Krishen Iyer’s Outline for Middle-Managers Navigating Return-to-Work Anxiety

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StrategyDriven Managing Your People Article |Middle Manager|Krishen Iyer's Outline for Middle-Managers Navigating Return-to-Work AnxietyAfter over one year of navigating an unthinkable public health crisis, the world is beginning to look more normal. As a result, executives and managers alike have started to brainstorm strategies for returning to the office. For some, returning to the office represents a long-awaited victory over COVID-19. However, others do not share that same optimism. While professional leaders cannot control their employees’ attitudes towards the pandemic, they can control their rhetoric towards return-to-work anxiety.

Return-to-work anxiety is valid. Some employees may have health issues that make them more vulnerable to contracting COVID-19 or more likely to have severe complications from the coronavirus. Simultaneously, plenty of professionals have caretaking responsibilities that could be impacted by working predominantly outside the home.

Regardless of the circumstances, it should be the top priority of professional leadership to empathize with their reluctant employees who are hesitant to scale back remote work. More specifically, it may be difficult for middle-managers to balance their team’s concerns with the organization’s intentions. If you are feeling stuck, here is a step-by-step outline for middle-managers navigating return-to-work anxiety.

Step #1: Assess your team’s attitudes towards returning to the office.

The study of public policy teaches us that no policy can be effectively implemented unless the public consents. For this reason, it is critical to do your best as a middle manager to meet your employees where they are at with regards to returning to the office. The nuance with assessing your team’s attitudes lies in that you cannot simply assume where your team stands on returning to the office unless you ask.

Even when prompted to speak their truth, your team might not necessarily be telling you the whole story. Take Linda Hill’s perception, for example. A professor at Harvard Business School and author of Being the Boss, Hill finds that “people are fearful of looking weak or not living up to expectations.” Keeping this in mind, I agree with Hill’s suggestion to use anonymous attitudes to assess what your team thinks about returning to the office. Anonymous survey data can empower you to narrow in on your employees’ concerns, while employees can rest assured that their opinions are heard and addressed.

Step #2: Determine how compromise can factor into your office’s reopening.

If you can give your team options on returning to the office, that should be your first point of action following an anonymous survey. Options should give your team the liberty to choose how often they come to the office, as well as on which days. You can also go the extra mile to meet your team where they are by making adjustments to their office space. For example, if your workplace is in an open-faced cubicle format, feel free to encourage your team to reach out to you privately about finding a more semi-private space to work in the office.

As a middle manager, empathy matters, especially when retaining talent. A FlexJobs survey found that 58% of professionals would “absolutely look for a new job if they weren’t allowed to continue working remotely in their current position.” The survey, which compiled data from over 2,000 respondents, also found that 65% of participants sought to work remotely full-time post-pandemic, whereas 33% of the study preferred a hybrid work arrangement. When considering the workforce’s acclimation to remote work, we see all the more reasons for managers to compromise with their employees about their office schedule.

Step #3: People-pleasing does not work.

Compromise is essential, but so is honesty. Make sure that you do not make any promises that you must later retract. Hill reminds us that no one can say with absolute certainty that returning to the office has “zero risks” from a public health insight. Offering your full transparency and honesty with your team can be a moment of growth for you as a manager. It may be a difficult conversation to let your employees know that some degree of compromise might not be possible, but the best decisions are rarely the easiest.

Although compromise might be tricky to balance with other internal stakeholders, you should, of course, try to make every employee as satisfied as possible. If someone on your team makes a novel request that you are unsure about, do not confirm that the accommodations can be made until you speak with senior leadership or your human resources department. That might be difficult to remember, given your innate desire to retain your team, but full transparency and honesty will make the decision-making process easy for everyone involved in the long run.

About the Author

Krishen Iyer is the founder of MAIS Consulting Services, a Southern California-based firm with a vertical focus on health and dental insurance distribution centers. MAIS Consulting provides innovative contracting and marketing solutions to their clients, a mission that draws on Iyer’s nearly two-decades-long career in digital marketing on behalf of insurance distribution centers.

Why You Should Revisit Your Hiring Requirements and Consider Hiring a 2021 College Graduate

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StrategyDriven Talent Management Article |2021 College Graduate|Why You Should Revisit Your Hiring Requirements and Consider Hiring a 2021 College GraduateThe market for talented employees is the tightest it has been in a long time, and as a consequence, many businesses have revisited their hiring requirements and been pleasantly surprised by the results. One specific hiring requirement that is often unnecessary is the classic “3-5 years of experience.” The truth is that there are many benefits to hiring a new 2021 college graduate, and the labor shortage has simply made this fact more apparent. Here we will go over a few of the reasons that hiring a 2021 college graduate should be on the top of your list of things to consider.

The first advantage: A strong willingness to work

If we are honest with ourselves, most of us will admit that when we begin a job our willingness to work is greater than it is after we have been working somewhere for several years. And this makes sense: a new hire is full of excitement and is anxious to impress. This effect is augmented exponentially in the case of a new college graduate. They are not only beginning a new job – they are beginning an entirely new stage of their life! This willingness can translate to better results not just from your new employee, but from other employees who want to step up their own game to avoid looking bad in comparison.

The second advantage: Digital and technological expertise

In today’s world, it does not matter if you run a communications company or a landscaping company, you need to use technology. The advantages of having a new graduate to serve as your ambassador to the digital world tend to fall into two categories: an ability to fix broken technology and an ability to leverage unused technology. We are all familiar with the headache that comes with computers, phones, printers, or any other gizmo or gadget you might need, so the benefits of having someone around who can solve them all is self-evident. The advantages that can come from leveraging currently unused technology are less apparent. One example of this is the woefully inadequate digital presence that so many businesses still have today. Especially if you are a customer-facing business, if you do not have an active and well-curated digital presence on websites and social media, you are likely missing out on a huge pool of customers.

The third advantage: They have no bad work habits to undo

While hiring someone with 3-5 years of experience has its advantages, it also raises some problems that a new college graduate would not. One of the issues that most commonly arises is that an experienced employee comes equipped with both the knowledge and the bad habits they picked up on their last job. And while the knowledge can be helpful, it can easily be offset by how difficult it is to instill new habits and values in an employee who is used to doing things a completely different way. In addition to the benefits mentioned above, a new college graduate will show up as a blank slate. You can teach them the correct way to do things and they will learn things right the first time. One related disadvantage of the limited experience that new hires have is that they do not have a work record. This is not as big of a deal as most people think, however, because much can be learned from a look at a candidate’s transcripts and a job background check.

The fourth advantage: They are primed to learn

Anyone who has left school and then returned again knows how hard it can be to put your mind back into gear so that it can learn as well as it used to. The brain works much like a muscle insofar as those parts of it that do not get used regularly tend to atrophy. Recent college graduates have had to learn massive amounts of new materials for as far back as they can remember. These candidates are capable of devouring new information and mastering new skills in half the time that you might expect.

Hiring is a challenge in the best of times, and in today’s market, the difficulties can seem insurmountable. While this situation is certainly frustrating, it can also represent an opportunity to revisit your hiring requirements so that you include new college graduates. They are willing to work, they are digital experts, they have no bad habits to undo, and they learn extraordinarily quickly.

4 Essential Tips For Successful Email Marketing

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StrategyDriven Online Marketing and Website Development Article |Email Marketing|4 Essential Tips For Successful Email MarketingEmail marketing is still one of the most effective ways of reaching new clients as well as convincing current clients to buy from you again. However, for your email marketing efforts to be successful you need to consider the following factors.

Personalize

No one likes to think they are being sent an automated email, so make sure you personalize your communication with prospects as much as possible. One way to do this is to use a [email protected] email address, and adding in each recipient’s name can help a great deal too.

Additionally, coming up with creative subject lines (emojis seem to work well), and ensuring the content held within the email you send is personalized to your audience can make sure that you use the human touch to your advantage.

Increase your email list

Email lists are not static things. They are always changing as sometimes people will ask to be removed, while others will ask to be added. Although, as a business, your target should be to maintain a list that has enough addresses for your purpose. Just be sure to remember that the number of emails you send out will be much higher than the ones that provide you with the response you are looking for.

Indeed, with that in mind, there is nothing wrong with using some techniques to get email addresses on your list either. One way of doing this is to include a signup button on your website, social media profile, and just about anywhere else that will encourage people to opt in to your emails.

You can also use conferences, and events to collect email addresses as well, something that you can do by offering entry into a competition, or free gifts. It’s even possible to buy email list to help swell your business’s database. Indeed, by purchasing email contacts in this way you can ensure that you get the contact info of people more firmly in your target demographic, something that can help you turn such contacts into customers much more easily later on.

Before you send – TEST!

Every marketing email you send reflects on your business, and if you want to ensure they do so positively it’s vital that you edit and test every single one before you send it! Check every link, image, and shortcode on your copy and as they are displayed on different providers too. Then you can be sure that each recipient will get an optimized experience, and that each email will have maxim efficacy.

Say no to SPAM

Your emails won’t do much good if they only ever see the inside of a SPAM folder! With that in mind, you need to do all you can to ensure they hit the recipient’s main inbox.

One strategy for achieving this is to make sure that all the HTML that your emails contain is formatted properly, as this can set off SPAM filters. Also, one of the best ways to stay out of a SPAM folder is to not send SPAM. This means adhering to the regulation on this subject and avoiding cheesy subject lines and crazy punctuation.

Why Your Small Business Needs a Toll Free Number

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StrategyDriven Managing Your Business Article | Why Your Small Business Needs a Toll Free NumberThink your small business isn’t big enough to require having a toll free telephone number? Here are four good reasons why investing in one or more toll free lines can be an asset to enterprises of any size.

Conveys Your Legitimacy

In general, potential clients like to feel that they are purchasing from a stable, well-established organization. While you have probably worked hard to build a reputation that conveys this, there are also subtle things you can do as a business owner to create a sense of trustworthiness. Having a physical address, business cards, and a toll free phone number are seemingly innocuous measures that can do a lot to clue your clients into the fact that yours is a legitimate organization that is eager to serve them.

Makes You Mobile

Local telephone numbers may make you accessible to nearby clients, but unlike toll free numbers they won’t move with you. In the event that you relocate your business, with a toll free line you’ll be able to keep the same phone number you’ve already established. There’ll be no need to contact existing clients with a new phone number, no reason to reprint your business cards, and no extra money spent on changing advertising or marketing materials.

Increases Team Cohesion

With remote work on the rise, even small businesses often have employees who operate from far-flung locales. With a toll free company number, disparate workers won’t have to bother with setting up their own business lines or compromise their privacy by giving out their personal numbers. They may also find it easier to foster their client’s confidence by providing them with a nationwide number that can be reached from anywhere at any time.

Improves Your Tracking

Internet companies that provide toll free services to small businesses frequently offer additional technologies that work in tandem with the phone line, such as data tracking and reporting. With one of these providers, you’ll often have access to information such as what time of day most calls are received, where they’re coming from, how long they last, etc. that can prove invaluable when building a marketing plan.

Acquiring a toll free number for your business can be a smart way to build your brand and make your operations more mobile. It can even be critical to connecting your team and may also aid in your marketing efforts. No matter how large or small your organization is, don’t overlook this simple way to potentially improve your enterprise.

5 Tips on How to Identify Phishing Emails

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StrategyDriven Practices for Professionals Article |Phishing|5 Tips on How to Identify Phishing EmailsLet us begin with defining and understanding phishing; it is a cybercrime in which a target victim is contacted by email, phone call or text message. The contact is established by someone illegally posing as a genuine establishment or an organization to lure individuals into giving out and surrendering sensitive data such as personal information, banking and financial credentials. The goal of phishing is to trick the recipient into believing that the message is something they want or need officially, like a request from their bank or probably a note from someone in their company and click a link or download an attachment that usually contains malicious software. What separates phishing is the attacker’s pretense as a trusted body of some sort to gain the victim’s faith.

Phishing is one of the oldest forms of cyberattacks, but that does not mean it is harmless. It is still one of the most prevalent and malicious types of cyberattacks to exist. Phishing is one of the most common means of cybercrime and what is worrying is that despite how much we think we know about scam emails, there are still people who frequently fall victim to this cyber attack.

Let’s see how to identify Phishing emails, the subtle signs that should help you spot one and how to stay protected from them.

1. Check if the message is sent from a public email domain

There is no chance of a genuine organization sending you an email from an address that ends with a public domain such as @gmail.com or @yahoo.com. Authentic and genuine businesses would have their own email domain and company accounts. If the domain name matches the sender of the email, the message is in all totality legitimate.

Another way to check a business’s domain name is to do a quick google search making it easy to detect phishing.

Many of us don’t ever look at the email address that a message has come from, which also holds many clues that can help you spot a phishing email.

When cybercriminals create their fake email addresses to lure people into their schemes, they often have the option to select the display name, which does not have to relate to the email address at all. Therefore, they can use a phoney email address that will turn up in your inbox with the display name of a trusted brand or business.

2. Obvious grammar and spelling errors

If you get an email from a big business or organization, but it contains many basic spelling mistakes and grammatical errors, it is an obvious sign that it is a phishing email. Therefore, you should read the email carefully and check for these mistakes because they serve as clues that help you identify a phishing email.

3. Open attachments with utmost care

Email attachments are necessary and carry a lot of vital information, but they are the biggest threat to your device, and you could end up becoming a victim of phishing. This is the reason why it is essential to scan every attachment in your email.

Email attachments, particularly from unknown senders, can have viruses, malware and other malicious programs that could hamper the security of your system and make it easier for an attacker or cyber-criminal to gain access.

So, make sure to scan all attachments you receive from both known and unknown senders to stay protected.

4. Protect your email by using an SSL Certificate

We often wonder is this website safe? The threat of phishing is growing daily, with websites and emails at most risk of this menace. To make emails more secure and resilient to online attacks like MiTM attacks, you should get Cheap SSL Certificate. Secure Socket Layer gives a safe and secure transfer-layer interaction among two end-users, the sender of the email and the receiver.

Installing an SSL certificate warrants that every communication between the server and browser stays encrypted and secured from external threats. In addition, an SSL certificate encrypts communications on websites whenever it is technically feasible, making it harder for attackers to shoot phishing emails.

5. The message has a sense of urgency

If you receive an email giving a piece of essential news or update and asking you to reply and act immediately, it mostly is a phishing email. But a careful study of such email or message makes you realize that the organization doesn’t get in touch with you by that email address, and you learn that they did not send you a document at all. That is why so many scams and phishing schemes request that you act as soon as possible. It is also common for phishing emails to instill panic in the recipient as if you would incur some heavy loss if you do not act. The email may claim that your account may have been compromised, and the only way to confirm it is if you enter your login details, such as username and password. And with this act, you have just given away your details to the scammers. Then again, the email might state that your account will be locked if you do not act instantly.

So, ensure that you take the time to go through the processes mentioned above and check if it is a genuine email and act only if and when, you are sure. If you are unsure, however, contact the company directly through some other means.