White Papers & Articles

​We’ve all experienced it – too much work, not enough time or resources to complete it.  Day after day passes, the work doesn’t slow down but your time frames become shorter and shorter furthering the stress of the looming workload.

All companies, start up to conglomerate, experience this same situation.  They’ve got work they can’t get to given the circumstances of their business.  Usually it’s…

• Don’t have enough time to complete all the work we have
• Don’t have enough resources to complete the work
• Don’t have the right resources to complete the work
• Work isn’t mission critical, so it gets shelved for other more important work

We can all agree we’ve seen this first hand and very well may be living it now within our current companies. 

The key question then becomes, “How do we address the ‘too much work, not enough [blank]’ commonality we all share?”

First, we need to assess the work in question and is it mandatory to keep close to the chest?  Meaning, are we the only ones who can do the work?
If your answer is:

NO – “the work can be done by someone else”; we should begin looking for alternative means for getting the work done via our supply base or strategic partners.  First, review your existing base of suppliers and their capabilities to see where work can be sent out.  Second, identify consulting firms which provide outsource services.  Many times the word ‘outsourcing’ is used as an all encompassing description for service providers that offer project or work package support, often which can be done onsite with the client just as easily as offsite – which would be the traditional method of outsourcing.

YES – “the work can only be done by our organization”; we should review the matrix of resources versus project loads.  Undoubtedly there are resources within the organization that aren’t working at full capacity and or are assigned to projects which aren’t immediate.  The trick with this approach is it may not satisfy the situation long term, often times when we try to keep things in house all we do is push off the situation to a later date.  If that doesn’t work, test your bias on ‘the work can only be done by us’. 

If you are in fact going to consider using an outsourcing or consulting firm to support you in your work projects be sure to follow this simple three step process to ensure you’re picking the right partners:

1. Location – it should never be understated, working with outsourcing firms which are local provides loads of advantages, cost being a major factor as you don’t have to pay for out-of-town travel expenses; this also helps ease potential communication issues
2. Flexibility – consulting firms that offer flexible services, tailored to your specific needs are always advisable to utilize; remember – it’s your work and your way, not vice versa; also, they should have a multitude of ways of approaching your projects, not a one size fits all approach
3. Understand Your Business – stay away from paying someone else to learn your business/ product or industry; consulting firms that have been there and done it before will know what’s needed and can step making quicker measurable impacts

Key Take Away:
Sometimes the best business decision we can make is deciding what work we want to do [internally] to increase our capacity and efficiencies while outsourcing work to suppliers or service providers which specialize in project work.  In turn, this means we can focus on the mission critical work, that we enjoy and are great at doing while giving someone else the work and or projects we can’t handle or don’t want to deal with.
 
Action Item:
Utilize the below decision tree diagram (yes, it’s overly simplified) to help you determine if the work you have in question should stay internally versus would benefit from being handled by an outside source.

​Are you looking for an outside services firm to help you with your projects?  If so, our company Square-1 Engineering, would be happy to speak with you about your needs.  Check us out at and let us know how we can help.

You read that right.  For the first time in decades there are more jobs available than the actual number of people that are on unemployment. As of July 2018  there are 6.3 million people in the US on unemployed, the equivalent of 3.9%.

​Axios, an online media company, shared yesterday we’ve officially crossed the barrier of more jobs available than people suitable or ready to fill them.  Our economy also continues to boom as we’re in the longest job growth period on record, now 94 straight months.  

How can this be?  If the economy is doing so well and there are so many jobs available why is it we still have so many people unemployed and why aren’t those which are unemployed taking the available jobs?
ANSWER: The American workforce is changing, changing in TWO BIG WAYS:
 
1. Sedentary Lifestyle: we’ve become a society of professional sitters.  The average person now sits, yes – sits on their keister, upwards of 51 hours and 44 minutes a week. It’s such a dramatic change in our society and workforce that some are now calling ‘sitting’ the new cigarettes.  We’ll leave the health aspect of sitting to another article.

For younger generations this lifestyle is their only perspective on working and it’s beginning to have a significant impact on our economy as it’s changing the jobs they’re taking, or willing to consider.  Jobs which are considered physically or mentally demanding aren’t at the top of the pecking order and those industries are having an incredibly difficult time getting new blood to join the ranks. (construction; farming; trucking; skilled trades like plumbers, electricians, mechanics; emergency services; law enforcement, etc.)

The change to a seated society tells us something else.  As a society we are moving away from a ‘do-it-yourself hands on’ society where we’re focused on production to a society of ‘creative typists’.  The new skilled trade is programming, not plumbing. 

Today’s emerging workforce wants to be close to technology and feel good movements while being free of work which may be construed as physically or mentally taxing.   Getting your hands dirty on the job is out, sitting inside with the AC and nap-pods is in!
 
2. The Skill-less Unemployable: No one likes to think that there are people out there which don’t have skills or aren’t employable, it’s un-American.  Yet it is becoming an increasingly frightening reality.  The second reason our workforce is changing is there are a growing number of unemployed workers that are finding themselves unable to take advantage of the volume of job opportunities on the market due to their skills or abilities becoming out dated.  Out of date just like the baloney sandwich my mom used to make for my lunch in grade school.

No one eats baloney sandwiches anymore, so if you didn’t adjust your skills with the growing times, moving to turkey or tofu, you got left behind.  And left behind without even realizing it, holding a moldy, crappy sandwich (your skills) in the process.

Those who are unemployed at present are largely in part just not employable.  Of course, there is always the exception to this rule however the growing majority of people who are unemployed just don’t have current day marketable skills to function in an environment which increasingly demands technology proficiencies.  With national unemployment rates under 4% it tells us that those who can work are working and those who can’t – well they’ll continue to experience hardships trying to find jobs in a marketplace that is increasingly unforgiving and more expecting of people’s capabilities.
​
As a result, the gap continues to widen whereas those who have been unemployed for some time trying to find work will continue to experience much of the same.  The stigma attached to unemployment, the longer you’ve been out of work the more likely it is you will remain out of work, is a harsh reality for those unemployed.  With so much opportunity to be had in the marketplace people who are unemployed for longer than a month or so find themselves having to develop colorful explanations as to why they weren’t working to hopefully appease prospective employers.