How Adobe Instils a Creative Company Culture

How Adobe Instils a Creative Company Culture As one of the leading software developers of the world, Adobe has  been praised for the strong company culture they  have grown over the years. From its humble beginnings in 1982, Adobe has grown into a multinational company, with over 13,500 employees. So whats so special about Adobes culture? Lets find out Work hard, play hard Adobe knows the importance of having fun. It takes centre stage in their company culture. There is a direct correlation between employees having fun at work and boosted motivation and productivity. Its been argued  that  fun may be the single most important trait of a highly effective and successful organisation. Naturally, employees that enjoy their job will want to stay at the company for longer, which obviously works in Adobes favour. Adobe Life Adobe uses their culture as a recruitment tool and love to show off their happy and healthy employees with Adobe Life. They share images online with the hashtag #AdobeLife and even have a magazine which includes some of the highlights of the goings-on in Adobe. New elevator skin @adobe office ?? #AdobeLife #MakeItAnExperience pic.twitter.com/uJzZoV1Xwz Joe Martin (@joeDmarti) January 17, 2017 This shows off the human side of the brand and gets employees more personally involved in the company. Creativity Adobe makes no secret of the fact they have a very creative outlook when it comes to work. Adobe knows that fostering their employees creativity and giving room for experimentation is the key to an innovative workforce. There are multiple reasons why creativity is important for a company. First off, it boosts productivity. It allows employees to work faster, and provide solutions in new and interesting ways. It also boosts employee morale being creative at work is fun, and theres nothing better than truly enjoying your job. View this post on Instagram Today got me feeling like ?? Grateful for my #adobelife celebrating 8 years! (??: @stephopoly) A post shared by ?? Esther (@estherray) on Jan 26, 2017 at 12:36pm PST Freedom and Responsibility One of Adobes top management techniques is to not manage. Adobe makes it clear that employees will not be micro managed, but will have true responsibility and freedom with their work. Employees are given challenging projects and problems and given responsibility from day one creating a trusting and innovative environment. Instilling trust in your work environment makes such a difference to employees. What do you think, has  Adobe got it right? Let us know in the comments below!

Interview With A Graduate On His Graduate Job Experience

Interview With A Graduate On His Graduate Job Experience Its almost a year ago that I interviewed Andre Lopes. He had just got a graduate job and I interviewed him about his job search and his time at university. You can read about it on my old university careers service blog. I thought I would take the opportunity to interview him again and see how the graduate job experience has been for him. Thankfully, he agreed to the interview and I hope that through his graduate job experience current students or recent graduates can get some information and motivation. Faizan (Interviewer):  Almost a year since our last interview. How has this year been and are you still working at Nationwide or have you moved? By the way, what is your title at work? Andre:  Im still at Nationwide in the same role as a Strategy Analyst but my responsibilities have changed and grown. As a whole, my year has been all about settling in and adjusting to working life. Faizan: In this one year, have you seen students improve their job search or felt they are a bit careless? Do you keep in touch with student activities since you were involved in the Students Union are you actively involved with student activities now? Andre:  With the economy continuing to stagnate, the graduate jobs market seems unlikely to pick up in the short-term so candidates are going to face similar challenges to graduates of recent years. From what Ive seen and heard, theres definitely been a response to the increased competition for jobs and the best graduates are getting both more imaginative and prepared for getting a job. However, its all too easy to forget that hunting for jobs is really a question of quality, not quantity (though sometimes both!) so despite being in a tough jobs market, graduates really need to target where they want to work and really know the ins and outs of that company. For instance, you could do a quick SWOT diagram (strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, threats), if you cant fill it in then open Google up and find out some possible answers. After all, if you were looking to hire someone, would you go for the candidate that can recite your companys 100 year history or the one that knows the strategic challenges it faces?! Ive kept in touch with my universitys rowing club over the past year and taken part in several socials which have been really enjoyable, even as a graduate! Ive yet to get involved in any of the university alumni activities but Im aiming to do so in the coming months. Faizan: Do graduates ask you for tips or help with finding a job what do you tell them? If not, then do you think graduates should approach other grads who have a job to find out more? Andre:  When Ive been back to Leicester, Ive been asked for advice from friends; some are worried that theyve waited too long or that they dont have enough accomplishments to talk about. My advice to them is that jobs are always coming and going so missing grad scheme deadlines in the Winter doesnt mean youre stuck for a year and accomplishments are everywhere no matter what youve done outside your course, theres going to be something different and interesting that an employer will want to hear about, your challenge is to understand what skills you used and what you got out of it. If you had to pin me down to give a single piece of advice, it would be to learn from your mistakes try and find out why a certain approach didnt/isnt working and adapt your chances of employment can only get better! At least while theyre still at University, graduates do want to know how each other got their jobs, they just need to keep in touch once they move away so that they keep their contacts and continue to understand how others achieved their job. Faizan: Are you involved in any extra-curricular activities outside work? How has life changed with getting into work and having a different lifestyle? Whats the one thing that really hit you as a change? Andre:  Not a great deal at the moment the lack of decent rivers nearby has (temporarily!) cut my coxing career short while Ive also been putting off making the leap into local politics. The biggest change I found was about keeping in touch with friends from university; its completely different now I cant just walk 5 minutes and knock on someones door so making the effort to stay in touch and stay interested in what each other are doing is really important. Faizan: Do you think, as a graduate, what you thought about work life has come true or is it a good / bad surprise? Do you think graduates can prepare for the working life or is it impossible to envisage how similar / different work life is? Andre:  On reflection, I dont think Im that surprised about how work life has changed my day-to-day life really it definitely makes you appreciate your evenings and weekends in way you wouldnt as a student though! Best way to prepare? Get into a routine before youre due to start work! Faizan: Are you happy with this working life? Do you miss university? What are your plans for the future? Andre:    For the first few months, I was definitely still a student at heart and I did yearn for that flexibility towell.. do and get involved with what I wanted! What I came to realise is that the flexibility is still there, you just approach it in a different way. If theres an area of work I want to get more involved in or theres more responsibility to take on, the opportunity is there for me. Outside of work, of course theres opportunities to get involved in similar things to student activities, you just need to make that effort to find out what you want to do and whats available around you. Faizan: Would you like to mentor 4-5 students from your university through their final year? Would you ever take up mentorship to help other graduates? Andre:  Personally Ive always found it incredibly hard to admit that theres something I cant do on my own and actually ask for help, so Im always happy to offer advice to someone thats willing to ask. Faizan: Once again Andre, thanks for your time. This is the second time I have interviewed you, and again, I am sure it will help students and graduates get an insight into the graduate job experience. Good luck to you in your future endeavours!     Related articles From Graduate to Mad Science Manager An Interview A Careers Service Charges Students For an 8-month Course Which Includes 6 Month Internship Interview With Inspired Quill Founder 5 Tools To Improve Your Graduate Job Search 4 Reasons Why You Are A Young Unemployed Graduate 0

How Employee Authored Content Can Build Employer Brand

How Employee Authored Content Can Build Employer Brand Companies love it when their employees claim it’s the best place to work. Real opinions from real people really do matter, especially in the world of recruitment. So how do you make sure your company is the most talked-about for the right reasons? Well this week I’ve been speaking to Phil Strazzulla, founder of NextWave Hire who says it’s all about capitalising on employee authored content and he explains why. Have a listen to the podcast below and make sure to  subscribe  so you’ll never miss an episode. What is employee authored content? So in my opinion, employee authored content is everything from somebody having a conversation in a bar with their friend about working at the company, to somebody posting something on Glassdoor, writing a blog post on an employee blog, or Snapchat. Its basically any sort of information offline or online that talks about working at the company. I think about the definition of employer branding in two parts. One is, what do people think its like to work for your company? The second is, what is it actually like to work at your company? And I think that employee authored content has implications for both. If you think about it from that perspective obviously, your employee voices are informing the world about whats it like to work with the company, and theyre doing that on Glassdoor. Theyre doing that in one-on-one conversations. Maybe theyre doing it in more formalized sorts of places that youre curating, like a blog or a Snapchat channel or what have you and so, it is imperative to sort of understand that trend and get on it to make the most of it. This is the way that youre going to be able to attract and convert talent. And there’s a couple of different reasons why. Employee voices, in my opinion, are the most important aspect of your employer branding. If you look at the Edelman Trust Surveys, there is some data that says that your employees are more trusted than marketing, recruiting, C-level, or the company itself. And so, we look at employee voices as trusted sources of information as outsiders. Employees also have really in-depth content. I think its something like 68% of those in talent acquisition dont truly understand all the roles that theyre recruiting for and its not surprising. If youre recruiting for 10 different roles, are you really going to understand the ins and outs of all those different roles? Probably not. But guess who does? The employees. And so, if we can leverage their voices to get at the specific pieces of information that candidates care about and get that information in the right places then thats huge in terms of attracting and converting talent. Talent acquisition is only so many people within an organization, but employees make up the rest. They make up the entire organization. They are so many more voices. And if we can do employee authored content in a way that gets the right information in a scalable way, distributed in scalable way, that makes it fun and easy. Thats huge. That is the biggest marketing channel that any company could ever have. And going back to that second part of the employer branding definition in terms of, whats in it for the company? There are a lot of insights that you can glean from what people are saying about the business. And many times, when companies start thinking about their EVP and that outside facing thing they start to say ‘lets do some employee focus groups,’ and lets transform that message into something that is easily digestible etc. A bit like a marketing type of message, which I have opinions on but I wont get into them now. But, essentially the outputs of those focus groups are the outputs of your Glassdoor views or the non-anonymous content thats going on all over the place . That informs the second part of that definition which is, whats it actually like to work at your company? And therefore, its super important because we always want to create an awesome place to work for the right person. That kind of gets our goals accomplished as a business. What kind of employee authored content is the best? My philosophy is that, a lot of times, what comes out of the kind of polished production quality, whats it like to work in a company should actually be more of the raw information. I think that the reason that people go to Glassdoor, despite understanding that some of the content is quite biased, is because it is that raw unfiltered information that you can sort of interpret as a person and understand better what its like to work at the company. I think that in many cases, companies will be well-served to do something similar on their own websites. Weve actually just started this new experiment, which is proven to be really successful, where we essentially host chats. For example, one of our employees will talk about a particular project that they worked on. So maybe an engineer talking about how they just use Python to do some web scraping. Or just generally whats it like to be an engineer, account executive, whatever, at our company. And its a pretty raw chat which is not filtered and theres not a lot of moderation. The answers arent perfect, but I think that, that sort of transparency really resonates with people. And thats the sort of thing that helps us to attract and convert talent. What is your step by step guide to getting your employees to be the voices to build the brand? Get buy-in from the C-level. We have a pretty robust onboarding process with our customers to make sure theyre successful. So, for example, we have just signed this customer which is a 400-person company, not huge. And within the first hour they had 100 pieces of employee content which is just crazy, literally within one hour. That onboarding process is something to the extent of, lets get buy-in and hopefully buy-in from the C-level where its like, Hey, culture is another weapon in our war for talent. We can use this to build our brand, to get the right people in, and really share what its really like to work at our company. And getting that buy-in then translates at the high level to the employee level where the message might change a bit to really sharpen what’s the business case? Why are we doing this? Why do employees have to do this? Why am I taking time out of my day to do this? Well, its because youre special. Its because you know what you do better than anybody else. Becau se we want more awesome people like you. Were going to make you feel good about this thing. So its kind of like aligning that incentive. Make it super easy.  Ive seen a lot of companies with employee blogs that die over time because theyre asking employees, can you write 500 to 700 words about what you do within the company? And people are just like, Oh, gosh. What do I write? How do I structure it? etc.. Most people arent great content creators but if you give them questions that theyve probably already been asked when theyre interviewing somebody or that conversation at the bar with their friend and you allow them to answer them in really easy ways, like, on their phones or with quick videos or with pictures, that means that the barrier to create that content goes way, way down. And somebody in 10 minutes can answer five different questions in a really in-depth way and share information that is not necessarily going to get out there about most companies. So thats sort of like the start of the playbook. Consider where we want to distribute this.  We know that, from the research The Talent Board  has done, and other organizations, your career page is basically the most important place to share your EVP, to share whats it like to work at the company. And so, for us, the number one place that we put content is on the career site. And that could mean rebuilding the site, that could mean creating a culture site. It could just mean enhancing existing pages. But it really has to be there so that we can get it in front of the right audience. And then, of course, your other kind of places that youre trying to build awareness could be LinkedIn, Twitter, Facebook, or maybe youre paying for a Glassdoor profile. Basically, all the different places where candidates are going to interact with this, and kind of mapping it to the candidate journey for your individual roles in your company. Who decides which employee authored content gets shared, whether it’s good or bad? I think we all live in the age of Glassdoor, and there is a visceral reaction for many people in talent acquisition when you mention the name Glassdoor. Within our platform you can approve the content before it goes live, and in fact, you have to approve it before it goes live. I think the stat is 98.5% of content is approved. And usually if its not its maybe because somebody rambled on a bit in a video, or maybe just wrote something that was very grammatically incorrect and you say ‘this doesnt really make any sense.’ Very, very rarely do you find employees that are looking to rant and rave about their boss in that sort of format. I think that Glassdoor is almost designed in some ways to collect that sort of information, which in many ways is helpful for candidates to understand that side of the business as well. But in my experience, Ive found very few times when this has backfired. A great example of this and if you want to know which companies are doing this well? One is Cisc o. Cisco has a really great Snapchat channel. They get a ridiculous amount of views. I forget the exact numbers but its massive, and this is a fairly new initiative. And my understanding is that when they first started doing this they were very, very selective about who they would let take over the Snapchat channel for the day. And thats the way that program works, is each day somebody gets to be the person who controls the Cisco Snapchat. And theyve never really had a problem. And at first, it was like, Oh, gosh. What if somebody does something really inappropriate? Well, I guess some Snapchats will go away really quickly. So were not taking that big of a risk. But theyve just built this audience and seen that it sounds like a huge ROI, especially considering that Snapchat is free, from doing this and they havent had a problem with somebody getting on there and saying something inappropriate. What company is doing this well? I think that the case study that I love, honestly, is the US military. And this was from a couple of years ago. It was at the height of the Iraq, Afghanistan wars. Recruitment was down, people werent signing up anymore. That initial burst of patriotism after 9/11 kind of went away, And it was like, how do we get more people to become soldiers? And this guy David Lee, he basically put out a call and he said, Hey, I want you to submit stories from the front. And they couldnt send cameras to Iraq, It was too dangerous and it was too expensive. So they basically had people take videos on their phones and submit little letters. And I think they got over a thousand stories. And I dont know the exact number, but their recruitment numbers went through the roof because people were going to this website. And there was just that personal humanizing connection with what was going on over there. Why it was important? What its like to do this job? And they were able to turn that deluge of stories into more and more applicants. And I think that if the US military can do this, one of the most bureaucratic organizations in the world, and they can do this in a way that doesnt violate security. I think they never changed a single story that was submitted, which is crazy. People were just submitting these on a form. They never had to change anything. There was no sort of security issues even though the war was going on. And if they can turn that into a positive ROI, in a time where it wasnt that attractive to go and join the military, that just speaks volumes about the power of these individual personalized stories. Follow Phil on Twitter @PhilStrazzulla and be sure to subscribe to the Employer Branding Podcast.

Never Work Just For Money - Personal Branding Blog - Stand Out In Your Career

Never Work Just For Money - Personal Branding Blog - Stand Out In Your Career People work to earn money and make a living. That is the reality. If we don’t earn money, we cannot fulfill our basic needs such as shelter, food and clothing. However, you shouldn’t let money control you. Otherwise, you can never find happiness and satisfaction. The trouble today is that most people work in jobs that they don’t like just to earn money. They think if they earn enough money to buy expensive cars, clothes, electronics and etc., they will be happy. Nevertheless, they forget one thing. Money can’t buy happiness. I am a supporter of following your passion and earning money through doing what you like. If not, you can come across with the following problems at some point in your life. 1.  You will never make enough money: Even if you are the highest paid employee for your level in your company, you will still feel underpaid. Therefore, you will always complain about your paycheck and talk about how someone else is paid much more although you deserve that payment. As a result, you will be unhappy and unsatisfied. 2.  Frequently Job Hopping: Since you are not happy and feel underpaid, you will want to look at other companies that you think pay more. Hence, you will find yourself job hopping frequently. At first, you can be happy for a little while because you will meet with new people and it is a new environment. Nevertheless, once you get used to it, the charm will go away and you will find yourself looking at job posts again unless this new job is your true passion in life. 3.  Have More Debt: Once you graduate from college and get a job, you will work to pay off your loans. Then, you probably want to buy a house. As a result, you will end up with a mortgage that lasts for years and you have to work to pay off that mortgage. On top of this, you have to keep your life style and buy the newest smart phone or go to Europe for vacation. As you can see, you will be confident in your spending because you believe you can pay them later. This can soon become a vicious cycle where you get your paycheck and use it to pay interest on your debt. As a result, you will get stuck on your high-paying job that you don’t like because it is the only solution to pay-off your debt. 4.  Become a Slave to Money: As you can understand from step #3, after a while, money starts controlling you as opposed to you control money and therefore, you find yourself becoming a slave for money. Don’t forget that money is not the most important thing in the world. Therefore, don’t put money in the center of your life. Go for what keeps you alive and excites you in life.

What Happens When What You Know isnt so Important CareerMetis.com

What Happens When What You Know isn't so Important â€" CareerMetis.com So many people when asked what they want to do after they graduate say something like “I would like a job in marketing where I can apply what I learned in school” or something equally aspirational.It is natural to want to make use of the knowledge gained in your area of expertise. You spend many years learning many subjects that cover your chosen academic path and want to try them out in the real world.evalBut I’ve said it before and it bears repeating: what you learn at school is merely the table stakes for a successful career; it guarantees nothing. That said, without some type of formal learning background and you are unlikely to be able to enter the race.There are many highly educated people out there who can’t get a job in the profession or company they desire â€" how many Uber drivers have you met with economics degrees, or bar servers with law degrees fro a foreign country? They are unable to follow their chosen career path and must settle for an occupation that pays t he bills.To be successfulyou have to do MORE than “apply your knowledge”. When everyone else is trying to do the same thing, how will this approach get you noticed; how will it enable you to standout from the crowd?It won’t.You have to LEVERAGE what you know to position yourself for career opportunities.You must look behind the schooling brand you have earned to discover the qualities you possess that enables you to apply what you’ve learned in a way that is both relevant to the organization you are interested in, and unique in thecrowd of applicantsbeing considered along with you.So If you have an MBA you will want to position yourself NOT as an MBA’er but, for example, as someone who is able to help take an organization where it needs to go.evalYour academic credentials allow you to have insights on business problems. You are a business problem solver first; MBA second or third or fourth or…The point is, lead with what unique value that you and only you can deliver; no t with your academic pedigree. Learn what an organization NEEDS to meet its strategic goals; work on objectives and tactics that line up with the desired future and be prepared to give 110% of yourself to execution if you are the successful candidate for the job.In answer to the question about what you want to do after you have finished school, I would like to hear: “After I graduate I intend to be the only marketing manager in the company I choose to work for that is viewed by others as a senior employee within 24 months.”evalDeclare your end game.Pledge to be unique.Trust that WHAT you know is only an aid to help get you there.

Happy Hour is 9 to 5 - in Chinese!!! - The Chief Happiness Officer Blog

Happy Hour is 9 to 5 - in Chinese!!! - The Chief Happiness Officer Blog My book is coming out in Chinese in January Im totally psyched about it! My Chinese publisher just sent me the cover design. Feast your eyes on this: Click for full size. My sense is that China needs some happiness at work bad! The success of Chinese businesses in terms of growth and profits cant be denied but not many people actually seem to enjoy what they do. Whats your take? Does China need a little happiness at work? Can it even be done, considering current typical working conditions as well as Chinas unique culture and history? Thanks for visiting my blog. If you're new here, you should check out this list of my 10 most popular articles. And if you want more great tips and ideas you should check out our newsletter about happiness at work. It's great and it's free :-)Share this:LinkedInFacebookTwitterRedditPinterest Related

How to Write a Resume That Can Create Your Name in the Business World

How to Write a Resume That Can Create Your Name in the Business WorldIf you are an aspiring worker who's planning to enter the workforce and need to add his name in the business world, then you need to learn some of the best tips on how to develop a resume. A good resume has certain effective factors that can be used by any applicant to stand out from others. Resume examples provide you with a good starting point when creating your own resume. There are different factors involved in a resume, and these include:Of course, writing your resume is not that simple because you have to convey a complete command. Hence, it requires a lot of practice and talent to create a resume that catches the attention of prospective employers. You should start by analyzing the type of job that you want to acquire, then you must come up with a proper resume template. It is best to stay away from copying and pasting resumes to build your career. Remember, a resume is simply a starting point.You should not copy the format and words of other people's resumes but also choose a sample that shows you how to present yourself as a qualified candidate for the new business opportunity. Use the resume example in your own and determine if it suits your needs. While you are doing this, you can learn the guidelines and format in which you should write your resume. In the end, you may find a way to convey your entire message using a very simple, straightforward resume template.The first section of your resume is called the 'information' section. You can use this section to brief your information on the position that you are applying for. This information should include relevant experiences that you have gained while performing your job duties. Some of the facts that you can include in this section are your name, contact number, and address. In the case of online jobs, this section should have the telephone number or e-mail address of the company. At the end of this section, you should mention the work history that you gained while performing your duties in the particular position.Your next section is called the 'resume elements'. Here, you can add your achievements and accomplishments to the list that you prepared for this section. It is best to do a personal research about your own achievements, to put the emphasis on the important aspects of your achievements.Your next section is called the 'performances' section. Here, you can include a combination of the information you've compiled in the information section. It's best to do a comparison in the field. On this, you may include accomplishments of your performance. However, you can also include personal details and responsibilities such as your age, education, special skills, and hobbies.Finally, your last section is called the 'recommendations'. Here, you can include recommendations of people who have helped you. These can include a co-worker, former employers, or family members.The main idea behind this resume writing exa mple is to show the employer how you could help them in a better way. There are lots of tips for how to write a resume. A resume example will let you know what you need to do and how to do it. This way, you will be able to communicate your own message effectively.