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Archive for the ‘Business Growth & Entrepreneurial Strategy’ Category

The Language of Business

Friday, November 25th, 2011

You can find a wealth of information about how a business runs and how well it does with it’s employees and customers simply by listening to the words the leaders use.

Words create perception; perception creates a perceived reality; a perceived reality drives behavior. And – behavior has consequences, by either reinforcing or deteriorating relationships. [Tip: One of our current favorite business books explores this principle in great detail - Tribal Leadership, Leveraging Natural Groups to Build a Thriving Organization (2011), by Dave Logan, John King & Halee Fischer-Wright.]

Listen to the words used in your organization. Do you hear phrases such as:

Our CEO is incompetent
This place sucks – we have no chance to do what we want
The customer has no idea what he wants
People around here just aren’t making the grade, no wonder we’re behind our competition
The problem with some of our people is their not ready for prime time
The only person you can trust is yourself – everyone’s out for their own back

Or, do you hear phases like:

Our customers are amazing and remarkably loyal
If it wasn’t for this team there would be no way we could have finished this project
We have so many good people no wonder we are doing so well
Our problem is that we are growing fast, which is a good problem to have
Our CEO actually gave his cell phone number out and we are all welcome to call him if we have a concern
This is such a great place to work, staff love it here and so do our customers

Look at the words used – customer, employee, CEO, description of the employees, how employees are referred to – similar words; very different meaning. And how they are used and how regularly will largely influence your culture – thereby your employees’ experience, customers experience and ultimately, your profitability!

As the leader, CEO, President, business owner, you have a responsibility to set the example, to shape the culture of the organization – and one key way you do this is through your use of language.

And if you happen to think that how you use language is not all that important, you can be sure of one thing – your past employees and your past customers got it. What would they say, you said?

For additional information on key issues and topics on Leadership see our blogs, free articles, white papers and videos at: www.kubicalaforestconsulting.com

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Posted in Business Growth & Entrepreneurial Strategy, Culture Building: Creating a Talent Gravity Organization, Leadership | No Comments »

Business Growth Strategies Part 2: Executive Responsibilities

Monday, November 21st, 2011

In summary of part one: Talented executives with a talented team of employees are a disruptive force in the marketplace. Executives bring the strategic vision, the employee’s create innovative ways to execute the strategy and implement it.

http://www.kubicalaforestconsulting.com/blog/2011/11/business-growth-strategies-how-it-all-comes-together-part-1/

And as the executive, the part that you are responsible for – is:

Ensuring your executive team provides a clear and concise strategic vision or direction for the company
Ensuring alignment between members of the executive team in developing the strategy and in leading it
Ensuring performance accountability in each executive member (and their ability to build and work with a strong team if they have employees/departments)
Ensuring interpretation (communication) of the strategy and key priorities cascade from the executives through the middle managers to the staff.
Providing strategy implementation guidance and support.
Ensuring the executive team puts in place customer-centric growth and retention strategies using employee feedback and ideas.
Ensuring that you have a succession plan for all critical positions/levels of your business. This is a inter-related element for business growth and talent management.

No business is perfect. Growth is complicated and stressful. But providing strategic leadership and direction by setting and messaging a clear strategy; understanding, making and keeping promises to your customers and your employees, and letting your employees contribute their best is what will grow and distinguish you.

For additional information on our unique model for business growth, see our blogs, free articles, white papers and videos at: www.kubicalaforestconsulting.com

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Posted in Business Growth & Entrepreneurial Strategy, Leadership, Professional Growth & Development, Talent Management: Selection & Development | No Comments »

Business Growth Strategies: How It All Comes Together Part 1

Thursday, November 17th, 2011

We’ve recently been writing about becoming a Talent Gravity Organization, and what’s required to achieve it. What you can’t do is grow your business without talented people. And the whole purpose of becoming a Talent Gravity Organization is to attract and retain high potential employees that help you grow your business.

So, what keeps talented people interested, productive, and creative that we haven’t yet addressed through an attractive brand, engaging culture, and growth environment? Strategy: A clear and embraced picture (or some prefer to call it a vision or direction) presenting a worthwhile challenge. Employees, too, want to win; they want to be the best; they want bragging rights with their family and friends.

You have a choice as the leader. You can emulate Reed Hastings of Netflix and grasp defeat out of the jaws of victory by coming up with a “customer doesn’t matter all that much” strategy, or you can emulate Jeff Bezos of Amazon who continues to build his business and garner strong customer loyalty through the Amazon Prime program.

Vision counts; arrogance is out. Poor growth strategy or lack of it (including employees not knowing it even if executives do—is reckless and totally avoidable.

Talented executives with a talented team of employees are a disruptive force in the marketplace. Executives bring the strategic vision, the employees fill in the details, create innovative ways to execute the strategy, and then implement. It’s truly a synergistic relationship. In our part two of Business Growth Strategy, we will provide you with the executive responsibilities and tips for building a strong business growth strategy for your company.

For additional information on our unique model for business growth, see our blogs, free articles, white papers, and videos at: www.kubicalaforestconsulting.com

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Posted in Business Growth & Entrepreneurial Strategy, Leadership, Professional Growth & Development | No Comments »

Why Talent Management Matters: Food for Growth

Monday, November 7th, 2011

In last Monday’s Blog (http://www.kubicalaforestconsulting.com/blog/2011/10/talent-management-and-the-talent-gravity-organization/), we wrote about the third keystone of a Talent Gravity Organization: Talent Management. And we presented eight components that comprise a strong talent management process.

The best way to look at the eight components is not linear, but as a circle starting with talent selection, with each component building on the previous component. Succession planning is the transition point. The point where one employee transitions out (into a new and bigger role within your organization) and another fills the vacancy. Think about this as an upward spiral for the employee.

Talent Selection: Through a rigorous vetting process (see our White Paper on Talent Recruiting and Integration and our article on Hiring for Fast Growing Companies – links below) the optimal candidate for your organization is selected.

Orientation and On-boarding: It’s important that the candidate gets the basics of employment addressed (signing required forms, benefits sign up and so forth) and also learns the “rules of the road” as they join your organization.

Performance Review System: The operant word is “system”. Employees need feedback, positive and negative so as to understand what they are doing well and what they can be doing better. This is not a once a year event, however. It’s an on-going process throughout the year.

Learning and Growth: Skills need to be developed, updated, and honed. And it can be provided through formal education, seminars, conferences or certification programs.

Incentive, Rewards and Recognition Program: This is a critical and often under-used component of management development. People’s internal motivations trigger differently. Some like accolades; some like rewards, some want something to strive for – a goal. But there is one commonality – no one likes to be taken for granted, or ignored or overlooked.

Management Training and Education: This is training specifically for managers new to management – those rising out of technical, clinical or field roles.

Leadership Development: For the candidate, this includes a developmental assessment of leadership traits and an integrative coaching process to transition and improve the new candidate’s integration into the organization, or to develop leadership style and qualities as a future successor. Leadership development for the entire executive team similarly uses the traits assessment for individual members and the entire group, whereas strengths in performance and potential areas of risk and underperformance are determined, with a collaborative and aligned effort for accelerated performance.

Succession Planning: Growth requires people to fill growth support positions. In this context:

Who replaces the employee that is ready for promotion?
Who fills the new position that is required to introduce a new product or service line?
Who fills your position if you do not show up for work tomorrow – for any reason?

Businesses are “organic organisms”. They live or die based on how they are nourished. And it is your talent that nourishes your organization. So don’t feed it junk or starve it.

Talent Management and the Talent Gravity Organization

Monday, October 31st, 2011

Our series on the Talent Gravity Organization focuses on helping you compete successfully in a talent shortage market place.

In past blogs, we discussed the importance of a strong brand to attract interest from prospective job candidates. We discussed culture (the way we do things around here) as an added attractor for future job candidates.

So now you’ve got their attention (brand), they liked what they saw during the interview (culture) – what’s next? How do you close the deal and not have buyer’s remorse – or a disappointed new employee?

Talent Management. It’s the third keystone in a Talent Gravity Organization. And talent management starts with selection. (Remember your brand and culture brought them to the point where they are interested in talking to you about employment.)

We recommend eight components for a successful talent management program:

1) A formal Talent Selection process

2) An Orientation / Onboarding program (supporting transition and swift assimilation to your organization)

3) A Performance Review System (evaluating and providing timely and meaningful feedback to the employee)

4) Opportunity for Learning and Growth (whether training is part of annual goals identified by and with the employee, a learning management system, coaching, off site training or opportunities for certifications)

5) An Incentive, Reward, and Recognition Program (engaging staff to help develop and employ a meaningful incentive and rewards program)

6) Management Training (preparing new/promoted managers for their role as leaders verses staff, line or field workers)

7) Leadership Development (to establish and promote emerging leaders for your succession plan)

8) Succession Planning (identifying and developing the leadership pipeline of successor candidates for exec and mid management roles)

Talent selection and retention is a longitudinal process; it’s not an event. You do not hire an employee and just assume they will start contributing day one. That is an incorrect assumption and a contributor to what is often referred to as a “hiring mistake”. It can also be an on-boarding mistake and that one is on the employer.

Remember, the process is not over when you hire a new employee, it is not something you check off of your To Do list as you move on to the next task on your list. It’s a process that starts – not ends – with the job offer.

Careers must be developed, nurtured, guided, and promoted.

How is your talent management process? Do you have the eight components in place, and if you do, do you make it a strong selling point in the hiring process?

In the changing demographic of the employee population, talent management is becoming a critical differentiator to attracting talent.

For more information on talent management and our unique model for business growth, see our blogs, free articles, white papers and videos at: www.kubicalaforestconsulting.com

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Posted in Business Growth & Entrepreneurial Strategy, Leadership, Talent Management: Selection & Development | No Comments »

Culture and the Talent Gravity Organization

Friday, October 28th, 2011

In Monday’s Blog (http://www.kubicalaforestconsulting.com/blog/2011/10/the-second-keystone-of-a-talent-gravity-organization/), we introduced Culture as the second keystone in a Talent Gravity Organization and provided some examples of a positive culture and a negative culture.

US Airways offers a credit card where you get 30,000 miles when you sign up and use your card for the first time. Sounds good until you discover that US Airways has one of the worst (26%) miles redemption program in the business. (And miles aren’t banked until you pay a start up fee of $80, which they don’t tell you up front either.) The brand (promise) and the culture (delivery on the promise) don’t line up well. Want to know who has the best: Southwest.

Now if you are an air traveler and have flown US Airways and Southwest, compare and contrast for yourself. Southwest has a great brand, a great culture, and it’s fun to fly. And if you were an employee looking for a job, where would you look first – Southwest. Southwest is rated #1 as the best airline to work for. It’s also profitable and gets a 5 star rating from J.D. Powers and Associates on customer satisfaction.

None of this happens by chance: the stronger the culture the stronger the gravitational attraction for future employees.

So how is your culture? If you don’t know – ask. Ask your employees, and here’s a potent way to do it: Conduct a climate survey that combines both a standardized electronically administered questionnaire supported with interviews with a randomly selected group of employees.

The results from the survey and interviews should be presented to the executive team – not just the CEO – with an analysis of findings and a listing of what the employees feel would improve their employment experience at your company. Then act on the information you have, including sharing the results and your plan with the employees. Follow-up and transparency are important to help employees feel you care and are acting upon their feedback. Miss this and next time they won’t engage, and skepticism will grow.

If you are not assessing the climate within your organization and you are frustrated with turnover and the inability to find qualified candidates, realize that it’s your decision (or lack of it). Just don’t waste other people’s time complaining about the lack of qualified candidates. People like to work with good people, they like to enjoy their work environment, they like and deserve to feel good about whom they work for – both the company and the boss. And this comes when you marry a positive brand with a positive culture. Remember, you can’t improve what you choose not to notice.

For more information on culture and our unique model for business growth, see our blogs, free articles, white papers and videos at: www.kubicalaforestconsulting.com

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Posted in Business Growth & Entrepreneurial Strategy, Culture Building: Creating a Talent Gravity Organization, Talent Management: Selection & Development | No Comments »

The Question of Management’s Necessity in Small Businesses

Friday, October 14th, 2011

Is Management Really That Important? In our work with small businesses we do get many variations of this question.

And we hear it in small businesses that:

Don’t believe an organizational structure is needed
Don’t believe in titles (and clear job roles with position descriptions to match)
When the person who runs the company believes that he/she is fully capable of running the company and making all the decisions themselves
When no one, other then themselves, truly understands the business and what is required for it to be successful
And when there is a belief all employees should act and feel the way they act and feel – have the same commitment.

While we find these beliefs are usually strongly held, they are unrealistic for today, unless you are a soloprenuer. Why? Because growing a successful company and holding beliefs such as these are incompatible. Now you may know a company who has these characteristics yet is successful in your opinion. In our experience, loosely run (and some even anti-management in philosophy) companies like this are rare, and many more are lying in the junk pile of broken companies than are positioned as a successful player in the marketplace.

In Monday’s Blog (http://www.kubicalaforestconsulting.com/blog/2011/10/small-business-growth-at-risk-addressing-the-talent-shortage-by-establishing-a-talent-gravity-organization/), we talked about the Kaufman Foundation survey that revealed 21% of the entrepreneurs interviewed said that one of their biggest impediments to growth was managing fast growth. What we don’t know, and the study didn’t reveal, is why. Is it because of the issues raised above or is it because they just can’t seem to put a management structure in place fast enough? Is it because they lack management talent, or is it because they won’t enable management talent to perform to be accountable?

If you are not planning how you will management your company through the ensuing inflection points, you are planning to fail.

You know (or should know) that as your company grows, it will need management and management support structures to deal with the growth. It should never come as a surprise and it should be planned for in advance.

Wherever you are in your business life cycle – new start-up to a fast growing company, plan on how you will manage the company through its growth phases. Plan well in advance. Planning in advance will also help you select the employees you want to help you grow – employees with skills that can evolve as your business evolves. See our article on hiring for fast growing companies. http://www.ere.net/2009/09/11/hiring-for-fast-growing-departments-or-companies/

For more information on business growth and talent management, see our blogs, free articles, white papers and videos at: www.kubicalaforestconsulting.com.

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Posted in Business Growth & Entrepreneurial Strategy, Management & Management Transitions | No Comments »

Small Business Growth – At Risk: Addressing the Talent Shortage by Establishing a Talent Gravity Organization

Monday, October 10th, 2011

In our recent blog, The Slow Leak in Job Creation by Small Business, http://www.kubicalaforestconsulting.com/blog/2011/09/the-slow-leak-in-job-creation-by-small-business/, we discussed the findings from a Kaufman Foundation study (published July 2011 by the Ewing Marion Kauffman Foundation). It provided a mixed report on small business job generation potential. One issue it did not address, but we mentioned in our blog, is the impact of the gap between the education of the workforce and the skills needed to do the work.

The educational gap was revealed in the latest Kaufman survey, as was the challenge of managing a fast growing business. http://www.kauffman.org/newsroom/high-growth-entrepreneurs-plan-to-continue-growing.aspx

The survey, conducted with entrepreneurs at the Inc. 500 Conference found that the biggest impediments to growth are:

Finding qualified people (40%)
Managing fast growth (21%)
Accessing capital (16%)
Sluggish economy (13%)
Taxes (4%)
Regulatory uncertainty (3%)

Finding qualified people and managing fast growth represent 61% of the impediments facing fast growing companies.

Finding qualified people will continue to plague the marketplace for the next few years.

It will take time for the educational system to catch up with the new marketplace demands. You have two choices as an entrepreneur and small business owner:

You can complain about it and about the shortcomings of the educational system – the “ain’t it awful” syndrome
You can focus on becoming what we call a “talent gravity organization” and make choosing your company the decision of choice.

It’s like musical chairs. When the music stops some chairs will be empty – your goal is be ensure that it’s not your chair that’s empty!

To help ensure this, we encourage you to become a talent gravity organization: a place that draws people to you, as people are drawn to work for Google and Apple for example.

Building a talent gravity organization requires working on:

Your brand
Your culture
Building strong strategic leadership to establish strategic growth plans
Embedding sound management practices
Being competitive in the market place with compensation and benefits
Being a learning organization so people that come will stay and grow with you
Being a business that celebrates and recognizes the greatness in your employees

Interesting, as you build a talent gravity organization, you will also be addressing the second impediment to growth – managing a fast growing company.

In the weeks ahead we will explore what’s required to become a talent gravity organization.

For more information on business growth, see our blogs, free articles, white papers and videos at: www.kubicalaforestconsulting.com

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Posted in Business Growth & Entrepreneurial Strategy, Culture Building: Creating a Talent Gravity Organization | No Comments »

Your Business Through the Eyes of Your Customer

Monday, October 3rd, 2011

How you see your see your business doesn’t matter. How your customer sees your business matters.

In a study conducted by Bain, they found “that while 80% of the managers (who participated in the study) believe they are highly differentiated in their core market, only 8% of customers, when asked, agreed.”

How do you describe your business differentiators?

We have outstanding customer service
We have the best customer response rate in the business
We complete our projects on time and on budget
Our executive team is second to none
Our employees are the best in the business
Our product blows away the competition
It’s hard to answer that question because we have no competition

Who says? Unless your customer says, it doesn’t matter what you say. But if you actually believe what you say in the absence of customer based feedback, you are raising a barrier to future success.

Hubris and the proverbial “head in the sand” behavior do not help grow a business. There are enough external factors and economic challenges as it is; you don’t have to add to your business challenges by being detached from reality.

Another problem you create is the dissonance between your culture and your brand. If your brand touts these superlatives, yet your customers disagree, you have clear evidence that your culture – the way work gets done around here – doesn’t support your brand.

And what makes this so problematic is that telling yourself and your employees how great the company is creates one of two problems:

Lack of credibility with your employees – simply they don’t believe you
Employees who buy into the hype and see no reason to do anything other than what they are doing

If growth is important to you – ask your customer how you’re doing. And listen carefully. The information your customer provides is your road map for improvement and growth.

For more information on business growth, see our blogs, free articles, white papers and videos at: www.kubicalaforestconsulting.com

If you enjoyed this piece, please consider sharing it!

Posted in Business Growth & Entrepreneurial Strategy, Customer Service | No Comments »

Motivated, Aligned, and Satisfied Employees are Differentiators

Thursday, September 29th, 2011

Demoralized workers do not do great work. Organizations do not become remarkable with demoralized staff. Customers do not love their experience with demoralized employees. Yet we find managers catalyzing demoralizing behavior every day.

In the last couple of weeks we saw:

Bank of America announce it will layoff 30,000 employees
The Chairman of the Board of Yahoo firing the CEO over the telephone
H-P firing it’s 3^rd CEO – the latest one lasting 11 months

And what do workers do when faced with these issues?

They actively look to leave the company, and the best one’s do
They hunker down, stay out of the way, and just do what they are told to do – keeping as low a profile as possible
They become disruptive
They decide to look better than others and do whatever it takes to discredit their colleagues – and interject an “every person for themselves” mentality, which further deteriorates the culture

And the managers are greatly hindered in their ability to help, basically for two key reasons: 1- many of them are in exactly the same position as the workers, and/or 2- they tend to discount the good advice of others, meaning power can hinder willingness to listen. And regarding this point, the Wall Street Journal (9/19/11) reported that a recent study to be published in the November issue of journal Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes found:

“That the more power the employees (managers) had the less likely

they were to take co-workers advice. The reason: Powerful

individuals held inflated confidence in their own judgments,

which led them to discount even good advice from others.”

So we see poor leadership, demoralized workers and managers who discount good advice from others. Now the best way to look at this is – that’s your competition. Your competition has a reasonable probability of being a dysfunctional organization. And dysfunctional organizations are not – and cannot be remarkable.

So, do you know how your employees are doing; what they feel and believe about the organization and about their managers (including you)? If you don’t, you should! Don’t be one of those managers with an inflated confidence believing you have it all figured out. Motivated, aligned and satisfied employees represent a significant differentiator in the marketplace. How strong is your differentiation?

For more information on talent management, see our blogs, free articles, white papers and videos at: www.kubicalaforestconsulting.com

If you enjoyed this piece, please consider sharing it!

Posted in Business Growth & Entrepreneurial Strategy | No Comments »

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Archive for the ‘Business Growth & Entrepreneurial Strategy’ Category

The Language of Business

Business Growth Strategies Part 2: Executive Responsibilities

Business Growth Strategies: How It All Comes Together Part 1

Why Talent Management Matters: Food for Growth

Talent Management and the Talent Gravity Organization

Culture and the Talent Gravity Organization

The Question of Management’s Necessity in Small Businesses

Small Business Growth – At Risk: Addressing the Talent Shortage by Establishing a Talent Gravity Organization

Your Business Through the Eyes of Your Customer

Motivated, Aligned, and Satisfied Employees are Differentiators