Best Types of Companies for Remote Work

Remote work has been around for as long as we’ve had the technology, but 2020 made work from home (WFH) a household word. Before the worldwide pandemic that forced businesses to close their doors, many startups already offered remote work. Without a physical office, expenses were reduced. Remote work also offers many other advantages to certain types of companies. Let’s take a closer look at five types of companies that offer remote work.

1 Technology Companies

Technology companies (tech) are great for remote work because they tend to have the latest technology. Tech companies include software development companies, IT companies, companies that sell electronics, artificial intelligence or computers, and website development companies. These companies have the ability for their employees to communicate through virtual meetings and communications applications such as Slack. 

During the pandemic, tech workers were more easily able to make the transition to performing work tasks from home, since the majority (if not all) of their tasks were completed using technology. 

2 Customer Service Companies

Customer services companies that offer services via online platforms such as chatbots are suitable for remote work. Customer service workers must be familiar with technology and have internet access to perform the tasks. Many businesses that hire customer service workers have customers from multiple time zones. To provide 24/7 service to these customers, they hire employees from different time zones to cover a wide range of work shifts. Similar to tech companies, customer service employees can communicate with supervisors or coworkers with communications software.

3 Education Companies

Education companies and companies that provide online education are perfect for remote work. These companies provide e-learning platforms for companies and educators. The course content is designed electronically, and IT programming is also handled online. Educators who use these platforms to design courses or offer tutoring work remotely to provide the content. The education is available at any time to anyone anywhere in the world with internet access. 

4 Creative Agencies

Creative agencies offer remote work for those interested in graphic design, advertising, marketing, and content creation. Work is completed through online collaboration and communication tools. Some agencies hire employees from the same city, while others hire freelancers from other cities in the same country or around the world.

Key Takeaways

Work from home has become possible because of the collaborative platforms and communication applications that we now have available to us. Many startups start as remote work companies, saving on the costs of having a physical office. In particular, companies that work with technology, customer service, and education, as well as creative agencies are well suited for remote work.

If you enjoyed this article, subscribe to make sure you don’t miss the next post!

Money and Power: the Ambition Penalty

If you’re interested in the “ambition penalty” that working women face and haven’t heard about Stefanie O’Connell, I recommend listening to and reading her work. She reveals research results about gender roles and gender stereotypes in the workplace.

Some of the topics that she discusses:

The “motherhood penalty” and the “fatherhood bonus” 

For every child a woman has, her income drops by percent. In contrast, for every child a man has, his income increases by six percent. Women are penalized (the motherhood penalty) because they are less likely to be promoted and held to a higher standard, while men are held to a lower standard. For example, they are more likely to be excused if they are late for work and they have children.

The “ambition penalty”

Successful women in traditionally masculine roles (such as leadership) face professional, personal, and social penalties. There is workplace unpleasantness in how they are treated by management and their peers.

Changes to traditional roles

Women who outearn their male partners (significant others) will notice an effect on their relationships. A housework gap exists as women still take on much of the housework. They also face increased stress levels, higher divorce levels, and increased cheating incidents from their partners.

Men who are married to wives in “traditional marriages,” meaning the wives don’t work, are more likely to have a negative view of women in the workplace. For example, they perceive an organization with mostly women workers as running less smoothly.

Perception of discretionary spending

What is considered a worthwhile expense? Men spend money on their vehicle, video games, or golf clubs. Women spend money on clothes, handbags, or skin care. However, it is women who are perceived as wasting money because of the expectation that women should be spending money on others, such as their children. 

Wage reduction

When more women are represented in a specific occupation, the average wage for both men and women in that occupation decreases over time. The conclusion is that the gender of the workers changes the wages of the work.

For more fascinating facts

If you’re fascinated by these research findings and want more details, check out her IG account.

Should You Quit Your Job and Become a Freelancer?

Taking control of your work schedule and workload and becoming your own boss has its appeal, but is that life for you? Should you become a self-employed freelancer?

If you’re undecided about starting a freelancing business, ask yourself the following questions. You may surprise yourself with your readiness to take your career in a new direction. Or you may need more time to re-evaluate your options. Either way, these questions will help you decide if freelancing is for you.

What are the challenges of freelancing?

If you’ve always been an employee, the sudden income instability may be frightening. Before you start, ensure that you have three to six months’ savings to pay your bills. You’ll be taking risks that you didn’t when you had a job.

As a freelancer, it’s your responsibility to find work for yourself, either by networking or creating a profile on a gig platform such as Upwork. When you begin working on your own, you’ll need to manage your time and goals wisely. Even if you have a job that lasts three months, you’ll be looking ahead to line up the next gig to start four months from now. Otherwise, when your contract finishes, you could find yourself without an income when your contract finishes.

As a freelancer, you may experience months with several clients and projects and months with a lot of free time on your hands. Setting aside savings will help with unforeseen expenses during these dry months.  

Some people prefer to ease into freelancing gradually by working in the evenings and on weekends while working full-time. Others work a part-time job while supplementing their income with freelancing. They may choose to freelance full time only after they have an established, steady client base.

What skills do you need?

Your success as a freelancer will also depend on your skill set. Most people start freelancing in the same industry where they worked for an employer. Others train for specific skills and look for freelancing contracts. If you’re building your skill set, you’ll be charging lower rates than someone with years of experience. 

Other factors determining how much work you get as a freelancer and how much you make include:

  • Whether your skills are in high demand. If many clients need someone with your skills, then you will find many opportunities.
  • Whether your skills are general or niche. Writing, for example, is a general skill. If you have a niche, such as writing grants or writing for tech companies, you will be in higher demand by clients that need more specialization.
  • Quality of your clients. Your relationship with your client as well as their financial situation will determine how much you can charge for your services. For example, if you are just starting, you may accept a contract with a small company that hasn’t been in business very long. Their budget would be limited, but you would be able to gain some work experience.

What is your business mindset?

The most important factor to consider about freelancing is your mindset. You’ll be setting your work hours. You can sleep in on a weekday and work nights or only work three hours a day. Those are some of the perks.

It also means you need a lot of self discipline to complete projects by the deadline, especially if projects fall behind schedule and you’re suddenly juggling multiple deadlines for reasons out of your control. People you know may discourage you from freelancing because of the risks. They’ll tell you to stick to the stability of having a job with holiday pay, sick leave, and a medical plan.

As a part-time or full-time freelancer, however, you’ll be able to decide what projects and work you want to take on, and you’ll be able to negotiate your rates. You’ll experience clients who treat you badly and clients who are a dream to work with. It’s a learning process, and as you gain experience, you’ll have better strategies for nightmare situations. When you become highly experienced and in demand, you can even turn down jobs to do only the work you enjoy.

Key Takeaways

Freelancing, either part-time or full-time, can be a dream come true for those who want to make extra income or take on new work opportunities. The ability to work where and when you please has its appeal. However, freelance work isn’t for everyone. You need mental discipline and a desire to aways improve your skills.

If you enjoyed this article, subscribe to make sure you don’t miss the next post!

Getting ChatGPT to Do My Job For a Day

With so much talk about ChatGPT replacing jobs (which is in fact a true concern). I wondered if ChatGPT could do my job for a day. (Mostly because it was the weekend and it’s more challenging to work on the weekend.) I asked it to do a couple of tasks. Here are some results.

Task 1: Create a test that tests job skills

I asked ChatGPT to create some questions to test a job candidate’s job skills. It generated an answer in a matter of seconds:

Sure! Here are some sample questions you could use to test a job candidate’s proficiency at customer service:

  • How do you handle a customer who is upset or dissatisfied with the product or service they received?
  • Can you provide an example of a time when you went above and beyond to help a customer?
  • How would you deal with a customer who is speaking loudly or rudely to you?
  • Describe a time when you had to handle multiple customer requests simultaneously.
  • How do you stay calm and composed when dealing with difficult or angry customers?
  • What do you think are the most important qualities for someone in a customer service role?
  • How do you handle a situation where you are not able to provide a customer with the solution they were hoping for?
  • Have you ever dealt with a language barrier when speaking with a customer? How did you handle it?
  • How do you keep yourself organized when handling multiple customer requests or issues?
  • Can you provide an example of a time when you successfully turned a dissatisfied customer into a loyal one?

Task 2: Create an answer key that can be reviewed using AI

Perhaps I didn’t ask the right question. When I asked ChatGPT to create an answer key to a job skills test using AI, it came up with this response:

To have AI check the answers to these questions in a standardized way, you can follow these steps:

  • Develop a set of criteria for evaluating each question. This could include factors such as the clarity and completeness of the answer, the use of relevant examples, and the candidate’s ability to communicate effectively.
  • Train a natural language processing (NLP) model on a large dataset of customer service responses to the questions you have developed. This will enable the model to recognize and understand common patterns and language used in customer service responses.
  • Use the trained NLP model to automatically evaluate the candidate’s responses to the questions. The model will analyze the text of each response and score it according to the pre-defined evaluation criteria.
  • Set a threshold for acceptable scores for each question. Responses that score below this threshold can be flagged for review by a human evaluator.
  • Review the results of the automated evaluation and make any necessary adjustments to the evaluation criteria or the threshold scores.

Conclusion:

When I asked ChatGPT to create a job skills assessment as well as a method to evaluate the assessment using AI, it replied with well-written responses. However, none of it was material I could use because the material was far too general. The issue was also my inability to word my task to get the answer I really wanted: to get ChatGPT to do my homework. What I learned was that it may take some skill to learn how to get ChatGPT to read my mind and do my creative thinking so I can take an afternoon off.

If you enjoyed this article, subscribe to make sure you don’t miss the next post!

4 Tips for Effective Networking Connections

If you’ve attended a networking event, you’ve likely connected with other business owners and entrepreneurs who later said, “Let’s meet over coffee.” It’s a great idea, but how do you know if this connection with lead to a meaningful business relationship?

Whether in person or at an online virtual meeting, you can make that follow up to the networking event a successful one by having clear objectives for connecting. Are you looking for opportunities and clients or just building relationships?

Here are five tips to help you make meaningful connections and create effective business opportunities.

1 Prepare a pitch so you connect with the right people

At every in-person networking event, prepare a brief, 15 to 30 second description of yourself, including your name, company name, what you do, and your ideal client. When informally networking at an event, this is the information you want to share. When asked to give an introduction to a group of people, the description is the same, but when you finish, restate your name and the name of your company. (People don’t always catch your name the first time.)

Take some business cards with you to share. They may also ask if you have a business card for a door prize draw. If you’re tech savvy, you can share your QR code to your LinkedIn profile or website instead of a business card. The benefit is you can easily update your LinkedIn profile or website, compared to ordering a new set of business cards whenever you update your information. 

For virtual networking events, have your contact information typed out and checked for spelling and punctuation. You can copy and paste your information into the chat after your introduction to the group.  

2 Attend networking events that attract the target market

Another tip for a successful networking event is to learn what you can about the event before attending. What industries or niches do the attendees represent? Do they have a newly-minted business or have they been in business for a while?

These questions are important because if you command a high price tag, a new business may not have the means to hire you. Similarly, if you are just starting to build your skills and your client network, a five-year old business may prefer to hire someone with an established success record.

If you are in a marketing business specializing in marketing for tech companies with 50 or more employees, going to an event for small business owners may not be the best use of your time. To make the connections you’re looking for, do your research on the event prior to attending.

3 Understand that networking isn’t the same as building connections

After attending a networking meeting, you hope to have two or three people to follow up with. You might also be approached by someone who wants to meet with you and learn more about your business over coffee. Be clear about the purpose for the invitation.

First, if you’re a new business owner, freelancer, or entrepreneur, meeting someone for coffee and getting to know each other’s business sounds like a great idea. You’ll build up your contact list and even if you don’t do business together, you’ll know who to recommend for (insert their business product or service here).

Second, general getting-to-know-you chats build connections but rarely result in any business. You already introduced yourself and what you do at the networking event. If someone truly is interested in bringing you business, they will say something specific such as, “I’m interesting in signing up for your finance education program but I have some questions. Can we talk over coffee?”

4 Set clear expectations

Always be clear about your expectations prior to setting up a follow-up meeting after the networking event. If the other person says they want to “chat and get to know you and what you do,” expect that you’ll be working on building a connection. The connection might lead somewhere or it might not.

A more specific objective, such as working on details about whether you can coach them on starting their new business is more likely to bring you a new client.

Key Takeaways

Networking is an important part of growing your business. A follow-up meeting after attending a networking event will be more effective if you are clear about your goals for going to the event, whether you just want to make a connection or find possible clients.

If you enjoyed this article, subscribe to make sure you don’t miss the next post!