Welcome to our monthly article highlighting the top community contributors for April 2023.
At Manchester Digital, we believe that collaboration and connection between people are essential for building a thriving community. We also understand the value of businesses that give back to their communities, and we take great pride in celebrating them.
In this article, we'll be highlighting some of the most helpful and active members of our community who generously shared their time, knowledge and expertise with others last month.
A special thanks goes to the following members:
- Auto Trader, BAE, Bruntwood SciTech, GFT, Slalom, Hackajob, GlobalLogic & Deloitte for their continued support through sponsorship of our programmes and events.
- Frame & The Candidate for offering their time and expertise to share top recruitment tips during our last Tech Bites event.
- Tunstall & Robiquity for helping us test our new job board API.
- Atkins, GFT, UK Engage & Zuhlke for contributing to articles for us this month to help showcase businesses and roles within the sector.
- Auto Trader, Known Origin, Stribe, Microsoft, Nuntaire Media, Praetura, Supremo & Tenspace for joining us last month to speak with the Department of Science, Innovation & Technology, which invited senior leaders within the Manchester Digital community to discuss various topics related to the digital economy, funding and collect information to help shape policy.
We encourage participation and want to foster a place where people can share their expertise and learn from one another. There is a wealth of knowledge within the Manchester Digital community, and we want to ensure that everyone can access and benefit from it.
We'd also like to highlight the top 10 community article contributions posted by members last month:
Seven Steps To Break Down Systemic Gender Barriers by GlobalLogic UK&I
“Despite progress over the years, women are still significantly underrepresented in tech. Systemic gender barriers – such as unconscious bias, lack of access to education, and cultural norms – can make it difficult for women to break into the tech industry. But how do we break down these barriers?
Follow our simple step by step guide for answers. Whether you break down one barrier or obliterate them all, any progress is positive.”
Being Human: The tech sector needs to remember its employees aren’t robots by Skout PR
“Another week, another round of mass layoffs in the tech sector. With Amazon (AWS) and Meta cutting thousands of jobs, and further layoffs at Salesforce and of course Twitter, it has felt a bit like the tech world has been imploding of late. This is of course concerning for us working in B2B tech PR, but more importantly for the developers, engineers, product managers, in fact anyone who has been made redundant from these businesses, considering how they have been let go and what they will do next is worrying. The pendulum seems to have swung from there being a dearth of tech talent with businesses fighting over it not that long ago, to a situation where there is a glut.
However, the outlook may not be as gloomy as it sometimes feels. In fact, many analysts believe that this contraction is more of a market correction following the rush to digitisation as a result of the pandemic. And yes, the tech industry seems to have been hit hardest – but no industry is immune from the rising costs that are causing redundancies to be made everywhere.”
11 Common Mistakes Start-ups Make and How to Avoid Them by Blu Sky.
“With so many moving parts to consider it is important take steps to ensure you don’t make mistakes that slow your progress, come back to haunt you later down the line or get you in hot water with HMRC.
At Blu Sky, one of our areas of expertise is start-ups and supporting them throughout their business journey.
Over the years we’ve worked with hundreds of start-ups, so we’ve seen it all. To help you out, we’re sharing 11 common mistakes and how to avoid them.”
Powering Tech Startups: The Vital Role of Product Marketing in Driving Success by Bright Spaces.
“In today's fast-paced world, we're seeing new tech startups pop up every day. While many of these startups have amazing ideas, only a few of them make it to the top. So, what's the secret? The ones that succeed are the ones that have the right product marketing strategy in place. Product marketing plays a vital role in the success of tech startups, and in this blog post, we're going to explore why.”
What Cyber Security Dangers do Recruitment Agencies face? By The Cyber Resilience Centre.
“Recruitment agencies are built on trust – your clients and candidates need to know their personal data is safe in your hands. If you haven’t thought about your cyber resilience before, you must know the cyber security risks the recruitment sector faces and how to mitigate them.
With 82% of UK recruitment firms adopting some form of hybrid working, you also need to ensure any staff working from home are secure.”
How to Talk to Your Employees about Stress and Worry by Dale Carnegie North
“Much of the country is suffering from escalating levels of worry and anxiety due to external environmental factors – political, economic, and ecologic – along with the impact of rising inflation rates and the cost of living. People are feeling insecure about fuel, food, and energy costs with the very real prospect that it’s only going to get worse…Evidence has shown that stress and worry in our personal lives impact our work quality and level of performance. As leaders, we therefore need to acknowledge, take interest and be empathetic to our colleagues’ concerns and worries, particularly in the current economic climate. Leadership should be exploring what support they can provide. Many managers, however, don’t do this because they believe they lack the resources or influence to do something. In the first instance, it’s about opening the conversation and how to have those discussions.”
Prevent information overload among employees: 8 tips by Workspace 365
“Information overload contributes to burnouts, depression, and decreased productivity and creativity among employees. It's therefore important for companies to prevent and reduce information overload as much as possible. However, that's easier said than done. The tips in this article will help you tackle the problem."
Employment law updates from April 2023 by Shoosmiths
“In April statutory rates of pay and maximum awards in the Employment Tribunal increase. Given current inflation, the increases this year are higher compared to previous years. Employers must ensure they adequately budget for the rise in staffing costs.
The key changes to rates and limits that employers need to be aware of are set out below.”
How can GA4 improve your audience understanding? [Video] by Door4.
“Overall, GA4 offers a range of features and improvements that can help you gain a deeper understanding of your audience and their behaviour, which can help you optimise your marketing strategies and improve your business outcomes. For digital-first businesses in e-commerce and lead generation, it is critical that this migration is effective and accurate. From tracking to goals & funnels, and e-commerce tracking – failure to configure GA4 can be a costly mistake.”
Identifying Your Tech Recruitment Requirements by The Candidate.
“The process of hiring the best talent in a highly competitive field such as IT & Technology can often prove to be a difficult acquisition in what is traditionally a candidate short market. The early identification of key technical requirements in a team enables a more effective recruitment strategy to be implemented. Therefore, constant communication between front-end, back-end, tech lead and project management teams will ensure that businesses can identify recruitment requirements in advance… Having recruited for organisations across the UK, we have identified the most common reasons which our clients recruit tech talent.”
