Best Blogs for September

Our best blogs for September include stories on establishing trust with remote workers, odd interview questions from top CEOs and the non-profit group Girls Who Code. That’s a lot of great stuff to read while tailgating before a big football game!

Establishing Trust with Remote Workers

A healthy amount of trust is vital to the success of any company, but when remote employees are involved, trust is even more critical.

Building trust with people who aren’t in the same office as you, who may be several time zones away can be difficult, especially when the primary mode of communication is email or messenger app. However, it isn’t impossible.

Issues related to remote work are increasingly becoming part of the way we do business. Our clients, customers, co-workers and superiors are increasingly in a different physical location from us. This shift is a good thing: Technology and globalization lets us to tap into a much bigger talent pool, while boosting diversity and keeping down costs.

In traditional workplaces of the past, the people within a company forged trust largely based on regular face-to-face interactions. In addition to collaborating, having lunch together, chit-chatting at the water cooler or sitting down for meetings all help to build a shared sense of understanding and trust.

With remote workers, there are far fewer chances for these kinds of casual, face-to-face interactions. On the contrary, interactions tend to be purpose-driven and over the internet, making them sporadic and impersonal. Therefore, you must work much harder, more intentionally and in new ways when trying to build trust with remote workers. this is not easy, but it can be done if approached in the proper way.

Read the whole story here.

The Oddball Interview Questions Asked by Top CEOs

Most interview processes don’t involve a sit-down with the company CEO. However, a few companies do include that meeting as a part of the process, and recently, some top CEOs have shared a few of the more unique questions they ask applicants.

At Airbnb, CEO Brian Chesky told the New York Times that he often asks candidates to tell him their life story, in under three minutes. Chesky said he asks this question to find out what candidates consider to be their most remarkable achievements, so he can determine if they are capable of doing remarkable work for his company.

Read the whole story here.

Making Tech Inroads with Girls Who Code

Girls Who Code is a non-profit organization founded by Reshma Saujani that is dedicated to promoting STEM fields with young girls, in part by changing the culture around how we teach these subjects.

Saujani has argued that our culture is more supportive of boys pursuing STEM careers, and much less supportive of girls doing the same. To try to correct that, Saujani not only supports and encourages the girls she meets, she also pushes them to take risks large and small. Boys, Saujani says, are given more permission to fail publicly and this allows them to leeway in learning difficult skills.

Read the whole story here.