Tag: Business For Sale

The best 11 ambient noise and music apps to help you stay focused

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While research tends to go back and forth on the advantages of noise versus silence for creativity and productivity, I always find myself more relaxed and focused at work after turning on a light amount of ambient sound, usually with some combination of rain, fan noise, and white noise. That habit has turned me into somewhat of an ambient sound connoisseur. Too many ambient noise apps come with cheap sound effects, annoying commercial breaks, or exorbitant subscription fees Read More …

How startups can create a culture where women can win

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Silicon Valley’s bro culture is infamous. Bloomberg’s Emily Chang wrote an entire book about it aptly named Brotopia , where she called out the toxic culture women face in the tech industry. In software development, “ shift left ” refers to finding and fixing defects early in the product lifecycle. To fix bro culture, we need to shift left and start early in the company lifecycle: Startups must create a culture where women can win. I’ve heard people argue that the real problem is a lack of pipeline, that there aren’t enough girls choosing science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) education. The truth is, the industry is unattractive to women because it’s an unfriendly place, as I’ve learned firsthand working at startups. Over half of women working in tech report experiencing gender inequality at work. Tech giants like Google (no, I never worked there) and Oracle (yes, I once worked there) have come under fire for sexual harassment and gender-based discrimination. Sidelining, mansplaining, patronizing, and pay gaps: A career in tech is still hard for women. Life in a startup is seemingly even harder. “How do you do it?” people often ask me. Like most women, I’ve had to navigate subtle and not-so-subtle biases at different points in my own career. Along the way, I’ve come to realize that terms like “imposter syndrome” unfairly place the burden to adapt squarely on women. Instead, it’s the environment that must change. The onus is on startups to create a culture where women can thrive. Start at the top, and start early Tech startups are overwhelmingly (72%) founded by men, who mostly recruit from within their own network and end up hiring more men who look just like them. The key to changing the company dynamic starts at the top. You need to bring on female leaders early—within the first five hires. Diversity and inclusion shouldn’t be an afterthought that’s addressed after your company has a dedicated HR team. It must be deeply embedded in your company culture from day one. Read More …

Remote work made digital nomads possible. The pandemic made them essential

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This story is part of  The Road Ahead , a series that examines the future of travel and how we’ll experience the world after the pandemic. In April, a radio DJ, a marine ecologist, a water polo player, and a migrant studies scholar flew to idyllic Dubrovnik, a seaside city in Croatia with a vast labyrinth of medieval architecture famed for composing the scenery of the cult fantasy TV show Game of Thrones . Hailing from Finland, Japan, and the United States, the travelers were among 10 lucky winners of a first-of-its-kind  digital nomad residency contest, for which the prize was a month-long stay in the lush “Pearl of the Adriatic” with complimentary meals and lodging. The residents ate, drank, networked, and day-tripped to the cliffs of Konavle—home of 2020’s most beautiful beach in Europe—and the island of Mljet, which is shrouded in dense forest that features exciting hazards like venomous snakes and wild mongooses. Ostensibly, they were there to brainstorm how to design Dubrovnik as a nomad-friendly city in the digital age. But for Croatia, the real goal was to market its own image away from a “holiday playground,” as program director Tanja Polegubic calls it, into a serious long-term destination for remote workers. You could think of it as striking while the iron is hot—or really, while Croatia is hot: During the COVID-19 pandemic, the country saw an influx of workers fleeing expensive cities in western Europe. “Asia wasn’t an option, so a lot of people were looking to the Balkans because the further east you go, it’s a lot cheaper,” Polegubic says. Croatia’s not alone: Countries spanning the Caribbean isle to the Arabian desert are suddenly pivoting to court digital nomads in the post-coronavirus era, dangling everything from free vaccines, to tax breaks, to the chance to live in tropical paradise. Call it a new global arms race, where the weapon in question is an arsenal of highly skilled remote workers—ones that were trapped in their homes during the pandemic, but could now be untethered by it from their offices forever. With a new class of human capital up for grabs, countries are looking to stockpile talent, and digital nomads are living a new reality: They’ve become a hot commodity. COVID-19 was an existential crisis: For the first time, a community built around having no fixed address was forced to shelter in place.” Digital nomads, ironically, are easy to locate. By nature of their lifestyle, many have built careers on the internet: sharing snapshots of dreamy landscapes spun from coconut palm trees and rainbow-colored villas, hosting blogs that detail the ins and outs of life perpetually on the road Read More …

The five best arguments that Apple’s App Store is a monopoly

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Apple and Google testified in front of the Senate Judiciary’s Antitrust Subcommittee Wednesday, and it’s fair to say the committee members came with their A game and that Apple walked away the biggest loser. At issue are the strict rules Apple imposes on app developers for the privilege of being listed in the App Store, which is virtually the only way developers can access the huge worldwide market of iPhone users. Google may be somewhat less in the antitrust crosshairs because it allows Android users to side-load apps from other marketplaces and websites. But both Apple and Google require many developers to use their respective marketplaces’ own proprietary payment systems to sell their apps, and they charge the developers up to 30% to do so. Both Democrats and Republicans in the hearing seemed surprised at that high toll and wondered out loud whether it would be so high if the two main app stores faced more competition. The subcommittee members had clearly coordinated their efforts before the hearing and presented Apple with a wide-ranging, and nonoverlapping, set of informed and relevant questions. However, the hearing was especially fiery because some big-name app developers who have a beef with the app stores—Spotify, Tile, and Tinder’s parent, Match Group—were sitting at the witness table too. Some of the best arguments against Apple’s App Store policies came from them. Spotify’s App Store blues Case in point: Spotify’s lawyer Horacio Gutierrez pointed out that not only is his company required to use Apple’s payment system (and pay the “Apple tax”), but the music app is also prohibited from directing users of its free iOS app to online promotions offering three months of Spotify Premium for 99¢. Gutierrez called this a “gag order.” Spotify had the sympathy of Democrat Amy Klobuchar of Minnesota, the chair of the Senate Judiciary Committee’s antitrust subcommittee, even before the hearing. “[Telling people] they can get a better deal [on an app] on a website, when the companies . . . on the app store are banned from doing that, that’s pretty outrageous,” Klobuchar told me on the phone Tuesday night. Spotify has a particularly interesting viewpoint because it competes directly with Apple’s own Music service, which naturally gets more visibility in the App Store. Klobuchar called this “self-preferencing.” Gutierrez said Apple had threatened retaliation against Spotify and in some cases carried it out. He claimed Apple told Spotify straight out that it would not promote the Spotify app and forced Spotify to wait for months for app-upgrade approvals. Read More …

7 soft skills recruiters value during uncertain hiring times

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The pandemic has created radical changes in the way we work. Hiring the right employees, who can not only survive but also thrive during these unprecedented times, has become even more critical. While technical and functional skills are still as important as ever, recruiters and hiring managers have also been seeking candidates who have specific transferable soft skills that are especially relevant during this time when the workplace as we know it has undergone such a radical transformation. Emotional Intelligence The ability to read situations and approach them with sensitivity is now absolutely critical, especially for team leaders, because “customers and colleagues are balancing so many competing demands in their personal and professional lives,” according to Amanda Georgoff, regional vice president of sales at SalesLoft. With face-to-face contact reduced, executives have to be able to pick up on the nuances of Zoom calls or Slack messages to ascertain employees’ struggles that affect productivity, according to Sean Walker, partner at the Bowdoin Group, an executive search firm. You can demonstrate emotional intelligence during your interviews by weaving in concrete, personal examples of how you changed your work approach with others based on what you ascertained was happening behind the scenes in their lives. Resilience Resilience is also critical to managing stressful situations. “We’re living in a world that can be disrupted at any moment, and those who demonstrate resilience will pull us forward faster,” says Robin Stenzel, chief solutions and talent officer at Outmatch, a talent decision platform. Therefore, hiring managers are now looking for candidates who have displayed optimism in the face of challenge, especially since the pandemic placed many people in front of many uncertain situations. The ability to adapt, learn, and work toward a successful transition has been a key factor in hiring, according to Sheila Ryan, chief people officer at Clear Capital, a financial technology and real estate valuation company. A way to demonstrate resilience to a hirer is to share specific examples in your cover letter or résumé of stressful situations you were in, the actions you took in response, and the ultimate result of those actions. Empathy While separating your work life from your personal life has always been tricky, the pandemic has made this separation nearly impossible. Whether caring for a loved one sick with COVID-19, working remotely while home-schooling, or dealing with the income loss from a partner’s unemployment, being sensitive to our colleagues’ challenges can make a huge difference to employee morale, retention, and productivity. Read More …