Fun Facts About Our Marketing Intern, Adrienne

We are pleased to have Adrienne as our new marketing intern! Learn a little bit more about her...

You Can't Win if you Don't Play

The PA Lottery Powerball is currently valued at $300 million dollars..... yes please. 
Our office decided to pitch in and purchase some tickets together. We have high hopes we are going to win, so I asked what everyone wanted to spend their winnings on first:

a) pay off student loans, mortgages, or put aside money for future bills, 

b) pay off family's debt,

c) put money aside for kid's education,

d) travel or vacation with friends and family,

e) buy a boat, buy an out-of-town condo, buy a truck, or... buy a taco bell (no judgement).


Daydream with us - What would be the first thing you would do with the winnings?



LM

Designing a Space that Works for your Business

If you haven’t heard the exciting news, we’re moving!

Before making this leap, our team gathered to discuss the pros and cons of our current office. We talked about what worked, what didn’t work, and what could improve our work flow and productivity. The cons ended up outweighing the pros, hence the decision to move. The process of designing a new office entailed a lot of work and thought. However, we found the most important step was first talking with all team members and getting their input.

Each job has a different set of tasks associated with it. Some employees may have work that takes extreme concentration and close attention to detail. They need a quiet space, clear of frequent interruptions where they can fully concentrate. Others may need a space where they can brainstorm and generate ideas with others on their team; they need an area that enhances creativity and allows them to write on walls, lay out concepts, work collaboratively, etc. An employee in Human Relations may frequently have private conversations and access to confidential information. They would not work best in an open-office type of layout, but rather in an area that is clear of frequent foot-traffic. These are just a few examples of how the work area needs to be conducive to the type of work the employee is trying to accomplish.

Having a meeting to discuss the type of environment employees work best in was extremely beneficial; we believe it will ultimately aid in creating a more efficient and productive team. We know it can be difficult to accommodate all requests, however working together to develop solutions that are advantageous to all is ideal in creating a team that runs like a well-oiled machine. It’s proven that engaged employees are more efficient and their happiness levels at work are greatly increased when they feel their opinion is valued… win-win!

• Have you changed your office layout recently? What tips can you share with us?
• How do you make your office conducive to the type of work you do?

LM

Give Your Day The Boost It Needs

“You don't actually do a project; you can only do action steps related to it. When enough of the right action steps have been taken, some situation will have been created that matches your initial picture of the outcome closely enough that you can call it "done.” 

― David Allen, Getting Things Done: The Art of Stress-Free Productivity

Productivity is the result of a combination of action steps to help you stay on track during the work day. I have some tips for those looking to boost their productivity:

• Create your own to-do list system. There’s nothing more satisfying for me than checking off a to-do list, and at the end of the day seeing all of my accomplished work. Take time at the beginning of your day to organize tasks, putting them in priority order. You might prefer a calendar to X off or some artsy stationary paper to make it fun, go with what works for you to stay on track for the day. 
• Clear off your desk ~ Clear out your mind. Keep your desk clutter free to help keep your mind clutter free. Organize those papers in files – even organize your email into sub files. You’ll know right where everything is to keep the creative juices flowing and have plenty of thinking space! 
• Check your emails less frequently, develop designated times for correspondence. Checking your email constantly throughout the day is bound to throw off your productivity. Understandably, not all of us have the ability to set aside our email, however, as a suggestion, take inventory of how often you are checking your email to decide how it is affecting your productivity. You may notice you do have a little wiggle room to schedule email checking appointments. 
• Focus on brain nutrition. How and what you eat absolutely affects how you feel, in turn affecting your productivity...

1. If your diet is full of high calorie-low nutrition food, try adding in whole foods: such as veggies and fruits. Pay attention to how your body feels after eating whole, clean foods.
2. Drink water. Water is known to energize and help us keep focused.*
3. Eat your lunch away from your desk, it gives you time to breathe, so when lunchtime is over you are ready to restart fresh.
4. If you drink coffee or tea, try sweetening it with Stevia or another natural sugar replacements to keep those sugar crashes at bay.

There are many resources online to give you more ideas of how to stay productive – these are just a few of my personal favorite tips.

I’d love to know, what keeps you productive / gets you flowing?

JT

*http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/you-illuminated/201010/why-your-brain-needs-water

An Office Party to Scream About

With Halloween being next week (already?!), we thought we could share some tips on how to have some killer fun in the office. Based on our highly scientific research on office celebrations, here are some surefire ways to make working on Friday, the 31^st, spooktacular.

• Frightening food – Ask everyone to make a scary looking snack or dessert and bring it to the office to share. Vote on the freakiest looking food! Bloody Witch Fingers anyone? OR have everyone make something for a pot luck lunch, but here’s the trick: the food is only allowed to be orange, black, yellow, or green.
• Create a photo booth – This is always a hit. String up some orange lights and cobwebs as your background, then get creative! Have a box full of masks, witch hats, and other Halloween décor for people to use as props.
• Pumpkin carving – Work as a team (or break off into smaller groups) and carve a pumpkin together. If you don’t want to deal with pumpkin guts and sharp knives, have a pumpkin decorating contest. Bring in a box of crafting items and go to town! It will be a lot of fun and a great team building activity.
• Go trick-or-treating – Halloween is about the candy after all. Encourage everyone to put out candy on their desks so other coworkers can mingle and trick-or-treat without leaving the office.
• Allow your staff to wear costumes or Halloween-inspired outfits… Because everyone wants to walk into their office with a black cape on at least once, right?!

What ways do you celebrate Halloween? We would love to hear some of your ideas!

P.S. Need some freaky food ideas? Check out some of ours below!

LM

Bloody Witch Fingers!
(Sugar cookies shaped into fingers,
with a slivered almond as the fingernail,
and raspberry jam as the blood)

Bloodshot Eyeballs! (Blend crushed up
Oreo pieces and cream cheese together,
form into balls. Melt white chocolate and
dip Oreo balls. Add red sprinkles, a red
gummy ring and a chocolate chip to finish it off)

From the Classroom to the Office..

I don’t think I will ever forget the moment when I finally realized I was not going to be a teacher anymore and would be joining my wife at Moore Research Services, Inc. After 22 years of teaching at Cathedral Prep, I had decided to retire from teaching to help my wife in her growing and expanding company. Oh trust me, there was a whole mix of emotions, questions, and concerns that were running through my head and I am sure Colleen felt the same way. However, the timing felt absolutely right. Colleen and I had been talking for a couple of years about me coming to work at Moore Research, but it wasn’t until April of 2014 when we were on a walk in Fort Myers, Florida that we looked at each other and said, “Let’s do this.” Of course we had already drawn up the pros and cons for each side before coming to that realization, but I vividly remember on that walk the excited feeling I had once we made the decision.

I see people now and the question is always the same – “how do you like your new job?”.. My answer is always the same – “I love it.” Now before you read the rest, please understand this – I loved teaching, I loved teaching at Cathedral Prep, I have nothing bad to say about my years there, and I left on good terms. It was a wonderful place to teach and there really is something special about the place – their history, their traditions, and their dedication to developing young men. However, that being said, there is something about a new job that is invigorating and exciting. You don’t really realize that until you make the switch because, quite honestly, after 22 years of teaching history, it was pretty much the same thing day in and day out. Not that I didn’t like it – I just didn’t realize how monotonous it had become. Sure I had different students every year and new methods of instruction were always being introduced, but it still didn’t change the main thing I was doing each day. 

When I made the career change, it was like jumping into a cold pool of water – I became suddenly very awake and very aware of my day to day life. With my new job at Moore Research, I can’t tell you what I am going to be doing tomorrow and for someone who followed a very strict day-to-day schedule, that’s very exciting! Every day I come in and it’s something different – technical issues, different surveys and test products, evaluating office space, payroll – the list goes on and on. Now I know what you are thinking.. that eventually, like teaching, this job will become monotonous and I might even agree with you. But you know what? That’s ok – because for as monotonous as my old job may have become, I loved it and wouldn’t have changed it for the world. I know many dislike and even fear change, but change can be good. For me, at this point in my life, change has given me a new outlook, now my world looks so different than from what I knew before. I have a new purpose – a new mission in life and I look forward to helping make Moore Research Services the best company it possibly can be.

Do you steer clear of change and if so, why? 

Have you boldly made a change recently that when you look back on it now you wonder why you didn’t do it sooner? I would love to hear about it!

FM

Our Boss Rocks!

We are so incredibly proud of our CEO, Colleen, for receiving the Marketing Research Association's Lifetime Achievement Award! She is the youngest (and we think the coolest) recipient of this national award.

The award is given to someone who has demonstrated a commitment of outstanding individual service to the Marketing Research Association and the marketing research profession. 

Read more about the award here!