250,000 Workers in its U.S. Warehouses

Prime Day, Amazon’s biggest shopping event, is here, and now one-day shipping is the norm for tens of millions of items available during Amazon’s Prime Day event, which runs from July 15 to July 16. To succeed at this rapid delivery, Amazon spends tens of billions of dollars every year and employs 250,000 workers in its U.S. warehouses. The process is an incredible challenge, and Amazon has faced criticism about working conditions at every step of the process. Watch the video to see what happens when you buy a Prime-eligible item on Amazon.com.
 
Credit to : CNBC

The 21st century has seen many advances in the ways which people work, and the modern workplace is very different to how it was even a few years ago. One of the most important developments has been the empowerment of workers to work remotely, remaining efficient and effective whilst away from their desks.

This has been a big boost to companies which enable flexible working, but creating a flexible workplace takes care and planning to implement. There are many potential benefits to be gained, but it takes a good understanding of the driving forces behind this technology to create a secure yet adaptable working environment.

What is a flexible workplace?
A flexible workplace is one which grants employees a degree of freedom in how and where they work. This means that employees can choose the type of work which best suits them, creating a happier and more productive workforce. Businesses can also integrate several different communications channels into a single package, which allows customers to select the option which best suits them; providing for customer’s needs instead of forcing choices upon them is key to the future of communications, according to specialists in the field.

Flexible communications systems are especially useful for SMEs where one worker may have several different responsibilities. By allowing them to adapt to different roles as the situation demands, flexible working practices let them stay productive whilst responding to the demands of their different roles.

What enables a flexible workplace?
Being away from their desk has historically meant that a worker lacks access to the full suite of communications tools and information that they need to do their job, compromising their productivity. This has been a disincentive for businesses to invest in mobile solutions in the past, but advances in technology have contributed to an increase in the effectiveness of flexible working.

Hosted telephony has become extremely popular – by configuring a business’s communications systems digitally, workers can keep a single phone number across multiple locations, allowing clients and colleagues alike to contact them easily no matter where they’re working.

In addition to this, the fact that smart devices have become almost ubiquitous has driven employers to enable their workers to use them for business, taking advantage of the connectivity which this can provide without much investment. This style of work has become known as “bring your own device” or BYOD, as employees supply whatever personal device they feel best suits their working habits.

What are the benefits of a flexible workplace?
One of the biggest attractions of flexible working for many businesses is the ability to create a comprehensive communications system which responds to changing circumstances. Providing employees with the option to work from their own devices lets them become mobile, and when this is backed up by flexible business communications systems which can supply the necessary infrastructure, this is a powerful tool for modern businesses.

What problems can there be in a flexible workplace?
Enabling workers to use their own devices limits the control which businesses have over how their data is used, and places a greater reliance on employees to keep data secure. Businesses are also unable to standardise devices, and cannot ensure that operating systems are up-to-date and secure – studies have shown that a wide array of operating systems are used in BYOD workplaces, and many of these are potentially open to exploitation (especially older, unsupported Android systems).

Flexible working for the future
This means that businesses have to carefully consider how their flexible workplace will be implemented; to what extent are they happy to let employees use their own devices? Will the added security of providing “work phones” compensate for the extra cost of purchasing and upgrading them? How will they educate workers on the importance of data security, and how will they ensure compliance?

A successful flexible workplace will have plans in place to ensure that these concerns are addressed before investing in any new technology. If these concerns aren’t addressed ahead of time, businesses can find themselves in trouble – that’s why many take steps to enlist a professional business communications specialist when considering a shift to a flexible workplace.

Though cloud technology and mobile workforces offer many benefits for businesses, it’s important to make sure that any change in your working practices is thoroughly planned ahead of time. Understand what is most important to your business, and work to ensure that your communications packaged suits your needs.

Gemma Maroney is part of the team at experts in business communications Solution IP. You can connect on LinkedIn and follow @SolutionIP on Twitter.

But then don’t forget that, we live in the era of technology
that has improved our lives in many ways. Optimizing workflow
with advanced software like Document Management Systems
improves productivity, eliminates clutter, and increases ROI.
In this post, we will be talking about business
workflow (process) and its management.

When we discuss about myriads of businesses struggling to manage workflow, one thing pops up in our minds is the “system”! What would be your suggestion in terms of managing a large number of documents or a heap of documents? Solutions are many; however it varies from business to business. Being an owner of a business, you should know the ways of optimizing the workflow. If you do not manage it, you will lose your employees and faith of your clients as well. This may sound harsh, but the only thing you need to implement is, “managing the business workflow through advanced systems”! So, let’s focus our attention on a business workflow, how it should be, how to optimize it, what are the benefits thereof and what are the outcomes gained by optimizing business workflow in this era of technology!

Nature of Traditional Workflow and Management

How many of you have geared up with traditional workflow? Surely, you might be one of those businessmen, who might have experimented traditional workflow to manage your business! Haven’t you? No wonder, you might have faced delays and inconsistencies! Yes, this was sure to happen. When you go for traditional workflow, there are chances of getting stuck in between and thus optimization gets slowed!

In traditional workflow each business document is routed via one department to another, this process involves manual evaluation, review, and approval and so on. Such type of traditional workflow appears to be time consuming and full of hurdles. In traditional workflow, you will notice progress becomes stagnant at one pace and tracking of documents takes long time.

Trailing with Traditional Workflow Pitfalls

No matter how old your business is! It may suffer if the workflow is not advanced and streamlined. If there is a lack of hi-end tech systems in your business, then there could be darkness! Trailing with traditional workflow may create difficulties and thus prevent your business from success. Proven pitfalls of traditional workflow are as follows:

–          Slow paced work lists

–          Confused Workflow Navigation

–          Managing multiple desktops with multiple tasks

–          Inadequate network/bandwidth

–          Obsolete systems

–          Dependency on Manpower

–          The process of comparing a case takes longer time.

Today’s Tools and Technology – A Boon! Envision towards Success!

Technology – a buzz word in this era has become a powerful tool. We, being the dwellers of hi-end tech globe, come across with the latest tools, technology, gadgets etc. Some technology is used in homes, offices while some used in businesses. Simply speaking, today’s tools and technology are a boon for us; they have transformed our lives drastically by making life styles easier and faster than before.

We are revolving around various forms like smart phones, laptops, iPad, Tablets etc; such gadgets have shared our burden in many ways. Be it a personal usage or professional; advanced technology is here to serve you with several revolutionary software that help managing business workflow. Today’s Workflow Management Systems have evolved to help optimize the collaboration of entities in a front office business process.

An Effective Business Workflow Optimization & Management, a Long Term Approach!

Now that you have understood the nature of traditional workflow and its pitfalls, its time to chip in for ‘how your business workflow can be optimized and managed easily with the help of advanced tools”! Software like Document Management Systems (DMS) is a great helping hand. Let’s unfold how it helps manage and optimizing the business workflow.

–          You can store business documents in a central repository.

–          Documents can be indexed and well maintained in the repository.

–          The Advanced Document Management System is well equipped with hi-end security features.

–          You can view and retrieve files/documents/folders from every nook and corner of the world.

–          A flexible approach with certain rules can help adjusting the data dynamically.

–          Data/Documents can be scanned with digital signature.

–          End users can use DMS as a service from remote places.

–          An advanced DMS can convert business documents in various formats like PDF, MS Word, and Excel etc. supporting diverse languages including English, Hindi, Arabic and many more.

–          Processes can be facilitated for equivalent or sequential single, group, or multi-tiered approval.

Benefits Offered by Advanced Tools & Technologies

Have you pushed your business workflow with advanced tools? If your answer is No then, your workflow managed traditionally is not enough! Running a business and not having advanced tools is like using a smart phone and not using the Internet! Does it sound weird? Yes, it does.

When you are blessed with highly developed software/tools then why don’t you deploy them for your betterment? Every software or tool has better side; it has something great to offer. Let’s have a glance at the benefits offered by advanced technologies.

• Increase Efficiency: Today’s era has introduced tools that not only increase work productivity but also lowers the ongoing cost of acquisition and operation. An effective workflow management resolves the crisis of maintaining, searching, tracking business documents.

• Increase ROI: Return On Investment (ROI) is increased hence your business gain maximum results within a defined time. However it varies from business to business.

• Meet with Clients’ Satisfaction: Clients’ satisfaction is your success! An efficient workflow management helps your business meet with client’s needs. It cuts off the manual work and hence save time and money. That’s what every client wants!

• Easy Payment Processing: An advanced workflow management will allow you to have an easy payment procedure. Payment process becomes faster and hence, payments can be done in a jiffy across the globe.

• Easy Management: Document Workflow Management is the key element. In today’s rapid paced world, easy management is hard to find, however advanced document management system can easily optimize and manage the workflow by maintaining business documents in a secured repository.

So, don’t let your business under-perform in this fast paced world. A competent workflow is an identity of business, so get your business workflow optimized and managed before your success gets affected!

An Author Bio:
Being an avid tech blogger, Pranay Roy has an enormous knowledge in Document Management Software, Currently he is placed in Document Management System & Scanning Software Company of India.

But, as people grow increasingly reliant on their gadgets and gizmos,
what happens when it all goes awry and everyone’s new tech falters?

If you, your family or your company are among those that rely
on technology, crafting a disaster recovery plan is a great
way to bounce back in the chance of rampant fallout.

Assess Potential Disasters

Disasters, either natural or otherwise, are around every corner in the internet age.
With hackers upping their arsenals daily, and rampant climate change creating
bizarre weather patterns around the world, the potential for calamities is always increasing.

Whether it is bloggers hell bent on destruction that you’re worried about,
or tornadoes at your doorstep, taking preventative measures early on is
an excellent way to prevent a minor setback from becoming a full blown disaster.

You may not be able to prevent every mishap, but getting a team together to brainstorm
all the things that can go wrong is an excellent first step. Like any other sort of disaster
preparation, preparing for the worst up front can mean a greater sense of resilience
when an earthquake levels your servers, or a storm severs your electricity.

Plan for Data Recovery

After you have assessed all the potential dangers to your company, it’s time to
begin building an infrastructure around your initial plan. If it’s data you’re afraid
of losing, investing in IT hosting and cloud storage is highly recommended.

By storing all of your information in the cloud, you’re not only scaling back on overhead,
but also getting a larger return on your IT investment. For smaller companies without
the space or funds to house their servers, the cloud acts as a perfect
replacement for traditional hard drives.

Although new to the scene, the advantages of cloud computing are aplenty,
especially in a disaster recovery scenario. In the event of a fire or other catastrophe,
hard goods and data are often severely damaged and or lost, but, by storing
information in the cloud, you can protect the wellbeing of your company and ensure a full recovery.

Test and Retest

Once your plan is set and the memos have been sent out, it’s time to test and retest.
Much like a fire drill, running through mock disasters is not only good practice,
but also a way to see if all preventative measures are in place.

It may take a little bit of imagination, and a great deal of cooperation from everyone
at your company, but preparing scenarios to run through is an essential part of
strengthening the safety of your data and your employees.

After your first round of testing, either successful or not, it’s important to
retest frequently thereafter.
You might not need to have a drill every day, but running through one once or twice
a month can directly affect your level of success in the future.  After all, it’s better to
be overly prepared beforehand then thrown for a loop later on down the road.

As you move through this process, you should always keep the specific needs of you
and your company in mind. Keep all preparation within your budget and keep
your staff actively involved and informed.

Protecting yourself and those that work for you is the most important part of owning a
business, and by backing up all files and documents, you can guarantee that you
remain competitive even in the face of disaster.

Author Info: Reanna Gutierrez is the Product Marketing Manager for OneNeck IT,
which provides hosted application management and other cloud-based
services for mid-level businesses.

An infographic containing essential risk management tips for SME Business

The GSA Schedule is one of the most
recognizable federal contracts.
It is a government-wide federal contract
and it’s open for anyone to buy from.

However, no one is needed to use it. It’s basically a five year contract
with three five-year renewal options. It is a hunting license, which enables
companies to pursue federal business once they have a GSA contract.

According to a market study, there are several products and services that have been
advanced by either military or federal applications. Here I am going to discuss a few
important requirements to 8a firm in getting an invention on GSA (General Services Administration)
Schedule. This assumes that the products as well as the services of the firm
meet the existing GSA Schedule requirements.

For a new invention, a company should fulfill the following requirements.

1. The specific good of the firm should display sales. The General Services Administration
with respect to sales on schedules makes use of only $25,000 as the last limitation.

2. The procurer or the reseller of goods must be able to show at least one year of fiscal declarations.

3. The company should have a business strategy for the particular good, which includes economic projections.

4. The company may require to obtain a competence certificate by the United States Small Business
Administration for getting the product enlisted on a GSA Schedule. Such authorized certificates
will contain information about cash flow and fiscal performance of the business.

Finally, I want to give you two additional tips, which are going to be very useful as well.

First, getting a patent/ provisional patent is required if the specific product is patentable before
marketing it to the US federal government. The American government accepts patent and provides
consideration to pay for premium products that are novel.

Second, discontinuing a new product only for acquiring sales is not advised.
The General Services Administration requires you to make the US government
your greatest customer. Therefore selling your specific invention at a minimal
price just for fulfilling the $25,000 GSA sales requirement is not recommended.
The government is going to pay for innovation. So we advise keeping your
margins apt as this is going to help your firm attain pricing margin in the future.

Author bio:
Adriana Sopi is attached to GSA University and offers training to businesses that
want to increase their sales through federal contracting. She has written a number
of articles on 8a certification and GSA Schedule Contract to help small
businesses get an access to the federal contracts.

You can think of it as a place where your software developers
can work and play without a negative impact to your business.
Changing software on your live system is a good way to get some bad press.

Clint Boulton reports in the Wall Street Journal that a recent grounding of nearly
2,000 flights by American Airlines was likely due to poor software testing.
That’s not the kind of headline you want to see about your business.

A Safe Place to Play

A sandbox can be a physical or virtual environment.
You can create a copy of your live computing environment, but with
no connections back to your production system.

The environment behaves like the production environment,
but doesn’t communicate with it. Everything done in that environment
impacts only that environment.

Applications can fail, crash and corrupt data without affecting your live system.
Within some types of software, such as a Java environment, you can create boundaries within
which the software can be tested without harming anything outside of the boundaries.

Both the physical and virtual environments accomplish the same thing.
They allow software to be run without harming your live system.

Development and Testing in the Sandbox

The sandbox is the perfect place to develop and test new software and apps.
For instance, new apps can be developed for the smartphone and tested on BlackBerry,
iPhone or Android devices. If you have a BYOD (‘bring your own device’) environment, you can
test the impact of different devices on your environment before approving their use.
Some software methodologies include the use of a sandbox in their best practices.

Releasing Apps and Plug-Ins in a Sandbox

A virtual sandbox can be employed when developing new browser plug-ins.
When implemented, the plug-ins will run in their own environment,
and not impact other plug-ins in the user’s browser. This is another way to isolate software
and restrict where it runs. This reduces conflicts and the risk a browser
may lock because of competing plug-ins.

Testing Upgrades and Patches

The American Airlines issue may have been caused by poor
testing of a software upgrade. Any upgrade or patch you receive from a vendor,
or you create in-house, needs to be thoroughly tested. Some companies will take shortcuts
because “it’s just a little fix,” only to discover they have disabled their entire
order processing system by not testing the fix first.

Research and Development

A sandbox is a great place for your R&D team to try out new ideas. Sandboxes
are often destroyed and rebuilt, because developers want to answer the question,
“I wonder what would happen if I did this.” When not burdened with the safety
of your production system, developers are free to create new and innovative software and apps,
especially when things like BlackBerry EMM come standard with the newest generation of smartphones.

A Part of Your Business Plan

Including a sandbox in your software environment plans fosters creativity
while protecting your production environment. It gives your software team a place
to work with software that could put your company at risk of expensive downtime.
Utilizing virtual sandboxes for apps and plug-ins minimizes risks to the user.
Sandboxes are a way to maintain and enhance your company’s reputation.
The alternative could be some really unwanted press.

These days more and more CEOs keeping fit and 
here is how you can do the same

It takes a certain kind of person to be the chief executive
officer of a major organisation. They spent the major chunk
of their lives fighting to win their position at the top of the tree.

They exist in a world of manic pressure where every result counts and
every mistake can cost them their job.  They live a life which has
hopelessly blurred boundaries between business, pleasure and domestic life.

They go to bed late yet rise at a time that most people would consider the middle of the night.
They timetable the time that they spend with their family. On many levels, the CEO lives a despairingly
unhealthy existence. Yet CEOs from major companies like AOL, MediaCom, NetFlix and Apple share
a common stress busting secret hobby – the gym – and increasingly the gym is becoming
the latest technological battleground.

CEOs and senior employees

CEOs and senior employees are used to using every technique and edge
possible to get ahead of the curve. They’re also super competitive as well
as data and performance driven. It’s therefore no great surprise
that these are the people that are leading the charge in the most rapidly
emerging sub-niche of technology – fitness technology.

Burntech.TV recently ran an article investigating the surge in popularity of fit tech
products, which shows that shipments are set to soar from 43.8m this year to nearly
60m by 2017.

This is only the start of the rise in this technology, with major manufactures like
Nike and Adidas rushing out new products, as well as fit tech market entrants
like TomTom and Under Armour entering the scene.

How CEOs are using fitness tech to help kill stress, get fitter and live healthier.

Fitness technology is a catch word for a whole host of technology which is used
to help people to measure their health and improve their fitness.
Leading CEOs typically rise early in the morning to attack the gym.
Many are using the below devices to get ahead:

Activity trackers: Activity trackers are simple devices which are much like the rubber
wristbands which were popularised by Livestrong in the late 1990s / early 2000’s.

They are used to track all of your daily activity, from your walking
right the way through to your sleep patterns.
The main aim is to help you to measure and understand your current
fitness in order to then set up a plan to improve it.
Popular devices like Nike’s Fuelband work with a companion smart
phone application in order to provide you with the output from
your activity. You can then share your daily activity through
social media, encouraging friends to get involved whilst
inciting some friendly competition.

BurnTech have phrased this as ‘social fitness’ and competitive CEOs are
using it to drive better performance in the gym.

Famous CEO ambassador: Tim Cook, CEO of Apple who has been spotted using a Nike Fuelband.
Great for: Anyone who works a stressful desk
job and who needs a gentle way to start doing more exercise

Heart Rate monitors:
Heart rate monitors are not especially new, but they have
evolved rapidly during 2013. This has been driven by new companies
emerging in the space, bringing fresh ideas, technology from other areas
and significant R&D budgets. Such companies include TomTom and
Under Armour, and this trend is set to continue with the heavily
rumored Adidas heart rate monitor / activity tracker in the pipeline.

Heart rate monitors track your heart rate during exercise, helping to direct your training routine.
New models from leading manufacturers like Garmin, include GPS functionality to map your
running route and smart trainers which act like a personal trainer to drive your fitness forward.
Like activity trackers, they typically come with companion software which
enables you to track your performance over time.

Great for: serious gym goers who are keen on going granular on performance and data metrics

So fitness tech has probably been the breakout genre in technology during the first half of 2013.
For technologically minded business people, fit tech can provide just the incentive that they need to get fitter. There’s an overwhelming bias between CEOs and gym-goers, and the reasons are plentiful.
Regular gym goers are healthier, more productive, rely less on stimulants and generally
get further ahead in the chosen careers.

BIO: Jamie Boyd is a staff writer for BurnTech.TV. BurnTech is a technology
publication which focuses on fitness technology.

Managing an office payroll has changed drastically over the
years with the creation of new time clocking software.

In times past, when the job was done manually, it was expensive
and time consuming. Employees were generally expected to
record their time by hand or to punch a clock,
the cards were then accumulated and tallied before being
passed on to another person who factored in overtime,
expenses and other things and then it was passed
on to someone else for payment.

That archaic method of record keeping had its own set of it pitfalls that can
now be easily replaced with new computer payroll programs that
are much easier and faster to use for many reasons.

Reliable Data
The problem with using this ancient method of record keeping had to do
with the reliability and accuracy of the data used.

Employees were on the honor system, and there was always the issue of human error.
Numbers could easily have been transposed or misapplied in some way.
Countless hours could be spent in the entire process.

With the new software options data collection and processing of all aspects
of payroll are automatically collected and calculated within your company’s
computer system. These systems can almost completely eliminate the possibility
of human error or even outright falsifying of certain information.

Saves Time
With the manual method of processing payroll, you find the time consuming
task of collecting data and inputting that data into either a data processing system or a ledger.
This could take as much as 5 minutes per employee just to input the data and even
more time to verify and factor in items such as payroll taxes, insurance deductions,
or overtime pay.  With the new payroll software, this massive consumption of time
frees up those workers for other jobs in your company.

It Saves Money
Consider the amount of money a company has to pay a team of payroll workers to
do this task; the cost of this new software is only a fraction of the cost.
Nearly every business is already taking advantage of the efficiency of using computers
so there is no added expense in purchasing any special technology to run the program.
For most businesses, the cost of the entire software package would
be far less than the cost of their payroll today.

Overall, a business that is running its payroll on time clocking software can feel confident
that they are making the best use of employee time and skill. They will also save money,
not only because of reducing the risk of human error, but also in terms of manpower.
In this regard, many businesses have found that using this type of software has
been very beneficial overall.

Click here for more information on time clocking software.