Robert Half Technology Salary Guide 2016

The latest annual Salary Guide from Robert Half Technology is out and looks at compensation trends across the tech industry for Canada and the US. The salaries in the guide reflect starting pay only and do not include bonuses and other forms of compensation.

The guide mentions that a demand and supply imbalance that has affected the IT hiring market for years will likely continue in 2016. So many IT-related positions are being created that employers throughout North America and across industries often must wait months to staff key roles. What’s new is that tech jobs are remaining open because candidates aren’t even applying.

Firms are now looking to grow their own talent, upping their investment in developing high-potential internal employees and making more entry-level hires. Employers are also more willing to "stretch," helping a candidate to fit into a role versus waiting to find someone who meets all of their hiring criteria.

The guide predicts that hot industries for hiring in the months ahead will be financial services, healthcare, managed services, telecommunications and hospitality. Mobile technology, big data and security will continue to be major drivers for IT hiring throughout 2016.

Tech roles in demand will be developers, business analysts and quality assurance professionals, systems engineers and systems administrators, database administrators and business intelligence analysts and help desk and desktop support.

The full guide -- including a ton of salary ranges -- is available here.

John.

HumberLaunch Summer Series Workshop: Pitching To Investors

This morning I attended the last of HumberLaunch's summer workshop series. [More are being planned for the fall season too.] The subject matter was Pitching To Investors, and the presenter was Kevin Smith, Chief Story Architect at The Story Architect.

Kevin walked us through the process of raising money for start-ups using his PACES system: Problem/Answer/Credibility/Evidence/Steps To Take Next. He estimated that in his career, he's been involved in around 10,000 pitches, so had gleaned the "good and the bad" way of raising money from investors.

You don't need a ton of money to get started. Kevin cited the example of Russ Montague, the Co-Founder of ShirtPunch who borrowed $2,000 from his dad to get the business started ... and now makes millions.

He referred to the early days of pitching, or "PowerPoint karaoke" as he called it. Nice phrase!

"You don't need money," he advised. "You need execution. Who's on the team is the most important question. The investor is not buying the idea -- they are buying you."

After an hour of great advice, the attendees divided up into groups of four and then had five minutes to make a pitch to the rest of the group. There were some innovative ideas.

I connected with someone too that has (what I think) is a brilliant idea, so -- true to the theme of the day -- have already pitched him on my services if he needs help launching it ...

John.

Quantum computing and social media

Having just returned from some valuable family time in a remote Scottish hamlet, my relaxed mind needed to kick-start itself again ... and what better way than to chat about quantum computing (QC) and social media? Obvious connection.

Now, QC is above my level of understanding, but imagine if that gear stick above was in your quantum car. Instead of choosing a direction to drive in at one time, you'd be be able to drive in more than one direction at the same time. If that explanation doesn't fully explain the concept, then Google the subject matter for more information.

So, as of now, I can fire up my Twitter account and -- as they used to say years ago -- "join the conversation." Once said conversation has been joined, I may thus choose to take a negative or a positive stance depending on my point of view.

The tweet is sent, the #humblebrags or trolling starts to flow, and the conversation veers off onto its chosen path.

In the future (once quantum computers go mainstream) I would be able to take alternative views at the same time, and the respondents would be able to do the same. The conversation would spin off into various directions simultaneously.

Imagine the possibilities:

• Brands would enjoy amazing success, screw up and apologize at the same time!
• People could YouTube videos of their dog AND cat on the same skateboard to the same music!
• Bloggers could write about "The Top 10 Ways To Increase Your Social Media ROI" and "Why Social Media ROI Is Dead As We Know It" in the same post!

It's mind-blowing. All angles could be covered at the same time. Everyone would be right and wrong simultaneously. QC would change the face of social media for ever. But at the same time it wouldn't.

John.

Take a video? Facepalm!

Selfies, videos, instant sharing ... 24/7, global. Taking a video by pointing your camera at the subject is sooooo June 2015.

I can't recall where I heard about Beme (because I like to give credit where it's due) but it looks pretty interesting. You can download it for Apple.

Easier to read the TechCrunch recap or watch the video:

From TC: "With Beme, video recording is done via the rear camera in four-second bursts. However, instead of hitting a record button and watching the screen to see what you’re filming, you capture video by covering your iPhone’s proximity sensor, which is the little dot next to the front camera.

"This means you start recording by placing the phone up against your chest, forehead, or any other location (a finger also works) that would cover the sensor."

As the video explains it, and I may be wrong, once you upload the unedited footage, your connections get a chance to view it once only and then it's gone forever. (For just them, or totally? Not sure on that front.)

This sounds like a hybrid of Twitter, Periscope and Snapchat. A very quick live video that has a short life span.

I used to jump straight into all the shiny new toys, and learned my lesson by trailing around a ton of moribund social media app accounts that never really took off, or just died. Not having an iPhone anyway, I can't check this one out. Wonder if an Android version is in the works?

Will be interesting to see if brands take this one up.

Have a great long weekend everyone!

John.

Do you trust your own website?

Been thinking a lot about websites recently. Windows 10 was released yesterday (plan to get it for free) with a shiny new browser called Edge. Looking forward to seeing how it performs versus Chrome and Firefox (stopped using IE a while back, so this may bring me back into the fold).

Then I also pitched a brand on an AODA audit for a new website they have in the pipeline to check its accessibility level. Still a lot of sites out there that could be improved.

So that got me thinking about Herb Communications' website. Can I trust it not to scam people into nasty malware and other crap? Websites are usually the first impression that someone gets of your brand, so it's literally seconds to make it a positive one.

Luckily I heard about Is It Hacked? via the Solo PR Pro group I joined. Ran Herb Communications through it, held my breath ... and everything seems OK. Phew! (But it does come with a disclaimer, "Note: this site just checks for common problems, a pass from here doesn't guarantee your site isn't hacked." Well -- at least it's a start to get people thinking about this kind of thing.)

Many a time brands are content to create a great website, but then forget to keep it properly maintained and updated. Websites are organic and you should be able to change anything you want, on the fly, instantly.

Keep it fresh and clean, evolve it over time, run it through some FREE checks such as the one above and get an idea of where you stand. It isn't the be-all and end-all of website maintenance but it keeps you on your toes and brings your own personal digital communications front of mind.

There's only so many hours in the day to help clients, but you have to help yourself first if you're to succeed.

John.

Is it the medium or the message?

The news story of the day is the dentist from Minnesota who reportedly killed a lion in Zimbabwe that was being used in a research project for Oxford University. Thirteen-year-old Cecil was lured out of the bush at night, shot with a bow, took 40 hours to die before being skinned and beheaded.

Understandably, social media has erupted over this event [graphic images] and apart from scathing Yelp reviews of the dentist's practice, an online petition has been set up that already has over 111,000 signatures -- and climbing as I write -- demanding "Justice for Cecil."

This is very similar to the recent activity over the female hunter who received death threats after a photo of her [graphic images] was posted next to a kill.

As a kid, I read a short story in the newspaper once about some guy that had hurt a dog. The way the story was written made it seem like a joke. I was 11 and outraged!

I ran to get my pen and notepad, and crafted a letter chastising the newspaper about its insensitivity. Into the envelope, on with the stamp and off it went in the mail. I didn't expect to get any response.

But the week later they printed my letter with an apology. I was extremely happy with that. I felt like I had made some small difference to redress the balance.

The point I'm trying to make in this convoluted way is that "communications technology" has come a long way from the humble written letter into the all-encompassing Internet. When you see something terrible online now, it takes five seconds to share it around the world, perhaps with some comments of your own.

It's MUCH easier to give an opinion, or protest at something, or raise awareness. Sometimes these things have legs and they follow people around, sometimes they peter out more rapidly.

Does something shared on social media have more impact than a written letter from an angry 11-year-old? Not sure.

John.

HumberLaunch Summer Series Workshop: Branding Your Business

That feeling when the alarm goes off at 6:00 a.m.! Luckily I'm an early bird so it was out of bed, a quick smoothie, shower and off to HumberLaunch's [breakfast] Summer Workshop Series (Herb Communications joined the business incubator a month or so ago).

Today's session was presented by Jacqueline Spicer, Founder of !nk Tank in Toronto. She talked about Branding Your Business.

Jacqueline shared some excellent insights and tips from her many years of experience helping brands of all shapes and sizes, from a variety of industries.

One comment she said that resonated with me [paraphrasing]: "You have a logo, website and are on social media, so you think you have a brand. No. You just have the tools, not the brand."

Yes! Been saying that for ages. It's just a tool, don't be nervous of it. A telephone, fax machine, e-mail that people use all the time = just tools. People are the brands.

"Know that brands are people too," she says. So we both agree on that.

There's a lot of, shall we say, "borrowing of ideas" from the Internet. Jacqueline mentioned that brands sometimes get stuck in their ways. As they say to her: "It's always been done that way and we don't want to break that mold because it's dangerous."

One point I disagreed on is that social media is not for everybody [please see Jacqueline's comments below for clarification on this point]. As I mention here, I believe it can be adapted to help most brands. There's the simple basics of monitoring your industry and competitors, to a full-on campaign of outreach and discussion with your customers.

She mentioned a quote from Simon Sinek, who I'm embarrassed to say is a new name to me: "People don't buy what you do, they buy why you do it." Now I plan to read more about Simon.

Lastly, we had to sum up our story in six words. Tricky ... but I think, "Twenty years of knowledge helping others" is close to what I'm striving for.

It's great to be part of a business incubator, get out for a while and listen/learn/chat with others in the same boat.

John.

[Updated with reference to Jacqueline's feedback below.]

Are brands human?

Massive Pink Floyd fan, not so much from the Syd Barrett era but shortly thereafter. Just got my tickets to see frontman David Gilmour's solo tour next March in Toronto. Very excited!

When I think of DG he sums up the Pink Floyd brand for me. Sadly, keyboardist Richard Wright passed away in 2008, and drummer Nick Mason and bassist Roger Waters have their own projects. So the band will never tour again. But they all played a massive part in shaping Pink Floyd's unique sound.

I thought about other people that represented brands. A few that sprang to mind were Colonel Harland Sanders (Kentucky Fried Chicken), Steve Jobs (Apple) and Richard Branson (Virgin).

Colonel Sanders' image is still used in KFC's branding; Steve Jobs had a hand in every aspect of Apple's products, and had films made about him; Richard Branson started his empire as a student from the humble telephone box. These three people still, to this day, symbolize the brand that they started.

There's been some blogs recently discussing whether brands are fake and just trying to be your "friend" on social media. Maybe some do. If so, we need to give more credit to the consumer that they can pick up on that manufactured sentiment.

Real people work at brands, not robots. There will always be that human touch behind campaigns and social media outreach. Social media is just a tool -- like the telephone, e-mail, letter, fax machine -- that real human beings use to communicate and promote their brand and, if we're being honest, trying to sell more products or services.

We all know that! It's our choice. If you don't like how a brand is treating you, then look elsewhere. There's tons of competition out there grateful for your business. In my humble opinion, the ones that survive and do well are those that -- by default or otherwise -- have a recognized person leading the way, ready to stand up and be counted and own it, during the good times and bad.

If your brand can find that "face" then you can stand out from the crowd. People are born to communicate with other people, it's just natural.

Have a good weekend!

John.

Right here, right now, there is no other place I want to be

Jesus Jones is my inspiration for today's thoughts. Someone asked me in a meeting yesterday what I thought "the next big thing" is going to be.

Wow! If I definitely knew that, I'd buy all the domain names going, get some keyword-targeted ads and make a killing. No one knows for sure, but everyone likes to have an opinion.

Though it's already started to pick up speed now via apps such as Periscope and Meerkat, I think THE FUTURE will be instantaneous engagement and collaboration between brands and their customers.

This sounds like a nightmare for people who hate ads, or think that brands are too intrusive already, but cut me a little slack to explain.

Brand X runs a contest. Someone wins. Who knows how it was drawn, is it fair, fixed? Tweet it for entries, hashtag that bad boy and live stream the draw. Notify the winner, who can then live stream their joy at winning.

Brand Y has just launched a new product. Forget the press release! Wander into the CEO's office, fire up the live stream and capture their excitement and thoughts as the first online orders roll in or people sign up. The CEO picks five new customers then at random from the first few minutes, and they get it free for the first year.

Brand Z produces movies, covertly leaks spoilers and other snippets of information to build up buzz. Forget that jazz! Wander around the set, live stream the actors as they film scenes and set up a Spoiler Alert channel. The Internet is going to spoil stuff anyway, so just own it first and be transparent.

Right here, right now.

And here's the tune if you have a coffee break ...

John.

50/50

On/off. Black/white. Up/down. Yes/no.

Most things can go either way. (Forget quantum physics, that's a whole 'nuther ball game.)

In business, people stress a lot about things that are out of their control. Will the presentation go well? Will I make the sale? Will the client sign the contract?

You can spend hours, days, months prepping to make everything perfect. But then something unexpected happens, or doesn't go the way you anticipated, and it throws you for a loop.

It's 50/50. You will get the result or you won't. There's talk of the mythical grey area or the wiggle room, but at the end of the day, you are going to walk away from the situation satisfied or disappointed.

If you can prepare for one of either eventualities, it makes it much easier to plan ahead and decide what your next move is.

John.

Pitch perfect

That beautifully composed and shot photograph above was taken by my fair hand on a trusty Samsung cellphone. (Point, click, thank you.) Feel free to use it under Creative Commons if you want. I merely took a stroll along the lake, and snapped away. It's a favourite spot to clear my head and get some inspiration.

The tiny grey smudge in the distance is Toronto. A bustling hive full of creative people using digital communications, start-ups trying to make an honest go of it, and businesses pitching their services.

Pitching is hard. You feel like you have to get the message exactly right, to be psychic, look into the mind of the potential client and try to figure out what they may need that they don't know they may need.

It's never perfect. You research, see what they're up to and plan the "must-haves" followed by the "nice-to-haves" for when the budget gets spent. The approach is made, hopefully there's a positive response, and you take it from there.

Some companies take a while to get back, others pretty quickly. No point being pushy; in my experience that doesn't help much. Just keep in touch and trust your instincts.

I'm pitching today and that was my break. Back to it!

John.

Disruption seems to be the hardest word

It's sad, so sad
It's a sad, sad situation
And it's getting more and more absurd
It's sad, so sad
Why can't we talk it over
Oh it seems to me
That disruption seems to be the hardest word

With apologies to Elton John and Bernie Taupin, I substituted one word in their sublime song to lead off today's blog post. Was going to cover disruption yesterday, but social media people with fleshy, flawed faces was more timely.

Disruption is the word of the times right now. It seems that to make your mark, be seen as different, or be valued at $billions, then you have to be disruptive, or disrupt something.

By the magic that is Google, I looked up the definition:

1. To throw into confusion or disorder
2. To interrupt or impede the progress of
3. To break apart or alter so as to prevent normal or expected functioning

These all seem quite negative to me. I have a better word ... to be revealed ... keep reading!

So I want to create a web service, say, something to do with transport that improves on the traditional way of doing things. If the buzz is that I'm disrupting that industry, then technically I'm "throwing it into confusion or disorder" or "impeding its progress" or "to break apart or alter" (that's a little closer, granted).

I would prefer to say supersede:

1. To cause to be set aside
2. To force out of use as inferior
3. To take the place or position of
4. To displace in favor of another

These speak more closely to what the new web service is trying to achieve. To improve on something, rather than slow it down or break it.

Just my thoughts.

John.

Do brands really hire underpaid social media people with fleshy, flawed faces?

[Disruption. That was going to be the topic of today's blog post based on what's currently happening between Uber and Toronto taxi cabs. But that can wait for another day; disruption is not going away.]

"Of course brands screw up a lot on social media. It’s because, despite their rictus grins, the plastic masks of friendship they wear are just hiding the fleshy, flawed faces of underpaid social media people, who are often trying to be the fun voice of several soulless logos at once."

Ouch!

That scathing paragraph comes from a blog post entitled, "Brands aren’t your friends, they’re the idiots at the social media party" on The Next Web site.

The gist of the article is that brands aren't our friends and many fake their social media presence to pretend they are. I have seen some brands do that, and some not. Horses for courses.

We can't forget that the consumer is in the driving seat now. I believe that people do enjoy following their favourite brands, and can just as easily leave them behind if they become, "the leeches of social networking, desperately trying to drain some blood from every bit of creativity they encounter," as the blog writer describes.

Brings to mind this meme:

Whether it's kitchen roll, cars, soft drinks, cookies .... whatever ... people do like to follow certain companies. It's up to those brands to judge the audience and engage accordingly.

John.

No disguising your actions on social media

People can still be a little nervous about social media, and rightly so, to an extent.

Here's an excellent article from Maclean's demonstrating some social media horror stories, from the angle of people acting foolish and then losing their jobs, or being hounded themselves via social media.

The takeaway is that more so now than ever, you're expected to face the repercussions of your social media actions, and that could mean loss of employment -- sometimes within 24 hours as some of the examples in the article illustrate.

Twitter, especially, is instantaneous. You fire up that tweet, press send and it's already out there in the wild, sitting on a server for posterity. Maybe someone has already grabbed a screenshot of it, so no point pressing the delete button = too late. If someone searches your name in the future, that tweet/case study may pop up to follow you around.

Does Twitter need a 30-second "grace period" or an "undo send" option, similar to what Gmail recently made standard after years in beta? Possibly. It may take off, may not.

I think the point is to go retro. Before the Internet and social media were just a twinkle in the eye, businesses picked up the phone and spoke to people. That was the first impression that potential customers got.

A tweet is the same. It's just a shorter version via digital communications. The difference is that it can be shared more widely, much faster, and others can jump in and add their thoughts and comments on the interaction.

I think it's 50/50 at the moment = the "good news" tweets balance the bad examples. I know that social media monitoring software can measure the sentiment of reaction to a brand's tweets, but not sure if there's data analyzing Twitter as a whole entity to gauge if it was a "positive" or "negative" day, in general, for sentiment. Would be interesting to know. (Maybe looking at what's trending is the closest option?)

Typing in "twitter sentiment analysis" came up with these results, but they seem to be individual tools for keywords and brands, rather than Twitter as a whole for 24 hours.

See you in 140, and have a great weekend.

John.

Building your brand with social media in the real estate business

I recently had the opportunity to give some thoughts on how realtors can enhance their brand using social media and online tools. There's a lot of opportunity there.

But, as mentioned, it's a personable business. Big money is involved in buying property and the human beings will close the sale, "not a tweet."

Read the full article on HomeOpeners at Genworth Canada.

John.

Sometimes you're blank, so don't force it

I try to blog once a day (here and in various other places). Writing is a big part of who I am, it's very enjoyable, sometimes cathartic, oftentimes has paid the mortgage and allowed me social time with friends and trips back to England to see family.

So words have always treated me well. But sometimes, they just don't appear on command.

Oh, don't get me wrong -- inspiration usually strikes, whether it's a piece of news that day, or an interesting blog post, report, study, opinion. Jump to the computer, flex the fingers and get cracking. Five hundred words or so flow out and there's a first draft.

Today was a "stare at the flashing cursor" moment. Nothing sprang to mind. Nada. Big fat zero.

Started to feel like I'd let myself down. "Come on," I thought. "You've written for 20+ years in some form or another. It's easy, just start. That's the hardest bit."

But then I thought about some of the pressure to perform at various tasks in the past. I got it done but it wasn't enjoyable. And I made a decision not so long ago to avoid -- if possible -- doing things that are NOT ENJOYABLE.

So, this is the end of this post. Nothing much else to expand on today. It's in the bag and I'm off to cook a nice dinner and watch the Women's World Cup.

Enjoy your Canada Day tomorrow with friends and family!

John.

You have an extra second to play with tomorrow

You probably don't feel it as you rush through your daily digital life, but the Earth's rotation is slowing down. Yeah, right, eh? Seems like there's not enough hours in the day, so that extra second being added tomorrow will really come in handy.

It's called a "leap second" and gets added roughly every 18 months, according to this interesting blog post by The Next Web.

Humans can handle it, but it's more of a problem for computers and apparently "wreaked havoc online" when it was last added back in 2012.

This all brings back memories of New Year's Eve 1999 when there was speculation about e-doom and gloom because of the change to 2000. If I recall, we survived that OK.

It's more technical in nature as the article explains ...

"The leap second is mostly a headache for system administrators who need to ensure their services are highly available and need to plan how to handle the change. Hardware providers such as Cisco now provide detailed advice on how their hardware handles the leap second, but the side effects are unpredictable."

If you want to count it down to a random one-second video with your friends and family, here's a handy Leap Second Countdown Clock from John Oliver.

John.

The SoDA Report: Digital Marketing Outlook

SoDA serves as a network and voice for entrepreneurs and innovators around the globe who are creating the future of marketing and digital experiences.

In May 2015 it released The SoDA Report: Digital Marketing Outlook, a digital trend publication.

From the preface:

"Conducted by SoDA in partnership with Econsultancy, the 2015-2016 Digital Outlook Study reveals some intriguing -- and challenging -- trends wielding an impact on the future of marketing and the creation of digital experiences.

"An increasingly complex ecosystem of brands, agencies and consultancies are ushering in a new era of disruption and change in the industry. The rise of consultancies in digital services and a more pronounced trend toward clients bringing digital work in house are just two of the salient findings from this year's study."

Weekend reading. Have a good one.

John.

Inside the social media head of a Generation Z teenager

"People try to put us d-down (Talkin' 'bout my generation)," Roger Daltrey once sang. That was decades ago, and people still like to talk about the varying generations that have appeared since then, most with space age names.

Generation Z. Sounds like a bad zombie film. But it refers to those born between 1995 and 2012 (give or take a few years). So these young people have grown up with the Internet, always-on tech and social media.

Lots of studies have been done to analyze what they want and need in this respect, but I thought this article was a good one as it is the thoughts of a teenager on her likes and dislikes of the various social media platforms.

Some interesting points to note:

• Photos and videos on Snapchat are no longer than 10 seconds, and it's this short, ephemeral, close-to-real-life sharing that really sparks my interest, and quite frankly, a lot of my time. Better yet (for now) Snapchat doesn’t have advertisements interrupting my experience.
• Today, the main reason I use Facebook is to keep in contact with people through Messenger. Scrolling through my newsfeed is just a way to pass the time if I'm honest, I rarely find anything interesting though due to a boatload of irrelevant content posted by others.
• I also get most of my news from Twitter. It’s a big part for me. Most, if not all, large news companies have Twitter accounts, and it's much easier to log onto my phone to catch up with the news that I'm interested in rather than pick up a newspaper, magazine, or watch the television.
• The main reason I don't have LinkedIn is because I don't really need it yet. For me, and most people I know my age, hardly anyone has a LinkedIn profile because it's seen as a platform for corporate activity. Maintaining a LinkedIn profile screams, "I'm now ready to grow up. Enough with all this messing around, I’m going to be an adult!"

So, there you have it. Just as brands start to adapt to this audience, then they'll need to get ready for the next Generation ... what?

John.

You're wrong

You go into a client meeting with a carefully crafted plan of action, something that you believe will work well. The questions and analysis begin, and then the best thing happens: you're wrong.

Yes. Wrong. By taking a closer look at certain aspects of the plan, the client and you decide -- TOGETHER -- that one part of it can wait till further down the road, but another part of it needs strengthening and more focus now.

The light bulb goes off and it's like, "Yes, you're right. If we concentrate more on X then we'll have a better XX and that will lead to a more successful XXX." [Feel free to insert your own X's if that's happened to you.]

Time and again you push forward because you think you know everything that is needed, and you just don't. Until you're sitting across from the client, brainstorming and discussing other great ideas that are spinning off from the "new" plan, then you're failing them.

They know things that you don't and vice versa. Unless you bring those out in discussion and look at the pros and cons of each strategy, then you're already on different paths at that point and it won't be a happy result.

So, in your next pitch meeting just ask yourself, quietly in your head ... "Am I wrong?"

John.