Really, this article is just a whinge. I'm an Australian. MyGov is fine, I interact with it as a citizen regularly. Government needs to outsource implementation of this kind of stuff because it's extremely hard to build software teams and manage their performance in permanent government roles. And those costs are reasonable - particularly for anyone that builds teams of software engineers and knows what aggregate team costs are like in Australia.
The hard part of the MyGov platform is the inter-department stuff, and I don't think that's a software issue, that's bureaucracy.
Fellow CEO here. I've tried a few things over the years and have now had an EA for at least 5 years so I think I've got a good grasp on what works and what doesn't.
Many years ago, I tried a remote VA. I'm on my second in-person EA. I've tried delegating a lot of different stuff - some works, some doesn't.
In no particular order:
* Remote VA. Don't even bother. They're of limited usefulness and it will come down to more work in communication for you in the end. They don't know your local environment, city, employees, customers.
* Personality. You want someone that's competent, smart and capable, but also humble. Would you be proud to have them talk to your best client to reschedule a meeting - would it be a great customer service experience? Do they make people feel welcome and offer them coffee? Is nothing beneath them - they're just as willing to put coffee cups in the dishwasher as well as update a spreadsheet? You want a great, friendly attitude and competence.
* Trust. You have to trust them. This depends on them as well as you: will they do the right thing? They will require time to figure out what your preferences are. It's unfair to expect them to read your mind. You need to coach them on that. But they also need to have an innate sense of what good looks like.
* Some things delegate well and some don't. Especially some personal items. An EA is ace at scheduling a 12 person meeting, venue, lunch, catering, and making sure it suits you. But it's a pain in the ass to get them to update your auto insurance, because they won't have authority on your account and it's such a pain to get it.
* Letting go of the small stuff. Do you care about exactly what kind of wine a client gets as a gift? That's hard to delegate time effectively. Or is it a price range and the EA's choice? Much easier. Similarly with scheduling meetings. You need to give your EA carte blanche on your calendar - within the expectations you agree. I don't do meetings before 9am or after 4pm. But within that, she is fine to schedule what is needed.
* Training yourself. You need to learn to use an EA if you haven't had one before. Surprisingly, this takes a while. It's much harder to delegate control your personal items - including your calendar - than delegating other items. You might think that because you have staff you're already ace at delegation, but this is different. You're actually giving up some personal choices in order to get more time. It was also much harder for me to ask someone to go out and buy X gift for my wife urgently than to delegate other functions. But you get used to it.
Hope that helps. Overall EA's are a massive time saver and make some administrative tasks just disappear. Really valuable for me.
My kids are 5 and 2. Nothing really seems to recharge the batteries. Aside from some chill time while they are in bed. It starts to get less intense closer to 3, but nowhere near what it’s like without kids. We went on a 5 day beach vacation recently and set our expectations low - it was great, but also exhausting.
I'm considering eye surgery. I'm mildly farsighted and have strong astigmatism, so I'm not suitable for LASIK and have been recommended Implantable Collamer Lenses (ICLs, sometimes known as contact lens implants).
I'm very interested to hear from people that have had positive LASIK experiences or even an ICL procedure done. So far on this thread it's mostly negative.
Don't write off Outlook without a second thought. It's big with loads of features, yes - but that's what's good about it.
If all you need to do is plain text email, sure, Mutt is fine. If you deal with a large amount of email, calendar appointments, tasks, contacts, etc, in a professional role, nothing beats Outlook.
Bummer, can't order this from Australia. Really want to get one of these for some testing. Anyone with inside info as to when these will be available outside the USA?
This was probably downvoted as it didn't help OP, however, this is really good advice. I'm doing it now - 2FA is enabled for all my work stuff but I hadn't gotten around to enabling it on Amazon. Didn't know they had it.
I know nothing about fashion so take this with a grain of salt.
Your products are definitely on the very high end of price when it comes to clothing. Do people buy expensive clothes from a brand they've never heard of online? Maybe you're better suited to a bricks and mortar store so people can touch and feel the product, without the heft of a well known brand behind you. If not a store, then supplying other stores.
The discounting strikes me with cognitive dissonance. You're trying to sell a premium product - why would you discount? Personally I'd never buy clothes that were this expensive outside of a premium suit. I am a purchaser of other premium products, though. Look at what the brands you want to imitate do. Do they discount? Do they do run out sales? Better to just change your price if you didn't pick the right one. If someone's looking for a discount, they're probably after a $20 sweater, not s $500 one.
That's theoretical, whereas government and corporations deal with realities.
100% capitalism isn't practical and is unfair (e.g, to the poor and sick). What is a fair way to divide costs for road usage: time of use, miles driven, emissions, cost of vehicle, ability to pay? It's not an easy answer, and many are practically unenforceable. Hence, tax.
And for the record: I'm generally capitalist by economic viewpoint.
It's certainly not a level playing field when competing against a multinational like Apple. It's also hard for countries to enforce competition rules (e.g. Anti-dumping)..
Yes, agreed, which makes it much more likely that laws will get passed to collect this tax as it will probably have strong political and voter base support.
That's not what I mean. I'm talking about what the tax money collected gets spent on by government - roads, healthcare, infrastructure, aged pensions.
If industry X was paying $100mm tax, and industry Y disrupts and replaces that, while paying only $20mm tax, the government needs to find $80 million to replace that tax shortfall.
They need to be a bit careful, because they risk causing much tighter tax regulation in EU.
I think this is going to happen anyway, as it's not just Facebook. Governments see it as a reduction in tax, and it's politically safe for a Government to do without getting voted out.
Global companies offshoring profits and not paying enough tax (in the eyes of many countries) was a hot topic at the last G20 summit in Brisbane.
This isn't limited to Facebook, as the article explains. The issue and background here is that when large companies operate globally, each country has its own local subsidiary, owned by the global entity. Money is made in each country by selling goods or services. How are the profits sent upstream to the parent company? By charging costs for goods; or license fees for services. As the company chooses their own costs and license fees, they can effectively control in which entity they make a profit and which they don't. This is also how companies shift profits to no- or low- tax jurisdictions. See: Apple and their large amounts of cash held outside of the USA.
With increased globalisation, this is an issue for many countries. In Australia, for example (where I live), the roll out and success of Uber means that the taxi company tax base will erode. If Uber shifts profits overseas, the Australian Government gets less tax but still has to provide the same level (or greater) services. Uber's a better service, we want it to succeed, but tax is needed for necessary services.
While companies continue to do this, the answer is information sharing between countries' tax offices and laws to ensure a certain amount of profits must stay on-shore, while not dis-incentivising multi-nationals from doing business in each country. As this already has political attention, I'd expect laws in most major countries to deal with this over the next 5 years.
The hard part of the MyGov platform is the inter-department stuff, and I don't think that's a software issue, that's bureaucracy.
MyGov isn't perfect, but it's fine.