We all know what Google is, and more than likely we use it multiple times a week if not daily. Most of us know too that if we don’t know what exactly to type in to try and find what were looking for, we can type in something close and Google will give suggestions of what it thinks we’re looking for. One question for you as a business owner is, have you ever tried to Google your company?
Search Engine Optimization (SEO) is huge for a company’s Web site as these are key words that need to be identified for search engines such as Google, Yahoo, etc, in order for your company to come up. If your business is not coming up when searched in a search engine you could be losing potential customers thus possibly taking away some of your business’ success.
HubSpot has posted tips for helping business owners with their SEO efforts so they can be at the top of searches and hopefully accrue more business.
“If you’ve spent time (or are simply curious) about online marketing, then the topic of search engine optimization (SEO) usually comes up. And, no discussion of search engine anything is complete these days without some mention of Google. This article provides a brief overview of how Google ranks search results with a look at their PageRank™ algorithm (a key component). I’m not a search engine expert (that’s the bad news). The good news is that I know enough to describe Google PageRank in relatively simple terms (such that you can impress your friends and family with your new-found knowledge).”
Read more…
Friday, January 29, 2010
Friday, January 22, 2010
Budgeting for Your Small Business
As you start and build your business, it seems that there are a million things to take care of. Having a budget and knowing how to keep a budget are key elements for business success. If you don’t know how to budget or how to manage a budget, your business may not survive. Being able to cover your expenses, make payroll and still be able to give yourself a paycheck can be a very challenging task. Having good budgeting skills can help ensure you’ll be able to do these things. It will take some business strategy and planning, but it will be well worth it in the end.
Trent Hamm with OpenForum.com talks about creating your budget and provides tips on how to do it with success.
“I'm going to make a prediction about your small business. You didn't get into that business because you were excited and enthralled by the idea of managing your finances and setting up a budget.”
Read more…
Trent Hamm with OpenForum.com talks about creating your budget and provides tips on how to do it with success.
“I'm going to make a prediction about your small business. You didn't get into that business because you were excited and enthralled by the idea of managing your finances and setting up a budget.”
Read more…
Friday, January 15, 2010
Employee Performance Reviews
Employee performance reviews may be something that business owners don’t necessarily look forward, yet, it is something that is critical and must be done. Performance reviews can provide great guidance for the employee. It will highlight the areas they are excelling in as well as the areas they need to improve upon in order to help make the business a success. It important in a performance review to identify what your business goals for the company are to help the employee in what they are trying to achieve moving forward.
TAB-Certified Facilitator, Oswald Viva, talks about a different way of doing an evaluation of an employee; a method that measures and employees performance rather than just review their performance.
The business world taught us to do formal performance “reviews” of employees on a fixed schedule, as a standard management requirement. Why? Does this practice make better employees? Does it make better managers? Does it guarantee excellence in performance? Do they really work?
Please allow me to answer those questions right now. No, they don’t really work and are mostly a big waste of time and effort.
I favor a different approach and a different method to “measure” (as opposed to “judge”) employee performance. I always told my employees (of any level) that they are being reviewed daily by our continuous interaction and I used “Management by Objectives (MBO)” and a “Review by Objectives (RBO)” method for measuring performance. Obviously the MBO is not a new system or management fad; to the contrary, it has been around forever (it seems), but many times it isn’t well understood or used.
What is the difference between RBO and the standard review method? RBO eliminates the subjectivity of performance judgment, because it does not depend on the difficult impartiality of a manager over multiple employees. With the RBO method—when used properly—there is no subjectivity, no favoritism or personal dislikes; results are clear, the goals were met or they were not and there is no ambiguity.
In a RBO process, a manager still meets “formally” with the employee but they meet to review progress achieved on the goals previously set. Judgment then is easy; were the goals met? Were they met on time? How many did not reach completion and why? Did performance exceed the goals set? Did the employee achieve extra merits?
The same meeting is also used to develop and set new goals for the new period. These goals must be jointly developed and agreed to—rather than being dictated by the manager—to ensure buy-in of the employee and to prevent future discrepancies. The frequency of these meetings depends on the length of the goals, but always ensuring that there are periodic ongoing progress reviews. Managers must not wait until the target date for completion to see if the goals will be met or not.
I’ve heard people claim that the RBO process cannot be used for production line workers or other low level employees because it is not practical to set goals for them. This is a fallacy as goals can be easily developed, monitored and measured for employees of any level.
Another benefit of the RBO process is that, contrary to the traditional method, all parties benefit from it. The employee learns and improves because the manager guides them through the goals set and, hopefully, teaches the employee how to accomplish them. Also, the employee knows exactly how they are being measured and what is required of them. The manager benefits because they have employees that respond to the guidance and become more productive and efficient and the company benefits from the increased productivity generated by happier employees and managers.
Incidentally, another erroneous practice is to tie-in performance reviews with salary increases. Creating this practice aggravates all the negatives of the traditional reviews and also of the RBO program because employees feel inevitably entitled to an increase at “review time”. I much favor a disengagement of the two, associating increases only to the achievement of goals as jointly developed.
My advice then is to scrap the traditional employee performance reviews and adopt a Management by Objectives (MBO) and Review By Objectives (RBO) process that ensures value of the process, fairness in performance judgment (measurement) and eliminates all the negative consequences of the traditional process.
TAB-Certified Facilitator, Oswald Viva, talks about a different way of doing an evaluation of an employee; a method that measures and employees performance rather than just review their performance.
The business world taught us to do formal performance “reviews” of employees on a fixed schedule, as a standard management requirement. Why? Does this practice make better employees? Does it make better managers? Does it guarantee excellence in performance? Do they really work?
Please allow me to answer those questions right now. No, they don’t really work and are mostly a big waste of time and effort.
I favor a different approach and a different method to “measure” (as opposed to “judge”) employee performance. I always told my employees (of any level) that they are being reviewed daily by our continuous interaction and I used “Management by Objectives (MBO)” and a “Review by Objectives (RBO)” method for measuring performance. Obviously the MBO is not a new system or management fad; to the contrary, it has been around forever (it seems), but many times it isn’t well understood or used.
What is the difference between RBO and the standard review method? RBO eliminates the subjectivity of performance judgment, because it does not depend on the difficult impartiality of a manager over multiple employees. With the RBO method—when used properly—there is no subjectivity, no favoritism or personal dislikes; results are clear, the goals were met or they were not and there is no ambiguity.
In a RBO process, a manager still meets “formally” with the employee but they meet to review progress achieved on the goals previously set. Judgment then is easy; were the goals met? Were they met on time? How many did not reach completion and why? Did performance exceed the goals set? Did the employee achieve extra merits?
The same meeting is also used to develop and set new goals for the new period. These goals must be jointly developed and agreed to—rather than being dictated by the manager—to ensure buy-in of the employee and to prevent future discrepancies. The frequency of these meetings depends on the length of the goals, but always ensuring that there are periodic ongoing progress reviews. Managers must not wait until the target date for completion to see if the goals will be met or not.
I’ve heard people claim that the RBO process cannot be used for production line workers or other low level employees because it is not practical to set goals for them. This is a fallacy as goals can be easily developed, monitored and measured for employees of any level.
Another benefit of the RBO process is that, contrary to the traditional method, all parties benefit from it. The employee learns and improves because the manager guides them through the goals set and, hopefully, teaches the employee how to accomplish them. Also, the employee knows exactly how they are being measured and what is required of them. The manager benefits because they have employees that respond to the guidance and become more productive and efficient and the company benefits from the increased productivity generated by happier employees and managers.
Incidentally, another erroneous practice is to tie-in performance reviews with salary increases. Creating this practice aggravates all the negatives of the traditional reviews and also of the RBO program because employees feel inevitably entitled to an increase at “review time”. I much favor a disengagement of the two, associating increases only to the achievement of goals as jointly developed.
My advice then is to scrap the traditional employee performance reviews and adopt a Management by Objectives (MBO) and Review By Objectives (RBO) process that ensures value of the process, fairness in performance judgment (measurement) and eliminates all the negative consequences of the traditional process.
Friday, January 8, 2010
Keeping Your Star Performers
As we enter 2010, they economy may be turning around slowly, but there is no doubt that it is still a tough economy. Companies are still doing layoffs and the unemployment rate is still high. It is important as an employer to have your best team ready to go. Keeping your “A-Team” happy and satisfied can sometimes be difficult but it’s a necessity. You shouldn’t assume that your current employees are just happy to have a job with the current economy.
As you continue to plan for 2010, you may want to incorporate new business ideas or business goals that can really involve your employees and keep them happy.
Amy Gallo with the Harvard Business Review blog talks about ways to keep your employees happy, even in this tough economy.
“When the economy is slow and unemployment rates are high, it's easy to think your employees will happily stay put in their current jobs. But that's a dangerous assumption. Research shows that voluntary turnover rates increase as consumer confidence builds. This means, as a manager, you need to figure out ways to retain your top performers, even if your company is still in a slump.”
Read More…
As you continue to plan for 2010, you may want to incorporate new business ideas or business goals that can really involve your employees and keep them happy.
Amy Gallo with the Harvard Business Review blog talks about ways to keep your employees happy, even in this tough economy.
“When the economy is slow and unemployment rates are high, it's easy to think your employees will happily stay put in their current jobs. But that's a dangerous assumption. Research shows that voluntary turnover rates increase as consumer confidence builds. This means, as a manager, you need to figure out ways to retain your top performers, even if your company is still in a slump.”
Read More…
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