Wouldn’t it be great if our bodies could diagnose and fix themselves so we wouldn’t have to worry about going to the dentist, or visiting the doctor and you’d never fall foul of the usual round of cold and flu viruses that magically appear at this time of year? 

Unfortunately, there isn’t yet a Matrix style programme that we can download into heads to sort out our health. And yet most of us, if we stopped to listen to our bodies and took some simple measures, could actually prevent a lot of the illnesses we have. 

Ok so you’re rushing around trying to meet with clients, grabbing a quick lunch and preparing an important presentation, but a small amount of time spent on yourself and the welfare of your staff could pay dividends in the future. It’s one of those investments that we should make but often don’t to our cost. 

Healthy Environment
Providing a healthy environment for you and your staff is vital to help reduce accidents and keeping people safe. It everyone’s responsibility to ensure not only that their working area is tidy but that their equipment is up to scratch. It’s also good to check they are sitting in the correct positions and are following the correct guidelines when using equipment. However, as their boss, it’s up to you to make sure they are aware of their responsibilities and that all new staff are given adequate guidelines and the appropriate training.  

Reduce Stress
A tense environment can quickly escalate causing staff to burn out and is one of the main factors why people fall ill. They may even end up leaving if this pattern keeps repeating itself, and in extreme cases this can result in staff taking their employer to court. Using humour in the workplace can foster wellness, improve stress management and increase productivity and morale.

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When customers are not buying, it’s very easy to take it personally, think the whole world’s against you and get very demotivated with the whole thing. And then of course, that makes the situation even worse – because customers can sense a mile off if you’re not happy and even though you desperately want more customers, they don’t want to work with you. 

So, what do you do to break out of this circle?  Well, an easy way (and often a better way) to think about your marketing is to focus instead on educating your customers. That means, rather than trying to convince them to buy, all you want to do instead is pass on useful tips and information to help people. 

The impact of this can be dramatic. Firstly, you start to perceive yourself in a different way. The emphasis is no longer on getting people to buy - you’re now an educator, a teacher in your subject. If you think of yourself in this way, you’ll find that you no longer worry if people don’t buy from you immediately. At least, if nothing else, you’ve been helpful to someone. 

The second impact is that the world of marketing suddenly opens its door to you. If you focus on educating your customers, there are a multitude of ways in which you can do this, from writing articles to giving speeches and seminars. These methods will help you to reach more potential customers who will also all perceive you as being an expert in your field – can’t be bad! 

Thirdly, customers receive a taster from you of what you can do. If you’re giving a seminar for instance, potential customers get to meet you and get to understand what you can do in a way they wouldn’t otherwise experience. Compare this method for instance to cold calling, where potential customers only get a call explaining what you do and no education at all. 

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In this age of business scandals, it’s crucial to remember that businesses based on ethics and quality actually work better. With that in mind, here are ten easy resolutions to inspire your business to achieve a very profitable 2008.

1. I will base every aspect of my business on honesty, integrity, and quality.

2. I will make sure every employee, from janitor to CEO, is trained to view every interaction with a customer as a key step in the marketing process, and to always give the customer respect and
attention.

3. I will train and empower every employee to let the customer go away feeling good about the entire interaction.

4. I will stand behind my products and services. It is better to refund the money and create a positive buzz.

5. Understanding that it costs an average of five times more to bring in a new customer as to keep an existing one, I will see that the entire organization exceeds customer expectations.

6. Recognizing that my competitors can be my strongest allies, I will initiate at least one joint venture (after all, if FedEx and the Postal Service, Apple and IBM, and General Motors and Toyota can cooperate, surely I can too).

7. If my company is not the best answer to prospect’s needs, I will refer that prospect to the company that can best serve.

8. I will devote business resources to make the world a better place.

9. I will volunteer on a community project, and set up incentives for my employees to volunteer on the projects of their choice.

10. I will base decisions on the Abundance Principle that there is enough to go around, and not on market share.

11. I will reduce my firm’s use of water and energy, and reduce my family’s use at home, and inform others of the easy changes I’ve made.

12.

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I don’t know about you, but there have been days when I’ve been out and about and not been near the office once. On days like this, it’s difficult to get any work done let alone any marketing. 

So, what can you do? Here are my top tips to do business effectively when you’re on the move. 

1)   Plan in advance – how often have you had to rush because you needed petrol and didn’t get it before? Or, had to get up early to print out materials that you needed for the day? Yes – me too! But, if you plan in advance and do these things before the day you know you’re going to be out, you’ll find your life is much smoother. 

2)   Use Technology – there are so many things out there now to help us organise our lives better, so why not use them? Blackberrys and IPhones are fantastic for managing your emails and Notebooks are great for travelling with – they’re so much lighter than laptops and are often free if you sign up for mobile broadband. I got a new Notebook recently for just £20 a month! 

3)   Use a call minding company – manage any phone calls you receive while you’re out and about by using a call answering service. They will answer your calls in your company name and will send any messages to your emails or by text to you. People far appreciate speaking to a human being rather than an answering machine, making you look more professional too. We use Professional Call Minders who are fantastic. 

4)   Scale down your workload - much as we’d like to get everything done if you’re out working, your time will be limited. Recognise this and scale back your workload accordingly – sounds obvious, but we very often don’t do this leaving us feeling stressed because we haven’t done as much as we would like. 

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Growth–too much, too fast, too soon–can be a direct cause of failure. The same is true for organizations that see growth as the only way to survive.

”We must achieve 20% growth at all cost,” has lead to the demise of PC/CE companies throughout the industry. The drive in a down economy is a sure road to disaster.

The problem is, no one wants to stand still. It’s not “The American Way”. Each of us starts a company with one objective: to grow…to gain greater stature and increase profits.

And why not? We’re constantly bombarded with “bigger is better”.

Look at the business pages. You never see an item on a company that’s growing slowly or maintaining status quo. But financial editors aren’t to blame for covering the growth of companies, growth of stocks, growth of industries. People want to be associated with winners. And when they invest, they want their companies to grow in sales, profits and market value.

As a result, the desire to grow becomes compulsive.

It’s also true that there are times that when a business stops growing, it begins to wither and die.

Unfortunately for many management groups, growth for the sake of growth has become the all-consuming objective. If you aren’t achieving the same level of growth and expansion than those in your market segment you are obviously not living up to your fullest corporate potential. Nearly every other consideration takes a back seat to this golden grail.

Don’t get us wrong. Growth is necessary. And growth isn’t necessarily bad. But it takes a lot of planning and preparation.

Your Objective…ROI
Growth and size may contribute to an organization’s temporary well being, but offer no assurance of long-term health.

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Nothing focuses the mind better than the constant sight of a competitor who wants to wipe you off the map.– Wayne Calloway

When Eric Schmidt (Google) said he paid a premium of one billion for YouTube he spelled out part of the strategy companies increasingly use to compete – acquire for growth or to block competition. The old management stigma of NIH (not invented here) has been replaced by the scramble to keep up with or lead the pack at almost any cost. With the world economy showing signs of recovering, companies are positioning themselves for the next phase of growth, the next big thing! Companies that were started two – three and more years ago nursed their activities along paying close attention to their cash flow to bring their products, services and technology along waiting for the business climate to improve. Admittedly the climate for IPOs (initial public offering) is weak – not even considering the fiscal and physical toll it takes on the company – all indicators point to a pent-up M&A activity and enthusiasm for the coming.

Mind-boggling, record-breaking numbers have grabbed the headlines:

• Dell buying Perot Systems for $3.9 billion
• Cisco acquiring Tandberg for $3 billion
• Adobe buying Omniture for $1.8 billion
• VMware grabbing SpringSource for a lowly $420 million
• Intuit snapping up PayCycle and Mint for a lousy $170 million each

These are only the tip of the iceberg. Tons of friendly and unfriendly M&A deals are being pursued or speculated:

• HP and Polycom
• Oracle checking out SuccessFactors, Taleo, Concur, RightNow, NetSuite, Citrix, ???
• Dell, Nokia and HP watching Palm’s struggles
• Google promising a buy a month

Many more “discussions” are started and broken off.

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The foundations of creative leadership start with taking personal responsibility for our actions as part of a group; in feeling confidant enough to suggest and accept revisions in team goals and performance. To successfully learn new styles of creative thinking and applied problem-solving, we must take personal leadership in using them, and in the interaction with our fellow workers and clients.

Peter Drucker said,” Management is doing things right; Leadership is doing the right things.” Handling problems, challenges and mistakes, effectively, depends on being able to cut to root causes, and to develop real actionable solutions.

I challenge you to discover new approaches to the problems you encounter; to see them as opportunities to grow and change the way you live, lead, or do business. A wise man told me; “My ability to earn would be directly dependent on my ability to solve problems.” In business, we are essentially paid for our ability to solve our client’s problems by the provision of innovative, productive services or products.

Creativity tools and tips can be applied in at least two directions:

• Problem solving
• Strategic planning

“Effectiveness - often survival - does not depend solely on how much effort we expend, but on whether or not the effort we invest is in the right direction.”

It has been my experience that creativity tools help in the process of defining the direction, and outlining the process needed to successfully reach the goals you set, or in solving perplexing problems you encounter enroute.

Some of the leadership objectives would be:

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While Total Quality Management has proven to be an effective process for improving organizational functioning, its value can only be assured through a comprehensive and well­thought­out implementation process. The purpose of this chapter is to outline key aspects of implementation of large­scale organizational change which may enable a practitioner to more thoughtfully and successfully implement TQM. First, the context will be set. TQM is, in fact, a large­scale systems change, and guiding principles and considerations regarding this scale of change will be presented. Without attention to contextual factors, well­intended changes may not be adequately designed. As another aspect of context, the expectations and perceptions of employees (workers and managers) will be assessed, so that the implementation plan can address them. Specifically, sources of resistance to change and ways of dealing with them will be discussed. This is important to allow a change agent to anticipate resistances and design for them, so that the process does not bog down or stall. Next, a model of implementation will be presented, including a discussion of key principles. Visionary leadership will be offered as an overriding perspective for someone instituting TQM. In recent years the literature on change management and leadership has grown steadily, and applications based on research findings will be more likely to succeed. Use of tested principles will also enable the change agent to avoid reinventing the proverbial wheel. Implementation principles will be followed by a review of steps in managing the transition to the new system and ways of helping institutionalize the process as part of the organization’s culture. This section, too, will be informed by current writing in transition management and institutionalization of change.

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