Month: February 2017

UDK Earns Angie’s List “Super Service Award” for the Third Year in a Row

AL_UDK(Draper., Utah, Feb. 27, 2017) – Utah Disaster Kleenup (UDK), a member company of DKI, North America’s largest disaster restoration contracting organization, proudly announced they received Angie’s List’s “Super Service Award” for 2016.

This is the third consecutive year UDK has earned this award for Salt Lake’s leading Water and Fire Damage Clean Up and Restoration Company, representing their consistently high-level customer service to members of Angie’s List, a local services marketplace and consumer review site.

“UDK is proud to have the Angie’s List members once again speak out on behalf of our services, and we are very proud to win this award for the third year in a row,” said Keri Jones, director of sales and marketing for UDK.

The Super Service Award is the highest honor given annually to the top five percent of qualifying businesses on Angie’s List. The winners are determined by consumer reviews and ratings, updated daily. They must meet strict eligibility requirements, including being in good standing with Angie’s List, passing a background check, abiding by Angie’s List operational guidelines and scoring an “A” rating, based on price, professionalism and punctuality.

“Companies that can meet [these] higher demands without missing a beat in their exemplary performance standards truly do stand apart from their peers. Only a fraction of the water and fire damage clean up and restoration companies in Salt Lake were able to do it,” said Angie’s List Founder Angie Hicks.

About Utah Disaster Kleenup

UDK is the largest disaster and restoration service company in Utah, offering 24/7 emergency residential and commercial response. Their advanced restoration technology, equipment, and facilities provide them with the resources needed to restore a customer’s property, so the customer can re-establish normalcy in their life. The central location allows for an immediate response time. UDK can reach you quickly, and start work fast. To learn more, visit www.calludk.com.

About DKI
DKI, headquartered in Chicago, is the largest disaster restoration contracting organization in North America. DKI franchise member companies provide full service restoration to their customers: emergency response, water damage mitigation, fire and contents cleaning, mold remediation, complete reconstruction and much more, 24 hours a day, 365 days a year. DKI returns damaged property to its pre-loss condition quickly and efficiently, delivering complete satisfaction to its consumer, insurance, and corporate customers. For more information about DKI, visit its website at www.dkiservices.com.

3 Spring Cleaning Tips for Your Business

springclean_smSpring is just around the corner. Here are 3 simple ideas for your business to get you refreshed and ready to tackle anything.

Clean Up Your Workspace

It’s as simple as doing a good clean of your desk or office! Break out the bleach wipes, go through the papers and consider even going paperless!  Nothing gets you ready for a fresh start like sitting down in a clean and organized environment.

 Touch Up That Website

Your website can’t be left forgotten, otherwise your SEO will suffer.  It’s easy to forget with everything you have to do to run your business. Consider pre-writing a few blogs and dedicating someone to keep an eye on updates, or even outsource your SEO tasks.

Organize Your Inbox

We get it, you’re afraid to delete something you might need later. But, if you have a bunch of old files cluttering up your inbox, it gets chaotic.  If messages are more than a year old and you haven’t looked at them, get rid of them. If you think you might need to access them later, create a folder for them for easy access.

 

How to Develop Business Relationships with Remote Workers

February 16, 2017

By: Chelsea Haley, DKI Ventures, LLC

As you’ve read earlier this month, workplace camaraderie can help improve productivity. And, employees agree! According to The Conference Board Job Satisfaction survey of 2014, 60.6 percent of workers stated that those around them at work improve their work environment the most.

So, if developing friendships in the office can have a positive impact on overall business performance, how do we build a meaningful relationship with those located 500 (or more) miles away from us?

Remote employment is becoming increasingly more common as technology evolves. Today, we are able to communicate with those hundreds or thousands of miles away through multiple voice chat and video applications. And, remote work is beneficial to a company as it allows the business to expand into more territories – Its sales and marketing professionals can travel by vehicle or public transportation instead of expensive plan trips and customer service can accommodate customer inquiries in all separate time zones. Yet, the downside is it makes it more difficult to develop close relationships among employees.

But, since camaraderie is so significant to a business’ success, don’t disregard just because your employees are miles apart. It’s important that you learn how to work with remote employees to strengthen your company. Here are four ways to help you do that.

Daily Meetings

Have each department hold daily fifteen minute meetings to catch up on each others’ progress and workload. This provides reassurance to managers that their remote employees are working while they’re behind closed doors, and a quick and easy update on where a project is in terms of projected timeline. But, don’t keep the conversation strictly business; open with a quick ice breaker on what was the last movie everyone saw or what is the weather like near them. By creating a daily professional and casual verbal atmosphere, the team can start to form camaraderie among each other, even from states or countries away.

Virtual Coffee Breaks

In addition to discussing work, conversing on a daily basis about life in general and taking a mental break from your work helps people refresh while also building those close bonds among colleagues. Yet, gathering in the break room for coffee and to discuss each other’s weekend plans doesn’t quite work for remote employees. So, what about scheduling five to ten-minute coffee breaks via Skype (or any video chat system your company uses)?

Close your email and any open tabs for just a few minutes to avoid distractions, and turn on your video chat. You can drink coffee, or not; the purpose is to relax and reboot. These virtual “coffee breaks” can be on a daily or weekly basis, but try to use this time to briefly chat with your team about non-work events. If they need a little push to get started, try round-robin saying one good thing outside of work that happened that week, and one thing each other is excited for in the coming week.

Use the Buddy System

New employees sometimes feel intimidated in general, since they lack the advantage of already knowing everyone around the company, what each person does, and his or her strengths. However, new, remote employees have an even larger disadvantage since they can’t simply walk up to other employees to introduce themselves; they have to call or video chat a stranger – It can provoke the same anxiety as cold calling. As you onboard new, remote employees, consider teaming them up.

You can provide a short list of fun facts and a photo for each employee and send these to their “buddies,” then they can set up a quick phone call to discuss each other’s backgrounds, interests, current events in their area, professional goals, etc. Their buddies can also be their go-to person for assistance or information while the new employee is still learning the ropes of the business.

Treat All Equally

There is sometimes the misconception that remote employees perform less than those onsite. From the onsite employees’ perspective, this can be difficult to manage since they do not always see their counterparts’ work. To this point, remote employees can feel underappreciated. Be mindful of this and make sure that all employees are aware of individual and team accomplishments. Recognize all within a team and their individual contributions.

If you give out awards or gifts, make sure the remote employees have a fair chance at receiving these as well. If you choose to treat your onsite team to a coffee, send your remote employee(s) a coffee gift card that either they can use at the same time while video chatting in the coffee shop or even on a later date, to show they’re equally appreciated.

In addition, it can be easy to neglect your remote employees if your onsite team throws a work party, but try to include everyone. If it’s a holiday party, consider flying everyone to the corporate office for a chance to official meet their entire team. If it’s a small potluck though, it may not be necessary to fly everyone in for just a couple of hours, but consider sending your remote employees a live feed to view from their own locations, so they can feel like a part of the “party.”

Improve Productivity with Color

A study by The University of Texas at Austin believes something as simple as the color of your office surroundings can help increase productivity.

It’s easy to forget about the walls around you when you’re setting up an office. There are many important things to think about: phone and computer connections, desk, file cabinets, lighting, space assignments, white and cork boards. Many times the color of a room is ignored and left taupe or grey. These colors can feel like a bit like a prison, especially when you realize people spend most of their waking hours in the office.

Different colors impact the sorts of productivity depending on the job.  Not ready to paint the whole office? You can add accents like office accessories to help give a burst of color where you need it.

The two most popular colors for offices are Blue and Green, but take a look at the bold color choices below and how you may be able to implement them to suit your business:

Blue is the most universal color for all job types. It gives a senBlueBlogPicse of openness and the calming freedom of the sky outside. It’s one of those obvious colors found in nature and makes everyone feel better and ready to focus on the tasks at hand.

Green is another color that make people think of nature and gives a calming feeling. Instead of painting, consider cubical dividers in green or maybe some plants to bring the outdoors in. Green is one of the colors that are said to help creativity. So creative positions can definitely be inspired by this color.

GreenBlogPicYellow is a way to brighten up any office and create a sense of happiness. This is a solid creativity color for people with creative or design positions. This color is best used sparingly, like an accent wall or desk accessories.  A little goes a long way.  Too much yellow can be overwhelming.

Red/Orange can create a sense of energy, but like yellow, should be used sparingly in artwork or accessories.  Red is usually considered a color that evokes passion, if used in large amounts, it can also create stress. This is best used in an area employees are in for a limited time and not their major work time such as the lunch room or hallways.

Should you be Encouraging Friendships at Work?

February 1, 2017

By: Chelsea Haley, DKI Ventures, LLC

Does your workplace support camaraderie among its team members? A joint study by management professors at the University of Pennsylvania and the University of Minnesota shows that friends outperform acquaintances in work tasks. Friends are more committed, more likely to offer encouragement, and communicate more effectively with positive and constructive feedback. While you may think friendships at work can distract your employees, individuals are more productive when they feel comfortable around their colleagues. They are more likely to ask questions, solicit help, provide feedback and stay on track because if they fail, they also fail their team/friends.

Check out how employee bonds can be beneficial to your business:

  • Improved workplace productivity and performance
  • Increased employee morale
  • Decreased workplace stress
  • Minimized turnover and burnout rates

So, how you can forge positive relationships among your staff to help foster a more creative and productive work environment? Sometimes this depends on the particular work environment and business. But, here are a few tips to get started:

Welcome Each Employee

As you hire on new employees, make sure everyone gets a chance at an introduction. It is best to try to complete this within the first couple of weeks. Before you write off their first week on the job as social hour, consider how you can stay productive but still promote employee bonding.

One way to do this is to invite your new employee to company meetings. For the first five to ten minutes of the meeting, introduce the newcomer then go round-robin with each other’s names and something they like to do in their free time. The purpose is getting to know each other, so just try to refrain from speaking about business for that first bit.

Another way to encourage introductions is to hold orientations among the different departments. These can include training sessions for the newcomer, if applicable, or simply quick meetings to get to know one another and what each employee is responsible for.

Hold Weekly or Monthly Social Hours

Engage in team-building activities – trivia, ice breakers, friendly competitive sports/games – just something that gets everyone involved and working together. You can also choose to hold a company potluck or catered lunch, after work happy hour or even a fun group outing. Schedule something that provides your employees the opportunity for some casual chit-chat in between the professional business talk.

Treat Them as a Team

It’s important to recognize and acknowledge individual work, but to encourage camaraderie, treat your employees as team members. Each department is a different team of people, made up different personalities and work styles, who work together and rely on each other to achieve a common purpose. The Creatives can’t effectively execute without the Analysts, and neither can be successful without the Leader. So, as each project deadline gets met, remind yourself and your employees it’s not just the leader who deserves the credit, it’s his/her entire team, because without their teamwork it would not have been accomplished as such.

Continue following our blog as later, we will discuss the challenges and importance of promoting camaraderie among the growing trend of remote employees.