Request Professional Feedback & Coaching via Google Buzz

Coworkers.com now makes it easy for you to share your feedback requests via Google Buzz (in addition to Twitter & LinkedIn). Our Get Feedback tool helps you quickly configure a request for feedback regarding: your work performance, a document or deliverable, an event or milestone, or even just ask a simple question. With one click, you can share that request any way you want - via email, URL, Twitter, LinkedIn, and now Google Buzz!

To Buzz your request:

• Choose "Get Feedback" from the "Feedback" drop-down menu on the site
• In the "Ask Via..." options, make sure "Web..." is checked
• Finish setting up your request, and you'll be presented with one-click links that let you share your request via Google Buzz & other services (see screen capture below)

Happy buzzing

Feature Update: Feedback Template Library

We've made it even easier to browse, preview, edit, create, and share Review and Feedback templates. You'll find a number of predesign templates covering everything from in-depth 360 degree work performance reviews to simple forms for getting feedback on a meeting or presentation.

Our users can create their own templates by either modifying an existing one, or building one from scratch. If a user decides to, they can share their custom templates so that they appear in our ever-growing library. As always, our templates fall into the three major categories of:

1. Work Performance
2. Event/Milestone
3. Document/Deliverable

Visit our Template Library today!

Get Valuable Input, on Autopilot: Schedule Feedback Requests

Have a weekly meeting that you manage or attend? How about a monthly or quarterly milestone? Do you wish you could setup an annual or quarterly review request today, that will go out on a future date?

Coworkers.com PRO users can now Schedule Feedback Requests. This is a helpful way to get into the habit of collecting ongoing comments and ratings from your colleagues. Simply use our Get Feedback wizard and include the optional scheduling information. Set it up once and you can:

• Schedule a one time request to go out on a future date
• Schedule a recurring request to go out: daily, weekly or monthly
• As always, the feedback you receive can be private, and people do NOT need to be Coworkers.com members to respond to your requests

Find out more about Scheduled Requests and other great features included in our Professional Account.

Feature Update: Share Any Feedback You Receive

Privately & Selectively Share Any Feedback
with an Individual or Group of Contacts

One of the key strengths of Coworkers.com is that it allows you to send, receive and manage both Public and Private feedback. Public feedback is usually provided in the form of testimonials or ratings that are visible to all the people who visit your public profile page. Private feedback, on the other hand, is input that you receive from others that can only be seen by you.

In speaking with users, we realize that sometimes you will receive Private feedback that you wish to share with a select person, or group of people. That's why we are happy to announce that we've added robust Sharing controls to Coworkers.com.

Want to share received feedback with your boss, a recruiter, or colleague, etc.?

• Simply go to "My Feedback"
  
• View a particular entry
• At the bottom you will now see a new Sharing box that allows you to share with: a Group of contacts; and existing contact; or anyone with an email address - the people you share with will not be required to have a Coworkers.com account.

CNN Radio Interviews Coworkers.com CEO

Take a listen to CNN Radio. Our CEO, Jonathan Clay, was interviewed today on the topic of the newly announced unemployment figures (10.2%) and what people can do to manage their careers in this environment. http://www.cnnradio.com

EmploymentDigest.net features Jonathan Clay – Founder Coworkers.com

Jonathan Clay, President and founder of Coworkers.com, recently had the pleasure of speaking with Bill Vick at EmploymentDigest.

Read the in-depth article and see the video interview on the EmploymentDigest.net website. We've also included just the video below:

• Read the full article here

New York Post - Jobs column highlights Coworkers.com

New York Post Jobs column "The site stuff" has listed Coworkers.com among their "picks for what’s new, notable and work-related on the Web"

Here are some highlights from the article:

"By now we all know Monster.com and LinkedIn, but practically every day new Web sites launch that aim to help you find jobs, stay on top of your industry, improve your career prospects or otherwise help you along in your work life. We sifted through the latest offerings and compiled the following list of sites that are worth a click..."

"CoWorkers: This brand-new site follows the model of Ed Koch, who as mayor famously queried constituents with “How’m I doin’?” The concept is to aim that question at work colleagues, requesting feedback by forwarding various review forms for them to fill out. In addition to general reviews of your job performance, you can request feedback on your interpersonal skills or “core values,” as well as on a specific achievement such as a report or a presentation.

The site — which calls itself a “career development and reputation management” tool — offers a dizzying number of options. Feedback can be made anonymously or not, it can be requested or offered unprompted. Results can be kept private or made public for bosses and recruiters to see, and can be viewed in various formats, such as graphs and pie charts. So it takes some navigating, but it may be worth it to see how you stack up in your colleagues’ eyes."

We're excited to be included in this list of up and coming career-related websites.

• Read the full column at New York Post

NY1's Employment reporter Asa Aarons features Coworkers.com

We recently had the opportunity to speak with Asa Aarons of NY1, New York City's 24-Hour News Channel...

New Websites Provide Inside Look Into Jobs

"The Internet is where practically all of the good employment information is showing up these days. Two new companies are promising ways to help job seekers land their dream job...

...Staying with the idea that feedback is a good thing in the career world, check out Coworkers.com, which is based partly on the idea that successful people thrive on honest feedback...

"Coworkers.com is all about the question 'How's my work?'" says James Young of Coworkers.com. "We provide tools that let you get feedback so that you can figure out what your strengths are and promote them, and also figure out where your weaknesses are so you can improve them and advance your career."

• Watch a video of the full segment on NY1.com

Self-Reviews can help you improve work performance and boost salary

Coworkers.com has offered self-review tools since it's inception. A recent article on Cube Rules discusses the real world benefits of self-reviews in the workplace:

"Your performance review facts become your performance review ratings. And what you can’t tell your coworkers is this: you will write an accurate self-review while most of your coworkers will not. If they write a self-review at all...

As a manager, I looked at hundreds of self-reviews given by the people that worked for me. I can count on one hand how many people provided a complete self-review. Those that did had one of two influences on my rating: they justified my thinking on the rating by providing facts and figures. Or they showed me accomplishments that I had forgotten about and needed to include in my thinking about the rating...

You understand that only the employees, focused on their career, did this accurate self-review, right? And when I say they justified my thinking on the rating by providing facts and figures, you realize that the justification was for a higher rating, right? More pay and a larger bonus..."

Honest, accurate, and frequent self-reviews not only help you focus on improving your skills, they can have a concrete impact on your career and compensation. The article quoted above makes this point quite clear.

• Read the full article at Cube Rules
• Use Coworkers.com to create & manage your Self-review

Data-Driven Feedback: Analytics For The Work You Do

With our unique analytical capabilities, you can get immediate, quantifiable and chart-able feedback on a report, presentation, campaign, or other work event or milestone, gaining an assessment of your effectiveness while building a comprehensive dossier of career accomplishments and marketable skills.

As you accumulate feedback (both private, and shared), you will be able to quickly visualize and identify aspects of your work that need improvement.


Our basic account has 8 distinctive chart types:

• Breakdown By Feedback Type
• Breakdown By Attribution
• Visibility (private vs. public)
• Score Distribution
• Overall Performance Over Time
• Category Performance Over Time (work performance, document, event, etc.)
• Breakdown By Subject Type, Visibility
• Breakdown By Group (grouped by respondents the user categorizes)

Gain greater insight into your career.
Get started with Coworkers.com Analytics today...

See Who's Using Coworkers.com

Coworkers.com gives professionals at any level, those in transition, consultants, and small businesses, the tools to instantly create a personal dashboard to manage their work, analyze their performance, gain feedback on overall performance and get reaction to specific deliverables, events, and job milestones.

Motivated Individuals:
Job Seekers, Movers and Shakers, Learn more...


Smart Workgroups:
Consultants, SMB's, Virtual Teams, Learn more...


Innovative Enterprises:
Managers Who Think Outside the Box, Learn more...


Modern Talent Management:
Recruiters & Human Resources, Learn more...

How to "Tweet" (or otherwise link to) Your Requests for Feedback

Have you ever wanted an easier, more organized way to gather feedback from your online & social networking contacts?

We've recently made improvements to our Feedback wizard so that you can quickly share your requests via shortened link on: Twitter, Facebook, or any other online source such as a website, blog, email newsletter, etc.



Simply step through our "Get Feedback" Wizard and choose the option that gives you a custom shortened URL for sharing online. After you make this choice, you will see the options shown above, including a handy link that will populate your Twitter status with one click.

The screen cap above illustrates a request for input on a speech. You can choose to get feedback on a wide variety of topics among our three high level categories of: Work Performance, Event or Milestone, and Document or Deliverable. Use a pre-designed template or craft your own questionnaire. Now, go Tweet your way to better work!

Tools to Manage Your Reviews & Feedback for Greater Insight

As part of our ongoing efforts to ease and improve the management of reviews and feedback that you send and receive via Coworkers.com, we've recently made some enhancements to the "My Reviews & Feedback" tools.



The icons in the first column make it easier to quickly see the attributes of a given review...



In addition to these helpful cues, the ratings column is now colored to reinforce the overall rating (green = 10-7, yellow = 6-4, red = 3-1).

Login to see your Reviews & Feedback, or Signup for free to get started. Keep your eyes out for additional management and analytics features coming soon!

Recovering From Negative Reviews

WSJ.com Video: "A Web site can be a marketer's lifeline with its customers, but what happens when it's marred with negative reviews and comments? Bruce Weinberg, marketing professor at Bentley University, tells WSJ's Erin White how to address and recover from poor feedback..."

This video addresses how to deal with reviews of a company or product Website. However, it's broad message is applicable to many situations. Feedback received, good or bad, is still better than not knowing about potentially legitimate problems with your product or performance. Watch it here...