Ellen Voie: Driving The Female Workforce With Positive Work Culture
You might associate success as something driven by personal ambition, but the goal is broader for others. Ellen Voie, CEO & Founder of the Women In Trucking Association, Inc., is more concerned about elevating the entire industry so everyone can benefit instead of advancing her professional path. While finding personal success, her organization is the driving force in creating a better environment for all women. Perhaps this is more of a woman’s way of leading an organization, but this is quickly becoming the best way to change the world. Women & Softer Economics In 2007, Ellen founded Women In Trucking Association as a nonprofit trade/professional organization. She found that women comprised about three percent of the driver population and had very little representation in board rooms or the C-Suite. The sentiment at that time was that the industry was being gender-blind and claimed to hire the best candidates. However, it was apparent that there was not a level playing field. There was unconscious bias in the hiring and promotion of female executives, and for female commercial drivers, the playing field was anything but level. Showers were communal for men, restrooms for women were scarce, trucks were designed for men, and companies didn’t provide women’s uniforms. The most critical area was the lack of data. Since women were considered “statistically insignificant” in trucking, breaking the information down by gender was difficult. Over the years, the Women In Trucking Association has worked with universities and private entities to look at the differences between men and women in transportation careers. Now, research has proven that women take fewer risks, both in the boardroom and in the cab of a truck. Women make decisions differently, and women have different values when looking for a career at a trucking company. Women are more collaborative and better at team building. All of these are positive attributes that weren’t valued in the past. Different But Inspiring Unlike other girls, Ellen has been interested in less traditional activities, such as woodworking, auto mechanics, drafting, and welding. After graduating from high school, she found a position designing material handling equipment at a steel fabricating plant. She was soon offered a transfer to the traffic (shipping) department and later advanced to Traffic Manager. She earned a diploma in Traffic & Transportation Management which gave her a great deal of insight into how the supply chain works. Later, after starting her family, Ellen took her skills in transportation and worked as a consultant to motor carriers in central Wisconsin. During that time, she earned her bachelor’s degree and Master’s degree in Communication. After eighteen years, she was ready to move on, and she accepted a position to lead the Trucker Buddy program, a nonprofit organization that matches professional drivers with elementary classrooms. In 2006 Ellen was recruited by a large carrier in the Midwest as the Manager of Retention and Recruiting Programs. Her job was to initiate corporate-level programs to attract and retain nontraditional groups, including women. The goal was to increase the ranks of female drivers at the carrier and understand this demographic’s needs. At the time, Ellen was working on obtaining her private pilot’s license, and she belonged to a women’s aviation group. It occurred to her that there wasn’t a similar organization for women in the transportation industry, which prompted her to start the Women In Trucking Association. Reinventing Against Disparity Although women make up 50% of the population, female business owners are still a minority, especially in transportation careers. Women entrepreneurs entering male-populated industries find additional challenges to bring their ideas to life. The Women In Trucking Association has over 6,000 members in ten countries, and about fifteen percent of them are men who join because they support the mission. The organization provides insight to its members through surveys, research, and partnering with other organizations to better understand gender diversity in transportation careers. The goal is to be a resource for the industry and the government. As a trade/professional organization, Women In Trucking Association serves its members. For anyone involved in the transportation environment, the opportunity to network allows members to build better businesses. They believe in transparency and are responsive to feedback. When members feel the dues are worth the cost to provide value to their company or career advancement, they’ll be sure to renew their membership, so feedback is crucial. The organization constantly surveys its members on important issues so they can better represent them. Most importantly, they use their insight to make changes in the industry by quantifying their experiences, giving them measurable goals. Overcoming The Uncertainties Despite such devotion, Ellen admits that she has difficulty responding to criticisms. She cannot help but often take these criticisms personally because the Women In Trucking Association is her creation. She faces a hard time when people try to attack them for something they dislike instead of discussing working together. The world is at a stage where gender diversity is becoming an essential goal in every industry. The Women In Trucking Association is on a mission to make women aware of the career opportunities in the trucking industry. They have always had a virtual presence as an organization, so this wasn’t a factor amid the pandemic. The goal is to hire self-motivated people since employees do not have established work hours or even vacation schedules. Everyone works to complete their duties without the need for oversight. Millions of business owners worldwide faced at least some level of challenges during the COVID-19 pandemic. The Women In Trucking Association was also forced to make difficult decisions. For instance, they had to cancel their in-person event in 2020 and switch to a virtual conference. They had over 600 enthusiastic registered attendees, which encouraged them to provide a virtual option. Similarly, in 2021, they had over 800 at their in-person event in Dallas and hundreds more who participated in all or parts of the virtual conference. From Ellen’s Seat Having a solid foundation, the Women In Trucking Association has future
Gagan Arora: From Transforming the Industry to Building an Empire
Mr. Gagan Arora was honored with World’s Greatest Leaders 2021-22”, 40 UNDER 40, and Asia’s Youngest Entrepreneur by Asia One. Recognized as one of India’s Top 100 Influencers by GMI and Forbes. An inspirational journey of a visionary entrepreneur from a small garage in Florida to transforming businesses across six countries through offshore and client services. Gagan, is a first-generation software entrepreneur, a tenacious leader, and a tech evangelist who has successfully built himself as a well-known brand name in the industry. He is Boston University Certified and the seven-time recipient of the BEST CEO award. He is the Chairman of the Foreign Investors Council’s Delhi Chapter and the Director-Global Education for the Asian Arab Chamber of Commerce, servicing 52 countries. Mr. Gagan Arora, Founder and CEO of Vertex Group, is a pioneer in providing aided sales and marketing services to BPOs, BPMs, IT solution providers, and financial and accountancy firms. What’s the inspiration behind Vertex Group? Would you like to mention some of the highlights from your journey? I have spearheaded Vertex Group‘s expansion into six countries in just five years, earning numerous honors including “World’s Greatest Leaders 2021-22”, 40 UNDER 40, and Asia’s Youngest Entrepreneur by Asia One, which was highlighted on CNBC and ET Now. I have also been named as one of India’s Top 100 Influencers by GMI and Forbes two times in a row. I am usually inspired when the utterly impossible becomes possible by embracing the challenge with a never-say-die mindset, no matter how difficult things grow. My desire to prove myself has driven me to build the best work environment possible, expand, and spread our message around the world. If I hear a story from someone who has overcome the odds, worked hard, focused, fulfilled on their word, and has been relentless in changing the world to make it a better place, I feel unbelievably inspired and uplifted. Three words that describe my entrepreneurial journey are Upward, Learning, and Evolving. Since the inception of my journey as an entrepreneur, I have been upward with the challenges coming my way considering my setbacks and failures as new learnings that allowed me to evolve and create a bigger picture of my vision. Deprived of any financial or psychological support, although my circumstances were homeless my vision was not. I had a crystal-clear vision of setting a trend of innovation and technology by using the best of my day-to-day business knowledge. To give wings to my passion I took a leap of faith and left my job, sacrificed the comfort of a monthly salary and perks, and invested money to achieve one true dream. Success to me came in the form of waves that had highs and lows but my keen determination to not settle for anything less kept me going despite a few initial failures. With a strong vision and the will to transform the industry, I laid the pillars of my dream in a small garage in Florida with a team of two, and have since, expanded my footprints across seven countries with a powerful workforce of over 1500+ people. Now, as a President of the Group and a leader, I have taken all of my experience and learnings to make a huge impact, growing my current company from 2 employees to more than 1500, with international offices in the United States, United Kingdom, Philippines, Nepal, Middle East, and Africa. Please brief us in detail about the current scenario of the business. How have the customer preferences changed over the years? With the increasing demand for technology, India’s IT solutions sector has the potential to become the world’s next space center. Advanced technologies such as Artificial Intelligence (AI), the Internet of Things (IoT), and others have shrunk the distance between the virtual and real worlds, resulting in an interoperable platform between Information Technology (IT) and actual physical activities. Over and above past human-machine interactions, machine-machine real-time communication is now conceivable. With the rise in processing capability of the chips, visualization and simulation tools have advanced significantly. A wide range of complicated, customized, and modular goods can be designed and immediately conveyed to the machines that will follow. Thus, embedded systems, factories, and workers link via the Internet of Things to collaborate in a cyber-physical environment. Society is rapidly moving from analog processes to digitalized technologies which have opened new ways for businesses to improve and evolve together with their customers. Also, it offers the possibility to link the worldwide economy and build a network in which every business can find its place. Your smartphone is a perfect example of digital transformation. It allows you to use different digital services like socialmedia, which are yet an example of digital transformation because they have changed our way of communicating with each other. Big dataor machine learningare other examples that are especially relevant for businesses that want to learn more about their customers. They offer completely new perspectives on your customers’ behavior that you can use to grow your business. With digital transformation businesses are taking an important step toward getting to know customers better.Pen and paper are outdated. Today you can collect important information via smart applications that offer endless possibilities. Customers’ expectations have changed, thus traditional marketing channels like PR and distribution are starting to lose their impact. Social media is critical for both marketing your items and communicating with your customers. Customer care is now available not only by phone and email but also through social media. As a result, customers have come to expect significantly faster responses to their inquiries. It would not be inaccurate to argue that digital transformation serves as a vehicle for taking your company to the next level. What are the unique challenges your company is currently facing? How have they affected your company? With the changing business environment, no industry is immune to unknown difficulties. The Covid-19 pandemic has built a new reality that is complex, ambiguous, and full of possibilities. Uncertainty regarding the future is one
How the Age of the Second Brain Can Destroy the First?
How many of you are harry potter fans? In the story, Dumbledore had a magical vessel he used to store and review memories. It was called the pencil. This is obviously a fictional story set in a school of magic. But today we have something like this in the real world, it’s called the second brain. The second brain is a digital brain that can be used to document every piece of information, every experience, every thought, and every learning. You can access all of this whenever and wherever you want. What does a second brain look like? Nothing too sci-fi or magical, a second brain looks like a word document backed up in the cloud. How much does it cost? Most second brains are free and some cost as little as $8 a month. The second brain has been developed on the hypothesis that a human brain is meant to have ideas not to store those ideas. So the second brain can do the job of storing. It will store everything from your thoughts to your screenshots, your grocery list, your notes, photos, passwords, reminders, and all other things you can think of. How does this work? The second brain works through apps like Notion, Evernote, One Note, Obsidian, and Mem, all of them work in the same way. They expect every bit of information you come across, everything that you think your brain cannot hold. Shopping lists, quotes, or reminders, you don’t even have to type them down, you can simply voice record and send. If you are reading something interesting online for instance you can email the relevant paragraphs to your second brain. If you have a fleeting thought you can make a quick note of it. Basically, every time you come across something that grabs your attention you log, in whatever form. Screenshots, photos, excel sheets, slides from a PowerPoint presentation, lines from an e-book, excerpts from online articles, and then you can access all this information whenever you want. Say years later you want to write an essay or prepare an address on federalism. All you need to do is go to your second brain and type in the keywords, everything that you uploaded on the topic will be in front of you. If you’ve uploaded a grocery list you can retrieve it the next time you go shopping. Advocates of the second brain say the system helps in knowledge management, it increases creativity and the theory is pretty interesting. It’s almost like having your own little library in the cloud. So is this the future? Well more like the present, believe it or not, all of us already have a second brain. All the apps that we use double up as a second brain. You know the ones that remind you to drink water or to stretch at home. Even breathe, apps tell you to stand up and breathe. They remind you to buy bread on the way back home. Apps remind you what you are doing 10 years back in the month of June. Gigabyte after gigabyte of content from your life is spread across these apps. Do you remember what was the storage capacity of the first iPhone? 16 gigabytes (GB)! Today, an iPhone’s memory can be expanded up to 1TB, that’s one terabyte full of information from your day-to-day life. What second brain apps do is replace all these apps with one, a notepad that doubles up as your library, your gallery, your reminder, your password keeper, your bookmark, your logbook, basically everything. It’s all cataloged! Some apps take it a step up they use time and location data to remind you of information/memories that you may have uploaded but forgotten. For instance, you go to a restaurant, the app will tell you that you came here 3 years back and this is what you ordered, this is who you came with and this is what you thought of the experience back then, obviously provided you’ve logged all of that. But who does that, who documents so much information from their daily life? Actually, most of us do! We are continuously uploading stories, we are tweeting every fleeting thought, and blogging experience. Second brain app stores this content. Quick question. Can’t we store the same information offline? Of course, we can. We can keep notes, we can keep files. Previously, we had a filing cabinet. Once upon a time, every office would have such cabinets but filing and then searching for that file takes a lot of time. A digital brain is more convenient. But do we really need one? Some of us can barely handle one brain. Jokes apart, science disagrees with the very high hypothesis of the second brain. It says our brain can store information, in fact, it can store 2.5 petabytes of information. It’s enough to store 3 million hours of TV shows. You have to leave the TV running for 300 years to use up all that brain space. In other words, we don’t have to worry about running out of brain space in our lifetime. So why do we need a second brain at all? These apps handicap us. They make us unnecessarily dependent on technology. Today, at least 20 million people are using a second brain. Some are leaning on them for making life decisions. There is a very interesting story in an article. Annie, a 27-year-old in New York City began taking notes on her dating life. For Annie, the notion love tracker functions almost like an alternate memory which, once or twice, helped her clarify the amorphous gut feeling she was experiencing. “Once, after a first date I remember thinking this guy is so much fun but he seems really immature,” Annie says. Then on the third date with him, she was enjoying herself but began to feel a bit uneasy like “something was eating at me that I could not put a finger on,” she said. So she went home
Paul Guenther: Offering Consistent Top-tier Business Solutions
“Just believe in yourself. Whether you think you can or think you can’t –you’re going to end up being right, either way.” In certain ways of business, stepping into an industry brings spontaneous challenges. If a business person molds these challenges and utilize them as a ladder to climb up to a particular position, he/she can bring a disruptive change within an innovative approach in their business niche. Following the zeal from studying law to lead a B2B advertising space that turned into a renowned brand is Paul Guenther. An entrepreneur who proved himself time and time with his leadership and commitment. As Founder and CEO of Knowledge Hub Media, Paul harnesses the power of business management from sales to marketing, accounting to website development. His tireless efforts and focused engagement enhance every aspect of the business. Learning & Leading Over the years, B2B customers are being targeted at an exponential pace, in the way that they market to different types of audiences. Currently, in the B2B demand generation space, KHM’s clients have shifted to more niche targeting – promoting their assets to very specific and specialized job roles and functions. Where in the past, companies would target based on more generalized criteria (e.g., IT Decision Makers in large companies), they have shifted to a more qualitative approach. It’s less about lead quantity and more about lead quality, reaching the exact folks who are most likely to buy their software and technology platforms. Previously, a company that might have targeted “HR Directors” now targets “Talent Management Directors” and “VPs of Talent Acquisition.” Again, more specific with the job roles that they are going after. And in most cases, instead of targeting companies by the number of people it employs or goes industry vertical, clients tend to target companies via account-based marketing (i.e., ABM lists). ABM lists are generally created and provided by KHM’s clients, pre-campaign launch. They are made up of companies that fit very specific targeting criteria, and in most cases, fall into one of three categories: current customers; competitor’s customers; companies showing intent to purchase a given software platform or solution. Dive into the exhilarating story of Paul and his experiences. Placing the Wick Mr. Guenther’s journey of career-oriented learning started at Penn State University in the Fall of 2002. At the time, he was unsure about what he exactly wanted to do. After some time, he determined that he wanted to go to law school, and decided to major in Crime, Law & Justice. He got his B.S. in the spring of 2006, which was immediately followed by a (short) stint in Law School. He was doing a part-time night program, and at the time, he was unsure about it too. He started working full time during the day, going out with friends at night, and not at all focused on what he should have been focused on. Whether or not it was a blessing in disguise, he ended up going back to school in 2008 to get his MBA with a concentration in Marketing Management (Wilmington University). In 2009, Paul started working on what would become “IT Knowledge Hub” – which is now known as Knowledge Hub Media. Once gained his MBA in 2010, he was off to the races with the company. Fortunately, over the next couple of years, he was able to bring his first few employees on – Anthony and James running Sales, and Chris, who filled the first Client Services role. He had also gone back to school by that point to get his Doctorate in Business Administration – finishing his dissertation and graduating in January 2020. Mission & Vision Knowledge Hub Media was established in 2009, and ever since its inception, the team has been a prominent player in the B2B advertising space. Their core competency, however, is lead generation – or “demand generation,” as it’s better known across the industry. KHM leverages content syndication via assets like white papers, webinars, case studies, and the like, to generate highly targeted leads for our clients. Most of our clients are in the software and technology industry – and when they’re not, they are usually advertising/media agencies working on behalf of the former. Most of our clients are promoting technology platforms and software solutions that they are looking to find net new customers for. Since the company’s initiation, Paul faced the challenge of not practicing things that traditional businesses do. Things like sales goals – and really anything that causes unnecessary stress, in general – are the things that the team tries to avoid. There has always been a favorable work-life balance, and overall, people continue to motivate themselves to get better. There is not much criticism or disagreement to go around, and that’s a good thing. Inspiring Employees to Meet Needs of the Clients Customers are always the most important aspect of any business. Without customers, no one has a business. Ensuring and enhancing the customer experience is always high up on KHM’s list, and at the end of the day, the team always wants to make sure that everyone is completely satisfied. It usually comes down to a few things: responsiveness, quality of the product, and customizability. Over the 12+ years, the team has evolved its practices and QA/QC measures to ensure only the finest lead quality – in terms of both data integrity and lead scoring mechanisms. It’s very important for the customizations where some clients are happy to stick with more traditional means and delivery methods, and some like the team to use custom API integrations, lead import systems, and form post technologies. The team is always happy to customize a product – with regard to both targeting and delivery – to go above and beyond the customer’s expectations. Being Adaptable to Unprecedented Times Businesses were being asked to keep their premises closed to combat the coronavirus. The onset of the COVID-19 pandemic was an uncertain time, and it impacted virtually everyone else on the planet. Though KHM
Arungalai Anbarasu: Delivering Breakthrough Technology and Digital Transformation
Journey and Inspiration As a child, the curiosity of questions like where we came from, how things are built, how the earth was formed among others kept Arungalai Anbarasu awake at night. This made her want to be an astronaut. However, she grew up not knowing that her poor eye vision would never let her pursue that path. Therefore, she went to study the closest thing to it, engineering. She has her master’s degree in Electrical and Computer Science. And her master thesis was on Non-Destructive Testing (NDT), that’s what her employer Waygate Technologies specializes in. After university, she joined the famous conglomerate General Electric (GE) into their graduate program called Edison engineering where she learned how technology is used to build and sell solutions that solve different problems in the world like energy, healthcare, transportation, and communication. Therefore, driving a strategy & business from wing to wing became a passion which made her take different roles in GE & Baker Hughes in the areas of finance, strategy, operations, technology, and business leadership up to her current role of Chief Technology & Strategy Officer for Waygate Technologies, a Baker Hughes business. She and her team look at the overarching strategy for Waygate Technologies while delivering breakthrough technology innovation and digital transformation. She also led the industrial X-ray and computed tomography (CT) business in the past few years at Baker Hughes (BH). Every role, every experience, every country Arungalai has lived, taught her something new and contributed to shaping her career and personality. The diversity of roles and global nature of her roles before has really helped her look at the strategy for the company in a very balanced yet with an exponential growth approach. Her experiences have also taught her the power of being able to flex from the strategic view to the tactical view to operate the business at best which she very much leverages in her current role. Not only to dream about the future but also to enable the operations to make it real! Opportunities Against Difficulties As with any company in this age – COVID has thrown at Waygate Technologies a really large wrench. Its key customers were impacted, and that is clearly affecting them – it does no one good to ignore that fact. “There are opportunities even in the difficult moments.” With that in view, COVID has also posed a positive aspect where the digital transformation is accelerating in every industry…It is the new beginning for the Digital Revolution! NDE4.0 in Waygate Technologies’ case. Overall, if anything good has come out of COVID, it is the fact that drove us further away from each other physically and brought a lot of people much closer together virtually. The manifestation of this in industrial inspection is the drive to data and the drive to a larger level of, remote, collaboration. This coincidentally is precisely what is enabled by the suite of Waygate Technologies’ digital products called InspectionWorks. What are the main challenges to achieving the transformation from a device-centric inspection company to a data-centric inspection company? – both internally and externally? Transformation exists throughout the process; not just technology. Sometimes, digital transformation is seen as a technology problem only. Waygate Technologies is a company with a great heritage – the team traces its lineage back to Krautkrämer and Seifert – people who discovered the technologies and invented the techniques. However, with this heritage also comes a lot of tradition that tends to get up-ended in this world of, quite literally, data-driven micro-second decisions (if you don’t believe in the time scale, just look at the micro traders on Wall Street). ‘Waygatians’ try to address these challenges along with multiple fronts: Move execution to focus explicitly on collaborative partnerships – with customers and partners – this is critical because all these software solutions can become most successful when the team works in close collaboration with customers and partners, and focus exclusively on areas where they can deliver the most value – this allows for scale in a world that is moving at warp speed. The second pillar is that of building the right commercial models – they are so used to selling boxes that even when they sell software, they end up selling it as if they are selling a box – they need to consciously create new ways of doing business – this means trying out new models, refining them and coming up with faster, and more efficient paths to revenue. They need to continue to look long and hard at how to enable sales and commercial success on software and solutions – this requires a completely different mindset that needs to be encouraged, by training, incentives, etc. Finally from a hardware and machine manufacturing business to a software solutions business is a hard shift on technology execution and rhythms – one example is that they are moving to a constant release rhythm – they have set up a quarterly release calendar and they would like to drive a steady expectation from their customers – where like any other major software company’s yearly release event – their customers look to them at certain times of the year for them to release new versions of their solutions – like clock-work. Women Softening Economy Making decisions after considering multiple viewpoints ensures the probability of success from the outcomes is higher & the probability of approach with balanced emotions is higher. Women bring unique perspectives to research and scientific conversation, reduce the skill gap, and foster economic growth. Focusing on Digitalization Arungalai Anbarasu, the Chief Technology & Strategy Officer at Waygate Technologies, is driving strategy & innovation for the company. In addition to pushing the technology & business models boundaries on industrial inspection solutions, Aru and her team are also focused on the digital transformation of Waygate Technologies and the spearheads of the firm’s evolution into a Digital Inspection Solutions (DIS) provider, taking customers from inspections to insights and from insights to innovations. The key enablers that
Jordan Meinster: Stretching and Kicking Basketball Franchise Performance into High Gear
They say there’s a time and place for everything – Jordan Meinster says the time to start a basketball franchise is right now. There are many things that mark PickUp USA Fitness out from other franchises, but Jordan starts with two. ‘First, we offer new franchisees a turn-key business complete in every detail, including training and mentorship programs. And second, our whole environment is based upon allocating substantial resources to our training programs, whether it’s complete training or 365 day/year support. We at Fortunes Crown got into conversation with Jordan Meinster, Founder & CEO, PickUp USA Fitness, to know more about the company and how it is helping the businesses as a whole. Below are the highlights of the interview: Please brief us in detail about the current scenario of the franchise business. How have the customer preferences changed over the years? PickUp USA has awarded 43 franchises for our basketball-focused concept. We have a nationwide presence and are considered the industry leader in basketball facilities. We stay in tune with our customer preferences and continuously adjust our services to ensure we are providing a world-class basketball experience. Some recent examples include a members-only adult basketball tournament each week and a new Youth Development league for kids in grades 3rd – 8th. Could you please walk us through your educational/professional journey? What was the moment that triggered you to step into the franchise business? I went to college in Durango, CO and always played PickUp basketball at parks and rec centers there while I earned my Bachelor’s in Business Economics. I put myself through school managing a restaurant. When I wasn’t in school or working, I was playing basketball! I worked for several years in banking and finance and eventually enrolled in night classes at USC where I completed my MBA. I always dreamed of opening a basketball gym and one day I got the courage to quit my job and start PickUp USA! When was PickUp USA established? What are the prominent services/solutions offered by the company? The first PickUp USA was established in Irwindale, CA (just outside of Los Angeles) in June 2012. PickUp USA is a basketball paradise for youth and adults. We do group and private basketball training, PickUp basketball with referees, tournaments, Youth Basketball Leagues, and a lot more. All of our clubs also have full fitness centers with weights and cardio equipment. What measures do you incorporate to ensure motivation and productivity within the workspace? How do you respond to criticism and disagreements? I take a very hands-off approach with my team. We collectively determine goals and then I let them figure out how to get there. It is a very entrepreneurial workplace. We encourage risk-taking and making mistakes. That has helped us become one of the fastest-growing fitness franchises in the US. Criticism and disagreements are a natural and productive part of any business. Criticism provides great feedback and insight from customers, employees, and franchise owners. Disagreements show that everyone cares. Friction is a part of growth and we welcome it as long as everyone remains respectful and professional of all team members. What measures do you undertake to ensure optimum customer satisfaction? How much impact does the customer feedback have on the company’s strategies? Customer feedback is a huge part of how we shape our programs and services at PickUp USA. We continuously run member surveys and connect with our customers at our gyms. Our corporate team is consistently onsite at corporate-owned and franchised locations and we actively solicit feedback from customers so we can know how to best serve them. Our franchise owners also perform self-audits on their stores to ensure that we are living up to the high expectations that our members and guests have for our clubs. As a leader, how do you ensure hiring the ideal franchising candidate with the ideal qualities? How do you ensure providing effective training and mentorship to the team? When analyzing franchising candidates for PickUp USA, our development team completes a comprehensive discovery process to get to know the individuals looking to franchise our basketball concept. Our Franchise Development Manager sends e-Brochures and conducts initial phone calls to answer initial questions and determine if there is a fit. From there, she sends them an application to complete. Upon receiving the application, she determines if the candidate qualifies to start our discovery process. If qualified, our VP of Franchise Development conducts a series of interviews and webinars to build the candidates understanding of our program. After this process, the VP determines if we will award a franchise to the candidate. It’s a very thorough vetting process that ensures we have top-tier franchisees to deliver our services to the public. After signing on as franchisees, our training and mentorship programs are widely recognized as the best in the industry. We allocate substantial resources to our training programs and all franchisees complete a comprehensive curriculum through PickUp USA University. Franchisees work directly with our VP of Operations, our VP of Marketing, and our Franchise Support Associate to complete their training, and they are assigned dedicated reps at the corporate office for ongoing 365 day/year support. We also have a platform for franchisees to communicate with one another, either one-on-one or in a community forum. We all support one another. When one of us wins, we all win. How did the COVID-19 pandemic impact you and your company? What was your response to the unprecedented situation? COVID shut down all of our gyms for a brief period in 2020. We banded together as a company and weathered the storm. We quickly recovered and were back to pre-pandemic levels of business by Q3 of 2020. 2020 wound up being a record year for the company and 2021 far surpassed 2020’s numbers. Things have not slowed down in 2022. Q1 was our best quarter ever. COVID was scary, but we have an amazing group of franchise owners and a dedicated corporate office. We didn’t close a single location
Karen L. Simon: A Resilient Professional Working in a Commercial Real Estate
With over 30 years of brokerage experience, Karen Simon is recognized as the first woman in Tarrant County to practice industrial real estate and the first female broker to be named the highest industrial producer in the Dallas and Fort Worth area. She specializes in office, retail, industrial and land sectors in leasing and sales. Running a business and raising children at the same time? That’s concrete tough. Thinking about family first against relocating for better opportunities, adds even more challenges. And end up entering into an industry dominated by men, that’s yet one more hurdle. But that’s what Karen Leslie Simon has done. Simon is the Managing Partner of Emersons Commercial Real Estate, responsible for marketing activities west of Dallas County. As an expert in real estate, Simon has completed over 900+ transactions encompassing thousands of acres of land and 6,000,000 square feet of building area. She has excelled as the president and managing partner of the Tarrant County division of Emersons Commercial Real Estate. The Inspiration Karen Simon earned her Bachelor of Science Degree from the University of Texas in Austin and a master’s degree in American history from Texas Christian University and 24 hours above masters from TCU as well. She also participated in the doctoral program at Texas Christian University. Ms. Simon started her career as a teacher in a community college and after 5 years she was ready to enter the business world. Though she wanted to continue teaching, the opportunity of teaching at a 4-year university was limited even if she completed her doctorate. Texas and TCU were not hiring faculty who graduated from their schools as they promote diversity. So she pursued the opportunity of the federal government. She had the opportunity to be considered as Executive Assistant for the Regional Administrator of The Department of Housing and Urban Development for Region 10, which was located in the Dallas- Forth Worth area. She was selected for the position and began her real estate journey. The Unexpected Journey One day an unexpected bulletin crossed her desk that if someone qualified to take the Brokers exam and did not already have a salesman license, they could do so. It was an opportunity for her as a HUD employee, as she was barred from holding a salesman license while employed by HUD because it could be a conflict of interest with the government. After learning she was only lacking 9 hours out of 900, she took a two-week leave from work and did the classwork, took a review class, and took the Brokers exam. To her delight, she passed the exam and began a new chapter in her life. After 6 months of holding her new license, Ms. Simon accepted a position as head of the Industrial Division for the Henry S. Miller Company in Tarrant Country and became the first woman to be defined as an Industrial Realtor in the metroplex. Experience Beyond Opportunities As a Managing Partner, Ms. Simon holds success in real estate in various capacities. From 1983 to 1989, she garnered valuable experience as the senior vice president of the industrial and land division of Henry S. Miller. Between 1990 and 2000, she flourished as the president of the R.E. Group Advisors, Polo Club Enterprises Inc., and the industrial and land division of the Woodmont Company. Soon thereafter, Ms. Simon was recruited as the executive vice president and managing partner of Bradford Commercial Real Estate Services, a role in which she thrived from 2003 to 2014. From 2014 to 2016, she was active as the president and principal of TIG Real Estate Services Metroplex West. In 1987, she participated in establishing the first women’s organization for women in commercial real estate, the Commercial Real Estate Women’s Organization. Establishing the Company Emersons Commercial Real Estatewas founded in 2004 by Richard Webb, a banker and a real estate agent, and Matt Price, a C.P.A and real estate entrepreneur. The company based initially in Dallas did real estate leasing, sales, and property management. It has since grown to include Karen’s office in Forth Worth, one in Oklahoma City, and one in Houston and Austin. In 2019, the company also founded along with Priority properties out of St. Louis, a company called 1045. Its primary functions were to manage all of Kroger’s real estate nationwide. It manages more than 80 million Sq Ft. This growth and expansion have opened additional doors for its participants, and the team hopes it will have a continuing positive influence on Emersons itself. Concrete Services Emersons is dedicated to providing clients with all of the benefits of an in-house real estate management operation without the typical overhead, expense, and problems associated with employing their staff. Its experienced team offers professional property management services to Tenant-in-Common owners who want to know their investments are in good hands. With expertise in banking, finance, accounting, leasing, development, construction management, property management, and Tenant-in- Common management – it understands the broad dynamic of modern property acquisition, ownership, and management. From full-service management services, including property management and construction management to single solutions like accounting and financial processing Emersons can design a management program that suits businesses. Karen Simon’s Achievements Because of her experience and knowledge, Ms. Simon has been sought out by national real estate publications and local business papers as both a column writer and source for stories about real estate issues. She has also been honored by The Business Press in its “Who’s Who in Business” section as one of the Decision Makers and Heavy Hitters in Tarrant County and was a two-time nominee for the Fort Worth Star Telegram’s Newsmaker Award for Civic Involvement. She was named to the Dallas Business Journal list as the #4 Heavy Hitter in land brokerage and 2001 she was named one of the Great Women of Texas. She was also selected to handle the disposition of the closed Albertsons grocery stores in the Dallas/Fort Worth area. She was recognized as Bradford Companies’ Top Producer in
FOUR REASONS MICRO-INFLUENCER CAMPAIGNS ARE THE MOST EFFECTIVE FORM OF INFLUENCER MARKETING
Influencer Marketing today is an upgraded approach to the most effective form of marketing since the Industrial Revolution – Word of Mouth. It allows your business to increase reach, stay relevant, and influence buyer behavior authentically. With 82 percent of consumers saying that they would be very likely to follow a recommendation from a micro-influencer and 65 percent of consumers discovering a new brand or product through an influencer at least once a week – your potential customers are motivated by consumers. Our boutique travel and lifestyle public relations agency spotlights our partner agency, The Stylista Group, and shares insights about micro-influencer campaigns as the most effective form of Influencer Marketing. What is Micro-Influencer Marketing Unlike macro-influencers and mega influencers (celebrities) who boast millions of followers, micro-influencers can range between 10,000 to 100,000 followers. Micro-Influencer Marketing is a social media influencer marketing strategy that enables a more focused approach to find your target audience in a niche market whilst maintaining a considerable reach. This approach often results in higher ROI. Finding Your NicheMicro-influencers have a competitive advantage due to their hyper-engaged and loyal following. Consider mega influencers such as celebrities, who have so many followers that interests can vary. On the other hand, micro-influencers tend to be highly engaged with their audience because they work harder to maintain their following and often focus on specific content within a niche. Being niche enables them to sustain their influence over common interests with their followers. #fashionblogger to #foodblogger ‘’Micro-influencers have 22.2 times more conversations weekly about buying recommendations compared to the average consumer.’’Influencer Marketing Hub 2021 Authentic MarketingWith the internet accelerating the growth of information accessibility combined with conscious consumerism, it is more important than ever for brands to ensure that their advertising efforts are genuine and brand values align with the customer. Although mega-influencers may appear more impactful, they are not relatable. For example, if a celebrity promoted a Target handbag with a good recommendation, followers may think that the promotion is only for monetary gain. Customers are also inundated with information from brands every day. How do you as a business cut through the noise whilst positioning your brand as credible? Saying you are trustworthy is not enough today – this is why peer-to-peer marketing builds authenticity amongst your potential buyers. In a 2019 global survey, 87 percent of consumers were inspired by an influencer to purchase from a brand. Micro-influencer campaigns have become a credible and genuine marketing channel to influence buyer behavior. Affordability The micros are more affordable than macro and mega influencers. Let us use Instagram as an example as 67 percent of brands use Instagram for Influencer Marketing. Micro-influencers tend to charge between $100 – $2500 per post depending on follower count. Whereas influencer profiles reaching millions can start from $10,000 per post, that is only affordable for businesses with bigger marketing budgets. Additionally, your marketing investment in influencers goes further than solely generating leads for your business, it can generate content. According to a 2020 Influencer report, ‘’80 percent of brands say they have increased the amount of content they produce’’ – meaning that their investments in influencer marketing are also enabling them to promote more content on the business’s digital platforms. And as a bonus, your business has more positive customer testimonials guaranteed. Better ROI, More ValueThe ability to relate to your customers evokes emotional buyer behaviors – so it’s no surprise that ‘’89 percent of marketers say influencer marketing ROI is as good or better than other marketing channels’’. Nano-influencers (generally under 10,000 followers) are similar to micro-influencers in terms of accessibility to a niche market. And, nano-influencers may achieve higher engagement rates depending on the product or service on offer due to their close community of followers. However, micro-influencers offer further reach; higher impressions and conversion rates; and greater brand awareness At the same time, they continuously maintain a high level of trust amongst their followers. Micro-influencer campaigns can generate more focused leads as they tend to be more experienced too. To conclude, Influencer Marketing is expected to reach a market size of $10 billion – it is clear that peer-to-peer marketing and word-of-mouth is still the most valuable method to generate customers and revenue for your business.
Joseph Rothstein: Passionate About Assisting His Clients In Growing And Scaling Their Businesses
The media industry has been rapidly changing since the dawn of the internet. Over the past couple of years, media platforms are dynamically influencing the business world such as advertising on Instagram. Recently, the COVID-19 pandemic has driven many businesses towards getting online to step their game up. The preys to this unwelcomed circumstance are the older generation businesses that have been holding off from providing their clients functional and enjoyable user experience. The pandemic has forced businesses to go digital; in-person meetings and traditional ways of being seen have been waved earlier for good. Joseph Rothstein, the Founder & CEO of Social Media 55, had sensed it all more than a decade ago. In the age of information, Joseph was a bit skeptical about the old implication methods of marketing. With a vision to be the best provider in the media industry, he began his entrepreneurial journey. In 2014, he founded Social Media 55 with the passion to impart brand exposure and visibility to businesses in need. The Day With Positivity Joseph radiates positivity and true enjoyment of his work. He spends most of the day working alongside VP of Operations Benjamin Ohayon, who has been a driving force for their customer success. Where Joseph as CEO is responsible for strategy and direction functioning closely with the team for successful campaigns, Benjamin is a true leader every CEO requires. Joseph oversees his graphic designers, SEO team, content developers, and works alongside the web development team. From Wireless to Digital Joseph, after a decade of working in telecommunications and servicing corporate accounts, was fascinated by marketing. He realized that he wasn’t being challenged working in the wireless cellular phone industry, and plunged into digital marketing about 10 years back. He began developing an e-commerce website for a luxury fragrance company “JIVAGO Brands.” Soon the brand started getting great traffic from the new website and mandated him to manage the social media platforms. He enjoyed working in the field so much that he decided to offer the same services to many businesses. Joseph gained enough experience for a startup, Social Media 55, to deliver services like social media management paid and organic, website design & development, SEO, PPC, and everything in between. “I’ve also been known for answering our 1-800 number after hours,” he says. Recognition as Leader Social Media 55 has been recognized as an exemplary leader multiple times. The agency has been awarded over 20+ awards in Social Media Management, SEO, PPC, Digital Marketing, B2B Services, Top Web Design Agency 2019, 2020, 2021 by GoodFirm, Clutch, Agency Spotter, Upcity, and more. They offer businesses innovative solutions that deliver the right type of audience to clients in the most effective strategies possible. Joseph and the team believe in transparency and hence, everyone plays a key role to make Social Media 55 successful. Such commitment allows them to pay close attention to the client feedback and in making sure the client is fully satisfied. The Close Connection Social Media 55 provides solutions that are customized to address the specific needs of the clients. From executives to associates and team members take a personalized approach and spend time working one-on-one with the clients to ensure they are meeting all of their marks. Everyone wants to help each other be successful, thus they ensure close communications with their clients throughout their mandate. They listen to their clients’ feedback closely so as to fine-tune their formula and deliver a superior service. Team members continue to evolve, to best meet the needs of clients. Their focus on integrity is at the forefront of what they stand for as a company and an agency. They carry a concrete reputation for providing honest and excellent quality work. They delve their heart and soul into each and every project they take on. The Challenges and the Opportunities No matter how many challenges you overcome, the new ones will find their way. The COVID-19 affected the company in many ways but the easiest decision company made was to keep everyone safe. The quickest agreement was to go remote immediately, which was not difficult for them as they were used to a hybrid work/home balance already. At the initial pandemic, they were busy working on their legacy accounts and noticed website traffic and leads had drastically dropped almost to a halt. After one month of crickets, the phones and the website exploded. The pandemic waves have eaten enough industries and collapsed the GDPs of major economic countries. However, months after businesses got their feet stronger, as they were scrambling to get online, Social Media 55 was working long hours to meet the high demand. There is a difference in surviving and thriving when it comes to adopting new technologies such as 5G. It is no more hidden that the advent of 5G will revolutionize almost every business in the world. From the Internet of Things (IoT) to science, communications to design, the 5th generation technology projects the next human evolution. For instance, Metaverse from Mark Zuckerberg with the help of 5G will allow users to interact with anything, anyone in the 3D world. The technology will bring exponential growth to the social media platforms and marketing more skin-friendly. Our files and needs are getting bigger and used by more and more each day, it’s no question that 5G will help manage all that data. Joseph has plans to elevate its marketing hierarchy through acquiring/developing a digital social media calendar management software that will support all the major platforms. Seek Out What You Desire Joseph’s message to aspiring business leaders is to get a job at almost any position in an agency and learn how the business operates. Pick apart what makes the business tick and find a way to bring added value to that company by taking initiative and improving something. Take that experience and attempt in moving up the ranks and locking down a position you feel is more in line with your goals. If you don’t see
Ishveen Jolly: Bridging Athletes and Companies Through AI
Ishveen Jolly (Anand), Founder and CEO, OpenSponsorship, is using her wide-ranging experience and interactions in India and Europe to redefine the importance of connections between agents and athletes and companies. What sponsorships will look like— a reimagined investment playground accessed through untapped AI and data. By tapping into the potential of AI, Ishveen delivers a platform that has room for every player. She considers the way sports decorum achieves optimal success and the way that technology advancement is moving in today’s rapidly-evolving world. A Qualified Endeavour Ishveen started her career as a management consultant and then as a sports agent. For five years, she worked in the sports industry primarily focused on securing sponsorships for athletes, teams, leagues, and events in India and Europe. Along the way, however, she realized that it wasn’t always easy for agents and athletes to connect with companies and vice versa. And when they did, the results weren’t always what either party had envisioned. A hard-hitting test occurred during the pandemic when they had to set up the entire office remotely. This huge adjustment is being thoroughly embraced now with their team across the US and even in the UK. This has meant being more reliant on processes, KPIs and ensuring check-ins regularly to ensure team members are thriving and achieving. Defining Moments of OpenSponsorship As a startup, unique challenges are a part of the business. Currently, some of the company’s challenges come from growing as a start-up to becoming a bigger business. OpenSponsorship constantly has to make sure that they have all the correct processes in place for them to continue to scale up and continuously make sure everyone on the team is in sync with a clear definition of ‘where we want to excel as one’ with OpenSponsorship. They are also facing an influx of competition, especially within the college space since the new NIL rule is in play. However, they are committed to constantly upgrading their technology to make sure it is sufficient, while still being simple for both athletes and brands to use. Women Determined to Rising Women can often change the atmosphere of any challenge. Any time you can bring diversity into the boardroom and into decision-making, it is better for all. Women are the primary purchaser of goods, which is a huge part of GDP. Understanding the patterns of how and why women purchase, is a major key. People have seen a huge part of big companies, delivering on women’s needs, ranging from personal care, health care, and furthermore. Ishveen Jolly feels like understanding women is most important. Women bringing their different perspectives is really important as well, especially when speaking about tech and AI. Ishveen thinks business and politics go hand and hand. You can not have one without the other, it is just how the world operates. There are so many business decisions that ride on policies. For example, in the world of sports, politically speaking sports betting is legal in the U.S and that brings tons of business and money into the company. Plus tons of businesses are opening up in terms of legality like CBD, which leads to business directly. All of these new categories often come with questions that are not clear yet the policies come into play. Policies often change, one of which people are currently dealing with is maternity leave, they present the leave that gives women the opportunity to go back into the workforce and that obviously transforms business. A huge cross-section between both fields. Women Hold More Potential to Excel Economically Obviously, sports and technology both have independently been male-dominated industries. But from DNA to genetics, both are different. Both are wired differently and those differences are what makes women tick. They see the world through different eyes. In terms of women, speaking of minorities, people with unique voices, are the ones who will make the world a better place for living because they are going to be more inclusive. Building diversity is what will be the recipe for success. It will help us build products, businesses, and policies that are inclusive for any and everyone. OpenSponsorship does have male team members on the team who are able to be more sympathetic and empathetic. But having a woman in the room can make people more sensitive and also create awareness in terms of being inclusive themselves. As a woman, you may use different language or be more considerate of others’ points of view. Female leadership can be more humane, as they often are more considerate. It often holds true a lot of time, but not always. Roles and Responsibilities Ishveen’s primary role as Founder & CEO is to constantly break new barriers, and think about new solutions to grow OpenSponsorship. Growing the team, revenue, and reaching new milestones really gets her excited for the future. She is constantly engaged in all aspects of the business. For her, it is important that she understands how the company flows from the inside to the outside. OpenSponsorship platform is the core of what it does. About a year back they released their mobile app and they are seeing an uptick in that from users – Mobile is becoming core to their product. They love the use of AI and data for their platform, from matching to suggesting the right campaigns for brands. They are always figuring out ways to plug in other technological solutions to theirs, like transitioning all their payments to athletes through Tipalti, using Stripe to collect payments from brands just to make it easier and quicker. They also use Intercom so that people can message us in real-time through the app. They are constantly leveraging technology to make their process quicker and more seamless. They differ from their competitors because they don’t want sponsorship to be a chance, based on who they know, or whether or not they got lucky. So they are determined to make sure that there is access for everyone and that it’s meritocratic, just like