The most recent city on the BarCamp Tour was BarCamp Omaha. Omaha has a blossoming tech and entrepreneur scene and was named one of the 7 cities that have caught startup fever. I got to see it first hand as there were tons of folks at BarCamp Omaha who had startups, small businesses or other tech projects they were working on.
The organizers, Dusty Davidson, Eric Downs, Matt Secoske and Megan Hunt (aka. Princess Lasertron who had just finished showing at Omaha Fashion Week.) did a fabulous job. They got a ton of sponsors for everything from snacks to the weather. The conference was held at the Nomad Lounge, a beautiful renovated factory space, with a pre-party on Friday night and a full day of sessions on Saturday.
BarCamp Omaha had tons of great sessions including:
(more…)
Tags:
This week (August 15th to be exact) we passed the 5 year mark for Batchbook. You may think we celebrated with a big party, donut cake, and funny hats, but actually we were pretty busy working and almost didn’t notice. When we did remember, we decided we had to mark this special occasion in some way.
We have a tradition here at Batchbook called Bilbo Baggins Birthdays. On each of our birthdays, we get to pick a customer to do something nice for. So, continuing that tradition for Batchbook’s birthday, we decided the best way to celebrate was to give some gifts to a few of our customers. So each new customer that signs up this week will be receiving a gift of some Killer Brownies. This will run through Friday afternoon, so if you have been on the fence, now is the time to get your Batchbook account!
Tags:
You might think that because we’re busy building the New Batchbook, it would be all work and no play around here. But, now and then we get up from our laptops and take a break. Last weekend we had our annual BatchBBQ and we enjoyed the company of almost all of our virtual employees (our 14 employees live in 5 different states). We laughed, we ate, we bounced and we put on crazy glasses. It was a great opportunity to relax and hang out with our co-workers and their families.
I thought you might like to meet the BatchBlue teams in their natural environment.
Administration
Darlene & Pamela
(more…)
Tags:
As you may know, BatchBlue is one of the sponsors of the BarCampTour which is a ten-city tour of BarCamps for 2011. The latest and 5th stop on the tour was at BarCampNola 4 in New Orleans.
The conference was held at Launch Pad which is a beautiful co-working space located in a building that is also home to a number of tech companies. Organizers Matt Tritico and Nicky Mast did an amazing job. The conference was very well organized and I enjoyed participating in the the BarCampNola tradition of introducing yourself with three words. Every detail was well thought out including the cute t-shirts and the delicious lunch.
Attendees added their session proposals to the Big Board, and then we were off! There were so many interesting sessions it was hard to choose one for each time-slot. Some of the sessions I attended were:
Tags:
I was once told that when interviewing for a new job at any company, it is beneficial to ask any real questions you have to the person who has been working at the company for the least amount of time as they are likely to be the least loyal and thus have the least reason to lie.
At BatchBlue Software, technically that person would be me.
Bill Pasnau, nice to meet you. I’m a part of the Customer Experience team which means if you’ve got an issue that you’ve sent over to support@batchblue.com there is a pretty good chance we’ve already had some interaction! When asked if I would be willing to write a post for the company blog, the first topic that came to my mind was how amazingly different my new job is compared to any other position I’ve ever held. Why is it so different? The flexibility.
I was in a staff meeting this morning in our office in Providence, RI. Monday is the only day of the week that I come into the office. I come for the meeting, and stay for the pastries (let’s be real, you would stay too). Outside of Monday morning staff meetings though, driving into the office is about as optional as the last week of high school for the senior class. Why? BatchBlue is designed so I can effectively do my job from anywhere I have an internet connection and a laptop! I can answer support emails from my uncle’s house in western CT, or my sister’s horse farm, or my mother in law’s house a couple days before her second daughter’s wedding (all things I’ve gotten to do with this new position). I rarely have to ask for time off since I can check emails from almost anywhere.
A big part of the tele-commuting success though is the support I receive from my co-workers. My wife wondered if I was going to ever get anything done working from home, other than really getting some mileage out of my Netflix subscription. The thing is, I’m never “alone” while I’m working. We use Skype to chat with each other from RI to NY to IL, even WA! We video chat once a week as well, because just that little bit of virtual face time with your co-workers after a few days at home or working from coffee shops around town, really lifts the spirits. If that doesn’t work, the treats on Monday morning do!
(more…)
Tags:
