Alexandra Levits Water Cooler Wisdom Telepresence Robots Coming to an Office Near You

Alexandra Levit's Water Cooler Wisdom Telepresence Robots Coming to an Office Near You Using telepresence robotics technology by Double Robotics and others, organizations are virtually sending their employees on client meetings and speaking engagements every day. But it’s not all sunshine and rainbows. Telepresence is one of the few commercial applications of robotics technology that I’ve been genuinely excited about. Now that remote work is significantly on the rise, I view telepresence as a terrific means for professionals to virtually project themselves into an engaging human office environment. Since I don’t have a telepresence robot myself yet, I checked out some opinions from those who have used them. Do the currentmachines live up to the hype, and are they a nightmare for IT staff to manage and secure? In theory Over at TechCrunch, Peter Hirst wrote about his colleague at MIT Sloan Executive Education, Paul McDonagh-Smith. Paul’s based in London, but his telepresence robot from Double Robotics allows him to present at a conference in Singapore first thing in the morning, then have a business meeting in Cape Town, South Africa and later that afternoon, meet with team members on the MIT campus in Cambridge, Massachusetts. “In our office, telepresence robots are no longer a novelty, but an everyday tool we’ve been using to enable our remote team members to be more engaged,” said Hirst. “Double’s robot units are available regularly for team meetings or one-on-one visits. We all enjoy the ability to be truly present in our interactions with colleagues and clients â€" an experience that feels much more natural and personal than a phone call or a videoconference.” In practice Emily Dreyfuss is a remote worker at Wired. She lives in Boston, but most of her colleagues are in an office in San Francisco, and she was feeling left out. Her boss bought her Double Robotics’ creatively named Double, which sells for around $2500. The telepresence robot was Dreyfuss’ physical embodiment at headquarters. Instead of legs, she moved on gyroscopically stabilized wheels. Instead of a face, she had an iPad screen. Instead of eyes, a camera with no peripheral vision. Instead of a mouth, a speaker. And instead of ears, a tinny microphone. At first, Dreyfuss was enamored with the experience. “It’s thrilling. I am in the office!There is the kitchen! There is Sam! Hi, everyone! I am here!” she exclaimed. Her robot, nicknamed Embot, attended meetings. “Plunked at the end of the conference table, my iPad head tracked the conversation, listening.” Although Embot put Dreyfuss physically in the office, her co-workers could only see her face and not her body, and therefore were not constantly reminded how pregnant she was. “The visual reminder of my changed condition was not in their faces,” she said. “I have worked at places before where women start getting treated differently when their bellies show. Dreyfuss realized, however, that current telepresence technology has its limitations. For one thing, people were always touching her robotic body without asking, either to help her move if she got stuck or just because they felt it. It was awkward for her â€" and her colleagues too. As one reported: “You know, when Joe lifted you up and carried you â€" with your face on the screen, it looked really inappropriate. Like he was cradling you in his arms.” Embot was also a little rough around the edges technology wise. Dreyfuss couldn’t hear meetings very well. Robots, of course, live off power and and Wi-Fi, and signal strength proved to be a big problem. For the rest of the article, check out QuickBases Fast Track blog.

Ux Resume - Free Or Paid?

Ux Resume - Free Or Paid?It's possible to get the job without a Ux resume. Yes, many employees write the same kind of resume for all their jobs. It's rare that you would find that you can search and find an identical resume for a job, but in this day and age there are still people who try to do this, even if they don't have anything else to do.In the conventional job search, candidates are given a CV and a cover letter, or a form letter. The resume should consist of the candidate's skills, education, work experience, achievements, and knowledge about what the employer needs. This is all a candidate needs to prove to the employer that he or she is worth the job. This works out well for the employer since the person who submitted the resume was usually very qualified for the job and that's why they chose to hire them.How does a job applicant get a resume out? Generally, the first step in the resume writing process involves finding the right format to use. Whether it's a format that loo ks traditional or a format that makes the resume stand out in a crowd is what makes the difference. In addition, this is also one of the things that will make the resume more memorable to the reader. No matter what the format, the goal is to present a resume that shows the reader what the applicant is about.Make sure that the resume includes the right information, but also isn't too lengthy or too short. You don't want to put so much content in the cover letter that it is making the applicant look unprofessional. A five page resume is just as effective as a twenty page resume if both are impressive and eye-catching.The next step of writing a resume is the job seeker going through and reviewing all the resume writing samples that they have. It can be hard to know which ones are authentic and which ones are not. A good way to deal with this problem is to go through the samples yourself and make sure that the resume you are looking at is reliable and convincing.There are some basic gui delines that should be followed while writing a resume, but there are no rules when it comes to style. If a certain style is different from the usual resume then that can be accepted. You just need to be aware of the effect that your personality has on your personality, especially when applying for a job that requires social skills.If you can show the true picture of the kind of person you are, you will probably be accepted a job more often. You should always remember that most employers are looking for hard workers who can easily adapt to changing situations. If you are a good communicator, then you will probably get a higher salary and a higher position.If you want to use a free resume writing software, that is great for the job seeker. However, I recommend that you go through sample resumes before deciding to write your own resume. Take note of what a good format looks like and make it your own.

Starting a business is less risky than it seems

Starting a business is less risky than it seems Entrepreneurship used to be an inclination that festered until a midlife crisis. But the entrepreneurship bug isnt something that hits in middle age, so why wait that long? Today, the people who start most new businesses are under 34 and if theyre doing it, so can you. Dont be stifled by your age or lack of experience. And dont be put off by the bad advice people spew when you mention entrepreneurship. Bad advice #1: You wont make enough money. Insane. Who is making enough money at the anything new? No one. The few who pull down six figures at the beginning probably spent six figures on grad school and are paying it back, with interest. So the fatalists who say you wont make enough money are really telling you to never switch careers, never risk being a beginner, never bet on yourself. This way of thinking will put your career in a coma. What many people mean when they say you wont make enough money is that you wont *raise* enough money. After all, if you raised a ton of money to start your business, you could pay yourself a great salary. Most of you have ideas that do not require amazing fundraising efforts. And, lets face it, if you are coming up with ideas that require a six-million-dollar investment, thats not really a good idea. Bad advice #2: You can be entrepreneurial in a large company. Large corporations suck up fast-paced, fun, innovative small business and make them boring, and then tell you, in an interview, that the position you are considering is very entrepreneurial. Its not. If it were entrepreneurial then it would be too big a wild card to fit into a corporate hierarchy. What the corporate maven really means is that the position youre interviewing for could be entrepreneurial if it were not in a large company. Bad advice #3: Starting your own business is too risky. At this point in loyalty-free corporate life, it may be higher risk to work for someone else. You probably know someone who got laid off in the 90s. And you probably know someone who got off-shored in the 00s. It was risky of them to bet that a large company would keep them around. And when youre sifting through those ubiquitous statistics that say most new business fail, think about the perspective of those numbers: Seventy-six percent of new businesses make it off the ground. Sure, most do not last as long as say, General Motors. But are you looking to run a multinational company, or are you looking to get control over your time so you dont get laid off or tapped to travel from home six weeks in a row? Dont listen to those people who tell you small businesses are risky. Listen to Matt Rivers, owner of Pump House surf shop in Massachusetts, who went into business when he was 17. To him, the biggest risk was that hed have to grow up and get a job that wouldnt allow him to surf. Matt redefined the meaning of risk, and you should, too. What is most important in your life? Can starting your own business get that for you better than a corporate job? Then entrepreneurship is pretty low-risk for you. And heres a piece of good advice: Dont think of failure as black and white. Rivers was so successful with his first shop that he opened a second. But running between the two shops took too much time away from surfing, and the extra money wasnt worth it. So he closed the second shop. Is that failure? To some, maybe. But to those of us who are enlightened, closing down a business is not so much failure as it is gaining self-knowledge to lead a more fulfilling life going forward.

Are You Unlocking the Full Potential of LinkedIn Groups

Are You Unlocking the Full Potential of LinkedIn Groups Everyone knows about LinkedIn Groups, but not everyone knows just how powerful they can be. Here are my top 5 ways you can make LinkedIn Groups do more for you, your business and your career: 1) Be a member of 50 groups: A lot of people are put off joining a lot of LinkedIn groups as they are worried about drowning in lots of email alerts. This does not have to be the case you can simply turn off emails from all groups in your LinkedIn settings or adjust your settings for each group individually: When you join a group, the people in it become a part of your LinkedIn network. LinkedIn will let you join a maximum of 50 groups. Making the most of this will greatly increase the size of your network and the number of people that you can see in your LinkedIn searches. You don’t have to stay a member of the same 50 groups all the time, you can chop and change when you find bigger, better or more relevant groups. 2) Use LinkedIn Groups to message people for free: Have you ever found someone you really want to get in touch with but don’t want to pay for an InMail? If you have a group in common then you can message them for free! If you don’t share a group, see if that person is a member of any groups and pick one to join. You might have to leave one of your other groups if you are using your full allocation of 50. Once you share a group with the person you want to contact you will have to visit the group and search for them in the “Members” section. When you hover your mouse over their name, you will now see the option to send them a message: This is a proper message, with no character limit and no restriction on sending links, unlike an invite to connect. 3) Use LinkedIn Groups to identify talent: LinkedIn Groups can be a great way to infer things about a person’s experience, specialisms or interests. For example, a solicitor that is a member of a HR group might be more likely to specialise in employment law, even if they don’t explicitly say so on their profile. Once you are a member of a group it is easy to search its members simply by visiting the group’s members section or using LinkedIns Advanced Search feature. It’s not always possible to join a group. For example, some group managers don’t allow recruiters to join. If you are not a member of the group then you can still search its members. If you have a LinkedIn Recruiter licence then you can easily search the members of ANY group using the filters on the left hand side of your search results. If you have a basic LinkedIn account then it takes a little more ingenuity. To search the members of any LinkedIn group with a basic LinkedIn account, you will need to have two windows open in your browser, both looking at LinkedIn. In the first window, run a simple search looking for the keywords you hope to find on profiles. In the second window, find the group whose members you want to search (for those keywords). Once you have found the group you are interested in and opened it up in your browser, you need to look in your browser’s address bar at the URL of the page and find the groups ID number. The URL is usually in the format: http://linkedin.com/groups?gid=TheNumberYouWant?trk= Copy (Ctrl +C) the group ID number from the URL, the number is usually 4 to 6 digits long. Now return to the keyword search you did in the first tab. Using the filters on the left hand side of the screen, select one of the groups you ARE a member of to filter by (it doesn’t matter which one). Now look for that group’s ID number in the URL of the sear results page The number is often right at the far end of the URL so click in the address bar and hit the  End  button on your keyboard to go straight there. Replace it with the number of the group you DO want to search. Hit enter and voila, you have searched members of your chosen group for the keywords you need without needing to join. If you like a more in-depth tutorial on this, then see this explanation  from the Social Talent blog. 4) Engage in LinkedIn Groups and become part of the community: LinkedIn groups seem to fall into three categories; the dead, the spammed and the useful. The first two categories are only really of interest to you as a way of expanding your network or sending messages. The third category is great if you actually want to become a part of the wider community you work or recruit in. If you regularly show up and are helpful, people are more likely to help you when you need it. Being helpful might mean sharing relevant content on a regular basis or it might mean helping to answer the questions other group members are asking. If you set yourself up as a useful member of a community (or LinkedIn group) when you need help to find a candidate or a new job, members of that group will be more likely to help you. Do be sure to post something more personal than a simple link to a job ad, you wouldn’t want to get SWAM’d. Just openly asking for help usually works best, with no links at all. 5) Run your own LinkedIn Group: What better way to set yourself up as a useful community member than being the person who started the group in the first place? You are then free to post whatever you like in the group without any threat of moderation, you also have the ability to send out weekly messages to group members. Running a group isn’t easy though, it’s a big commitment and it takes a long time. You have to dedicate the time to make sure your group never falls into the “dead” category and be careful not to turn it into too much of a promotional vehicle and end up in the “spammed” camp. RELATED: Top 10 Reasons Why Your LinkedIn Group SUCKS!

What is the Best Way to Write Numbers on Resume?

What is the Best Way to Write Numbers on Resume?Writing numbers on resume is very important. It is good to know how to write numbers on resume as this will make a great difference in your career. You might think that this is a tough job but it really is not. Yes, it may be challenging and requires a lot of patience but still you can make it work.The most common form of writing numbers on resume is to have them written in big bold letters. Most of the employers would like to see these numbers or even more in the resumes. If you do not want to create confusion then you can read carefully the requirements in the job posting to understand how many numbers are required for filling up the vacancy.For example you need numbers of resumes. Do not just have them in big bold letters. Instead, write them with the name of the job and the position they are applied for. After filling up the form with the required information and contact details and the required numbers and keywords write the number and keyword on the resume. The number should be small enough to fit into the job opening.There are many different patterns which you can write the numbers in. Use different patterns if you have different positions. There are also rules for every state. The pattern is based on the sequence of the state names.You can write numbers in any format you want. You can use one or all of the following formats: I, II, III, IV, V, etc. Do not forget to include the title of the position. You can also put the letter for the letter heads.There are many other options to write numbers on resume. You can write them using symbols, colors, abbreviations, etc.You can add numbers to your resume by writing them in different types of fonts. You can choose the font that best suits your personality. This is a great idea if you like using this option for writing numbers.Number writing is not difficult. You can do it by yourself with your computer or by hiring a professional for it. Sometimes, hiring a profes sional will help because he knows exactly what the format should be. However, the benefit is you will save money because you won't need to pay someone else to do it for you.

interview preparation service would help you most

Poll Of The Week #6 Which resume writing/interview preparation service would help you most 0 Flares 0 Flares Thanks to those for voting in this weeks poll!  Here are the results: First Place:  60% Resume Editing (using existing resume) Second Place: 13%  Cover Letter Creation AND Interview Preparation Third Place: 7% Full Resume Writing (from scratch) AND Accomplishment Creation Fourth Place: 0% Reference Verification Resumes are important, dont let anyone tell you differently. Recruiters and hiring managers are flooded with resumes once they post a position and simply cant spend a long time reviewing each resume.  What does this mean for you?  Well, it means you better have a clear, easy to read, and exciting resume!  The resume needs to grab their attention quickly, and keep the readers attention.  Most resumes I read have spot on content, but the format, grammar, or flow of the resume comes off sloppy or cluttered. If you arent fully confident with your resume, I would suggest talking to the nice folks over at Vertical Media Solutions.  Compared to their competitors, they have much more affordable prices, and offer a much more intimate service in which they will help you develop a strategy surrounding your job search.  Personally, I find the Resume Edit and Accomplishment Creation services are extremely helpful to a job seeker looking for a strong boost. Go to www.vmsolu.com and check out their services.

The strongest force in business (no, not money) - The Chief Happiness Officer Blog

The strongest force in business (no, not money) - The Chief Happiness Officer Blog As a leader, manager or executive, what is your driving force in business? Think about it for a second. What gets you out of bed in the morning and makes you take that drive to work? What is behind the choices you make? How do you set your goals and ambitions? There are many possible answers. Ask a thousand people and youll get a thousand different answers. Money would probably show up quite often. So would power, influence, getting ahead, recognition, security and success. But I believe that there is one underappreciated driving force in business. One force that spurs people on to stellar results, wise decisions and strong business relationships. One strong force that, when harnessed in your work life, will make you more efficient and let you enjoy work more. One that all business leaders everywhere need to know about and build into their businesses at the most fundamental level. Curious yet? Here it is: The strongest driving force in business is happiness! Yes, happiness at work. I know that work is often seen as a desolate wasteland, a thoroughly unpleasant experience you endure to make a living. Work is tough, darnit, and it should be! If people were enjoying themselves it wouldnt be work! But thats simply wrong. I know, and studies back this up, that people do their best work only when they enjoy what they do. It doesnt mean we have to love every single aspect of our jobs, but when we like work more than we hate it, we are much more efficient and productive. There are three major areas where you as a leader can harness this force and use happiness to drive your business and your career. 1: Make your employees happy Studies consistently show that employees who like their jobs take fewer sick days, stay in their jobs longer, are more productive, give better customer service and do work of a higher quality. In fact, happy employees consistently outperform unhappy employees in every single area you can come up with. Take a closer look at most business success stories and youll find at the root of them a group of people who went to work thinking MAN, this is great I cannot believe how much fun it is to work with this team on this project! And thats why all employers and leaders must focus on their people first and make sure they are happy at work. But doesnt the customer come first? Sure. And when the company puts the employees first, the employees put the customers first, because happy people naturally give great customer service. Think about it: Who would you rather be served by in a restaurant: The surly waiter who hates his boss and his co-workers or the happy waitress who loves working there? 2: Make your customers happy What is your goal: To sell as much as possible? To maximize the numbers and meet your sales budget? To upsell every time? Or is it to make your customers happy? The latter option is the one that will gain you committed fans for life. Customers who know that you have their best interests at heart and genuinely want whats good for them will keep coming back for more. You may do a little less business right now, but youll do a lot more business in the long run. Businesses who choose this approach also have the satisfaction of knowing that theyre helping people. 3: Make yourself happy at work What about you? Do you enjoy your work? Do you whistle happily going to work and going home? Are you doing the things you enjoy doing? Do you like and trust the people around you? You yourself, as a business leader, need to be happy at work for one simple reason: If you hate your job, its going to rub off on every single person there. As a leader you set the tone and people will notice whatever you do. Set an example and make youself happy at work. And when you do this you will also become more successful. A recent study showed that while success does make people happy, the link is much stronger the other way, meaning that happy people are much more likely to become successful and wealthy. This is not surprising when you think about it, because happy people are more optimistic, energetic, likeable and creative ? all essential qualities in business. The real choice And this is what some of the best and most profitable companies arounnd the world have realized: That its not about sacrificing your business goals and your profits in order to be happy. That in reality, making happiness your driving force in business will make you more profitable. You dont have to choose between happiness at work and success ? the real choice is this: Do you want your business to be happy and more successful? Or unhappy and less successful? Tough choice, huh :o) The question is of course: What can I do about it? How can I make myself and other happy at work? Check back tomorrow for a challenge to all leaders a simple way to create the fundamentals for happiness at work for yourself and your people. If you liked this post Im pretty sure youll also enjoy these: You may be a great leader but how is your followership? Happiness makes you successful (not the other way around) why The Customer Is Always Right is wrong Thanks for visiting my blog. If you're new here, you should check out this list of my 10 most popular articles. And if you want more great tips and ideas you should check out our newsletter about happiness at work. It's great and it's free :-)Share this:LinkedInFacebookTwitterRedditPinterest Related