Posts 16–20 of 52

Speedy meetings are awesome, but not the way Google created them

Google introduced Speedy Meetings in 2011, which shortens meetings from 30 to 25 or 60 to 50 minutes. The intended goal was to allow you to “prep for your next meeting or get to your next appointment if you have a packed schedule.”

Sounds great, right? Unfortunately, speedy meetings the way Google has created them just don’t work. The temptation to keep the meeting going until :30 or :00 is just overwhelming. Human nature leads to people to keep talking past the supposed speedy meeting end time.

But there is a solution. Instead of ending meetings early, I’ve found it works much better to start meetings late! Wait wait, I know this sounds crazy, but hear me out.

How to start using 100% renewable energy at home without installing solar panels

You probably wish you could do more to support the fight against climate change, but it’s not clear where to start. Luckily, there’s actually a really easy step you can take that will dramatically decrease your carbon footprint, and it only takes 5 minutes!

Switching from Google Workspace to Zoho - the Good, the Bad and the Buggy

Late last year, Google announced they’d be doing away with their free, legacy G Suite (now called Google Workspace) program. I’d been using G Suite with my jedfonner.com domain for 17 years to handle email, calendar and Google Docs. When Eli and Isaac had gotten old enough, I’d given them accounts at jedfonner.com too. Even though Google eventually walked back their plans to force people off their free tier, this scare made me realize I didn’t want to be beholden to Google for such crucial systems as my email and calendar for me and my family.

Looking around for alternatives, I looked at a few like ProtonMail and Tutanota but eventually I settled on Zoho. I’d actually been using Zoho Notebook for a while, ever since Google Keep stopped working on my phone, and I liked how the company was focused on being a low-cost but full featured suite of products for teams and businesses. So I decided to take the leap and move from Google to Zoho Workplace.

Let me tell you about my experience moving away from Google. If after reading this post you are interested in signing up or switching to Zoho, use this referral link to earn $100 in promotional credit: https://go.zoho.com/uDa.

Boost your 1-on-1s with this one simple trick

The number one rule of being a manager is to have 1-on-1s with your direct reports (Don’t believe me? Read this and this and this). But the best 1-on-1s are those where your direct report has spent time thinking about what they want to discuss with you. How can you ensure this happens?

In my experience, some of your employees will jump at the opportunity to have uninterrupted time with their manager, and they will have a million things they want to talk about. But what about the other type of employee? At least half, if not more, of your employees need to spend time reflecting and thinking about what they want to get out of the meeting beforehand. How do you encourage these people to prepare for their 1-on-1 with you?

I’ve found that sending a specific, helpful, and timely reminder email can have a huge impact on the quality of your 1-on-1s. Sounds easy, right? Let me show you how you can set this up automatically.

Some Things Never Change

My mom just sent me this old picture from when I was a kid. That’s me and our family cat Fuzzy.