I love the fact that someone deserving gets something nice at the end of the programme.  I usually think  ‘oooh how lovely’ and have a bit of a cry.

However, if every CEO and Managing Director in the country really wanted to know what was happening on the ‘coal face’ in their organisation it’s extremely unlikely that they would be able to disguise themselves sufficiently with a new haircut and a pair of glasses if there were only 20 people in the company.

Good CEO’s and Managing Director’s recognise that without their people not a lot actually happens in their organisation and it’s in their interest to know how staff feel and what it’s really like to work for the company.  However, how do they find out if they can’t get an offer of a TV crew and some plastic surgery?

My experience tells me that the only sure way to know how your people are feeling is to ask them.  I don’t mean staff surveys that give people limited choices in what they’re allowed to answer or suggestion boxes that can be percieved as paying lip service to listening.  What I’m suggesting is that each person in the organisation is given the opportunity to express their views about how they feel and what they would like to see improved and what follows is an active exploration of those views with some clearly owned actions and some resulting activity.

Resulting action is critical to ensure, again, that you haven’t conducted a ‘lip service’ activity.  ‘Actions speak louder than words’ is a great maxim to live by.

There may be things that we don’t want to hear, that make us feel uncomfortable but we all know that a ‘clearing of the air’ is generally a good thing to do.  Obviously this needs to be done with respect, care and compassion but adopting this approach will pay huge dividends.  There may be issues raised where it’s just not possible to effect change but if you know about it you can at least provide an explanation of why it can’t be changed.

As your organisation expands and a few more layers of management structure become necessary it becomes even more essential that you, as the leader of your organisation, have fostered an open, honest and direct culture.

I have been working with a manager recently who told me about his team of ‘complainers and whiners’.  When I asked him to write down what they were complaining about the piece of paper I gave him stayed blank.  He explained that he didn’t know one thing they complained about because he had learned how to cut the conversation short assuming that all they were doing was complaining.  Further exploration revealed that there were actually some real, if fairly minor, business issues that needed to be addressed.  Even if the eventual outcome wasn’t what the individual was looking for they would at least be able to see that a genuine attempt at finding a resolution had been made.  This improved relationships dramatically.

One of the greatest gifts we can give another human being is to listen to them.  Really listen.  How often have you felt that you wanted to get a really important point across but you knew the person that could make a real difference wasn’t listening?  From a human perspective it’s soul destroying.  From business perspective it can build a culture of mistrust, demotivation and stress.

How does your organisation ensure that you know how your staff feel?  I would love to hear your views and hopefully you won’t have to go undercover to know how your people feel about working in your company.

Jules

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Lots of love

Jules

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Below is an outline that I often use with clients to help them get control over the disaster zone that is their desk.

Find a time of the day where you can sit quietly with a cup of tea and make your list.   Preparing it at the end of the day for the next day will help with clearing your head so that you can spend time with your loved ones without worrying about work.

List everything – don’t group similar items together such as ‘do quotes’ or ‘prepare the teams’ one to ones’.  Identify each item seperately so that nothing gets forgotten.

Once the list is complete, go through it and put a D next to everything you can get someone else to do.  Use a different coloured pen if it helps you.  Remember if it’s the first time you’ve delegated a particular task to someone you will need to explain/show what needs to be done and how.  Also make sure that any task you have delegated includes instructions on reporting back to you if there is a problem or when it is completed.

Prioritise the rest of the items on your list using:

• 1 : High Priority – needs to be done today

• 2 : Medium Priority – should be done today but can roll over to tomorrow if need be.  Don’t forget that tomorrow this priority might need to be upgraded to 1 if it’s a time sensitive task.

• 3 : Low Priority – needs to be done soon but can wait if other priorities/emergencies jump up through the day

As you complete each task cross it off the list.

Only create a new list when the one you are working on is either complete (Woo hoo!) or it’s looking a bit messy.  Don’t forget to move anything still outstanding onto your new list.

Enjoy the sense of accomplishment!

I would love to know whether this has helped or what you do to stay on top of the stuff you hate doing.

Lots of love

Jules xx

Please let me know how you get on.

Jules

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It’s often all too easy to forget that whatever work you do that somewhere you have a customer. Even if you don’t come face to face with them they are always there at the end of some process. Does your team spend too much time on non-productive work and forget that who they are serving?

Love to hear from you.
Jules

Working with a manager recently we began the session by discussing conflict resolution.  My approach is always to teach new management techniques in the context of particular situations that managers are dealing with at that time as I find abstract learning rarely has the same depth of impact.

This manager was having problems with a ‘difficult’ member of staff and it became evident quite quickly that she was carrying a huge amount of anger towards this person.  Talking the issue through I realised that both parties appeared to have become entrenched in their own position, with neither willing to move towards any sort of compromise.

So, I asked the manager to list all of the words that she was feeling about her staff member.  These are the words that she listed:

• Upset
• Angry
• Mistrusting
• Disappointed
• Frustrated
• Challenged
• Stressed
• Let Down
• Don’t like her
• Negatively influencing the team
• Sad
• Can’t get through to her
• No middle ground
• Giving too much
• Stuck
• Don’t know what to do

I then asked her to spend a moment really trying to get inside the thoughts and feelings of her member of staff.  I asked her to try and really imagine what it is like to be that person. Then I asked her to list all of the words that she imagined her member of staff might be feeling.  This is what she said:

• Shitty
• Under Pressure
• Not valued
• Angry
• Fearful
• Frustrated
• Let Down
• Mistrusting
• Not Supported

As you can see, although the two lists aren’t exactly the same the feeling emanating from both of them is pretty similar.

My client quickly realised that if both of them are feeling this way then the chances of finding any kind of professional, constructive or peaceful resolution to their issues wasn’t going to appear any time soon.  During the session we decided that she would discuss both of the above lists in an open, warm and caring way.  This way, she felt that it would be much easier to discuss some performance issues that she had concerns about in the hope that this difficult relationship could be put back onto a much healthier footing.

Regardless of who is right or wrong, for the sake of securing a positive resolution, it’s my view that we all need to start looking for the commonalities that we have with the people we work with.  It’s really easy to identify how different we are from everyone but this just helps us to remain apart from others.  Finding the common ground might take a bit of soul searching but for the sake of a peaceful and productive workplace my experience tells me it’s a much nicer way to do business for all concerned.

Once we understand where we have things in common with the people we work with, the resolutions will often float to the surface without a great deal of effort.  If you’re having problems with a member of your team perhaps you could give this approach a try, just once, and see whether it makes a difference.

As always I would love to know your thoughts and experiences.

Lots of love

Jules

• Chill
• Courage
• Communicate
• Care
• Celebrate

Hope you find this useful and I do hope you will devise your own victory dance and find something to celebrate every day.

Let me know how you get on.

Jules

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Obviously tenants agreements will state that no smoking is allowed inside the building which means that smokers need to stand outside the building when they want to smoke.

Truthfully my initial reaction to seeing all of these cigarette buts was one of offence.  It makes the approach to the building look awful (in my opinion).  Worse that many of the buts were littered underneath my bedroom window which is on the ground floor.   Fortunately my bedroom window has been closed recently but won’t be from now onwards as the weather improves.

It’s obvious that what I consider to be acceptable standards of behaviour is not the same as for other people.  I do know that if I was a smoker I wouldn’t drop my buts at the front door and take the risk of offending others.  If I want it to stop I’m going to have to do something about it.  I’m not sure what that might be yet as I don’t know who is responsible and what might be a good approach that would not cause offence in return.

Whilst mulling this tiny problem it reminded me of managers that I have worked with who don’t take the time to define acceptable standards and behaviours for their teams.

Too many businesses have publicised their standards of ‘excellent customer service’, and thereby acceptable behaviour, because they have worked out how they can deliver their service cost effectively and within the boundaries of current resources.

The most effective teams I have ever worked with have been those who have defined and communicated what they consider to be acceptable standards and behaviours whilst at work.  Attending to the detail of how a team behaves shows elegant team management.

What is acceptable behaviour?  In my experience acceptable standards and behaviour tend to be driven by customers needs.  For example, some customers like an informal chatty approach on the telephone but others would find this unacceptable and would prefer a more formal approach.  As the manager, if you don’t communicate this to your team and leave them to their ‘best efforts’ it could sour future relationships and have long term repercussions.

The best and easiest way to identify what your customers want in terms of behaviour is to ask them.  It seems fairly obvious but not many team managers I know have gone to these lengths.  What is ‘excellent customer service’ to you isn’t necessarily ‘excellent’ to me.  One of my customers was quite happy to be kept informed of updates and progress via email with minimal words and was happy with just facts and figures.  I found this out by calling him and being told, in a very straighforward manner, that he didn’t have time for ‘chatting’.  Other customers felt happier if phone calls were made so that a nice, ‘get to know you’ conversation could take place.

Taking the step of asking your customers how they would like the service delivered to them would ensure several things:

1. You would have a vehicle for discussing acceptable standards with your team
2. You will be able to communicate clearly with and to your team about what is acceptable and thereby, what is not
3. More than likely, you will have impressed your customers by the fact that you have taken the time to ask them what they want
4. You will have created the potential for discussions about increasing business or selling other services with your customer

In approaching team management in this way you are doing everything you can to improve the image of you and your team.  For those team members who don’t want to play the game, you also have a vehicle for managing performance or managing them out of the business if need be.

With the increase in internet/social media marketing it’s never been easier for your customers to find an alternative supplier so it’s critical that you create great relationships with them that secures their loyalty for the long term.  Taking the time to understand what they consider acceptable in your team’s behaviour may take a bit of time but will ultimately reap the greatest rewards.

I would love to hear your views and thoughts on the above so please take the time to comment.  It would be greatly appreciated.

Jules

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