Here’s something I bet you didn’t know… over 40% of potential employees say that they look for the development opportunities within a business when they’re deciding where they want to work. (Udemy) Every successful entrepreneur recognises that training and development isn’t just a tool to keep people sweet – it’s an essential investment in their […]
Did you know that over 40% of employees say that they look for the opportunity to be developed when deciding where they want to work. (Udemy) Successful entrepreneurs recognise that training and development is not just a tool to keep people sweet but an essential investment in their business growth. They know that a business owner […]
I think you’ll agree with me when I say that we’re not all the same. We all work in different ways; we all have different styles, different characteristics, quirks and foibles. We communicate in different ways, we want to receive communication in different forms, and we get pleasure out of doing different tasks. The dynamic […]
I want to talk to you about the lost art of running an effective probation period. Because let’s face it, there are so many people working merrily away in businesses who never actually ‘passed’ a probation. They just drifted into full time employment or their probation period has been extended and extended again and extended […]
Right now as business owners, we’re all assessing and re-assessing key elements of our operation – from our business model to our marketing, from our team to our own role in the day to day. We’re thinking about what we’ve missed during lockdown, and what we’ve loved, and wondering if we will be able to […]
Right now as business owners, we’re all assessing and re-assessing key elements of our operation – from our business model to our marketing, from our team to our own role in the day to day. We’re thinking about what we’ve missed during lockdown, and what we’ve loved, and wondering if we will be able to […]
Like everyone else, I’m wondering what will happen after lockdown, what’s going to have changed for good, and what’s going to go back to business as usual? And how quickly? Will the milkman, the village shop, the local butcher still get our trade? Maybe we’ve supported them to avoid the crowds at the supermarket, or maybe […]
As I write, we’re in week six of lockdown and I want to share something that’s really struck me over these past few weeks – just how much of pretty much every business owner’s focus, has been on marketing and sales. Of course that’s sensible – we all need to do what we can to […]
Are you open to feedback – from your team, from clients, from those nearest and dearest to you? Do you recognise that you don’t have all the answers? That you don’t always get things right? That, just like your team, you can learn something new, and improve your performance, every single day? I know that […]
‘To work successfully with other people, you have to trust each other. A big part of this is trusting people to get their work done wherever they are, without supervision.’ – Sir Richard Branson Trust has never been such a valuable commodity. With the over night jump in people working remotely, many business owners who […]
Have you decided what your goal is for lockdown? Do something transformational in these precious weeks and months, and reap the benefits for years to come. I’m sure that for many of us the lockdown period has been a chance to rethink what’s really important, and to reset our goals for the weeks and months […]
What do you want to achieve in the next few months? Have you set your self goals? Are you really focused on what you’re going to get done, and how? Something really struck me this week, and I feel the need to share it with you. I want to talk about the importance of your […]
I took a bit of stick this week for writing a post suggesting that we all use the current situation as an opportunity to do something positive – to create something – to do something that you’ve been talking about doing, but have never quite got round to. I suggested that one of these things […]
When I start working with a new client I always spend some time talking to each of their team members individually to discover: What they love about their work What they find frustrating What aspirations they have What blocks them from giving great service to their customers What one thing my client could do to […]
Job turnover in an organisation with positive company culture is around 14%, compared to turnover in low company cultures at almost 50% In last week’s blog I wrote about digging deep to find your true core values. Having defined them, it’s important to live them consistently, because from these behaviours will stem the culture of […]
People talk about values a lot. But I think often they don’t really understand what they are and why they’re important. There may be a list of your business values up on the wall where you work. But what are they really all about? The word value comes originally from the latin word valere, which means […]
I can remember attending a creative thinking workshop once. Not only did it not get my creative juices flowing, but the few I had, shrivelled up and died! It was presented and run in traditional, death by powerpoint; slides without images or colour, just bullet points of what was being said. No interaction, no audience […]
I had a number of bosses in my time with McDonald’s – some great, some not so great. But each one of them taught me something about the sort of leader-manager I want to be and the sort of manager I definitely don’t want to be! I remember one boss I had who was very […]
Leader? Manager? or Hybrid? The challenge for the small business owner (and yes, the photo is a long shot – A Labradoodle ‘hybrid’ – but who doesn’t love the odd dog picture?!) “Before you are a leader, success is all about growing yourself. When you become a leader, success is all about growing others.” Jack […]
I love Vera. I love her complex character played by the great Brenda Blethyn, the people in her CID team and of course gorgeous Durham and Northumberland. And the storylines are just perfect Sunday night viewing, for me anyway. Whereas she has got some great qualities as a leader (more of that later), when it […]
Much as I love the words ‘please’, ‘thankyou’ and ‘sorry’, there’s another word out there that can make a big difference. It’s a principle of human behaviour that if you’re asking for a favour, you’ll be more successful if you give the reason why. If you’re asking people to do something they like to know […]
As featured here in HRD Connect 2020 will be a big year for new beginnings. How can leaders ensure their best people stay put? A new decade can be a catalyst to kick-start your own journey to accomplish your life goals. Members of your team who dream to be somewhere else and start their own […]
I don’t know about you but I love posts you see on social media about businesses going the extra mile for their customers. Delighting the Customer, going the extra mile, or as I heard it referred to as, Sprinkling the Pixie Dust, costs businesses very little but the repercussions, the return for just naturally putting their […]
I want to share an interesting conversation I had recently with a control freak. (I use that phrase because I used to be one too!) Business Owners come to us for help to escape the day-to-day operation of their business, but the truth is that so many find it hard to let go of their role, […]
Your daily routine is the key to your personal productivity and effectiveness. It should be crammed full of habits that will maximise your focus and efficiency, and move you closer to achieving your big vision. If you’ve already sorted your to do list into, ‘ditch delegate or do’ then you’ll be focussing on those tasks […]
“Lack of direction, not lack of time, is the problem. We all have twenty-four-hour days.” Zig Ziglar In a recent blog I asked you to look at your to do list and sieve it into Ditch Delegate or Do. So now you have a new to do list which reflects those tasks which as a business […]
So, you have a Big Vision that gives you goosebumps and it’s plastered on your wall in huge letters. You’ve started to plan with your team about how together you’ll make that Vision a reality. And you’re all buzzing about the future and cracking on. Great stuff! I can feel the energy from here. Now, all that’s […]
Over the past few years I’ve talked to a lot of business owners who are struggling with how much they have to get done, and let’s face it, us business owners have a lot of ‘stuff’ to do. So much stuff and all of it urgent. A bulging inbox controlling our day, forcing us to react, […]
“If you want to be wealthy and happy, learn to work harder on yourself than you do on your job.” – Earl Shoaff You’ve prepared your business plan and now you’re identifying skills you’ll need to deliver it. You’re deciding whether to hire, outsource or give opportunities to your existing team members. But sometimes the […]
One of my favourite films is ‘A Few Good Men’ set in the US military. Tom Cruise, a lawyer, asks a soldier, “How do you know where to go for meals; it’s not in the manual?” “Well,” the soldier replies, “I guess I just follow the crowd at chow time.” When you start out in […]
