Ever tried fitting a square peg into a round hole? That’s what designing mobile apps feels like without considering layouts for iOS apps. You want it to work on every device, but it doesn’t. Many others have encountered the same difficulty.

I’ve been there, too – grappling with app layouts that look perfect on one screen size but distort or shrink awkwardly on another. It can be frustrating and time-consuming!

In this article, you’ll uncover the key to a website design, forming adaptable designs that adjust easily across various gadgets and display sizes. We will explore how to set up your development environment correctly, design optimized layouts, implement responsive components effectively, and, more importantly – troubleshoot common issues you might face.

Building Responsive Layouts: The Step-by-Step Guide

TechAhead builds all web apps and mobile applications, including those with responsive layouts for iOS apps. Our process involves several key steps:

• Determining User Needs: We start by understanding what our clients want their users to achieve with the application.
• Crafting Wireframes: Next comes creating wireframes, which serve as blueprints for the final design.
• Selecting Suitable Elements: We choose appropriate elements, like buttons, text fields, etc., based on device specifications.
• Making Use Of AutoLayout: To ensure responsiveness, we use AutoLayout – a tool Apple provides that automatically adjusts interface elements based on changes in the screen size.
• Testing: We conduct rigorous testing to ensure the app’s layout performs well across different devices and orientations.

In this era of mobile-first design strategies, recognizing the importance of responsive layouts is essential. With a user-friendly interface that adapts seamlessly to various screens and orientations, your iOS app can deliver an enhanced user experience, leading to higher engagement rates.

Highlighting the Importance of Responsiveness

In this digital age, having a responsive layout for your iOS apps is no longer an option but a necessity. With the rapid increase in mobile usage, ensuring that your app delivers an optimal experience across all devices and sizes of the screen is paramount.

The Rise of Mobile Usage

A recent report by Statista revealed over 6 billion smartphone users worldwide. This number is projected to reach 7.33 billion this year. Furthermore, DataReportal’s Global Digital Overview shows people spend over 40% of their internet time on mobile devices.

User Expectations and Experience

Users today expect seamless navigation and interaction with applications regardless of their device. A study conducted by Google Think Insights found that if an app or website does not satisfy users’ expectations, they are likely to switch to another one immediately.

The Impact on Business Success

A well-designed and responsive website design layout can significantly impact business success factors such as customer satisfaction, conversion rates, and search engine rankings. According to research from Clutch Co, businesses with optimized mobile websites tripled their chances of increasing their customer base up to 5 times compared with those who don’t have one.

At TechAhead, we understand the importance of building responsive layouts for iOS apps. We specialize in developing web and mobile applications that are visually appealing and use the latest responsive design principles by providing a seamless user experience across all devices.

Ensuring a Smooth User Experience Across Multiple Devices

Creating an app that functions seamlessly across multiple devices is crucial in mobile application development. This is especially true for iOS mobile apps, where users expect high-quality performance and a smooth user experience regardless of screen size or model.

Understanding Responsive Layouts

The first step towards ensuring this seamless functionality lies in understanding responsive layouts. A responsive layout adjusts its design based on the screen size and orientation to provide optimal viewing and interaction for optimal user experience. It allows your iOS app to look great on everything from smaller iPhone SE screens to larger iPad Pro displays without additional coding.

A Step-by-Step Guide to Building Responsive Layouts for iOS Apps

To create a responsive layout for your iOS app, follow these steps:

• Determine Your Breakpoints: You’ll need to decide at what points your design will change based on different-sized screens.
• Create Flexible Grids: Your grids should be able to resize themselves depending on the viewport width.
• Use Auto Layout: This tool provided by Apple helps you define rules (constraints) about how views and UI elements relate to each other regarding positioning and sizing.
• Prioritize Content: Last but not least, ensure that critical content remains prominent no matter what device it’s viewed on.

TechAhead has extensive experience building all types of web apps and mobile applications, including those with responsive layouts. We understand the importance of providing a smooth, user-friendly experience across multiple devices and are committed to helping you achieve this goal.

1. Create Wireframes & Mockups

Once you understand your users’ needs, start creating wireframes or mockups of the application using tools like Sketch or Adobe XD. These visual hierarchy guides represent the skeletal framework of your app and serve as a blueprint for its design and functionality.

2. Select The Right UI Elements

Your choice of responsive UI elements can significantly impact how users perceive and use your app. For example, buttons should be large enough for easy tapping; text must be legible even on smaller devices and screens; images must scale well across different devices and font sizes without losing quality.

3. Leverage Auto Layout Constraints

Auto Layout constraints, offered by Apple’s development environment Xcode, allow developers to create flexible interfaces that respond appropriately regardless of screen size or orientation changes.

Remember: Building responsive layouts isn’t just about making things look good—it’s also about ensuring usability across all devices.

Setting Up the Development Environment

Creating a responsive layout for iOS apps starts with setting up your development environment. You need to get everything in place before you can start building, just like a chef prepares their kitchen before cooking.

To commence, download Xcode onto your Mac. Apple’s integrated development environment (IDE) lets you build and design apps for all devices. Here is the link to download Xcode.

1. Xcode Installation Steps

You’ll find this process similar to downloading any other software:

• Go to the Apple App Store on your Mac and search for ‘Xcode’, then click Get once it appears.
• Type ‘Xcode’ into the search bar and click Get once located.
• Wait as your computer downloads and installs Xcode automatically.

The installation may take some time because of its large size. So, while waiting, grab a coffee or do something productive.

2. Coding Languages: Swift & Objective-C

Once installed, familiarize yourself with Swift or Objective-C– these are programming languages used by TechAhead when designing app layouts. Swift, particularly, has gained popularity due to its simplicity and power over recent years.

3. Create Your First Project

To ensure everything works perfectly fine after setup, create an initial project in XCode, which will give you hands-on experience in actual coding practice. Click File > New > Project from the menu options within the XCode interface, then select the appropriate template based on needs.

In essence, creating a development environment for your iOS app is akin to building the foundation of a house. It would be best to have it solid so that everything you build on top will hold up. With Xcode installed, understanding Swift or Objective-C under your belt, and an initial project underway – you’re ready to dive into designing responsive layouts.

Designing the Layout

When it comes to iOS app development, creating a responsive layout is vital. It’s about more than just aesthetics; you’re shaping the user experience. At TechAhead, we’ve gained knowledge over the years on how significant this procedure is.

A well-designed layout can adapt to user feedback from your target audience on different devices and screen sizes without compromising functionality or appearance.

Determining Your Audience’s Preferred Devices

The first step is understanding your target audience and their preferred device types. To start designing a practical layout for your iOS application, it helps to know what devices your target audience prefers. You need data on which iPhones or iPads they use most frequently so that you can optimize accordingly.

The Apple Developer site offers valuable resources on device usage statistics and design guidelines for each model.

2. Selecting Appropriate Responsive Design Elements

Moving forward with these insights allows us to select appropriate design elements – buttons, images, text fields – based on the average screen size of our target audience’s preferred devices. This approach ensures consistency across various screens while enhancing usability.

We have found tools like Sketch and Adobe XD incredibly useful when selecting other elements, allowing designers to visualize their work in real-time on multiple screen layouts simultaneously (Adobe XD).

3. Ensuring Seamless User Experience Across Devices

• You’ll want a clear hierarchy of information: prioritizing critical functions by placing them at the top of your layout.
• Navigation should be intuitive and simple. Aim to reduce the number of taps needed to access key features.
• Always design with thumb-friendly zones in mind – these are areas easily reached while holding a device single-handedly.

These elements ensure your app works smoothly on different devices – key for keeping users engaged. For more insights, check out the studies by Nielsen Norman Group.

Implementing Responsive Components

Creating an iOS app that functions optimally across all gadgets is essential. One key element to this goal is the implementation of responsive components. What does it imply for an element to be ‘adaptable’?

A responsive component adapts its size and layout according to the screen size and orientation of the device. This flexibility gives your app an edge, ensuring a consistent user experience across different iPhone models.

Apple’s Human Interface Guidelines recommend prioritizing adaptability in design. The company provides Xcode’s Auto Layout toolset, which lets you create flexible UIs for multiple screens.

1. Making Use of Constraints

The core principle behind implementing responsiveness lies within constraints – rules defining how responsive elements relate to each other and their parent view.

To start, specify horizontal and vertical constraints for each interface object. This helps determine their position relative to others or edges of the super-view.

2. Leveraging Stack Views

You can further streamline your design process using stack views (UIStackView). They automatically manage layout based on set parameters like spacing, alignment, and distribution – making it easier than ever.

3. Tailoring Designs with Size Classes

Beyond just adjusting dimensions, achieving truly adaptive layouts often needs variations in design depending on the screen size or orientation.

This is where font size and classes come into play. These abstract measurements allow designers to categorize devices based on font sizes and display characteristics, helping them tweak designs accordingly.

For example, iPads are smaller devices usually assigned Regular and font sizes and size widths, while iPhones have Compact widths.

You can use size classes to alter the number of elements visible on the screen or change their arrangement based on device type. Remember, creating an app that feels right at home across all devices is more than just scaling; it’s about giving a tailored, user-friendly experience.

Testing Design Layouts

As we create our iOS app layouts, testing becomes a vital step. This ensures that your design works well across different devices and screen sizes.

To guarantee that users receive an ideal experience on their device, examining your design across all the elements and sizes of the screen is critical. This includes iPhones of all models and iPad variants.

Think about it this way: You wouldn’t buy a new pair of shoes without trying them on first because they might not fit right or be comfortable. It’s the same with designing for multiple screens; you have to make sure everything works perfectly.

1. Selecting Devices for Testing

You don’t need every Apple device under the sun, but try testing your responsive layout using representative models from small (iPhone SE), medium (iPhone 12 Pro) to large devices (iPad Pro). These should cover most user scenarios and catch any major issues.

2. Finding Issues Through Testing

Different problems can surface when you start testing your designs across varying devices – overlapping elements, font size too small, or big buttons are just some examples. Like how professional chefs taste their dishes before serving them up – designers must do similar tests with their mobile apps.

Xcode offers excellent debugging tools such as ‘View UI Hierarchies’, which lets us examine each layer within our user interface closely, helping us find where things may have gone wrong during implementation.

• ‘Slow Animations’: By slowing down animations, developers can better understand the transitions and interactions between elements.
• ‘Color Blended Layers’: This tool helps identify layers that are being overdrawn, which can affect performance. It colors these areas red to highlight potential issues.

Optimizing Performance

Your iOS app’s responsive layout must perform smoothly, irrespective of the device or the user-friendly-sized screen. The performance optimization journey begins with the efficient use of resources.

1. Effective Use of Resources

The key to optimized performance lies in using your resources effectively. It’s like running a finely tuned machine; each part should function most efficiently. This means understanding how different components interact and optimizing their interactions for speed and efficiency.

Avoid unnecessary computations by caching results where possible. Caching is akin to jotting down a recipe instead of trying to remember it every time you cook – it saves time and effort.

2. Image Optimization

Apple’s guidelines on image optimization suggest we must aim for the right balance between image quality and file size. Imagine stuffing a king-sized comforter into a small washing machine – not practical. Similarly, large images can slow down your app considerably.

You can reduce image sizes without compromising quality using various online tools like TinyPNG.

3. Coding Practices

Clean coding practices go far in improving an application’s performance, too. Code clutter slows down apps just like traffic congestion slows us down during rush hour commutes.

• Ruthlessly eliminate dead code (unused variables/functions).
• Leverage lazy loading techniques similar to ordering pizza when you start feeling hungry – get what you need precisely when you need it.
• Make sure to use synchronous and asynchronous calls judiciously. It’s like deciding whether to call a friend (synchronous) or send them a text (asynchronous).

4. Testing Performance

No optimization strategy is complete without testing its efficacy. Apple’s Instruments tool allows you to monitor your app’s real-time performance, helping identify bottlenecks.

Optimization improves an app’s speed and ensures its performance remains consistent despite changes. It also ensures the app stays speedy, even when adding new features, squashing bugs, or updating the latest iOS versions.

Troubleshooting Common Issues

Creating responsive layouts for iOS apps is not without its challenges. Sometimes, even the most meticulously designed layout can encounter issues when viewed on a different device or a different size screen.

You can confidently address any design challenges with the right tools and understanding. Let’s delve into some practical strategies that TechAhead employs to fix typical hiccups with your website designs.

1. Flickering UI Elements

If elements in your app flicker when transitioning between different states or views, it might indicate a synchronization issue between various layers of the app’s User Interface (UI). One way to solve this problem is using CAMetalLayer, which provides high-performance rendering capabilities and minimizes graphical glitches.

2. Inconsistent Layout Across Devices

Sometimes, an app may look perfect on one device but completely disarrayed on another. This usually stems from hard-coding dimensions instead of employing relative sizing techniques like Auto Layout. Apple’s official documentation about Auto Layout is an excellent resource if you need help understanding how to implement dynamic sizing methods effectively within your application.

3. Poor Performance On Older Devices

No matter how beautiful an app looks, users will abandon it faster than a sinking ship if it doesn’t perform well across all devices – especially older ones. Test your app on different hardware configurations to ensure smooth performance across multiple generations of iPhones and iPads. Tools like XCode can simulate older devices and help identify performance bottlenecks.

4. Misaligned Touch Targets

Another common issue is touch targets not aligning correctly with the screen size, making the app difficult or frustrating. Again, Auto Layout comes to the rescue by allowing you to define constraints for interactive elements relative to other views, ensuring a consistent and optimal user experience regardless of device size.

FAQs- Layouts for Ios Apps:

How do I get different app layouts on my iPhone?

You can use Apple’s native tools like SwiftUI or third-party apps to customize your iPhone layout.

Can you change the layout of apps on iPhone?

iOS 14 and above lets you alter your home screen using App Library and Widgets for a unique look.

How do I organize my iPhone apps aesthetically?

Group similar apps together to make your iPhone more visually appealing, leverage color coding, or apply themed icons with Shortcuts.

How to structure an iOS app?

Create a solid structure by planning the navigation flow first. Use the Model-View-Controller (MVC) pattern as a starting point, then refine it based on needs.

Contact TechAhead today for all your web and mobile app development.

Inner Image Credit: Provided by the Author; Thank you!

Featured Image Credit: Provided by the Author; Thank you!

The post Building Responsive Layouts for iOS Apps: A Step-by-Step Guide appeared first on ReadWrite.

Having a strong online presence has become almost essential for small businesses in the modern world.

As such, high-quality and attractive website designs are now more sought after than ever. From proposal websites to e-commerce shops, customers expect nothing less than professional web services that meet their individual requirements and preferences.

If you’re looking to launch your own website design business, there are specific steps you will need to take in order to promote growth and attract clients.

The focus of this outline is to provide an overview of the journey from starting up a single operation run by you as the sole proprietor right through to expanding the scope of your services in line with changing trends across industries on an international level.

Defining Your Niche and Target Audience

In order to create a successful website design business, it’s important to first define your niche and target audience. This involves taking a deep dive into the types of websites you want to specialize in (e.g., e-commerce sites, portfolio collections, blogs).

Conducting industry and market research is also an important step for gaining insight into what your target audience is looking for; this could include gathering data on their preferred style and functionality needs or tracking trends within the area of website design.

Once you have all the necessary information at hand, you can start shaping your services according to specific client requirements or marketing goals—positioning yourself not just as a designer but rather as an invaluable partner able to truly make an impact.

Developing a Solid Business Plan

Source

When optimizing for content targeted with certain keywords, it is essential to ensure the website provides value and caters specifically to its target audience. Quality is key when creating content in order for search engines to recognize and reward optimized pages.

Developing keyword-optimized content should be balanced with staying within the reader’s attention devices and addressing the search query from a neutral perspective (avoid forcing superfluous keywords).

Relevant articles offer readers insight into targeted topics without going off track which can help build credibility and trust in your brand.

Additionally, maintaining natural keyword density helps to periodically get popping throughout the article body without disrupting engagement or overstuffing the post leading to optimization failures & possible blacklist warnings from Google.

Building an Impressive Portfolio

Creating an impressive portfolio is one of the most important steps when starting a website design business. It shows clients who you are and what kind of work you do and gives them insight into how it would be to work with you.

Designing sample websites to showcase your skills will allow potential customers to see not only the finished product but also your development process. Furthermore, making sure that different projects demonstrate versatility in order to illustrate many types of services that can be achieved will draw even more attention from users.

Additionally, case studies should provide an accurate description of how problems were solved and give credit where it’s due by letting customers know there was teamwork involved, too, if needed.

Setting Up Your Online Presence

Source

Setting up your online presence is an important step when launching a website design enterprise. First, you need to register a memorable domain name for your business and design a sleek website that reflects your brand’s identity.

It should describe the services & scope of work being offered as well as provide links to showcase portfolios, case studies, testimonials & most importantly, contact information.

Social media platforms offer great opportunities for businesses to expand their reach and visibility online, and good quality content marketing increases traffic towards websites, setting them ahead in the competition.

You might even consider hiring a local SEO agency that would strategize effective SEO campaigns proven to deliver winning outcomes.

Crafting Effective Marketing Strategies

With an online presence being increasingly important for businesses, crafting effective marketing strategies is essential for a successful website design business.

Using social media platforms to showcase work and engage with potential customers, SEO techniques to increase visibility, networking within the industry, and collaborating with other services can help drive engagement and attract new clients.

Strategic advertising on platforms like Google Ads as well as other digital campaigns can draw in even larger numbers of leads while promotions including discounts or referral programs will further boost interest. Quality customer service married with persuasive yet personal messaging consistently delivered across channels will build brand loyalty over time.

But be aware: organic marketing takes years as doing so requires that you build more than just a website, but an actual brand.

Offering Exceptional Customer Service

Great customer service is key to a successful web design business. You should establish clear communication channels from the outset, and provide clients with realistic project timelines and expectations.

Put yourself in the client’s shoes—make sure they have an enjoyable experience working with you every step of the way. Where possible, go the extra mile by exceeding their expectations to gain positive reviews and referrals which can help build overall credibility for your business.

At the end of it all, take the time to gather feedback from both satisfied and dissatisfied customers about improvements that could be made. With exceptional customer service as well as creative skills, you can turn a website design enterprise into a thriving endeavor.

Scaling and Growing Your Business

Scaling and growing a website design business requires careful planning and execution. As your client base expands, you may need to hire additional designers or staff to support the increased workload. Focus on expanding your service offerings too – while retaining current clients and staying up to date with evolving market trends in the industry.

It’s also important to continue honing skills and embracing new technologies along the way. Make sure that every aspect of customer engagement is satisfactory so they keep using your services again in the future. With solid foundations laid, it’s much easier for you to build a flourishing enterprise over time.

Conclusion

Launching a successful website design business requires hard work, careful planning, and the willingness to continuously innovate.

By clearly defining your niche and target audience, creating a solid business plan, showcasing your portfolio with pride, establishing an online presence, formulating effective marketing strategies supported by great customer service, and gathering feedback for valuable insights into what can be done better—you are well on your way to building your flourishing web design enterprise that stands out in today’s markets.

With dedication and passion for this creative profession, you can harness technical know-how and skills and become very successful as a web designer.

The post How to Launch a Website Design Business appeared first on ReadWrite.

Cryptocurrency trading has gained immense popularity in recent years, with traders looking to capitalize on the volatile nature of digital assets. One crucial aspect of successful crypto trading is identifying potential entry and exit points. 

See also: Has Trading Cryptocurrencies Reaching an Tipping Point

By understanding when to enter a trade and when to exit it, traders can maximize their profits and minimize their losses. This article aims to provide a comprehensive guide on identifying these crucial points in crypto trading.

Understanding Entry Points

Entry points refer to the optimal moments to initiate a trade in a particular cryptocurrency. Several factors come into play when identifying entry points because of the ethereum code. This is an automated app that helps you understand all the hidden markets of cryptocurrencies and most safer for trading and collecting points. 

Technical analysis indicators, such as support and resistance levels, moving averages, and candlestick patterns, provide valuable insights into potential entry points. 

These indicators help traders gauge the strength and direction of price movements, enabling them to make informed decisions.

Technical Analysis Indicators for Entry Points

Support and resistance levels are key technical analysis tools that help identify entry points. Support levels represent price levels where demand is strong enough to prevent further price declines, while resistance levels indicate price levels where selling pressure increases.

Moving averages are another essential technical indicator for identifying entry points. Moving averages smooth out price data and provide a clearer picture of the underlying trend. Traders often use the crossover of different moving averages or the interaction between price and moving averages to determine entry points. 

For example, a golden cross, where a shorter-term moving average crosses above a longer-term moving average, is considered a bullish entry signal.

Fundamental Analysis for Entry Points

While technical analysis is valuable, fundamental analysis is equally important when identifying entry points. Staying informed about the latest news and project updates related to a cryptocurrency is crucial for making informed trading decisions. 

News can significantly impact the market, causing sudden price movements. Traders must evaluate the credibility and relevance of the information before considering it as a potential entry point.

Market Sentiment and Trend Analysis for Entry Points

Market sentiment plays a vital role in crypto trading. Traders often follow market trends and sentiment indicators to identify potential entry points. Identifying the prevailing trend, whether it’s an uptrend, downtrend, or sideways market, can help traders determine the appropriate entry strategy. 

Tools like trendlines, moving averages, and indicators like the Relative Strength Index (RSI) can assist in trend analysis.

Identifying Exit Points

Exit points refer to the opportune moments to close a trade and secure profits or minimize losses. When determining exit points, traders must consider risk management and set profit targets. 

Establishing realistic profit targets based on risk-reward ratios ensures traders maintain a disciplined approach to trading. Stop-loss and trailing stop orders are effective tools for managing exits, as they automatically trigger an exit when prices reach predefined levels.

Risks of misidentification or misunderstanding of potential entry and exit points 

Non-identifying or misunderstanding potential entry and exit points in crypto trading can expose traders to several risks. The ability to accurately determine when to enter or exit a trade is crucial for maximizing profits and minimizing losses. Here are some risks associated with not properly identifying or misunderstanding entry and exit points in crypto trading:

1. Missed opportunities: Failing to identify the right entry point can result in missed opportunities for profitable trades. Crypto markets are highly volatile, and prices can change rapidly. If traders enter a trade too late or at an unfavorable price, they may not fully capture the potential gains that could have been achieved with better timing.

1. Increased losses: On the other hand, misunderstanding exit points can lead to increased losses. If traders hold onto a losing position for too long, hoping for a reversal, they risk further price declines and potentially significant losses. Setting clear stop-loss orders and adhering to them is essential to limit potential losses and protect capital.

1. Emotional decision-making: Misunderstanding entry and exit points can lead to emotional decision-making, which is often driven by fear or greed. Emotional trading can result in impulsive actions, such as panic-selling during market downturns or FOMO (Fear of Missing Out) buying at the peak of a price rally. These actions are often detrimental to profitability and can lead to significant losses.

1. Lack of discipline: Properly identifying entry and exit points requires discipline and adherence to a trading strategy. Traders who lack discipline may be tempted to deviate from their predefined plan, leading to suboptimal decisions. Consistency and following a well-defined trading strategy can help mitigate the risks associated with emotional and undisciplined trading.

1. False signals and market noise: Crypto markets can be subject to significant price fluctuations, which can result in false signals and market noise. Traders who misunderstand potential entry and exit points may fall prey to these false signals, leading to poor trading decisions. It’s important to use multiple indicators and tools to confirm signals and avoid making trading decisions based on unreliable information.

1. Overtrading: Non-identifying or misunderstanding entry and exit points can also contribute to overtrading. Overtrading occurs when traders excessively buy and sell assets, often driven by impulsive decision-making. Frequent trading can lead to increased transaction costs, higher exposure to market volatility, and reduced overall profitability.

1. Lack of risk management: Traders who fail to identify suitable entry and exit points may also overlook risk management measures such as setting stop-loss orders, calculating position sizes based on risk tolerance, and implementing a diversified portfolio. This lack of risk management can expose traders to excessive losses and increased vulnerability to market fluctuations.

To mitigate these risks, it is important for crypto traders to develop a well-defined trading plan that includes clear entry and exit criteria, risk management strategies, and adherence to a disciplined approach. Implementing thorough research, technical analysis, and using reliable indicators can help improve the accuracy of identifying entry and exit points. 

Conclusion

Identifying potential entry and exit points is essential for successful crypto trading. Traders can identify entry points by utilizing technical analysis indicators, such as support and resistance levels, moving averages, and candlestick patterns. 

Fundamental analysis, including staying informed about news and project updates, and analyzing market sentiment and trends, further enhances the accuracy of entry and exit decisions. Implementing risk management strategies and setting profit targets are crucial for maintaining a disciplined approach to trading. 

With practice and refinement of entry and exit strategies, traders can increase their chances of success in the dynamic world of crypto trading.

The post Identifying Potential Entry And Exit Points In Crypto Trading appeared first on ReadWrite.

Cryptocurrency investments have gained significant popularity recently, attracting many investors seeking lucrative opportunities. However, with this increasing popularity comes inherent risks that must be effectively managed. 

This article will explore valuable tips to help investors mitigate risks and make informed decisions when venturing into crypto investments.

Conduct Thorough Research

To navigate the cryptocurrency market successfully, it is crucial to dedicate time and effort to comprehensive research. Begin by understanding different cryptocurrencies and their underlying technology. 

Investigate various cryptocurrencies’ market trends and historical performance, allowing you to assess their potential. It’s essential to do market research as cryptocurrencies are so popular, and for more profound research now, people can use the quantum ai app. 

Delve into the team behind a particular cryptocurrency project to evaluate their credibility and expertise. Consider regulatory frameworks and legal considerations that may impact your investments.

Diversify Your Portfolio

Diversification is a fundamental principle of investment risk management, and it applies equally to cryptocurrencies. By spreading your investments across different cryptocurrencies, you can mitigate the risk associated with individual assets. 

Diversifying within the crypto space involves including different types of crypto assets, such as coins, tokens, and stablecoins. This diversification strategy can help balance risk and potential returns, safeguarding your portfolio against significant losses.

Set Realistic Goals and Risk Tolerance

Before entering the crypto market, defining your investment objectives and time horizon is essential. Assess your personal risk tolerance and comfort level with volatility. Understanding these factors will help you align your investment strategy with your goals and risk appetite. 

Stay Informed and Updated

The cryptocurrency market is highly dynamic and influenced by various factors, including news and market developments. Stay informed by following reliable sources of information and analysis. Subscribe to newsletters, join online communities, and participate in forums to gain insights into the latest market trends and potential opportunities. 

Monitor regulatory changes, as they can significantly impact the cryptocurrency landscape.

Secure Your Investments

Ensuring the security of your crypto investments is paramount in the face of increasing cyber threats. Choose reputable and secure cryptocurrency exchanges to conduct your transactions. 

Implement strong security measures such as two-factor authentication and consider utilizing hardware wallets to store your digital assets offline. Be vigilant about phishing attempts and scams, and never disclose your private keys or sensitive information to unauthorized sources.

Use Stop Loss Orders and Take Profits

To protect your investments from sudden market downturns, consider setting up stop-loss orders. These orders automatically sell a cryptocurrency if it reaches a predetermined price, limiting potential losses. 

Similarly, take-profit orders can be utilized to secure profits by selling a cryptocurrency when it reaches a specific price target. Regularly review and adjust these orders based on market conditions to optimize your risk management strategy.

Avoid Emotional Decision-Making

The cryptocurrency market is notorious for its volatility, often leading to emotional highs and lows. It is crucial to be aware of the influence of emotions on investment decisions and develop a disciplined and rational approach to investing. Avoid making impulsive decisions based on short-term market fluctuations and focus on long-term trends and fundamental analysis.

Consider Long-Term Investing

While the allure of quick profits may be tempting, it is essential to recognize the volatile nature of the cryptocurrency market. Consider adopting a long-term investment strategy that focuses on fundamental analysis and the viability of the cryptocurrency project.

Seek Professional Advice if Needed

If you are unsure about navigating the complexities of cryptocurrency investments, it may be prudent to seek professional advice. Consult with financial advisors or experts in the field who deeply understand the crypto market. 

They can provide guidance tailored to your needs and help you make well-informed investment decisions. Alternatively, consider professional portfolio management services that specialize in cryptocurrency investments.

What are the fundamental risks in crypto investments: A must-know for beginners and experts

Engaging in cryptocurrency investments offers exciting opportunities, but it is equally crucial to understand and be aware of the fundamental risks associated with this volatile market. Both beginners and experts must recognize and assess these risks to make informed investment decisions. 

• Volatility and Market Fluctuations: One of the most prominent risks in crypto investments is the high volatility and rapid market fluctuations. Cryptocurrencies can experience significant price swings within short periods, making them susceptible to sudden market crashes. Beginners and experts alike must understand that substantial gains can be swiftly offset by substantial losses, requiring caution and careful risk management.

• Regulatory and Legal Uncertainty: Crypto investments are subject to an evolving regulatory landscape that varies across different jurisdictions. Governments and regulatory bodies worldwide are still defining their stance on cryptocurrencies, resulting in uncertainty and potential legal risks. Changes in regulations or the introduction of restrictive policies can impact the value and usability of cryptocurrencies. Both beginners and experts should stay updated with regulatory developments and ensure compliance to avoid legal complications.

• Cybersecurity and Hacking Risks: The decentralized nature of cryptocurrencies, while providing advantages, also exposes investors to cybersecurity risks. Hackers target exchanges, wallets, and other crypto-related platforms, aiming to steal digital assets. Beginners and experts must adopt robust security measures, such as using hardware wallets, two-factor authentication, and reputable platforms, to safeguard their investments. Neglecting cybersecurity practices can lead to devastating losses.

• Technology and Project Risks: Crypto investments often involve supporting specific blockchain projects or cryptocurrencies. However, not all projects are equally reliable or successful. Some projects may lack a solid foundation, competent teams, or disruptive technology, increasing the risk of failure or loss of investment. Beginners and experts must conduct thorough research, analyze project fundamentals, and evaluate the team’s credibility and technological advancements before committing funds to any project.

• Liquidity Risks: Liquidity risk refers to the ability to buy or sell cryptocurrencies quickly without significantly impacting their market price. Some lesser-known or illiquid cryptocurrencies may face challenges in finding buyers or sellers, leading to liquidity issues. Beginners and experts should be cautious when investing in low-cap or less popular cryptocurrencies, as exiting positions during market downturns can be difficult or result in substantial losses.

Conclusion

Managing risk in cryptocurrency investments is crucial for safeguarding your capital and maximizing returns. You can make informed investment decisions by conducting thorough research, diversifying your portfolio, setting realistic goals, and staying informed. 

Furthermore, prioritizing security, stopping loss and taking profit orders, and avoiding emotional decision-making will enhance your risk management strategy. Responsible and informed investing in the cryptocurrency market is key to long-term success and wealth accumulation.

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Every year, millions of employees across the United States complete job-related courses in compliance, soft skills, upselling, product training, and more. In the wake of the coronavirus pandemic, companies are reinvesting in training practices. This is especially prevalent among small businesses and large companies, who are investing on average 600 more dollars a year in training than midsized companies.

How Do You Properly Measure the Value of Corporate Learning in Your Business?

Measuring the return of investment, or ROI, of learning and development programs is incredibly important to making visible the impact of these programs. Revenue and profit are two classic indicators of a successful ROI.

Post-coronavirus, new metrics like employee confidence, increased sales, and employee engagement levels are feeling more indicative than pre-covid metrics such as training attendance, travel for learning and development, and webinar completion. One problem is that 92% of companies do not track learning and development ROI at all, which means that they are missing out on valuable information to the success of their company.

The basic formula for ROI is simple: learning and development benefit, minus the cost of learning and development, divided by the cost of learning and development multiplied by 100. Expenses of ROI include time (including corporate learning material development), effort (training time per employee) and money (including transportation, venue, catering, speakers, and equipment).

On average, having an in-person training session could end up costing upwards of $40,000. This number is also missing another major cost, which is the total a company may spend on an employee being trained. When basing on a salary of $15 an hour, a company could be spending over 1k based on 71 hours of training.

It may seem worth it for a company to outsource their training, but alternative and online models are not always as money saving as they would appear to be. These outsourced options still include costs for content libraries, course authoring tools, communication tools, third-party consultants, course marketing tools, and learning record stores.

While some of these options can be found from trusted sources such as LinkedIn and Mailchimp the investment may overall still be more than a company finds proportionally worth it.

Some are Worried About Outsourcing their Corporate Learning Programs Outside of the Organization

Unfortunately, when asked about their experiences many employees reported mixed outcomes. A quarter of employees surveyed said they forgot learning and development material immediately. 1% less said that the training wasn’t relevant to their position, and another 21% of employees said the material was out of date.

Out of the organizations surveyed, 35% of them felt they did not have access to the training content they would want for their employees. This cumulatively leads to major losses in learning and development– only 10% of money spent on traditional learning and development delivers real results. Ineffective training leads to a loss of $1.35 million per 1,000 employees.

Accurately measuring ROI is key to turning the major loss into new potential for the company. When tracking an increase in revenue, a direct correlation was found that for each $1 spend on L&D there was a $4.70 revenue increase. This correlation shows that the key to revenue increase is finding the best tool to use to measure your L&D ROI. Arist is a new company that describes itself as a “science-backed microlearning platform.” It is used by 15% of Fortune 500 companies.

Bringing it All Together

Arist attaches value to modern key performance indicators like confidence life and employee retention, which can be hard to quantify or consider in a traditional framework. Arist also costs less time, money, and energy.

Arist takes 195% less time than traditional modules, saves $96 annually per learner, and can alleviate 82% of the energy learning and development teams have to spend on course creation.

This boosts ROI and revenue along multiple avenues, and increases the adoption of learning by 90%. Arist is a very effective tool for companies attempting to clarify their ROI in learning and development. See more in the infographic below.

Published First on ValueWalk. Read Here.

Featured Image Credit: Pexels; Thank you!

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Understanding Original Equipment Manufacturers (OEMs)

Original Equipment Manufacturer (OEM) refers to a company that produces and supplies components, assemblies, or finished products to other companies, which then use these parts in the assembly or construction of their own products.

These OEM-produced components are typically designed and tailored according to the specifications provided by the client company. The term “OEM” may also imply that the final product carries the branding of the client company, not the manufacturer.

Key Takeaways

1. Original Equipment Manufacturers (OEMs) are companies that produce components, parts, or subsystems used in the final assembly of another company’s end product. They play a crucial role in the supply chain for various industries, such as automotive and electronics.
2. OEMs often offer cost-effective solutions for companies needing to source specific components for their products. By working directly with an OEM, the purchasing company can reap the benefits of economies of scale, specialized production capabilities, and reduced lead times for procurement.
3. Establishing a partnership with an OEM can lead to long-term collaborations, as both parties work together to improve product quality, streamline production processes, and drive technological innovation. This can result in increased efficiency, reduced costs, and an overall competitive advantage for the businesses involved.

Featured Partner for Equipment Parts Learn More on EquipmentShares's website Shop OEM and Aftermarket Parts  Sorted by Manufacturer Fast Shipping and Customer Service

Why are Original Equipment Manufacturers Important?

The term Original Equipment Manufacturer (OEM) holds significant importance in the equipment and construction industry as it refers to companies that produce and supply original parts and components for a product.

These OEM companies are crucial for maintaining quality, performance, and compliance standards within the industry.

By collaborating with OEMs, businesses can ensure seamless integration, optimum functionality, and adherence to specific design and safety specifications for their equipment or projects.

Additionally, relying on OEM parts and components guarantees that products meet warranty requirements, reduce potential liabilities, and maintain a higher resale value. In essence, OEMs play a vital role in sustaining the integrity, reliability, and long-term success of various equipment and construction projects.

Featured Partner for Equipment Parts Learn More on EquipmentShares's website Shop OEM and Aftermarket Parts  Sorted by Manufacturer Fast Shipping and Customer Service

How Original Equipment Manufacturers Work

Original Equipment Manufacturers, commonly referred to as OEMs, serve a crucial role in various industries, including automotive, electronics, and construction equipment. Their primary purpose is to design, manufacture, and supply components, assemblies, or systems that are included within a finished product or system sold by other companies, known as value-added resellers or VARs.

As specialists, OEMs contribute to the performance, durability, and overall quality of the end products that people use on a daily basis. For instance, an OEM may provide essential components like engines, transmissions, or braking systems for automakers, exerting a significant influence on the reliability and efficiency of the vehicles they produce.

Collaboration with OEMs enables value-added resellers to focus on their core competencies, such as marketing, distribution, and after-sales support, while leveraging the expertise of OEMs in research, development, and manufacturing specific components. The partnership between OEMs and VARs drives the production of higher quality products and fosters continuous innovation in the market.

Additionally, OEM components are often sought after in the aftermarket for repairs and maintenance, as their use ensures that the replacement parts are as close to the original components as possible, maintaining the product’s performance standards. This interconnected relationship between OEMs and VARs demonstrates the critical purpose of original equipment manufacturers in today’s dynamic marketplace.

Featured Partner for Equipment Parts Learn More on EquipmentShares's website Shop OEM and Aftermarket Parts  Sorted by Manufacturer Fast Shipping and Customer Service

OEMs Versus ODMs

OEMs and ODMs are two distinct types of companies that play different roles in the manufacturing and supply chain process. Here are the key differences between them:

Product Development

OEMs are involved in the entire product development lifecycle. They conceive the idea, conduct market research, design the product, and manage the engineering and manufacturing processes. OEMs focus on creating unique products that differentiate them from their competitors.

On the other hand, ODMs are primarily focused on the manufacturing aspect of the product development cycle. They collaborate with OEMs to convert their specifications and requirements into a finished product. ODMs have expertise in manufacturing processes, cost optimization, and scalability.

See also: Have You Heard of These 6 Amazing Ways to Use AI In Construction

Branding and Marketing:

OEMs build and market products under their own brand names. They invest in marketing strategies, brand recognition, and customer loyalty. OEMs often have a direct relationship with customers and handle sales, distribution, and after-sales support.

Contrarily, ODMs do not market products under their own brand. Their role is to produce goods based on the specifications provided by the OEMs. ODMs typically remain anonymous to end-users and rely on the OEMs to handle branding, marketing, and customer support.

Intellectual Property (IP) Ownership:

As the creators and designers of the products, OEMs retain the intellectual property rights associated with their products. They have control over the design, patents, trademarks, and other IP elements related to their branded products.

Instead, ODMs operate based on the specifications provided by the OEMs. The intellectual property rights associated with the products generally belong to the OEMs, unless there are specific agreements stating otherwise.

Supply Chain Relationships:

OEMs usually have a network of suppliers and contractors to source components and parts required for their products. They manage the overall supply chain and coordinate with various vendors and manufacturers.

ODMs, on the other hand, often have established relationships with manufacturers and suppliers. They leverage these connections to procure raw materials and components necessary for the production process. ODMs focus on efficient production and assembly operations.

Featured Partner for Equipment Parts Learn More on EquipmentShares's website Shop OEM and Aftermarket Parts  Sorted by Manufacturer Fast Shipping and Customer Service

OEMS Versus Aftermarket Parts

OEMs (Original Equipment Manufacturers) and aftermarket parts refer to different types of products in the context of automotive and other industries. Here are the key differences between them:

Quality and Standards:

OEM parts are known for their high quality and reliability because they are manufactured according to the same standards as the original parts. They are designed to meet the specific requirements of the vehicle, ensuring optimal performance, fit, and safety.

The quality of aftermarket parts can vary significantly. While some aftermarket parts may meet or exceed OEM standards, others may be of lower quality. It’s important to research and choose reputable aftermarket brands to ensure the quality and compatibility of the parts.

Availability:

OEM parts are typically available through authorized dealerships or authorized parts distributors. They may also be available through online platforms or directly from the OEM. However, OEM parts are generally more expensive compared to aftermarket parts.

Aftermarket parts are widely available through various channels, including independent auto parts stores, online retailers, and local repair shops. The aftermarket industry offers a broad range of options, allowing consumers to choose from different brands, qualities, and price points.

Price:

OEM parts tend to be more expensive compared to aftermarket parts. This is partly due to the higher quality and the fact that they are produced by the original vehicle manufacturer. Additionally, OEM parts often come with warranties that can contribute to the higher cost.

Aftermarket parts are generally more affordable than OEM parts. The competitive nature of the aftermarket industry can lead to a wide range of pricing options, allowing consumers to choose parts that fit their budget.

Warranty:

OEM parts often come with a warranty provided by the vehicle manufacturer. These warranties usually cover defects in materials or workmanship and may vary in duration depending on the part. Using OEM parts during repairs or replacements may help maintain the original vehicle warranty.

Warranty coverage for aftermarket parts varies depending on the manufacturer and retailer. Some aftermarket brands offer warranties that are comparable to OEM warranties, while others may provide limited or no warranty coverage. It’s important to review the warranty terms and conditions before purchasing aftermarket parts.

Featured Partner for Equipment Parts Learn More on EquipmentShares's website Shop OEM and Aftermarket Parts  Sorted by Manufacturer Fast Shipping and Customer Service

Examples of OEMs

Takeuchi

Takeuchi is a Japanese company that specializes in the manufacturing of construction machinery, primarily compact excavators, compact track loaders, and compact wheel loaders. As an OEM, Takeuchi manufactures these construction machines and sells them to other companies or equipment dealers who then brand and market them under their own names.

Volvo

Volvo, a renowned name in the automobile sector, also has a construction equipment division called Volvo Construction Equipment. They manufacture road construction and maintenance equipment, as well as machinery used in construction, mining, and infrastructure projects. Their product range includes wheel loaders, excavators, articulated haulers, and compact equipment like skid steer loaders and compact excavators.

John Deere

Known primarily for its agricultural machinery, John Deere is also an Original Equipment Manufacturer in the construction equipment industry. They produce a wide range of equipment, such as backhoes, loaders, excavators, and motor graders, which are used in various sectors, including construction, agriculture, forestry, and landscaping. Their equipment is designed to provide high performance, durability, and ease of operation, catering to the needs of construction projects across the globe.

Featured Partner for Equipment Parts Learn More on EquipmentShares's website Shop OEM and Aftermarket Parts  Sorted by Manufacturer Fast Shipping and Customer Service

Frequently Asked Questions(FAQ)

Q1: What does Original Equipment Manufacturer (OEM) mean?

A1: Original Equipment Manufacturer, commonly known as OEM, refers to a company that produces parts, components, or complete equipment that are used as essential components in the construction or assembly of another company’s final product.

Q2: What is the difference between OEM and aftermarket parts?

A2: OEM parts are produced by the original manufacturer of the equipment or vehicle and are typically designed to meet precise specifications. Aftermarket parts, on the other hand, are made by third-party manufacturers and may vary in quality, fit, and design.

Q3: Why choose OEM parts over aftermarket parts?

A: OEM parts tend to have a higher quality, as they are produced by the original manufacturer. They usually come with a warranty, ensure a perfect fit, and maintain the integrity of the equipment or vehicle. While aftermarket parts can be less expensive, they might not offer the same quality, reliability, or compatibility as OEM parts.

Q4: Are OEM parts more expensive than aftermarket parts?

A: Generally, OEM parts are more expensive than aftermarket parts due to their guaranteed quality, fit, and performance. However, the cost difference can vary depending on the specific part and brand.

Q5: Where can I purchase OEM parts for my equipment?

A: The most reliable source for purchasing OEM parts is through the equipment manufacturer or through an authorized dealer. This ensures you receive genuine parts with the expected quality and performance. Our partner EquipmentShare has a reliable online marketplace for getting the OEM parts you need to keep your equipment running.

Q6: Do OEM parts come with a warranty?

A: Most OEM parts come with a warranty provided by the manufacturer, which guarantees the part’s quality and performance for a certain period or specific conditions. The warranty’s length and coverage may vary depending on the manufacturer and the specific part.

Q7: How can I identify if a part is OEM or aftermarket?

A: OEM parts usually have the manufacturer’s logo or identification markings on the product’s packaging or the part itself. To ensure a part is genuine, purchase it from a reputable source, such as the original equipment manufacturer or an authorized dealer.

Q8: Can using aftermarket parts void my equipment’s warranty?

A: Using aftermarket parts can potentially void your equipment’s warranty, depending on the manufacturer’s warranty terms and conditions. It’s essential to review your equipment’s warranty information and consult with the manufacturer or an authorized dealer if unsure. This is almost always true. Typically, if an OEM part is not available, you may get special permission from a manufacturer to use an aftermarket part.

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Growing attention has been paid in recent years to the need for sustainable and novel approaches to agriculture’s age-old problems. Hydro-tech farms are one approach that is gaining popularity as a means to this problem. These farms use state-of-the-art hydroponic systems and cutting-edge technology to grow their produce in a sustainable and effective manner. This article will go into hydro-tech farming, discussing its history, current state, and potential future applications and effects on the agricultural industry.

One way to cultivate plants without using soil is through hydro-tech farming, often known as hydroponics. In hydroponics, plants are grown in a water solution that is rich in nutrients. This gives the plants easy access to the minerals and elements they need to thrive. Tilling, a common farming activity that can cause soil erosion and nutrient loss, is unnecessary with this method. Hydroponic farms are able to increase crop yields while decreasing water and pesticide usage by providing plants with a controlled atmosphere and optimal conditions.

Hydro-tech farms are built to make the most efficient use of water and other resources. By cultivating plants in a greenhouse, growers are able to provide optimal conditions for plant growth by managing environmental variables such as temperature, humidity, and light intensity. Water is conserved with this precision farming method by being reused inside the system. In addition to being better for the environment, hydroponic systems use significantly less fertilizer and pesticide than conventional farms.

The capacity to grow crops throughout the year is a major benefit of hydro-tech farming. Seasonal shifts and inclement weather are common constraints on conventional farming. In contrast, hydroponic systems offer a climate-controlled setting in which crops can be grown in any season. This guarantees a year-round supply of fresh vegetables while decreasing the need for imports and the associated transportation costs.

When faced with the problem of scarce farmland, hydro-tech farming provides a novel answer. Hydroponic systems make efficient use of space by employing vertical farming methods. The vertical arrangement of plants makes it possible to grow several different types of food in the same space. This type of vertical integration not only improves crop yields but also decreases the amount of land required. This allows for the establishment of hydro-tech farms in urban areas, which brings agriculture closer to consumers and lessens the environmental impact of food delivery.

The widespread adoption of hydrotech farming has fundamentally altered the agricultural and food production systems. Hydroponics is having a profound effect in several fields, so let’s look at a few of them.

Urban farming has been made possible by the proliferation of hydrotech farms. As the world’s population and rate of urbanization rise, so does the demand for environmentally responsible methods of urban food production. Hydroponic systems are a great option since they can be set up in confined areas and under strict environmental control. Fresh, locally grown produce can be made available to city dwellers through the use of urban hydroponic farms, which can be incorporated into buildings, rooftops, or even converted industrial locations.

Growing plants in indoor facilities where environmental conditions are carefully monitored and regulated is known as controlled environment agriculture (CEA). Hydroponics is essential in CEA because it allows farmers to control the environmental factors that affect plant growth. In areas with harsh weather or scarce farmland, this technology can make a huge difference. Hydro-tech farms can guarantee constant crop yields and limit the chance of crop failures due to external influences by providing a controlled environment.

The term “vertical farming” describes a method of farming in which crops are stacked or layered vertically, typically in urban settings. Vertical farming relies heavily on hydroponics, a technology that allows plants to thrive without soil. Hydro-tech farms are an economical and space-saving solution because they maximize crop yields per square meter by making vertical use of available space. Farming can be brought closer to urban populations and the carbon footprint associated with food transportation can be reduced by incorporating vertical farms into high-rise buildings, refurbished warehouses, or purpose-built structures.

In comparison to conventional agricultural methods, hydroponics are more environmentally friendly and productive. Hydroponic systems use technology and innovation to allow for year-round food production, decreased resource use, and optimal use of available space. Hydro-tech farms have the potential to play an important role in the future of food security, environmental protection, and agricultural sustainability. A more robust and long-lasting food system is possible with the help of this technical development.

First reported on CBS News 

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The best, most effective teams collaborate well and work together to accomplish goals. But team collaboration today is very different than it was before the pandemic. With some teams now entirely remote and others hybrid, fostering collaboration in your workplace has become more challenging but also more essential.

Fortunately, as workplaces evolve, technology also evolves to keep pace. The result is a wide array of collaboration tools that can help keep your business running smoothly and efficiently.

Featured Partner for Workplace Productivity Learn More on Monday's website Free Version: FREE FOREVER Starting Price: $8 / monthly Integrations: Outlook, Teams, Slack, Zoom, Excel, Zapier, LinkedIn...

Top Collaboration Tools for Your Team in 2023

If you want to support team collaboration in 2023, these tools should be at the top of your list. They can help with everything from communication to meetings to staying organized and more.

For Communication: Slack

Slack functions as a digital headquarters for your team, and it can foster team communication.  Slack operates through channels. You can create channels for your projects, topics, and teams. These channels help keep all of your communication organized, and they give your whole team the ability to see important information and work in sync.

Since everything is organized by channel, you can quickly bring a new team member up to date. Conversations and files become searchable archives, so you can quickly access the information you need without having to ask others to resend a file.

Your whole team will enjoy several other flexible communication options with Slack. Huddles promote connection and communication, and you can access audio or video calls in a single click, whether you need to reach out with a quick question or have a more in-depth conversation.

With Slack clips, you can create short videos, audio, or screen recordings to swap information. Transcripts of those clips are archived and can be searched, too, so team members can always retrieve those updates.

Slack offers four subscription plans, including a free plan and a Business+ plan for $12.50 per user, per month.

For Video Recordings: Loom

Loom is one of the best collaboration tools to improve your meetings. We all know that they sometimes seem to drag on and interrupt workflow. With Loom, you can record videos and bypass time-consuming meetings entirely. Loom lets you record your screen, and thanks to its desktop and mobile apps, it will work on any device.

Once you’ve recorded a video, you can share it with a link, so recipients don’t have to log in to watch it. Your team members can react to the video with time-stamped comments and emoji reactions to keep the conversation going.

Loom’s Starter plan is available for free and supports videos up to five minutes long. Upgrade to Loom’s Business plan for $8 per creator per month for unlimited videos and unlimited length. Loom also offers an Enterprise option.

For Shared Workspaces: Jotform Teams

With Jotform Teams, you can create shared workspaces for your teams. No matter where your team members are based, they can collaborate on online forms, tables, apps, and more. Functioning as an all-in-one workspace, Jotform Teams allows you to keep all of your data in a single location, so team members have access to the latest information.

Within Jotform Teams, you can use Jotform Tables to organize and manage data and stay on top of project progress and deadlines. You can also assign team members different roles, which gives them different levels of access. Jotform Teams even allows you to monitor activity logs and recent changes made to forms.

Jotform offers five subscription plans, and Jotform Teams is part of the Enterprise plan.

For Project Management: Asana

Asana helps keep your whole company and all of its teams connected in a shared space. The platform offers multiple view options, including list, timeline, and board views. Changing the views gives you a broad look at the overarching project progress, or you can opt for a much more nuanced, detailed view of each element of a project.

With Asana as one of your collaboration tools, you can assign team members tasks and deadlines. You can also easily break down a project into smaller components. Team members can communicate through cards and upload documents directly to cards to save time. The platform’s automation capabilities include project templates and automated work requests. Asana also offers the ability to create custom rules to automate tasks like assigning work and setting due dates.

Asana offers three subscription plans, including a free Basic plan, a Premium plan for $10.99 per user per month, and a Business plan for $24.99 per user, per month.

Featured Partner for Workplace Productivity Learn More on Monday's website Free Version: FREE FOREVER Starting Price: $8 / monthly Integrations: Outlook, Teams, Slack, Zoom, Excel, Zapier, LinkedIn...

For Meetings: Zoom

Zoom has emerged as one of the go-to collaboration tools for meetings. Known for its quality webinars and virtual meetings, Zoom is a robust platform that supports workplace collaboration in many ways.

This platform is an ideal choice for teams that include remote members. Zoom’s online whiteboard allows your team to expand on and clarify ideas, even when team members are in different locations.

Zoom Rooms are virtual conference rooms that support collaboration. These rooms allow both in-person and remote team members to collaborate in real-time, creating a valuable experience for your entire team. Zoom Rooms help foster a sense of connectivity among your team members, even if you can’t be physically present in the same space.

The platform offers a broad selection of plans. That includes specific options for products like Zoom One, Zoom Whiteboard, and Zoom Rooms. Zoom One plans include the free Basic plan, the Pro plan at $149.90 per user, per year, and the Business plan at $199.90 per user, per year.

Choosing the Right Collaboration Tools for Your Team

Whether you need a better way to stay organized, want to facilitate online project collaboration, or need to improve your video chat capabilities, these collaboration tools can help. As you explore the different tools, consider not only what your current needs are — but what your collaboration needs will be as your business grows. To get the best value, choose a tool that can grow with your business and provide the support it needs to expand and evolve.

Featured Image Credit: Provided by the Author; Pexels; Thank you!

Related Post: Best Productivity Tools of 2023

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This post appears courtesy of the Ferenstein Wire, a syndicated news service. Publishing partners may edit posts. For inquiries, please email author and publisher Gregory Ferenstein.

Legislation around drone use is of paramount importance for their hardware and software developers, as well as businesses hoping to make use of them for deliveries, security surveillance and other purposes (see our review of the best drones). Laws governing their use not determine the scope of their use, and can even shape public perception of these compact flying machines.

What will the public think now that drones in the U.S. are now legally permitted to fly equipped with non-lethal weapons aboard? The change comes courtesy of a recently amended bill in North Dakota.

See also: Why Drone Regulations Are Taking Forever

The law’s author, Representative Rick Becker, originally wanted to require police to secure a warrant for drone surveillance. But then local law enforcement managed to sneak in the right to equip drones with tasers or rubber bullets by amending the original prohibition against lethal and non-lethal force to just limiting lethal weapons.

Weaponizing Drones: This Is No Game

When I contacted Becker, he showed concern over the revised bill. He’s worried, in particular, that it will have dramatic unintended consequences.

“I think it’s important to maintain the humanity in making decisions to deploy weapons against another individual,” he told me. “We can’t depersonalize it and make it like a video game.”

See also: Forget Pizza: In The Future, Drones May Deliver You

It’s easy to see where the concern comes from. Drones tend to be navigated by handheld units that often mimic game controllers. With weapons on board, the whole premise also puts the attacker further removed from the target, as well as the injury he or she will inflict.

Becker says he “has no knowledge” that police are equipping drones with tasers to hunt down criminals, and he trusts that local law enforcement knew what it was doing when it amended the law. But he suspects it could be an issue in the near future. “Clearly it was important to them to add that provision,” he said.

Drones have faced varying regulations around the country. Back in 2013, Virginia passed a temporary moratorium on state use of drones, so officials could probably assess the safety and ethics before releasing them into the wild.

Droning On

The matter in North Dakota shows how the nuances of local politics could influence the future of drone laws. But do these politicians and lawmakers fully grasp what’s at stake when they create or vote on legislation?

Becker is only a part-time representative. In his day job, he’s a plastic surgeon. When I called him, his phone rang at a medical office. At the time, he seemed unaware that that story had even reached the national spotlight.

It has, in part, thanks to the efforts of tech companies like Amazon, Google and Facebook, all of which have much-hyped drone initiatives.

See also: How Amazon’s Drone Superhighway Would Work

Amazon has been aggressively lobbying all levels of government to ease restrictions, so it can unleash a fleet of drone delivery vehicles. (Because who doesn’t want tacos to rain down from the skies?)

Becker’s scenario is not uncommon. North Dakota has a part-time state legislature that convenes on odd-numbered years. “A legislature that only meets half time can only do half as much damage as one that meets full time,” he said. North Dakota will meet again to reconsider drone laws in 2017.

Technologies, particularly emerging ones, often collide with politics, as our elected and appointed officials try to make sense of new devices, services and software. Many find themselves struggling to define rules for public safety without hampering the spirit of innovation that led to those innovations. It’s a tough balance, and drone use in particular is going through its fair share of scrutiny.

A consequence of these proceedings is the public’s impression of the technology, which already carried a fair amount of suspicion in light of privacy concerns. What happens now, with their weaponization being sanctioned, remains to be seen.

What’s certain, and perhaps most important for entrepreneurs pursuing drone technology, is that adoption will likely go through many more assessments and challenges before it becomes mainstream.

For more stories like this, subscribe to the Ferenstein Wire newsletter here.

Photos by Adriana Lee for ReadWrite

The post Weaponized Drones Are Now Legal In The U.S. appeared first on ReadWrite.

Guest author Bill O’Connor serves as co-chair of Morrison & Foerster LLP’s UAS/Drones Group. 

On CBS news program “60 Minutes,” Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos very publicly declared his intentions to use unmanned aerial systems (UASs) to make deliveries. Leaders at GoPro are eager to use drones to help customers capture previously impossible angles. And businesses like Airware are breaking new ground with software to make drones useful for sectors ranging from mining to humanitarian work.

These aren’t the only businesspeople taking notice of drones (see our review of the best drones). At the end of 2014, the Federal Aviation Administration granted just 12 business entities permission for commercial drone use. Fast-forward to today, and the FAA has issued UAS approvals for more than 1,700 commercial organizations.

See also: New Mandatory Drone Registration: The Worst-Case Scenarios

Currently, however, using UAS commercially comes with some hefty baggage: predominately, immature and rudimentary regulations that are still being formulated. Indeed, the bottom line for business leaders is that the FAA has yet to issue final regulations for commercial drone use.

Gaining Authorization For Commercial Use In The U.S.

Until the FAA introduces formal regulations—likely in 2016 or early 2017—only two ways exist for obtaining legal authorization in the U.S. for commercial UAS operation.

First, business leaders may apply for permission to use drones commercially through an exemption process set forth in Section 333 of the FAA Modernization and Reform Act of 2012. This exemption process is the main avenue through which the FAA grants companies approval to fly UASs for commercial purposes.

These Section 333 exemptions come with strict parameters, including height, speed, and flight-time restrictions. Although initial exemptions took six months or more to process, a streamlined process means approvals now take about 90 days. Notably, these exemptions are currently only available for small UAS (under 55 pounds) with extremely low risk profiles.

Businesses may gain approval to fly UASs commercially by obtaining an FAA Special Airworthiness Certificate. This more onerous process is akin to the approval process for manned aircrafts. Businesses that take this route might someday reap rewards by obtaining a less restrictive approval than those that do so through the Section 333 exemption process.

Upcoming Regulationson Commercial Drones

While the FAA closed the formal comment period in late April that encouraged stakeholders to comment on proposed commercial regulations, businesspeople are keeping their eyes peeled for finalized FAA rules. Because the proposed regulations are incremental in nature, business leaders are pressing the FAA to undertake more comprehensive rulemaking.

Nonetheless, the proposed regulations in the notice of proposed rule-making strongly indicate what the interim regulatory framework might look like. Some of the proposals include:

• The UAS must always be within a licensed operator’s line of sight.
• The UAS operator must possess an FAA Airmen Certification.
• The operator must refrain from careless or reckless operation of the UAS.
• UAS may only be operated during daylight hours (official sunrise to official sunset, local time).
• Airspeed cannot exceed 100 mph.
• The UAS must be operated below an altitude of 500 feet.
• UAS operators are restricted to operating a single drone at a time.
• Operators must submit their drone for FAA inspection upon request.

It’s clear these rules will — at least for the short term — significantly restrict commercial UAS use. For instance, they would forbid Amazon’s proposed delivery drones fleet which, when traveling longer distances, would not be able to remain within operators’ lines of sight at all times.

Right or wrong, some business leaders have accused the FAA of stymying innovation. But the FAA’s primary mandate is to keep the skies safe. As such, the FAA is working with industry partners and NASA to safely integrate UAS by creating an Unmanned Traffic Management (UTM) system. And requiring UAS pilots to be trained and certified ensures they understand where commercial air traffic may operate, the effects of weather conditions, and how to prevent accidents.

What Your Company Should Be Doing

If companies like Amazon succeed in pushing for more flexible regulations, drones might be the next big innovation for your industry. Be proactive about voicing your thoughts about how drones should be regulated. Get involved in organizations like the Association for Unmanned Vehicle Systems International (AUVSI). Look for opportunities to partner with government agencies like NASA and the FAA.

Plenty of regional and international regulatory bodies are also working to formulate commercial UAS rules. The International Civil Aviation Organization, in conjunction with various working groups, is working to develop Standards and Recommended Practices (SARPs) for UAS that likely will form the basis for comprehensive, global regulation. The European Aviation Safety Agency recently issued a proposal that takes a risk-based approach to drone regulation. The results of these international efforts will undoubtedly affect U.S. regulation of UAS.

To participate in the discussion, identify specific regulations you’d like to see tightened or eased. How would you use the technology, and how might certification procedures impact your operations? How would you limit risks and address any losses that might occur as a result of UAS operations? How would you demonstrate a level of safety equal or greater than that of manned aircrafts?

The most pressing barriers to widespread UAS use—and the ones business leaders can contribute most toward solving—involve the infrastructure needed for drones, as well as the development of safe and reliable detect-and-avoid technology. Chiefly, we need a low-altitude highway where UAS could operate beyond line of sight—autonomously and safely. To navigate such a highway, drones would need the ability to “see” other drones, other manned aircrafts, and any obstacles along the ground. Until this kind of infrastructure is developed, beyond-line-of-sight commercial drone operations will likely remain restricted.

Don’t be passive about how the rules for business drones are developed. Be involved if you want to be heard—it’s a discussion that’s happening quickly, and it will likely have a huge effect on a wide variety of business in the years to come.

Lead photo by Don Mills 

The post How To Get Drones Off Of The Ground: Be An Active Player appeared first on ReadWrite.

This post appears courtesy of the Ferenstein Wire, a syndicated news service. Publishing partners may edit posts. For inquiries, please email author and publisher Gregory Ferenstein.  

Many commercial drones (see our review of the best drones), including those purchased over the holidays, must now be registered. According to the Federal Aviation Administration, starting February 19, all drones weighing between 0.55 to 50 pounds must be registered with their owners’ names and addresses in a national database. Violators can face civil penalties of up to $27,500 and three years in jail.

Though people won’t be able to look up users by name, they will be able to identify names and addresses from the drone’s ID. The New York Times reports that disclosures are “meant to nudge users to be more responsible.”

“Unmanned aircraft enthusiasts are aviators, and with that title comes a great deal of responsibility,” said Secretary of the Transportation Department Anthony Foxx.

A Helping Hand For Investigations

These new regulations are a response to a rash of public incidences with drones, such as crashes at sporting events or those flying dangerously close to commercial airliners. Previously, it was difficult to identify the operator of a recovered drone when it endangered the public. This new database will make investigations much easier (even those conducted by neighbors).

Earlier this year when regulations were first announced, industry insiders expressed skepticism around a database.

“A national registry has serious implications for privacy,” said Vice President of the Information Technology & Innovation Foundation Daniel Castro. “Journalists may want to use drone photography to investigate government or industry corruption, or citizen journalists may want to use drones as part of a protest. Rules should be written so that some legitimate anonymous actions are still protected where possible.”

According to a FAA press release, the registration “does not yet support registration of small UAS [unmanned aircraft systems] used for any purpose other than hobby or recreation—for example, using an unmanned aircraft in connection with a business.” Other exemptions or regulations are in the works. But, for now, if you’re selling, buying, or getting a toy drone for the holidays, be sure to be aware of the new rules.

Read more about the rules here.

*For more stories like this, subscribe to the Ferenstein Wire newsletter here. 

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In today’s fast-paced business environment, where having the right product is critical to success, Chief Product Officers (CPOs) have become increasingly essential. They play a crucial role in driving revenue growth and ensuring that a company’s product strategy is aligned with its overall business objectives. But how does that translate into revenue acceleration? In this blog post, we’ll explore who a CPO is and why they have become in such high demand, what to focus on to drive revenue, and how to take your organization to the next level and accelerate revenue growth like a CPO.

What is a Chief Product Officer?

Before we can talk about how CPOs drive revenue acceleration, let’s paint a picture of what a CPO is.

CPO, short for Chief Product Officer, is a senior executive in a company responsible for managing and developing the company’s product strategy and roadmap.

The CPO’s main responsibility is to oversee the entire product development process, from ideation and design to launch and post-launch maintenance. They work closely with other stakeholders, including engineering, marketing, and sales, customer success, and finance teams, to ensure that the product roadmap aligns with the company’s overall business goals.

Why Chief Product Officers are essential to driving revenue acceleration

As we mentioned, CPOs are responsible for developing and executing a company’s product strategy. This makes them crucial for revenue acceleration because they are the ones defining the product vision, prioritizing features, and ensuring that the product delivers value to customers. But beyond the roles and responsibilities, there are two overarching key areas that CPOs focus on to help drive revenue growth. These areas are achieving alignment and autonomy, and building company-wide visibility.

Enable Strategic Alignment and Team Autonomy

Why is this so crucial to driving revenue? To put it simply, a row boat cannot maximize its speed if one of the rowers is pushing their oar in even a slightly different direction. It’s the same with your company. If not everyone in the company is aligned on what to do, how can they push towards those goals effectively? Furthermore, if they aren’t given the freedom to push towards these goals, the metaphorical rowboat will remain stagnant.

That’s why a key part of a Chief Product Officer’s role is to create a strategy that ensures everyone on the product team understands the company’s overall business outcomes and OKRs and moreover, how their work contributes to those goals.

At the same time, they need to provide the team members with the autonomy to make decisions and take ownership of their work. As the people on the ground, they are most suited for day-to-day decisions so long as they have the context. Additionally, when teams are given autonomy, they are more likely to come up with creative solutions to problems which lead to innovation and growth. That brings us to visibility.

Enable Context and Visibility for Effective Company-wide Decisions

To truly provide alignment and autonomy, everybody needs clarity and visibility. Chief Product Officers need to establish a process that establishes clear goals, metrics, and reporting. This gives everyone a window into how other departments are working and how their own work fits into the bigger picture.

Additionally, when teams have visibility into other areas of the organization, they can identify opportunities for collaboration and can work more effectively with other teams to drive revenue.

Alignment, autonomy, and visibility are the foundational blocks to increasing efficiency, innovation, and collaboration within an organization. These elements will ultimately lead to increased growth and success for organizations.

6 Steps to Driving Revenue

Now we know the who (CPO) and the what (alignment, autonomy, and visibility) of driving revenue. Let’s finally dive into the how of it all.

We’ve broken it down into these 6 steps that CPOs follow to create visibility. Which ultimately builds a high-performing product machine to drive revenue.

1. Set OKRs (the right way)

To build a high-performing product team, you need to have goals for them to hit. CPOs typically use OKRs (Objectives and Key Results) as the goal-setting framework to do-so.

There are a few tips and tricks to setting OKRs. When done right, good OKRs will be specific, measurable, and aligned with company business objectives. When done wrong, improperly set OKRs or too many or too few OKRs can lead to confusion, siloes, and lack of focus.

When using this framework, here are some simple tips to keep in mind:

• Align them with company objectives so everyone is working towards the same goal
• Focus on your outcomes over outputs
• Set challenging (but achievable) goals to push your team
• Create a feedback loop and review your OKRs

2. Build an Effective Operations process

CPOs rely on their operating process to ensure that their team is aligned, efficient, and delivering high-quality products. Here are some steps you can take to build an effective operating process:

• Define your product development process for how your team will develop and launch products. This process should be documented and shared, so everyone is clear on their roles and responsibilities.
• Establish clear communication channels between team members, including regular check-ins, progress reports, and team meetings. This ensures that everyone is on the same page and working towards the same goals.
• Set up regular reviews and retrospectives to evaluate your team’s progress and identify areas for improvement. This will help you refine your operating process and ensure that your team is continuously improving.
• Create a culture of experimentation and learning. Encouraging your team to experiment and take risks, while also providing them with the support they need to learn from their mistakes will help your team stay innovative and responsive to changing customer needs.
• Implement a framework for decision-making that outlines how decisions will be made, who will make them, and what factors will be considered. That way, your team can make better decisions, faster.
• Ensure visibility into the product development process with a system and tooling for tracking progress and providing visibility into the product development process. This will help you identify bottlenecks and inefficiencies, and ensure that everyone is working towards the same goals.

3. Adopt a Platform to Enable Source of Truth Data and Framework for Decision Making

Adopting a tool that is purpose-built for outcomes cuts out a lot of manual work in your operating system, enhancing your team’s productivity and allowing them to focus on what’s important.

A great CPO entrusts a great tool to keep organizations on track by helping teams manage product backlog, prioritize features, and track their progress up to OKRs.

In many ways, a tool shapes the way a company runs. Look for tools that:

• Connects strategy and delivery. This is a crucial feature that allows you to be outcome-focused.
• Provides flexibility so that your teams don’t need to change how they work to fit the tool (the tool should fit you!).
• Create visibility. The right tool will give you insights into how your whole company performs so you have a full picture.
• Empower teams with best practices and pre-set workflows so your team is working at its highest capacity.

Nothing is more expensive than “free” tools like spreadsheets for operations. While these tools can be useful for certain tasks, they are not a scalable solution as your company becomes more complex and will ultimately be more costly.

4. Upskill Your Teams

Your team plays a critical role in the success of your product. That’s why it is crucial to invest in both your customers and employees. By investing in your employees, you can increase productivity, stay up-to-date with industry trends, promote employee satisfaction, encourage innovation, and build a strong team culture. Providing your team with autonomy is a key component of this investment.

To maximize the potential of your team, consider allocating a research and development budget, providing access to relevant slack channels and communities for continuous learning, and offering training on methodologies, best practices, and other relevant skills. This will equip your team with the tools they need to work at their best and drive success for your product. By prioritizing employee development, you can create a work environment that fosters creativity, collaboration, and growth.

5. Measure Your Outcomes After Work is Done

Analyzing results is a crucial yet often overlooked step that drives companies to stay competitive. After setting up great OKRs and tracking the progress of deliverables, it’s important to perform a periodic look-back to identify areas for improvement, ensure accountability, demonstrate returns, and ultimately drive continuous improvement. This is especially critical for Chief Product Officers who play a key role in decision-making.

By analyzing results, you can ensure that decisions are always data-driven, enabling you to make informed choices that drive revenue. This step not only helps you identify areas for improvement but also allows you to celebrate successes and learn from mistakes. It’s important to prioritize accountability and transparency in this process to ensure that all team members are aligned toward the same goals.

Continuous improvement is key to maintaining a competitive edge, and it starts with analyzing results and making data-driven decisions. By leveraging data, you can identify trends, anticipate customer needs, and make adjustments that lead to improved performance and customer satisfaction.

6. Prioritization Guide Team Prioritization with Strategic Allocation

Sometimes, allocation can be more important than prioritization in running a business. Companies need to ensure that they are allocating resources to the most important areas rather than just focusing on prioritization. Doing so communicates:

• Where the company is headed
• The highest priorities
• What decisions need to be made based on the priorities

Prioritization alone does not ensure success. Allocation is what will help you optimize your resource utilization and ultimately balance your short and long-term goals. This is key to managing risk because you have the resources to address any unexpected challenges or opportunities.

In Summary

Chief Product Officers play a vital role in today’s business world as they are responsible for overseeing the entire product development process. The most successful CPOs prioritize creating alignment and autonomy while building company-wide visibility to drive success.

To achieve this, CPOs can leverage proven strategies such as setting clear product vision and strategy, establishing effective communication channels, and fostering a culture of transparency and collaboration. These steps not only promote alignment and autonomy but also enhance company-wide visibility, enabling stakeholders to stay informed and engaged.

The success of a CPO in executing these strategies can significantly contribute to a company’s revenue acceleration and ensure that its product strategy aligns with overall business objectives. By creating a shared vision and fostering a culture of innovation and continuous improvement, CPOs can drive the development of products that meet customer needs, exceed expectations, and drive business growth.

Featured Image Credit: Photo by Roman Ska; Pexels; Thank you!

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Using scheduling software improves time management. But not everyone is making use of this new technology. When you don’t utilize your time management software — i’s similar to having a new Ferrari, but driving it barely five miles under the speed limit.

To unlock a sports car’s ultimate speed, you must understand its engine. You must learn software advantages and how to leverage the power it has to boost your productivity. You’re only getting surface value for your software if you’ve looked at it solely like the Ferrari above — and only been interested in the paint and leather seats. Change how you think about your scheduling software.

Anticipate What Your Software Can Do for Productivity

Living in the moment is exciting but not very productive when you’re thinking about software. So you need to plan if you want to maximize your time using the software. Ask any industry leader or successful entrepreneur how much planning goes into their daily lives — and the same goes with using a piece of software.

You should plan daily, weekly, and monthly by changing your schedule program’s perspective. Above all, with daily planning, you may schedule challenging tasks at times when you know you are more productive. For example, plan all meetings and deadlines weekly. Monthly planning allows you to review your own KPIs and prepare for a more productive month. Meanwhile, your scheduling software lets you and others cooperate and plan together when you all have open times.

Leaders must juggle several jobs, duties, and deadlines. Your scheduling software will also assist in decreasing manager-team misunderstanding and miscommunication. For example, X’s new blog post is due tomorrow morning, with editing by an in-house editor at the end of the day — is that on the editing schedule? You need to have a spot to manage your team’s metrics for your scheduling software. He says the metrics help team leads and managers plan their time for each development cycle.

Personal-Professional Balance

Even if your profession is vital to your lifestyle, your family and yourself should always come first. According to a Deloitte study,  organizations that promote work-life balance see double the employee productivity. Therefore, the most excellent scheduling software encourages work-life balance.

Set aside time for family. Schedule dates with your spouse and your children’s athletic events and recitals. These events should be non-negotiable, and you may arrange them using the same tools you use for your business.

The balance between work and life is much easier to accomplish. Use scheduling strategies that help you maximize your productivity while on the clock. For example, the Pomodoro technique divides work into little blocks with brief pauses in between. Using this scheduling strategy will help you focus better during the day, do more things in less time, and take less work home.

Color Coding for Geeks — Great at-a-Glance Scheduling

A unique color-coding system helps you to comprehend your itinerary quickly. Each item on your timetable can be assigned a different color. Red can be used to highlight important client meetings. For example, yellow can represent longer-term tasks like planning or reporting. Blue may stand for family time, personal obligations, etc. To complete activities faster, you’ll want to establish your schedule’s priority. There are many ways to accomplish this.

Visual cues can help people understand information faster, so go ahead and be colorful. Once you learn your color code, your daily schedule will inform you where and when you need to be. For example, a red light indicates a board meeting that you must prepare for. Consequently, no matter what the event is, a sliver of blue at the end of your schedule will remind you that you can’t work late tonight because you have a family event.

Set Alerts on Scheduling Software

Scheduling an event isn’t always enough — you’re not using scheduling software to its full potential if you don’t set reminders for important events. Therefore, setting up reminders for each meeting or appointment will help you keep track of your schedule. Remember to set an alarm for your travel time as well.

Your reminders will serve as a backup if you forget something or misplace your paper notes. There’s nothing worse than missing a critical meeting or giving the incorrect impression — these types of things damage careers. Use your scheduling program to avoid this.

Reminders can also help you prepare for upcoming occasions. Consequently, a half-hour notice before a big presentation provides you time to gather your thoughts and organize your materials. You should know yourself well enough to see if you need more time than a half hour. That’s all you will need if you have prepared the night before and have everything ready to go for that meeting.

Others to Contact in Scheduling Software

Preparing and attending a meeting where the other party does not show is counterproductive. Both parties must agree on a schedule. Even if you do everything perfectly —  there are times when someone may be late or not show up for a meeting. All your planning and organizing will be for naught.

To avoid this, send reminders to folks with whom you have made plans. Most scheduling software allows you to set up reminder messages.

Leaders can create the perfect reminder once and use it for all future engagements for everyone on their team.

People won’t have to worry about colleagues or clients skipping meetings or writing personalized emails every time. They may also share a meeting agenda or a scheduling link to improve collaboration — and the same process and work while managing your hybrid teams’ hybrid work schedules.

We need to cease utilizing our scheduling software for only the basics. Instead, leaders should use this software tool’s array of valuable features to boost productivity companywide.

Start today to make the most of your time. Remember that using your scheduling software — “now” — spelled backward means you’ve “won.”

Image Credit: Andrea Piacquadio; Pexels; Thank you!

This article was originally published here.

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The metaverse is getting much attention now as technologists, marketers, and pundits examine and debate what’s possible in this domain and how companies can leverage it. As a result, brands may wonder if they should create metaverse experiences now or wait and see if the metaverse lives up to the hype.

We think the decision is easier to make with an imaginative perspective on the metaverse, how it may evolve, and how your key personas, business, technology, and infrastructure can benefit from it.

Develop a Working Definition of What the Metaverse Means to Your Company

The idea of the metaverse is not new, but the zeitgeist is still scouring for a universally accepted definition. There are common themes like 3D visualizations and video game-like immersive experiences.

Some even say it is the internet in 3D because dimensionality is one of its essential elements. But in a more practical sense, the metaverse is effectively the next stage of internet evolution that transpires over time instead of at the flip of a switch and will continue to unwind.

We are heading to a future of technology-enabled “superpowers” that let us go inside the internet rather than solely experiencing it through a flat screen. Instead of visiting web pages and apps for everything, we’ll frequent virtual spaces and overlay information into our everyday realities. Instead of consuming, creating, and sharing content, our virtual experiences will be the content that others engage with. Think of what that means to your brand.

Will these immersive experiences replace websites? Not likely. However, the metaverse’s lure over the flat internet does seem irresistible. The level of immersion will be a central topic for user experience designers, design agencies, and consultancies in the coming years.

Why the Metaverse Should Matter to Your Enterprise

Gartner expects 25% of people to spend an hour or more each in the metaverse by 2026. And at least half of US adults and teenagers are counting on the metaverse to improve their experiences shopping for beauty, travel, clothing, furniture, real estate, and workout routines. Not to mention the opportunities VR, AR and MR bring to asset management, training, analysis, and automation.

There’s a clear potential first-mover advantage for brands that start creating immersive experiences in the metaverse. Brands daring to plunge in can help define the emerging metaverse. Brands that sit out risk treading water in a metaverse defined for them instead of riding the waves.

Let’s go back to the definition of the metaverse as the next stage of the internet. Should your brand have a website? The question seems almost ridiculous today, but in the ’90s, it wasn’t a requirement. The brands that started first got more experience about what works – other brands waited to develop an internet strategy. And thus, the concept of digital transformation was born to assist the companies that didn’t embrace the world wide web.

Determine What’s Possible for Your Brand in the Metaverse

Thinking about the metaverse in three categories can be helpful.  First, there are the immersive experiences that most of us associate with it — gaming and community.  Second, there’s blockchain technology, which encompasses Non-Fungible Tokens (NFTs), smart contracts, cryptocurrency wallets, and decentralized autonomous organizations (DAOs). Third, are digital-twin technology that uses 3D representations of structures as large as cities to artifacts as small as a pin. But processes can also be digitally twinned.

It’s also helpful to think about the goal for each metaverse experience. Is it to immerse consumers in brand-related moments to engage them in new ways? Or is the plan to leverage digital twin technology for exact, location-independent employee training or more responsive and efficient field service? What other use cases exist for employee, customer, and asset journeys?

Once brands know which use case they want to start with, they can develop the right metaverse to fit from consumer-facing experiences to industrial applications and everything in between. Brands should be willing to experiment with metaverse technologies. This is faster, cheaper, and less risky, given the metaverse is in its infancy and the technology is rapidly evolving.

Identify the First Steps Required for Your Brand’s Entry into the Metaverse

What does a brand need to start getting some quick wins in the metaverse?

Metaverse project leaders need support and clear cross-organizational communication. For example, it’s wise to find out if other metaverse projects are planned or underway inside the company. If so, coordination will streamline tasks, prevent duplication, and generate efficiencies. Projects may also require a consultancy partner to help implement or leverage immersive technology, identify projects with fast outcomes, and develop a roadmap and metrics for success. With those steps in place, brands can embark on their journey toward metaverse maturity.

Thinking of the metaverse as the internet, but better take some of the mystique away from this unprecedented shift. However, it also compels brands to seek immersive experiences to produce. So they’re not left behind as the metaverse goes from a shiny new trend to an inevitable part of humanity’s evolution.

Featured Image Credit: Photo by Thisisengineering; Pexels; Thank you!

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Every small business aspires to grow as big as a Fortune 500 company one fine day. In fact, any business would want to keep advancing in an incremental way to scale new heights. Besides, this is what makes the enterprise world highly competitive. The ultimate objective of every business is to penetrate its market to dominate the market share in its own exemplary way.  This explains why businesses lay great emphasis on market penetration strategies.

The fact of the matter is that business advancement strategies cannot exist without market penetration tactics. The market share of a company will always be a key performance indicator of its advancement and authority.

Probing further, in every industry, we identify the top performers in terms of their market share. For instance, if we talk about the smartphone industry, Samsung and Apple are the biggest players with dominating market shares. They have always had fierce competition in dominating the industry. Still, due to some extraordinary market penetration strategies, Samsung dominated the smartphone industry by leaving Apple in the second spot.

To substantiate, in the second quarter of 2022, Samsung made it to the top spot with a market share of 21.8. Whereas Apple bagged the second position with a market share of 15.6%. We can largely attribute the success of Samsung to its market penetration strategies. This example makes a clear case for paying heed to the need for a firm market penetration plan. However, what does the term market penetration exactly imply? Let us find out.

What is market penetration?

Market penetration is a measure of how much share a company holds in the overall market for a product. To elaborate, it defines how much a product is used by consumers relative to the total estimated market size for that product. For service businesses, it will be a measure of how much a service is used by consumers relative to the total market size for that service.

Now, let us also look at the definition of market penetration strategies. It is the course of action that a company initiates to increase its market share in the overall market. Besides, market penetration is one of the four elements of the Ansoff Matrix. To explain, Ansoff Matrix is one of the widely applied strategic models used by companies. A company’s market penetration strategy is the set of tactics aimed at increasing its market share.

Let us understand the same through an example. Currently, Tesla has over 70 percent market share in the US EV market. Now, let’s say the company sets a target for attaining a market share of 90 percent in the next three years. For that, the company will need to frame an effective market penetration strategy. The KPIs of its penetration strategy will determine whether the company meets its business objectives.

Now we know all about what market penetration is and what is a market penetration plan. For successful market penetration, companies need actionable strategies. This is what this meticulous blog is all about. The next section puts forth some incredible strategies for market penetration.

5 Business Strategies For Successful Market Penetration

1. Revolutionize Your Promotional Practices

Marketing and promotional strategies have nowadays become a major pillar on which the growth of every business majorly depends. Statistical data (vtldesign dotcom) states that big names like Salesforce and Oracle dedicate 20% or even more of revenue to marketing. Besides, the same reports validate that marketing is eventually responsible for generating companies’ revenue growth of 38.4%. This brings us to the very first marketing penetration strategy. In this, you have to ensure that you need to revamp your promotional practices.

To elaborate, thanks to technological advancements, we have tremendous marketing sources like affiliate marketing, social media marketing, and so on. Apart from the sources, technological advancements even revolutionized the way marketing was done before. For example, technologies like artificial intelligence (AI), VR, and AR (augmented and virtual reality), have also contributed to the same. They have assisted in presenting even simple messages of brands in the most impressive form to attract more potential consumers.

Hence, revolutionizing the form of promotional practices will assist you in enhancing the awareness and brand visibility of your business. This greater brand awareness will assist you in attracting more customers. Besides, this will assist you in acquiring a bigger share of the market effectively.

2. Enhance Your Business Territories

Business territories here include all of your distribution channels through which you deliver your product or service in the market. Distribution channels play a major role in penetrating the market effectively. The success mantra is simple, the more distribution channels you have, the more accessible you are to your target audience.

Hence, in order to effectively penetrate your target market, you need to enhance the territories of your business. For online mediums, you can enhance the distribution channels by

• Creating websites
• Selling features of different social media
• Collaborating with e-commerce websites
• Creating separate apps

For offline mediums, you can invest in building up more brick-and-mortar stores. Other than that, you can also dig out the opportunities to give the franchises to other people.  Rather than handling it all at once yourself, you can let your other franchise partners handle it. This will assist you in expanding your business networks in terms of your business partners as well as your customers.

This way, you will be able to take advantage of different distribution channels to get more customers to your business. Hence, you will get successful in acquiring more market share for your business.

3. Acquire or Partner With Other Businesses

Jim Henson once correctly said, “when you can’t beat them, join them.” The most prominent and perfect example that fits the above-given quote is Facebook, now called Meta. This happened when Meta acquired Instagram and Whatsapp, which were some of its biggest competitors. With this comes another tremendous strategy that can assist you in penetrating your business effectively.

To elaborate, while acquiring, you can always target your competitors like Meta or go for acquiring small businesses. When you acquire any business, you will automatically get control of its existing clientele base. This will ultimately add up to your clientele base and will assist you in having more market share under your wing. Besides, when you go for partnering with other businesses, there is also a major consideration. You should always go for businesses that complement your business in one way or another.

For example, recently, an Italian MNC, Ferrero Group, or simply Ferrero’s subsidiary brand Kinderjoy ‘Nations’ has announced its expansion in India. Along with its expansion, the company joined hands with Discovery Channel. The main aim of this partnership is to promote their unique animal collection in order to encourage kids to gain effective knowledge of wildlife. Now, as Kinderjoy is a specific product created for kids, partnering with an educating medium enhances the value of both partners. Additionally, it also gave them the opportunity to totally tap into their partner’s target market to acquire new customers or audiences.

Hence, both partnering and acquiring are both great ways to penetrate the market. The only need is to identify which form of market penetration of these two goes best for your business.

4. Acquire customers through cost leadership

As per the cost leadership strategy, companies look to develop a competitive advantage by offering a product or service at the lowest price. It is a strategic advantage that companies look to gain over their competitors. To explain, when companies offer the highest quality products at the lowest price, they attract new customers.

In such cases, businesses often try to become the price leader in the market. To define, a pricing leader refers to the dominating firm of the market that sets the price and the rest of other firms the competition follows. Businesses become the price leader by lowering their profit margins and grabbing the attention of their customers towards them. One of the biggest examples of effective cost leadership in the aviation industry is RyanAir. The company used a dynamic pricing strategy and became the cost leader in the aviation industry.

However, in the race to become a cost leader, you also have to ensure that you can not make your prices too low. This will directly impact the profitability of your business, or people can also doubt your quality. Besides, being a cost leader cannot be a long-term pricing strategy. Once you acquire a substantial share of the market, you can change the pricing strategy. The foundation for that would, of course, be excellent customer service. When businesses offer great customer experiences, customers are even happy to pay premium princess.

This way, dynamic pricing will assist you in attracting more and more customers from different social groups. This will ultimately assist in gathering a larger share of the market.

5. Embrace Product Diversification

Last but not least, a strategy that can assist in enhancing your market penetration rate is product diversification. For those who are not aware of the term, let us explain it to you. Companies apply product diversification by introducing new product lines or services to attain a greater market share. The underlying objective of diversification is to amplify business profitability.

In fact, there are a host of successful product diversification examples to look at. Disney went on to introduce its own OTT platform and cruises after starting with cartoons. Similarly, Coca-Cola ventured into the healthy drinks market after starting with carbonated drinks. When businesses expand, they can tap into more markets and acquire more customers.

As diversification allows you to add more variety of products to your business. By implementing this, you will easily be able to capture the largest share of the industry. However, every diversification strategy should be accompanied by a clear change management strategy. An effective change management approach ensures better integration of transformations in a business.

However, one of the biggest challenges that might occur in product diversification is failing to identify the potential of the target market. Hence, it is really essential to rectify the attractiveness of your target market before investing a huge amount in it. This is where the analysis of the business macroenvironment and microenvironment becomes essential.

To encapsulate, with the increasing competition in the business world, it often gets difficult for businesses to enhance their market penetration rate. Hence, the need is to effectively understand the market and utilize some of the effective market penetration strategies in order to enhance the growth of your business.

Besides, the above-given strategies will effectively assist you in skyrocketing your market penetration rate. So what are you waiting for? Utilize them and experience the difference yourself.

Featured Image Credit: Gustavo Fring; Pexels; Thank you!

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Scaling So Far shares candid conversations with tech founders and leaders on how they’ve built and scaled their teams.

You’ll want to enjoy this entire podcast here.

In the 50th episode of the Scaling So Far podcast, Jonathan Siddharth, Founder, and CEO of Turing discuss the lessons he’s learned scaling the Turing team with Dan, the Scaling So Far host. Jon and Dan also talk about why unlocking global opportunities for top tech talent and tactics for sourcing, engaging, and nurturing brilliant engineers are critical today.

Dan

Jonathan, pleased to be chatting with you today. Firstly, thank you for joining us on the Scaling So Far podcast – great to have you with us. Could you tell us a bit about yourself to kick things off?

Jonathan Siddharth

Thank you for having me, Dan – excited to be a part of the podcast. For the listeners out there, I’m Jonathan Siddharth, CEO and Co-Founder of Turing. Turing is a platform that lets you push a button to hire prevetted remote engineers worldwide. 

Turing uses artificial intelligence to automatically source software developers from all over the world, automatically vet them, match them, and help manage the collaboration after we match software engineers with opportunities. 

We recently became a Unicorn a little over three years after we launched, and we are in the process of rapidly scaling. We call this process “blitzscaling,” where you grow at this accelerated pace. So excited to share some of our lessons learned and challenges with you.

Dan

Can you tell me a bit more about Turing’s mission and vision?

Jonathan Siddharth

Absolutely. So we now live in a remote-first world, and every company today is in a race to reap the benefits of remote engineering talent. Twitter is going remote; Square is going remote; Coinbase is going remote – even traditional companies like Siemens, Ford, etc., are seeing the benefits of going remote. 

And the reasons are obvious.

Number one, you can tap into a planetary pool of engineers versus just looking in your backyard. 

Number two, you have the opportunity to tap into geographies that nobody else is looking at today, like Latin America, Africa, Southeast Asia, Central Europe, etc. 

And third, distributed teams work now, as we’ve discovered in the last couple of years.

Remote is hard. It’s challenging for three big reasons. First, if you are a Head of Engineering at a company like Coinbase, how do you build a global pipeline to find great people? If you want to hire tens of thousands, how will you build a pipeline of thousands of Golang engineers from Brazil or C-sharp engineers from Croatia? That’s hard.

Second, evaluating a global engineering talent pool can be tricky. For example, if you are looking at an engineer from Italy, say – you may not see Stanford or Berkeley in her educational background. You might not see Google, Facebook, or Stripe in her work experience. She could be a great engineer, but there’s just no signal from just the resume. So you have to interview that person. And how are you going to interview these thousands of people from all over the world without sucking up all of your engineering teams’ interview time — that’d be super hard.

And third, it can be tough to manage engineers effectively after you’ve found them. Because if your communication is a challenge because time zones are broad, often the right kind of daily communication and performance management does not happen. Often managers don’t have enough visibility into the work people are doing. Security can also be a concern.

So these are the three big problems. 

Number one, it’s challenging to build a large enough global pipeline to find genuinely great people. 

Number two, it’s hard to evaluate all these engineers at scale. 

And number three, once you’ve found that perfect engineer, how do you manage them? How do you take care of communication, security, and other issues?

And the traditional solutions, Dan, weren’t built for this. If you look at a recruiting firm or a staffing firm, most of them don’t do any vetting of engineers. They don’t have a global reach. If you look at marketplaces, they’re usually hit or miss in terms of quality. And these IT services companies also don’t have Silicon Valley-caliber talent.

So we asked ourselves a simple question: Can we solve these problems with software? 

What if we had software that could source engineers planet-wide? What if we had software that could evaluate engineers for a Silicon Valley bar? What if we had software that could automatically match the right engineers to the right jobs with machine learning? And what if we had software that could manage the collaboration after the match – this is why we built Turing.

Turing’s creating a new category called the ‘talent cloud.’ It’s a distributed team of developers in the cloud. These developers are sourced, vetted, matched, and managed by software. So an Engineering Manager, or the Head of Engineering, or an early-stage founder can push a button to spin up your engineering dream team in the cloud as easily as you spin up servers on Amazon. So that’s what we do.

Dan

This is great. Sounds excellent. So you Co-Founded Turing back in 2018, is that right? I’d love to hear what the journey to now has looked like for you and the team.

Jonathan Siddharth

Yeah. It’s been a journey. It’s one of those things where every year feels very different from the year before. In the CEO role, as a company grows, you have to scale with the challenges you see at that next step. 

Like in the last year, our headcount grew by almost 8X. So, the company’s been growing tremendously. A big inflection point for us was February or March 2020, when the pandemic hit. It accelerated a lot of this shift to remote work and this move to distributed teams. GitLab, Automattic, and a few companies tasted the benefits of remote, distributed teams.

And it’s never been a better time to be an engineer. Previously, your opportunity radius was maybe 20 miles from where you lived, regardless of how capable you were, how motivated you were, or how smart you were. Now that’s no longer the case. So at Turing, we want to kill the geo lottery. 

So we want to create a future where the place you live doesn’t impact the kind of opportunities you can access. So these last three and a half, four years have just been this period of rapid scaling as we grow our developer base. 

We now have about two million developers signed up on Turing and hundreds of companies building teams from Turing, including Coinbase and Johnson & Johnson. We also have fortune 500 companies like Disney and others. It’s been fun to experience blitzscaling in its purest form for all the good, the bad, and the ugly.

Dan

You raised $87m Series D in October last year – hit unicorn status. How are you investing the new capital? What do the next 12–18 months look like for Turing?

Jonathan Siddharth

We raised a unicorn round of about 87 million last year. Since then, we have focused on scaling up our sales and marketing and accelerating our developer growth. There are many developers worldwide, and we want Turing to be where the best developers work. And really, investing in our product R&D. So, we build many products to automate the sourcing, vetting, and management of developers. 

And it’s a lot of data science and machine learning coupled with software engineering to get the efficiencies of scale. So vetting is zero-touch in that we can have various job types, tech stacks, and seniority levels. So we want to build this machine that can evaluate engineers at scale in an objective, data-driven way without all the biases that a typical interview process would have.

Traditional interviewing is not very scientific. It’s kind of broken and has all sorts of room for bias. So we want to level the playing field for global talent. So a big focus for us after our series D is automation. So automation and sales and marketing, I would say, are the big levers. So we’ve raised about $140m so far. Most of the money is still in the bank as we continue to grow. We will also look at any attractive M&A opportunities in Europe and LATAM. So we’re always interested in great teams of people and technology that can give us an edge.

Dan

Forbes named you one of America’s best startup employers last year. Massive congrats on that. What is unique about Turing’s employee experience that you think secured this accolade?

Jonathan Siddharth

So there are a few things that are unique to our culture. Our main pillars are speed, continuous improvement, and a long-term focus on customer success. And when I say speed, I think one of the biggest weapons a startup has is the ability to execute fast without bureaucracy and much red tape. 

So we spend a lot of time thinking about how to go faster. And this means being very focused on what we do. It means only focusing on the significant needle-moving initiatives that can impact our metrics substantially. It means saying no to many things and saying no to a bunch of product initiatives that could be nice things to do but may not move the company forward in a meaningful way. And I think people like that culture. So when people come to us from some of these larger companies, they first notice the speed. This company moves fast.

One of the other attributes that fit in with speed is we are very comfortable failing. So we would rather take a big, bold bet in an area where we see an opportunity to do something 10x better or 5x better. And we’ll be happy if 80 percent of the time, rather than conducting tons of iterative, incremental improvements. And I think people like that. So that was speed.

And a second important part of our culture is a culture of continuous improvement. So when we hire people, we look for people who care deeply about making themselves better, making their teams better, and making the company better. It’s this mind mindset of getting better every day. I have an app on my phone where I track – did I work on an aspect of my self-improvement today? I like to maintain a streak of continuous improvements because these things add up.

Dan

So what will you focus on from a talent and people perspective in the year ahead?

Jonathan Siddharth

So we’re focusing on hiring exceptional leaders in the company and ensuring that our team is coordinated, aligned, and moving in the right direction. We are now about 700 people. It’s much harder to keep an organization of 700 people focused on the most needle-moving things than when we were 70. So it’s going to be recruiting extraordinary leaders into the company.

So I would say recruiting and ensuring that the entire team focuses on the right things. Everybody has a clear sense of company priorities, their team’s priorities, and how they contribute to moving the company’s key metrics forward.

One thing that sometimes gets missed is something that’s in between recruiting and ensuring the organization is aligned and moving in the right direction, which is onboarding — making sure that we are making the people we hire successful. So we have the proper checkpoints with them  — and that’s a whole different topic with its own challenges — you need an organization to have the right balance of leaders and individual contributors.  

I prefer the term leaders rather than managers at Turing. Like we want leaders, not managers. We want people who raise the level of performance of their team, not somebody rubber-stamping the work of an incredible team. So, ensuring we have the correct ratio of leaders to individual contributors will be a focus. So, recruiting, excellent onboarding, and having a great culture where the entire organization is moving in one direction to hit our company goals.

Dan

You’ve also been named one of Fast Company’s ten most innovative companies in 2021. I’m not surprised, given the demand for tech talent and the global transition to remote work over the past couple of years.

Why do you think unlocking opportunities for global tech talent is so important right now?

Jonathan Siddharth

Today, we live in a world where every company must become a software or a technology company to survive and thrive. Right. And the fundamental scaling constraint to a technology company is having great engineers and the ability to unlock the world’s untapped human potential. There are great people worldwide who could be the perfect engineer in your team to contribute to helping you go where you need to go. I think that’s the message that resonates powerfully with every tech company.

When you think about it, do you want to hire the best people in the world or people who happen to live near your office? It feels stark in terms of what the best path is. So we’ve benefited from those tailwinds. Traditionally, engineers that wanted to work in the heart of the technology industry had to relocate to a few centers in Western Europe, the west coast of the United States, certain parts of India, parts of China, or parts of Israel. 

These are influential tech hubs, but you have to uproot your life and move to those places to work. And today, the jobs come to you. And I think we look back on this era as being transformative, much like the internet was in the nineties regarding how it connected the world and made civilization progress faster.

So we are fortunate to be at the center of that shift which is a big reason why they included us in many of these lists. We were named alongside Slack, Zoom, and GitLab. These companies are powering the boundaryless future, where you can work from anywhere. And that’s the movement; it’s the work-from-anywhere movement. And I think it will be a hugely positive movement for the world. 

Even outside of the tech industry, if you look at it from an environmental standpoint, how much pollution are we avoiding by not requiring people to commute one to two hours daily? How much productivity do we lose when everyone commutes daily for one to two hours? And then they’re a little bit tired when they reach work. You’ve lost so many hours of your day – like 10 – 20% – it’s a significant amount of life that you’ve now got back to do whatever you want.

Dan

You held your event Boundaryless recently, didn’t you? What were some of the key takeaways from this?

Jonathan Siddharth

We used that event to announce big product launches for us. For example, one significant product we launched in our Boundaryless event was a completely automated self-serve system that made working with engineers, like picking the right engineer you want to work with, as easy as going on Amazon.com. 

Let’s say you are starting a company and want a backend Python engineer. So we have this system now where you can input what type of developer you’re seeking. What are the critical tech-stack strengths you need in a developer? Maybe it’s Python, perhaps you also want to add Node, and then you’ll see a ranked list of prevetted engineers from Turing, and you can push a button to choose which engineer you’d like to interview and get started.

And it’s just very, very efficient. We’ve taken a process that would typically take months and reduced it to a matter of days and, in some cases, the same day. And that took a lot of work behind the scenes to automatically evaluate engineers that scale used machine learning to recommend the right developers for the right jobs when choosing from a pool of 1.2 million. And we previewed that, and today, more than half of our startup customers use that product. And a lot of engineering managers value efficiency. Like they don’t like talking to a salesperson, getting on zoom. So they like this search engine just to find the developers they want, push a button, and get going.

Dan

What tech candidate assessment or evaluation do you feel is most effective for fast-growing companies?

Jonathan Siddharth

So for fast-growing companies, when we evaluate software engineers, we assess them along three primary dimensions.

We evaluate their technical skills, we evaluate their soft skills, and we vet their seniority level. When we assess an engineer for their technical skills, we build a deep developer profile for each type of engineer. This profile is a detailed, comprehensive, continuously updating vector representation of that developer’s strengths and areas for improvement.

So with a machine learning engineer, we would evaluate them for how good their machine learning theory foundation is, whether it’s probability statistics, linear algebra, or things like that. We evaluate them for how hands-on they are and how good they are at building a text classifier and working with the latest frameworks. We would also examine their software engineering fundamentals. 

How good are they at writing production-level code? We would evaluate them on their ability to build machine learning models versus maintaining the models in production. So we have all of these attributes that we are vetting the engineers for. Where relevant, we also evaluate them on things like their systems design capability or ability to architect systems and stuff like that.

And in the second bucket, soft skills, particularly for a startup, it’s crucial to have very proactive engineers with an ownership mentality who don’t need a lot of direction.

Typically in a startup, the engineer might report to somebody fairly senior, maybe one of the founders or a CTO or VP of engineering. So they need to be the kind of person who doesn’t need a ton of hand-holding where they can understand the vision for a feature or a product that you’re trying to build. They need the ability to take that to completion without requiring a ton of iteration and back and forth with the person they’re working with. They must be able to work with minimal supervision and be committed to working hard. I mean, startups are hard work, right? 

Like it’s not for everyone at all stages of their life. So you kind of want somebody who’s committed to the company’s mission and can work and put in those long hours. Look for somebody good at direct communication and escalating when things are not going right. In a startup, speed is paramount. So you don’t want somebody who sort of says yes to you. 

You want somebody who negotiates more directly with you. So the soft skills front, particularly for somebody working at a startup, I think some of these requirements are important in a startup, as you might also need to wear a couple of different hats. 

Sometimes the engineer might need to wear a more product-centric hat too. You might have to make some product-centric decisions. You might have to work with a designer. You might have to talk to customers. So you kind of need all of that too.

And on the third dimension, we pay a lot of attention to the level of seniority the client seeks. We have engineers who can work at the level of a task, at a feature level or the level of an entire product. And we typically have a conversation with our startup or enterprise customers to understand what seniority level they need. 

So it’s technical skills, soft skills, and calibrating on seniority levels so that we can help companies find the right talent they need. And often, Dan, it’s a conversation. Sometimes when customers come to us, they have a vague sense of what they need. And in a conversation with us and through iterating with our product, we help them sharpen their job rec for the task that they need to be done. 

Sometimes, what you need for a project might not be a machine learning engineer. Instead, it’s more of a data scientist or maybe an engineer who understands data sciences – it’s an iterative process to figure out what our customers need.

Dan

And aside from technical challenges, how do you assess for qualities like culture fit / add or hiring for “potential” even?

Jonathan Siddharth

Yeah. How do we assess for culture fit and hire for potential? So culture fit is something tricky. Let me answer that first from a perspective, and then we can talk from a customer perspective. I think it starts with the Founder and CEO writing down the culture. So I spent some time writing down all the best practices from the culture we want, treasure, and value in the last month. We call it the Turing way, and we’ve written it down in this Google doc in conversation with our exec team – what traits have made us successful so far that we want to preserve? 

So it starts by writing it down because different companies have different cultures, and there’s no one size fits all, but you have to write it down to put a stake in the ground for what you stand for. And you’ve written it down.

Then you need to have a way to hire and fire and promote based on those values. So one of the things we are doing now is we’ve written it down, and we write specific examples of what each sort of cultural value means, and some of it can be kind of polarizing. Like in our culture, we write that we work crazy hard. 

We think Turing will be one of our generation’s most influential companies to unleash the world’s untapped human potential. And it’s going to take a ton of work, and we want you to know what you’re getting into, right? So this is not a company where things will go slow, and it’ll be a lot of work, but we can promise you it’ll be rewarding and fun. 

So the first step is to write it down. And you also want to write it down collaboratively, like taking input from the outstanding leaders you have in the company and your exec team. Then you also want to be mindful of not being too ossified in the culture itself. Someone told me that they hire not for culture fit but for culture addition. So you want to hire people who will contribute positively to the culture and improve the company’s culture and who can add their own to the Turing way.

So we kind of watch for that in our interview process. We have people who interview for culture. You want to have like a very standard way in which you assess culture. Ask the same questions to determine your ability to contribute to Turing’s culture. So you calibrate it across a broad group of people and share this culture document you create with prospective candidates and managers. Not have this be something sitting in Slack or a Google Drive, but actively use it. I think the more often you can point to that, the more it’s being used.

So step one is to write it down. Step two, be comfortable with evolving and editing it. And step three, have a hiring, firing, and promoting system based on what you’ve written down. So yeah. A culture document without enforcement is kind of toothless, right? So it’s important.

Dan

You have a database of 2m developers across 10,000 cities. That’s an incredible trove of talent. Talent that typically is in demand and tough to hire.

How have you attracted and engaged that talent to the extent that they opt-in to Turing?

Jonathan Siddharth

Great question. So firstly, we live in a remote-first world, and every company’s in the race to hire the world’s best remote talent, but it can be hard to stand out in a planetary pool. If you are an excellent engineer from a small town near Sao Paulo, Brazil, nobody looking at your resume might recognize the schools you went to or your prior work experience. And that’s a shame like this could be a perfectly fantastic engineer, but there are just not too many signals that exist. 

And if you’re an engineer historically before Turing, you had, I would say, three options that you could have, you could have done. One is you could have applied directly to the best companies that are hiring. And most of the time, when folks do that, they don’t hear back. So you get lost in the shuffle. Like you cannot get career growth, you kind of get mentorship. These are long-term engagements, and you’re working on exciting products. So that was good about them. The hard part was you never heard back. It’s hard to get noticed.

On the flip side, there used to be these marketplace companies, which were easy to get on, and the jobs were easy to get. You can post a job on some of these marketplaces. You might get a gig here or there, but these are gigs, not real jobs, like not jobs that contribute to your career growth. You don’t get good mentorship. Often you’re not working on the most important part of the product. You might be working on something on the site that people don’t care about much.

The third used to be. You could go work for like an IT services giant. The good thing is these are easy to get. But you’re not directly working with the companies. You’re working for the middle person. So we thought we could create a new category of work where we give people the benefits of each of these without none of the cons. 

What if you had access? What if you could work for Coinbase or Rivian? You could work for Johnson & Johnson directly on their core products and have long-term engagements, career growth, community, etc. It’s a model that combines all of the benefits with none of the cons. Have you had the flexibility to take time off between engagements? Why we build – to satisfy that goal. 

And people value the work we do on our community side to help our engineers uplevel their career growth. We have programs where we help them learn how to interview better, work on their soft skills, and work on their leadership skills – recommending what skills are in demand that they could learn to grow their value in the industry to get promoted faster.

So we want to give people like this guidance to be the sort of jet pack on their back to help them reach the heights they’re truly capable of achieving.

Dan

What have some of your biggest learnings been regarding building teams?

Jonathan Siddharth

I would distill this into three significant learnings. First, building teams is being intentional about the job description. You are starting to hire for a role – it may sound obvious, but often the most significant times when we’ve had challenges is when that initial job spec wasn’t super clear in terms of what we were looking for in this role in this person. So spending time being clear on who we are looking for to do what role and how we will measure success, making sure that’s defined very well upfront. So that’s number one.

The second learning is that  I would go back to our earlier chat on hiring for culture. And it only starts when you write it down. It’s not OK to just look for the person to do the job. Are they going to be a good culture fit for Turing? Do they get on well with other people on our team? We also look to do at least two back-channel reference checks for every exec-level role we hire. I think that that is important.

And the third learning for me is to –particularly for leadership and executive level roles – stay very close to the person for the first two to three months. I try not to give them a ton of responsibility too quickly. And it’s one of those things that requires a little bit of a lack of a better word, a top-down push where the person, particularly in leadership roles, I feel like the person may feel like they are ready at a particular stage sooner than you may know they are. 

And there would probably be a phase where the person probably feels like they have sufficient context, but you have more context about what they know to kind of stay close to the person for the first two to three months to ensure they’re successful, I think is key.

So number one is being clear on the job description and what you require them to do. Then, how are you going to measure success? The second is making sure that a good fit for the culture and stage of the company. And third is, staying close to the person in the first two to three months. 

Regarding the culture piece, I think I will be hiring a hundred inferior versions of this person. It’s going to be an army of this person. So the leader often becomes the ceiling for the function. So are you hiring people with a high enough ceiling so that they can attract amazing people? And the leaders also model what good performance is to their organization. 

So if you have like a hundred people who will be lesser clones of this person in terms of their ability to contribute, would you be happy with that? I think that’s a sound check.

You build teams by building leaders, by hiring leaders. So you want to make sure that the leaders, the template of the leader, is precisely the one you want a lot of copies made in your company.

Dan

I like that. And if there’s one thing you could wave a magic wand at and fix when it comes to building and leading tech teams – what would that be?

Jonathan Siddharth

My advice to any founder is that hiring speed matters with tech teams. And you’re going to hire the right engineering team fast by casting a planet-wide net. So I find companies sometimes being overly restrictive regarding where they hire, which always hurts the company. Your goal is to build a product that makes your customers happy and moves the metrics for the business. 

And you want to do that as fast as possible so that you can grow as quickly as possible. And the biggest stumbling block can be the speed of hiring. If you’re hiring one engineer a month when you should have been hiring five, that can profoundly impact your ability to compete with companies with better hiring velocity.

So my advice would be to be very thoughtful about which countries your team is in. A 4-hour time zone overlap is all that’s needed for an engineering team. If not, you are losing out on great people unnecessarily because a lot of engineering time is spent inside a code editor, GitHub, Slack or JIRA, or tools like that. So a 4-hour overlap for tech teams is acceptable. 

If you look at crypto or the open source movement, it’s a testament that distributed teams work with primarily asynchronous collaboration. So my advice would be to look for a 4-hour overlap. Other than that, cast as planet-wide net as you can so that you find genuinely great people. Tech teams are no different from other teams in that what makes a great team is a great leader who sets the right culture. 

As the founder, you can’t ensure that every IC on the team performs at the level they need to. You need great leaders. So I would recommend having an engineering manager, director of engineering, or head of engineering who’s hands-on.

At Turing, we have a culture where the leader is usually the best engineer in the team and is also good at managing the team. That way, they can unblock their team, which can help them identify and make the right architecture, systems, and design decisions so that the company moves critically in the right direction.

So I would say the two pieces of advice would be to cast a wide net, have a 4-hour overlap for distributed teams, and ensure you have a hands-on engineering manager. I think for a tech team today, I would split it into engineering product and data science; usually, design is in the product. You also want a tech team collaborating well with their peer organizations. 

You want an engineering team that can be an excellent partner to product and a strong partner to data science. You want a data science team that can be an exceptional partner to product, a good partner to engineering, and data science is a somewhat new function that didn’t exist in this form maybe five years, even ten years ago, for sure. Perhaps even five years ago. So it’s essential to clarify the boundaries for who makes what types of decisions, like, what is data science responsible for? What is engineering responsible for? What is product responsible for?

And when you are building a team, you might want to think through that more carefully. This new tech category of data engineering is now different from data science at Turing. We have data engineering under data science. As a result, we need to be very thoughtful about who defines the data layer in a company, which defines the database, which defines the nature of the metrics being tracked, the events being logged, the schema for a dashboard that you build, and who determines where the database sits, where the servers are located. 

So you kind, when you’re building a tech team, you want to be thoughtful about not just your team but your engineering team, your data science, data engineering team, and your product team, and how you split responsibilities between them.

Dan

A couple of light-hearted questions to bring our chat to a close today. First, is there anything you’re super passionate about? Something you find unapologetic amounts of joy in – this can, of course, be professional, personal, or both!

Jonathan Siddharth

Thank you, Dan, for that question. One thing that gives me joy is working on my continuous improvement. I want to wake up a little better every day than I was the next day. So I have a long list of areas for that. I want to up-level myself in places I want to improve at that I actively work on. And I always feel happy when I work on something related to my improvement. And these things compound over time. there’s a lot of value in it.

On the personal side, spending time with my wife and my one-month-old daughter is a huge source of joy and fun. Besides that, I love being at the cutting edge of machine learning. So I love reading up and playing with some of the most recent machine learning frameworks, just building things for fun.

That’sat’s interestiIt’sIt’s been so great chatting with you today. I enjoyed our conversation. I appreciate the time. So thank you very much for being on our podcast.

Jonathan Siddharth

Likewise, Dan, I enjoyed our conversation as well, and for Founders, there’s no better time to build a startup from anywhere in the world. You can fundraise from anywhere. You can hire a team from anywhere. It doesn’t matter where you are based anymore. So I wish you the best of luck in building your companies.

And if you need to hire engineers, do check out Turing!

Featured Image Credit: Provided by the Author; Thank you!

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In this after-show, Kat Hu, from our Chief of Staff team, and I, Jonathan Siddharth, CEO, and Founder of Turing,  discuss the main takeaways from our most recent TDLS episode with David Zhang, Partner at TCV.

You may enjoy watching this After-Show episode here.

As always, the full text of the discussion is below.

Kat Hu

Welcome to our podcast on scaling unicorns in a remote-first world. We’re going to reflect on today’s conversation with David Zhang. from TCV. What are your thoughts on how that call go? What learnings you’ve learned?

Jonathan Siddharth

Yeah, it was a fun chat. I am glad we are doing this aftershow on what was interesting from that chat. I think for our first question, I found David’s responses super interesting on what companies are doing differently, given the shift in the macroeconomic climate. What stuck with me was his three main comments. 

One was this is the time to “lean in and get fit” for most companies. 

The second was the focus on the quality of growth. It was interesting how for TCV, the quality of growth is not a temporary phenomenon that you just started thinking about in 2022. It seems to have been a part of their investing ethos for a while.

Third, being just being thoughtful about scenario planning. It was interesting that David called it different shades of red for what could happen and making sure your team is right-sized in the various areas. So, that stuck out to me. What about you?

Kat Hu

Along those lines, I saw so many parallels between what he said and what we see in Turing—of what we’re focusing on, how we’re navigating, the macro shifts, and focusing on quality. He talked about things like team development and building a world-class team, I know that’s something that you’ve been focused on, and we’re proud to have that at Turing today.

And something else that I found interesting was similar to the discussion with Sandesh. He said the most critical thing for CEOs who are scaling is balancing doing what you’re already doing well and looking at the horizon to catch the next S-curves and frontiers.

Jonathan Siddharth

Yeah, that’s right. But, again, I was reminded of our focus on teams. Sandesh also had that same comment, where you have to be good at what you’ve always been good at. And you have to keep doing it while looking out for the next wave.

It was also good advice to ensure that even in that post-product market fit scaling phase when you’re very close to product innovation, ensuring the product velocity is high and staying close to customers is essential. 

Kat Hu

Yeah, for sure. I think having that cycle and that feedback is what we hear over and over again. It’s important, and hearing about how you do it with your emails is excellent tactical advice.

Jonathan Siddharth

Yeah, and it was also interesting to hear his thoughts on board meetings as to how you would run board meetings. What are some ways to make them more productive?

Kat Hu

Yeah, it was interesting that other companies are thinking of similar topics at board meetings. David mentioned that on top of people’s minds are scenario planning, tracking growth quality, and ensuring we are doing the right thing regarding the team. It’s encouraging that what he says about building the right team for a company parallels what we are doing within Turing. It’s validating that many other companies are thinking about the same things during this time. 

One thing in terms of scenario planning that I found interesting was he didn’t just mention the various shades of red but highlighted the two frameworks. One. How do you survive? Two. How do you thrive? It makes you think of all the category leaders in the past who, during similar times of red. It’s more important now than ever to wonder how they did it and consider incorporating that into our strategy. 

Jonathan Siddharth

Yeah. And it’s not just about surviving but also about having a strategy where you thrive in a storm.

He mentioned having strategy first, followed by execution, having board meetings to track how execution is happening on the agreed-upon strategy tightly, and ensuring that companies have an intellectually sound approach to measure success. And being asked how we are tracking relative to the success metrics that we set for ourselves, in some cases, if we need more data, then how can we go and collect more data to know whether or not we can validate our hypothesis? But it is too early to tell. We will probably figure it out later.

Kat Hu

Yeah, and again going back to scenario planning, what he said what I thought was pretty wise is when you have these scenarios planned. Then, amid all these other external stressors, you can just focus on execution and focus on continuing on your path because you’ve already mapped out these different scenarios.

Jonathan Siddharth

That’s right. And it’s interesting David also shared about the Sequoia deck. In Silicon Valley, there is often a group thing where everybody is looking for one simple formula, something to tell them what to do, like the silver bullet. But, unfortunately, there are no silver bullets, and there’s no one size fits all. 

Ashu from Foundation would say the same thing, which is too often, there are these prescriptive pieces of advice that just get parroted around, and people sometimes tend to apply them without thinking. It might be the right advice for a specific type of company at a particular stage, but some advice is not universally applicable. 

Kat Hu

Yeah, during your conversation, I noticed you were nodding many times. The two of you seem to align on many points. One other item I was thinking about was inflection points for Turing and companies at scale during this kind of time in the macro environment. 

It was so interesting to hear different examples of these companies that have pivoted or changed in drastic ways that sometimes not everyone sees but have a significant payoff. Have you thought that much about some companies or Turing?

Jonathan Siddharth

Yeah, I mean, one way I think about it is that there could be big inflection points happening in the macro environment that could be an opportunity to do something new, so let’s call them external triggers. But, also, there could be internal triggers that you’ve identified and some new disruptive things you could do and pursue. 

To me, in the external bucket, I kind of see the Netflix shift from DVDs to streaming. The world was switching to streaming, Internet videos were getting better and better, and the browsers were getting better at streaming stuff. 

For us at Turing, there were these external shifts like the pandemic, which was a big inflection point for remote work. And that accelerated the world’s transition to remote work by at least five years. So I think those are some of these external triggers, and you can’t control them. And when they happen, you want to recognize that there’s an opportunity for you and understand if you position the right way relative to that shift.

Then there are internal pushes where you feel like there is something disruptive, some new business that you can bring to market. And here, I am reminded of Amazon launching AWS, a big needle-moving business for them. 

Turing’s focus on teams is like that, and there could be more. For these inflection points, sometimes I try to answer the question of why now? Did something happen now that just makes this the right time to do something like this? Why hasn’t it been done before, and I separate that into the internal and external and try to think about what’s the next internal thing that we could do that could move the needle for the business? It does take time to reflect, and this is why our exact off-sites are helpful when you have some time to breathe, pause and reflect. It’s hard to do this in our weekly exact syncs or monthly business reviews.

Kat Hu 

Yeah, totally. I think that’s a good call. There could be times to reflect quarterly, and off-site is a good medium for that.

Jonathan Siddharth

Yeah, anything you took away from for your future company after Turing goes public?

Kat Hu

I liked his recommendations. I searched up Pedro Franceschi, and there was this article about “what I learned about people that scale,” I am excited to read more about his Medium post. It’s helpful to have frameworks to be more efficient, productive, or successful in specific ways.

Jonathan Siddharth

Yeah, that’s right. That’s a good catch, and on that, I think we can close our after-show. This was a fun conversation, and thank you, everyone, for joining us!

Please Enjoy Watching the Complete Video Here.

The post Turing Distinguished Leader Series: After-Show Episode Two appeared first on ReadWrite.

How to Scale Unicorns With Partner David Zhang, TVC

The theme of this episode is how to scale unicorns. Joining us for this episode is our partner David Zhang, Partner at TCV ((Technology Crossover Ventures). He focuses on investments in fintech, the internet, and software.

Jonathan Siddharth 

I’m excited to welcome David Zhang from TCV. We’ll have a fun conversation over the next 40-45 minutes. Welcome, David.

Here is the full YouTube — Please enjoy this episode: How to Scale Unicorns

And before we get started, could you share a little about TCV and what got you into venture investing?

David Zhang

I’m a partner at TCV, which we founded in 1996. We’re a crossover fund. We’ve been doing this for almost 30 years. 

So, think of the typical two founders with a pitch book in a garage. That’s not what we do. Instead, that’s the sort of pre-series-A investment where companies or founders have visions of where they think there are underserved market needs, and they’re coming up with something super excited to try to solve that. 

That’s not what we do. We come in after a product has landed and found product market fit and has some escape velocity. So we would invest in any conventional series B’s through public offerings. 

And, I think to go back to your question, Jonathan, on how I got to venture, I broadly stumbled upon it, if you will. I have been in and around technology for over ten years. I founded a startup years ago, and that’s how I started getting a taste of it. The startup didn’t work out, but I found ways to be around it, whether it was on the sales side in Goldman for a few years. And then, I also invested in tech companies as a public markets investor for several years before. 

Jonathan Siddharth

Sounds great. What’s your opinion on what’s happening in public markets and the ripple effect on private markets? How does that translate into advice that you give to your startups? I’m sure many of your startups are relatively large companies in the unicorn stage and beyond. What guidance for your portfolio companies?

David Zhang

Yeah, it’s undoubtedly an interesting time. It’s interesting for a bunch of reasons. 

I think everyone’s like the sky is falling. So many people think it’s doomsday and what’s super interesting about it is that narrative has completely turned if you just rewind the clock. A year ago, it was the complete opposite, right? Things were never rosier. We were at the tip of a bull market, and it was like the party wasn’t going to stop, right? It was like there was no end in sight. 

And now it’s like, gosh, the sky is falling, and it’s the opposite narrative. There’s a lot of fear in the market. So the broader issue is that two things need to be parsed separately. 

One is the investor sentiment, which is what I just described. 

The other is that investor sentiment is changing because there appear to be potential fundamental cracks in the economy. We haven’t seen any systemic collapses or big pockets of the economy get entirely decimated, but there are certainly worries about those things happening. And a big part of that trends and signals portend potential calamity, right? So inflation is always one where it’s not fun. There can be all kinds of different knock-on effects from it. So that’s the big one, obviously, with the geopolitical tensions, not just Russia and Ukraine. But broader geopolitical and economic instability.

I’m trying to be optimistic. There are a lot of worries, but it doesn’t feel like the economy has collapsed. 

If the market hits a severe downturn, how long will it last? And what happens in that scenario? There is a bunch of conventional wisdom out there, and one of them that’s super trendy is to make sure you have three years of cash runway, right? 

Sequoia sent out this deck. I’m sure you guys have probably seen it too. Anything that goes around just gets circulated like wildfire. It’s almost like the venture community is almost like an influencer bubble. 

In my humble view, there’s a danger in providing a one-size fits all type of advice. I think every company’s portfolio is different, so they’re all different sizes, different stages, different geographies, different cash positions, and different market leadership positions. 

I will say the one thing we tell all our portfolio companies is to get fit and lean in. So the “get fit” part of it is whatever your circumstances are today, lean inwards a little bit, do some introspection, and figure out which part of the house requires some cleaning up.

Good CEOs will look inside and say: “Hey, maybe we’ve been hiring a little bit too much during the sugar rush phase of the pandemic, and what does that mean for performance management? Have we become soft? Can we squeeze out more from folks that we’ve hired, and are there things that maybe we have completely neglected? Can now use the opportunity to right-size it or improve it?”

Indeed, if you don’t have enough cash, I would almost say you should always have three years of cash runway. So this is becoming the number one piece of advice on the street. And it is kind of silly because that was always supposed to be the case, so if you don’t have that, you better get it now, that’s for sure. 

And then you know, the lean in part is that if you’re a market leader, for example, and your house is in order, and things are going well, how do you use this opportunity to separate yourself from the pack? Chaos often creates some of the best opportunities, so we tend to back category leaders. And so, as part of our DNA, we say if you are in a decent spot now, this is the time. Others are going to be potentially suffering. So how do you use this chance to kind of really break away?

Jonathan Siddharth 

Yeah, that was super insightful. I like the get fit and lean in. I feel the same way, and at least for me, from Turing’s perspective, we were in a Blitzscaling phase, where in Reed Hoffman’s terms, where you prioritize speed over efficiency in moments of uncertainty. And now, I think there is a shift that we’re seeing where everyone prioritizes efficient growth and scaling a lot more than before. So such things as contribution margin, burn multiples, GTM efficiency, and ROI of different marketing teams become more important.

Do you feel the same way and think the focus on efficiency of growth is more important than just pure top-line growth? So first, we were much more sort of with a high growth rate, and we did not even care about how we got the revenue when we got it. And now we are much more careful about revenue quality revenues. Would you say that? 

David Zhang

Yeah! I love the candor there, Jon, and it’s very true. I think you characterize it super well. So there’s a product side and a business side. 

The beauty of software, in general, is that you have this concept of MVP. Building a business around software has always been different. When you’re building a business around something, you’re monetizing something. You’re going out to acquire customers. You are creating something around it. 

We’ve always thought about that. And this is one of the pillars we talk about internally, but also to our founders. All the companies we invest in have a similar value alignment, and we call this quality of growth. So this has always been our most significant focus area, whether in 2022, 2021, or 2001. 

But with quality of growth, the centering question has always been, how do you grow as quickly as possible without sacrificing underlying unit economics? So having just growth is not enough. You need to have as high quality as possible. 

So I’ll give an example. We led the investment in a new bank, their Series F, in 2019.

Now they’re a public company, and they’re a great example of high-quality growth. So they have about 60 million customers now, and they have a view of the net present value of each customer when they’re onboarding them and their models to show it. So they have quantifiable risk profiles and ultimately map them to lifetime value, right? 

And these things are dynamic as they see real-time signals from how customers behave when they’re paying back bills. You know, when they’re loading up the phone and stuff like that. The vast majority of their customer acquisition is word of mouth. So they acquire customers with very little pocket expense. 

When you put those two things together, you get high-quality customers, high LTV, and acquisition at super low costs. So that’s an example of the quality of growth by not just blind growth. They are also growing at a crazy speed on those dimensions, but the quality underlying it is also really high. 

Jonathan Siddharth

Yeah, yeah. That’s great, David. How do you measure the quality of growth? Do you have other efficiency metrics that you look at when you evaluate businesses to check the quality of growth and the quality of the revenues? 

David Zhang

Customers come in, and they leave, or they stay. If they love something, they typically stay. And you know, a cost goes out with an acquisition, so whether it’s hiring a salesperson, commissions, or paying Google. Sometimes you don’t pay them at all. They call them word of mouth. So all these are different ways to acquire customers. And those customers must bring some kind of value to you, right? 

So if you break it down to those three components, the first is how are you acquiring a customer? That’s number one.

And then the number two question is, are they staying? Because if you’re acquiring customers, but they’re leaving at a fast pace, then you have a leaky bucket. So is this a one-time acquisition or a multiple-time acquisition to get the person to that door?

And then finally, it’s doing the math on the value. Whether it’s $3 or $3,000 can make sense depending on what that person eventually pays you back.

The conventional LTV CAC is generally used for subscription-type businesses where things tend to be more of a recurrent nature. The numbers don’t always tell the whole story if you dig deeper. But stuff like retention is super important. So how sticky are your customers, and can you break that down to customer retention? You can break that down into the inverse of that churn. You can break that down to revenue retention because different types of models, whether subscription, usage-based, or transactional, will have different retention metrics. 

And then you have LTV that can be measured by knowing if customer sticks for two years, three years, or five years, and during that time, how did they grow with you? And what is the associated economic value that comes with that? 

And that’s the fourth piece is more qualitative than quantitative, is how you’re monetizing. Do you think one way is more sustainable than the others? So your way of monetizing your business does factor into quality. So the quality of growth has implications on the revenue stream’s sustainability.

Jonathan Siddharth 

That makes sense, David. And in board meetings that you have today, are there any topics you see coming up for discussion that perhaps didn’t come up one or two quarters back?

What is your primary advice to companies that still have to adapt to what may come? I would love to hear your advice for companies of these types.

David Zhang 

Here’s the first one. I think many companies are now starting to do scenario planning. So they’re like: “Hey, if the economy goes to different shades of red, are we well positioned to survive?”

And then the next question is: “Are we well positioned to thrive? Are we well positioned to emerge even better? So depending on where you are in this stage of that discussion, or that preparedness, if you will, it typically marches through that sequence.

The second one is talking about the quality of growth again. We’ve always centered around that, but what’s changing this time? We were very sure before. So, let’s make doubly sure this time. So, ensure your quality of growth is super solid.  Doing this allows you to be confident about your path without being distracted: “Hey, is this working? Or is it going to come back to bite me later?”

And then the third is the team. And so a lot of it is performance management. You need to know all the people I’ve hired or the people I’m about to hire, whether up and down the stack, people in the engineering team, people on the C-suite management team, and what we expect from them. So narrow the focus to ensure we know what we’re trying to play for.

And in times like this, there are opportunities because many companies are in this trend. Later stage, public companies are right-sizing their teams, so there are many opportunities out there. So just keep an eye out; depending on your growth stage, it could be reasonably attractive. So it’s important not to lose talent.

Jonathan Siddharth

Cool, David. And, if you think of a company’s journey as a sort of there is that 0-1 phase, i.e., finding product-market fit stage. And then you have that early traction where you’ve hired your early team, and you’re in that one to 10 million revenue type run. And then there is the 10 million plus scaling stage at which many post-unicorn companies are likely at.

In your mind, what is different in the way companies need to operate in that post-unicorn stage? 

David Zhang

Yeah, that’s a great question. I love how you’re very clear about the centering metrics in your mind with revenues, which reflect scale. 

You know, a lot of times, what we hear is: “Hey, what does the company do is $5 billion of equity value is $10 billion.” That’s a valuation number and pricing number. There are billion-dollar startups that have a later stage of maturity than the $10 billion company, right? Like that happens. 

And so that’s exactly how we see it. We think of it much more in terms of how many employees does the company have? What’s the revenue scale? 

So I think of it as a company’s lifecycle, and a few qualitative stages are important. We have multiple companies in our portfolio. But different companies fall into different stages.

The first one is the pre-product-market fit which we don’t do. 

Then the post-product-market fit is what we discussed as growing and naturally hyper-growth. And then, every product that business matures at some point. So, in that hyper-growth phase, we don’t think about [these things], but going from series B to series E needs a lot more. I’ll give you examples.

Amazon today is still unlocking different S curves, small ones or big ones along the way. So from when they founded the company three decades ago, there are still arguably some parts of the business in hyper-growth, and some are not. 

And so, the point is, we often talk about second X or new S curves for every product that matures in parallel with the core business or core product or business that’s in hyper-growth. 

And so, Amazon with AWS is the most prolific example. They started with the core merchant business, and suddenly, they have a consumer business; where did that come from?

The company is still innovating and unlocking new curves. They’re still in hyper-growth if you will. And then, finally, when all the growth spurts and S curves slow down and die down, the company matures. 

And at this point, the company has reached its full potential. So if it’s a great company, it’ll grow slower but at a very healthy compounding rate. And they will hopefully produce or prioritize profit margins if the economics work. So that’s how we see the growth phase. The growth phase is the most exciting in the entire lifecycle of a company because of the explosion of innovation and growth. And that is where I spend all my time at TCV. That is our specialty. And we’ve been doing that for three decades.

Our advice to our founders is that they’re underpinned by a few pillars we discussed. So the quality of growth is number one. That’s something that we have been centering around forever.

The team is super important. Ten out of ten times, the path from a promising startup to achieving greatness as a company depends on whether or not a co-founder can surround themself with what we’d like to call a world-class team. 

The team is not just an effort of one super soldier but like the impact of an army. It’s a skill. And so, in the growth phase as a co-founder, you start spending a disproportionate amount of your energy on team quality. It is essential to recognize that the team and the bench you build around you are super important, but most people don’t realize that working on their ability to attract talent is vital. So even if you recognize it, it doesn’t mean you can do it right.

And then the third one is keeping your eye on the S curves. I’m going to describe a few conflicting statements in there. But you will appreciate why it’s kind of interesting.

This subject relates to some of the stuff we discussed early on S curves and examples. It’s a very tough balance because, on the one hand, as a co-founder, 200 percent of your focus needs to be on the core product and mission.

Suppose you dropped the ball in that – game over. But if you’re doing it right, these new opportunities and perspectives will often l emerge with the organic evolution. And they can be big ass curves that mark inflection points and even be needle moving. So how do you focus on scaling your core product and business to its full potential while not being distracted by new shiny objects? 

It’s very different for every company in every category. So many things are path-dependent. But often, it comes down to this delicate balance between visionary and execution. And the very, very best CEOs have this unique mix of both qualities of vision and execution. Such CEOs can orchestrate a team around them to achieve both simultaneously. So if you’re good at one, how do you make sure that the other gets done, whether or not it’s you that’s driving it, or you have a great team that’s driving? 

Jonathan Siddharth 

That was super interesting, David. It’s somewhat paradoxical and something I think about a lot. How do you work on maximizing the fullest potential of the current business and not skipping a beat while looking for that next S curve? 

I’m reminded of Apple in a sense. In the early days, the iPod to iPhone transition. It was tough, right? I mean, even after the iPhone, you could argue that the iPad and Apple Watch were kind of good, but not as good as the previous one. And it’s a balancing act to sort of keep optimizing the current machine to its fullest hilt and go while continuously running a background process for the next step function shift. 

What are the most common pitfalls you see companies make in that post-product-market fit scaling stage? 

David Zhang 

The number one danger is losing sight of the product and your customers. And so, what you got here in the first place won’t get you to the next stage. And that’s the theme that we’ve been focused on this entire podcast, but at the same time, there are specific primitives you can never let go of.

There are some truisms. And one of them is your product. 

Most of the companies that we invest in are product-driven companies. They are often the market leader not because of market positioning, but they are the market leader because they have the best product in the market. Their product is better, faster, and cheaper. And a lot of times, there are technological underpinnings. That’s the secret sauce.

When I say losing sight of things, I mean the culture and the ingredients for product innovation and velocity. Those things generally tend to portend success. And people often say: “My product is flying off the shelf. I never had to focus on building a sales team. Now I’m going to amass A killer sales force with a CRO of XYZ background. And we’ll go out and ensure we’re getting our stuff out through the channels.” But in all of this, you forget about your product, right? The core product itself needs to keep innovating. 

You must consider how your company and customers are evolving with the market. How many times has your company, your product catalyzed behavioral change? Customers are never satisfied. They will grow their expectations, so can you keep up with that pace of delivering a magical user experience? 

And that is the key, right? If you focus too much on other stuff, you can get the best sales team and efficiency metrics in the world. But if you forget about making your product much better than anyone else, and if the innovation slows down, it’ll catch up with you over time.

Jonathan Siddharth

That’s excellent advice. Sometimes when you get too large, you look at many spreadsheets, dashboards, and metrics. And there is a risk that you may lose touch with the product, the roadmap, and your customers, right? 

This is something I think about a lot, and one of the things I love doing is I send emails to all our customers who sign up for the first two weeks of the product, and I just have a conversation with them about how their first how their experience with Turing has been.

And I find I’m blown away by how detailed their responses are. People send me these long emails about what they want to see in the product. 

And I’ve never written an email to a company CEO saying: “Hey, can you build this, can you do that?” But it’s incredible how responsive customers are if you just ask. So we take this as a crucial input source when considering what we put in our product roadmap. What do we build next? 

And some of our customers say: “I’d love to hop on a Zoom and share more thoughts in more detail.” I’m blown away because these are C-suite-type folks who are directors of engineering or heads of engineering who want to hire engineers.

David Zhang

You know precisely the spirit of what I’m saying! Right. So a lot of companies track NPS or CSAT. Those are the two scores to understand how customers are feeling. So, if there’s any drop in satisfaction or other negative trends, that’s a warning sign. 

So you just got to make sure they’re super happy. The hard part is getting to the minds of their minds and understanding their experience, how it’s evolving, and how there might be pockets of underserved needs that are emerging already exists that you can solve. If you don’t solve that today, or you don’t produce that surplus value, that becomes a lost opportunity. And if that grows over time, customers will want more. That’s just how the journey is. 

Jonathan Siddharth

Yeah, that’s right. And David, I have one final question. And then I’m going to ask Kat from our Chief of Staff team to ask a question. My last question is, execution is essential in this product-market market fit and scaling phase. So having a good cadence is important. I liked this phrase, “Step by step, ferociously.” And also someone who said his goal was to build an operationally fearsome company.

Board meetings are an excellent way to ensure the company execution marches to a very tight beat. How do you like to run board meetings? What is your TCB POV on board meetings for companies in that crucial post-product-market fit scaling stage? What topics do you tend to discuss for maximum impact? 

David Zhang 

That’s a great question. What we focus on is having a handle on the pulse on how you’re tracking execution. So execution is often an output of strategy as well as focus. 

You’re not going to succeed in everything you do, right? So, the first thing we always try to do, whether it is board members, investors, or even just friends, is to advise how that when they’re about to start something, they should also try to think about what success looks like. The best way to do this is to keep things as simple as possible and not complicate them. But, in addition, it’s crucial to have the discipline to reflect on that all the time. 

So I have launched a product for six months or even three months. The easy answer would be: “Okay, things seem to be going well. Let’s give it another year.” The good executors will say: “Yeah, we have enough data points from 6 months. If we don’t have enough data points, let’s find them and be critical of why we succeeded. And how does that affect the original Northstar? Whether it’s their KPIs or broad strokes qualitative outcomes. Whether it is a stop or a do more. And having that very disciplined but also frequent feedback loop is critical.

Jonathan Siddharth

That’s great insight, David. We think the same way. So, the first question we ask is: “What does success look like?” Sometimes you have a way to estimate it. Sometimes you don’t. So, it’s always good to have that benchmark baseline to know if we’ve succeeded or failed. 

I’m now going to invite Kat from our Chief of Staff team to ask you a question.

Kat Hu 

Hello, David. So you’ve touched on inflection points in the past. You mentioned it a bit here in terms of S curves. Could you share more about how you think about inflection points for companies in the scaling phase?

David Zhang

Yeah. So if you think of a company as a living, breathing creature, that’s how I like to describe companies. So, many times the metaphor for inflection points would probably be these crossroads in a person’s life, which precedes the change in opportunities, right? 

So, for example, physical growth spurts, new jobs, moving countries, and cities. So like those big moments. That’s the metaphor for inflection points for a company. I’ll give you two examples to bring this to life. 

I love using specific companies in our portfolio for a while now. So the first one is Netflix. Suppose you trace the history of Netflix, which we’ve invested in since 1999 and are still one of the largest shareholders. Netflix was originally a DVD mail-to-home business. I don’t remember the last time I saw a DVD, but that’s how they started. And then, in 2011, they announced this plan to split as mail and streaming services. And they required customers to pay for two subscriptions if they wanted both DVDs and streaming, hoping that people would move to streaming.

That was a strategic decision. Looking back on this, it would have also allowed Netflix to invest more heavily in content needed to drive the subscription business. At least that was the thinking. But customers weren’t happy. The churn rate increased, and then the stock plummeted by 70 percent. That’s an interesting inflection point in the company’s life. At least at TCV, we thought: “Hey, streaming is a potential form factor inflection that will fundamentally alter consumer behavior.”

That’s very clear today. It wasn’t apparent at that point. That was our chance to invest. So we added $200 million of fresh capital to Netflix and its vision to double down on streaming. And so that’s one example of inflection.

I’ll go to the bank which we talked about before. They started with a credit card product. Their second product was this company banking account with savings and checking. When we invested in it, this product had just launched. So we spend a lot of time understanding the product. We thought, gosh, this is a super significant development. We felt that even though it’s not being monetized today, it had the potential to be the center of gravity of workflow. 

We believed this thing would be able to unlock a multi-product distribution and really strengthen the business mode. So, we looked at this product and said: “This is an inflection point for the company. It will go to multi-product because of this, or it has that potential.”

People thought at that time were like: “Gosh. $10 billion.” But that was the price we were paying because we understood this inflection point.

Kat Hu

Both were fascinating examples. Do you have any books, podcasts, or blog posts that you recommend to CEOs thinking about growth in their startup?

David Zhang

Yeah, too many. Some of these are victims of recency bias. Frank Slootman’s Amp It Up is an excellent book. It’s not just not growth, but it’s also leadership. There is an audio podcast called ‘Invest Like the Best.’ I think many people follow, at least in my echo chambers. 

There are blogs that I read. So Stratechery by Ben Thompson is pretty good. Pedro Franceschi, the co-founder of Brex, has a Medium blog, where he writes about the company and its products along with his journey with mental health. He also shares profound thoughts on how people scale. 

And yeah, there’s probably a list of 50 others, and I can share that with you via email.

Jonathan Siddharth

Thank you, David. I enjoyed this conversation. 

Watch the complete interview.

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Thank you for the phenomenal response to Turing Distinguished Leader Series. Looking at the success of our sessions, we’ve come up with an exciting after-show format. In the after-show, we will discuss the main takeaways from our most recent TDLS episode.

You may enjoy watching this After-Show episode here. As always, the full text of the discussion is below.

Jonathan Siddharth

Welcome, everybody. So this is our after-show to our podcast on scaling unicorns in a remote-first world. I have with me Kat Hu from our Chief of Staff team. I’m Jonathan Siddharth, CEO, and founder of Turing, and we’re going to reflect on today’s conversation with Sandesh Patnam from Premji Invest on scaling unicorns in a remote-first world.

Kat, what stood out to you in the chat with Sandesh today?

Kat Hu

Yeah, I’m excited to get started! But, first, Sandesh was so insightful and gave a lot of wisdom for scaling startups from his vantage point with about a decade of experience in venture capital. One thing that stood out was how he emphasized that culture is essential for leadership as startups get scaled.

And then Jonathan, turning it back to you. I know culture is also very important at Turing. How have you thought about the culture at Turing, especially with it being a remote-first company?

Jonathan Siddharth

Yeah. Sandesh’s point on culture resonated with me. And the first thing I thought about was the need to write things down in terms of your culture or what you’d like your culture to be. For a high-growth company like Turing, there’s so much culture we import relative to the size of the company. I feel like if you don’t write down the kind of company you want to build, sometimes things get set by accident. So then I think a lot about when it comes to cultures.

Step one is thinking through the culture, core values, and how you want people in the company to work, make decisions, and write them down. Step two, the harder part, is to communicate and ensure that the culture you want is the culture being lived in the company.

For example, at Turing, we have a culture of moving fast, working only on big needle-moving things, not incremental things, and being very data-driven in our decision-making. So I think a lot about how we reinforce that in our hiring, firing, and promoting. Do we live those values? Or is it just a doc that lives somewhere the CEO wrote a long time back that people just read, and that’s it?

I’m curious about how you see the second piece of the puzzle? Do you think we live those values at Turing today? What do you see as things that we could do better?

Kat Hu

So I do think that culture does come from leadership, and something that I’ve seen that works well at Turing; hopefully, this advice can help other companies as well, is that you host the CEO roundtables. And this is, for many of the team’s leadership, where we transparently talk about this culture.

And I think another thing that is strange here is you’ve asked everyone to bring in the best of somewhere else that they’ve worked and see how we can make it Turing. So not only are we living out our core culture, but we’re also very open-minded to find the best culture and continuously improve and grow with the team’s diversity worldwide.

Jonathan Siddharth

Yep, that’s right, Kat. I was speaking with our head of recruiting this week. And I’d shared with her that a passing grade is when somebody fits the culture we want. We have a four-point scale of strong reject, weak reject, weak accept, and strong accept. So three out of four is like you fit our culture, but we want more than that. Ideally, we want somebody who’s bringing something amazing to our culture that we can imbibe and become even stronger. That’s when you go above three.

And I think reinforcing those values in hiring is also important to ensure that your team has the values you care about. Value alignment is particularly critical for leaders because when you hire a leader, you will have many clones of this person. Whatever strengths or weaknesses they have, it’s going to be magnified and massively leveraged and amplified.

So I am much more careful about cultural fit, being more strict about holding the line on culture fit, and not hiring people who don’t fit our culture.

Kat Hu

So that relates to something else that stood out to me in our talks with Sandesh. He mentioned that at each level of scale, oftentimes, as a founder, you need to up-level or transition the leadership group. When I heard it, I thought it was a bit of a taboo or a sensitive, emotionally fraught topic. What do you think about this?

Jonathan Siddharth

Yeah, and it’s definitely a taboo topic, and Sandesh alluded to it too. CEOs tend to be loyal to the team that brought them here. And that’s a bias to be aware of.

For this particular topic, we are primarily talking about the exec team, i.e., a CEO’s directs in a company. And typically, I hear from many people that an exec’s success rate is pretty low. For example, people tell me that 50 percent of the time, you should assume an exec doesn’t work out in the first six months. I’ve heard this from multiple people and multiple VCs in the past. And it’s always an unsettling and uncomfortable stat to hear.

And the way I think about this change is there are a few mental models you can have.

One mental model I have is to do what creates business value, to ensure that the company’s value grows with the steepest possible slope. So do what’s best for the business. A high-level director ensures the company’s value increases over time. And to do that, one question to ask yourself at some time is: “If you were hiring for this role today, would you still hire this person?” That’s one way to think about it and to check whether this would work or not.

The second is that with every exec, I think about their strengths and areas for improvement and everybody has areas for improvement. Are they aware of their weakness? Are they receptive to feedback? Are they coachable?

Are they either working on it by changing the way they work or are they open to fixing it with the right kind of hiring to complement their blind spots or weaknesses, maybe? When that is not true, when the person is unaware of the gap that exists and cannot change that, I would think about either layering that person or changing the responsibilities. It’s rare that you would have to fire that person because they’ve clearly been good enough to get the company to this particular stage. Hopefully, there is a way to find another role for them that could still be value-generating for the company.

Although realistically, I imagine in most of these cases, the person would probably choose to leave if that happened. In those cases, too, the CEO needs to be grateful for all this person’s contributions to help the company get to the stage. If I were doing this with someone, I would ensure that this person has a great next job opportunity lined up, and I will do everything I could to set them up there because it is the case that some people are probably better suited. Someone could be a superstar at the zero to 50 million revenue stage, but maybe the 50 to 500 million stage is not their sweet spot because it is a different job.

Your responsibilities change. Sandesh referred to people, processes, and repeatability. And this is a different type of job. You can’t be as hands-on as you were in the zero to 50 stage, and some people may not enjoy it as much. Maybe they like the zero-to-one phase more than the one-to-two. And it’s not that they are doing anything wrong. It’s just that their strengths are at that stage. And perhaps their strength is primarily in that stage one. And then a company would love to have them at that stage one phase. So by making a solid referral, we are finding the right fit where they are happy, and it’s also good for the company. So it’s a tricky conversation to have.

Kat Hu

I think it’s great to have a framework because it’s a topic that seems so hard to touch because of the emotional aspects. And I think, as you mentioned in the interview, you’re not only doing what’s best for the company but also helping the overall shareholders. You’re supporting the whole ecosystem and ensuring they’re set up for the best thing for them, which may not be the next level of scale.

Jonathan Siddharth

That’s right, Kat! And one of the things I think about when I have conversations with leaders in a high-growth startup, people should assume that their roles will evolve and change over time. Of course, when the company is growing, you expect your scope and responsibilities to grow too if you’re doing well. But I think it’s essential for the leaders to set expectations that roles will evolve, reporting structures will change, and will constantly be in a state of continuous improvement of the org itself, perhaps twice a year or once a year.

This is because, for a company that’s growing as fast as we are, something that worked a year back may not necessarily be the right structure now. So I think it’s essential to set that expectation early, so people are not surprised. It’s healthy when a company is continuously editing itself in the best possible structure for that next growth stage and the next business phase.

Kat Hu

And then, Jonathan, as the CEO and founder of Turing, I have a few questions about being a founder. The first is when Turing is growing and scaling rapidly as it has been in the last couple of years. How do you approach your personal change? And you mentioned the shift in roles and responsibilities and even mindsets, and so, how do you grow? How do you learn this with each stage?

Jonathan Siddharth

So I kind of work backward from where I would like the company to go in terms of scale growth, etc. And then, I work backward from all the risks to plan to get there and identify all the gaps. And then I map it to address those gaps. [I also think about] what are some areas where I need to uplevel myself, and then I seek out specific mentors. And, I read a lot, as you know.

I think about working on those specific areas of scale to make sure that I’m scaling at least a couple of years ahead of the phase for the company. It gets a little more challenging as you grow and scale. I think a lot of people can give and offer great advice to go from zero to 1 million, which is an important milestone or one to 10 million.

As you grow and reach a particular scale, it feels a little bit like doing a Ph.D. in a field where, after a while, you’ve gone pretty deep down the rabbit hole in one specific area.

For many PhDs, they might be the only people in the world who are exposed to that problem. So I tried to decouple a few areas, for example, leadership, management, scaling teams, culture, and many aspects of a CEO’s role.

How do you create a plan for the company? How do you ensure excellent execution? How do you recruit great execs, and how do you retain great execs? How do you work well with a board? How do you work with your investors in the right way?

So I seek out excellent mentors for each of them, and it’s almost like I have a Yoda for each specific skill, and occasionally I make my pilgrimage to Dagobah, this island where Luke meets Yoda. So I go there, and I try to learn from people who have done this at scale, and I try to absorb as much as I can and make the changes needed to apply that to Turing’s situation.

But it’s all about the mindset of being in a state of continuous learning and continuous growth. So it has its positives and negatives where I feel like on the negative side, it may feel like you’re constantly being self-critical. So you have to balance that with reminding yourself of all the good things that are also happening with the company.

But firstly, it’s about identifying areas you need to work on for this year, function-specific mentors, books, and other resources, and being in a state of continuous learning. Whenever I meet someone, I think about what I can learn from this person. So make sure you surround yourself with people you can learn from.

Kat Hu

Yeah, and I’ve seen that. But, again, I think being open-minded and surrounding myself with really good people, so I don’t make bad decisions within the company.

Jonathan Siddharth

For example, Kat, the superpower I want to steal from you is the excellence in structured communication and structured thinking. I feel like with you, when I have a meeting, there is very little that falls through the cracks, right? There is almost perfect information capture from a meeting, so that’s one of the many things I like about working with you.

Kat Hu

I appreciate it. And then the other question I had for you as a founder is the same question posed to Sandesh. What are the most important skills or traits to develop for future founders?

Jonathan Siddharth

I think Sandesh mentioned resilience, right? I believe resilience is a great trait.

As a founder, you need a strong bias for action and speed and to be unstoppable in finding your way around obstacles. I think it requires a lot of persistence. In my first company, I learned the value of persistence. I don’t know if it’s a feature or a bug. Whatever it is, I have it. And I was fortunate to work with a great co-founder, which has been phenomenal, and it’s been great partnering with him on two companies.

My first company took about nine years to get to a good acquisition. I think persistence is essential. I think it’s important to be in a continuous learning, continuous improvement mindset, where you’re always looking for ways to keep getting better daily and week after week. You kind of have to balance confidence with caution. You need a lot of self-confidence in your ability to execute and build a great company. But you also kind of have to be constantly scanning for your blind spots. My first company’s approach was primarily like: “Here’s what we need to build, and here’s how we’re going to build it. Let’s go build it.” It was a little more of what we needed to do.

Now, I think not just about what we need to do to execute and win the market and build an iconic company, but I also think about all the things that can go wrong. I think about all the ways we can fail and make sure we have a clear risk mitigation and contingency plan so that I’m never surprised.

So, I think a lot about redundancy and fail-safes for different plans. And it may seem pretty negative to think about all of that, but it actually gives me a lot of peace of mind when I know that: “Hey, here’s our plan A, but you know if something changes here, we have this plan B, and there’s a backup to this plan B which is Plan C.”

So there is no single point of failure for anything; it reflects in many other things. I always want to be in a situation I can walk away from if things are not good. And that means building sound backup systems in planning. So in terms of what’s a trait, maybe the trait is systems-level thinking, thinking in terms of contingency planning, and surrounding yourself with great people.

I think I am fortunate to work with a great exec team and a great co-founder. So maybe the trait there is being the kind of person that strong leaders want to work for. So those would be on my list, and it does take a lot of energy and work. It’s not easy. And it’s imperative to have an excellent personal support system. My wife, Emily, is amazing. I don’t think it’s very easy to be married to a founder CEO. And I think for everyone, it’s good to have a good personal support system outside of work. So that’s something that has helped me focus clearly on Turing and help the company get to where it needs to go.

I think it’s Paul Graham of Y Combinator, he has this phrase to describe founders, and he came up with “relentlessly resourceful.” So that was his phrasing of what it takes. But we all have blind spots, and I may be missing some stuff here too. This is from my experience so far. I’m sure if you ask me the same question a year or two from now, I will have a few more things that I want to add to this.

Kat Hu

That makes sense! Was there anything else from Sandesh’s interview that stuck out to you that you want to emphasize before we wrap up?

Jonathan Siddharth

There was one thing that I thought was interesting. I asked Sandesh: “What is different in a post-unicorn scaling stage that you want people to be mindful of?” He said: “In most markets, the first 20 percent is easy to get; the next 80 percent is tough. Although there won’t be a clear line that you cross where you’re like, ‘Oh, we have to do something different now.’ You have to continuously track what will help us unlock this next more challenging market segment. In the next 80 percent, is there something different in this customer segment? Are the objections different? Does the product need to change? Does the sales process need to change? Does the GTM need to change?

Recognizing that you may need to make some changes and again, what got you here may not be what brings you to that next stage and making sure that you make the right changes to attack that. So having this nuance to growth, it’s not for margins. It’s probably stage-wise.

That made me think about being aware of it, being open to it when it happens, and keeping an eye on it. Sandesh said you must first hear and sense it in the GTM function. So I’m going to keep my eyes and ears peeled to make sure that we see that and react to it optimally.

Kat Hu

Yeah, that’s excellent advice!

Jonathan Siddharth

Yeah. Great. This was fun. This was our first after-show for these how-to-scale unicorns in a remote-first world. Do you think we should keep doing this?

Kat Hu

I enjoyed this, and I loved learning more about your perspective, diving deeper into suggestions, words, and wisdom, and making it more actionable.

Jonathan Siddharth

That sounds great! And for all founders, heads of engineering, and others listening, if you’d like to spin up your Engineering Dream Team in the cloud, hire pre-vetted engineers at the touch of a button, go to Turing.com, and that message was not sponsored, it was organic! Cool. Thank you, Kat, and we’ll continue this with our next segment.

Kat Hu

Thanks, Jonathan. Have a good one.

Jonathan Siddharth

Thanks. Bye.

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This post is sponsored by The Wearable Tech In Sport Summit, an event taking place in San Francisco on September 9–10. It reflects the views of the sponsor, not ReadWrite’s editors.

Athletes today use increasingly complex technologies to enhance performance.

We have seen considerable leaps forward in sporting performance as a direct result of technology either used during competition or in training. The big question is which technology has had the biggest impact on its respective sport?

Attend The Wearable Tech In Sport Summit, September 9-10 in San Francisco, California—use discount code “World20” to save 20%!

Below, we have listed the top five technologies that, in our view, have had the profoundest effects.

Video Technology

Several sports have adopted in-game video analysis and video refereeing.

This includes rugby, football, tennis, and even soccer. It has meant that decisions can be made quickly and accurately, allowing correct decisions to be made in more instances as these games become increasingly fair.

Many believe that this has taken some of the fun out of sports, but the truth is that it simply makes it fairer and creates a situation where players know that should they break a rule, they are far more likely to be caught.

Having several cameras around a pitch has also had a major effect on the way that players are analyzed after competition across almost every sport. The ability to look at a performance on a screen and make judgements on it has allowed coaches and analysts to look at individual elements of a performance and make decisions based on what they can see. This is then filtered into the training regimes of the athlete, allowing for better performances and better chances of success.

Portable Sensors

Cycling used to be very much a sport of feel and arbitrary judgement, riding a certain distance or climbing up a particular hill so many times was enough to prepare people for a race. Along came heart-rate monitors and people could train within particular heart-rate zones, but this was still only analyzing what the effort was doing to the body, rather than what the effort was doing for the actual performance.

When power meters came along, it allowed cyclists to train in accordance with how much power they were pushing through the pedals. Having the ability to train at a consistent level with the readings appearing on a screen in the handlebars meant that consistent power could be achieved, something that is vital in the modern day peloton.

Team Sky may not have been the first team to use power meters, but the way they utilized them changed the way that every professional team trains and has totally changed the landscape of cycling from a sport based on feelings to arguably the most number intensive sport in the world.

See ReadWrite CEO Redg Snodgrass speak at The Wearable Tech In Sport Summit—register now!

Similarly, we can see the use of GPS sensors that have allowed rugby, football, and soccer coaches to see exactly where a player is at any point during a match, then look at their movements and see how these can be changed to improve the athlete. Using GPS sensors has helped Mizzou Football develop players into NFL talent by tracking their performance in practice and games.

These kinds of sensors are also constantly evolving and getting smaller, making even more impact on performance whilst being able to pick up the most minute information. It has been predicted that soon they will be embeddable within everyday clothing, allowing for complex measurements to be taken constantly and improving analysis even further.

Since inventing the VS racket string, Babolat has changed the game of tennis. Its most renowned invention to date allows players to track and share data to improve performance through an app. Speaking at the Wearable Tech in Sport Summit on September 9 and 10 in San Francisco, hosted by Innovation Enterprise, Daniel Becker, the company’s senior marketing manager, will discuss new technology and what else they’re doing to help improve performance in sport.

Drug Testing

Tests to detect illegal drugs aren’t an individual technology as much as a collection of technologies that has changed almost every sport in the world.

Until 1999, there were small-scale, uncoordinated drug tests across individual sports, but these were fairly easily bypassed. In many sports, drug abuse to improve performance was endemic.

Since then, the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) has helped to push forward the use of drug-testing technologies to help fight the use of performance-enhancing drugs in sport. This has levelled the playing field in many sports and helped to weed out some of the biggest drugs cheats in world sport, from Lance Armstrong to Dwayne Chambers.

It has given faith in performances back to the athletes too. Before, when an outstanding individual performance occurred, many treated it with a degree of suspicion. Today, thanks to this technology, people may have doubts, but athletes can point to reliable drugs testing to show that it is a clean result.

Aerodynamics And Hydrodynamics

When elite athletes in sports that require speed and stamina perform in competition, they need to be able to do so with minimum resistance. This has been recognized across several sports today. From the materials used in swim outfits to the curves on a Formula 1 car, the understanding of aero- and hydrodynamics has allowed the performance of athletes to minimize air resistance and increase speed.

The use of aerodynamics as a decider between winning and losing was shown emphatically in the 1989 Tour de France final time trial where Greg LeMond sat in second place 50 seconds behind Laurent Fignon. He adopted aerodynamic handlebars and helmet, while Fignon did not. LeMond eventually beat Fignon by 58 seconds, winning the three-week event by only 8 seconds. Later analysis through wind-tunnel data showed that the use of the bars alone gained LeMond 1 minute and the helmet 16 seconds. Essentially if Fignon had adopted this new technology, he would have won the event.

Data Analytics

The ability to analyze millions of data points has meant that sports teams and athletes can look at the tiniest successes or failures within any performance and either recreate or remove particular conditions.

It has meant that everything that an athlete does can be interconnected and assessed to divide a performance into its individual elements, rather than as a simple whole. It has been the basis of the current obsession with marginal gains that coaches are interested in. If they can find a 0.1% improvement in any part of a performance, then this will give them a slight advantage, but if they can find this number in several areas then they can add up to a significant improvement. It was this philosophy that led the British Olympic team to much success during the past three Olympics.

This philosophy is only made possible through the use of data analytics, as it allows for the tiniest details of an athletic performance to be studied, seeing where small improvements can be made and how athletes can improve their chances of success.

Photo courtesy of Shutterstock

This post is sponsored by The Wearable Tech In Sport Summit, an event taking place in San Francisco on September 9–10. It reflects the views of the sponsor, not ReadWrite’s editors.

The post The Top 5 Technologies That Have Changed Sports appeared first on ReadWrite.