0  

eCornell Launches WebSeries: Live Events with Cornell University Faculty

eCornell, the online learning unit at Cornell University, has launched WebSeries, a monthly subscription to online events that feature presentations and interactive discussions led by Cornell University faculty and industry experts.

WebSeries is the latest addition to a broad portfolio of online professional courses and certificate programs from Cornell University. These live one-hour online events provide working professionals and lifelong learners with access to world-class instruction, timely research and practical guidance from experts at Cornell University.

“We’re excited to connect people around the world to useful and relevant insights from Cornell faculty in a new online format that truly supports lifelong learning.”
– Paul Krause, eCornell’s CEO and Associate Vice Provost of Online Learning for Cornell University

eCornell’s current WebSeries Channels include Entrepreneurship, Human Resources, and Women in Leadership, all with live and recorded events applicable toward earning CEUs. Several additional channels will be launched over the coming months, including Hospitality, Leadership, and Marketing.

Recently in the Women in Leadership Channel, ILR School’s Assistant Professor Allison Elias led a WebCast on “Do Women Lead Differently? Should They Lead Differently?” with real actionable advice to those who experience unconscious bias and stereotyping in the workplace. As you’ll see in this clip from the event, Channel subscribers were able to ask Professor Elias questions directly in eCornell’s virtual environment while engaging with other attendees in a chatroom discussion simultaneously.

“We are proud to launch our new WebSeries subscriptions, enabling people everywhere to have direct access to the brightest minds at Cornell University.”– Sally Berkowitz, eCornell’s Product Manager

Subscriptions are available per channel at $39/month and $279/year.  Excerpts from recent and upcoming events can be viewed at eCornell.com/WebSeries.

— 

About eCornell | Cornell University

As Cornell University’s online learning subsidiary, eCornell provides many of the world’s leading organizations with online professional development in the areas of finance, healthcare, hospitality, human resources, leadership, management, and marketing. eCornell has delivered flexible, engaging, and immediately applicable learning experiences crafted by Cornell University faculty to over 90,000 students in more than 200 countries.

For more information, visit www.eCornell.com.

 

  0  

Women Leaders and the Ongoing Debate Over Hard vs. Soft Skills

Yes, there’s an ongoing debate about whether or not women leaders should busy themselves with non-leadership-related tasks, ones that involve using “occupational” or “hard” skills (generating reports, statistical analysis, research). The argument goes that these tasks are best left to subordinate teams. This may be partially true.

At the same time, women leaders are expected to demonstrate competence and authority when working with others, hold others accountable, make difficult decisions and encourage collaboration across teams—what some might call “behavioral” or “soft” skills. Ask anyone who’s ever held a leadership position and they’ll assure you there’s nothing “soft” about leading people in an organization.

Conventional wisdom suggests that a healthy and considered balance of hard and soft skills is what really makes a good leader great. This makes sense and sounds like it’s more in line with what I hear from Cornell faculty I work with everyday. And it seems more based in reality. The truth is, most organizational leaders use all manner of soft and hard skills, each day, every day.

Since we launched back in February, the Women in Leadership WebSeries Channel has covered themes like gender bias, stereotypes and strategies for navigating them, crisis communication and the women’s leadership profile. In this post’s context, they scan like the softer side of the skills spectrum.

I thought we’d switch gears a bit for this next one to see if we can insert some hard skills education into the mix, to bring balance to the Women in Leadership Channel.

Last week I sat down with Mary MacAusland, CPA, PhD, a senior lecturer at the Cornell University School of Hotel Administration. Mary and I discussed how important it is for organizational leaders to understand financial statements. The financial statement is one of the primary tools that can help a leader make sound business decisions. For many, it’s the go-to data set for determining organizational strategy.

Whether you’re unfamiliar with financial statement interpretation or someone who’s seen many a financial statement in your day, I think you might benefit nonetheless from Mary’s insight. As a woman leader, understanding basic financials can do nothing but benefit your career.

We’ll go through an insightful case-study review of Starbucks statements from 2012-2015 as a platform for understanding how these reports work. I invite you to join Prof. MacAusland and me on Friday May 6 at 1:00PM for our next Women in Leadership event, Leadership Hard Skills: Understanding Financial Statements (navigate to the Women in Leadership Channel listings and you can enjoy a 30-day free trial subscription).

 

  0  

Do Women Lead Differently? Should They Lead Differently?

Here is a 5-minute excerpt from our recent WebCast for women leaders, Do Women Lead Differently? Should They Lead Differently?. Professor Allison Elias from Cornell’s ILR School introduces us to the “double bind” that professional women face at work. This session can help you identify and use your strengths and talents—whether those are masculine or feminine attributes—to have power and influence in your organization while also crafting your own definition of success. check it out:

If this excerpt has piqued your interest, I recommend you sign up for your free 30-day trial subscription here and enroll through the Women in Leadership Channel.

  0  

Know Thy Entrepreneurial Self, Build On Your Strengths

Here is a 5-minute excerpt from our recent WebCast for entrepreneurs, The Entrepreneurial Profile: Building On Your Talents. Professor Mona Anita Olsen, from the School of Hotel Administration at Cornell, walks us through the Gallup Entrepreneurial Profile 10 (EP10), a new talents-based assessment that helps entrepreneurs discover and develop their entrepreneurial talents.

If this excerpt has piqued your interest, I recommend you sign up for your free 30-day trial subscription here and enroll through the Entrepreneurship Channel. For best results, try the EP10 yourself ($12 cost) before viewing the WebCast.

After you complete the assessment, you’ll receive a personalized report that includes your unique talent profile. Prof. Olsen provides her contact info at the end of the session, so feel free to connect with her for advice as you prepare to build on your talents as an entrepreneur.

  0  

Strategies For Moving Your Startup Into a Bricks-and-Mortar Space

On April 6 we’ll be hosting a WebCast for startups called “Build Your Business: Real Estate Challenges for Startups” with Cornell alum T.J. Hochanadel.

As host, I needed to learn a few things about real estate strategies for startups, so T.J. and I had a conversation earlier this week.

What should a startup be thinking about when readying for the big move into a bricks-and-mortar address? 

T.J.: Every company has its own unique set of criteria that drive real estate decisions. Startups should look closely at a number of things, like price, geography, image, scalability, talent attraction/retention, commutability, life cycle of business — we’ll take a close look at all of these during our WebCast.

T.J., Can you recommend any tools or resources here that may help guide the startup toward an informed decision about real estate?

T.J.: Business execs tasked with the assignment of securing an office space should really consult with a commercial real estate professional who can represent tenants’ interests. The best commercial real estate advisors/brokers spend time understanding the business to help you formulate a strategy around your office choice.

Here at JLL, we have a really cool interactive tool called the Square, which is meant to help business executives grasp an initial understanding of a real estate strategy that best meets their current/future business needs. It really helps to guide the conversation going forward.

What if my company is focused on acquisition? Should that change my game plan?

T.J.: Each situation is unique, and it mostly depends on how the acquiring company underwrites the real estate obligation of the company being acquired. I think the argument could be that a company focused on acquisition would want to maintain high flexibility in its lease. However, I can recall several examples where a company was acquired shortly after signing a long-term lease.

What if I live and work in an area where the startup culture is not very dense or developed yet? Should I go where there is a culture and supportive infrastructure around startups?

T.J.: Again, each business requirement is unique. Generally, I believe successful companies tend to locate in geographies that will foster their growth. Tech hubs like NYC, Palo Alto, Los Angeles, etc. offer many advantages over less-developed hubs.

A business owner will want to consider the effects a geography has on access to capital, talent, and other unique business resources, and weigh those against cost of operating in those geographies.

How does company brand figure into real estate considerations?

T.J.: An office is a place that most of us “live in” every day, so it is inherently going to be a reflection of the brand. For the startup out there who is in the process of raising a large round of funding that will enable them to grow their employee headcount, they’ll want a home that will help them attract and retain talent. Or for the fashion designer who is looking to open a showroom, a client’s optical view of the brand image will be significantly influenced by the showroom. As discussed above, each situation is unique, and it is important to undertake the heuristic process to determine the best strategy for reach business. We’ll cover all this and more next week in our 1-hour WebCast.

 

Go here to register and to take advantage of our free 30-day trial subscription to the Entrepreneurship Channel.

  0  

Introducing eCornell WebSeries

Cornell University has launched a subscription-based webinar series that offers monthly online live webinars led by Cornell University faculty. The WebSeries consists of lectures, driven by Cornell University faculty, Q&A and interactive audience exercises on topics that are immediately applicable to your life. If you can’t attend the live event or want to re-watch something you’ve seen, the lectures are archived for viewing at a later date. You can earn Continuing Education Units (CEUs) by attending each event. We are launching with two channels: Women in Leadership and Entrepreneurship.

The Women in Leadership Channel features Cornell University faculty who bring academic expertise and real-world experience to help organizations overcome imbalanced power and influence in the workplace. In these one-hour interactive sessions you’ll learn how to:

  • Identify gender bias and stereotypes in the workplace.
  • Execute on individual and organizational strategies for overcoming bias, allowing for women to succeed in leadership positions.
  • Communicate, strategize and direct from a leadership position as a woman.

The Entrepreneurship Channel brings together Cornell University faculty, leading entrepreneurs, venture capitalists, and financiers to help you turn your brilliant idea into a successful startup business. In these one-hour interactive sessions you’ll learn how to:

  • Present and validate your startup business idea.
  • Manage the financial, legal and ethical aspects of your venture.
  • Introduce entrepreneurial principles and best practices to your business, whether it be a tiny startup, a global enterprise, a nonprofit, even a government agency.
  • Assess the competition and optimize your product or service for market success.

You can sign up for a free 30-day WebSeries trial! Learn more here: eCornell.com/StartWebSeries

  0  

Introducing our new HR Certificate

We are pleased to announced the launch of a new online Human Resources Management Certificate, developed by faculty at Cornell University’s ILR School. The nine-course program covers the foundational core competencies of human resources and features engaging content and interaction with expert instructors and peers. Like all eCornell certificates, it was designed with working professionals in mind as it is taken 100% online.

“The new Human Resources Management Certificate is based on the leading research, teaching, and outreach that are the hallmarks of our school’s mission of advancing the world of work,” states Kevin Hallock, the Kenneth F. Kahn Dean and the Joseph R. Rich Professor of Economics and Human Resource Studies at the ILR School.

The online HR courses cover topics crucial for a career in human resources, including employee performance management, total rewards compensation, labor relations, staffing decisions, employee engagement, training and development, coaching, countering bias, and internal consulting. Students who successfully complete the online program will receive a Human Resources Certificate from Cornell University.

“Whether you’re an HR generalist, specialist or new to the world of human resources, this Human Resources Management Certificate gives you the foundation needed for a successful career by providing ways for you to align your HR department to your organization’s goals,” said Associate Professor John Hausknecht. “We’re proud to make this online certificate program available to professionals around the world.”

The new Human Resources Management Certificate program includes lectures from 10 faculty members, input from numerous practitioners in the field, and a range of activities designed to translate concepts and best practices to application on the job.

Want to learn more? Go here or download our printable information sheet.

  0  

Why Branding is Dead, and Why Mindset Is Your Only Hope In the Future

There was more content created online in the last two years than was created in all of the prior 2000 years. Every conversation, tweet, and piece of content is a part of your brand image, and impacts a prospect’s experience with your brand.

The future success of your brand relies on you being able to provide and manage a positive experience across over 60+ marketing channels, 24 hours a day. Simple branding no longer works; the only sustainable way to consistently provide a positive experience to your prospects is by understanding Mindset.

Salesforce.com’s Mathew Sweezey explains why the modern digital landscape has killed the traditional concept of branding, and why Mindset is your only hope for building a consistent brand in the future.

Mathew Sweezey is the Head of B2B Marketing Thought Leadership for Salesforce.com. A consummate writer, he authors a column for Clickz.com on marketing automation, has been featured in publications such as Marketing Automation Times, DemandGen Report, Marketing Sherpa, ZDNet, and is the author of Marketing Automation for Dummies. Mathew speaks more than 50 times per year around the world at events such as Conversion Conference, Dreamforce, SugarCon, and to companies including Microsoft, Investec, NetJets, and Restaurants.com, to name a few.

  0  

Inspiration Isn’t Enough: The Mindset of a Social Leader

In this one-hour webinar and panel discussion, Switch & Shift’s Mark Babbitt and Shawn Murphy detail what makes social leaders and people-centric organizations successful.

Since the early days of the Industrial Age, employers have attempted to elevate the hearts and minds of their employees. Their primary goal: to positively affect business results.

Decades later, we see that most of these attempts failed. Even today, 74% of our workforce is disengaged. Perhaps that is because our leaders, while relentlessly trained to marshal resources and improve efficiency, profit margins and market share, largely ignored the needs of the employee.

This short-sighted effort left employees depleted and disillusioned. And ultimately, those less-than-inspiring leaders – and in some cases, entire industries – learned that business growth is tied directly to the ability to tap into the collective wisdom of their people.

To overcome this modern organizational malaise, today’s leaders must infuse two essential human-centered elements into their business model:

  •      Adoption of a social leadership style
  •      Creation of an optimistic workplace

In this webinar, you learn how to leverage social leadership to build and maintain mutually-beneficial relationships with your customers, champions, vendors – and especially your employees. You discover how to create a workplace environment that inspires employees to bring their hearts and minds – and even their souls – to work.

Most important, in the 60 minutes you invest in this webinar, you gain an understanding of how to remove the barriers that limit your organization’s performance – and, working together with your employees, realize your full potential.

Learning Objectives

  1.     Describe the 5 social leadership mindsets
  2.     Explain how the 5 social leadership mindsets benefit business
  3.     Develop a plan to increase social leadership practices in your immediate team
  4.     Articulate the 6 beliefs essential to create an optimistic workplace
  5.     Integrate into your leadership practices an adaptive one-on-one format that transforms relationships and performance
  6.     Learn the signs that your leadership mindsets and practices are having a positive influence on your team

Mark Babbitt serves as President of Switch & Shift, is CEO and Founder of YouTern and is a founder of ForwardHeroes.org. A serial mentor and social leader, Mark has contributed to Huffington Post, Inc. and Harvard Business Review.

Mark is also the co-author of A World Gone Social: How Companies Must Adapt to Survive and an in-demand speaker. Recently, he was named a Top 100 Leadership Speaker by Inc.com.

He and his family call Seattle home.

Shawn Murphy is CEO and co-founder of Switch & Shift, an organization dedicated to the advancement of human-centered organizational practices and leadership.

Often found in the classroom teaching, on the stage speaking, or alongside clients consulting, Shawn is passionate about helping people become the best version of themselves.

UPDATE: Watch the archived event here, and download the slide deck here.

 

  0  

Psychographic Segmentation – What Is It and Why You Need To Use It

No two people are created equal, and no two customers are identical. Market segmentation is a must for any company that wants to maximize its reach. Even within a specific niche, segmenting enables you to reach different sections of society, giving you inroads to more customers and increasing the loyalty of those consumers.

Demographic Segmentation

The most common form of segmenting is breaking down a population by demographics. For example, men might get a different message than women, and older customers would receive a different style of marketing than younger consumers. On the surface, this is a great way to differentiate between groups of customers who are fundamentally different and cannot be reached via identical means.

However, while demographic segmentation does have its place in marketing, it’s not the most efficient way to segment. To really find out the divisions in your marketplace, you have to dig a little deeper. After all, there’s more to people than their age or gender. Behaviors and attitudes are far more important in terms of creating customer profiles and identifying ways to reach groups of people.

Psychographic Segmentation

Psychographic segmentation takes the traditional forms of segmenting and goes well beyond the barriers that once existed. As the name suggests, psychographic segmentation ventures into the various ways that people think and feel about the world around them.

The more you understand a population, the better you’ll be able to market to this group. Psychographic segmentation allows you to develop new insights based on questions you might never have considered. For example, you can learn whether your customers value price or brand name, and you can also see how different discounts affect buying behavior.

The sky’s the limit with psychographic segmentation, but the deeper you try to go with market segmentation, the more diminishing returns you’re likely to receive. For instance, sending out surveys to determine consumer behavior only works if you get a high response rate and your customers tell the truth. Psychographic segmentation also requires frequent maintenance and updating of customer profiles. After all, demographics rarely change, but people’s attitudes change frequently.

In spite of some flaws, psychographic segmentation is easily the most effective and incisive way to understand your customers and give them the personal touch that’s necessary to retain their business. To learn more about psychographic segmentation and other market research tools, check out eCornell’s Marketing Strategy Certificate. This online program offers in-depth training on:

  • Marketing strategy, marketing research and analysis
  • Applied tools such as segmentation, targeting, positioning, and strategic pricing
  • Brand management and brand equity
  • Promotion strategies

Get more information on our Marketing Strategy Certificate.