Thought Leaders

Business Coaching

Coach Darin: Employee Experience Design: If you build it, they will come

A new employment trend has emerged over the last few years that is substantially changing the way businesses interact with and inspire their employees. In response to the pandemic-induced disengaged workforce, business owners had to rethink their approach to employee acquisition, engagement, and retention. As labor dynamics like The Great Resignation and Quiet Quitting made headlines and rattled businesses, many organizations recognized the need to do things differently to attract and retain the talent they need. The time was right to embrace Employee Experience (EX) Design. EX design is the

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Cyber Security

Blocking all the spam

Cyberthreats are all around us and the primary threat vector for your business is email. This method of attack is the easiest way for hackers to attack your system. Employees will run across emails enticing them to click on links that would lead them to corrupt sites that would infect your network. To combat these attacks, good spam software is important. That software must include URL rewrites to make sure your email is as protected as possible. For example, you have a link in your email and see that it

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Shawna Woodward

Real Talk Real Estate: Quick tips for a quick sale

If you are planning to sell your real estate soon, you may be asking, did I miss the perfect time to sell? The short answer is no, you are not too late. However, unlike the previous years, preparing a home for showing will take some effort. Gone are the days of multiple offers on an ugly home. Things like curb appeal, present-day decorative features, and fresh paint matter again! Pricing correctly is always the main key to selling quickly, but you also need to make sure you present your home

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Business Coaching

Coach Darin: What can predictive analytics do for your business?

Every business (yours included) generates a lot of data. Every customer interaction, sale, and follow-up report produces information of great potential use to the organization. The key is harnessing all that data and using it to your company’s advantage. This process is often referred to as predictive analysis. According to the Harvard Business Review, predictive analytics is “the use of data to predict future trends and events,” and leveraging “historical data to forecast potential scenarios that can help drive strategic decisions.” In other words, the information your company generates today (and the proper

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Cyber Security

Are your passwords weak or strong?

Hackers are everywhere and they are looking for weak passwords to get in and cause destruction on your networks and devices daily. The best way to combat that is through strong passwords. They need to be complex and lengthy. Be sure to include numbers, letters, and symbols with a good number of characters. Even with today’s sophisticated hacking methods, computers still are not able to crack long passwords quickly. The challenge is how you remember a secure password with all those numbers, symbols, and letters. Well, your answer would be

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Shawna Woodward

Real Talk Real Estate: “Unraveling the Housing Market: Is Change on the Horizon?”

There’s been a recent shortage in the number of home sales, and you might be wondering why that is. What does this mean for the future? I saw some interesting things happening in our local MLS this week. For all those real estate newbies out there, MLS stands for multiple listing service, the website licensed real estate agents use to share home details with other agents. What I saw ignited a faint wonder, is the market starting to shift? My position has been pretty stout on the current sellers’ market

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Business Coaching

Coach Darin: Leverage AI to grow your business

Artificial intelligence. What once felt wildly futuristic has suddenly become mainstream and is growing more ubiquitous by the minute. You are likely already interacting with AI, even if you are not completely aware of it. When your text message autocorrects itself or when you apply facial recognition to log into applications on your smartphone. When you enhance that selfie with a little photo editing before you post it to social media. When your music streaming service recommends a new song it thinks you might like. When you interact with a

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Cyber Security

Hope for the best, plan for the worst

What would happen if your organization was hit with a catastrophic loss? Even though it may not be the most enjoyable process to think about, it’s good to go over the “what ifs” to protect your business should a catastrophic loss of data or physical location occur, whether it be a flood, fire, or hurricane. Do you have a plan should one of these natural disasters hit your business? To begin, my recommendation would be to start by asking yourself and your trusted co-workers, “How would we return to business

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Shawna Woodward

Real Talk Real Estate: Local tax assessment bills, millage rates, and unnerving updates

Last week, I watched a segment on the local news where they interviewed representatives from the Richmond County tax assessor’s office talking about the process used to decide values for property taxes. This process is similar to a property appraisal done by realtors or appraisers and is determined by local sales values. All counties generally follow the same process and then use their local millage rate formula to decide a tax assessment figure. Here is a quick example to show you how the millage rate process works. In Georgia, the

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Business Coaching

Coach Darin: Leverage AI to grow your business

These days, nothing seems more topical than AI (Artificial Intelligence). With the much-ballyhooed advent of ChatGTP, business owners and CEOs are examining new ways in which AI can help increase efficiency, streamline operations, and grow their businesses. What exactly is AI? According to Wharton Online, AI “refers to the ability of machines to learn and make decisions based on data and analytics.” For many businesses, automation based on artificial intelligence is the starting point for incorporating more AI into their operations. Built-in processes that rely upon repetition and timing benefit significantly through the application

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