”.

ZDNet.com click the link to read the rest of the story.  Get our free tools here.

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Who has banned Zoom? Google, NASA, and more

Video conferencing app Zoom has had a massive increase in users because of new remote work requirements due to the COVID-19 pandemic. That spike in users also exposed a growing list of security flaws: Zoom bombing trolls have emerged, user email addresses and photos have leaked, calls aren’t being end-to-end encrypted, and flaws found in the Zoom installer allow an attacker to gain root access to computers that run a malicious version of it.

TechRepublic.com click the link to read the rest of the story. Our FREE Tools can help!

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Working from home? Stay connected using Microsoft Teams, for free

Microsoft Teams is a collection of online services that you can access through a web browser (at https://teams.microsoft.com) or through the Teams app, which is available for Windows, MacOS, iOS, and Android. … That combo of apps and services gives you the ability to invite people to join your organization and create teams for different groups; everyone in your organization can chat, with Slack-like channels within each team for group conversations; and private chat capabilities allow 1:1 and group conversations, with the option to add audio and video and share screens.

ZDNet.com click the link to read the rest of the story.  Get our free tools here.

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