UTurn^TV

….…‘How to stop staff crying in the corridors and bitching in the kitchen!’

If you’ve ever had one of those days when you get nothing done because you’re dealing with staff crises, then this is the seminar for you.

Whether their woes are justified (let’s face it times are hard) and they really need your support, or whether the tantrums and twisting are down to internal issues, there’s a way to solve them all.  In just two hours you’ll learn:

• How to spot the problems before they start
• How to deal with each issue as a team
• How to get your team working together happily

Book Online now: http://happierstaff.eventbrite.com/

You’ll hear from UTurn’s own Jules Rutherford, who used her vast experience in team management to develop the Moments of Clarity programme.    In this insightful and interactive seminar, Jules will share her real life tales – some will amuse you, some will amaze you, including:

• How a Snickers Bar improved my performance
• What happened when I hit my target to employ 72 people in just 3 months

Book Online now: http://happierstaff.eventbrite.com/

You’ll learn something from each tale to help you work in a caring and compassionate way and keep your staff happy.

Places are limited so book your place today for the chance to experience how it feels to have a MOMENT OF CLARITY LIVE in the seminar.

Book Online now: http://happierstaff.eventbrite.com/

I had a great day today at an all day business seminar.  There were some truly inspirational speakers, one of which was Mr Richard Denny.  He said something that inspired me to do this video.  I hope it inspires you too.

Check out Richard Denny’s website at www.denny.co.uk

Jules

Yesterday I had lunch with the lovely Justin Turner who is the MD of Carrot Media.  I delivered my Team Building programme to him and his team just over a year ago when they were experiencing some operational and staff challenges.  Over a year later he has done a video for me where he explains that not only did Moments of Clarity resolve their issues in the short term but has had a long lasting effect on the team and the success of the business.

Thank you Justin.

Jules

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Is your workplace plagued with petty behaviour?  Is your team culture negative and filled with too much stuff that doesn’t have anything to do with getting the job done? 

As ever I would love to hear your thoughts…

Jules

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If, like me, you are one of the 2.5 million viewers of the Channel 4 programme Undercover Boss I wonder how many of you reflect on this programme in relation to your own workplace?  I’m sure you do.  The comparisons will be really easy to make.

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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In this video Jules asks how do you deal with stresses of birthday cake buying in your workplace?  Is it a source of stress, or have you adopted a share and share alike attitude – even if one person in your team refuses to buy cakes on their birthday.  Teams work best if you can cultivate an atmosphere of open, honest communication.  Is that your team?

Without positive feedback from your team it’s very difficult to know whether or not you are getting it right for them.  You need to be a little bit brave and willing to improve on the feedback you get but the benefits will far outweigh any dent in your ego.  This video explains why getting positive feedback can improve your performance and make your team happier.

If you want to go through this exercise with your team please email me at jules@uturntv.co.uk and I will send you the questionnaire and the guidelines which will help you make this a positive experience.

Hope to hear from you.

Jules

The following blog is taken from a Project Management website owned by a friend of mine.  He is the best Project Manager I have ever worked with and is the only one I know that can bring in an IT project on time and on budget.  Whilst Ian focuses on ensuring efficiency within the project management tasks it is great to see that he also recognises the need to ensure that the emotional needs of staff need to be taken into consideration too.

The constant focus on hard tasks, deadlines and outcomes above all else is often a recipe for creating unhappy staff.  The best managers take an holistic approach to their teams and make sure they check in on the ‘happiness monitor’ on a regular basis.

You can visit Ian’s site at P M Advice.  I hope you enjoy his blog as much as I did and as always I would love to hear your thoughts.

Push, Push … and SNAP!

I work with so many programmes and projects that run to tight deadlines and suffer from mistakes that cost the programme days even weeks of delays. Why is it so hard for managers to understand that constant over working of staff will result in mistakes, in re-work, in lost time due to having to fix the mistakes. Management must recognise that driving staff to do excessive hours only works for short a period, in my experience, about two weeks, then mistakes start happening that cost more time than that perceived to be saved by pushing on.

So, remember as a professional project manager, you are only as good as the team around you, so it is your job to manage their hours to avoid over working and the impact of mistakes. This month I have witnessed a massive push to hit a, made up, deadline that has resulted in mistakes and problems causing over 3 weeks worth of delays. Added to this is the personal impact on each individual that will last longer, as sickness lost further time and damaged personal relationships outside the office are also damaged.

Remember a happy team, works far more effectively than an unhappy worn out team.

Teams often spend too much time running around like headless chickens and call it work.  In the majority of cases someone avoided making the time to put some stabilising foundations in place which would ultimately save time and money.  Is your team like that?  Do you spend all day sticking Elastoplasts on broken arms?  This video might help.

What a funny old week.  I have had several meetings and training sessions this week with clients and business associates where the conversation has turned away from the main reason for the meeting onto more personal subjects.  As someone who is always willing to lend a listening ear to anyone in need I often find myself furiously scribbling book titles, website, music and organisations that have supported me in my personal development over the last 11 years.

In my work with middle management and teams, looking at who I am in a positive way and learning new and better ways of approaching life has made a big difference to how I work so as you can imagine I’m a big fan.

I thought it might be useful (and save me some time!) to list below what has inspired me over the years.  I’m not claiming that these things are ‘the answer’ – they just happened to work for me.  If they work for you that’s great.  If not then I hope you find what you’re looking for somewhere.

The Celestine Prophecy: An Adventure – This book by James Redfield was the first one I read that was in the personal development genre.  At the time it blew me away and it’s still one of my favourites.  I had no idea that you could ‘be better’ or ‘be happier’ by reading anything so it was a revelation on many levels.  Looking back, I now know that because it was presented in story format it made it easy for me to accept and acknowledge the concepts you are encouraged to consider.  The blurb about the book is “THE CELESTINE PROPHECY tells a gripping story of adventure and discovery, but is also a guidebook that has the power to crystallize your perceptions of why you are where you are in life–and to direct your steps with a new energy and optimism as you head into tomorrow.”

The Power Of Intention: Change The Way You Look At Things And The Things You Look At Will Change: Learning to Co-create Your World Your Way – Wayne Dyers book is pretty well described in the subtitle of this book.  I found it incredibly useful for looking at the world differently than I ever had done.  It certainly helped me to see how much of the negative stuff in my life was being created by me.

The Power of Focus: How to Hit Your Business, Personal and Financial Targets with Absolute Certainty – I love Jack Canfield (obviously not like that because that would be weird seeing as I don’t know him).  I love his practical, useful and down to earth style that tells it like it is in the nicest way.  The Power of Focus is great if you want to get control over your life but don’t even know how to start a To Do List.

Ludovico Einaudi is a classical pianist and composer who is still alive.  He writes some of the most beautiful music I have ever heard.  Taking time to relax and chill out is an essential part of staying sane and this music is just perfect for that.  There is peace and beauty in this music that takes you to another place.  (Mines always a hammock on a tropical beach.)  My favourite albums are Divenire, Einaudi: Le Onde and Nightbook which is his latest release.  If you ever get the opportunity to see him play live it will be well worth it.

In what sometimes seems like a mad mad world His Holiness the Dalai Lama’s book The Art of Happiness: A Handbook for Living is a great book for challenging your thinking on how the world should be.  I would never call myself a bhuddist but there is a huge amount of wisdom in this book that will apply to everyone’s life.

In order to keep my skills and head in the right place I work with a wonderful woman called Jane Lumley.  Describing what she does would take all day so beyond saying she is a Health Kinesiologist I would strongly suggest checking her out.  Her site is Reflecting Health and I would encourage you to explore what she does.

Reading Nelson Mandella’s auto biography makes you realise that when you have belief anything is possible. Although I would always recommend reading any books about inspirational people, Nelson Mandella’s strength of character shines throughout this book. A Long Walk to Freedom: The Autobiography of Nelson Mandela

I have just realised as I have been writing this that I could end up making this blog the longest blog in history!  There is so much out there that can inspire you to change whatever aspect of your life you feel needs to change.  Perhaps the list above will give you some starting points that will lead you to exactly what you need.  I certainly hope so.

I would love to know what inspires you.  Please feel free to share your thoughts in the comments below so that anyone who reads this can have wider choice.

I hope wherever you are you are well and fine.

Much love

Jules

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