debor058

PickyDomains -  World’s first risk free naming service   No one needs to be yelling from office to office, or sending unnecessary emails. It's simply a waste of time. That's why we asked 9 entrepreneurs from the Young Entrepreneur Council (YEC) what they rely on most for communication among team members. Their best answers are below. 1. Bitrix24 I have tried many different apps for internal team communication and  Bitrix24  is the best by far. Bitrix24 has group chat and video , document management , its own cloud , a calendar for planning , email , a CRM system , human resource capabilities and much, much more. There isn't anything that I wish Bitrix24 could do but doesn't. The best part is that you can pick and choose which parts you use (and it's totally free). – Robert De Los Santos, Sky High Party Rentals 2. Slack Our team switched from Hipchat to Slack in less than a day, and everyone loves it. It's really easy to learn, the integrations are fanta...

There’s no such thing as a free lunch. It’s one of the saddest facts in my life, right up there with my insane student debt and the realization that Taylor Swift will probably never talk to me. But there’s good news! I just saved a bunch of money by switching to… no, I’m kidding. The real good news is that, while lunch may not be free,  Customer Relationship Management software  can be! Free stuff is exciting! Free CRM comes in two categories – free, but limited (also known as freemium), and open source. So the free, but limited versions offset caps on the amount of free users, contacts, storage, extra features, or some combination thereof. Open source, on the other hand, offers an unlimited, fully functional CRM to users. The caveat is that your company needs a person (or team) who can install and configure the CRM. Of course, because of this, open source CRM is extremely customizable, which is nice. Most open source CRM companies also offer a preconfigured version and/or ins...

Trying to manage a project without  project management software  can turn into a Godzilla-like apocalypse quickly. Even with the best intentions and strategy, a wrong turn can quickly demolish months of work, and a misstep can mean the small-business equivalent of losing San Francisco. Taming this project gone bad can be a horrific task—especially when you have to pay a lot of money to do it. Fear not. Small businesses have a variety of possibilities for organizing their projects from the deep. And the best part?  All of these options are free. 8. Bitrix24 Bitrix24 is a project management system entirely free for up to 12 users, with an option to upgrade to more for $99 per month. The features rival those of PM’s current go-to software:  BaseCamp . Pros Users can choose whether to use Bitrix24 in the cloud or self-host on the company’s own server. The PM features are outstanding: Bitrix24 offers Gantt charts, layered task options, time tracking and management, and ev...

PickyDomains -  World’s first risk free naming service   Complex, creative work can be some of the most challenging and rewarding work to do. Unfortunately, it can also be the most frustrating. When you're the team lead, it's your job to protect your team's creativity and energy by keeping projects from endlessly expanding, consuming all the resources, or turning into endless, recurring tasks instead of defined projects. There are three different ways that a team can be held hostage to an unending project. Creative Scope Creep Creative projects are notorious for inevitable scope creep: you start with a defined scope of work, and base your estimates of needed resources and time on that scope. As you tackle the project, however, the defined edges get fuzzy. More work is needed, and the scope of the project creeps out, maybe just a little bit here and a little bit there. That extra work, however, can completely skew all plans and timelines, leading to frustration and a project...

PickyDomains -  World’s first risk free naming service   Lori Kleiman is a Chicago based business expert and author with more than 25 years of experience advising companies on HR issues. Lori has a master’s degree in human resources, has been certified as Senior Professional in Human Resources (SPHR) by the HR Certification Institute and is a member of the National Speakers Association. Telecommuting and remote work remains a hotly debated topic with high profile supported and defectors alike. How do you personally see this trend develop? Have we hit peak ‘telecommuting’ or will the remote workforce keep growing significantly for the foreseeable future? LK: I believe that flexible work schedules are essential, but full scale telecommuting can be difficult to maintain. There is no doubt that there is a loss of camaraderie and teamwork with workforces that do not interact on a regular basis. I recommend organizations use telecommuting for those that have earned the trust on a...

The main problem of conducting business from home is isolation, broken daily routine and lack of motivation. Here are some tips you can use to conduct your business efficiently. 1. Choose tools for work. It’s the first and foremost thing you have to do. Everything will do – from Excel sheets to complex CRM systems – just make sure you have all the information at hand and don’t forget to update it. The latest trend is all-in-one collaboration workspaces - Bitrix24 is free and particular popular. Besides Bitrix24, there are, for example, MangoApps, Freedcamp and some other. They substitute multiple tools like Trello or Asana for project management, Slack or Yammer for inner social communication, Dropbox for sharing files, Skype for making calls and provide CRM for maintaining client database. 2. Choose a special workplace at home. You should draw clear line between work and home so that to be able to focus on business. It’ll be good also to change into work clothes. 3. Make more call...

PickyDomains -  World's first risk free naming service   It might be a merger, a buy-out, company-wide restructuring, a round of layoffs, or an industry-wide economic plummet that’s left your team reeling. Or perhaps it’s something on a smaller scale: an unexpected firing or resignation, the loss of a key client, or a project that exploded in everyone’s faces. Whatever the crisis, you’ve survived it, but now you’ve got a team of war-weary, discouraged team members looking to you. Here’s how you can help your team pull together again. Don’t Ignore the Crisis One of the worst things you could do as team leader is simply act as if nothing has happened. Unfortunately, team leaders who are uncomfortable with conflict or unsure of how to talk about a crisis may take this route. What happens, however, is that your team members feel betrayed and abandoned. By ignoring the effects of the crisis or acting as if nothing has happened, you’re sending a clear message: Deal with this yourse...