It’s why there are so many networking groups for all industries and interests – groups for tech folks, women, marketing professionals, defense contractors, young professionals and the list goes on. It’s why people join the chamber of commerce, Rotary and their local alumni group.

We came across this article “7 Places to Hang Out and Build Your Business,” which suggests a couple of places you might not have considered. One of those is airport and hotel lounges. The article notes, “You’re likely to meet other business people who have experienced flight delays and have time on their hands.” And you can use that time to build a business relationship.

Other suggestions include entrepreneur groups, tech meetups and even your local college campus. And don’t forget social media, which is becoming a great way to build connections and to stay in touch with people after an initial meeting.

Where are some places you go to build your business? Do you belong to a more traditional networking group or have you found some unique ways to build connections?

When Twitter started out, it asked people to answer the question “What are you doing?” in 140 characters or less. And so tweets were: “Eating a cheese sandwich” or “Stopping at Starbucks for morning coffee.”

Yawn.

But it didn’t take long for Twitter to evolve well beyond “What are you doing?” tweets. It quickly became a place where people shared information, made connections and where businesses began to engage with customers in an entirely new way. A kind of online water cooler, Twitter shapes conversations and interactions, giving people a way to comment on everything from breaking news and TV shows to the weather and sports.

Here are a couple of great stats from an article on SocialMediaToday.com that demonstrate the power of Twitter:

• It took three years, two months and one day for Twitter to hit the 1-billion tweets mark. Today, it takes just a week for Twitter to hit that same 1-billion mark.
• Twitter reports 572,000 accounts were created on March 12, 2011, and 460,000 new accounts were created each day on average in February 2011.

That’s a lot of tweets – and a lot of people. If your business isn’t on Twitter, you’re missing an opportunity to reach those potential customers. It’s also a way to engage with current customers by providing them valuable information, answering questions and giving them a vehicle to promote your product or service.

While many businesses create a Twitter account, not all of them keep it going. One of the keys is to maintain a regular presence on Twitter. That means tweeting regularly and engaging in conversations on Twitter. Don’t just spit out information or promotional tweets, be part of the Twitter community. By doing so, you’ll find current and potential customers turning to you as a reliable resource and a solid brand.

Is your business using Twitter? How does it help?

Be sure to follow Spirit Telecom on Twitter @NoStaticST.

Why bother with job descriptions? According to the U.S. Small Business Administration, a job description helps attract the right candidates; describes the major areas of an employee’s position; and serves as an outline for job training and evaluation.

Keep in mind, though, job descriptions shouldn’t be written in stone. They should be flexible enough to account for changes in the company, employee growth and new opportunities. The SBA notes, “If inflexible, job descriptions will keep you and your employees from trying or learning new tasks within the job.”

Does your business take the time craft detailed job descriptions? Do you review those during an employee’s performance review?

• Pick a tone and a focus. It can funny, informational, high-tech, not tech, customer-service oriented – just pick one and stick with it.
• Keep it updated. Make sure your company blog is updated on a regular basis – at least once a week so you keep people coming back for more.
• Promote it. Make sure the blog is prominent on the homepage of your website and link to your posts on your Twitter and Facebook accounts as well as in any email newsletters you send.

Here’s a good article from SocialMediaToday.com that looks at the 10 best corporate blogs. Among the favorites are Caterpillar, Starbucks, Whole Foods, Marriott, Manpower and GE.  They have varying goals from customer engagement to brand awareness or simply to compliment an already strong company brand (Whole Foods, Patagonia and Southwest).

Yet one key component to a good company blog is to keep it simple. Don’t get caught up in industry jargon and don’t constantly be trying to sell your products so your blog becomes one large advertisement. Make it a resource people bookmark and return to time and again.

Do you have a company blog? What lessons have you learned from it? How has it benefited your business? 

Check out this article highlighting a study out of Australia measuring the movements of almost 5,000 adults. The results: “The researchers found that extended periods of inactivity correlated with larger waistlines and higher risk of cardiovascular problems.”

Research finds that taking at least short movement breaks during the day can really help. Every hour, stand up and stretch. Take a quick stroll around your floor and maybe even trot up a couple flights of stairs for quick cardio burst.

If you can, schedule a meeting for the coffee shop down the street so you’re getting a little exercise or use your lunch break for a 10-minute walk.

Of course you could always ask your boss to spring for the treadmill desk, although we’re not sure just how long it takes to master the art of walking and typing while talking on the phone.

But there are a couple issues with the “reply all” button. Some people get “cc” happy, opting to include everyone even remotely connected with a project or question on the e-mail thread. The result can be a chain of e-mails flooding your Inbox that really aren’t applicable to you. For some, it creates an electronic paper trail, which can admittedly be useful when your boss says, “I didn’t say that!” and you can produce the e-mail showing she did in fact give her approval.

Even worse than an Inbox full of e-mails debating the best time for a meeting is the accidental use of “reply all.” Just about anyone with an e-mail account can offer up a story of sending something they wished they hadn’t. It’s bad enough when an inappropriate e-mail goes to one person – it’s a thousand times worse when it goes to half the staff.

A recent article in The Wall Street Journal highlighted some real-world examples of “reply all” missteps. We read it with a chuckle and the sobering thought, “There but for the grace of God….”

If you’re lucky, your colleagues will laugh it off as a stupid mistake, but certainly there are times when an offense e-mail can result in lost business or ruined relationships.

The best way to avoid a “reply all” blunder is simply to pause and look at the “to” line of your e-mail. It will take less than a second but could save you some serious problems.

We’d love to hear your “reply all” stories. Share and we’ll select one random person to receive a Sprit Telecom goodie. 

Those are more simplistic examples, but do illustrate the concept of working in a web-based world whether accessing your holiday photos or running a sophisticated piece of software for your business.

Cloud computing has even gotten the attention of the U.S. government. According to a March 7 article in The Washington Post, the TechAmerica Foundation is leading the effort to create a commission that will “make recommendations to the federal chief information officer and the commerce secretary.”

The Obama administration is pushing government agencies to use cloud computing whenever it can as a way to reduce costs and increase efficiencies. According to the article, “The commission is expected to address the way the government should deploy cloud technologies and consider policies that could advance the cloud-first initiative.”

What are your thoughts on cloud computing? Are you using it in your business to save money? Do you have any concerns?

The survey came out just in time for Employee Appreciation Day on March 4. Hmm, seems many employees aren’t feeling the appreciation.

The problems? Leading the list was salary (47 percent) followed by workload (24 percent), lack of opportunities for advancement (21 percent) and the employee’s supervisor (21 percent). MarketTools, which provides software for enterprise feedback management and market research, polled 451 adults in February 2011.

The survey also found the overwhelming majority of the employees’ companies don’t have a program to regularly solicit employee feedback. So, if your employees are unhappy, there’s a very good chance you don’t know about it and haven’t even bothered to ask.

Let’s hear about your office – do you solicit employee feedback? If so, what do you do with it?

A recent piece by Jonah Lehrer in The Wall Street Journal highlights the benefits of not paying attention. Researchers have drawn a connection between daydreaming and creativity. Turns out being distracted by a YouTube video or what’s going on in the cubicle next door is a good thing.

Lehrer cites a study of 86 Harvard undergraduates that measured their ability to focus and drown out outside distractions, such as a humming AC unit or a side conversation. The results: those who had a hard time staying focused were seven times more likely to be rated as creative.

“According to the scientists, the inability to focus helps ensure a richer mixture of thoughts in consciousness. Because these people struggled to filter the world, they ended up letting everything in. They couldn’t help but be open-minded.”

Would it be worth applying this information to your business? Should you build in some leisure time for your employees to be “distracted” from work giving their brains a chance to open up and be creative?

But in some cases, an inadequate office telephone system can be more of a hindrance than a help. For example, in today’s world, the ability to have your calls forwarded is a key component. You need to be able to check voice mail remotely – and in some cases, you might prefer to have your messages sent to your e-mail.

One of the things we do at Spirit Telecom when meeting with potential customers is take the time to truly understand their business needs. It’s important to assess how a company is using its phones, the problems it may be experiencing and to take a look at future phone needs. Every business is different so an off-the-shelf phone system may not meet a business’ unique needs.

When shopping around, look for a company that provides some of the following features:

• Call forwarding
• Remote office
• A Web portal so you can easily customize features and manage your phone system needs
• A secure, private network
• HD quality voice

What phone system features are most important to your business?

While the iPad is great for surfing the net from your couch while watching your favorite sitcom, the tablets are also finding a solid spot in the business world.

This article from Silicon.com reports that nine months after the iPad came on the scene, Apple found “80 percent of Fortune 100 companies had either deployed or were piloting the table device” with another 67 percent of CIOs planning to incorporate tables this year. Half of those CIOs are also planning to purchase tablets for their employees this year.

Tablets make sense for businesses. Compared to a laptop, they are less expensive but offer much of the same functionality. Compact and light, they’re great for business travelers. They also offer businesses a chance to become paperless – load documents, memos and reports on the tablet for easy reading and save on printing and paper costs while being kind to the environment.

Is your business using tablets or does it have plans to purchase iPads for employees? Let us know the benefits tablets offer your business.

Office Space

We spend a lot of time at work. We spend a lot of time talking about work, thinking about work and sometimes even figuring how to get out of work. That’s probably why the workplace plays such a prominent role in television and movies.

Each week, we can grab some one-liners from “The Office,” “Parks and Recreation” and “30 Rock” – all of which are set in the workplace. We laugh at the silliness but secretly recognize some of our co-workers. We’re glued to TV dramas that focus on a particular profession – police detectives, doctors and lawyers.

The silver screen is no exception. This year’s Oscar nominee “The Social Network” – while it starts in a dorm room – transfers to the workplace and has a healthy dose of drama and office politics. An article from the Chicago Tribune names “The Social Network” as one of the best workplace movies. Also on its list, the 1940 film “His Girl Friday,” “The Apartment” from 1960 and Kevin Smith’s 1994 film “Clerks.”

Other office-focused films that give us a chuckle are “Office Space,” (who hasn’t wanted to smash an uncooperative copier with a baseball bat?), the Dolly Parton classic “9 to 5” and “The Devil Wears Prada” with Meryl Streep as the completely overbearing magazine editor.

OK, so what’s on your list of the best office movies? What characters play out in your workplace every day?

Typically we think of brands involving logos, taglines and a color scheme, but now a company brand extends to social media as well, requiring you to monitor your brand online and develop your social media personality via Facebook, Twitter and more.

Here’s a great article from Inc. magazine on “The New Rules of Branding Your Business Online” that offers up excellent suggestions on bringing your brand into the social media world. Key tips include engaging your customers so they better understand your brand and develop brand loyalty.

Also, use social media to tell customers more about who you are; it’s easier to connect with a company you feel you know than one that’s simply a static website. Monitoring your brand via social media is important. People will be talking about you, so watch out for what they are saying and respond – whether it’s a positive or negative comment.

Let’s hear how you’re building your brand on social media.

Does your company pay for your phone or maybe half your phone bill? If so, does that mean you are literally on call 24 hours a day, seven days a week? If your company owns the phone, it’s highly likely your boss will be tracking your movements.

A recent article from McClatchy Newspapers points out how office-issued phones blur work and personal lives. Companies can monitor every personal phone call from your child’s school and every text from your husband.  Some more extreme situations may results in firings and litigation.

“As mobile phones become commonplace work tools, the legal and practical boundaries around the devices are becoming a hot issue,” the article notes. “Companies are grappling with policies and a growing number of lawsuits by employers and employees are cropping up over concerns ranging from privacy and liability to expectations and etiquette.”

But in this era of constant communication and obscurity of a true “day off,” companies need to be realistic and understand personal calls pop up during the day and, at the same time, employees may be responding to work-related e-mails on their BlackBerry from their living room.

The bottom line is that companies need to be clear on their expectations. Have a policy, establish some ground rules and work with employees to manage expectations and whether you want employees on call at all hours or can they turn the phone off on weekends.

Do you have an office-issued cell phone? Does your company have a policy? Share your experiences with us.

Here’s a great article on communication mistakes that crop up in virtually every office.  One of the common mishaps is simply not communicating at all. Workers rarely talk with their supervisors, believing they have nothing to say or that their ideas won’t make a difference. As this article points out, employers have to take the initiative to encourage employees to speak up and soliciting feedback.

Also important to keep in mind is the use – and often overuse – of e-mail. We’ve come to rely so heavily on electronic communication we have to keep in mind face-to-face conversations can result in more effective communication and fewer misunderstandings. Taking five minutes to walk down the hallway and explain what you need done can save headaches when a project isn’t executed the way you needed.

Do you find communication suffers at your workplace? What’s the cause and how do you overcome it?

As we highlighted in a blog post on this topic last year, IPv6 will provide a much larger pool of numbers for use as IP addresses. Expressed mathematically, IPv4 provides addresses equal to 2 to the 32^nd power or about 4.2 billion. IPv6 provides addresses equal to 2 to the 128^th power. Two, times two, times two, etc. … 340,282,366,920,938,463,463,374,607,431,768,211,456 addresses to be exact.

We’ve come a long way from 1969 when the Internet began as a research tool. Since then, we’ve exhausted more than 4 billion IP addresses.

Regarding these final IPv4 address, this blog post from The Wall Street Journal notes, “The batches of numbers were distributed to five regional addressing organizations around the globe, who will allocate the numbers to ‘service providers’ – a broad group that includes Internet operators, Web companies and others – over the coming months.”

Most likely consumers won’t feel any impact from the switch to IPv6 – which will happen over several years – but it’s certainly interesting to reflect on the fact we’ve reached a new level in our use of the Internet.

The announcement was part of Obama’s State of the Union address last month and calls for making “500 megahertz of wireless airwaves, or spectrum, available over the next decade to meet the growing demand for broadband services, including the widely popular Apple iPad and proliferation of smartphones,” according to this Reuters article.

The article also quotes Obama as saying, “This isn’t just about a faster Internet and fewer dropped calls. It’s about connecting every part of America to the digital age.”

A November 2010 report on home broadband Internet adoption in the United States used Census data to assess broadband access and usage. Findings included:

• 7 of 10 American households used the Internet in 2009.
• Income and education are strongly associated with broadband Internet use at home.
• Broadband Internet adoption was higher among white households than black or Hispanic households in 2009.
• Urban residents are more likely than rural ones to adopt broadband Internet access.
• Lack of need or interest, lack of affordability, lack of an adequate computer, and lack of availability were all stated as the main reason for not having home broadband Internet access.

So in reviewing these findings would you agree the government needs to make an investment in wider broadband access? Share your comments!

Feeling overwhelmed at work can be the result of a number of factors, including hitting a growth spurt as a business, dealing with staff cutbacks or even being unorganized. Regardless of the reason, it’s hard not to feel discouraged. So, what can you do to get your schedule under control and workload reduced to something slightly more manageable?

• Get focused. Part of work-related stress comes from getting caught up in a cycle of meetings, e-mails and other tasks that crop up throughout the day. Shut your door – physical and virtual – and stay focused on the task at hand. Yes, it’s easier said than done, but you’ll probably find you actually complete tasks faster when you stay on track rather than stopping and starting a dozen times.
• Be realistic – to yourself and your supervisor. Unless you’ve found some extra hours in the day, there’s truly only so much you can accomplish in a given workday. While it’s tough to tell your boss you just can’t head up another project, you have to say “no” from time to time. It’s better to say “no” up front rather than having to scramble at the end to turn in a mediocre report or a late presentation.
• Take breaks. You may feel that burning the midnight oil is the only way to meet your deadlines, but tired work usually produces poor results. Allow yourself a lunch break, a coffee break or time to hit the gym before work. Stepping away from a project can give you a renewed perspective and the chance to see things in a different light.

What’s overwhelming in your job? How are you addressing it? Or are you drowning? Share your tips and advice!

Foursquare announced its 6 millionth user last week and reported 3,400% growth in 2010 – a number pretty much any company would be happy to promote. Users logged more than 380 million check-ins last year and the app continues to grow in popularity. As this article from Gigaom.com points out, even with 6 million users worldwide, Foursquare isn’t quite mainstream. Only 4% of Americans are using such located-based services, according to the Pew Research Center.

Twitter, for example, wasn’t exactly mainstream when it started either. Facebook’s initial audience was college students. Not all technology explodes onto the scene to infiltrate our daily lives immediately. So as businesses, don’t immediately discredit what might be seen as “niche” services appealing to a small audience. That’s not to say you should jump on every tech bandwagon, but keep your ear to the ground and your mind open to the ways these tools could benefit your business.

What are some tools you adopted early on for your business that yielded great success? What tech are you watching closely?

For some people, everyday is Fun at Work Day. We’re not yet sure who those people are, so if it’s you, please chime in and let us know. For the rest of us, fun and work occasionally go together but most of the time the focus is on “work” rather than “fun.”

So, circle Jan. 28 on your calendar and get ready to have fun at work. Here are a few ideas to get you started:

• Surprise the office with a Keurig coffee machine and treat everyone to a morning cup of java (or make it a really fun day and have two cups).
• Set up Rock Band in the conference room and have a lunchtime concert (ripped jeans and tattoos not required).
• Take a 30-minute afternoon break and have an office scavenger hunt. The winner gets an extra vacation day.
• Let employees bring their dogs to work (well-behaved ones only!) and then head outside for a quick game of fetch.

Your employees have been probably been working hard during the first month of 2011, so Fun at Work Day is the perfect opportunity to let everyone blow off a little steam and reconnect as co-workers. Let’s hear your ideas for having some fun at work.