Knowing is fun – learning, much less so. For a small business, it’s often costly. Here are a few lessons you should get to know early: Care for Your Employees Successful small business owners are known for their ingenuity and their willpower. What they’re not as known for is for how they treat their employees. …
5 Important Lessons Small Business Owners Should Learn Early Read More »
The quality of your customer service will determine much of your startup’s success. Treat your consumers well and not only will they come back for more, they will be more willing to overlook the inevitable hiccup in your service. Fortunately, there is much you can do to refine your customer service program. Here are 9 …
9 Tips Any Entrepreneur Can Use to Improve Their Customer Service Read More »
Interviews are hard for business owners. In my business coaching sessions, it comes up often with clients, and rarely in a positive way. Business owners value the fact they need to employ more staff, and the growth of their business is a validation of this. However, they view the whole interview and hiring process as …
The Problem with Hypothetical Questions in Job Interviews Read More »
While not all employees are chronic procrastinators, many businesses might boast their fair share of them. As an owner or manager, you may already understand that procrastination is not emblematic of laziness or even a lack of motivation, but it can feel that way when your business faces important deadlines. Procrastination in its elemental form …
Covid-19 has forced companies to change the way they motivate their employees. Lockdowns all around Australia have pushed us into our largest recession in 30 years. As a result, many small businesses have had to cut many operational costs, including salaries. Predictably, this has not been met by employees with much enthusiasm. Fortunately, this provides …
Becoming an entrepreneur and starting your own business is like a child taking their very first steps. You will make mistakes, have downfalls, and experience hardship but whilst this may cause immense stress, it is not all negative. With perseverance and a major positive attitude, you may very well push past these issues and thrive. …
Why Starting a Business can Create Strain on your Mental Health Read More »
The best leaders are constantly changing their leadership styles to adapt to their ever-growing and/or evolving businesses. The longer a leader is in a position of authority, the more you will learn about which methods of leadership best suit you and your organisation. There are many ways to lead a business, some of which are …
Strong and effective leadership gives companies the extra edge that helps them carve out a niche and succeed. While just about anyone can be a leader, a select number of people go on to become great leaders. Leadership is not easy and while there is a lot of work to do, leaders are always racing …
Curiosity is an attribute that is critical for leaders to succeed in a disruptive world. Agile leaders are those who are highly motivated, have the drive to learn new things and explore. Curiosity is the precursor to these desirable attributes in leaders. What does curiosity mean? Curiosity is an element of cognition. An early definition …
Is your company slow to react to change? Does your company have many ‘layers/section’ so that your employees feel stifled and don’t have a voice or a say over what goes on within its walls? Are only a few in charge of the decision-making process? Do you often find that there is a conflict between …
The uncertain times brought on by the ongoing COVID-19 poses unique and new leadership challenges to public health specialists and business leaders. Clearly, the right kind of leadership determines the success of nations and humanity in times of multi-dimensional and complex crises. Leaders are expected to provide exceptional leadership even as socio-economic foundations are being …
Communications is an intricate skill – it’s not only about what you say but how you say it. There are several critical components of communication, and body language is one of them. Communication includes both verbal and nonverbal cues. While most of us train ourselves to be adept at using verbal cues (words), we forget …
Developed in 1964, Vroom realized that performance in the workplace was based on factors impacting the individuals. These included knowledge, abilities, experience, and personality. However, regardless of these factors if the three crucial variables were fulfilled each employee would be motivated to perform at a higher level to make things better for themselves. The first …
How to Motivate Staff – Insights in to Vroom’s Expectancy Theory Read More »
George Bernard Shaw pointed out that “the single biggest problem in communication is the illusion that it has taken place.” Communicating is an integral part of our everyday life. We talk for several hours to people each day while we also communicate through emails, texts and video calls. A study shows that we spend more …
Bring People and Ideas Together with Conversations – Real Conversations Read More »
Fact: The next few months are going to be testing for SME’s and their owners.. It is understandably hard to stay calm and focussed, particularly for those around you, when you (owner or leader) are trying to adjust to a very new and fast changing environment. When we are put in this position of vulnerability, the natural tendency is to …
Others are Depending On You – Leading while Adapting Read More »
Larsen also states that leaders whose roles are misaligned with their values experience inner conflict, stress, or frustration. It is fairly common in my work as a business coach to come across leaders and business owners who are facing hardships without recognising the reasons. It would be advisable to assess and have an ‘inner look’ …
As a leader, the most effective (and many would argue, perhaps the only way) you can direct your life and the lives of others is to truly know what you stand for. Your personal values – the way you choose to conduct your self – direct your thoughts, priorities, preferences, and actions. In other words, …
Giving Back the Monkey People don’t need to be managed; they need to be unleashed. ~ Richard Florida, Professor of Urban Theory In 1974, William Oncken wrote one of the two bestselling articles in Harvard Business Review: “Management Time: Who’s Got the Monkey?” The piece compares an employee’s dilemma to a monkey. When the manager …
I’ve been writing about the need for managers and leaders to improve performance (this post) by helping employees to think better and improve their abilities to problem solve. Until managers learn to do this, they will continue to contribute to employee disengagement. Starting a coaching conversation is an ideal way to encourage self-directed learning. How …
Teaching People to Think Leadership practices need to keep up with the realities of organisational life. There’s an increasing gap between the way employees are managed and how they want to be managed. One cannot teach a man anything. One can only enable him to learn from within himself. ~ Galileo Galilei With so many …
Hand on your heart – ask yourself -are you totally satisfied with your job? You are not likely to be all that dissatisfied, after all, the job pays the bills and most of the people who you workd with ‘ok’. However, you are unlikely to be ‘super happy’. A study by Deloitte revealed that meaningful …
The true value of a owner/manager lies in their team. (Besides, the more productive and proactive the team, the better the manager looks.) If you run a startup, one of your primary responsibilities is to get your team working at its highest efficiency. Here are four ways you can encourage your employees to be more …
Four Ways to Encourage Your Employees to be More Proactive Read More »
What happens when a business owner has self-destructive or business harming leadership behaviours? What happens when family members don’t get on well in business? What do we do? How do they change? It makes me think of my favourite skit of all time (watch here), starring Bob Newhart. (Younger clients might struggle to recognise that …
