Coaching Businesses to Success News Update

"Training is everything...education is the cornerstone to survival"
Anita Roddick, Past CEO, The Body Shop
Without training, employees struggle to do their job well. Customers then suffer and loyalty collapses.

Investment in training can be costly, yet the costs of failing to train your people can be even more significant. Disastrous to the well-being of the very business.

In a world when communication of poor performance is across the globe in seconds, organizations simply cannot afford to have inexperienced and untrained people any longer.

What's more, your people too hate to do a poor job, believe it or not. They do care, for their own feelings of fulfilment of doing a job well.

Lose them, lose your customers. It's guaranteed when you fail to train your people in ways that they love to learn and are focused on value-creating outcomes, for them and your customers.

When the going is tough, the best train more, not less.

November 4, 2007 11:48 - Why, Why, Why?

Firefighting!

It's all too easy to get bogged down with all that stuff that comes at you - and you are expected to solve it all.

Yet solving problems, whilst it gives you a nice warm feeling of success (you 'knight is shining armour' you!), is not the most productive use of a manager's time at all.

Sometimes preferring to be in the thick of effort and action is more a comfort zone to you, than what you need to be doing.

So, a tactic when problems seem to crop up in the same areas from time to time, is to ask 'Why?' and then when the answer comes is to ask 'Why?' and then when the answer comes ask again 'Why?'.

Once you have done this (and it is of value up to five times), you will be much closer to the source of the problem. Expending energy fixing the source is well worth the effort - and then it won't come up again.

That is a very productive use of your time.

November 5, 2007 14:36 - Small Lists

To-do lists!

Love 'em or hate 'em, they have a value.

So many times these lists can be a burden because they just get abused. Too much on them and they have little relevance and get ignored.

In Tim Ferriss' new book, 'The 4-Hour Workweek' (really!), he suggests that you have a to-do list that is no more than 3 inches square (and write normal size too!).

By having a small number of do-able activities each day there are at least five benefits:-

* You focus only on priorities

* Successful achievement of your list builds self-belief

* You gain 'spare' time that gives you flexibility to spend more time with your people, building relationships

* Things which last for weeks speculatively on your old style list don't depress you.

* You bin your list each day with a flourish and carry nothing over. It's amazing at the sense of freedom this can give you.

Try buying a pack of those square refill blocks of paper from your local stationers and give this a shot for a week.

You may well be surprised at the value it brings to your day.

PS Ferris reckons that you can achieve a '4-hour Workweek' through outsourcing work, especially if you are an entrepreneur. If you are employed, you could read 'creative delegation' for 'outsourcing'...

November 6, 2007 16:24 - How To Use Succession Planning To Build A Successful Team

Succession planning in any business, is vital to avoid major challenges later on when a key person in an organization has left their important position.

Taking the time to build a succession planning strategy doesn't take that long, so here are a few ideas that will get you started. (Read Article)

November 6, 2007 16:53 - Management Skills The Quick And Easy Way

Management is not the easiest job in the world. If done correctly however, it has its many rewards.

But what if you are in large scale management involving many people and situations? Would not that be very challenging?

Here are a few steps to consider... (Read Article)

November 11, 2007 20:03 - Difficult People - Deal With Them!

The most visited page on my website is right here.

I'm not sure exactly why this is and it's interesting to see the challenges that people, managers being the main target here, of course!

So, to whet your appetite, here are five simple steps you can take right away, taken from the page above. If you want to find out a lot more background, in an easy to read page, then take a look!

1. Some people will cause you pain in your business. Who are they? What is it costing you to have them behave in this way? What have you failed to do in the past? How have you impacted on their behavior? Do you need to do anything differently?

2. What would you wish it to be like with them? How would they behave? This is your goal.

3. What do you need to do to make this better? What have you tried? What have you not tried and why not?

4. If you have to have a difficult series of conversations, get all your facts straight and if necessary, start again, making sure you set strict review phases as you go along. set clear expectations, goals and timescales. This works!

5. Include in the discussions the good stuff too. They are mostly good people and want to do well. Can you find their button to press? Because that is the most cost-effective goal.

Remember, that at the end of the day, the vast majority of people want to do a good job - it's just that sometimes, something gets in their way - and you can help with that.

November 12, 2007 08:36 - Staff Satisfaction Surveys Stink!

Most large organizations have them nowadays - they even give prizes for the number of employees that complete them, yet what happens next?

Truth is, in many organizations, the doing of the survey is more than enough.

Only rarely does anyone get down to what happens next. (Read Article)

November 15, 2007 17:56 - Management Snippets - Enhancing People Skills With Technology, Not The Opposite

In a world of constant technological progress, if there is one thing that has suffered, it is good old people contact and relationship building.
Technology has made it so easy to avoid each other directly.

You can leave a text message; or you can e-mail, you can switch yourself off from instant messaging.

Fundamental people skills of conversation, one-to-one debate and supportiveness are all disappearing.

Using technology to enhance, rather than destroy the capability to be human is a step that smart bosses make.

In fact, it can make life easier, where you forget to praise or acknowledge progress maybe, there is, after all, an e-mail or voicemail you can leave unexpectedly, rminded to do so by your software.

As long as you focus, when you can, on bridging the gap that technology seems to have created, where one-to-one interaction is lost.

It's all very well using technology as an extra to the way you relate to people, as long as it isn't used as a way to escape real interaction - as it has been for thousands of years, with another human.

November 17, 2007 08:17 - Management Snippets - Change, The Easy Way

"There are only two ways to get people to support corporate change. You must give employees the information they need to understand the reasons for change - and put enough influence behind the information to gain their support"
Carla O'Dell, President, O'Dell and Associates
How would it be if you gained the hearts and minds of your people every time you needed the business to change?

Too often the changes required are put badly to those who will need to make the biggest changes.

So they revolt - understandably!

Giving as much information generically, followed up quickly by personal information about how they are affected, with someone to talk to them who is senior enough to matter, makes all the difference in generating the groundswell of support you will need.

Personal committment to one-on-one communication, where it is needed, will be the difference between smooth transitions and chaos.

As a manager, you have an enormous capacity to make this happen, if you are prepared to do the face-to-face work.

November 21, 2007 19:29 - It's all About Perspective

We start with nothing in life, we are a blank sheet of paper that anyone passing can draw upon to give us a map that suits us to form something that gives stability and a structure.

We form the world we exist in, to ensure that we can cope with it in the best way we can.

The familiar map serves us well - and it has it's drawbacks.

We can get fixed in seeing things our way as the best and sometimes, the only way.

Yet our way is only the map we have created, and we need to be mindful that whilst it suits us, everyone else will have their own way of seeing things that suits them too.

When we work closely with others, not only can we help ourselves if we recognize that there might be a different perspective on the way we see things, we may also transform the lives of others by helping them understand that there might be a different way.

And ourselves.

Taking the time to help your people explore other possibilities - and that they may be rewarding and valuable for them - takes a little time.

The rewards might be worth it more than you can imagine - to you, to those you work with and to the business performance too.

That's what we like, a win-win- win, with no losers.