I was a fan of ABC’s Extreme Makeover: Home Edition years ago when it first aired its heart-warming episodes. I’ve since lost my enthusiasm for the show, but definitely not the philanthropic concept. Plus, I’m a sucker for ”before-and-after” tales of transformation! Probably one of the reasons I was so excited to help in a local transformation (of a slightly smaller scale) earlier this summer.
You remember our posts about DAXKO Impact Day 2010. I spent the day at the Birmingham YWCA (a.k.a the only project that day with air conditioning). There was no Ty Pennington onsite, but my 15 or so DAXKO crew mates definitely made the day interesting and entertaining!
We tackled a computer lab overrun with broken equipment, mangled cords, and literally hundreds of mice (computer mice, that is). When we walked into the room that morning, it was pure chaos. With a little (well, make that a lot of) elbow grease and effort, we worked to inventory, test, clean and organize the space. The result? {This is the part where you yell, “Move that bus!”} A useful, safe and comfortable place for the women and kids of the YWCA to learn, practice their computer skills, apply for jobs and simply have fun.
Here’s my favorite part…
BEFORE:
AFTER:
Fun. It’s a word that gets tossed around a lot at DAXKO–and infused into everything we do. From monthly meetings to family lunches, we’re all about some fun. And while DAXKO prides itself on this fact (a fun fact, indeed!), there’s another fact to face: fun had in the workplace can sometimes create some not-so-fun connotations. Luckily for DAXKO, we define the word fun to fit our needs–and in many cases, we redefine it, too.
Fun: not first and foremost, but still important
During our first week on the job, a group of fellow newbies and I were asked how we perceived DAXKO before joining the team. Talk of fun was definitely sprinkled throughout the conversation, but not just fun for fun’s sake. Instead, we discussed how DAXKO has a fun way of doing what it does well; how team members can do their jobs and have fun at the same time; and how it’s fun to be a part of the company’s successes. We decided DAXKO fun is not arbitrary fun, but more specific, like the element that makes a task more exciting, or the reward for a milestone met.
All play, no work? No way!
DAXKO’s fun culture and people make it more than just the market leader–they make it the market leader, with a smile. Being fun gives our brand a personality, and our team the ability to relate to customers on unique levels. But is fun had at a cost? Hardly. If anything, fun simply enhances what we do. Fun is often had in conjunction with meeting our goals, meeting our customers’ needs, and, for team members, meeting our expectations. Because while we’re experts at fun times, DAXKO is even better at solving market pain and providing rewarding careers for team members.
So, is fun a bad thing? Not at DAXKO.
Fun is important to what we do–but only because fun is defined differently around here. Friends of DAXKO certainly like us because we’re fun, but that perception would go nowhere if they didn’t already like us for what we do and how we do it. So the next time you catch us playing up the word fun on Twitter, Facebook, our website, and in general conversation, remember that we’re fun–and then some!
This year’s upcoming DAXKO Reach conference will be lucky-number seven. Fitting, because we’re pretty excited about what the three-day event—packed full of networking, learning, and pure fun—will hold for DAXKO customers and fanatics alike.
Other than our usual non-conference feel and insightful sessions, attendees can expect to get more out of Reach than ever before. Whether getting a first-hand look at some of our latest (and greatest!) product updates, or finding out what makes SOHO so amazing, one thing’s for certain: Reach 2010 is all about discovery.
What’s New?
Ready to discover your potential (and then some)? Join us October 17–20 for Reach 2010, and register today at http://daxkoreach.com. In the meantime, follow us on Twitter (@DAXKOReach2010) and spread the word!
DAXKO develops software via the agile methodology. Our ScrumMasters help drive the process. We operate off task boards. We have 3-week sprints. What is this foreign language I’m speaking? Fear not, fellow non-techies! The clips below will help you (as they did me) make sense of these terms and the development approach we use at DAXKO.
Meet Matt D. He recently took on the role of ScrumMaster for our DAXKO Accounting product. His brief 3-part interview series is definitely worth checking out. Enjoy!
What is a ScrumMaster?
ScrumMaster Interview Part I from DAXKO on Vimeo.
What does it mean to be agile?
ScrumMaster Interview Part 2 from DAXKO on Vimeo.
What are the benefits of being agile?
ScrumMaster Interview Part 3 from DAXKO on Vimeo.
We’re big fans of free press around here… who isn’t? So what better than a local article that captures some of the personality and perks of DAXKO. Here’s a snippet from our friends at Birmingham Magazine. Thanks for the shout-out, guys!
From the outside, it seems like a juxtaposition. Do people who wear flip flops to the office really work that hard? “This place is intense, people will tell you it’s more intense than any other place they’ve worked,” [CEO Dave] Gray says. “We’ve been in the top 10 of the fastest growing companies in Birmingham for seven years, we’ve enjoyed double-digit growth in this economy for the past two years. … That stuff doesn’t happen because we’re nice and having fun. It happens because we have a lot of people here who are committed to what they’re doing and to each other, and work really hard to get it done. We want to create an environment that people are excited to come here every day and it’s a rewarding experience, but when they get here people work hard.”
Read the full article at BhamMag.com.
Reading a recent issue of the Birmingham Business Journal, I came across an announcement of Chris Price’s promotion to director of operations for Shelby Baptist Medical Center.
Part of our mission as a company is “to provide rewarding careers for our team members.” Of course, our hope is those careers last as long as possible at DAXKO, particularly for top performers. However, the reality is that people rarely stay in the same company their entire career like they did a couple generations ago. (In fact, the average tenure today is somewhere closer to 2 or 3 years.) So it is our hope that those that do eventually leave DAXKO go on to attain career success wherever they may go… and that their time at DAXKO proves to have been a key contributor to that success. We go so far as to say that we hope it is a “career defining” experience.
Well, back to Chris. He started his career on our services team a few years ago. Then he felt the tug to go back to school to get into healthcare administration…the healthcare industry runs in his family if I remember correctly. A few short years later (the years of school and work likely don’t feel all that short to Chris), and he is in his new role as director of operations.
There are other similar stories among our alumni, and some that are quite different… whether it is Puja who is leveraging the management experience she got at DAXKO to lead a team of developers in India for her new company after her family decided to move back to their home country, or Natalie who more recently departed to enter culinary school full-time in order to follow her dream to be a chef.
Congratulations, Chris! We are proud to call you a DAXKO alum.
Unless you’ve been living under a rock for the past few weeks, you’ve no doubt heard about DAXKO’s recent visit to the YMCA’s General Assembly where we had the opportunity to meet thousands of attendees. Like any conference, one of the more interesting things to do is cruise the vendor exhibit area – if nothing else than for the cool freebies.
For someone like me who doesn’t attend a lot of tradeshows, it was interesting to observe the different ways people engage (or don’t). If you’re manning a vendor booth, you learn pretty quickly that everyone has a unique tradeshow personality. Here’s what I experienced…
My question to you is… What is the best way to approach these different groups and engage in conversation? Some of my tactics this week were…
I’d be interested to hear your ideas for approaching these folks. Hit me in the comments.
The first few days of a new job can be nerve-wracking. But easing into my new position as a Product Management Assistant has been interesting so far; from hearing Dave talk about DAXKO’s beginnings to learning how to run data in DAXreport, I feel like I’ll never stop learning. I think I’ve also learned a little already about DAXKO’s office culture as well.
Here are 6 things I have learned in the last 6 days as a new team member at DAXKO:
After this brief break in our broadcast, we now return you to your regularly scheduled programming.
Now it is time to play catch up! There have been tons going on at DAXKO. So over the next week we will play catch up on subjects like Impact Day, Team Member Accomplishments, new faces, and so much more.
So where do we start? The core – Team Member Accomplishments.
One of the teams that I love to brag about is Support. This team is truly one that exemplifies teamwork and family. It is a strange (strange in a good way) thing to be around the Support pod for more than 2 minutes. If there, one will be able to sense the brotherly/sisterly jokes, the fatherly support, the motherly caring, and the athletic push to take service to another level. This atmosphere makes it so exciting to share in an individual accomplishment with the team.
Jessica and Heather both reached 10,000 cases closed during the month of July!
Heather celebrated her 3 year anniversary in June, and Jessica is set to reach her 3 year anniversary in August. This means that they roughly closed 275 cases a month.
Don’t be confused, this is no easy feat. A case can range from finding a solution within minutes to researching and working with Engineering Services for hours and then reporting back to a customer. Many of our customers can tell you that regardless of the issue or time of day, both Jessica and Heather have always been pleasant to talk with and helpful beyond expectations.
Congratulations, ladies! Welcome to the 10,000 mile high club!
Last Friday, the DAXKO Foundation held its first ever Impact Day. In case you missed the original announcement, here’s the general gist of the day…
Team members took a day off from DAXKO to work at one (or more) of 3 volunteer sites. It was hot. It was dirty. And it was well worth it! Here’s the impact we had around the community…
Over the next week or so, we’ll be posting about each project individually and in detail. But for now… check out our Flickr collection. Cool t-shirts, huh?
If you’re a reader of DAXKO Nation, you’ve no doubt heard about our recent (and first ever) mobile app development competition. If the competition is news to you, read here and here to get up to speed. In this post, we’re interviewing the winning developers – Jeff, Adam and Caleb – to find out more about their app, their challenges through the process, and their vision for DAXKO Shout. Take it away, guys…
MAD Competition Winners from DAXKO on Vimeo.
At last weekend’s YMCA General Assembly in Salt Lake City, the YMCA unveiled their new brand identity. Aesthetically speaking, it’s a fresher, simpler, more casual approach. Also, getting a lot of attention from the NY Times, Today Show, etc., is the fact that they’ve now gone down to one letter, referring to themselves as “The Y” (according to NBC Nightly News, The Village People stated, “We are deeply dismayed.”).
More importantly than the changes to the logo and colors, The Y has come out with a clearer articulation of their purpose to strengthen their position as America’s largest charitable organization and to better describe to the public what it is they do. This purpose is outlined in three focus areas: youth development, healthy living and social responsibility.
An intended outcome of the event in Utah and the release of this new brand strategy will be a more consistent communication and execution of The Y’s mission and purpose. Done right, this “one voice” will have the opportunity to drive significant change and positive results in the thousands of communities they serve.
I for one am excited about the potential.
As Sally mentioned in last week’s post, several DAXKO peeps made the trip to Salt Lake City for General Assembly hosted by YMCA of the USA. We had an awesome time meeting and mingling with thousands of YMCA attendees including volunteers, CEOs, program directors, board members, and more. It was great to see so many people excited about DAXKO’s awesome products and services.
As expected, it was a hectic week. Fasten your seatbelt, here’s a quick recap…
Wednesday:
Thursday (a.k.a. the longest day ever):
Friday:
Saturday:
Sunday:
What do we want to do now? SLEEP!!!
Having just returned from four days in Salt Lake City for the 2010 YMCA General Assembly, I find myself re-energized for the work we do with YMCAs. The conference, which had 3,000 attendees and was last held in Nashville in 2006, is the single largest gathering of YMCA staff and volunteers, and is therefore the largest gathering of DAXKO customers.
The conference, from the session speakers and tradeshow floor to the one-on-one interactions and group activities, was a fantastic event. I applaud all those involved in its planning, including those that organized our participation, namely Amy G. and Natalie F.
The event acted as a reminder of our position as the clear market leader in the Y Movement. It might sound a bit boisterous, but with over 400 associations as customers, it is simply a fact. What this meant for us over the past few days was that we were constantly reconnecting with both customers and “future customers” from all over the country. As we walked down the streets in Utah, waited for flights in the airport, and moved throughout the event center, we were always running into people we knew.
The event had an all-star roster of speakers and the content was inspiring, but there was also plenty of time for personal connections and fun…whether it was dinner with the teams at Louisville and Raleigh, lunch with the group from Boise, our happy hour reception with a couple hundred attendees, an early-morning run with Steve Tarver and Journey Johnson or celebrating at the Bash.
Along with our annual customer conference, General Assembly is among my favorite DAXKO experiences. We were glad to hear that they have increased the frequency of the event, now taking place every three years. We are already looking forward to the 2013 YMCA General Assembly where we’ll once again spend time with a few thousand of our closest Y friends.
General Assembly 2010 officially kicks off today! Thirteen members of the DAXKO Team are on hand to mingle with attendees and showcase DAXKO’s products and services. We wanted to start the conference off with a bang, so we unofficially coined today “PCI Day” at the DAXKO booth (booth #96, by the way). What, you ask, is PCI Day?
Well… we’re celebrating the fact that DAXKO has been certified by IBM as 100% PCI DSS compliant. That’s a lot of technical jargon that translates to increased security and less liability for our customers. Get the full scoop at www.daxko.com/pci.
So how are we celebrating? With an appearance by our very own “PCI guy” - Matt C., of course. Matt’s on the ground in Salt Lake talking all things PCI and giving out buttons that promote DAXKO’s PCI compliance. Cool, huh? As if the buttons weren’t enough to entice the masses, we’re also raffling an iPad. So if you’re at General Assembly today, you should definitely swing by. Our black DAXKO shirts and khakis are hard to miss!
If you’re intrigued by all this PCI talk and want to learn more, check out:
More to come from Salt Lake…
PS – PCI guy is the tall one, back left. He rocks!
The first set of DAXKO feet will be on the ground today in Salt Lake City, Utah, for the 2010 General Assembly of YMCAs - the largest YMCA event that only rolls around every few years. For YMCAs, this is the event that ignites passion for the mission in the hearts of staff and volunteers through connections, education, and inspiration.
DAXKO first attended General Assembly in 2001 in New Orleans, with merely a prototype of what is now known as DAXKO Operations. It was there that we met our first paying customer, Randy from the Mid-Willamette Valley YMCA (OR). General Assembly 2001 was a momentous event for DAXKO, as it sparked conversations and led to demos for some of our early adopters in South Hampton Roads, VA and Mt. Diablo, CA.
General Assembly 2006 was held in Nashville and was my first exposure to this big event. I can truly say that DAXKO rocked the house in Music City! Customers and future customers alike flocked to DAXKO’s booth to rave about our products and services… and to get “tattooed.” Yes, you read that correctly. DAXKO ran a tattoo parlor at General Assembly 2006 for temporary tattoos reading “DAXKO Rocks.” It was, without a doubt, all the rage that year to have a tattoo from DAXKO! We also gave out t-shirts to customers that read, “I rock with DAXKO.” Seeing a theme, here?
The momentum this type of a conference creates is amazing. As my first exposure to the prospect side of our market, it was an eye-opening and exciting experience to see people’s jaws drop at the reports our systems provide. And today, as I prepare to leave for my 2nd General Assembly, I am filled with pride for what we have accomplished since the last gathering in 2006. Just to name a few…
Weird, I know, but the Virginia Slims slogan, “you’ve come a long way baby,” comes to mind when I look at the list above. There is no doubt we wouldn’t be where we are today without the DAXKO team effort that has been put forth over the last four years. I have a feeling we are going to rock the house again at General Assembly 2010! Stay tuned for updates from Salt Lake City….
Since it’s inception in 2009, the DAXKO Foundation has been involved in several community service projects, including a playground renovation and after-school tutoring program at the local YMCA. While those projects continue, this year, the Foundation is rolling out something new – Impact Day 2010. It’s a day where DAXKO team members get out of the office and into the community to spend time volunteering and team building. Here’s how it works…
Team members have 3 service projects from which to choose. They’ll spend the entire day getting their hands (and likely their clothes) dirty working with either:
Stay tuned for a recap and photos from Impact Day 2010!
A few months ago, I challenged NuProfessionals to Join the Conversation at their organization. I emphasized the importance of knowing your craft and being able to speak up when the discussion enters your realm.
I also strongly believe in challenging your leadership to live up to their stated mission and values. Ask why or how or when? Hold them accountable for the kool-aid they make everyone else drink.
BUT, there is a time and a place for everything. As a NuProfessional (or experienced professional, for that matter), there is a fine art to knowing when to speak up and when to shut up. Case in point, TLNT’s article Speaking Your Mind May Feel Good, but Usually Turns Out Bad clearly depicts a recent slip up made by Army General Stanley McChrystal, former commander of U.S. forces in Afghanistan.
McChrystal was relieved of his command – yes, he was fired – on Wednesday by President Obama for disparaging comments he made that were published in Rolling Stone magazine.
“The article quoted General McChrystal and his aides speaking critically of nearly every member of the president’s national security team, “ The New York Times said , “dismissing Vice President (Joe) Biden as “Bite Me”; calling the national security adviser, Gen. James Jones, a “clown”; and disparaging other top officials.”
Imagine that! Someone, in that high and public of a position, not knowing when to stop talking. Even President Obama encourages debate but not division. Can’t we all just get along?
Look, it’s simple. We are on the same team. If you disagree, speak up and discuss it amongst yourselves. Map out the evidence to support your position. But when it comes time to talk about the issue outside of your group, be classy. State your view, but don’t bad mouth. Here is more from the same article:
Yes, speaking your mind may feel good, but it usually turns out bad.
I’m surprised that someone like Gen. McChrystal didn’t know that, because high ranking military officers rarely become high ranking officers unless they have mastered the art of speaking in public without saying anything controversial. In fact, McChrystal’s big mistake was that he probably didn’t spend much time getting counsel and guidance from the OTHER person in his organization who has undoubtedly mastered that same kind of skill set – his HR chief.
When in doubt, ask somebody, preferably someone with a level head that is not emotionally connected. The article’s author (John Hollon) refers to HR, but there are other team members can tell you if you are being a bone head.
Live and learn from other’s mistakes. Don’t make the same costly mistake.
Earlier this week, the Birmingham Business Journal (BBJ) gave DAXKO’s CEO Dave Gray a big shout-out as ”Top CEO” in the category of companies with 25-100 employees. This is the first year the BBJ recognized local CEOs, so kudos to Dave for making the inaugural list!
The CEO awards were created to recognize the top executives in the Birmingham area, based on their contributions to the success and growth of their businesses, the performance of their businesses in the past year and their roles in the local business community. With DAXKO’s continued success and Dave’s active involvement in the community, it’s no surprise he made the list.
Award finalists were recognized and winners announced at a special dinner event earlier in the week. Check out the DAXKO crew below. Congrats again, Dave!
When I transitioned into the Human Resources profession, one of my challenges was to build relationships with others I could best relate to in the Birmingham area. I know accounting, the professional organizations as well as other accounting professionals with whom I have interacted as I built my career. But shifting to a new field after 6 years of building a career was not as easy as I expected.
My team lead, at the time, connected me with some professionals and encouraged me to join the local chapters of professional HR organizations. Then comes the Birmingham Society of Human Resource Management and my getting involved. Long story short, I became involved and made some great connections.
One connection that came from BSHRM is a group called Evolve. This is a small group of HR professionals with 2-15 years of experience that meet once a month just to talk. There is no agenda, no hidden incentives, just good food, good company, and good conversation. We have been meeting for about 6 months now and each month seems to get better.
So, where am I going with this going?
During our last meeting at Dram (great food by the way), we noticed a group of well known and respected HR professionals that have been in the game much longer than us. Of course, a fellow Evolver and I take notice as the different individuals come into the restaurant and we begin to talk about what we know about each individual and their accomplishments.
After dinner, one of the Elite (those we admire) stops by the table and talks briefly to my fellow Evolver on his way out. Come to find out, this group of maybe 6 or 7 Elite HR professionals (called the DeVinci’s group), have been meeting once a month for the past 10+ years. They started meeting, just like us, just to decompress, talk shop with other HR professionals and build relationships. That’s exactly what we are trying to do!
It was exciting and encouraging to know that we are somewhat following in the steps of those whose jobs we are aiming for. Of course, the conversation is different and our outlook or solutions may vary but it is basically the same train of thought. Wow!
When talking about the group, both Janet and Forrest shared how it is an anchor for their careers and a great way to build solid friendships over the years.
Thank you, DeVinci’s group, for leading the way!
