Unmask Your Best Self with These 3 Secrets to Success

Ever wondered what you have in common with Pulitzer Prize-winning author Maya Angelou or Golden Globe and Academy Award-winning actor Tom Hanks?

If you’ve ever felt like your accomplishments have happened due to luck, timing or a mistake and feared that you’d be “found out” at any moment – you’re not alone. Angelou and Hanks are among the estimated 70 percent of people who experience this phenomenon, commonly known as impostor syndrome, at some point in their lives.

While the impostor phenomenon can impact anyone, it’s particularly common with high-achieving women. And because we’d love to live in a world where masks are reserved for the upcoming Halloween holiday – some of our most bold Jacobs women shared the tips that helped them unmask their best selves this year for International Women’s Day, International Women in Engineering Day and now, International Day of the Girl.

Christel van der Nol, project engineer and wellness coach; water engineer and project manager Andrea DuMont; and Jennifer Edmunson, planetary geologist, join today’s empowerment conversation to reveal their secrets to success.

Define what success looks like

“Fit and healthy is not about having a six-pack, but having a fit and healthy mindset,” says Christel van der Nol. “Feeling fit is more than physical health, it’s all about mental health and balance in life, including work.”

Christel herself balances her daily work as a project engineer with her passion for fitness. “On the weekends, I give trainings for several brands like Reebok and Nocco,” she explains about her business that helps people adopt a fit and healthy lifestyle.

At Jacobs, she helps lead high-performing and cross-functional teams through a framework to complete some of our most complex projects. Christel’s ambitious and positive attitude – integral to the Scrum coach role – shines through on her Instagram account, @FitGirlChris, where her followers get a glimpse into her fitness journey that recently landed her the cover of Dutch Women’s Health.

To be successful, you first need to think about what success would look like for you, she says. “Define what your success is. For me, I think that we are successful if we are happy in what we do.”

For Christel, success thus far includes landing the aforementioned brands as sponsors, running a successful business and cultivating an innovative career – and maintaining a fit, healthy and happy lifestyle throughout.

She adds, “Don’t see your goal as just the goal – try to enjoy the journey toward it. That, for me, is the best part.”

Figure out what gets you up in the morning

Andrea DuMont’s thrilling career as a project manager and water engineer started at home – specifically at the kitchen table, where her eager engineer father exposed her to the wonderful world of data and inspired her to join her high school’s F.I.R.S.T. robotics club.

Now, when she’s not helping secure underground drinking water supplies with aquifer storage and recovery, taking measurements from a drilling rig, constructing city-wide management plans or traveling, she’s inspiring the next generation of engineers through her blog, with an active following of more than 7,000 subscribers.

“Young girls need role models. Sally Ride, the first American woman astronaut, has this great quote: ‘You can’t be what you can’t see.’” “It’s hard to get into engineering if you can’t see yourself in it. So, I think a lot about how I can write about my job and these projects in a way that would inspire someone to want to pursue engineering,” she says.

And with posts titles from “Career Roadmap – Futile or Useful?” to “A Walk on the Valve Side” and “Learning from Angkorian Water Engineers,” Andrea’s blog offers a little bit of everything, giving young women an encouraging, empowering look into a sometimes-inaccessible industry.

When it comes to success, Andrea encourages being an active participant in your career and figuring out what makes you jump out of bed in the morning. “For me, that means expanding my network and reaching out for a variety of projects,” she says. “I love to work with diverse teams and solve all sorts of different challenges.”

“For you, that may mean taking on a leadership role, advocating for yourself and your value or finding an innovative way to solve a problem,” she continues. “It will be different for everyone. At the end of the day it is your career. Be proud of yourself and your engagement.”

Get out there, be tenacious and remember, nothing is impossible

“Don’t look at things as impossibilities,” says Jennifer Edmunson, “Only look at them as challenges that need to be overcome.”

As a geologist and in-space manufacturing engineer, figuring out how to build on Mars is one of the thrilling challenges she’s faced with, and it starts with studying soil chemistry, mineralogy, and geomechanical properties. In fact, when the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) confirmed nearly three years ago that water indeed flows on Mars, Jennifer was already deep into experimenting with 3D printing and additive construction for in-space use.

“Be tenacious,” she says, “Success will be yours if you just keep trying.”

Jennifer and her team found early success using a Martian simulant to create cement construction material and she’s hopeful that one day, they will be able to use 3D printing technology to print their entire habitat. For now, Jennifer spends most of her time at the NASA Marshall Flight Space Center in Huntsville, Alabama, where she’s leading the charge to better understand the Red Planet’s origin, habitability and resources – all through a geological focus.

“Don’t be afraid to take a detour in life – sometimes the end of the new road is exactly where you should be and will be more fulfilling than your original intended path,” Jennifer adds.

Her own path has also included work supporting NASA’s International Space Station program, an orbiting research facility – the largest single structure ever put into space by humans – that’s helping develop groundbreaking vaccination research and generating captured-imagery to assist with disaster mitigation and relief efforts, including the recent Hurricane Florence.

Most of all, your success depends on getting out there, she says. “Use social media to advertise yourself and the capabilities of your company/organization. It’s a good opportunity to bring business your and your company’s way. Go to conferences and network, and present and publish your work. Otherwise, only the few you work with will know how awesome you are!”

Ready to show the world how awesome you are? Jacobs is hiring! Click here to view available career opportunities and join us in delivering the promise of a more connected, sustainable world.

3 Secrets of Small Business Success in 2022

Whether you’re the new biz on the block or an industry vet, mistakes are a very real part of running a company. Some fail to realize they’re not being as flexible or as well planned as they think they are. Sadly, passion isn’t enough.

Save yourself and your business the heartbreak of learning lessons the hard way in 2022 with three little secrets of small business success.

Keep a Consistent Cash Flow

When it comes to having a steady stream of revenue coming in, it matters for everyone — you, your employees and any current or potential investors. Most importantly, cash flow is what keeps the business afloat.

For a company to stay financially healthy throughout the years, it’s essential to keep an eye on costs going in and out of the business. Account for costs that have not hit the books yet either, so you aren’t caught by surprise.

Get in the know about your cash flow.

Positive cash flow is when the cash coming in, whether from sales, payment collection, etc., is more than the cash that’s leaving your business due to covering monthly expenses, employee salaries and the like.

Negative cash flow occurs when your outflow exceeds incoming cash. This is a red flag for trouble ahead.

Take the rational steps to better manage your cash flow. Try collecting your receivables quicker, keeping an eye on inventory loss and monitoring any debt.

Build your cash flow statement so you know where your finances stand so you can experience small business success in 2022.

Work Out Automation

The second secret of small business success is marketing automation: It’s the feature that will usually sell a business on a specific end-to-end CRM, but it requires more work than you care to give to set it up.

Or perhaps you look at it as something reserved for large businesses with massive marketing teams. It’s not. Your business can appear bigger by taking the extra time to fully flesh out the automation setup.

Do you text and email your contacts? What about targeting promotional campaigns to them based on special anniversaries or holidays? How do you manage your social media accounts? You can automate all of these activities.

Automation is the perfect fit for small and mid-sized businesses because it:

Saves time when you want to target multiple customers while still segmenting your messaging

Helps you nurture relationships with your customers with anniversary or appointment reminders

Streamlines lead generation efforts

The automation process extends beyond marketing. Are your payment processes outdated? It’s beyond worth it to explore the many ways automation could turn your business into a small business success story.

Build Great Customer Relationships

When it comes to small business success, you need customers who love and support you to help keep it afloat when new sales are down. When your customers are fans of your business, it makes a world of difference for you. Keep them in your corner by:

Providing quality products and services consistently. Growing pains will unexpectedly hit, which means you’re enjoying some measure of success. Don’t let that growth cause you to slack on your quality standard. Hire new employees, add shifts to the schedule or plan out more processes as needed.

Meeting deadlines and expectations. If you make a promise to be present for a service, be there and on time. If you say you have a product, double-check your inventory first. While these are small courtesies, they go a long way with your customers.

Keeping a top-notch customer service team. Make sure your staff is up to date on how to manage issues that may arise. Stress the importance of delivering reliable customer service every time . You can’t satisfy every type of complaining customer. Allow them the chance to be heard, understood and welcomed into the resolution process. However, when that fails, keep in mind that not everyone is your ideal customer

Remember, these key points also work for the digital side of your business. Keeping your website mobile-friendly and running quickly with accurate information and acknowledging every review will help you in building customer relationships.

By heeding these three secrets of small business success and creating long-term positive habits, you can largely impact your business. Start 2022 the right way. Be the business your customers want to choose and your employees are proud to be connected to.

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3 Secrets of Successful Companies

Some companies are just better than others. There are a number of attributes that make a good company stand out from the herd including name recognition, innovation, and market share. The important thing is for an investor to spot the eventual winners before they become household names.

So, what makes a great company? And does that description necessarily equate to a good stock option as an investment? The answer depends on whether you ask an accountant, an economist, a marketer, a human resources (HR) expert, or even the company itself. But by pulling all of those disciplines together, you generally can define a good company.

In this article, we look at three key attributes that make a company successful. Learn to spot them early, and you could find yourself riding their coattails to success, too.

Key Takeaways Companies need to maintain a competitive advantage in order to stay in business.

Barriers to entry, name recognition, and price leadership can all help firms remain competitive.

If a company has above-average management—people who have experience and have been with the company for a long time—there's a good chance that the company will be a success.

Companies can achieve market leadership through quality, innovation, customer service, or even warranties.

Competitive Advantage

A competitive advantage is any characteristic that a company has that helps it keep up with the competition in the marketplace. Companies need to maintain a competitive advantage in order to stay in business. Author and Harvard Business School professor Michael Porter, who came up with the Five Forces Model, also pioneered the concept of competitive advantage, breaking it down into two forms—differentiation advantage and cost advantage.

Differentiation advantage is when a company provides a superior service or product for the same price charged by the market. Cost advantage, on the other hand, is when a company provides the same service or product as the market but at a lower price. Porter collectively refers to the two concepts as positional advantages because they define a firm's position as having the leading service or product in its industry. According to Porter, these advantages aren't fully sustainable because the promise of economic rents invites the competition. This is the amount earned on top of what is necessary from an economic standpoint.

The following are a few key factors that can help companies keep up their competitive advantage in the market.

Barriers to Entry

Good companies can maintain their high status if there are significantly high barriers to entry into their fields. Some of the most common barriers to entry include large fixed costs, such as those associated with heavy manufacturing, or long-term research and development (R&D) costs, like those found in the pharmaceutical or computer software development industries. All of these entry costs can deter competition from entering the market, thus helping the company sustain its leading status.

But barriers don't necessarily have to be cost-related. Other barriers include strong brand identities of the competition, licensing, regulation, and tax benefits.

Name Recognition

We tend to take the value of name recognition for granted when looking at a company's status. Take, for instance, companies like Kimberly-Clark (KMB) and Coca-Cola (KO). Brand names like Kleenex and Coke have become synonymous with their products.

But there's one problem with name recognition—placing a value on that name. There's really no easy way to do that. A name only has qualitative value, but it can provide a long-term relationship between a company's products or services and its customers. While it can be debated whether this trait alone makes a company good, when combined with the other characteristics it can be a powerful source of success.

While name recognition may boost a company's profile in the market, keep in mind that it only has a qualitative value.

Price Leadership

There is nothing more powerful than providing comparable services or products to the market at a lower price. In any economic environment—whether it's a boom or a bust—there will always be a demand for low-priced services and products. Being able to come to the marketplace with consistently lower prices across the board can fill a niche in the market that can attract customers for an extended period of time. The key in price leadership is being able to sustain that level and fend off others who try to compete in that space.

Above-Average Management

The quality of a company's management is a big factor in whether a company is successful. One of the most important attributes in any management team is a blend of experience. Experienced managers can not only lead a company through market cycles, but they can also provide mentorship for the next generation of managers.

Another telling attribute is when management tends to stay at a company for a long period of time. Talented managers can be swayed to move from company to company with very attractive compensation packages. If they tend to stay at companies where they like to work, it's usually because they believe in the future and success of their companies.

Market Leadership

One of the most important characteristics of becoming a good company is market leadership. Leadership can come in many forms, but the reputation that comes along with this tag is priceless. An industry-standard label is one that every company strives to achieve. Examples include leading the market in quality, innovation, customer service, or even warranties.

Market leadership is probably the hardest status to maintain. No competitor is content just being in the second position in the industry. This is where barriers to entry come into play. If you're interested in a company that competes in an industry with high barriers to entry, it's much more likely that its market dominance may continue. Companies can also move toward market leadership by buying and merging with other successful companies to improve their market share, vertical and horizontal integration, and technological bases.

The Bottom Line

So what exactly is it that makes a company a good company, and does that necessarily lead to a good rating result for a good investment? If the company has a competitive advantage, above-average management, and market leadership, there's a very good chance that you're looking at a potentially strong option for investing. While these traits alone don't necessarily tell the whole story, they are important factors when it comes to evaluating whether a company might be recognized by investors globally as a good investment.