This career assessment quiz will help you determine your workplace persona. This key piece of information is incredibly helpful to have as a working professional. Here's why understanding your top personas is helpful for your career...
It Will Help You Market Yourself To Employers
Here at Work It Daily, we like to say that you are a business-of-one. That means you need to know how to market yourself effectively and build your personal brand. Taking this career assessment quiz will help you determine your professional strengths so you can market yourself more effectively to employers.
It Can Help You Pinpoint Your Career Path
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Knowing exactly what makes you happy on the job will make the job search much easier. You won't be wasting your time applying for jobs you think you'd like; you'll be focusing on careers you know you'd love.
It Will Help You Articulate How You Add Value
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You could reallywow your potential employer by telling them what value you'd add to the company. This quiz will tell you your professional strengths and how you can capitalize on them in the workplace.
This Career Quiz Only Has 20 Questions
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I'm sure you had tests in high school that were longer than this quiz. It only has 20 questions, and you can take your time answering them. Plus, the questions aren't hard—just answer them honestly! You'll be glad you did it. And remember, there are no wrong answers!
You'll Learn Something New About Yourself When You Take This Quiz
Knowing this important aspect about yourself will help you in the long run. The more you know yourself, and how you function in the workplace, the better off you'll be.
So, what are you waiting for? An important piece of your personal brand is waiting to be revealed!
A critical responsibility of an executive is to set up a proper budget for their organization. Setting a proper budget usually involves setting financial goals, identifying expenses and revenue streams, and creating a budget that helps drive business success. So, what are some practical strategies for creating and managing a successful budget?
We recently asked our executives how they set up a proper budget.
Here are their responses...
Ana Smith, Talent Architect & Global Learning Strategist
As an executive, setting up a proper budget is a critical responsibility that requires careful planning, analysis, and monitoring. Here are some steps to consider when setting up a proper budget:
Define your financial goals: Before setting up a budget, you need to define your financial goals and objectives. This will help you to prioritize your spending and identify areas where you need to cut costs.
Estimate your revenue: Determine how much money your organization expects to generate in the upcoming period. This includes revenue from sales, investments, and other sources.
Analyze your expenses: Identify all of the expenses that your organization will incur during the upcoming period. This includes fixed costs like rent and salaries, as well as variable costs like marketing and materials.
Prioritize expenses: Once you have identified all of your expenses, prioritize them based on their importance to your organization's success. This will help you to allocate resources more effectively and avoid overspending.
Allocate resources: After prioritizing your expenses, allocate resources to each category based on their importance. This will help you to ensure that you are spending money where it is needed most.
Monitor and adjust: Once your budget is in place, it is important to monitor your actual expenses and revenue against your budgeted amounts. This will allow you to identify any discrepancies and make adjustments as necessary.
In summary, setting up a proper budget requires careful planning, analysis, and monitoring. By following these steps, you can ensure that your organization's financial resources are allocated effectively and efficiently.
Ana Smith helps people & organizations achieve their full talent potential by developing and co-creating people strategies and customized solutions, and turning them into impactful outcomes and collaborative relationships, using coaching as the "red thread."
Michael Willis, Sports Business Operations Executive
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I love the time of the year when it’s time to work on the upcoming year’s budget at the NFL.
For me, the budget is a living and breathing document. You just don’t put in all the effort to file the budget in the filing cabinet once approved. More on that later.
I have a process that I follow every year. I keep a folder with all the notes and conversations that I had to build the budget. I keep various budget versions as I move to the final approved budget.
My budget process goes as follows:
1. Current Year Actual
The current year’s actual P&L numbers will be my basis for the upcoming budget cycle.
I go to each department head in our group and ask them if they have anything they want to buy or change that they didn’t do this season. Also, I will ask if they have any one-offs that won’t be done after the season ends.
2. Game and Replay Officials – (CBA) Collective Bargaining Agreement
Seventy-six percent of the Football Operations budget is covered by the Game and Replay Officials’ salaries and travel expenses agreed upon in a seven-year agreement between the NFL and the Officials’ Union.
So, I only have control of 24% of the Football Operations budget.
3. VP & Finance Review
This is when I sit with my boss and Finance to make any adjustments, then move to the approval of the budget.
4. VP & Commissioner Review
After Finance approves the budget, my boss sits with the NFL Commissioner on what the department wants to do in the upcoming year.
The Commissioner doesn't have the time to go through the entire budget page by page. So, I draw up a “one-page” report. This is a simple one-pager with one number at the top of the page, representing the current year’s “actual” spend. In the middle of the page are the budget changes for the upcoming year. At the bottom is the total budget for the upcoming year.
5. Finally, the Living and Breathing Part
Now that I have a final version budget in my hands, I will bring life to the budget by calendarizing the budget. That means I will spread the budget over twelve months, showing when to spend the money. That means I can discuss how we are pacing every month or quarterly, from budget to actual.
Michael Willis has 18+ years of experience working with accounting & sports organizations and has managed P&Ls of $10M - $125M+ with budgets of $3M-$50M+. He worked for the NFL for 22 1/2 years, mainly with the game officials working on the financial/accounting side of the business.
Lisa Perry, Global Marketing Executive
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As a brand marketing executive, a well-planned marketing budget is critical to strategically allocating resources, outlining a successful marketing strategy, maximizing return on investment (ROI), and effectively reaching your target audience. Creating a marketing budget may seem daunting, but it doesn’t have to be. Here are six steps to help you set up a marketing budget that aligns with your goals and drives tangible results:
1. Define Marketing Goals & Objectives: Before diving into budget planning, clearly define SMART (specific, measurable, attainable, relevant, and time-bound) marketing goals and objectives. For example, what are you looking to do? Increase brand awareness or consideration, generate leads or conversion, drive loyalty or advocacy? Understanding your objectives will guide your budget allocation decisions and ensure your marketing efforts align with your business goals.
2. Conduct Analysis & Research: Analyze historical marketing data and conduct research that will provide valuable insights for budget planning. Evaluate the performance of past marketing campaigns, identify successful strategies, and pinpoint areas for improvement. Additionally, research market trends, customer behavior, and competitor activities to make informed budgetary decisions.
3. Develop a Marketing Plan: Develop a marketing plan with strategies and tactics aligning with your goals and objectives. Part of the planning includes researching the costs of the various marketing tactics. This is when you can determine which budget line item you want to include, how much money you want to allocate, and when you plan to spend it.
4. Estimate Marketing Costs: When submitting your marketing budget estimates for approval, it is crucial to accurately forecast how much you anticipate spending, as once approved, these estimates become your budget. Research industry benchmarks, obtain vendor quotes, and consult with your team to accurately estimate the costs involved.
5. Develop a Marketing Budget: Set a realistic marketing budget considering your financial resources, revenue projections, and the estimated costs of executing your marketing campaign. Strive for a balance between ambition and realism to ensure you have sufficient funds to support your activities throughout the budget period.
6. Monitor & Adjust: Regularly monitor and evaluate the performance of your marketing activities to ensure your budget is being utilized effectively. Track key performance indicators (KPIs) such as conversion rates, cost per lead, and customer acquisition. Identify areas that require adjustments or optimization. You can optimize your budget allocation for maximum impact by staying agile and responsive to data-driven insights.
Setting up a proper marketing budget requires careful planning, data analysis, and an understanding of your business goals. Then, you can create a budget that drives measurable results, strengthens your brand, and propels your business toward success.
Lisa Perry helps companies build leadership brands, driving loyal customers & delivering profitability. She does this through a process that builds brands consumers love. Her goal is to help companies develop, monetize, and grow their brands.
Most organizations have an intranet to facilitate communication, collaboration, and information sharing among their employees. It typically serves as a centralized hub for features such as:
News and events - providing a way to share company news, announcements, events, and other updates in a timely manner. More transparent communications can promote a more positive culture.
Policies and procedures - a centralized location to store all policies, procedures, and guidelines. These are important principles that set the tone and make sure everyone is on the same page.
Self-service workflows - empowering employees to perform tasks such as requesting time off or ordering business cards themselves.
You can tailor and provide content that the employees need and want. Ask the employees what type of information would make the intranet more relevant and meaningful for them. Having the appropriate content is a good first step. You can take your intranet from good to great by making the intranet’s attributes more effective.
Attributes Of A Great Intranet
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The intranet should have a straightforward and intuitive GUI (graphical user interface) and be easy for the employees to navigate and use. It should have a logical layout that allows employees to find the information and resources that they need easily and quickly. If not, many employees won’t take the time to figure it out.
Are there other ways you can cater the intranet to your employees? For example, do most of the employees work in the office? If not, and with the increasing use of mobile devices, make your intranet mobile-friendly. This means formatting the intranet for various mobile devices (e.g., smartphones and tablets) without compromising user experience or functionality.
And last, but definitely not least, the intranet should have strong security to protect sensitive data and ensure that only authorized employees have access to specific content. All employees should be authenticated and have some type of role-based access. For example, access to HR-related data should be strictly limited.
Benefits Of A Great Intranet
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A well-designed and well-implemented intranet can provide many benefits to employees. One of the biggest benefits is the ease of information stored in a centralized repository. It’s a one-stop shop making it easy for employees to access the information (single source of truth) they need conveniently and quickly.
Next, it’ll be easier to maintain and keep content current. This facilitates effective communication and collaboration within the entire organization. There are even specific tools such as blogs, chat features, and discussion forums that can be leveraged. If the organization has multiple locations, everyone receives the posted information at the same time.
When you have an intranet that provides relevant and current content that employees want, it will increase employee engagement, which will lead to better adoption. And when you provide features such as recognition programs or feedback mechanisms to give employees a true voice, they will really feel valued.
But if the employees aren’t engaged or actively using the intranet, then your intranet may need improvement. Instead of guessing what the problem might be, ask the employees! After all, you’ve made a sizeable investment (both in time and monies) to create and maintain the intranet.
Maybe a bunch of the content is outdated or irrelevant. Or the GUI is confusing, too complex, or not mobile-friendly. Besides soliciting employee feedback, you can regularly review performance and metrics such as clicks to help identify areas that need improvement.
Proactively take the time to make sure the intranet is effective and aligns with the employees’ needs. This can, in turn, can take your intranet from good to great, and lead to increased employee productivity, satisfaction, and overall organizational success.
For more information on making your intranet go from good to great, follow me on LinkedIn!
