Recently I polled some fellow workshifters on the twitter network asking about what some of their biggest challenges were when working out of the home office. It was an interesting find because quite a few folks said that the biggest challenges included trust and communications. After having been a professional workshifter for the past three years I can honestly say that I concur with this challenge. So how do we deal with them? I've created a few methodologies in which I live by on a daily basis. I hope these help. Please share your thoughts and ideas in the comments. Would love to get your take.

1. Always be honest. Recently I fell ill to a nasty flu bug and needed to take a couple days off to recover. I was very open and honest with my team and did everything I could to minimize the impact on the team for those two days. Look, people will see right through a lie. I've always found that being honest whether it's for a sick day, a family event, or anything really is the best policy.

2. Keep Good Logs. I keep logs of everything I do on a daily basis. For me this happens in two places. I use Evernote for my digital logs and a yellow note pad for quick notes and a second hard copy of my daily logs. Evernote is an application that runs in the cloud. You have access to these notes on any computer with the app installed as well as the majority of all mobile devices. I am an iPhone user and absolutely love it!

3. Don't flood the email. I have found that throughout my career it's best not to flood coworkers email. This is inefficient and wastes a lot of time. If I have questions I try to note them on my pad and send one email with all the items if possible. As workshifters I know there often feels like there is a disconnect between you and the main office so email is a great way to let everyone know you're busy. Resist the temptation and be conscientious of others time.

4. Clarity in Communications. make sure that you are clear on the methods of communications used by your team. Maybe they use Google docs and spreadsheets, maybe they are heavy users of GoToMeeting and Citrix products. there are many ways to communicate but be sure to find clarity there. If your organization has no clear communications system or methodology it might be time for you to do some research and lay out a plan!

5. Do Amazing Work. This one is obvious right? It's really hard for your boss to come down on you with fury if your work exceeds expectations. This is the number one way to build trust and make sure you are always in the communications loop!
 
What do you think?


Photo Credit: Assbach

Today's post is from Josiane Feigon, author of the bestselling book Smart Selling on the Phone and Online, the sourcebook for inside sales. Her Cubicle Chronicles blog is voted among the top 25 sales blogs. She is founder and CEO of TeleSmart Communications, a 20-year veteran and thought leader of the industry, Josiane is recognized as one of the world's leading experts on inside sales team and manager talent, providing consulting, coaching, and training solutions for hundreds of Fortune 1000 companies. Visit Josiane's website: www.tele-smart.com to read her blog, purchase her book, and download her latest e-books and white papers.

With Google Voice turning one year old and becoming available to U.S. residents, it's time to highlight the benefits to workshifters.

1. Choose a Local Number or use your existing mobile number
At my company I have the ability to forward my office phone to another number. However, the call can't be forwarded unless the number I'm forwarding to is in the same area code as my office. Nowadays, people aren't choosing to have home phones, they're using their mobile phone as their main contact number. And...why change your cell phone number if you relocate to that area code since almost all calling plans are national and don't charge long distance fees. With Google Voice, you can pick a phone number in any desired area code or zip code and set that as the forwarding number, which will automatically ring any and all phones you choose.

2. Transcribed voicemail
When you're in the plane, you can't make and receive calls over airplane wifi, but you do get internet access. If you miss a call and the caller leaves a voicemail it will be transcribed and sent to you as an e-mail, SMS, or both.

3. Visual voicemail
Having visual voicemail is such a time saver. I can see who called, when, see the message as a transcription, archive it, and not have to dial in and listen to a string of messages. Get in, get the info, and get out!

4. Personalized voicemail greetings
This is one of the BEST options; personalized voicemail. All you gmail contacts and groups are accessible through Google Voice. You have options to create personalized voicemails for groups (family, work, friends) or for individuals. Changing the voicemail message is quick, easy, and instant; taking less than a minute. It's especially useful if your work calls are forwarding to your Google Voice number because you can record the same greeting you have on your office phone and the caller/client won't know the difference.

How do you use Google Voice?

Photo credit: Google
 

If you go back and look at how Google started as a company, it's really amazing to see how much they have grown. Starting out with search, they have grown into many areas including collaboration, mobile, and productivity. While at times I wish that Google would focus, it's hard to argue against their strategy as they are leaders in the search market and challengers in many other areas.

So when they announced Google Wave there was a ton of hype because everyone was waiting for that next killer application from Google. Let's face it, these are the guys who did Google Search, Gmail, Adwords. All game changers in their categories, so expectations were pretty high.

But something happened along the way.. No one really knew what to do with it.

I am like a lot of people when I say that I honestly haven't used Wave a whole lot. When Google first announced it I rushed out and got an invitation, started a few Wave's with some buddies, but the interest quickly faded. That doesn't mean that Wave couldn't be a great tool for workshifting and after I revisited it some benefits bubbled up to the surface:

•    For team collaboration it quickly beats trading information back and forth via email. We have all been on those long email strings, soon you lose track of what came first, that important attachment that everyone else is referencing has been misplaced in your inbox. With Wave all of this information is contained within the Wave for everyone to see. One version of the truth.

•    Get new teammates up to speed quickly. As you add new people to your team you can quickly get them up to speed by using the playback feature found in every wave. The playback starts over at the beginning of the wave and you can quickly see the content and people who where added to wave as they happened.

•    Wave brings conversation into your project. How many times have you been working remotely on a project, needed some additional information from a team member, and you then had to use other tools to start these offline conversations. With Wave, all of these conversations can happen within the project where they are then stored for the whole team to see.

I decided to take another run at really using Wave to see if it fits into my workshifting toolbox and I need your help. A few weeks back I posted five reasons why your boss won't let you workshift and now I want to come up with a post that focuses on the reasons why you can.

I have started a wave so that we can collaborate on the responses. This will help me out by getting some feedback on my post and it will allow us to kick the tires on Google Wave to see the good and the bad. I will put out a follow up post on how Wave worked and if it meets the mark for workshifting use.

If you are interested in joining, make sure you have a Google Wave account, and shoot me an email at wave@itkgroup.com and I will email you the invite. Hopefully we will get a new post put together and we will see if Google Wave is a workshifting treasure or tease.

Have you found any workshifting benefits of Google Wave?


Photo Credit: Rafa Garces

Just recently, I found myself lying in bed at 1:30 am with my iPhone in hand answering emails and responding to people who I missed on twitter and Facebook that day. After switching off the device I realized that I was then spending another hour laying there thinking about the next day and how I might be able to work on the issues, problems or ideas presented in the emails. This sounds somewhat absurd doesn't it? I mean it wasn't more than a few years ago that you shut down the computer and that was the end of your day. Now we have mobile devices following us around and I know that I am not the only one perpetuating this issue!

I suppose you think that the rest of the article is going to be tips on how to find balance. Well, maybe a bit of it will be but I would really love to poll the readers of the workshifting blog on how you find balance! As remote workers and workshifters it feels second nature to pick up your phone during dinner to check your email. It feels natural to want to check the status on a project when you're really supposed to be focused on your kids school play. So what gives? Do we need to start setting up rules for ourselves? Here are two things that I am trying to reclaim a bit of sanity and hopefully make me more efficient with the time I am spending working.

1. Morning and Evening Email Redux - I remember hearing advice years ago saying that the worst thing you can do to yourself is watch the news first thing in the morning and just before you turn in at night. After all there is rarely anything good or uplifting on the news so why inundate yourself with that energy to start and end your day. I am going to apply this advise to email and social networks for now on. My advise would be to spend 15 minutes in silence each morning. Maybe visualize your day and set your wheels on the right track to move forward. Maybe it is talking a brisk walk before the morning shower. Either way I recommend clearing the mind every morning to get aligned. For those evening email and social media stints I recommend a good book. Read something enjoyable that settles the mind and leaves you with positive feelings. If you find yourself grumbling about the world forces around you each day, change the forces!

2. Reclaim the Weekend - Ok, so not all of us can afford to ignore our work life all weekend and maybe some of us are even scheduled to be actively working on the weekends. For those of you in that situation this should be called Reclaim a Day. I love my job and I love what I do. That being said it's important to disconnect and recharge for a day a week. I find this helps me immensely. Every Sunday i turn off the computers and leave the mobile devices to play sweet tunes in my ears rather than being a email machine or work device. I can't give you specific to do's here as we are all different but after chatting with a friend recently about this topic I told him to rekindle a passion. We grew up together golfing and fishing on the weekends as kids. Why not revisit some of those things? There is always time for yard work and chores. Go rekindle a passion.

These are two of the things I am doing to keep me fresh and creative. I would love to hear your thoughts. Are you able to put away the technology for a bit or are you checking your email at 1:30 am each night? What rules or habits have you created to help you stay fresh?


Photo Credit: Jorge Quinteros

We started this blog with the goal of building a community by providing content and resource material that was tailored for workshifters. The community was not built based on promoting products or services, although the occasional promotion is ok (just don't be "that guy"), it's based on fulfilling the need for information and the desire of sharing a common interest.

Over the past year I've watched as solo-preneurs chat with large enterprise companies about a wide range of topics.  It's less about what they are talking about, and more about the fact that they are talking, discovering and to enabling. Many of the questions and conversations are fielded and managed by the community.  One of the biggest lessons learned, is that once the community takes off, the community is in control. However, their desire for a consistent diet of rich and tasty content only grows with the community. So stay on it.

Another lesson learned is that your services are talked about alongside competing services.  Gasp!  I know it's hard to swallow, but your services are not right for everyone.  At my company, we absolutely love our products, but we know one size does not fit all.  We hope we attract customers that are a perfect fit.  Sometimes we don't and we definitely hear about it.  If you're going to build a community you need to be ok with that, because much of the conversation extends beyond the blog and takes place on Twitter, Facebook and other community blogs.  

What's really fun is watching the conversations that have little or nothing to do with technology. Common topics include comfortable office chairs, pets, marriage, diet, travel and about everything in-between. This is a nice lead in to one of, what seems to be, the hardest areas in managing a community and that's being REAL.

You could also replace REAL with HUMAN, HONEST, TRANSPARENT, etc. The point is it must come from the heart. You really and truly need to care. The community has low tolerance for corporate speak and canned responses. If you do more listening than talking, it will start to come naturally.

Online communities are not the exclusive domain of companies. We all belong to communities, online and in the real world. There is your Facebook community which you maintain, monitor and contribute to. In this day and age, it will become most people's first experience with a community. Then you may be belong to a car club, or cooking group and neither of which are online.  

As workshifters we often build a community around our co-working locations. You probably know the person that works the espresso machine, a few of the regulars, etc. This real world community probably extends to the web in the form of check-ins on Foursquare (who doesn't want to by mayor of their joint?), photo uploads to Flickr and messages in Twitter. If you're thinking about starting an online community blog, take that same casual demeanor and move it online. Be consistent, be transparent, be real.

My top 7 lessons:

1.  The community is in control
2.  Be the best electronic version of yourself
3.  Listen more than you talk
4.  Keep it really interesting
5.  Monitor and contribute daily
6.  Don't let questions or comments go unanswered for more than 24 hours
7.  If you don't genuinely care, don't do it

These lessons aren't particularly earth shattering, and you may read similar advice on other blogs. What's important is the application of the lessons. Much like when you read a book on a topic that's important to you. The reading of the book is not the measurement of success.  You are not striving to be an excellent book buyer. What matters is the practical application of the advice.  

That's my opinion, what's yours?


Photo Credit: Niall Kennedy

We all think we know how to communicate, right? As children, we learn how to talk; as adults our vocabularies increase as does our knowledge of both verbal and non-verbal queues. To borrow from an overused cliche: "It's not only what you say, but how you say it..." Wellllll...maybe, yes, ok. But what about when you say it, how much of it you say and to whom it's said?

In the world at large, communication (much like knowledge) IS power - when invoked. Strong communication skills, both written and verbal, are key to the management of many of life's issues as well as professional advancement.  And, although the communicator may depend heavily on there being information at hand, it is his/her dissemination of that information to the right people at right time which results in the greatest benefit.

In the world of project management, communication is KEY. It's so key in fact, it's one of the Project Management Institute's nine knowledge areas. And, as any well-seasoned project manager knows - and as any new PM will soon find out - communication breakdowns can spell a project's certain demise. My mantra has always been, "when in doubt, OVERcommunicate." We all have too many emails in our inboxes anyway; leave it to the recipient to decide if they need the information or not.

If there is relevant and timely information which pertains to a project, disseminate it!!! I have never had a stakeholder nor project resource tell me to stop bombarding them with emails about a project, but I have certainly been involved in instances whereby a simple FYI would have gone a long way toward keeping stakeholder's anxieties at bay and resources and schedules on track.

In particular, if a project has met with any type of constraint ( be it a resource, budget or scheduling constraint) or dependencies are preventing a milestone from being met - communicating potential roadblocks will help a PM avoid having to ask forgiveness at best or admit project failure at worst. Although you do not want to instill unnecessary concerns or "cry wolf" if you will, when there is the definite potential for adjustments or parallel pathing, your stakeholders need to know.

Effectively, the art of project management involves delicately balancing a defined scope with identified deliverables, the resources involved in managing these deliverables, in order to ultimately reach milestones within an acceptable timeframe and budget. If any of these items stand to be affected, the three 'Cs' are your best friends: Communicate, Communicate, Communicate. Remember - one of the distinct advantages of being a project manager is the implicit trust you earn from those relying on you to steer a project to success; embedded in that trust is a willingness for your voice to be heard - so don't be afraid to use it. It's your "responsibility" !!!

At the same time, use the tools which have been created just for your project management pleasure  - tools such as MS Project and Visio are invaluable visuals which can communicate the progress of your project and any changes therein. I vividly recall managing a dual datacenter build for a methodical Japanese client (who also happened to be the parent company!), and when faced with project roadblocks for which I could neither excuse nor prevent, my constant Visio timeline updates won me all the brownie points that I needed to overcome an inevitable shift in delivery date. If you're not a techie, which I certainly am not, there are numerous tutorials and resources available to learn how to use these tools.

We all take comfort when uncertainties are minimized, and there is no better way to ensure that those who need to know are in the know than by communicating. And whether you are a professional project manager or managing a life project such as a new home purchase or renovation or enrolling in a new school, the same rules apply.

A...B...C is for COMMUNICATION. You would not settle for mis-information so don't settle for a lack thereof either


What do you think?



Photo Credit: Phantom of the Flicks

Hello workshifters! I hope everyone is enjoying their summer. A friend of mine took me flying in his Cirrus SR20 recently. It was great fun and quite a learning experience. One of the strongest lessons learned was the amount of attention and communication it takes. There is a lot going on for a pilot during take off, in the air, and landing.

Before we turned the engine on there was an exhaustive pre-flight check. The exterior and cabin inspections are critical to identify and fix any potential problems that may occur during flight. This is done in the same sequence every-time. This is a good practice. At the beginning of your day, go through a pre-flight check to make sure have everything you need to work productively. This is true especially if you are working outside the home. What is your pre-work checklist?

Another thing I noticed was the amount of talking between air control, our plane, and other pilots. I had no clue what the myriad of acronyms, call signs, and aeronautical jargon meant but the pilots spoke it fluently. It wasn't the talking that impressed me. It was the listening. After each command the pilot repeated his instructions back to the tower verbatim. When you are in the air, you can't afford to have miscommunication or, even worse, assumption. This is also true working remotely. More often than I like to admit in the past I have half heard another party on a conference call or made assumptions from an incomplete email. It is better to have someone repeat or clarify than act on something unclear. Try repeating back to the messenger what was said to make sure you received it clearly   

On our way back home we landed at a small airport to refuel. Once on the ground we were met by the airports manager.  My friend Chris and he started chatting and it was like they were old friends. Pilots have a tribe to themselves and welcome each other with open arms. They relate with one another on unique level of shared experiences and expertise. In the workforce as more and more of us trade cube farms for the world as an office, we need to welcome our new friends into the community. We can learn so much from each other and share great stories of digital nomadic adventure.

What do you think?

This afternoon's post is from Tracey Webb, a 25-year business veteran with a depth of experience in high-tech, health care, software, and financial services segments.   Having worked for global enterprises like Xerox, IBM, as well as some of the largest international learning and development organizations, Tracey has a long track record of producing success for her clients.  Currently, she serves as the Director of Consulting Services for Cox eLearning Consultants

I can remember the first formal training session that I attended at Xerox over 20 years ago.  Xerox was and still is a big proponent of training its people.  There was a huge complex in Leesburg, Virginia which rested like a monolith hidden in the woods, which included a veritable army of people in Xerox's training division.  The firm poured untold resources into sending its people to the training mecca for an in-person deep dive into various forms of skill and knowledge transfer.

The trek to Leesburg began from all over the country.  There were personnel involved in scheduling at the local branch level and at the training center in Leesburg.  Room assignments, airplane tickets, ground transportation, and of course the famous cafeteria!  The gravy budget alone must have been in the thousands of dollars.  It was northern Virginia and they put gravy on everything!  The cafeteria was huge, the selection large and varied.  The logistics and the budget to train the employees was a very large endeavor to manage and to fund.

Now it would be hard to imagine an organization flying all of its huge salesforce to one central location to train twice per year.  Training has evolved to the point where employees would probably balk at a learning and development solution that only centered on classroom training.  Today, employees expect to be fully engaged by at least a blend of modern technology and some version of classroom training.  

The technology employed had best reflect the tone, look, and feel of modern social networks with a beguiling user interface.  The days of participants sitting enthralled in classrooms by the dynamic instructor are over.  In fact, they probably never happened.  This is not to say that there aren't some fabulous instructors and facilitators out there, but the expectation of adult learners has changed.  Also, research has shown that repetitive learning in targeted doses after a training event reinforces and accelerates learning.

So what do adult learners in a more tech savvy environment expect now from training?  Well, given the scrutiny over budgets, bailouts, and layoffs, any firm that spends the kinds of funds in both human capital and actual training dollars that most of the major corporations did 20 years ago would be considered a pariah, even by its own employees.  Especially if those costs were associated with travel, given the myriad of distributed learning technologies available today.

Additionally, today's training populations expects to be given material to digest in "bytes."  This requirement is all about time and performance pressure:  the need is to be able to translate the skills and/or knowledge into useful information almost immediately.  Even the reinforcement must be easily digestible and applicable instantaneously.

So how do we develop the collective brain of the organization in a manner that has a reasonable return on investment in terms of time expended, dollars expended, and knowledge applied that results in concrete improvements?  We create a blended learning platform that includes classroom training only where necessary and cost-efficient (all of the targeted employees in one location with corporate real estate readily available for training sites).  

The e-learning portion of the platform must be carefully constructed and integrated with the brick and mortar learning methods.  The electronic methodologies must be easy to use without excessive links that must be clicked on and activated.  The user interface must have that sleek and modern appeal so common to the social media market now.  

Many of the modern electronic platforms have interfaces that replicate live human interaction in an on-line environment.  While one of the benefits of e-learning is the mobility of self-pace lessons and learning individually, there is also the crucial element of group on-line learning which provides a virtual classroom and encourages collaboration and additive learning between all students in the on-line session simultaneously.  

Technology now allows for student polls, chats, and hand-raising to facilitate discussion.  Instructional designers need to carefully consider how this technology can be leveraged in the integrated learning engagement to accelerate adoption of new skills and behaviors that produce business results.

The organizational training landscape has morphed tremendously in the last few decades, but even more so in the last five years with the advent and adoption of social media.  Participants don't quite expect to be entertained, but they certainly expect to be engaged.  They also expect that their organizations will optimize resource allocation, given the concerns about financial stability.  Integrated and blended e-learning solutions can help ensure that the organizational training metamorphosis continues on a positive trajectory that engages the learners and produces targeted results.

How has technology changed the way you learn in the past couple of years?


Photo Credit: Sir Watkyn