The Work-life Insight

Why do some people seem more persuasive than others? The ability to gain influence in a negotiation doesn’t have to do with your personality or how naturally charismatic you are. The secret to getting what you want goes far beyond your height, complexion, or number of degrees. Improving influence surpasses book knowledge and IQ. Reading the circumstance below the surface is key. Here lies 5 examples of how to get better at using methods of persuasion.

1. Be Mindful of Sequence

Effective negotiation occurs in three phases. The first phase is all about gathering information and building a relationship. It revolves around establishing an understanding and earning your counterpart’s trust. The second phase involves taking what you’ve learned and managing their perceptions of loss and fairness. It isn’t until the third phase when a deal finally begins to take shape. In phase three, your primary focus should be on implementation.

Too often, we forget that this process is sequential. We’re so focused on proving our value that we blindly skip ahead to stage three without first building a relationship, demonstrating an understanding and addressing the pictures in our counterpart’s head. In other words, we don’t create the foundation for influence.

It’s almost impossible to persuade someone to change their mind or alter their behavior if you haven’t first made them feel understood. And you can’t truly understand someone if you haven’t taken the time to sound them out, listening to all the information they’re giving you (both verbal and nonverbal). What is your intuition telling you?

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2. Gather Information and Build Trust

As a rule, people aren’t inclined to trust when they’re being talked at. Rather than launching into a monologue about your ideal solution, your challenges, or the value you think you can provide, shift your attention to the relationship at hand. At its core, negotiation is an exercise in relationship building. In phase one of that process, focus on answering two questions:

1. How can you get your counterpart to think about out loud in front of you?
2. How can you earn their trust and convince them to meet with you again?

Using a mirror is a great way to encourage your counterpart to expand on what they’ve said and show that you’ve been paying attention. In addition to mirrors, use labels and summaries to demonstrate your understanding and nurture trust. As you attempt to uncover your counterpart’s perceptions, expectations, and past experiences, avoid the impulse to ask “why” questions. Despite your best intentions, asking “why” (as opposed to “how” or “what”) can come off as an attack.

3. Understand and Manage Loss

Every human decision can be broken down into perceived risk versus opportunity, loss versus gain. Everyone is scared of losing something, and that fear of loss tends to overshadow the potential benefits.

To influence a negotiation, you need to know what loss looks like for your counterpart. Employ tactical empathy, use labels, and try to paint an accurate picture of your counterpart’s perspective. When you get a “that’s right” response, you’ll know you’ve hit the nail on the head—and any resistance your counterpart has been harboring will melt away.

Once you understand your counterpart’s perception of loss, you can begin to manage how it affects the deal at hand. That said, addressing loss in the wrong way can come off as a threat or an attack on your counterpart’s autonomy (their most prized possession). So how do you inject the realization of loss into a conversation without destroying trust

The most effective way to address loss is by asking calibrated and no-oriented questions.

» What happens if you don’t improve?
» How long are you willing to accept the status quo in the position you’re in now?
» Is it out of line to say that your team could use x?
» Would you disagree with x?

After summarizing your counterpart’s response back to them, round it out with another no-oriented question.

» Did I miss something?
» Did I get that wrong?
» Would you disagree?

When it comes to talking about loss, no-oriented questions are exceptionally effective. By inviting correction, you make it easier for your counterpart to maintain their autonomy and answer honestly. In contrast, fishing for a “yes” (by asking a question like, “Do I have that correct?”) can make your counterpart feel trapped and lead to a “counterfeit yes”—an insincere agreement meant to get you off their back.

Finally, avoid using your understanding of loss to make threats or set ultimatums. If you try to manage loss with threats, it will come back to bite you later.

4. Address Fairness

Like loss, our perceptions of fairness directly influence our ability to trust someone and hear them out. The desire to be treated fairly—and the fear of being treated unfairly—is central to negotiations. To influence your counterpart’s perceptions, you must manage fairness in relation to perceived loss and opportunity.

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The best way to address fairness is by leading with it. Consider the following statement:

I want to make sure that you’re being treated fairly at all times. When you’re not, say something so that we can back up to the point where the unfairness occurred and work from there.

This approach creates a collaborative environment and prevents your counterpart from using fairness as an accusation down the road (e.g., “we’re not being given a fair deal”).

5. Tackle Implementation

If you’ve done all your work correctly, you won’t be met with resistance or counter offers in stage three. In fact, you shouldn’t need to do any persuading at all. Instead, you should spend the final phase of your negotiation addressing implementation and encouraging your counterpart to engage with the solution. Doing so will create buy-in and preemptively solve problems.

The best way to make your counterpart feel connected to the solution is by transforming them into a problem-solver. Make note of the vision they brought to the table, then make sure to address that vision and tie specific problems they’ve identified to the solution at hand. Rather than telling them that the contract should be six months long, lead them to that solution by asking, “How do you make sure you don’t regress?” and, “What are we going to put in place so that we know you’re improving?”

Asking calibrated questions can also help bring behind-the-scenes deal-killers to the negotiation table and encourage all those involved to think beyond the present moment. By asking “If … then?” or “When … what?” questions, you’ll force your counterpart to look to the future and problem-solve with you.

For more strategies and tips to get what you want out of a negotiation, download our latest e-book below.

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Post Author: Brandon Voss
Website: https://blog.blackswanltd.com

Over the past few years, design thinking has quickly gained momentum in the business world. Some of the world’s leading brands—the likes of Apple, Google, HBO, Samsung, World Bank, and General Electric, many of whom have also gone towards having coworking spaces to create those design ideas—have embraced design thinking as a means of optimizing product innovation. At its core, design thinking is a methodology for creative problem solving. In stark contrast to analytical thinking, which involves the breaking down of ideas, design thinking involves the building up of ideas.

While design thinking has firmly implanted itself across product development teams, it has not secured a stronghold across sales teams—yet. Characterized by routinized activities, traditional sales methodologies tend to be at odds with the iterative methodology that underpins design thinking.

Times are changing. The sales cycle is becoming increasingly complex and customers are demanding a more personalized experience. If you’re a sales rep, you know you need to up your game and become more innovative. Sales teams are recognizing the value of incorporating a design thinking approach into their daily activities. Salesforce’s sales team, for example, has embraced design thinking in its sales discovery process and has realized a 100% increase in revenue growth as a result. It’s time sales teams more broadly recognize the value of design thinking.
The Hasso Plattner Institute of Design at Stanford University, commonly known as the d.school, is a premier design thinking institute that has birthed such gems as The Pulse News Reader, a news aggregator that has inked a position in Apple’s App Hall of Fame. The d.school’s five-stage model of design thinking is directly applicable to sales teams:

1. Empathize

‍Empathy is at the core of design thinking. Empathy involves both a cognitive dimension—an ability to look at a situation from another person’s perspective—as well as an affective dimension—an ability to relate to relate to a person and develop an emotional bond with them.
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he importance of empathy in sales cannot be overstated. Empathy is a key predictor of sales success. A groundbreaking study published in The Journal of Marketing Theory and Practice found that there is a strong positive relationship between empathy and a buyer’s level of trust, as well as his/her level of satisfaction. In our current sales landscape where a mere 3% of buyers trust reps—the only professions with less credibility include car sales, politics, and lobbying— seller trust is in short supply and high demand.

Empathy is especially valuable in the sales process because it encourages information sharing. Research has found that, according to buyers, the number one way for salespeople to create a positive sales experience is to listen to their needs. When we’re armed with so much information and data and a slew of AI and machine learning solutions, it’s easy to assume we know everything about the buyer. It’s important to first step inside the shoes of your customers and listen to what really matters to them and what is top-of-mind.

2. Define

The objective of the define stage is to craft a problem statement or, in design thinking speak, a point of view. So often salespeople define the problem before developing an empathetic understanding of a buyer’s needs. The result is solution selling. Solution selling has long past its expiration date. At least 50% of sales reps’ prospects are not good fits for their offering. Only by defining the buyer’s problem can salespeople determine whether there is a lucrative fit.

The define stage involves asking a lot of questions. Perhaps contrary to popular belief, this focus on questioning does not impair sales conversation, but rather enhances it. According to one analysis of 519,000 discovery calls, there’s a clear relationship between the number of questions a sales rep asks a buyer and his/her likelihood of success.

3. Ideate

The ideate stage unlocks the true potential of design thinking, especially in the context of sales. This is when the focus shifts from problem identification to solution generation. And it’s all about quantity—about generating a wide range of possible solutions, not necessarily the final solution. It involves thinking beyond the obvious and necessarily entails significant creativity. How can I craft an offering that is uniquely suited to my buyer?

While often pushed under the carpet in sales, creativity is essential to sales and a key predictor of success. Research from the Aston Business School, a highly-regarded business school in Europe, revealed that sales professionals who were more creative generated higher sales than their less creative counterparts. Another study by Adobe found that companies that foster creativity are 3.5 times more likely to outperform their peers in terms of revenue growth.

When crafting solutions to customers’ problems, sales reps must dig deep for their creative juices. How can you craft a sales pitch that strikes a strong emotional chord with the customer? Which decision makers, in and beyond the C-Suite, should you involve? If the customer sells a free or inexpensive product or service, take it for a test run. Read through customer community forums and reviews. Don’t let up in terms of stepping inside the shoes of your customer. Only by embracing these type of activities can ideation by optimized. Being in a coworking and shared office environment will get you connected to many different types of sales reps, many who could share their insights on how creativity can boost revenue.

4. Prototype

The fourth stage of the design thinking process is prototyping—developing more fleshed-out and scaled solutions. Prototyping shouldn’t be done in a black box—otherwise you are sure to lose momentum. Prototyping is an opportunity to have a more directed conversation with your customer after the discovery calls. The most effective sales reps will involve champions and other affiliates from the customer’s organization in the prototyping process and vet ideas with them. Involving tangential stakeholders in the solution process goes a long way in terms of making them feel valued and invested in the final solution.

5. Test

The final stage of the design thinking process is to test the final offering. This necessarily involves unveiling the fully fleshed-out pitch to all key stakeholders. During the test phase, salespeople need to be strategic and see themselves on the same team as the customer. They should use collaborative words and phrases—words like “we” and “together”. The “you versus us” mentality is dangerous. Not surprisingly, research has revealed that top-performing salespeople are up to 10 times likelier to use collaborative words and phrases, as compared to their low-performing counterparts.

Forrester predicts that one million US B2B sales reps will be out of a job by 2020. Salespeople can no longer afford to rely on so-called tried and true approaches. Nearly six in 10 salespeople say that when they figure out what works for them, they don’t change it. In a world where each customer yearns personalized selling wants, this mindset is problematic. Design thinking—which is especially well suited for solving ambiguously defined problems—is key to establishing a genuine connection with customers and engaging them throughout the sales process. It’s key to sales success.

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Post Author: Falon Fatemi
Website: www.forbes.com

75% of employees believe wellness programs have a positive impact on their productivity and performance.

• Wellness has moved to the center of discussions around the future of work
• It helps operators create a unique workplace experience and differentiate their offering
• In 2019 we expect to see greater emphasis on health and wellbeing at work, along with increased data usage to better understand and adapt to occupiers’ needs

Wellness has weaved itself into the center of workplace-related discussions. A survey from 2017 found that 78% of employees believed a company’s wellness program had a positive impact on their health. Additionally, 75% of them believed wellness programs had a positive impact on productivity and performance.

A research conducted by Optum earlier this year found that companies are now offering more wellness programs to promote productivity, improve moral, and aid in recruiting and retaining workers.

This year, Allwork.Space predicted that wellness would be a key workplace trend as more companies would adopt and implement wellness programs. We were right, and next year will be no different. As more companies seek to offer a unique workplace experience, many are using wellness as a way to stand out and ensure people feel their best.

What’s in Store for Wellness in 2019

• Wellness goes beyond Physical Health

The definition of wellness and health has gone far beyond physical health and we will begin to see more programs that focus on mental and spiritual wellbeing. While in the past most workplace wellness programs have focused on physical health, such as weight loss and becoming more physically active, we are seeing more companies shifting their focus to total wellbeing. Talk of mental health started to garner strength this year (2018) and it will continue on an upwards trend in 2019. Next year, you can expect to see an increase in the number of companies that adopt wellness programs that focus on mental, emotional, financial, intellectual, social, and spiritual wellness. These might take the form of meditation rooms, napping pods, stress management, going sans alcohol in events, hosting workshops, etc.

• Wellness and Data Analytics Meet

Data has come to revolutionize (and maybe even simplify) the lives of people. Data already plays a key role in the workplace; it helps companies enhance their workplace experience by better understanding the way people interact with and use space. Similarly, data can help companies improve and customize their wellness programs; it can help them identify the programs that provide the best results, which programs are underutilized, and it can even help track an individual’s personal health. Using data in wellness programs can also make it easier to track and measure results, especially for programs that seek to improve productivity rates, stress management, prevent burnout, and improve engagement. Data can open a new world of wellness programs that companies hadn’t previously considered.

• The Built Environment Embraces Wellness

Companies are starting to use the built environment as an active tool to address and improve wellness. When designing or repurposing the workplace, companies are increasingly thinking about the materials they use and how much the workplace encourages movement and interactions. The Fitwel Rating and WELL Building Standard are two examples of how the built environment is changing to better cater to people’s wellbeing. The workplace is no longer a place where companies only want to maximize their use of square footage; they are thinking about how the workplace can actually improve a person’s personal and professional lives. Talk of workplace design today centers around air quality, access to water, stairs, temperature, natural light, and lighting.

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Post Author: Cecilia Amador
Website: https://allwork.space

Not sure what virtual coworking entails? Picture an online portal where people work from virtual spaces but can see those in their ‘space.’

It’s no secret that the entrepreneurship landscape is changing: In the United States alone, 24 percent of workers work from home, according to a Bureau of Labor Statistics 2015 report. And the trend is increasing exponentially. Following — potentially leading — that trend are entrepreneurs, who, more than ever, either work from home or from shared office rental space around the world.

I was in India for three months, for example, and witnessed the opening of three new WeWork locations. Across India, WeWork went from zero location early last year, to a staggering 14 locations, as seen on the company’s website.

And, with internet speeds increasing dramatically year over year, more and more people have access to faster connections, opening up a world of otherwise impossible opportunities. According to Speedtest.net, the world’s internet speeds increased more than 30 percent just in 2017.

These factors have brought me and others to wonder what the near-future of entrepreneurs might look like. Here are some predictions:

From coworking to virtual coworking

I’m a firm believer in coworking spaces, having used them since 2014, starting with Project Spaces in downtown Toronto. But I’m certainly not the only entrepreneur using them. Jeffrey Howard, co-founder of Project Spaces, reported that over the past seven years, he’d seen his locations grow to 18,000 square feet of space across two locations. His company currently has 300 members across 200 companies. Overall, tmore than 1,000 companies call Project Spaces home.

The Living Room, voted the best coworking space in Málaga, in Spain, where I used to work from, had a similar expansion, growing to more than 100 members in less than three years. Then of course, there’s WeWork’s meteoric expansion.

What does this growth tell us entrepreneurs? That the trend is not going away any time soon.

However, I personally believe that in the very near future, we’ll see the rise of virtual coworking spaces. At its most basic, this will mean an online portal where people work from virtual rooms, meaning that members of a given “space” will have their cameras on, and be able to communicate with other members of the room, just as if they were together “for real.”

In fact, this already exists to some degree, and I’ve personally used one of these resources myself:

Complice.co released a feature it calls “rooms.” Anyone can create a room and make it public or private. Using rooms, you can simulate a virtual coworking space. When I couldn’t find a suitable coworking space in Spain, I gave this feature a try, and it worked well enough. I can’t imagine a near-future where entrepreneurs wouldn’t take advantage of that. Or, at the very least, you’d see current coworking spaces expanding to allow members access to the virtual component of their space.

Another alternative for now is My Work Hive. I haven’t tried it myself. But, going beyond simply turning on cameras, and given the increasing popularity of virtual reality, when you have this futuristic technology, I can’t imagine not taking advantage of it and creating complete office-style “worlds,” where you’ll be able to interact on a deeper level of realism. (Of course, I have not yet seen that happen.)

From coliving to purposeful coliving

My second area of interest here is coliving. Coliving has always been with us, mostly in expensive urban cities, but also in poor developing countries.

In New-York City, in Manhattan, the price of a one-bedroom apartment rarely falls below $2,500 per month, according to nyhabitat.com. And, a two-bedroom ranges between $2,800 and $5,000 (and the outer boroughs aren’t much better). Given that, a lot of people opt for coliving with others, mostly with strangers.

We’ve all heard horror stories about a friend’s roommate, or we have stories of our own. For some reason, we don’t give much thought to whom we want to live with, and may end up in a miserable situation. It doesn’t have to be that way.

One of the best experiences of my life was my time coworking and coliving at AngkorHub, in Siem Reap, Cambodia. I was living with like-minded, hard-working, high-achieving individuals. And it was there that I began to understand what is potentially the best lesson of my life:

“You are the average of the five people you spend the most time with.” – Jim Rohn

I found that to be so true. It was during my time there that I started achieving more. Much more. I was working hard, but also working smart. And that was only because others around me were doing the same.

In the near future, I can’t imagine entrepreneurs coliving together without there being a unifying purpose between the roommates. I imagine “themed” apartments — different creative-minds living together, high-performers living together., technology enthusiasts living together, etc. The result would go beyond living, and be more about sharing ideas and working together, on the same — or different — projects.

The near future: How near is near?

That’s hard to predict, but the motion has already begun. In this knowledge economy, learning, adapting and being productive are an entrepreneur’s top assets. In the past few years, coworking and coliving have proven to help with that. In fact, 74 percent of coworkers said in a survey that they were more productive.

With today’s internet speeds and accessibility, it won’t take long until virtual coworking happens. It will be more practical and cheaper, making it easier to become more widespread. Entrepreneurs of the near-future will take advantage of these advancements and thrive more than ever before.

So: Is that a future you’re looking forward to?

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Post Author: Danny Forest
Website: entrepreneur.com

Having trouble recruiting in this tight labor market? Your remote workers might be more inclined to work for you if you offer a coworking option.

If you picture “coworking” as a group of tech-startup millennials sitting around on second-hand furniture in a common space, think again. Today’s professional coworking sites attract a diverse array of companies and individuals as members. Most also provide chic environments with such amenities as 24/7 access, custom coffees and teas, honor bars and cafes, high-tech security, private offices, workout facilities, high-end furnishings, social and networking events, learning opportunities and much more.

“Coworking” is typically defined as membership-based workspaces where diverse groups of freelancers, remote workers, and other independent professionals work together in a shared, communal setting. As these alternative work settings have matured, they’ve begun to attract large enterprise clients who see these spaces as a solution to some of the tough challenges they face.

Thinking of getting in on the ownership or management side of this trend? We can share some of our experiences and the lessons we’ve derived as we’ve grown Gather, our own new network of coworking spaces.

You can recruit from diverse geographic locations

Sometimes, large organizations are unable, or don’t choose to, entice enough workers to work at their corporate-headquarter locations. But this no longer has to be a setback. Motivated by the tight labor market and enabled by technology, organizations are now recruiting talent from outside their (limited) backyards.

Professional coworking provides a home to many of these far-flung teams and individuals.

One reason why this works for remote workers is that they appreciate the more structured work setting which coworking provides. There are also studies that show that certain workers are more productive, happier and more creative in an office environment. These workers want to avoid the social isolation that can accompany working from one’s kitchen table. Finally, coworking provides the types of amenities these employees would find if they worked at a corporate headquarters.

For example, our Gather membership has included employees from Google, Citibank and International Paper, to name just a few.

You can fuel creativity.

Large organizations sometimes find that coworking’s collaborative environment boosts the creativity of its teams. Moving your development, research, marketing, design or other teams from a more bureaucratic corporate environment to a coworking culture can breathe new life into these creative types.

Additionally, collaborating with other coworkers from outside the corporate team can spark new ideas. Whether they’re making a permanent move or seeking an alternative space for meetings, events or an occasional day away, employees often find the change of environment energizing.

Gather often hosts meetings for our local Fortune 500 companies, universities and colleges and other large organizations. We also make a permanent home for creative teams from the likes of PRA, Red Hat and others.

You can provide client companies an easy means for expansion.

Larger organizations looking to expand into a new market often use coworking to assist in that leap. These large firms will make a temporary headquarters using coworking and focus on growth, leaving the minutiae of setting up an office to the coworking company.

Coworking also gives these rapidly expanding organizations the flexibility to take more space, as needed, until they reach a point where finding offices outside of coworking makes sense. These geographic moves often start with one person, then quickly grow into teams of five, ten or more.

Professional coworking can normally accommodate teams ranging from 1 to 20 or more. These types of members at our coworking locations include Hickok Cole, an architecture firm from Washington, D.C.; Diversant, an IT staffing company from New Jersey; and Accuvein, a medical technology company, from New York.

You can help companies be more cost-effective.

While, on average, coworking’s cost per square foot exceeds that of renting traditional office space, when you dig, the numbers make sense for many large organizations.

A typical commercial lease length is between three and five years. And that can help companies, which tend to have a hard time projecting exactly how much space they will need in the coming months or years.

Consequently, they’ll often take more space (at least initially) than is necessary. Coworking organizations can be more flexible. Membership agreements at most professional coworking organizations range in length between 30 days and one year. This gives corporate clients the flexibility they need to scale up or down, paying only for the space they need that month.

If employees are more productive, happier and retain longer in coworking environments, then the potential savings in hiring costs and the benefits of increased productivity add to the case for coworking. This is why we concur with one of our local economic development directors, Garret Hart, who recently said, in an address to our local business community, “Coworking is the way work is going.”

We concur even more with Bernice Boucher, managing director of workplace strategy at JLL. She said: “With a growing number of companies becoming curious about shared space, it’s only a matter of time before coworking becomes an integral part of the corporate real estate toolkit.”

For all these reasons, if you run a large organization, perhaps you too should take a hard look at the benefits that teaming up a professional coworking organization as a strategic partner can bring.

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Post Author: Doug and Polly Whit
Website: entrepreneur.com

Companies considering how to invest in AI capabilities should first understand that over the coming five years applications and machines will become less artificial and more intelligent. They will rely less on bottom-up big data and more on top-down reasoning that more closely resembles the way humans approach problems and tasks. This general reasoning ability will enable AI to be more broadly applied than ever, creating opportunities for early adopters even in businesses and activities to which it previously seemed unsuited.

In the recent past, AI advanced through deep learning and machine learning, building up systems from the bottom by training them on mountains of data. For instance, driverless vehicles are trained on as many traffic situations as possible. But these data-hungry neural networks, as they are called, have serious limitations. They especially have trouble handling “edge” cases-situations where little data exists. A driverless car that can handle crosswalks, pedestrians, and traffic has trouble processing anomalies like children dressed in unusual Halloween costumes, weaving across the street after dusk.

Many systems are also easily stumped. The iPhone X’s facial recognition system doesn’t recognize “morning faces”-a user’s puffy, haggard look on first awakening. Neural networks have beaten chess champions and triumphed at the ancient Japanese game of Go but turn an image upside down or slightly alter it and the network may misidentify it. Or it may provide “high confidence” identifications of unrecognizable objects.

Data-hungry systems also face business and ethical constraints. Not every company has the volume of data necessary to build unique capabilities using neural networks. Using huge amounts of citizens’ data also raises privacy issues likely to lead to more government action like the European Union’s General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), which imposes stringent requirements on the use of individuals’ personal data. Further, these systems are black boxes-it’s not clear how they use input data to arrive at outputs like actions or decisions. This leaves them open to manipulation by bad actors (like the Russians in the 2016 U.S. presidential election), and when something goes embarrassingly wrong organizations are hard put to explain why.

In the future, however, we will have top-down systems that don’t require as much data and are faster, more flexible, and, like humans, more innately intelligent. A number of companies and organizations are already putting these more natural systems to work. To craft a vision of where AI is heading in the next several years, and then plan investments and tests accordingly, companies should look for developments in four areas:

More efficient robot reasoning. When robots have a conceptual understanding of the world, as humans do, it is easier to teach them things, using far less data. Vicarious, a Union City, CA, startup whose investors include Mark Zuckerberg, Jeff Bezos, and Marc Benioff, is working to develop artificial general intelligence for robots, enabling them to generalize from few examples.

Consider those jumbles of letters and numerals that websites use to determine whether you’re a human or a robot. Called CAPTCHAs (Completely Automated Public Turing tests to tell Computers and Humans Apart), they are easy for humans to solve and hard for computers. Drawing on computational neuroscience, researchers at Vicarious have developed a model that can break through CAPTCHAs at a far higher rate than deep neural networks and with 300-fold more data efficiency. To parse CAPTCHAs with almost 67% accuracy, the Vicarious model required only five training examples per character, while a state-of the art deep neural network required a 50,000-fold larger training set of actual CAPTCHA strings. Such models, with their ability to train faster and generalize more broadly than AI approaches commonly used today, are putting us on a path toward robots that have a human-like conceptual understanding of the world.

Ready expertise. Modeling what a human expert would do in the face of high uncertainty and little data, top-down artificial intelligence can beat data-hungry approaches for designing and controlling many varieties of factory equipment. Siemens is using top-down AI to control the highly complex combustion process in gas turbines, where air and gas flow into a chamber, ignite, and burn at temperatures as high as 1,600 degrees Celsius. The volume of emissions created and ultimately how long the turbine will continue to operate depends on the interplay of numerous factors, from the quality of the gas to air flow and internal and external temperature.

Using bottom-up machine learning methods, the gas turbine would have to run for a century before producing enough data to begin training. Instead, Siemens researchers Volar Sterzing and Steffen Udluft used methods that required little data in the learning phase for the machines. The monitoring system that resulted makes fine adjustments that optimize how the turbines run in terms of emissions and wear, continuously seeking the best solution in real time, much like an expert knowledgeably twirling multiple knobs in concert.

Common sense. A variety of organizations are working to teach machines to navigate the world using common sense-to understand everyday objects and actions, communicate naturally, handle unforeseen situations, and learn from experiences. But what comes naturally to humans, without explicit training or data, is fiendishly difficult for machines. Says Oren Etzioni, the CEO of the Allen Institute for Artificial Intelligence (AI2), “No AI system currently deployed can reliably answer a broad range of simple questions, such as, ‘If I put my socks in a drawer, will they still be in there tomorrow?’ or ‘How can you tell if a milk carton is full?'”

To help define what it means for machines to have common sense, AI2 is developing a portfolio of tasks against which progress can be measured. DARPA is investing $2 billion in AI research. In its Machine Common Sense (MCS) program, researchers will create models that mimic core domains of human cognition, including “the domains of objects (intuitive physics), places (spatial navigation), and agents (intentional actors).” Researchers at Microsoft and McGill University have jointly developed a system that has shown great promise for untangling ambiguities in natural language, a problem that requires diverse forms of inference and knowledge.

Making better bets. Humans routinely, and often effortlessly, sort through probabilities and act on the likeliest, even with relatively little prior experience. Machines are now being taught to mimic such reasoning through the application of Gaussian processes-probabilistic models that can deal with extensive uncertainty, act on sparse data, and learn from experience. Alphabet, Google’s parent company, launched Project Loon, designed to provide internet service to underserved regions of the world through a system of giant balloons hovering in the stratosphere. Their navigational systems employ Gaussian processes to predict where in the stratified and highly variable winds aloft the balloons need to go. Each balloon then moves into a layer of wind blowing in the right direction, arranging themselves to form one large communication network. The balloons can not only make reasonably accurate predictions by analyzing past flight data but also analyze data during a flight and adjust their predictions accordingly.

Such Gaussian processes hold great promise. They don’t require massive amounts of data to recognize patterns; the computations required for inference and learning are relativity easy, and if something goes wrong its cause can be traced, unlike the black boxes of neural networks.

Though all of these advances are relatively recent, they hark back to the very beginnings of AI in the 1950s, when a number of researchers began to pursue top-down models for mimicking human intelligence. But when progress proved elusive and the rich potential for bottom-up machine learning methods became apparent the top-down approach was largely abandoned. Today, however, through powerful new research and computational techniques top-down AI has been reborn. As its great promise begins to be fulfilled, smart companies will put their money where the mind is.

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Post Author: H. James WilsonPaul R. DaughertyChase Davenport
Website: https://hbr.org

Coworking Trends for 2019 That You Should Know

Coworking Spaces have been there for more than a decade now and the coworking search trends suggest it is going to grow beyond what anyone can expect. In this post about Coworking Trends 2019, we suggest some new changes that will affect the coworking concept to make it even better.

Coworking Trends For the Year 2019

Scroll through for the latest coworking trends and prepare for the future.

Technology

Coworking Trends in 2019 suggest that space owners are more focused on technology. Earlier, many spaces had to hire managers for day shift and then for the night shift to help coworkers who would pop in anytime. Technology has taken over in such a way that there will be no need to hire even a single manager to take care of the coworking space. Access cards, coworking space management software, booking system, attendance system, automated invoices, time trackers etc. have all become so advanced that you just need to see your revenue at the end of the week or maybe at the end of the month. All human interference and hassles have been outgrown.

Multiple Locations

As per coworking trends, people tend to opt for a space that has more than 1 location within a city since they get a choice to work at any of the locations. Frequent travellers or businessmen tend to opt for coworking spaces that have multi-city locations. If you are coworking space, it is time to grow and branch out. If not, then you should definitely be a part of some coworking passport programme which allows the cardholder to use a designated number of hours at any participating coworking space.

Space Design

If we’d have to name one thing about coworking spaces that they are known for, then it would be their interiors. The design is so well prepared and executed that a person falls in love with space in the first look. But a detailed research on Coworking Trends suggests that this is getting better day by day. We have a couple of new coworking spaces opening up on this earth every day and it is the space design which is getting better day by day.

Sitting desks, standing desks, sofas, couch, bean bags are all normal. Moreover, we know that almost all shared office rental space provide coworkers access to recreational activities within their office space. A sports room with foosball, table tennis, chess board are all things of the past. The coworking space design has evolved in a much brighter way. Check out this picture of swings in a coworking space to understand how creativity is changing the traditional coworking spaces.

Additional Out of Box Services

As per the latest Coworking trends, shared office spaces have started to provide many additional services to their coworkers just like a big corporate company provides its employees. Some ongoing trends in coworking spaces for 2019 include babysitting, a chartered accountant for your startup, making office space pet-friendly, bank tie-ups for a loan, business account etc.

If a coworking space is missing out on these basics and does not go the extra mile for its clients, it might soon start losing out customers to newly opened spaces.

Niche Coworking Spaces

There are cities in the world that house over 100 coworking spaces and most of them are fully occupied. The trend of niche coworking has already been introduced and is sure to grow further. What niche coworking means that you target a particular segment. If we’d had to explain it with an example that just imagine – a coworking space for artists, only for females, for developers and coders, coworking space especially for writers, photographers and so on.

Such coworking spaces are designed in a way to attract only that segment and have all the facilities that a professional in that field might need. Since coworking is all about creating a community, as per recent trends, these niche coworking spaces have created quite strong communities.

Connection to Nature

Trends suggest that coworking spaces are getting more inclined towards greenery. A space that has ample plants, flowers and well maintained green walls are somehow more attractive to coworkers. Coworking trends suggest that new design concepts have also started to include an artificial waterfall, stones, beaches like structures and other things that depict nature within the space.

Community, Culture & Classes

People come to coworking spaces to work but as per recent trends in coworking culture, there much more than workspace that is needed. From weekly lunch to events and from yoga classes to meditation sessions, all are becoming a part of the coworking concept. These activities are optional and often occur over the weekend but the good thing is that they add up to the long list of offerings that your coworking space provides.

The Corporate Shift

Earlier coworking spaces were meant for freelancers, solo entrepreneurs or small businesses but now days even corporate companies are exploring coworking spaces for their employees. This shift is happening for the good as it is building more trust in coworking spaces. One coworking trend to look out for in 2019 is to make your coworking space corporate friendly. You should be able to customize it and differentiate between open area, small personal office space for rent and lounge area.

Digital Marketing

Last but not least. The major coworking trend that is picking up quite fast is digital marketing. No matter how well space has been built, no matter the location of the space, your space will not attract coworkers until and unless you spread the word. As search trends for coworking spaces on search engines are increasing, so are the efforts of digital marketing. Owners and managers now understand that a single person who joins the space is a long-term customer. No matter the acquisition cost of a coworker, it actually pays off in the long run. If you are still not running ads on social media and search engines, you need to start doing it.

Moreover, investing in a photo shoot of your coworking space or getting a professional video will always be a great investment.

Coworking trends may vary from region to region and even from time to time. The above mentioned 10 trends are the ones that might guide the coworking culture for the year 2019 and make it future ready. In order to succeed and offer something different to your clients, you need to up the game in an ethical way. One way to stay in the loop is to keep following such trends on Coworking Mag.

Credit:
Post Author: Ajay Deep
Website: https://coworkingmag.com/blog/

Employee engagement is critical to the sustainability of your company. You can define it by the extent to which employees commit to someone or something in their organization, how hard they work, and how long they stay as a result of that commitment. Employee engagement lends itself to better customer engagement, sales and profits. Ultimately, employee engagement boosts the bottom line.

A 2018 Dale Carnegie study on employee engagement identified three types of employees: engaged, unengaged, and actively disengaged. Engaged employees drive company initiatives and move the organization forward. I call these individuals “influencers.”

The second group, the unengaged employees, do the minimal work to keep their job. They’re not bad; they just exist. I often call these people “retiring in place.” This group may be the most pivotal, since your goal should be to help these people move to the first group.

The final group, which is the most difficult and the most toxic to your current culture, are the actively disengaged employees. They have negative attitudes, they can be disruptive and their negative energy affects those around them.

Just because an employee has been with your organization for many years doesn’t mean he or she is continuing to add value. Think about the employees whom you consider the backbone of your company. These employees are highly committed, dedicated and motivated. Your goal should be to create a culture that encourages employees to stay and engage, which feeds into what I call team synergy.

Your goal should be to create a culture that encourages employees to stay and engage.

Start by asking what your company values. Your mission statement should provide a guideline for the behavioral style, work ethic and priorities you desire in your employees. This understanding helps facilitate interviews, so that you’re hiring people who buy into your culture. It’s also important to incorporate these values into the daily lives of your employees, so you can retain engaged employees who believe in these values.

With respect to organizational structure, researchers and practitioners have identified six elements that lead to an engaging team environment:

• You need a clear vision for your desired outcomes as a team.
• The vision must be filtered down to all levels of the organization and operationalized.
• You need ongoing training and a learning environment.
• You need decision-making authority within the team.
• You need team-based rewards and evaluations, or what I call “process goals.” If you have a big goal for your team, break it down into small, manageable steps, and establish rewards along the way. That approach encourages positive behavior change and keeps people motivated. (As an analogy, if you set a goal to lose 50 pounds, but the only time you received reinforcement was when you lost the entire 50 pounds, your goal would be pretty daunting.)
• Lastly, you need a culture that’s open to various ideas and perspectives.

What constitutes a great team? Here are six elements that I’ve found differentiate great teams:

• Aligned values: What motivates the individuals must align with the team’s goals and motivations. When considering your organization’s core values, also consider how they translate into behavior.
• Trust: Team members must know they can count on each other to get the job done correctly and that as a challenge crops up, they will have each other’s backs.
• Respect: Individuals need self-respect for their own ability to contribute as well as respect for other team members’ abilities.
• Communication skills and the format to communicate
  effectively: A strong leader will facilitate those conversations.
• Passion: A great team is made up of committed people who believe in what they’re doing and whose goals align
• Soft skills: Technical – and technological – expertise is a necessary but insufficient ingredient for leadership that cultivates great teams and employee engagement.

The process of evaluating your company’s culture requires assessment of employees and determining the factors influencing employee engagement. Ask yourself what changes you can make to motivate and reenergize those employees who have a history of being productive members of your team but are no longer engaged. These investments in human capital provide a huge ROI because they create loyalty in your employees and thus in your customers. Investing in your employees and creating employee engagement is essential to your bottom line.

Investing in your employees and creating employee engagement is essential to your bottom line.

Credit:
Post Author: Denise Federer, Ph.D.
Website: https://trainingindustry.com/blog/

As a business coach for millennial entrepreneurs, I regularly encounter young creatives who feel defeated, burnt out and frustrated with their work. And honestly, I can’t blame them. With today’s competitive advertising platforms, algorithmic inconsistencies on social media and an overload in content creation, it’s harder than ever to stand out and scale an online business with confidence.

That’s why I asked four seven-figure millennial entrepreneurs to share their best insights on how they continue to grow and reach new milestones in their businesses against all odds. Use this advice to gain clarity, inspire action and think outside of the box to manifest massive change.

1. Invest in the right team members.

A common theme I see amongst young successful entrepreneurs is their ability to choose business partners and team members with strengths that can be leveraged for success.

“The reason that my business reached a million dollars in revenue within three months of launching was because I had a strong business partner with essential skills that I lacked,” says Irina Wynn, CEO and founder of World Microblading and Fab Life Society. “He excelled at paid media and business development, so having him on my team allowed me to focus on the creative and branding aspects so much more. The truth was that I already had an offer people needed, but my business partner helped position me as the go-to choice in my niche through ads and essentially become the Category King,” Wynn says.

Ultimately, it’s impossible to grow if you’re capped out on your time, your energy and your resources, so having the bravery to step out of your comfort zone and bring others into your vision is often the key you need to experience a major breakthrough.

2. Stop overcomplicating your success.

While building the necessary skill sets to scale your business is often a steep learning curve, nothing is more challenging than rewiring your mindset for success. But if you’re able to make certain mental shifts and continually strengthen that muscle, you’ll see that the only thing standing in your way is your own self-doubt.

Jeremy Adams, the co-founder of Prestige Food Trucks and CEO of Unicorn Innovations, credits his multimillion-dollar ventures to his simple belief that he could do it. “What most people don’t realize is how simple it can be to reach seven figures. You can sell 100 $10,000 items to get to a million, or 10 $100,000 items to get to a million. I simply chose to enter an industry where the average customer pays $1 million per year. It started with believing that I could and not overcomplicating it.”

3. Always evaluate the quality of your product.

Shaan Patel, the CEO and founder of a Mark Cuban-funded company, PrepExpert, says that your business will never grow if your product isn’t essential to helping others.

“There are three key elements attributed to hitting seven figures: 1) Product, 2) Product, 3) Product,” he says. “Focus on creating the best possible product or service for your customer. The better the user experience that a person has with your product, the more likely they will tell a friend or colleague about it. Word of mouth is worth 10x more than any paid marketing you can do for your product or service. In fact, for the first five years of my business, I didn’t do any marketing for Prep Expert. Yet, the company still doubled revenue every year. Why? Because the SAT and ACT classes are so good that students would tell their friends about the score improvements, college admissions and scholarships they got! Word of mouth is key to building any seven-figure business. By building a better product, you are building the marketing directly into the product.”

4. Leverage the power of your local community.

If you’re stuck in a sales rut, one of the best things to do is to look outside of the box, reconnect with your brand values and create new ways for your ideal customers to pay you.

That’s how Johnathan Grzybowski, co-founder of digital marketing agency, Penji, was about to hit seven figures in his business. “Back in November of 2017, we were having trouble enrolling new customers. Being a community conscious startup, we’re always seeking new ways to support our local community, so we came up with an idea,” he says. “We decided to create a new offer that serviced qualified local nonprofits for only $1 per month. The program gained local notoriety and shortly after, top influencers and leaders within our local network championed us by introducing their friends and business colleagues to our business. Most of our sales within our first year came directly from positive praises that stemmed from us giving our service away for free to nonprofits.”

As you can see, reaching accelerated results in your business is often so much simpler than you think—all it requires is for you to step out of your comfort zone, leverage the right teammates to lift you up, strengthen your mindset and dare to do the (seemingly) impossible. You’ve got this.

Credit:
Post Author: Lena Elkins
Website: www.success.com

A two-person startup just closed a $180,000 annual contract with a Fortune 500 procurement team. They didn't have a corner office. They didn't have a receptionist or a mahogany boardroom table. What they had was a professionally equipped conference room, booked for two hours at $65 an hour, in a purpose-built coworking facility in Jersey City. The total cost of looking like a company ten times their size? $130. The return on that investment? Roughly 1,385 times what they spent. This isn't a hypothetical. It's the kind of math that startups and freelancers are running every week as on-demand conference rooms become a critical tool for closing bigger deals. The old playbook said you needed a permanent office to be taken seriously. That playbook is dead. What replaced it is a smarter, more intentional approach: rent the room when the meeting matters, skip the overhead when it doesn't, and let the quality of your space speak before you even open your mouth.

The Psychology of Space: Why Professional Settings Close Deals

Before a single word is exchanged in a meeting, your environment has already made an argument for or against you. Research from the University of Exeter found that well-designed workspaces can increase productivity by up to 32%, but the psychological effect on clients is just as powerful. People make snap judgments about competence, reliability, and financial stability based on where they're sitting. A polished conference room with proper acoustic treatment, clean sightlines, and professional-grade AV equipment sends a message: this person is serious.

Establishing Instant Authority and Credibility

There's a concept in behavioral psychology called "priming," where environmental cues shape how people interpret subsequent information. Walking into a professional conference suite primes your client to view your pitch through a lens of competence. The room itself becomes part of your sales toolkit.

This is especially true for freelancers and small teams who lack the brand recognition of larger competitors. When a prospective client visits a well-appointed meeting room with a staffed reception area, complimentary refreshments, and a business address in a respected commercial district, the perceived gap between you and a 200-person agency shrinks dramatically. You're not faking it. You're being intentional about the impression you create, and that intentionality is exactly what clients are evaluating.

The ROI of a $65 Conference Room

Traditional Office Costs (Annual)

• Lease: $54,000–$102,000
• Total with expenses: $70,000–$130,000

On-Demand Model

• 2 meetings/week × 2 hours × $65
• Annual cost: ~$13,520

Savings

• $56,000–$116,000 per year

Often, one meeting pays for an entire year of room bookings.

Technical Advantages That Actually Matter

1. Enterprise-Grade Internet

• High-speed (often 1 Gbps)
• Low latency
• Stable connections

Critical for:

• SaaS demos
• Video calls
• File sharing
• VPN access

2. Security Standards

• Encrypted networks (WPA3)
• Isolated connections
• Professional infrastructure

Why it matters: Enterprise clients evaluate security - even in meetings.

3. Advanced AV Setup

• 4K displays (75”+)
• Wireless screen sharing
• PTZ cameras
• Professional audio systems

Impact:

• Clear communication
• Better hybrid meetings
• Stronger presentations

Leveraging On-Site Support and Amenities

The details that seem small often carry outsized weight. A staffed reception area that greets your client by name, offers them water or coffee, and directs them to the correct room creates an experience that feels polished and considered. These touches are standard at quality coworking facilities but impossible to replicate at a coffee shop or hotel lobby.

Catering options also matter more than most people realize. Providing a spread of lean proteins, whole grains, and fresh fruit during a lunch meeting keeps energy levels stable and signals thoughtfulness. Compare that to the standard hotel catering tray of cookies, pastries, and soda that triggers an energy crash thirty minutes into your pitch. The food you serve is part of the message you're sending.

On-site technical support is another differentiator. When your HDMI adapter fails or your video call drops, having a staff member who can troubleshoot in real time prevents the kind of awkward technical fumbling that kills momentum in a presentation.

Maintaining a Professional Image for Distributed Teams

Remote and hybrid teams face a unique challenge: they need to come together physically for certain high-stakes interactions, but they don't need a permanent office to do it. On-demand rooms solve this precisely. A distributed startup with team members in three states can book a central meeting location for quarterly planning sessions, client presentations, or investor meetings without maintaining space that sits empty 90% of the year.

The consistency of the experience matters here. When your distributed team always meets in well-equipped, professional environments, clients and partners never question whether you're a "real" company. The physical space validates your digital presence, and the hourly cost is a fraction of what you'd spend on permanent real estate.

Making the Space Work for Your Next Big Opportunity

The shift toward on-demand professional spaces isn't a trend. It's a structural change in how small businesses and independent professionals compete for high-value work. Starting from just $65 an hour, freelancers and startups can access the same caliber of meeting environment that Fortune 500 companies use, without the six-figure lease, the furniture procurement, or the IT infrastructure buildout. The room becomes a strategic asset rather than a fixed cost, deployed precisely when and where it creates the most value.

If you're ready to stop meeting clients in spaces that undermine your pitch, consider what a purpose-built professional environment could do for your close rate. WorkSocial, located in Jersey City with easy PATH access to Manhattan, offers exactly this kind of on-demand meeting and coworking space designed for professionals who want to make a strong impression without long-term commitments. Explore your options here and see how the right room can change the trajectory of your next deal.

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