business - SheryleGillihan

Will Your Job Continue To Exist?

Technology has vastly transformed the job landscape and companies that thrived for decades found themselves behind the curve or worse, bankrupt and destitute.

We are at the beginning of this crazy SciFi rollercoaster. Technology continues to evolve and the pace of it is exponential. Some of these new innovations disrupt entire industries. I keep asking myself, “Will my job be relevant in five years? How about ten years?”

The Art of Negotiation

Last weekend, I gave a talk on The Art of Negotiation. When available, I’ll also post the video of my talk. Here are the biggest takeaways: Everything is negotiable. It’s all about the relationship. There are fears on both sides. Know your value and also understand what you do and don’t know. Stand your ground. Some…

Don’t just stand there.

Ideas lead to invention, thus, many of us are stingy with our ideas. We fear that if we share our ideas someone else will build it before we get the chance to build it ourselves. The problem with this thinking is that often times, we don’t build the majority of ideas we keep secret. An idea…

Do it right.

There’s great value in iteration and I’m a strong believer of building towards a minimum viable product, but I also strongly agree with the old adage “you get what you pay for.” The first time my husband deployed overseas, he asked me to mail him a CD player. Digital music was already on the rise and it…

Let’s Get Uncomfortable

Does your company ask you to provide constructive criticism to your colleagues? It’s common practice and it’s a good one, but I find it challenging to put negative feedback into a happy sandwich. Honestly, I’m not sure the happy sandwich works on anyone past elementary school because we all expect it. In the end, all that…

How I’ve Come to Love Sales

A couple months ago, I gave a presentation on the topic sales despite my aversion to sales. I cringe at the sound of the word and yet, in June of 2014 I found myself promoted to Director of Partnerships at CauseLabs, managing all of our relationships and, that’s right, sales. What I’ve learned in the…

Behind the Scenes of Project Scoping

This past weekend I gave my first WordCamp talk. I slipped away from my practiced talk several times, but I think that’s okay because it was fun and it spoke more to the needs of those that were in the room. Thanks to everyone who attended and made it a really amazing discussion. I do…

Reality Check: If you build it, who will come?

If you derive hope from the Field of Dreams story and recite the ever popular “if you build it, he will come” quote as your reasoning for building without logical rationale, you may be in for a disappointment. In a tech savvy, well-connected city of potential app users, you would think that your awesome app…

Reality Check: How Failure Can Lead to Long Term Success

I had the great fortune of failing on my first project. Yes, you read that correctly and it was not a typo. I know it doesn’t seem like the type of thing one would be proud of, but I gained something from that experience that I continue to look for in other projects. I was…

Is your organization a social enterprise?

What is a social enterprise? Social enterprises are organizations whose primary purpose is to serve the common good, and whose strategy applies business disciplines and market-based strategies to achieve social or environmental missions. Social enterprise models There are two social enterprise models: Non-profits and For-profits. Non-profits utilizing business models and the power of the marketplace…

How to “Right-Size” a Project

If you’ve been a project manager for a while, then you know that when a client says, “can you send me a scope of work?” that means, “tell me how long this will take and how much it will cost.” If you’re new to project management, then you have all of this to look forward to and whether you’re new or rather experienced, here are some pointers to help you along your way.

Identifying Your Job Description

Recently, I’ve been taking on a lot more responsibility and the hours in the day just weren’t enough to get it all done. I take that back; I had enough time to do everything, just not enough time to do it all well. I found I was picking and choosing which things would get more…

Partner Solutions: A New Paradigm for Digital Services

The most important thing about choosing a team name or title is ensuring it reflects your job both internally and externally. What’s in a name? At CauseLabs we have three core teams that make things happen: the Creative Team, the Tech Team and the Partner Solutions Team. While the first two are fairly straightforward, Partner…