The Work-life Insight

The Room is Killing Your Meeting – Here’s How You Can fix it

We spend a huge amount of our workday in meetings. Middle managers are estimated to spend about 35% of their workday in meetings. Executives can spend as much as half their day in meetings. That’s a lot of time!
A lot of wisdom has been shared about designing and running effective meetings. Yet few resources offer advice on the meeting room itself. The meeting room is a core piece of the meeting experience. Effective meeting room design can impact and change your entire meeting.
Well-designed meeting rooms can put attendees at ease, encourage conversation, and induce creativity. Mindful meeting room design can drastically improve effectiveness of your meetings.

Tips to Design Effective Meeting Rooms:

The Purpose of the Room

The key to designing meeting rooms is to understand your team’s needs. Firstly, decide on size and location of the room. Some key questions to answer here are:

• What will the room be used for? Are these going to be smaller, collaborative rooms or do you need a full size boardroom?
• How does your team like to work? Do they work in small groups or do they work in large teams?
• Is this room meant to be client facing, or is it for internal use only?
• Does this room need to be within easy access from employees, or does it need to be located further away for additional privacy?

Taking a step back to look at use cases allows you to begin tailoring your meeting rooms to the way that your organization works.
In addition to understanding how employees prefer to collaborate, it’s also important to understand where they like to collaborate. Meeting room analytics such as average meeting size and room utilization rates will help you determine the size and number of rooms you need.
Once you decide on placement and size, you can use your understanding of the purpose of the room to further enhance its design.

Equipping the Room

Essential equipment should be evaluated before moving onto more creative aspects of meeting space design. Fleshing out these essentials, based on user needs, will help provide a base for your creative choices.
Here are some considerations to keep in mind when building out your equipment requirements.

Furniture

It’s important to understand how the room will be used and identify key requirements. For example, will people need to move the chairs around and swivel to look at a screen? If so, a requirement might be chairs on casters that can swivel. Alternatively, if the room is meant for creative work, you might want to provide alternative seating that encourages more freedom.
As for tables and surfaces, consider not just size, but usage. Would people be primarily standing or sitting in their meetings? If they use the room for standing meetings, you might require a standing or height-adjustable table. Do the tables need to be moved?
Additionally, think about power and power access. Do you need power access through the table for other equipment? What about charging outlets for attendees with mobile devices – this could include USB charging ports or wireless charging.
Beyond choosing the right table and chairs for the meeting room, there are some other furniture considerations. For example, do you need in-room storage for meeting supplies? Do you need whiteboards?
Check out the Google Ventures design war room in the video below and see how the purpose of the room changed the design and furniture requirements.

Technology

As our world becomes increasingly digital and mobile, audiovisual equipment is now key to the meeting experience. Some core pieces to include in your technology selection include screens/displays and communication devices.
Again, consider how that technology will be used in each room. Not every room requires a screen or a communications device, and rooms should be appropriately outfitted based on their purpose. Some rooms might benefit from a traditional whiteboard and marker, while others might require advanced teleconferencing tools such as high quality cameras and microphones. Most rooms might simply need an easy to use AV presentation system.
Meeting rooms are typically high demand spaces in the office. Poor planning regarding booking processes can lead to unnecessary tension and conflict in the workplace. Beyond displays and communication, an important aspect to consider is how meeting rooms are booked and used.
Tools such as digital displays installed outside the meeting rooms and sensors to detect room occupancy can help alleviate some of these conflicts in the workplace and improve productivity.

Lighting

Lighting is crucial to the meeting room experience. Excessively soft lighting might result in participants dozing off. On the other hand, harsh lighting might not be conducive for reading and viewing of screens.
Once again, understanding the purpose of the room is crucial in building lighting requirements. For rooms that are designed to be comfortable, cozy spaces, softer lighting is often necessary. Large boardrooms might require more brightness, and rooms with projectors might require dimming lights.
Lighting is also heavily dependent on the location of the room. If the room has a lot of natural light, you might have to look at reducing lighting with blinds. For rooms without windows, light must be a primary consideration in room design.

Sound

Sound management is often one of the most neglected pieces in meeting room design. Meeting rooms that are designed without consideration for sound often result in unwanted side effects.
This could include echoing and reverberation, scraping from moving furniture, or feedback between microphones and speakers.
Acoustic controls are now available in a variety of designs that add to the feel of a meeting room, rather than take away from it. Wall mounted acoustical panels are effective at keeping sound in, as are ceiling mounted baffles. If it’s sound from outside the meeting you want to keep out, look at using similar solutions throughout your office to reduce sound reverberation.

Fleshing out the rest of the meeting room experience

Once you’ve finished designing and implementing the physical environment of the meeting room, the next step is to consider and design the full meeting experience. You will want to think about how people use the room, from start to finish.
Firstly, how do people reserve and book the meeting rooms? Are only specific teams allowed to use specific rooms? Do you require a dedicated staff member to manage these rooms and requests? We recommend using a meeting room booking system such as Workscape to make booking rooms simple for your team. This will help you avoid scheduling conflicts and ensure smooth processes in using the room.
Second, how do people use amenities that are in the room? Are your audiovisual tools easy to start and use, or do you need a technical team member available to set up these meeting rooms beforehand?
Some other ideas to consider:

• Would you stock refreshments in each room?
• If the room requires additional privacy but has glass walls, would you need to add privacy blinds?

Finally, how would you know when the meeting ends and the room is available? Do you need a team member to clean up the room after each use? What if a meeting ends early? Would you be able to use that additional time for other meetings? Workscape can help with this by using smart sensors. It is simple – just plug the sensors in and Workscape will inform you when a meeting ends early, or if not one shows up for a meeting.

Get Creative!

Once you firm up the hard requirements for your meeting rooms, you can get creative in your meeting room designs.
The key here is to enhance your corporate culture and identity with your meeting room experience. Keeping your equipment requirements and room goals in mind, choose furniture, paint, and decorations that match your corporate culture and the image you want to convey.
Struggling to get creative? Here are some ideas on how you can inject your company culture into your meeting room design:

Color scheme

Color can change the experience of a room. Using official company colors is a classic way to match the meeting rooms and echo the company brand experience.
For more formal boardrooms and conference rooms, neutral colors are always a good choice. Despite being formal, you can spice up the room with a kick of color. For example, Resignation Media’s office in Texas maintains formality in their meeting rooms with neutral gray, white and black. To add a bit of personality to the room, the firm opted to go with with multi-colored chairs.

Unconventional color choices can be used to express company culture and influence meetings as well. Strong colors such as red and orange can evoke excitement and even aggression, and might be suited to encourage teams working towards competitive targets.
Other colors such as green and blue can be calming and refreshing, and help alleviate some of the tension in charged meetings. Yandex’s meeting room in Kazan uses yellow-green to create a refreshing, soothing space for relaxation and more casual conversations.

Materials

Similar to color, materials can change how a space is perceived. Glass and chrome can often push a modern, clean look. On the other hand, wood is extremely versatile and can be used in many applications. The right wood can bring warmth into the room and add some rustic charm. X3’s office in Romania converts an attic into a charming, cozy space with the use of wood beams and tables. Comfy chairs further add to the cozy warmness.

By blending colour and materials, you can shape how the space feels. True North Mortgage in Dallas uses glass and white to portray a clean, modern meeting room.

On the other hand, Rocket Fuel Chicago uses a similar design, but selected a fun lime green as their primary color. This creates excitement and energy, contrasting with True North Mortgage’s clean white.

Tie Your Space to Your Company

Tying the space to the company doesn’t necessarily mean emblazoning your logo everywhere. While that design element might work for some spaces, other spaces could call for subtler elements.
One way to creatively make the space your own is to tie the space to what you do. Red Cross Blood Processing Service in Melbourne achieves this by decorating the walls of their meeting rooms with blood type lettering. This gives a shout out to the mission and goals of the organization, and makes the meeting room truly a Red Cross meeting room.

While Adidas Shanghai prominently includes the Adidas logo in the conference room, the highlight is actually the 3 strips of white that evokes Adidas’s iconic brand. Combining that with the brand’s classic black and white combination really strongly ties the meeting room to the brand, making it a great space for client meetings.

Other rooms in the Adidas Shanghai office maintain the black and white motif, but depict images of athletes as well as value statements. The decorations are still strongly tied to the brand identity and very clearly mark the space as Adidas.

Don’t be afraid to have fun!

Meeting rooms and spaces do not have to be stoic spaces devoid of personality. Adding elements of fun can help transform a dry boring meeting into an engaging, exciting one. What’s important here is to keep in mind your workplace culture – embrace it and do not be afraid to include the more outlandish ideals.
Red Bull’s Mexico office embraces fun, transparent meetings with this meeting and lounge space. Not having any walls creates a space that’s open and inviting, as well as connected to the rest of the office. The playfulness fits with Red Bull’s unconventional brand.

Facebook is infamous for the miNY room in New York, popularized through Instagram by celebrity guests. A miniaturized room, it features tiny furniture and a parody of Facebook’s workplace culture. While more fun than functional, the room’s purpose is to make a statement and create a strong memory for guests.

Have Excellent Meetings

Meetings are a huge part of our working life. Effective planning can improve the content of a meeting, but it is extremely important to consider your meeting environment and processes. Having a well-designed meeting space, that has fully considered how meetings will run, will help to significantly enhance the meeting experience for you and your attendees.
Designing a meeting space and want to simplify meeting room booking? Workscape can help – sign up for a free consultation now.

Credit: https://www.workscape.io

How Do I Improve My SAT [or any] Score?

As always: study, study, study.

‍Get a handle on the underlying academic concepts tested on the SAT, and bone up on the areas where you’re deficient. Then, you might want to consider signing up for a prep course, like those offered by Prep Expert.

Prep Expert’s courses will teach you test-taking strategies – how to notice trap answers or read passages more effectively, for example – and can go a long way toward improving your score.

200 Points is No Joke

When it comes to particular schools, the average scores for admitted students will change from year to year, and the trend is almost always up – If a particularly large number of students apply to a school in a given year, the average SAT score of admitted students could go way up, making that school much tougher to get into. So when you make your list, it’s probably a good idea to have at least a few ‘target’ schools where you’re closer to the 60th-70th percentile of SAT scores.

3 Steps to Breakthrough

Develop a(1) Strategy (Develop a Strategy of Success)(2) Story (Visualize Success)(3) Be in a Peak State (Exercise & Practice)How to Develop a Strategy of Success:         Click Here

With questions? Surprisingly…no!

Not with questions. At least, not with open-ended or questions that are meant to be answered with a “yes.”

Your best tools are statements based on observations. Labels and cold reads. They extend thought processes, helping people open up the flow of what they are thinking and causing them to say it out loud.

Is it crazy to think this would work for you and your unique situation?Here’s one label that Los Angeles area real estate broker Kendyl Young and her team are using in open-houses for residential real estate. They will use it after a twosome has walked through a house discussing it:

“It looks like you had a lot to talk about.”

Kendyl has described this approach as opening up the floodgates of truth talk.

Before they would ask a good calibrated (open-ended) question such as “What did you think?” or “How does this house work for you?” This would often be met with some information. But not a lot. Certainly no opening of floodgates.

When she and her team switched over to labels / cold reads such as the one above – they’ve started getting responses like: “Oh yeah!!!” and then a deluge of what the prospective buyer’s thoughts were.

The Black Swan Group is defining a “cold read” as an observation you can make of the situation before anything is said by your counterpart. It can be an observation of physical actions, body language, or predictable responses to the circumstances at hand.

It can be adding up the facts as known and stating a hypothesis, as opposed to asking if something is true.

A number of years ago, I was interviewing an informant with my partner in the FBI. The informant had far too much detail about the robbery of a video store to have not been a participant. He was telling us the story, claiming that it had been told to him by the target of our investigation (the robber).

When it occurred to me what the truth was I didn’t ask a question, I stated, “You know this much about the robbery because you participated in it.”

I didn’t say it as an “aha!”. I didn’t state it as an accusation or a “gotcha!”. I just said it quietly as a simple fact, with a downward intonation in my voice.

He hesitated for a moment and quietly said,    “Yes.”  I still remember the shocked look on my partner’s face as he stared at me.

I’d done this wrong in the past. I once participated in an interview of a drug dealer. We were looking for his brother. We showed him a picture of his brother, and I asked him if he knew who was in the picture.

He said “No.”

“This isn’t your brother?”

“No.”

“Who then, is it!?”

“I don’t know.”

Later, in the same interview, I got frustrated and simply said:

“I’m not asking you, I’m telling you, I know this is your brother.”

He said, “So?”

People react differently to statements than they react to questions.

Both the good thing and the bad thing about a good calibrated question is that it makes people stop and think. (Calibrated questions are primarily questions that begin with “What…?” or “How…?” – they are not questions where we are hoping for a confirmation of a “yes”.)

The process of getting them to stop and think will often have the opposite effect of “unlocking the floodgates” of truth telling by virtue of getting them to stop and think.

You can apply this idea to any situation where you want to encourage who you’re dealing with to simply open-up.

Brandon Voss does this all the time with people who call The Black Swan Group to inquire about training.

Prospective client: “So give me your sales pitch.”

Brandon: “It seems like you got a lot of problems you’re trying to solve.”

Prospective client: (Whoosh! 45 minutes of outlining challenges.)

Kendyl and her team even brainstorm cold-reads together. They talk about typical things they frequently see when buyers come through houses and then come up with cold-reads to use.

They use them and then report back to the rest of the team the results.  Very smart!

After a while, no matter what your circumstances are, you can probably pretty much describe the 5 – 7 types of potential clients you see the most frequently. That’s what intuition and experience are all about – getting a good feel for your typical challenges.

Come up with some and try them! Find your own ways to unlock the floodgates and create great relationships.

Relationships = Revenue

Good luck!

Click here & Learn to negotiate like no one other

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So you're tasked with planning a strategic offsite for your team. If you're new to planning or just need a refresh, you've come to right place. We know there are a ton of moving parts, so we built a guide that outlines everything you should consider when planning an offsite.From finding the right venue to choosing a crowd-pleasing menu, ensure everything goes according to plan with these tips below:

1. Lock down the date.

First things first, make sure the whole team can attend. After you've double checked that everyone is free, send out a calendar invite as a placeholder before anyone books a trip or schedules a meeting.

2. Budget wisely.

Budget will be the determining factor on whether you can splurge or need to save on the venue and catering. Expect to spend about 70% on the venue, 25% on food and beverages, and 5% on transportation and miscellaneous supplies. Fees at WorkSocial are less than any hotel in the area.

3. Finalize the agenda ahead of time.

Ask the team lead for the proposed agenda in advance. From there, you'll know how long to book the venue for, how long to set aside for meals, and can let the caterers know when to arrive and cleanup. This will help determine if you have time allocated for setup, breakdown, all agenda items, and some buffer time for breaks and potential delays.

4. Choose a venue that is both functional and inspiring.

Consider the primary purpose for the offsite — is it to spark new ideas, motivate the team, increase team unity? If the answer is yes, look for a venue that offers natural light and breakout areas. Bonus points if you find a spot with outdoor space and close to the waterfront in Jersey City.

Find the perfect venue for your offsite in the New Jersey and New York City metro area.

5. Order food that fuels.

Think outside the boxed lunch and bagel route and choose catering that will keep the team satisfied so energy levels don't drop midday. These sample catering menus are a great place to find inspiration.

6. Hydrate and caffeinate.

Even if you're not supplying breakfast, let the smell of fresh coffee welcome the team to kickstart the day. Supply the venue with enough water bottles and other beverages to keep everyone hydrated until happy hour. All included at WorkSocial's training room venue.

7. Designate someone to be your eyes and ears.

If you're not attending the offsite, make sure the point person knows the catering company's contact info, how to get inside the venue, and any other logistical details. Check in with them throughout the day to make sure everything is going according to plan.

8. Dot your I's and cross your T's.

The day before the offsite, get the finalized headcount and confirm all last minute details with the venue, catering company, and team leads to avoid any last minute surprises. Which will all be handled by WorkSocial's team!

9. Ask for feedback.

After the offsite, ask the team leader for feedback on the venue, catering, or if there was anything you could have done differently. Even if the offsite was a smashing success, there's always room for improvement!

Credit:

Oscar Peerspace

Website: https://www.peerspace.com/

Training rooms are much more than spaces where employees come to sit and learn – they’re dynamic environments where people meet, learn, share ideas and collaborate. When designing a space to accommodate such a wide range of activities, it can be hard to decide which aspect of the design should take priority.Our advice? Flexibility. Just like at WorkSocials premier training roomThe following considerations will help you create a flexible and effective training room space.

1. Get Physical

The best place to start when designing a space is with the actual physical room itself. Is it large enough? Is the HVAC sufficient? Will it allow compliance with ADA accessibility for wheelchairs, and additional space for guide dogs, assistants and equipment? We recommend 15-17 square feet per participant, and at least 10-foot ceilings to allow the use of visual aids. HVAC controls should be accessible inside the room, and allow a minimum air velocity of 12 to 15 feet per minute. The space should be designed to meet specific ADA guidelines, such as accessible doors, ramps, hardware and signage.

2. Flooring

The perfect flooring can be found at the intersection of form and function. Look for low-pile commercial carpeting with a pattern that will remain stylish until the next renovation (approximately 10 years) and will not highlight the inevitable coffee stains and muddy shoe prints. Low pile is also ideal for improving acoustics and muffling noise from moving chairs and foot traffic.

3. Lighting

Because for rent training rooms in NJ are flexible, lighting should be easily preprogrammed or dimmed, and designed for even illumination. Choose ambient light over direct down light sources, as it eliminates glare on screen surfaces and fills in the shadows on faces so people look well on screen. Windows are the best ambient light sources, but make sure they have easily adjusted shades or drapes.

4. Technology

To deliver multiple lesson delivery options, the room must have it all: white board, ceiling-mounted projector with remote, large-format screen, DVD player, speakers, wireless microphone, laser pointer and a lectern from which all this technology is easily managed.

A good design includes additional outlets in the floors, walls and work surfaces to power this technology as well as participants’ laptops. A great design strategically places tables with flip top outlet boxes directly over these power outlets. This will eliminate cords in the walkways and associated trip hazards.Tables are a major factor in how a room can be used, so it’s crucial that they are high-quality and durable to withstand daily use, and easily rearranged and stored to allow as many possibilities for different layouts. Tables’ folding or nesting mechanisms should feature tool-free operation. Choose 60-inch tables with C-shaped legs for added knee room, at widths up to 24-inches – just deep enough for a laptop and book.Chairs should be constructed of material that doesn’t conduct heat or cold, and ergonomically designed for superior comfort. Consider padding, pneumatic seat height adjustment and swivel capability options.

5. Room Configurations

While formal classroom and auditorium configurations might work well to accommodate town-hall meetings and/or video presentations, we recommend a more relaxed style to better facilitate free-and-easy communication among participants and between the instructor and participants. Round, U-shapes and arcs promote the Socratic teaching method, which emphasizes student/teacher dialog. Smaller configurations, such as six sets of five, are also ideal for encouraging peer-to-peer teaching and group problem solving.

While a good instructor can overcome any obstacle in a room’s set up, a well-designed and flexible training space helps them be their best in Jersey City.

Credit: www.falconproducts.com

There seems to be something special about coworking spaces. As researchers who have, for years, studied how employees thrive, we were surprised to discover that people who belong to them report levels of thriving that approach an average of 6 on a 7-point scale. This is at least a point higher than the average for employees who do their jobs in regular offices, and something so unheard of that we had to look at the data again.

It checked out. So we were curious: What makes coworking spaces – defined as membership-based workspaces where diverse groups of freelancers, remote workers, and other independent professionals work together in a shared, communal setting – so effective? And are there lessons for more traditional offices?

To find out, we interviewed several coworking space founders and community managers, and surveyed several hundred workers from dozens of coworking spaces around the U.S. A regression analysis following our survey revealed three substantial predictors of thriving:

People who use coworking spaces see their work as meaningful. Aside from the type of work they’re doing – freelancers choosing projects they care about, for example — the people we surveyed reported finding meaning in the fact that they could bring their whole selves to work. They’re able to do this in a few ways.

First, unlike a traditional office, coworking spaces consist of members who work for a range of different companies, ventures, and projects. Because there is little direct competition or internal politics, they don’t feel they have to put on a work persona to fit in. Working amidst people doing different kinds of work can also make one’s own work identity stronger. Our respondents were given the opportunity to frequently describe what they do, which can make what they do seem more interesting and distinctive.

Second, meaning may also come from working in a culture where it is the norm to help each other out, and there are many opportunities to do so; the variety of workers in the space means that coworkers have unique skill sets that they can provide to other community members.

Lastly, meaning may also be derived from a more concrete source: The social mission inherent in the Coworking Manifesto, an online document signed by members of more than 1,700 working spaces. It clearly articulates the values that the coworking movement aspires to, including community, collaboration, learning, and sustainability. These values get reinforced at the annual Global Coworking UnConference. So in many cases, it’s not simply the case that a person is going to work; they’re also part of a social movement.

They have more job control. Coworking spaces are normally accessible 24/7. People can decide whether to put in a long day when they have a deadline or want to show progress, or can decide to take a long break in the middle of the day to go to the gym. They can choose whether they want to work in a quiet space so they can focus, or in a more collaborative space with shared tables where interaction is encouraged. They can even decide to work from home, without repercussion, if they need to meet a repairperson or deal with a family member need.

And while coworkers value this autonomy, we also learned that they equally value some form of structure in their professional lives. Too much autonomy can actually cripple productivity because people lack routines. Coworkers reported that having a community to work in helps them create structures and discipline that motivates them. Thus, paradoxically, some limited form of structure enables an optimal degree of control for independent workers.

They feel part of a community. Connections with others are a big reason why people pay to work in a communal space, as opposed to working from home for free or renting a nondescript office. Each coworking space has its own vibe, and the managers of each space go to great lengths to cultivate a unique experience that meets the needs of their respective members. Grind, for example, is a growing network of coworking spaces in New York and Chicago. Anthony Marinos, who oversees Grind’s marketing, community management, and member services, shared with us, “When it comes to cultivating our community at Grind, we’re all about the human element. We consider ourselves as much a hospitality company as we do a workspace provider. Our staff knows all of our members by name and profession, and we’re constantly facilitating introductions between Grindists.”

WeWork, which recorded a valuation of $5 billion last December, emphasizes how it “seek[s] to create a place you join as an individual, ‘me’, but where you become part of a greater ‘we.'”
Importantly, however, socializing isn’t compulsory or forced. Members can choose when and how to interact with others. They are more likely to enjoy discussions over coffee in the café because they went to the café for that purpose – and when they want to be left alone elsewhere in the building, they are. And while our research found that some people interact with fellow coworkers much less than others, they still felt a strong sense of identity with the community. We believe this comes from coworkers knowing there is the potential for interactions when they desire or need them.

So what are the implications for traditional companies? Even though the coworking movement has its origins among freelancers, entrepreneurs, and the tech industry, it’s increasingly relevant for a broader range of people and organizations. In fact, coworking can become part of your company’s strategy, and it can help your people and your business thrive. An increasing number of companies are incorporating coworking into their business strategies in two ways.

First, they’re being used as an alternative place for people to work. Michael Kenny, Managing Partner of San Diego-based Co-Merge, told us, “In the past year and a half, we’ve seen a dramatic increase in the use of the space by enterprise employees. We have seen teams come in to use various on-demand meeting rooms. We have users from global companies of size ranging from several hundred to several thousand employees who use the space not only to allow their distributed workers to get productive work done, but also to attract employees who demand flexible workplace and work time.”

Grind is also witnessing growth in the number of remote workers who are becoming members. “We haven’t had to reach out to larger organizations, they actually tend to just come to us,” Anthony Marinos says. “We’ve had employees from Visa, journalists from the Chicago Tribune, and even people affiliated with large financial institutions all work out of Grind.”

Spending time away from the office at a coworking space can also spark new ideas. Rebecca Brian Pan, the founder of COVO and former chief operating officer of NextSpace, explained how Ricoh’s innovation team worked out of NextSpace Santa Cruz for several months to observe how people work and where they hit pain points. Based on member insight and feedback, and their own observations, the Ricoh team explored several new products that could help members in their daily work and chose the most highly rated product to pursue. From this effort, Ricoh later launched this product globally as their Smart Presenter, a paperless meeting solution.

Second, the lessons of coworking spaces can be applied to corporate offices. Just as it’s important to encourage flexibility and support your mobile workforce, there is an equally important reality of creating the right kind of work environment inside your own walls. But this doesn’t just mean creating open plan layouts or adding a coffee bar.

In reality, people need to be able to craft their work in ways that give them purpose and meaning. They should be given control and flexibility in their work environment — many companies are increasingly adopting the best planning practice of providing a 1:1 ratio (or close to it) of desk seats to seats in shared settings used for either collaborative work or quiet work.

Companies are also trying to enable more connections, helping people to interact and build community beyond work meetings. Coworking spaces are one place to look for guidance, as they regularly offer networking events, training programs, social events, and even summer camp. Some companies are going even, further, however. Rich Sheridan and James Goebel, founders of Menlo Innovations in Ann Arbor, Michigan, recently expanded their office space by 7,000 square feet so that so that start-ups and early stage entrepreneurs can work alongside Menlo programmers to spur community and innovation.
In a way, the company is reverse-engineering its office into a coworking space.

Our research — which is ongoing — suggests that the combination of a well-designed work environment and a well-curated work experience are part of the reason people who cowork demonstrate higher levels of thriving than their office-based counterparts. But what matters the most for high levels of thriving is that people who cowork have substantial autonomy and can be themselves at work. Our advice to traditional companies who want to learn from coworking spaces is to give people the space and support to be their authentic best selves. The result will be employees who feel more committed to your organization, and are more likely to bring their best energy and ideas to the office each day. Even if it is corporate headquarters.

A version of this article appeared in the September 2015 issue (p.28, 30) of Harvard Business Review.

A big change in accounting will put $3 trillion in liabilities on corporate balance sheets

• A big change in lease accounting rules effective Jan. 1 requires companies to record operating leases on their balance sheets.
• Operating leases include everything a company rents to run its business, from office space, equipment, factories to planes and cars.
• The accounting change will result in an increase in company leverage, a key measure when evaluating a company’s risk.

A new corporate accounting rule is about to pull an estimated $3 trillion out of the shadows.

Starting this year, companies are required to record the cost of renting assets used in their operations, such as office space, equipment, planes and cars, on their balance sheets rather than bury that expense in the footnotes of their financial statements, thanks to a new accounting standard now in effect.

The result will be trillions of dollars added to liabilities on their books. Until now, only leases that led to the purchase of the asset were accounted for in this manner. The change, by the Financial Accounting Standards Board, is supposed to make it easier for investors to evaluate a company’s financial obligations.

Sheri Wyatt, a partner at accounting firm PricewaterhouseCoopers, said “It’s going to affect all companies’ leverage. They will have more liabilities on their books than they had previously.”

Morgan Stanley expects the consumer discretionary sector to experience the largest increase in debt because of this change, and it estimates the leverage ratio for the retail sector to grow to 3.4 times from 1.2 times.

U.S. public companies are committed to a total of $3 trillion in operating leases, according to International Accounting Standards Board. Companies with large amounts of operating leases include retailers and restaurants that lease properties and airlines and shipping companies that lease airplanes, cars and ships.

It may force investors, including quantitative funds, to change the way they measure certain financial criteria they use in making their investment decisions. Leverage — measured in the ratios of debt to earnings or debt to equity — is a fundamental number used when evaluating a company’s risk.

Analysts and sophisticated investors hadn’t really ignored the large amounts of lease obligations when calculating debt ratios. For many years, they have been capitalizing leases by multiplying the annual rent expense by 8 times to get the estimated value of the remaining lease payments. However, the numbers companies now have to put on their balance sheets may look very different than those estimates.

“I do think people will have to adapt to new metrics – and they may be surprised. The liabilities and assets that companies report may look very different from the ad hoc estimates that people have used in the past,” Todd Castagno, equity strategist at Morgan Stanley, told CNBC.

“Those very common metrics that people look at to value equities, to look at performance, to screen for high quality stocks, all those ratios are going to change,” Castagno said.

Quant fund surprises

The change in company leverage will directly affect some quantitative funds that use leverage as a screen.

For example, the MSCI Quality index uses debt to equity as one of the metrics to rank companies. If a company’s debt to equity ratio changes significantly due to the new accounting standard, it will get screened out of the index.

“You might have different companies moving in and out of what you define as quality depending on how these ratios change,” Castagno said.

To be sure, the additional liabilities on the balance sheets shouldn’t have an effect on company credit ratings as they had already been taken into account.

“We don’t expect a significant rating impact,” said Kevyn Dillow, accounting analyst at Moody’s Investors Service. “The credit quality is not changing. Moody’s estimate of a lease obligation is pretty precise in that we calculate a present value based on company’s disclosures.”

Data vendor inconsistencies

To add to the complexity, some data vendors haven’t incorporated lease liabilities into companies’ total debt amounts, and won’t in the future. Depending on what platform investors use, they will get very different numbers.

For example, Refinitiv will not treat operating leases as debt for U.S. companies, only as non-debt liabilities on the balance sheet, to “allow clear comparability of reports across companies, markets and accounting standards,” a spokesperson told CNBC. It will only add the leases liabilities to debt for companies filing under International Financial Reporting Standards, mostly in the European Union, Asia and South America.

Bloomberg Terminal is already incorporating lease liabilities in company debt.

FactSet told CNBC that it has not updated the data for early adopters yet but will capture the operating leases as part of the debt in the next reporting season.

“Some of the data vendors are adjusting and some of them aren’t. Depending on what data vendor you use, you are going to get very different metrics. I think people are concerned with that,” Castagno said.

by: Yun Li

Client intake form

Employees don’t like them. Research proves they’re ineffective. Why is it taking so long for us to get rid of them?

First, you tear down the walls and dispense with the soulless cubicles. Then you put everyone at long tables, shoulder to shoulder, so that they can talk more easily. Ditch any remaining private offices, which only enforce the idea that some people are better than others, and seat your most senior employees in the mix. People will collaborate. Ideas will spark. Outsiders will look at your office and think, This place has energy. Your staff will be more productive. Your company will create products unlike any the world has ever seen.

That is the myth of the open office, a workplace layout so pervasive that its presence is taken for granted, and its promises–of collaboration and innovation–are sacrosanct. According to a 2010 study by the International Facility Management Association, 68% of people worked in an office with either no walls or low walls–and the number has undoubtedly grown.

There’s just one problem. Employees hate open offices. They’re distracting. They’re loud. There’s often little privacy. “The sensory overload that comes with open-office plans gets to a point where I can barely function,” says one 47-year-old graphic designer who has spent more than two decades working in open environments. “I even had to quit a job once because of it.”

For as long as these floor plans have been in vogue, studies have debunked their benefits. Researchers have shown that people in open offices take nearly two-thirds more sick leave and report greater unhappiness, more stress, and less productivity than those with more privacy. A 2018 study by Harvard Business School found that open offices reduce face-to-face interaction by about 70% and increase email and messaging by roughly 50%, shattering the notion that they make workers collaborative. (They’re even subtly sexist.) And yet, the open plan persists–too symbolically powerful (and cheap) for many companies to abandon.
As with so many things today, we have Google, at least in part, to thank. Open floors have existed since the secretarial pools of the 1940s, but when the then seven-year-old Google renovated its headquarters in Mountain View, California, in 2005, the lofty, light-filled result was more than a showcase for the company’s growing wealth and influence; it signaled the dawn of a new professional era. Architect Clive Wilkinson eschewed the cubicle-heavy interiors of the company’s previous office for something that resembled a neighborhood: There were still some private spaces, but also lots of communal workplaces and small, glassed-in meeting rooms. “The attitude was: We’re inventing a new world, why do we need the old world?” Wilkinson says. With Google’s rise, his vision for a collaborative workplace took off. “We had [companies] come to us and say, ‘We want to be like Google.’ They were less sure about their own identity, but they were sure they wanted to be like Google.”

Around the same time, a more radical version of the open office was emerging from other startups founded during the dotcom boom of the late ’90s. As these companies proliferated, they looked for cheap ways to differentiate themselves from each other and their predecessors. They found inspiration, Wilkinson says, in the more playful offices that had long been common in the advertising industry. Some moved into the unfinished lofts of San Francisco’s South of Market district–and left them that way. Walls only make things complicated when you’re rapidly adding (and eliminating) staff. “Those places were terrible,” says Joel Spolsky, who cofounded Fog Creek Software in 2000 and is currently the cofounder and CEO of Stack Overflow. “They were so loud, because there were no drop ceilings. It was painful for everybody. But [dotcom startups] were doing it because they had literally no choice.” Out of necessity, an aesthetic was born.

By the time Facebook opened its Frank Gehry–designed Menlo Park headquarters in 2015, the open office had become not just the face of innovation in Silicon Valley but a powerful metaphor. Facebook now houses roughly 2,800 employees in a 10-acre building that the company claims is the largest open floor plan in the world. “The idea is to make the perfect engineering space: one giant room that fits thousands of people, all close enough to collaborate together,” founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg wrote when he announced the design in 2012. Famously, he has a plain white desk in the communal area, just like everyone else. (He also has a private “conference” room, where he is rumored to spend much of his time.)

The whiff of disruption that open offices carried became irresistible to startups and established companies alike. “When you talk to leaders in corporate real estate or CEOs about why they designed their space [in an open plan], most will give some fluffy answer,” says Ben Waber, cofounder and CEO of workplace analytics company Humanyze, which uses sensors to track how people use offices and interact with each other. “But when you dig down, it’s because this is what the workplaces look like at a couple of highly successful tech companies.” Calvin Newport, a computer science professor at Georgetown University who studies how people work, takes an even more skeptical view: Open offices have become a way to indicate a company’s value to venture capitalists and talent. The goal is “not to improve productivity and collaboration, but to signal that the company [is] doing something interesting.”

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Planning to get all your colleagues together for a conference? Want to stack the odds in your favour to make your company event a complete success? To help you out, we've compiled a list of 7 mistakes to avoid at all costs.

1. Not Establishing a Theme

If you want to encourage attendees to make the trip, you need something that will make their mouths water - a promise that they will learn new things and enjoy a special experience.

2. Choosing Inappropriate Dates

Most business conferences take place over two or three days. However, this does not mean that you are free to choose any old weekend.

3. Making The Conference Unnecessarily Long

Although most conferences take place over two or three days, it is entirely possible to organise a one-day business conference. Whether you are organising a team-building session or a training conference, the important thing is to make good use of the time.

4. Not Confirming Attendees Presence

While it is true that employees of an organisation do tend to turn up to company events, that doesn't mean you don't need to confirm their attendance.

5. Waiting Until The Last Minute to Prepare The Event

As with any company event, organising a conference requires a significant amount of work in advance. To make it a success, you must therefore start taking the first steps as early as possible.

6. Choosing a Location That is Far Away or Difficult to Access

When choosing a location for your business event, don't just visit its website. Go to see it in person to make sure that it is not too far away or difficult to find.

7. Not Getting Help

A business conference is a major event, so you can't organise it alone. Secure the help of two or three colleagues to take care of the various details. Another solution is to enlist the services of an event organiser.

Credit:

Oscar Tiberghien

Website: https://blog.bird-office.com

You can start a business with a limited budget and a very short turnaround time. In fact, you can start a business between the time you wake up in the morning and the time you go to sleep that night. You just need a list of resources and tools, and a lot of focus.

There are a few things that will make it easier to start a business and scale it quickly. First, it will help if you already know the type of business you want to build and have a basic understanding of the target market you’re seeking. It can also help if you choose a service-based business, such as a marketing firm or consultancy, rather than one that specializes in products. Product-based businesses require prototypes and plans for manufacturing and distribution, which can take time to set up. However, if you already know the types of products you want to sell, or if you want to open a retail shop or an e-commerce site, it can be done as long as you know where to find the products you plan to sell.

So, are you ready to start a business? This handy list can help. From start to finish, you’ll see the steps you need to come up with an idea and bring it to fruition, giving you the foundation you need to grow a thriving business in the days that follow.

1. Come up with an idea.

The idea must answer a few questions:

• Who is you ideal customer?
• What business should you want to be in?
• What business do you want to be in?

To come up with a business idea, and because you’ll be putting a great deal of time and energy into your new business, it can help if it’s in a subject matter area that fits your unique interests. Chances are, you already have a general idea in mind, but if you’ve never thought about what type of business you might start, take a few minutes to think about the best type of company to open for you. Imagine a potential investor or client reviewing your background to determine if you have the skills necessary to offer your particular services. Then try to make a match.

In addition to your background, you should also ensure your business will serve a specific need. What problem are you going to solve? If you plan to start a bookkeeping business, for instance, you may see a demand for the type of services you offer among small businesses like yours. The problem those businesses face is finding someone to handle their bookkeeping at an affordable rate, rather than having to pay a salary to a full-time employee for accounting services. Once you’ve identified the problem, you can start to tailor a solution and design your business.

2. Conduct thorough research.

Your research should not only address the landscape of your business but also answer:

1. How do I speak to my customer
2. Who is the best in the business and how do I be better them
3. Why me and not the other guy

Market research is a key part of launching a new business, but you don’t have to pour weeks of research into your idea. Instead, you can use the many tools available to learn more about the market for the business you’re starting. For the first day, just take a little time to determine how many businesses like yours are out there and what services they offer. How can you differentiate yourself from them? You should also pay close attention to their customer base since they’re likely representative of your own target demographic.

In addition to existing businesses, you should also spend time searching for information that will reveal the demand for your products or services. If you’re local, search social media community pages. If you’re thinking about starting a mobile grooming business, for instance, search to see if anyone has asked about that kind of service in your area. Extend beyond that to see how often local residents ask for groomer recommendations. If you can’t find helpful posts, create your own and simply ask if anyone would be interested in the services you’re planning to offer.

3. Choose a business name

1. Can you name a business that aligns to your ideal customer and the business you want to be in?

It can be easy to spend months trying to think of the perfect business name, but while it’s important to choose something catchy, it’s even more important to make sure it’s unique. The first step is easy: Look online to see if any businesses operate under your name. If you plan only to sell locally, having the same name as a business on the other side of the country might not seem like a problem; however, you may have difficulty getting the website name you want, and customers might not be able to find you in search results. So it’s best to choose a name nobody else is using.

Even if a quick web search shows no use, you’ll still need to make sure the name isn’t trademarked. The same goes for any products or specialized services you come up with—always check to make sure the names aren’t protected. You’ll also need to check with your state department of revenue to make sure your business name isn’t already taken, because you won’t be able to register with the state if someone else is operating under the same name.

4. Identify your target audience; why

1. You company needs A voice
2. People must Ask questions you answer
3. What is the tone to Speak to your

Defining your target market is an important part of starting a new business. There are several demographic maps you can use to identify your key audience, whether you plan to market locally or in a wider geographic range. The Census Bureau has its own apps to help, as do sites like American FactFinder. This information is especially useful if you’re planning on marketing locally, since it will tell you the areas of town where your ideal age group likely is. Say you’re interested in opening a business that will primarily cater to retirees, you will want to focus on the part of town most likely to attract that population.

You can also study the keywords and ads used by specific businesses in your field using tools like SERanking’s Competitor SEO/PPC research tool. If you have time to create a quick survey and post it on your own social media accounts, a tool like SurveyMonkey can help you not only create the polls you need, but easily study the data they provide. These tools are ideal for getting instant information in time to take action on it.

5. Decide on a location

Don’t work from home, please!
If you’re starting a business today, you’re probably working from your home office or maybe even your kitchen table. But you don’t have to stay there. Research local workspace options and line up the contact information you’ll need to make a decision. A coworking space in Jersey City can be a great choice for a new, growing business. Coworker.com search WorkSocial can help you find a space in the size you need with your preferred amenities. Although, don’t feel pressured to permanently leave your home. You can still work out of your house and just occasionally use a coworking space or a conference room at WorkSocial for a change of scenery or meeting with clients.

Some businesses require a dedicated office space in Jersey City, or a virtual office. A tax preparer or attorney, for example, might need an easy-to-access office with professional signage to attract clients. If that is your goal, track down a real estate agent that can match you with an available, affordable commercial space for lease that fits your needs and flexibility. Don’t worry, you can still work on getting other aspects of your business set up since it will likely be at least a couple of weeks before you start meeting with clients. You have plenty of other things to get squared away first.

6. Buy a domain name and design the site

Your domain name is an important decision, so take some time to think it through. Experts say the value is in the .com, so if you’re married to the business name you’ve chosen, you could run into problems. Use a tool like GoDaddy’s domain name search to check names related to the one you want. If yours is taken, GoDaddy offers available variations.

Once you’ve found your domain of choice, lock it in by buying it. You’re only committing to the cost of the domain name, which is marginal and will expire within a year or two depending on the payment option you choose. You’ll want to make sure you renew the name before it expires to avoid losing it to someone else, especially once your business is established. Also, try to make your business name as evergreen as possible, avoiding tying it down to a specific location or product. This will allow you to evolve over time.

7. Get web hosting

Having a domain name is only part of the process. You’ll also need a service to host your website, which you’ll design in the next step. GoDaddy and other domain providers offer web hosting, but their fees aren’t necessarily the cheapest. Shop around for the top web hosting providers and pay attention to the various fees advertised. You’ll pay a monthly fee, which you can sometimes take care of in one lump sum, and for that, you’ll probably also get an email address for your new business. This will match the domain name you chose, but you can direct it to an email address you already use if, say, you prefer to stick with your favorite Gmail account.

Cost is only a small piece of the puzzle, however. You should also pay attention to the customer service your web host provides. Do they promise 24/7 uptime, or something close to it? The last thing you need is for your website to go down at 7 p.m. on a Friday night, only to find you can’t get anyone to do anything about it until Monday at 8 a.m. when the host’s offices open again. You should also look for web hosting providers that promise top security to ensure your website won’t fall victim to a costly security breach.

8. Build a website – focus on who you are talking to

Every business needs a website. It’s the first place customers will go to learn more about what you’re offering. Fortunately, you can build a website quickly thanks to the many do-it-yourself tools where you simply choose a template and upload basic information, like how to contact you and what your business hours are. You can refine the rest later, especially once you have a logo and more details to share. Try to make it easy for customers to contact you to schedule an appointment or ask questions.

There are numerous DIY website builders to consider. WordPress is free and popular, but it lacks the drag-and-drop functionality you’ll see with sites like Wix and Squarespace. These sites make it easy to build a professional website without the help of a graphic designer, but you’ll pay for it. If you want to remove the branding that comes with such sites, you’ll be asked to pay a monthly fee. Wix, for instance, charges $14 a month and up for business sites, while Squarespace charges $18. You may want to opt for the slightly higher-priced monthly plan for each of these, though, rather than committing to a full year, to give yourself a chance to try it out.

9. Set up phone service.

Before you can win your first client, you’ll need phone service. You likely already have a cell phone, but you’ll need a more professional interface to run your business. Nextiva’s phone service helps you move seamlessly between a desk phone and your cell phone, with a mobile app to manage it all. If you’re on the road for the day, you can switch all your calls to your cell phone. Perhaps best of all, if you make outgoing calls from your personal phone, it will show up to the person at the other end of the line as your office number.

If you’re starting a new business, your needs go well beyond basic phone service. Nextiva’s bundles combine phone service with chat, surveys, customer service CRM and more. You’ll even have analytics to offer insight into how you’re doing as you work hard to grow your business. Best of all, since these phone services are cloud-based, your solution will grow as you do, which means you won’t have to waste time shopping around once you’ve added a few employees to your team. You’ll also pay a low monthly fee, so there will be no expensive setup fees to kick things off.

10. Set up a customer database

At one time, professionals kept all of their contact information in address books and on Rolodex cards. Today’s successful businesses maintain a comprehensive database, collecting information on prospects and customers and using that information to close deals. If you learn offhandedly that a potential client enjoys football, for instance, the right database will allow you to log that detail so that you can refer to it later. Maybe you can purchase tickets as a gift or simply mention to last night’s game in conversation.

Not every business needs such a database. First, it’s important to determine if you’ll be regularly interacting with your customers and, if so, whether you’ll need to track them on an ongoing basis. In most cases, you will, and the best type of database to set up will be a customer relationship management (CRM) solution. There is a wide range of software options, including the ever-popular Salesforce, Infusionsoft and HubSpot CRM. Make sure you choose a tool with plenty of modules and integrations so that you can add on to it as your business needs evolve. If it ties into your email and phone applications, you’ll reduce duplicate work.

11. Generate leads – that ha fun…sleepless nights

As a new business, you need good leads to win customers. No matter what type of business you run, getting those names will present a big challenge at the outset. Lead generation software can help by automatically identifying people who might be interested in what you’re selling. Whether you’re calling potential clients on your own or planning to deploy a mass email campaign, this type of tool can help you narrow down those who are most likely to say “yes,” avoiding the time you might waste contacting those who would never be interested.

Your options vary from solutions that automatically pull leads and use them to populate your database, such as LeadGenius, to those that interact with the solutions that you already use. Marketo gathers information on the people who visit your website each day and helps you deliver personalized messages to them. If you use Salesforce as your CRM, you can use Pardot to make sure your pipeline is always filled with ready-to-convert leads. The software even interacts with your social media platforms to ensure that you’re fully informed about the potential customers interacting with your brand online.

12. Create a social media audience

In addition to a website, you’ll also need a social media presence. You may have personal profiles on sites like Facebook and Twitter, but it’s a completely different world when you’re coming at it from a business perspective. Your new company will need a profile on every social media site where your customers are likely to hang out. If you’re after the younger demographic, you’ll want to put your focus heavily on Snapchat and Instagram. The older crowd, on the other hand, is more likely to be on Facebook and YouTube. Set up a page where you’re likely to find your target demographic so that you’ll be prepared to make use of it once your business is officially open.

For customer-facing businesses, it’s important to pay close attention to Yelp, which houses reviews for businesses, because local customers interested in buying from you will probably go there first. And if you’re local, you should also consider setting up a page with Google My Business, which will show your operating hours and location when someone searches for you.

13. Apply for appropriate licenses if needed

You can’t operate a business without the required licenses. If you’re an attorney, accountant or other regulated professional, you probably already know what licenses you need, but a business also needs to register with state authorities and pay the associated fees. If you’ll be selling items subject to sales tax, you’ll need to set up your business to set aside those funds so that you can submit them to local authorities on a monthly basis. Specialized businesses, such as those selling alcohol, will also need permits from the state to operate.

No matter what type of business you run, though, you’ll need a license from the state. Luckily, you can often get the ball rolling online. In Kansas, for instance, you’ll find the paperwork you need on the Secretary of State’s website. Here you can check to make sure your chosen business name is available, file formation documents and more.

14. Get an EIN.

You’ve likely gotten to this point in your professional life using your social security number. That nine-digit ID is all you need to get paid by an employer and file taxes each year. You can even work as an independent contractor or sole proprietor using your social security number. However, if you’re working with a large number of payers, who will be asking for your tax information in order to pay you, you may want to consider getting an employer identification number (EIN). This number will protect your social security number while still allowing businesses to report that they paid you.

The IRS requires you move to an EIN once you begin operating as a corporation or partnership. You’ll also be expected to have an EIN once you hire employees or file employment tax returns. Filing for an EIN is an easy, immediate process that you can do online. You’ll simply go to the IRS website and complete the form. Once you have the EIN, you can begin using it in place of your social security number when you’re acting on behalf of your business.

15. Open a bank account.

You’ll also need a bank account for your new business. The first resource for this will most likely be your own bank because you’re an established customer, but don’t hesitate to at least look at the fees other banks are offering. You may find you save money by switching to a bank that specializes in business accounts. You’ll want to find a location closest to your home for convenience, but it’s also OK to set up an online bank account. Many of your transactions will be electronic anyway, but remote deposit makes it easy to deposit paper checks without setting foot in a bank.

Before you can open a bank account, you’ll need to have the right paperwork. This includes your EIN, if you’ve set one up, or social security number if you prefer to do things under your own name for now. You’ll also need copies of the documentation you provided to the state when you registered your business, including your articles of formation. You may need a copy of your business license before you can finalize the account, so if the state hasn’t issued it yet, this step of the process could be delayed.

16. Invest in accounting software.

You won’t have much of a business if you can’t get paid. One of the most important steps you’ll take is to set up accounting procedures for your new business. Invoicing is essential, but it can help to tie it into your bookkeeping software to ensure everything is logged in real time. Fortunately, there are many accounting and invoicing solutions to choose from, all of which can be set up in a matter of minutes. Look into each solution first to determine which will work best for your needs.

Among the top solutions available are QuickBooks, FreshBooks, Xero and Zoho Books. Some of these do have free options, which will work fine before you have customers to bill, but you will quickly exceed the limitations of free accounts. So, make sure you compare the monthly costs associated with the business size you’re estimating to have within the next few months, rather than the customers you think you’ll have in your first few weeks of operation. Also, be sure it’s easy to pull the reports you need at tax time so that you don’t spend weeks trying to get everything together.

17. Create a marketing plan.

It can take a while to create a marketing plan for a new business, so don’t feel pressured to put together an overly detailed document right away. Small Business Trends has templates you can use to build a quick marketing plan. At the very least, it will prompt you to think through the various ways you’ll promote your new business. You’ll be asked to come up with a mission statement, describe your target market and more. You can also follow a few simple steps to design your own from scratch.

As you draw up your marketing plan, you’ll refer to the demographic data you discovered while setting up your social media profiles, because before you can figure out how to promote your business, you’ll need to identify your target market. Another part of your marketing plan might be buyer personas, which means coming up with an imaginary person to represent your typical customer. You can list out that buyer’s occupation, family data and personal interests and tie them into how that person will use your products.

18. Write a business plan.

In addition to a marketing plan, you’ll need a business plan, which will come in handy as you seek financing and reach out to new clients. As with your marketing plan, you’ll be able to refine and add to your business plan as your business grows. It’s important to have a document in place that gets you started, especially if you plan to ask for a bank loan, and the Small Business Administration has a business plan builder to help you get going.

A traditional business plan includes an executive summary, general description of your company, data from the market analysis you’ve done, information about your product or service, and your financials. Since you’re brand new, you may not have all those things yet, but at least you’ll have the skeleton of your plan so you can build on it later.

19. Get funding.

Now that you have the beginnings of a business plan in place, consider how you’ll pay for your upfront expenses. If you’ve chosen a business that you can operate from your home, you’ll save some money. But you’ll need to consider personal bills, assuming you aren’t going to run your business on the side, and how you’ll take care of smaller expenses like paid ads and networking events. A bank loan is worth considering, but it will put you in debt. Perhaps instead, check into grants that might be available to small businesses like yours.

Crowdfunding can be another useful way to bring in money for your new business. This is especially beneficial if you’re selling a product where you need a large chunk of money up front in order to pay for manufacturing. This strategy can help build an online presence that you can use to promote your campaign and generate word of mouth. Even if you plan on running a service-based business, you can use a site like Indiegogo to get the word out and gather support.

20. Protect your products

If you’re concerned about someone stealing your concept, you may want to trademark your business name, but first you’ll need to make sure nobody else has filed before you. You’ll also need to demonstrate that you have a distinctive name and you plan to use it for a very specific type of product. You can’t, for instance, trademark the name “World’s Best Donuts” for your shop. And the filing fee is in the hundreds of dollars, so make sure you’re ready to make that investment.

You’ll also need to make sure your idea is protected against theft. A patent can help with that, allowing you to get exclusive rights to your product design. If you plan to pitch to investors, being able to confirm that you’ve filed for a patent can demonstrate how serious you are. You can file the application yourself and save money or turn it over to an attorney to manage, at which point you can expect to pay thousands of dollars. Either way, it will take time for the request to be processed and approved, so on Day One, you’ll only be able to kick off the process.

21. Get a logo.

You’ll need a distinct, professionally designed logo if you want your business to stand out to and stick with the customers who come across it. You can look through portfolios on sites like 99Designs and Upwork, narrowing your choices to those whose design matches the style you want. If you want quick turnaround, make sure you let the designer know. You can also hold a contest on 99Designs and have multiple designers compete for the job.

If you have artistic talent, you can save money and time by designing your own logo. You can try it the old-fashioned way, using a tool like Photoshop or GIMP, or you can use a tool that offers help, such as the AI-powered logo maker provided by Logojoy. Since simple design is in style, this may not be hard as you think. Experiment with various fonts and colors and pass them over to some friends and relatives to ask for feedback.

22. Consider insurance needs.

Insurance is one step you shouldn’t skip. A shop with foot traffic throughout the day can’t risk a slip-and-fall lawsuit without insurance in place to protect it, for example. The type of insurance you need depends heavily on the work you’ll be doing. However, every business can benefit from professional liability insurance.

Also known as errors and omissions insurance, this protects you against any mistakes you might make in the course of doing your work.

As much money as working from home can save you in the early days, you’ll need to be aware that your homeowner’s or renter’s insurance doesn’t keep your business safe the way it does your personal property. You’ll need to check with your insurer to find out what extra coverage you’ll need for the equipment and other items you’re using for your business. You’ll also need to pay close attention to any extra coverage you might need on your vehicle if you’re using it for business. Lastly, business interruption insurance can safeguard your investment if a disaster should someday temporarily affect your ability to earn income from your business.

23. Decide if you need help.

As your business grows, you’ll likely find it more difficult to do everything on your own. But hiring a salaried employee can be a huge commitment. There are less long-term arrangements that can help you. You might try contracting with a virtual assistant who can help as needed. Sites like Upwork and TaskBullet are ideal for getting help with specific tasks, such as cleaning up your mailing list or transcribing an audio file.

You aren’t limited to virtual assistance through sites like these, though. You can also use outsourcing to hire workers to write content, answer emails, schedule appointments and more. By hiring contractors for small tasks, you have the opportunity to try them out and determine whether you want to continue working with them in the future. It can also be a great way to find a salaried worker, provided you’re OK with them working remotely. Even once you have employees on the payroll, though, you’ll probably still find that you can use freelancers for certain tasks.

It may take more than a day to fully build out your new business, but these steps are a great start. On Day Two, you’ll show up for work ready to move forward with so many things already in place.

Credit: Drew Hendricks
Website: www.success.com