Great Incentives for Great Employees

Posted on June 2, 2013 by spr1334mspilotro

As a business starts out there are a few challenges that CEO’s will have to face. One challenge is hiring the right people for each position needed. The next one is retaining the employees. If you are going to try and expand and compete you have to make sure that your employees are happy. If employees know they are working in an environment that they love, then they will want to stay. By offering incentives to your employees it shows that you care about them and you want to make sure they are getting treated fairly. You do not have to do anything outrageous like Google or Facebook do in their work space. Simply adding free lunch once a week will improve absenteeism and decrease your turnover rate.

For example, Google has been known to offer on-site haircuts, gym memberships, fully stocked lounge areas with billiards and video games, on-site dry-cleaning, and even gave employees 100,000 hours in subsidized massages in 2012. Who would not want to work there? You can get all your errands done for free while you are at work. By offering incentives like these it increases employees productivity. I know if my job offered half of those incentives I would want to make sure I am doing my best at work so I can stay with the company.

Almost everyone has heard about how working for Facebook is great. Not only do they have catered meals and a insane break room, they also offer paid maternity leave for four months. They also give reimbursements for daycare and as a bonus Facebook gives you $4,000 as a gift for the new born. That is crazy to think that they give gifts like this to every single employee that works at Facebook. You would think people would take advantage of it but that is not the case. They have never had a problem that would make them want to take away the gift. They trust their employees with their company, and the employees trust the company with taking care of them.

Yes all this seems outrageous if your a small company, but just by allowing employees to wear jeans one day a week can make a large differnce. You have to find out what works best for your employees and your company. Start by asking some of the employees what they like or what they feel could help them get through a tough day at work. You would be surprised with how easy it could be to ask employees what they want instead of assuming. By making the employees feel like they have a say, they will have more respect for management and the organization as a whole.

If you can pick some incentives at your job what would they be?

Would your productivity increase if you got offered incentives?

HTC First to HTC Last

Posted on May 26, 2013 by spr1323rsenatore

Imagine if you were Mark Zuckerberg, the CEO of Facebook, and your product attracted 175 million people on a daily basis. I don’t know about you, but I would be thinking of other ways to capitalize on this already loyal fan base and try to introduce more products targeted toward their needs without stemming off the confines of what has made Facebook successful. Hey, what about a cell phone?!

This idea has apparently caught AT&T’s eye when they decided to allow the new Facebook Home software to be integrated in the HTC First cell phone.

Facebook Home is software for your phone that allows Facebook to essentially take over your phone. This allows users to take advantage of their already established social base on Facebook and communicate with these friends on their cell phone “more conveniently”. It consists of features such as the cover feed that allows you to glance at your phone for photos and posts, chat heads that allows you to send and receive texts and Facebook messages in one place, allows notifications to be accented on your home screen and an app launcher.

To me, the advantages this product are allowing cell phone users to no longer have to pay a texting fee due to the chat heads feature and from a company point of view it allows Facebook to mass distribute its product without consumers having to buy a cell phone. However, from a product design standpoint, I don’t think Facebook Home targets the cell phone market very well. It tries to reinvent the cell phone world too much by focusing the cell phone software design around people instead of apps. As a consumer would you enjoy having your cell phone constantly flowing with your friend’s pictures and status?

Apparently the majority of Facebook Home users did not enjoy having their phone being constantly engulfed with their friend’s updates when the first month sales reports came back. “BGR.com says that sources at AT&T indicate that fewer than 15,000 of the phones had been sold by the end of its first month. By comparison, in the three months of the year AT&T sold 6M smart phones, of which about 1 M were android phones- an average of more than 300,000 per month. “AT&T then cut the original $100 price to $99 cents on-contract. The mistake HTC First made to integrate their product with Facebook home has seemed to have left them with an essentially useless product with a lot of inventory. Now it is rumored that the HTC First will soon be discontinued and unsold inventory will be returned to HTC.

I would question management’s decisions during the product development stages when designing the product, how they reviewed Facebook Homes design, and most importantly how they tested the market. If these stages were done efficiently I feel that AT&T could have better understood the consumer demand for the HTC First Facebook phone and could have been more aware of this disaster before it occurred.

As a consumer would the HTC First Facebook phone satisfy you? How do you feel management could have avoided this disaster?

http://www.foxnews.com/tech/2013/05/13/no-home-for-facebook-at-att-htc-first-to-be-discontinued/
http://www.techhive.com/article/2039633/facebook-slams-brakes-on-htc-firsts-international-plans-following-poor-home-reception.html
http://www.facebook.com/help/558055177560569
http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/2013/may/14/facebook-home-app-htc-problems
http://news.cnet.com/8301-1035_3-57329634-94/facebook-phone-who-would-buy-this-thing/
http://www.theatlanticwire.com/technology/2013/05/htc-one-isnt-saving-htc-facebook-phone/65486/
http://news.softpedia.com/news/175-Million-People-Use-Facebook-Every-Day-133744.shtml

Tweet Equity: Social Media in the Workplace Boosts Productivity

Posted on May 13, 2013October 26, 2015 by spr1314csanmateo

Over the past decade, social media has become a hallmark in the realm of communication. Not only has it re-shaped the way in which communication functions on a social level, social media has taken on a new role in the workplace. Social media usage in the office is no longer seen as a distraction for workers and has become a new tool towards productivity and engagement. Instead, these companies have adopted an embracing attitude towards it and have incorporated it into company culture and everyday office life.

To prove this argument, a study was conducted at by Joe Nandhakumar, professor of information systems at the Warwick Business School in the United Kingdom. Over the span of two years, the study monitored the productivity levels at a well-established European telecommunications company that practiced policies that encouraged social media use in the workplace. The results of the study show a clear rise in productivity. This rise can be contributed through the employees’ ability to respond to client and customer concerns in a quick manner, through the use of social outlets and networks such as Facebook or Twitter. Employees were also able to use these outlets to pitch products and ideas and close sales. Nandhakumar also noted that social media allowed for heightened collaboration amongst employees, both within the office and in other locations that may be farther away.

This embrace of social media within the workplace is a major indicator of the definitive changes in corporate culture and the face of business in 2013. Social media has the ability to allow a company to build a distinct culture and identity. Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, and Google+ allows businesses to grow a public presence and allow fast and direct communication with its customer base, clients, current and potential employees, and any other interested user. Social media also changes the way in which employees communicate with each other and management. In a time where telecommuting is a very common practice at most companies, networks such as Skype or Google (Hangouts) make it possible to have quick meetings without the need to physically be in the same place. Not only does this boost productivity and cuts down on time, this also has the potential to cut down on travel expenses for companies, since they are afforded with the convenience of virtually conducting a meeting absolutely anywhere. Skype and other video chat outlets have also become commonly used in job interviews, saving time and money for both the employer and the potential employee.

The topic of social media usage in the workplace very distinctly paints a picture of the how business is conducted in 2013. There is an immense embrace of transparency in business that allows for collaboration, growth, and innovation. The corporate use of social media has opened the conversation on many levels.

How do you think the relationship between business and social media will expand in the future?

Source: http://www.businessweek.com/articles/2013-04-01/when-social-media-at-work-dont-create-productivity-killing-distractions#r=inn-s

Socialcast: Facebook for business or an innovative way for collaboration?

Posted on April 28, 2013April 28, 2013 by Klaudia Obrzut

Socialcast is cloud-based social network for business that aims at easing communication between employees and vendors. Its platform allows employees to share ideas, documents, videos, and seek for help, when needed.

VMware bought Socialcast in May 2011, when the company was just starting to target business with its goal of easing internal communication. VMWare, with it new update in mid-April, transformed Socialcast from merely a commination tool, to a dream product for any Project Manager.

VMWare, through Socialcast, wants to alter the way businesses access information by improving business processes. The new update is especially important for Project Managers as it integrates multiple different systems, such as CRM (Customer Relationship Management), ERP (Enterprise Resource Planning), Sharepoint (document management software), email, and other applications. It creates a centralized workspace that helps Project Manager to keep track of deliverables and critical activities through communication with the team.

The new update also allows for instant messaging feature, called Socialcast Messenger, that is available on the platform as well as on mobile devices. While it is not an innovative feature, the IM keeps employees off using other massagers, such as Google Chat, and instead, keeps the communication centralized. Socialcast also allows employees to post updates, such a new security policy, and lets others in the company to comment on the post.

DePaul IT department, at which I am currently employed in as a Help Desk Analyst, uses similar features that Socialcast provides. We have a database, called DePaul University Knowledgebase or the “Wiki,” where specialists from different IT teams post documents and articles on various topics. This is especially helpful for my team because it aids in troubleshooting a technical problem. There are documents ranging from security polices to instructions on how to install various programs, such as SPSS, on DePaul machines. The Knowledgebase is especially useful for new employees, as they are not familiar with DePaul technology policies.

Socialcast Broadcast. Does this look like a Facebook wall?
Source: http://www.socialcast.com/

We also use internal instant messaging to aid in communication between different teams. I can communicate with my supervisor instantly without the hassle of e-mails. I personally find the IM and the Knowledgebase very useful, as I don’t need to get away from my desk and take time from others to ask questions that can be otherwise answered with a support document.

While Socialcast is useful for employees to familiarize themselves with the company’s policies and seek help, how much does it look to you like Facebook, but just for business? Even the platform of Socialcast looks very much alike the Facebook wall. The idea of Socialcast new update is to centralize the workspace and minimize e-mail communication, or even eliminate meetings. Has the way we communicate changed so drastically that we no longer seek face-to-face interaction even in the workplace? What do you think of the new Project Management update to Socialcast?

—–

Sources:

Socialcast Website

VMware Adds Project Management, Secure IM to Socialcast Platform By Thor Olavsrud. April 18, 2013.

VMware Updates SocialCast With Private Messaging By Chris Preimesberger. April 22, 2013.

EA Says Good-Bye to Several Popular Facebook Games

Posted on April 16, 2013April 16, 2013 by spr1332shuang

On April 15th, Electronic Arts (EA) has announced that they will be retiring several of their most popular social Facebook games: The Sims Social, SimCity Social, and Pet Society. EA stated that the reason is that,

“After millions of people initially logged in to play these games, the number of players and amount of activity has fallen off. For people who have seen other recent shutdowns of social games, perhaps this is not surprising.”

These three games will officially go offline in approximately 2 months, on June 14, 2013.

An issue that follows the closure of these games involves the in-game currency for these games. Facebook games are free-to-play, but many games (“freemium” games) like EA’s allow users to purchase in-game currency with real currency to buy certain features in the game that are not free. So while EA is fine with retiring the games, many dedicated players are not happy with the fact that they spent real money on the game, and will no longer be able to access the game and the items they purchased once it goes down. EA’s response is as follows:

“Players are encouraged to spend their remaining balance of SimCash in The Sims Social before the game is retired on June 14th. As of that date, any remaining SimCash left in the game will be invalid.”

This does not really solve the problem. Players cannot do anything about it and refunds will not be provided.

These announcements have all came after EA had recently been voted for and crowned as the Worst Company in America for two consecutive years, as well as the chaotic launch of their newest game, SimCity 5. EA’s closure of these games continues to shed light on the issue of consumers not “owning” a product that they purchased, most notably intangible products such as online-only games.

As an ex-player of some of EA’s Facebook games, I think that the reason why people gradually stopped playing their games is because they failed to meet the consumer’s requirements. They were great games at the start, but as they started becoming more aggressive with the new content and the push to purchase in-game items, the games started going downhill. Many of the players, as well as myself, did not like it. Even though the community had expressed their feelings about these decisions, EA failed to address the problems. Just as our class failed to consider the consumer group’s requirements in the paper airplane activity, EA failed to meet their players’ requirements and expectations for their games.

What do you think of EA’s move to retire these games, and their responses to their consumers’ complaints in regards to the in-game currencies? What do you think about the issue in regards to the payment for and the ownership of intangible products? Furthermore, what does all of this say about the quality of EA’s products and services, as well as EA as a company in general?

Sources

Facebook Home for Mobile Users Innovative? or a Flop?

Posted on April 9, 2013April 10, 2013 by spr1331abarrios

Facebook wants to takeover your computer, tablet, life, and now your Phone?

The sole objective for Facebook Home is to immediately let you gain access to the social network with just a simple look at your phones screen, and this works without you physically running the app or even unlocking your phone. So in simple words, from your locked screen you’ll be able to see your news feed, posts, and full screen photos posted by friends—not to mention you will also have the ability to comment and like the items you stumble upon.

So how exactly is this innovative/different as to other phones with normal software? A Facebook Home equipped phone differentiates itself from other phones as you turn on the screen. You will see the time and a small circle at the bottom of the phone displaying your current profile picture. If you don’t touch the screen, your news feeds, known as Cover Feed (in Facebook Home), will start displaying and automatically scrolling from one post to another. There is also the option of manually swiping through the feed just incase you come across something interesting. On the bright side each post takes up the entire diameter of the screen, giving you the perfect visual. If a photo is posted then it will lighten up the screen and you have the option of double clicking to enter your comment or to add a like. If it’s a text post, the author’s photo will appear transparent in the background. If you swipe your finger to the right, you now engage in Facebook Messenger, where you can directly speak to your friends, while also seeing and receiving your SMS texts.

If your friends are boring and you’re really not an avid Facebook user then I can see this being very pointless and annoying to you. But if your obsessed with Facebook and constantly stalking an ex-boyfriend or girlfriend or cant get enough from just having it on your computer, then Facebook Home might be right down your alley. Then again, the option for Facebook Home is 100% optional when buying a new phone, so Facebook still allows the customer choose whether they want to adapt to Facebook Home or just use the normal app.

iPhone users, you like the idea? Well unfortunately Facebook Home is an optional feature for Android users only. It won’t be running on any Apple products because apple does not allow other companies to take control of the main functions. Though in Apples basic settings you are allowed to sign into you Facebook and Instagram and be able to share content easily. But that’s as far as it goes with Apples strict policies.

Do you think Facebook Home is differentiating the brand in the right way or setting up for a flop in the mobile world? Was it a bad decision to make software that has opted them from the biggest mobile manufacturer, Apple? What are you thoughts?

References:

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424127887323550604578412664150862712.html

Operations and Project Management in Today's Competitive Environment

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Facebook

Great Incentives for Great Employees

HTC First to HTC Last

Facebook Home for Mobile Users Innovative? or a Flop?