My husband Gordon and I work together, day in and day out, and trust me, The Importance of Teamwork in the Workplace can not be underestimated. Not only do we live together, but we work together 24/7. It is all about effective communication, sharing a common goal, collaboration and solving problems …and not harming one another in the process.
From http to https
Contents
This week we started the daunting task of moving our website from a http to a https site. Basically, the addition of the ‘s’ says that Contented Traveller is a secure site. The reason we have done this now, and trust me we are a little late the party, is that Google wants our sites to be secure.
For nontravel bloggers, you need to know that Google is God to us in this industry. Google is like our boss. Google decides things like how good our information is, tells us how many people read each and every article, where they live, what age they are, and nearly whether they are drinking tea or coffee as they read our site. They also tell us, and the people we work with, whether we are valuable. So suffice to say, that our business is reliant on our good reputation and the skills that we bring to a job, but also on Google backing us up with the metrics to prove we are indeed awesome (shy smile there).
If you like this technical stuff, you can read more about http and https here.
Networking
If you read my article last week on Networking, you will know we were at a conference with many print journalists, who frankly don’t really like ‘bloggers’. We did have an absorbing discussion with an editor from San Francisco, who said we could not prove our numbers, whereas he could tell us exactly the circulation of his daily newspaper.
Gordon jumped in quickly with our stats, and where our readers are from, their age, their education, and how frequently they visit our website. Now that is just one example of The Importance of Teamwork in the Workplace, where Gordon can take on these technical issues, while I can just schmooze around building relationships, which it seems I am good at. He could not tell us how many people had read specific articles, and why his newspaper ends up in the bottom of a bird cage, however. I did laugh when he said that travel bloggers or digital influencers were the cause of fake news, but I sort of let that one slide ..sort of.
From Bloguer to SHAG
So this week was all about The Importance of Teamwork in the Workplace for us. We have a secondary site called Short Holidays and Getaways, bonus points if you notice the acronym. We decided that the previous name, The Best of Travel Bloguer sucked, and if we were going to take this site to the new secure site, we might as well change the name. This was supposed to be the test run so that we could seamlessly transition to our primary site, Contented Traveller. However, nothing is ever easy.
The Importance of Teamwork in the Workplace
So, I moved into Gordon’s office for the week. Ok, it is only next door to mine, but these significant changes required us to work as a team to get things right. After a few threats of divorce, we settled into a very good routine and worked side by side for 12 hours a day. We still haven’t finished, but we are on the same page and showing that we are a good team. I learned a lot from Gordon, and I know he learned a lot from me. This makes our business a lot more efficient, and our communication was 98% civilized and constructive. I will leave the 2% out, but when someone says, ‘who would put this dumb piece of code in here,’ well let’s say I used different communication skills.
I did a live Facebook from command central. Check it out here for a laugh. Look how happy Gordon is with me ..not.
We travel together, and we do business trips together, and we do Media Fam Trips together. We each have our strengths, and that is good. Frankly, on paper, we are the most unlikely team, but it works. It works because we have this synergy, where the sum is greater than the parts.
Do we do stupid team building exercises like group hugs etc. in our workplace?
Well, hell yes we do. We rather like one another and our team. The key indicators for The Importance of Teamwork in the Workplace for us are effective communication, sharing a common goal, collaboration and solving problems…together .. and the team building group hugs work.
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This is such a sweet post Paula. Love your teamwork!
Thanks Janet.
You two are such an inspiration for us young ones.
LOL, thanks lovely Jean
Love it! technology can be a real stress on a relationship. By the way, congrats on your transition. Surprisingly, we just went through the same process on reflectionsenroute. That and moving to a new host, setting up CDNs, etc. What a week! #wkendtravelinspiration
I don’t know that we are finished Jim. We are seeing lot’s of little things that could be better on our site. I had to ask Gordon what a CDN was.
Paula, we are also lucky to have an office each. Steve and I work really well together and we agree communication is the key. Steve recently changed our site to add the ‘S’ too. This is just one of the benefits of marrying someone technically knowledgeable, the other is the team hugs 🙂
I agree, look for a tech nerd and it helps a lot.
You are so lucky Gordon is a tech-head. I’m sure you make him pay for the “stupid” word lol. Who believes anything they read in a newspaper!
I am lucky, but he has been pointing out the errors of the way I do things, and yes he pays for it, but then he is inevitably correct (on tech things), and I fix things up.
Paula, nice to read more about your blogging adventures! I will need to look later into converting my site into a secure site (technical issues are not fun).n So many people do not take bloggers seriously. It feels good when you find a companie or brand that want to partner with you for real. #wkendtravelinspiration
I agree, blogging is a job you work hard at to establish our professionalism.
You are very brave to take the plunge and move to https. And I think you can prove your numbers better than the newspaper. A blog’s numbers are automated and collected real time. There are an awful lot of bird cages out there that need to be lined 🙂 .
Very brave taking the plunge, and yes there are a lot of bird cages lined with newspapers 🙂
All I can say is that you are sooooo lucky to have your own office. David and I share a home-office. We more or less have to – either that or spend the day shouting advice to each other from separate rooms. Our ‘day’ job often requires urgent communication. When I have my blogger’s hat on I can only fantasise about having a work space of my own.
it is good to have separate offices to work in, but we have actually enjoyed working together this week in the same room. Who would have thought.
Thanks for sharing. I’ve recently come to grips that my husband and I do not have any of those things you mention in the first paragraph…. good communication skills, sharing a common goal, problem solving mechanisms….. which is why we have filed for divorce….sad but true.
I am so sorry Vicki. Thinking of you, Paula and Gordon