It has never been a better time for me at Rise. We’ve formed a leadership team to create and execute our vision and I couldn’t be more excited about our progress and future. We started by defining the Rise core values and focus. This allowed us to define what we believe and why we’re here.

It’s timely to have found this video from Steve Jobs making its way around Twitter. In the video, a younger Jobs describes the moment Apple partnered with Chait Day (now TBWA\Chiat\Day) to help bring Apple back to its center. Jobs explained that Apple, at its core, believed passionate people have the ability to change the world. The concept created to launch this campaign was think different.

Jobs paints a picture in the clip below describing the way to cut through the advertising noise and clutter people live with to define or redefine the way people think and feel about a company.

Things to ponder:

• How important are your core values to your company?
• How are you communicating this to your prospects and customers?

I just read a post from OnStartups.com about the magical team mix for successful web startups.

The story starts at last year’s SXSW where several members of the web startup community gathered for dinner. What’s interesting is the backgrounds of those at the dinner. You’d think people venturing to start a new business online would be business managers or entrepreneurial visionaries of some sort. But no, half of those attending were user experience designers by trade—in other words, professional problem solvers.

In my opinion, it’s obvious why.

The common thread of a great startup team has to be problem solving. Wether you’re coding or creating an interface, taking care of the pain points and solving problems for people from the foundation (the big idea the startup is building) to the smallest details creates memorable, exceptional experiences.

Wether you’re starting a new business online or building onto your established company’s web presence, focusing on the challenges your audience faces is a key ingredient for success.

Some time ago, the American workforce started to feel caged in. We got tired of monotone rows of cubicles covered in drably-colored cloth. We began to compare ourselves to the computers we work on. And we quietly muttered from inside our boxes that we were not just information processors, but individuals with ideas! and thoughts! and personalities! that didn’t fit in with the corporate overcast environment.

So walls were knocked down. Workspaces were pushed into groups. Muttering turned into coherent conversations, and a din rose over our desks. The open office environment was born.

For a time, we all sat back and saw that it was good. But then the quarterly reports came in and exposed that our productivity plummeted by 66%. Our work quality had not necessarily decreased, but our use of time was far from beneficial.

Reconstructing cubicles seemed blasphemous, so we began to look for remedies. Searching lead to the exploration of how sounds affects our moods and actions, and that is where you’ll find us now.

Rise Creative Group is an open office environment, and we’re about to embark on a journey of self-discovery. How does sound affect our output?

In a video by Julian Treasure, we learned that sound affects both the ways we think and act.

Sound can make us want to leave or stay. It can make us focus or flee. It can inspire or discourage. And it’s almost always subconscious.

Our everyday lives are noisy – we talk over the conversations of others; we block out the sounds of traffic; and we even tune out of commercials on the television and radio.

Our relationship with sound has become muddled. What we think is just background noise can make or break our moods and your company’s productivity.

At Rise, we’ve already sent out the polite emails asking others to use the office chat for conversations rather than speaking across the room. We suggested using headphones to listen to our music of choice and to block out some of the inevitable exchanges. Our conference room is used for collaborative work when possible. And the dream of sound-proof collaborative spaces has been placed in our heads thanks to Jason Fried of 37signals.

In the coming weeks, we’ll be experimenting with sound. This morning, the radio remained off, and yours truly wrote a coherent and evenly-toned blog.

Like Julian Treasure suggested in his video, we’ll also try out the lovely sound of bird song. My personal response to the thought of bird song was skepticism, but after just a few seconds of it, I felt more refreshed, encouraged and ready to get down to some business.

For now the question remains: how do you cope with the noise and distraction of working in an open office? We’re hungry for suggestions!

That weekly video we told you about…in video format last week…well, it’s here!

This week at Rise – Ian eats a burrito, and we still create websites.

At Orlando website design agency Rise Creative Group, we take a detailed approach when it comes to getting to know our clients. This intimacy creates the basis by which we begin figuring out your user experience strategy, and it’s ultimately what helps us make the website of your dreams – but we’ve realized the tables are often unbalanced.  

We get down to all the knitty-gritty details of your business, but sometimes you may not really get to know us. Over the next few weeks, we’re embarking on a journey that will help you get to know the stellar minds behind Rise, your Orlando website design company.

We’ll be posting some tidbits everyday here on our blog, our Facebook, and our Twitter.  Here’s what to expect:

Mascot Mondays
Some of Rise’s best employees don’t even get paid. In fact, they aren’t even human, but they rule the HR department. When things get rough inside the office, rather than squishing stress balls, we turn to our Rise Mascots – the few, the proud, the furry. Check out our Mascot Monday album on Facebook to see pictures of these everyday heros.

Tossup Tuesdays
For all the goodness we can’t quite classify, we bring you Tossup Tuesday!  You’ll never know quite what to expect on a Tuesday – we could toss you a picture of employee desk flair and ask you to name that person, or you may watch a video of a hilarious outtake, or it might be something altogether different.  All we know is that you won’t want to miss it.

When Do You Rise? Wednesdays
Maybe you’re not sure about our capabilities, maybe you’re not sure who to choose as your Orlando web design company, maybe you just like testimonials – for all those reasons and more, we’ve developed When Do You Rise? Wednesdays.  On this day, we’ll showcase a site we’re particularly proud of (…all of them?) and interview the company about how they came to select Rise and the benefits they’ve seen since putting their web dreams in the hands our of creative team.

Anthropology Thursdays
Because your success is important to us, we’ve carefully selected all the individuals that make up Rise Creative Group.  Some of them we’ve gone looking for, some of them found us. Either way, we think they’re important to helping build your business, and we’d like you to get to know each of them. Follow a day in the life of each of our unique minds.

Rise Recap
Rise has gone multimedia!  For real.  We’ve spent plenty of time developing unique and interesting multimedia content for our clients – now we think it’s our turn.  On Fridays, check out our Youtube, Facebook, or Twitter to view our weekly video news recap.  Don’t worry – at Rise, all our news is good news.  Tune in this week!