These days no employer can afford to lose a good employee. Not every person on the payroll is a superstar, but all play a real and necessary role in achieving your mission, from the BD team out in front to the admin and IT staff behind the scenes. That’s why this quarter, we’ve focused on investing in your workforce.
Committing to making your team run like a well-oiled machine, whether there are three of you or several hundred, is a winning mindset. Check out the tips from our own Director of Operation on managing a hybrid workforce, then consider the benefits of upskilling your cyber talent, and consider a new way to look at employee engagement – by measuring “thriving” behaviors! We also cover the latest trends in training. After all, you don’t want your programs to grow stale.
We haven’t ordered matching jerseys or penned a rallying cry here at DTS, but we have invested in our team relentlessly, recognizing that our people are the very essence of our service. How do you feel about your workforce? Let’s continue the conversation. Shoot me an email or a call.
Edward Tuorinsky
Managing Principal
DTS
Edward.Tuorinsky@consultDTS.com
571.403.1841
Managing a Hybrid Workforce
Ideas to consider from DTS Director of Operations, Brian Sims
Hybrid is happening. Though you’ve likely made lots of adjustments in the past two years to get to this point, there’s still more you can do to make hybrid an asset in your workplace. We’ve gathered four proven guidelines from our own experience – and that of our clients.
Indoctrinate everyone: If you don’t have a formal onboarding process, create one and send all current employees through it to work out the kinks. Be deliberate about spelling out expectations, defining work norms (from what is OK to wear on a Teams call to how to handle WFH emergencies), and your company’s standards for handling client service and vendor interactions. For new employees, create a multi-touch orientation where new employees spend time one-on-one with various experts from around the company during the first few weeks of employment.
Choose your oracle: Decide on a single source of truth. Commit to a communication vehicle that works for all employees to share information efficiently, like a weekly email, text message, or SharePoint site. Publish news there first and have all other forms of communication refer back to it.
Write the book: Develop written policies and governance for hybrid teams. These living documents should be revisited often and should focus on being flexible, not telling employees what they can or cannot do. Some policies might require trial and error to get things right. For example, when we have team meetings now, we ask everyone to dial into the conference line individually to listen, regardless of where they are working, and to turn on their camera when they are talking. This saves bandwidth and makes “face time” equitable between those in the office and those working elsewhere.
Measure differently: Having a hybrid workforce means you now need to focus on outcomes rather than outputs. The outcome mindset measures value based on individual contributions to the end result. Were objectives met? Is the client satisfied? Are teammates satisfied with the balance of contribution across the team? What’s the feedback from other team members? These are metrics necessary to determine if each employee is contributing in substantial and meaningful ways.
10 Tips to Develop Cybersecurity Knowledge Within Your Organization
Continuing education is important for many professions, but it’s essential that everyone in your organization receives training in cybersecurity. Why everyone, you ask? You can’t assume that employees know or follow proper cyber hygiene in their personal lives. Allowing them to connect personal devices to your network or use company resources without training is taking a big chance with data, arguably one of your most valuable resources. Most hacks are the result of human error, and we can impact that!
To help you get started, we’ve collected ten of our best tips to help you move the needle from cybersecurity zero to hero.
Are Your Employees Thriving?
Are you thriving? Microsoft defines that as being “energized and empowered to do meaningful work.” The company shared its new way of thinking about employee engagement in the Harvard Business Journal – and provided a bit of a primer for organizations wanting to give it a try.
The rationale behind thriving is this: The pandemic has prompted many to reflect on the role of work and career in their lives. Employers need a better way to determine if employees are feeling the sense of purpose critical to being energized on the job. Read on to see how you might use this novel survey and scoring method with your workforce.
Trends in Training: Bite-sized Learning Continues to Dominate
Microlearning, short bursts of new material, continues to be the biggest trend in eLearning this year. The technique can be applied to how-to videos, interactive learning games, brief articles, and short sessions that convey information concretely and expressly. Its popularity has grown this year precisely because few employees feel they have time for training and development, and it returns value (new nugget of information or skill) with little interruption in productivity.
Is it time to hang up days-long training sessions or hours of instruction? Read the full article in EconoTimes.
Service Spotlight: Learning and Development
DTS’ training and learning solutions go far beyond developing and presenting materials. Our consultants guide organizations through a full needs evaluation, planning, curriculum and materials development, and presentation lifecycle. We specialize in providing full-service training enhancement services using traditional and new, and innovative methodologies for retention, performance, and mission success.
Schedule a L&D consultation call with our sales team by emailing sales@consultDTS.com.
The Pulse of Cybersecurity
DTS continues to follow all cybersecurity regulations and CMMC updates very closely and commits to providing this information to our clients in plain language, with actionable takeaways.
WHAT’S NEW:
By now, you’ve probably heard that the CMMC Accreditation Body is being called the Cyber AB. The rebranding will help distinguish the organization from the federal government. The Cyber AB is a completely independent 3rd party organization tasked with maintaining the CMMC ecosystem. That’s also why CMMC assessments will be slightly different from DoD assessments of NIST SP 800-171
You’ve got (cloud) choices. DTS has introduced an option for those needing a high-trust environment who are already using Microsoft’s commercial cloud environment. The option uses PreVeil and can be used to save money for companies where it makes sense operationally and financially. For additional details or an assessment to see if it’s right for you, contact DTS.
About DTS
DTS consultants go far beyond just “getting the job done.” We continually find better, more efficient and more effective ways to satisfy the needs of our public- and private- sector clients. DTS provides full lifecycle Management and IT consulting services, and can support your organization by researching and answering specific questions, solving critical issues or helping you plan for the future. Among a crowded field of contractors, DTS stands out for the quality of our people, the power of our approach, and the impact of our results. www.consultDTS.com
Continue the conversation:
Email sales@consultDTS.com or call 571.403.1841
