Archive for the ‘Leadership’ Category

Is Your Company Sick?

Wednesday, September 22nd, 2010

Is your company or agency doing everything it can to build a successful future? Or is it sicker than it looks, with problems building up that could cripple it in the future?

There are 5 factors that are common to all successful businesses and agencies. Of course, there are other issues that are specific to your situation – but these 5 are shared by everyone.

The 5 themes are:

  • Vision, leadership and direction
  • Managing performance
  • Customers
  • Teamwork
  • Attitudes and motivation.

Recent research also suggests that those companies that have strong, diverse thinking at Board level (evidenced for example by having at least three women Directors) are performing significantly better than the average through the global financial crisis. So the first of these factors, concerning leadership, includes a challenge to ensure that strategy is being formed by a diverse group of people, with diverse backgrounds and opinions, and with the strength of character to challenge that old chestnut of  ‘the way we do things around here’.

I have written an article which will help you to create a very quick health check on your company: ‘The Company Success Health Check’.

In future articles I will expand on each one, and provide tips and ideas to help you to find strategies that will improve the health and likely success of your company or agency.

Today’s Action:

Go to the article and use it to rate your company’s performance in each of the 5 areas.

Then identify the things that also need to be addressed.

Next, talk to others in your company and generate ideas.

Finally, have the courage to take action! Don’t accept second best – if your company is sick, it will drag you down with it.

Your coach,

Hugh :D

Boosting personal, professional and company performance

The Energy Revolution

Thursday, August 5th, 2010

Lis Faenza is simply awesome. Author of the ‘Nemesis’ trilogy and the ‘Infidel’ series, as well as The Energy Bucket and various White Papers, hypnotherapist and mentor, with various degrees including two at Masters level, Lis also mentors CEO’s and managers on the importance of their personal health and energy to productivity.

I listened to Lis speak recently and had that great experience of having what I felt to be true validated, extended and turned into a real life case study.

In a nutshell, we need people to bring positive energy to work. All too often, we experience the opposite from our colleagues. What Lis showed us is that there is now solid research to show how each of us is affected by positive and negative attitudes and emotions in people around us, and even at a distance.

Our feelings create emotions, which we now know affect the state of our DNA, which affects our energy levels. This affects our feelings – and so it continues. DNA curls up and shuts down with negative emotions, and it’s contagious! Positive emotions have the opposite effect.

So all of us need to recognise the impact we are having on those in our teams, companies, families – and take responsibility for challenging negativity.

In one under-performing team, Lis carried out an ‘energy audit’ and ran some workshops about all of this, which clearly motivated them to decide to change – urgently. She helped them to create a new vision for the future. Then a month later she updated the energy audit, and, without having done anything more than create this positive vision, everything had changed!

Everyone had got excited about managing their own energy, they were literally bringing energy buckets into the office (with fruit, water etc), and decided to have a ‘bucket meeting’ once a month to discuss energy and strategies for keeping it positive. And the team became one of the top performing ones in the company.

Today’s Challenge:

So what are you doing about your own energy?

What can you do to help uncurl your DNA?

Is it time to step up and challenge the moaners and whingers that drag you down?

How about smiling instead of snarling at someone who upsets you?

What else can you do to help create an atmosphere where you are surrounded by positive energy?

If you can do this, watch productivity soar!

For more, check out Lis Faenza’s website -

http://thebucketrevolution.com/