General

Siri – Virtual Personal Assistant

Imagine your day is filled with meetings or you’re busy with whatever it is that’s diverted your attention. You may need to book a table for dinner tonight, buy concert tickets, book a flight for that much needed getaway, BUT you have no assistant nor have you got time to look things up. Siri is a virtual personal assistant app that can do all this for you! The input device is your voice and operates the same way as Google Voice Search. The app can be downloaded from the Apple App Store, but only works in the US at the moment.

The other day, I demonstrated it to a work mate. I asked for a dinner booking at a restaurant that serves duck in Fitzroy, Melbourne, Australia. Siri came back telling me I need to book a flight from Los Angeles to Melbourne and asked if I’d like to look at some flight schedules!! However, it didn’t tell me which restaurant it had in mind for me. But then again, Australia is not flushed with businesses with an online presence and APIs to go with it (API – application programming interface – this allows software applications to talk to each other). For a lay person, what Siri does is recognise your voice request and inputs those details into, for example, an airline booking webpage and then presents the results to you for your decision.

It’s a shame Australia is so far behind to make use of Siri.

-TH

Tags: coolness, G Media, gadgets, Garion Hall, gmedia, Personal Assistant, Siri virtual personal assistant
Posted in Blogs, General, IT

On the road armed with an iPad

Recently I was in the US on business and the trip coincided with the launch of Apple’s iPad. I decided to head down to the nearby Apple Store, approached one of the Apple Genius and asked if I could pick up a 16GB iPad. She said the 16GB and the 32GB iPad models were sold out in that store. I asked her to check the other stores in the Los Angeles area and they too were sold out of both models. I walked out with a 64GB iPad under my arm.

I sync’ed the iPad with my MacBook and transferred my powerpoint presentation to the iPad, edited and animated the slides, hooked the iPad up to a projector and walked through the presentation. It was so easy!! It was less hassle and in less time than firing up the MacBook and hooking it up to the project. As I was on my way to San Francisco on a Virgin America flight (you can connect to the internet on the flight!!! $14.95 for a 30 day pass), I went through the presentation once more, surfed the web, emailed work and friends, checked out FaceBook and LinkedIn, bought the rad Siri Personal Assistant app (will write about this on another blog) from the App Store on the iPad. Apart from presentations, I used Pages (word processor) and Numbers (spreadsheet) to finish off meeting notes and reviewed some financial data. All this was done, literally, at the touch of the screen. The UI was easy and intuitive – it took me less than 10 mins to read through the instructions and master all the finger gesture commands.

As I expected, the presentation went like a treat. Using the iPad allowed me to be more personal with the people I was meeting with – they sat next to me looking and pointing to charts and graphics immediately before us rather than at some projector screen 5 meters or so away. I now use my iPad as my notebook, taking meeting notes and saving it to my directory. Having experienced how suitable the iPad is for me, I can’t wait for the 3G version which would allow more mobility.

- TH

Tags: Apple, G Media, Garion Hall, gmedia, innovation, iPad, iPad review, iPhone, review
Posted in Blogs, General

Drum roll please…

The management team at G Media are all keyed up at the moment as our fearless leader Garion Hall is about to unveil our revised and super charged Performance Review Policy.  Garion has spent a billion hours, give or take, researching, measuring, benchmarking; you name it he’s done it and all in the name of accurately measuring and recognising G Median’s game-changing performance.

I had a sneak peak at it the other day it looks pretty amazing!! It made me think about my role as a manager. A manager’s most important and most difficult job is to manage people. You must lead, motivate, inspire, and encourage them. Sometimes you will have to hire, fire and discipline employees.

People don’t really work for companies; they work for managers. To the extent that you can be a good manager, you can keep employees, keep them happy, and reduce the costs associated with employee turnover. In the process, you should make your own job easier.

Employees are one of a company’s largest expenses, unlike other costs (buildings, machinery, technology, etc.) employees as assets are highly volatile.   Managing performance is not always easy, as there is no ‘one size fits all’ approach to managing people and their performance.  So as a manager how do I ensure I am getting the best from each individual…??  Well I’m no leading authority but this is what I have learnt in practice, through observation but mostly reflection.. Lots of cringe worthy reflection!

Make sure your people have everything they need to do their job well.

By hell or high water, you have to get them what they need to do the job, and do it right. This includes:

• Proper training
• Proper tools
• Properly defined position descriptions and KPI’s.
• Well documented processes and procedures
• Adequate and proper motivation
• Trust in you as their manager (and yes, they absolutely need this in order to do the job well. It’s not optional.)
• Appreciation/Morale

Get everything that impedes your people from doing their job out of the way.

This is often the most difficult for me.  It’s not glamorous or fun work. Slogging through this stuff takes lots of time and energy. I know it leaves me drained, but, it needs to be done. What to look for when you are clearing a path:

• Old processes and procedures that are no longer needed
• Non-productive meetings
• Work that is not related to the core mission of your team
• Lack of communication.
• Unrealistic expectations from customers, other management, or even the employees themselves.

Make sure your people are performing, and make sure they know you’re all over it…
Once you’ve got the first two sorted, it’s time for some accountability. The key here is defining “job well done” in a way that can be objectively measured and inspected. Your people should know:

• What is being measured
• Why it’s being measured
• That you expect them to uphold a certain level of performance
• You will be regularly inspecting for that level of performance
• What steps you will take if that performance level is not met
• What is offered if they exceed that performance level

Phew!!  A lot to take in right..? Hang in there still a tiny bit more.  Employees are responsible for their own performance within the team. As their manager, I am accountable to our (awesome) board of directors ensuring results in my department, concrete measurable results.

Everyone in the workplace has an important part to play in organisational performance. Good organisational performance is the result of high quality functioning by the individuals within it.  Go Team!!

Tags: G Media, Garion Hall, gmedia, management, motivation, performance review, staff, staff management
Posted in Featured, General, Production

Self confidence building for women starts with building self esteem

As the Production Manager at G Media I spend most of my day working with young women, whether it is staff or models.   As part of my induction I spent many weeks with Garion Hall discussing and learning about the many issues young women face in today’s society and how they take their toll on self confidence.

G Media takes its responsibility to women very seriously.  We collaborate with our models and staff to create an environment which supports the development of individual self confidence so that they in turn can make good healthy decisions for themselves.  Over the last 10 years Garion Hall, CEO, G Media, has worked extensively with social researchers, health workers and local women’s support groups to better understand what we can do every day at G Media to empower woman who value who they are, feel confident and believe in themselves.

We believe that once a woman recognises her-self worth and confirms that she is a marvelous achievement then her feelings and trust in her own self worth will soar.  Confidence comes from a different place inside ourselves, we carry ourselves differently.

All of our experiences in life are opportunities to learn and connect more deeply with ourselves. The more we connect to ourselves, the more healing we do. When a situation makes us feel angry, sad, sick to our stomach, fearful or off centre in any way, our body expresses this discomfort by a physical contraction. This is a signal for us to reconnect with ourselves.

I love it when I see this reconnection in the young women we work with, and they love it too. When young women start believing in themselves and replacing negative thoughts with satisfaction and confidence, their whole life changes. They are no longer making decisions for the wrong reasons; the decisions they make are decisions that are good for them. I get to watch their appearance actually change too. They stand straighter, they walk with a sense of sureness, and they speak with confidence, because they are.

As a woman, there is nothing more inspiring to me than a young woman learning how to stand in her power or a woman standing strong in her power. I feel so lucky in my life to be able to witness these miraculous changes in the women I work with everyday. It reminds me how big love is.

Tags: confidence, G Media, Garion Hall, gmedia, self esteem
Posted in Blogs, Featured, General, Marketing, Production

Debate and Opinion Drives Innovation

We’re always innovating at G Media. We’re never short of creative ideas; innovation’s basic building block. Innovation begins when people convert problems to ideas and new ideas result from questions, problems and obstacles. G Media staff are encouraged to think differently and to critique conventional wisdom, including challenging your colleagues.

How often have you sat in a meeting where an idea’s been tabled and it seems like everyone agrees with it…except you? The best thing you can do is to voice your opinion. Differences that normally divide people, such as problem solving styles, can be used to fuel the innovation process within an organisation.

Recently, I proposed an idea. The economics made sense. It was a different approach and has potential to add value to G Media. There was lively and vigorous debate; however, the idea wasn’t shelved but required more detail. The inquisitorial nature of the discussion was a boon. It made me reflect on how people conceptualise formative ideas and I walked away with two fresh ideas.

Do yourself and your organisation a favour and don’t waste an opportunity to stimulate creative thinking among your colleagues by respectfully critiquing ideas in their formative stages.

- TH

Tags: different, fresh idea, G Media, Garion Hall, innovation
Posted in Blogs, General, IT

Information Asymmetry and Customer Service

If you’re like me, knowing next to nothing about cars, you dread taking the car in for a service. Well, this week when my car wouldn’t start, the first thought that popped in to my head was: “How much am I going to get stung?”.

I bought my car brand new and drove it off the showroom floor seven years ago. Oh, what an experience that was. Fast forward seven years, no major faults or repairs over the years other than the usual service. Until Tuesday week ago. That morning, the car wouldn’t start and had to get it towed to the flagship dealership for service.

I get a call at lunch saying it was the starter motor (WTF is that?!) – it was gonna cost me $2,000 and the part needed to be shipped from overseas and it would take two weeks. Something didn’t sound right. Maybe it was the nervous voice at the end of line? I called around other dealers of the same brand. Same part and labour would cost me $1,250 (the highest price of the three dealers I called).

Maybe the mechanics I called weren’t as smart. You know, they may not be good enough to work at the flagship showroom. Anyway, I thought I’d experiment with the new information I had gained. So I telephoned the flagship.

“Hi, just got another quote for the part,” I said, “You’re right, it’s going to have to be shipped from overseas; they don’t have any in stock. And you’re right, it’s not cheap, it’s going to cost me $1,087 and $230 for labour.” My reliable friend “Silence” stepped in. It must have seemed like an hour before the fellow at the end of the phone replied.

“Oh, umm, let me go and check the price again. Can you hold?” the well trained flagship mechanic asked.

“Hi, are you there? We can do you a better price. The best price we can do is $1,510,” he offered.

In short, I got them to send me the diagnostic report. The two entries were contradictory. I paid $169 for the labour cost to fit a new fuse and drove it to another dealer. The not-so-flagship dealer put it through several tests. Conclusion: nothing wrong with the starter motor. Hmmm.. I’m no expert when it comes to cars, but I know when someone’s tried to take me for a ride.

Posted in Blogs, Featured, General

Don’t Sell, But Rent!

Recently, a G Media colleague asked,”What should I do with my property? Should I sell and buy into another area?” The property – her principal residence – has greatly appreciated in value. Would it not make sense to sell it and use the proceeds as a deposit for another property? But my colleague wants to be in the property investment game, too. She also wants to buy another property.

If you research on the internet, you’ll find many articles about whether to buy or rent. The answer would generally be “buy” if the property market is in a boom, interest rates are low, lack of housing and so forth. But the answer would be “rent” if the general market characteristics were the opposite. The analysis between the two situations comes down to how much cash and capital appreciation you’ll receive from renting out an investment property. Then comparing it against how much cash you’ll make from investing your hard earned dollars in something of similar risk, such as a term deposit or government bonds (they pay you interest at set frequencies). But this analysis is not entirely appropriate for my colleague. She’s already got a property and should make use of it.

As an alternative, my friend could keep her current property and rent it out, use the value (equity) she gained from the property value increase as a deposit to buy another investment property. And rent the new property, too. It’s an attractive market at the moment. There’s a high demand for housing and we’ve been told there’s just not enough housing to go round. I’ve heard stories about people offering rents that are higher than what was expected! Plus, the “experts” are predicting the property market to continue to be strong this year.

So where is she going to live?! She should rent a property. What?? How does this make sense, you’re saying. It makes perfect sense if my colleague doesn’t care about not living in “her” house (which is contrary to the Australian dream). While she’s renting, she’s got two extra income streams (the rents from the two investment properties) which she should aim to be two-thirds of the total mortgage repayments (depending on her salary and how much debt she wants to have) and she tops up the remaining third with her salary. She gets to enjoy being in the property market with two properties that appreciate in value in a booming market and she can deduct the mortgage interest (not the principal repayment component) against her salary.

Anyway, this is my suggestion to her.

Tags: G Media
Posted in Blogs, General, IT

Welcome to G Media

Tags: G Media, Production
Posted in Blogs, Featured, General, Home