Category: Tips and Tools

As more and more businesses utilize the video conference call in order to connect team members from around the globe faster and easier than ever, the ways in which you can call have also changed. Most smartphones, which many industry professionals carry with them at all times, come with all the tools needed to call on the go, and the popularity and efficiency of large scale video conference rooms continues to increase as well. But for when you need a comfortable medium between a literally out of pocket impromptu conference call and a full scale all hands meeting, the huddle room is an excellent choice.

Huddle Rooms: The Basics

If you’re new to the term and want to understand a bit more in order to know what benefits a huddle room can give you, read on. A huddle room is a small meeting area usually designed for somewhere around three to five people to gather. Most are equipped with a small, central table, several chairs, a large monitor, and other broadcasting equipment like microphones and a webcam or two. Huddle rooms are an excellent solutions for short, small, impromptu meetings. They’re an excellent choice for brainstorming sessions, long distance problem solving, and other types of firefighting video conferencing. Their biggest advantage is that, unlike large conference rooms that may need to be booked well in advance and can get to be very expensive to outfit, one business could have multiple huddle rooms for a much lower equipment cost. Additionally, these relatively compact spaces can offer the sound and audio quality that a handheld smartphone can’t match, with steady mounted cameras, moderate lighting to avoid deep shadows and or blinding glares, and usually offer proper soundproofing and good location to minimize noise pollution and echoes.

Design and Capabilities

When it comes to upgrading or designing a huddle room from scratch, or even just utilizing it properly, you need to understand and focus on the convenience of the small group factor. One webcam, assuming it is a high enough resolution, should be enough for one space. Because the central webcam in the designated meeting room will be further away from each individual face as opposed to one in a smartphone or laptop would be, high resolution is key. Lifewire offers a buyer’s guide if you need a little more information on the details of the tech itself. The preference between microphones and headsets really depends on your desires, but since some webcams even come with microphones built it and headsets can be considered distracting, one or two good table mounted or ceiling suspended microphones in a sound friendly room should do the trick. As far as software goes, however, you shouldn’t feel the need to hold back. Assuming your computer has the right horsepower, a good multi-call conferencing software such as BlueJeans can connect your huddle meeting to hundreds of other devices.

Now, assuming that your room is properly equipped with all the necessary tech, it’s time to get a little creative with taking advantage of the capabilities of a huddle room.  Assuming you’re utilizing the central camera, it’s a great idea to take advantage of the wide camera angle and consider finding ways to use the rest of the space. Whiteboards or large paper sheets can be an excellent way to go a little old school when it comes to fleshing out your designs, so having one on hand and out of the way is a pretty solid idea. Not only can this help the other people on the end of the line better visualize your concepts, but having this artistic element is a great way to really utilize the audio-video combination that this kind of conferencing offers. Additionally, consider bringing in 3D models or mockups of products into the huddle room. Having much more space as well as the free hands to work can allow you to demonstrate how something would work or look on camera, another plus. On a related note, the room can be converted quickly into the ideal troubleshooting area for IT or technically issues. Bringing in a copy of a customer’s product and showing them exactly where to look and what to do in order to fix issues can be a life saver, combining both visual and audio in order to make an excellent point and aid in problem solving.

As you continue to experiment with your video conferencing practices and try to find the best set up for your situations, hopefully this guide has offered you a new perspective on some of the more inventive ways that these smaller, specialized spaces can add another whole dimension to your tele-communicative practices. While large scale conference rooms will still very much have their place and usage, and while mobile video chat and conference calls will still be invaluable for on the road, off the cuff calls, a huddle room can bring its own particular advantages to the table.

So you’ve decided you want get your criminal justice degree online, but you’re not yet sure what kind of job you’re going to pursue with it. Well, the two most important aspects considered by most students during the decision-making process are: job demand and wages. In other words, “is the job going to pay well” and “will it be easy to find a position after graduating?” Those are the key questions students should ask themselves if their primary goal is to build a stable and lucrative career. With that said, here are three popular jobs in criminal justice that offer the best of both worlds:

1. Police Officer

With about 650,000 police officers currently employed in the U.S. and about 25,000 annual job openings in this field, this one easily deserves the top spot. The only profession in criminal justice that has more employees would be Security Guard, with more than a million security guards in America alone. However, security guards only make an average salary of about $28,000, while the average salary for a police officer is about $61,000, so we couldn’t list security guard as one of the highest paying, but it does qualify as one of the most in-demand jobs. Although additional training is required to become an officer, you can earn your criminology degree online in as little as 24 months and go from there.

2. Correctional Officer

There are almost half a million correctional officers in the U.S., with about 15,000 annual job openings in this sector. They make an average annual salary of about $45,000. With a criminal justice degree and a high school diploma or GED, you’ll be in an ideal position to be hired at just about any correctional facility.

3. First-Line Police Supervisor

First-line police supervisors make excellent salaries, with the average yearly income being about $85,000 in this sector. There are about 100,000 positions actively filled in the U.S., with about 4,500 openings popping up each year. If you think about it, wherever there is a police department this position is in high demand. However, keep in mind many departments will require that you first have some prior experience in law enforcement, so you might have to start with one of the aforementioned positions or another police-related job before climbing to this rank.

Not Satisfied With Any of the Above Options?

Of course, if you’re interested in specializing in a very specific niche of criminal justice, and ease of employment or education are not really concerns, then don’t hesitate to follow your intuition and go with the career path that seems like it would be the most fulfilling in your eyes. Sometimes the longer, more difficult road is more satisfying in the long-term. For example, if we were going for jobs based on demand and salary alone, we would have to list lawyer as the luckiest profession in the criminal justice field, with an average salary of about $135,000 and more than 15,000 annual job openings. However, at the same time it’s important to consider that they have to earn much more than a criminal justice degree to get into that position, so it’s a larger commitment that isn’t ideal for everyone.

One of the many upsides to working from home is that you get to hear less office jargon! But even if you’re not with colleagues face-to-face, you’ll still be talking on the phone to clients or using social media, which means office jargon can still creep in.

Office jargon is often used as a tool to make a task or job seem bigger or better than it may actually be, but it can also be used in a much more innocent way, explains Gareth Jones, Business Manager at Kit Out My Office:

“The modern working life is fast-paced, and as such we strive to deliver information in a clear and concise manner. The downside of this is it is a breeding ground for jargon. Setting a collective New Year’s Resolution in your office to stamp-out jargon in 2017 could definitely help to improve morale.”

Traditionally, New Year’s resolutions are often set as personal goals to better ourselves, ranging from visiting the gym more often through to learning a new language. For 2017, Kit Out My Office want colleagues across the UK to come together and set a New Year’s Resolution for their office – to stamp out the most annoying office phrases and improve office morale.

The top five most annoying office phrases are –

1. Think outside the box
2. It’s not rocket science
3. Amazeballs
4. Going forward
5. Can I borrow you for a second?

Hmmm… I must admit to having used ‘let’s think outside the box’ and ‘it’s not rocket science’ a few times myself!

Dr Julia Claxton, Principal Lecturer in Leadership and Organisational Development at Leeds Beckett University added her opinion, “hurt feelings, unclear goals and ambiguous strategies are just a few examples of issues that can arise and contribute to low morale and are the basis of an ineffective team that can be easily avoided.”

At the opposite end of the spectrum lays “best-practice”, which is the least annoying phrase used, with nobody stating that it was irritating or overused.

Top 5 phrases that won’t annoy your colleagues –

1. Best-practice
2. Thrown under the bus
3. No brainer
4. Cool beans
5. Move the goalposts?

So now you know!

The market is improving thanks to the growing economy, but it is also becoming more competitive than ever. In order to maintain a competitive advantage and be successful as a business (and business owner), you need to maximize all the instruments and skills you have. A lot of business owners are pursuing an MBA online and taking business analytics courses for that very reason. This is now something you can do online, thanks to top universities such as Ohio University making their distance learning programs available.

There is no shortage of benefits you will gain from mastering business analytics. Having the ability to understand the market, consumers and competitors is among those benefits. You can also manage risks more effectively simply by making data-driven decisions every time. Of course, you will be able to avoid errors this way.

To fully understand the importance of business analytics, read the full infographic by Ohio University.

Ohio University Online

When people share whispered horror stories about offices burning down, inevitably with some poor entrepreneur’s life’s work going up in flames, it’s easy to shrug your shoulders.

Fire safety is a legal obligation so, of course, you already tick the necessary boxes to meet regulations.

But what are the chances of a fire tearing through your business?

After all, devastating blazes are nothing more than the over-dramatic stuff of soap operas and paranoid nightmares, right?

And yet, the modern office is surprisingly full of hazards.

Look around at all that computer tech and those overloaded sockets – that crucial electrical equipment you couldn’t operate without is also the biggest cause of workplaces fires.

With that sobering thought in mind, we’re sharing three top tips to help you adopt a fire-safety culture and protect your business in 2017.

#1: get a fire safety plan in order

As with everything in life, organisation is essential for fire safety – it’s great news if you’re naturally a methodical thinker with a penchant for spreadsheet and itineraries, but a nightmare if you’re more of a last-minute Larry.

It may not be fun, but thinking through worst-case scenarios is the only way you’ll be able to put a plan in place to deal with them.

Focus on gathering information about emergency exits, meeting points and warning systems – if you’re struggling, your local council should be able to send out a fire safety officer to offer some advice on the best tactics and plans to adopt.

#2: emphasise the importance of prevention

Prevention is a much better tactic than dealing with the fallout of a blaze, so undergo a risk assessment to identify any potential hazards or weak spots, like sources of electrical fires.

Whilst regular Portable Appliance Testing (PAT) will keep your electrical equipment in good shape – reducing the chances of devastating malfunctions – also talk to staff about the importance of switching off unused computers and sockets.

Even after you’ve implemented such changes, doing routine safety checks and inspections yourself will continue to highlight any likely issues, whilst also being mindful to make sure everyone is remembering their training.

#3: invest in protective measures

Should the absolute worst happen, you won’t be worried about money or the building. Instead, your biggest concern will be guaranteeing that no one – you, your employees or customers – comes to any harm.

Invest in protective measures, like a blast wall or fire doors, and you’ll have peace of mind knowing everyone will be kept safe until the emergency services arrive.

But your most important task is to install and maintain an alarm system that’ll give as much forewarning as possible.

With so much on your plate, it’s easy to get complacent about hazards – make sure your business doesn’t fall victim to a devastating blaze by following our three top fire-safety tips.