Greater Milwaukee Jobs

One day I visited a friend at her children's clothing shop. The merchandise was displayed nicely, the store had customers, but my friend was furious. "What's wrong?" I asked. "My part- ner went home early again," she grumbled. It wasn't long after that my friend closed the shop and the friendship with her partner disintegrated. The two mothers both wanted flexibility, but one used it way too often at the detri- ment of the business, the partnership and the friend- ship. Today, people are starting businesses in droves, aspir- ing to be their own boss and have the flexibility they crave. But when you go into business with friends, more than just financial rewards are at stake and increasing work-life issues are at the crux of conflicts. Differ- ences around roles, work hours and the pace of growth can undermine a friendship in such setups. "Picking your business partner is as important as picking your spouse," says Jena Rissman Atlass, presi- dent of Atlass Dispute Res- olution in Fort Lauderdale, Fla. "About 99 percent of time when things go wrong it's because 'friends' didn't address the hard stuff." Many find a written oper- ating agreement, while potentially painful to create, forces them to establish ground rules. Friends, mothers and business part- ners Neydy Gomez and Claudia Machado say their agreement took about three months to complete and brought up sensitive issues they hadn't con- templated. In May 2015, they opened Zaniac Miami, a science, technol- ogy and math after- school program in a campus setting. "We agreed up front about how often we would meet to go over plans, how we would leverage each other's abilities, how we would handle life's unex- pected events, and how we would handle our different personal priorities," Macha- do says. "Some issues were difficult and took a while, but we were able to come to an agreement." The two realized a busi- ness partnership could unravel if one felt like she was carrying all the weight. Gomez puts in long hours at the Zaniac Miami campus during the week. Machado comes in on the weekends. "It may not always be 50-50. Sometimes Balancing Act: Pick your business partners with caution By Cindy Krischer Goodman Miami Herald (TNS) swelled in the last decade and now represents 8.4 percent of the U.S. workforce, according to a new study by economists at Harvard and Princeton uni- versities. Nearly 3 million Americans became free- lancers from 2005 to 2015, the study found. Because people who work independently are not techni- cally employees, they do not enjoy the raft of worker pro- tections that apply to almost everyone else. That leaves independent contractors out of the wave of pressure to upgrade pay – the latest exam- ple being the $15-an-hour minimum wage that is poised to become law in California and New York. "Raising the minimum wage is extraordinarily important, but it shouldn't distract us from the other question, which is: What do we do about the fissuring of the tra- ditional American work- place?" said Seth Harris, former deputy secretary of the U.S. Labor Department. The "gig economy" has become synonymous with app-driven ride-hailing and home-sharing services that have altered the way many Americans travel. But new research by Harvard econo- mist Lawrence Katz and Princeton economist Alan Krueger suggests that the vast majority of contract workers do not answer to Internet companies. Less than 0.5 percent of the labor force works through an online intermediary such as Uber or Airbnb, Katz and Krueger found. Most contrac- tors do other freelance jobs, in areas such as sales, home health care or construction. In these arrangements, the assumption is that workers sacrifice a safety net in the interest of flexibility. Free- lancers aren't entitled to workers' compensation, health care or unemployment insurance, or the minimum wage. In exchange, they are their own bosses. In Joy Brande's case, that control is a matter of degree. Brande, 66, spends about 15 hours a week driving for Uber. She can choose to not take rides when she knows "drunk kids" will be the main clien- tele, and can simply turn the app off if she's feeling burned out. But if she is online and does not take 80 percent of the rides, the company sends her a text strongly encouraging her to accept a greater share. Uber also sets the fares for each of her rides and monitors her customer service rating from riders. Harris explained that federal law treats contractors "like independent businesses that are expected to be able to negotiate their own individual compact through bargaining with other businesses." The problem is that many people called contractors by the companies that pay them do not actually have total autonomy. Indeed, one of the main strategies of labor activists to extend protections to contract workers is to turn them into employees. "Port truck drivers across America are misclassified as independent contractors," said Barb Maynard, a spokes- woman for the Teamsters union. About 65 percent of all truckers are not properly 2 GREATERmilwaukeeJOBS • May 5, 2016 gig economy ... from page 1 see GIG ECONOMY . . . page 6 What to do when your work team's performance falls short & A Q A. When you're talking about a pattern of performance issues, look hard at root causes. Start with diagnosis. List the actual issues that have occurred – errors of omission and commission alike. And recall that these are just the problems you know about. To be sure that you're aware of the full scope, go to the internal team to gather information about their experiences and the consequences of the service issues. Further, check in with others you work with inter- nally to see if broader issues are going on. Understand both the urgency and the severity of the con- cerns they raise to help prioritize subsequent improvement actions. Remember a couple of things when you're going to your cus- tomers. First, when you ask, be in learning mode. Ask clarifying ques- tions, and don't become defensive. Second, make a commitment to improvement without overpromis- ing on specifics. Do, however, prom- ise to follow up. And then be sure that you do! Once you've gotten a full picture of the issues, identify themes. Are they tied to specific people or processes? For example, is there a handoff of work from one person to another without sufficient structure to ensure that nothing slips between the cracks? Are adequate quality checks in place? It may be hard to see patterns, especially if you're really close to the work. If so, enlist others to help think through the feedback. Be mindful about the detail you share, though, especially if it could involve individual performance issues. Now consider the solutions. If you have a critical break, you'll need to fix it immediately. Deeper process changes may take a little more time. Consider both individual and team- level solutions. If you have individuals who fall short, that'll be a one-on- one matter. If performance shortfalls can't reasonably be remediated, con- sider moving people to different roles or off the team entirely. How- ever, use training and coaching to bring them along if possible. For team solutions, enlist the team! People struggling with poor processes are the best source of improvement ideas. Often, though, time pressures and unresponsive systems lead people to take a "workaround" mind-set. Use these workarounds as a source of insight and challenge people to solve the problems their clients have experi- enced. What if you have trouble getting the team to take this seriously? Use your clients' words. Be as blunt as needed. Overall, though, take a positive approach. When given information and tools to work with, your team is likely to step up and achieve the results you and your clients are looking for. Q. My team has had some issues providing acceptable service levels to one of our internal clients. Some balls have been dropped and some errors made. What can we do to re-establish trust? By Liz Reyer Tribune News Service (TNS) Liz Reyer is a credentialed coach with more than 20 years of business experience. Her company, Reyer Coaching & Consulting, offers services for organizations of all sizes. Submit questions or comments about this column at www.deliverchange.com/coachscorner or email her at lizdeliverchange.com. A publication of Conley Media Call Center Director: Cindy Shaske 262-306-5016 cshaske@conleynet.com Account Executive: Julie Sears 262-306-5008 jsears@conleynet.com Story Coordinator: Dan Muckelbauer 262-513-2626 dmuck@conleynet.com Production: Patricia Scheel 262-513-2690 GREATERmilwaukeeJOBS Volume 18 • Number 33 May 5, 2016 To place an ad: Call us at 262-306-5008 or fax us at 262-338-5271 deadline: Noon on Wednesdays Distributed by: Conley Distribution 262-513-2646 ©2016 by Conley Media, LLC Waukesha County Independent and Locally Owned GREATERmilwaukeeJOBS is published weekly by Conley Media – Waukesha County, 801 N. Barstow St., Waukesha, WI 53186. Contents of this publication may not be reproduced in any form without the written consent of the publisher. GREATERmilwaukeeJOBS assumes no liability for any error in copy or content. It is the advertiser's responsibility to be aware of the laws pertaining to employment advertising. Call 262-306-5008 for information. see BUSINESS PARTNERS . . . page 6

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