Financial Incentives May Not Motivate
by Jeffrey Pfeffer,Thomas D Dee /August 2007
Research by Jeffrey Pfeffer, Thomas D. Dee II professor of organizational behaviour at Stanford Graduate School of Business, published in The Conference Board Review and "What Were They Thinking?: Unconventional Wisdom About Management" (Harvard Business School Press) suggests that the common management practice of offering financial incentives as motivators can have the reverse effect.
Jeffrey Pfeffer said:
"Incentives should be used not to drive behavior but instead to provide recognition and to share the company's success with its employees. There are, unfortunately, few shortcuts in leadership-and using financial incentives to fix companies isn't one of them."
The study found that organizations increasingly have been using individual incentive pay with the intention of improving productivity and efficiency. It cites a salary survey by Hewitt Associates, the compensation and human resources consultancy, which found the percentage of companies offering at least one plan tying pay to performance rose from 51 per cent in 1991 to 77 per cent in 2003.
Jeffrey Pfeffer said organizations can be misguided if they use incentive pay based on the belief "that if employees were just compensated appropriately, virtually every organizational and management problem could be solved."
The report cites the author's own experience buying a car. When the salesman (paid by commission) was told he and his wife were not planning to make a purchase that afternoon he began ignoring them. They ended up buying from another dealership where more attentive salespeople "tried to build a customer-service culture and encourage dealer loyalty."
The author also cited the experience of city officials in Albuquerque who began paying garbage collection crews for eight hours of work irrespective of how long it took them to complete their routes in an attempt to cut overtime costs. Far from encouraging workers to finish the job quickly, some crews cut corners "missing pick-ups; speeding, which caused accidents; or driving to the dump with overloaded trucks, which led to fines".
Jeffrey Pfeffer also challenges the controversial practice of awarding stock option grants to top executives:
"There is evidence that the higher the option grants to senior executives, the more likely it is that their companies will have to subsequently restate their financial statements."
The author questions the common assumption that employees are motivated primarily by money and suggests that too much reliance has been placed on financial rewards. A supportive organizational culture can be just as important.
Jeffrey Pfeffer commented:
"You want rewards to be large enough to be noticed, and you want to use them to provide an occasion for celebration and recognition, to let the group come together and share successes and enjoy each other's companionship. But you certainly don't want to make the incentives so large that they begin to drive, and thereby distort, behavior."
"One can change a pay system or a set of financial rewards fairly quickly and easily. It is much harder to change organizational culture, people's mindsets and beliefs, their knowledge and skills, and how effectively they work and communicate with each other. Thus, financial incentives offer the mirage of a quick fix-and contemporary management seems to be enamored of that idea."
Motivation
Thursday, January 24, 2008
Posted by Handoko T Porrung at 1:16 PM 0 comments
Women in Leadership
Gender stereotyping a key barrier
by: Ilene H Lang (July 2007)
A new survey has found that gender stereotyping continues to be a key barrier to the advancement of women in corporate leadership and leaves women leaders with limited and conflicting options.
The Double-Bind Dilemma for Women in Leadership: Damned if You Do, Doomed if You Don't is the third in a series of reports examining the effects of gender stereotyping in the workplace by Catalyst, a non-profit organization working to advance opportunities for women and business. The study surveyed men and women business leaders in the US and Europe. Of 1231 participants, 296 were US senior managers and corporate leaders (168 women and 128 men) and 935 were European managers and senior managers (282 women and 653 men). The second part of the study provides qualitative analysis of in-depth, semi-structured interviews with 13 women leaders in a large US corporation.
The report argues that gender stereotyping results in organizations routinely underestimating and underutilizing women's leadership talent. The 2006 Catalyst Census shows that while women make up over 50 per cent of management, professional and related occupations, only 15.6 per cent of Fortune 500 corporate officers and 14.6 per cent of Fortune 500 board directors are women.
Ilene H. Lang, Catalyst president said:
"When companies fail to acknowledge and address the impact of gender stereotypic bias, they lose out on top female talent. Ultimately, it's not women's leadership styles that need to change. Only when organizations take action to address the impact of gender stereotyping will they be able to capitalize on the `full deck' of talent."
The report highlights numerous previous studies demonstrating similar leadership styles in men and women. However, earlier research by Catalyst found that women business leaders faced persistent gender stereotyping frequently confronting them with double-bind "no-win" dilemmas not experienced by men. The current study found that men are still perceived as "default leaders" while women are considered "atypical leaders" and as violating accepted norms, irrespective of their leadership style.
The survey identifies three common dilemmas currently experienced by women business leaders, supported by comments from participants:
1. Extreme perceptions. Women business leaders are perceived as "never just right". Those who act in a manner consistent with gender stereotypes are considered too soft, those who go against them are considered too tough.
"My observations show senior women to be at either end of the spectrum, drivers that do it themselves (even though they might have given it to someone). This type tends to give little recognition and is a perfectionist. The others are very effective delegators, giving lots of recognition and building loyal teams, but can be perceived as 'not tough enough'" (US man, age 35-44, level not specified).
2. High competence threshold/lower rewards. Women leaders face higher standards than their male counterparts and receive less reward. Often they must work doubly hard to achieve the same level of recognition for the same level of work and "prove" they can lead.
"Men and women are seen differently, and the difference in my experience and observation is that we (women) need to show it more times before they believe it. With a woman, they will want to see the behaviour repeated more frequently before they will say that this is really part of the women (sic) and her capabilities" (European woman, high-potential manager).
3. Competent but disliked. Women exhibiting traditional leadership skills such as assertiveness tend to be seen as competent but not personable or well-liked. Those who adopt a more stereotypically feminine style are liked but not seen as having valued leadership skills.
"...it may just be that people are more sensitive to how women behave in that regard. There does seem to be a little more tolerance for harsh behavior from men rather than women. Women are quicker to get labeled, and with men, it's easier to brush it off..." (High-potential woman, US-based manager).
"I have experienced in the past that women can be distrusted in leadership roles, especially when they use a dominant style of communication. On the contrary, if they use a collaborative style serving their organization and empowering people, they get more recognition and sincere appreciation from their male equals" (Spanish man, age 31-35, middle management).
The report suggests that organizations need to develop strategies to remove the pervasive and damaging impact of gender stereotyping from the work environment to take advantage of the expanding pool of female leadership talent.
Ilene H. Lang explained:
"While women may address double-bind dilemmas with individual strategies this is clearly about organizations shifting their norms and culture to meet marketplace demands."
The report argues that education about how stereotyping works and holding individuals accountable can decrease the negative impact of gender bias. Actions that organizations can take include:
* Providing all employees with tools and resources to increase awareness of women leaders' skills and the effects of stereotypic perceptions.
* Assessing the work environment to identify ways in which women are at risk of stereotypic bias.
* Creating and implementing innovative work practices that target stereotypic bias; particularly effective when specific areas of risk, such as performance management procedures, are addressed.
The report suggests ways in which organizations can apply this knowledge:
* Managerial training and diversity education - educating managers and employees about the origin and consequences of bias, inconsistencies between values and actual behavior, and causes and effects of gender inequality in the workplace.
* Performance and evaluation management - employing objective and unambiguous evaluation criteria.
Posted by Handoko T Porrung at 12:56 PM 0 comments
Business Success
Saturday, January 5, 2008
Common Barriers to Your Business Success by Shaun Kirk
I recently realized something that I consider to be relatively important and I wanted to share it with you. Over the past few years and I ve heard some interesting reasons as to what is holding a business down and keeping it from expanding. Ive heard things such as there is too much competition andtimes have changed and government regulations are the root of all evil and must be destroyed†Ive heard them all.
As a business owner, I used to agree with these reasons quite a bit. When I first decided to learn how to better run my business I hired a consultant and I remember a particular conversation with her whereby she asked me something that I considered rather rude: she asked me why I was not successful. I was very surprised and somewhat angered that she asked me this directly. At first I didnt answer, I just kind of looked at her and shrugged my shoulders. So she asked me again, Why are you not as successful as you know you should be? I said I cant believe youve asked me that question. Ive paid you some money and youre insulting me?She laughed, but persisted and asked me the question again,So Shaun, tell me, why arent you as successful as you know you could be? I hate to say it but I then became really angry. I went on for about 15 minutes giving all the reasons why I couldnt be as successful as other business owners.
After blurting out all my reasons for failure, my consultant very calmly said to me, Im going to tell you something that might upset you. Are you ready? I said yes. She saidYour success or failure in your business is your own doing and as soon as you really understand that, youre on your way out of it.At that moment in my life it was more truth than Ive ever heard. It put me completely flat back into the chair. I said, Wow. So what do I do? She replied, Well show you what to do, but you have to change your mind about a few things. You have to change your mind fromI have all these reasons why I cannot be successful to I can and will be successful. So off we went and my business continued to expand from that point.
At the beginning of this article I mentioned that I had a bit of a revelation when I realized something. Now Im going to tell you what it is. After hearing very many business owners complaining about all the reasons why they arent doing well, I spotted this one very simple thing. They are paying attention to all the barriers to their success.
But what are the barriers? The barriers are nothing more than something that you consider will stop you. If you consider that you cant drive new business in your doors, youl have trouble with that. If you consider that you cant find good people, youll always look around and have a staff that youre never quite happy with, because you cant find good people. The truth is, you can find good people, but you consider that you cannot, so therefore you cannot.
My point is, I realized that all my past excuses and all the excuses Ive heard since from other business owners as to what is holding down the business are simply things that are considered or believed to be true. They are not physical barriers, such as a wall or something that you can touch they are things that you think will hold you back.
Sometimes what is holding you back is a fear of failing, and that fear of failing keeps you from starting anything or sticking your neck out so to speak. Sometimes what keeps you from doing well is thinking if you want anything done right you have to do it yourself Thats the hallmark of an overworked executive. With this thought in place you become exhausted and burn out while the other staff cut out early to go to a soccer game or something like that and dump the work on you.
The only barriers that are worth solving are the barriers that actually keep you from winning the game. If you arent sure what the game is, then you might consider any problem in your office significant enough to handle. This could be something such as having two staff members not getting along and you spending an afternoon trying to patch things up, when most likely if youd just throw them in a room theyd work it out and you could get back to solving the barriers that are in the way of your practice goals being achieved. A true barrier is something that you must confront fully and handle or you will never get to the next step.
About the Author
Shaun Kirk is Co-Founder of Measurable Solutions Inc., a consulting firm engaged in all areas of business management. Measurable Solutions trains entrepreneurs and executives how to be consultants to their own businesses, so they not only can expand their own business but any business. With his partner, Jeff F. Lee, he has built the most rapidly expanding company of its kind in the world. Visit his website at www.measurablesolutions.com.
I recently realized something that I consider to be relatively important and I wanted to share it with you. Over the past few years and I ve heard some interesting reasons as to what is holding a business down and keeping it from expanding. Ive heard things such as there is too much competition andtimes have changed and government regulations are the root of all evil and must be destroyed†Ive heard them all.
As a business owner, I used to agree with these reasons quite a bit. When I first decided to learn how to better run my business I hired a consultant and I remember a particular conversation with her whereby she asked me something that I considered rather rude: she asked me why I was not successful. I was very surprised and somewhat angered that she asked me this directly. At first I didnt answer, I just kind of looked at her and shrugged my shoulders. So she asked me again, Why are you not as successful as you know you should be? I said I cant believe youve asked me that question. Ive paid you some money and youre insulting me?She laughed, but persisted and asked me the question again,So Shaun, tell me, why arent you as successful as you know you could be? I hate to say it but I then became really angry. I went on for about 15 minutes giving all the reasons why I couldnt be as successful as other business owners.
After blurting out all my reasons for failure, my consultant very calmly said to me, Im going to tell you something that might upset you. Are you ready? I said yes. She saidYour success or failure in your business is your own doing and as soon as you really understand that, youre on your way out of it.At that moment in my life it was more truth than Ive ever heard. It put me completely flat back into the chair. I said, Wow. So what do I do? She replied, Well show you what to do, but you have to change your mind about a few things. You have to change your mind fromI have all these reasons why I cannot be successful to I can and will be successful. So off we went and my business continued to expand from that point.
At the beginning of this article I mentioned that I had a bit of a revelation when I realized something. Now Im going to tell you what it is. After hearing very many business owners complaining about all the reasons why they arent doing well, I spotted this one very simple thing. They are paying attention to all the barriers to their success.
But what are the barriers? The barriers are nothing more than something that you consider will stop you. If you consider that you cant drive new business in your doors, youl have trouble with that. If you consider that you cant find good people, youll always look around and have a staff that youre never quite happy with, because you cant find good people. The truth is, you can find good people, but you consider that you cannot, so therefore you cannot.
My point is, I realized that all my past excuses and all the excuses Ive heard since from other business owners as to what is holding down the business are simply things that are considered or believed to be true. They are not physical barriers, such as a wall or something that you can touch they are things that you think will hold you back.
Sometimes what is holding you back is a fear of failing, and that fear of failing keeps you from starting anything or sticking your neck out so to speak. Sometimes what keeps you from doing well is thinking if you want anything done right you have to do it yourself Thats the hallmark of an overworked executive. With this thought in place you become exhausted and burn out while the other staff cut out early to go to a soccer game or something like that and dump the work on you.
The only barriers that are worth solving are the barriers that actually keep you from winning the game. If you arent sure what the game is, then you might consider any problem in your office significant enough to handle. This could be something such as having two staff members not getting along and you spending an afternoon trying to patch things up, when most likely if youd just throw them in a room theyd work it out and you could get back to solving the barriers that are in the way of your practice goals being achieved. A true barrier is something that you must confront fully and handle or you will never get to the next step.
About the Author
Shaun Kirk is Co-Founder of Measurable Solutions Inc., a consulting firm engaged in all areas of business management. Measurable Solutions trains entrepreneurs and executives how to be consultants to their own businesses, so they not only can expand their own business but any business. With his partner, Jeff F. Lee, he has built the most rapidly expanding company of its kind in the world. Visit his website at www.measurablesolutions.com.
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Posted by Handoko T Porrung at 12:40 PM 0 comments
Management Policies
Workforce Management Policies to Keep Skilled People by Lucy Caudle
You might be able to attract people with high value skills through a well-presented ad. However, to keep them with you, your organization must have put in place workforce management policies that make these people want to continue with the organization.
The policies must fit in with the organization and the place where it is located. If the policies are incompatible with the existing organization and place, they are likely to remain just book policies that will not be implemented in their true spirit.
We look at some standard workforce management policies that can create an environment that make people want to remain with you.
Organizational Culture: We mentioned how the organizational environment affects the policies that can be implemented in their true spirit in an organization. You could consider creating an environment that would facilitate the development of your workforce into a cohesive team of achievers. Basically, what you try to do is to create an organizational culture where people tend to help each other rather than blame or hinder each other.
Induction Training: Help new employees to quickly become a productive member of your team through an effective induction process. Introduce them to other team members and help them absorb your organizational culture, and to become familiar with the ways of working in your organization.
Clear Goals and Roles: Develop job descriptions that indicate clearly what team role each employee should seek to play, and what goals the person should seek to achieve.
Goals Aligned to Higher Level Goals: Carefully align employee goals with the team goals, which are aligned with successively higher level goals culminating in overall company goals. That way, the employee would find it easy to contribute in a meaningful manner, and be rewarded accordingly.
Work Environment: Arrange workstations, facilities and tools that help employees perform without undue stress. Uncomfortable workstations, high noise levels, having to find needed tools yourself, and so on are stressful and make employees look for better places to work in.
Credible Performance Measurement and Reward Structure: One of the best motivating factors is being recognized and rewarded for good performance. The performance must be measured in a way that the employee can understand clearly. Good performance, which can also be measured in terms of contribution to team effectiveness, should be rewarded consistently and without discrimination.
Skills and Career Development Options: Each employee should be able to develop his or her skill, and a career development path should be open for his or her progress in the organization. A certification program can add to the attractiveness.
An Effective Mentoring Program: A mentoring program that helps each employee achieve personal and company objectives should supplement the above. The mentor would try to help the employee meet company expectations in a way that also meets personal expectations.
Conclusion
Carefully developed workforce management policies that would fit in with the organization and the place where it is located could pay high dividends. Your organization would then find it easier to attract the right kind of people, with the right skill set that you need. More importantly, you would find it possible to retain these skilled employees in your organization.
We looked at standard workforce management policies that can help you develop a highly motivated workforce in your organization.
About the Author
About author:
Lucy Caudle, Marketing at SMART, writes about the benefits of Workforce-Management-Policies
You might be able to attract people with high value skills through a well-presented ad. However, to keep them with you, your organization must have put in place workforce management policies that make these people want to continue with the organization.
The policies must fit in with the organization and the place where it is located. If the policies are incompatible with the existing organization and place, they are likely to remain just book policies that will not be implemented in their true spirit.
We look at some standard workforce management policies that can create an environment that make people want to remain with you.
Organizational Culture: We mentioned how the organizational environment affects the policies that can be implemented in their true spirit in an organization. You could consider creating an environment that would facilitate the development of your workforce into a cohesive team of achievers. Basically, what you try to do is to create an organizational culture where people tend to help each other rather than blame or hinder each other.
Induction Training: Help new employees to quickly become a productive member of your team through an effective induction process. Introduce them to other team members and help them absorb your organizational culture, and to become familiar with the ways of working in your organization.
Clear Goals and Roles: Develop job descriptions that indicate clearly what team role each employee should seek to play, and what goals the person should seek to achieve.
Goals Aligned to Higher Level Goals: Carefully align employee goals with the team goals, which are aligned with successively higher level goals culminating in overall company goals. That way, the employee would find it easy to contribute in a meaningful manner, and be rewarded accordingly.
Work Environment: Arrange workstations, facilities and tools that help employees perform without undue stress. Uncomfortable workstations, high noise levels, having to find needed tools yourself, and so on are stressful and make employees look for better places to work in.
Credible Performance Measurement and Reward Structure: One of the best motivating factors is being recognized and rewarded for good performance. The performance must be measured in a way that the employee can understand clearly. Good performance, which can also be measured in terms of contribution to team effectiveness, should be rewarded consistently and without discrimination.
Skills and Career Development Options: Each employee should be able to develop his or her skill, and a career development path should be open for his or her progress in the organization. A certification program can add to the attractiveness.
An Effective Mentoring Program: A mentoring program that helps each employee achieve personal and company objectives should supplement the above. The mentor would try to help the employee meet company expectations in a way that also meets personal expectations.
Conclusion
Carefully developed workforce management policies that would fit in with the organization and the place where it is located could pay high dividends. Your organization would then find it easier to attract the right kind of people, with the right skill set that you need. More importantly, you would find it possible to retain these skilled employees in your organization.
We looked at standard workforce management policies that can help you develop a highly motivated workforce in your organization.
About the Author
About author:
Lucy Caudle, Marketing at SMART, writes about the benefits of Workforce-Management-Policies
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Posted by Handoko T Porrung at 12:37 PM 0 comments
Social Responsibility
What is Corporate Social Responsibility? by Steven Ross
Corporate social responsibility is no longer a buzzword, but a permanent concept in the business world.
Corporate social responsibility (CSR) has been defined differently by many different organizations. For example:
1. Your commitment as a company to operate economically, socially and environmentally conscious while balancing the interests of your stockholders.
2. How you manage the processes in your business to impact society positively.
3. The different types of activities you engage in and resources you use to increase your profits without excessive use of deception or fraud.
4. A process of integrating social and environmental concerns into the operation of your business, while seeking a profit.
No matter the definition you choose, Corporate Social Responsibility iis all about taking into consideration the interest of society, environment, shareholders, employees and all other types of social relationships. This is more than just about staying within the law, as far as your obligations are concerned. It is above and beyond that.
For example, there are certain emission laws, as they relate to pollution, to protect the environment. However, many people argue that these laws are ridiculously low in their standards. As a company, you have to consider how much you're willing to pollute the environment, in order to secure a profit. What is the balance? You have to answer that to determine your own social responsibility.
Most people approach corporate social responsibility, as it relates to developing community projects, or aligning with beneficial causes. For example, there are many different businesses who align themselves with breast cancer awareness, to increase the awareness and to help secure funds for research. In this instance, they are using their good standing in the community, as well as their high traffic areas to exercise good social and ethical behavior.
In fact, there are many different Corporate Social Responsiblity standards that a business can comply to, if they want to start enforcing more social responsibility within the corporation. For example, there is Global Reporting Initiative's Sustainability Reporting Guidelines, social accountability international SA8000 standard, and Verite's Monitoring Guidelines.
In conclusion, I have given you some information on what corporate social responsibility is, and how it affects the business world. Use this to determine your own social responsibility within your corporation.
About the Author
Want to learn more about Business Ethics? Steven Ross has written many more fascinating articles at http://www.businessethicsreport.com Business Ethics
Corporate social responsibility is no longer a buzzword, but a permanent concept in the business world.
Corporate social responsibility (CSR) has been defined differently by many different organizations. For example:
1. Your commitment as a company to operate economically, socially and environmentally conscious while balancing the interests of your stockholders.
2. How you manage the processes in your business to impact society positively.
3. The different types of activities you engage in and resources you use to increase your profits without excessive use of deception or fraud.
4. A process of integrating social and environmental concerns into the operation of your business, while seeking a profit.
No matter the definition you choose, Corporate Social Responsibility iis all about taking into consideration the interest of society, environment, shareholders, employees and all other types of social relationships. This is more than just about staying within the law, as far as your obligations are concerned. It is above and beyond that.
For example, there are certain emission laws, as they relate to pollution, to protect the environment. However, many people argue that these laws are ridiculously low in their standards. As a company, you have to consider how much you're willing to pollute the environment, in order to secure a profit. What is the balance? You have to answer that to determine your own social responsibility.
Most people approach corporate social responsibility, as it relates to developing community projects, or aligning with beneficial causes. For example, there are many different businesses who align themselves with breast cancer awareness, to increase the awareness and to help secure funds for research. In this instance, they are using their good standing in the community, as well as their high traffic areas to exercise good social and ethical behavior.
In fact, there are many different Corporate Social Responsiblity standards that a business can comply to, if they want to start enforcing more social responsibility within the corporation. For example, there is Global Reporting Initiative's Sustainability Reporting Guidelines, social accountability international SA8000 standard, and Verite's Monitoring Guidelines.
In conclusion, I have given you some information on what corporate social responsibility is, and how it affects the business world. Use this to determine your own social responsibility within your corporation.
About the Author
Want to learn more about Business Ethics? Steven Ross has written many more fascinating articles at http://www.businessethicsreport.com Business Ethics
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Posted by Handoko T Porrung at 12:36 PM 0 comments
Management for Organizations
The Key Importance of Workforce Management for Organizations by Lucy Caudle
Unless yours is a one-man organization, you achieve your organizational goals, to a smaller or greater degree, through a workforce. If that workforce is not productive, the efficiency of goals-achievement suffers and costs of achievement go up.
To some extent, productivity can be ensured through use of fear. However, in modern organizations operating in a competitive environment, fear is becoming less and less effective. Workers have increasing choices for selecting their employers.
This is particularly true of IT workforce with the specific kind of skills that your organization needs. You have not only to find people with the right skills but you also have to retain them. Both productivity and customer service can improve significantly if you are able to maintain a stable workforce.
It is in this context that workforce management has become a key management area these days.
What Is Workforce Management?
Workforce management seeks to develop a workforce consisting of happy and productive workers through:
* Good payroll and benefits packages and administration
* Best HR practices that help recruit and retain the right kind of workers with the right set of skills
* Training and developing the workers into a team with the right mix of skills and fitting in with the organizational culture
* Monitoring performance and rewarding good performers
* Forecasting requirements and developing career and succession plans to meet the requirements
While the above is the generally accepted view of workforce management, newer and specialized definitions have also developed. These specialized kinds of workforce management cater to the emerging needs of service organizations and call centers.
Workforce management software can help service organizations through:
* Forecasting work orders
* Planning the number of skills of technicians needed to service these work orders
* Planning the tools and vehicles needed for the servicing
* Scheduling the workers, tools and vehicles in an optimal manner using predefined rules
* Assigning work orders to particular technicians in each area
For call centers, workforce management software can:
* Forecast call volumes throughout the day
* Plan shifts in a customized manner
* Schedules workers by skills and experience
* Forecast seasonal changes in volumes
* Monitor performance
Workforce Management Contribution to Bottom Line
The diversity of skill sets required in modern IT departments make it critical that these be assessed and managed properly. Otherwise, the IT department would rather be a drag on the resources of the organization instead of being a contributor to its bottom line. There would be an imbalance in the demands and availability of specific IT skills.
Service organizations need to optimize the contribution of their workforce through scheduling and routing of their field service personnel. This scheduling is a complex exercise that needs to consider the skills, nearness to the service sites, availability of needed parts and other factors. It would need specialist workforce management software to handle this complexity in a reasonably satisfactory manner.
Conclusion
A workforce with right skill sets and experience can make a real contribution to achieving organizational objectives. With an increasingly competitive marketplace for skilled workers, only a highly effective workforce management could help organizations hire, develop and keep their skilled workforce. Workforce management software can help IT and service organizations optimize worker satisfaction and performance.
We will look at different aspects of workforce management in a series of articles.
About the Author
About author:
Lucy Caudle, Marketing at SMART, writes about the benefits of Workforce-Management-Overview
Unless yours is a one-man organization, you achieve your organizational goals, to a smaller or greater degree, through a workforce. If that workforce is not productive, the efficiency of goals-achievement suffers and costs of achievement go up.
To some extent, productivity can be ensured through use of fear. However, in modern organizations operating in a competitive environment, fear is becoming less and less effective. Workers have increasing choices for selecting their employers.
This is particularly true of IT workforce with the specific kind of skills that your organization needs. You have not only to find people with the right skills but you also have to retain them. Both productivity and customer service can improve significantly if you are able to maintain a stable workforce.
It is in this context that workforce management has become a key management area these days.
What Is Workforce Management?
Workforce management seeks to develop a workforce consisting of happy and productive workers through:
* Good payroll and benefits packages and administration
* Best HR practices that help recruit and retain the right kind of workers with the right set of skills
* Training and developing the workers into a team with the right mix of skills and fitting in with the organizational culture
* Monitoring performance and rewarding good performers
* Forecasting requirements and developing career and succession plans to meet the requirements
While the above is the generally accepted view of workforce management, newer and specialized definitions have also developed. These specialized kinds of workforce management cater to the emerging needs of service organizations and call centers.
Workforce management software can help service organizations through:
* Forecasting work orders
* Planning the number of skills of technicians needed to service these work orders
* Planning the tools and vehicles needed for the servicing
* Scheduling the workers, tools and vehicles in an optimal manner using predefined rules
* Assigning work orders to particular technicians in each area
For call centers, workforce management software can:
* Forecast call volumes throughout the day
* Plan shifts in a customized manner
* Schedules workers by skills and experience
* Forecast seasonal changes in volumes
* Monitor performance
Workforce Management Contribution to Bottom Line
The diversity of skill sets required in modern IT departments make it critical that these be assessed and managed properly. Otherwise, the IT department would rather be a drag on the resources of the organization instead of being a contributor to its bottom line. There would be an imbalance in the demands and availability of specific IT skills.
Service organizations need to optimize the contribution of their workforce through scheduling and routing of their field service personnel. This scheduling is a complex exercise that needs to consider the skills, nearness to the service sites, availability of needed parts and other factors. It would need specialist workforce management software to handle this complexity in a reasonably satisfactory manner.
Conclusion
A workforce with right skill sets and experience can make a real contribution to achieving organizational objectives. With an increasingly competitive marketplace for skilled workers, only a highly effective workforce management could help organizations hire, develop and keep their skilled workforce. Workforce management software can help IT and service organizations optimize worker satisfaction and performance.
We will look at different aspects of workforce management in a series of articles.
About the Author
About author:
Lucy Caudle, Marketing at SMART, writes about the benefits of Workforce-Management-Overview
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Posted by Handoko T Porrung at 12:36 PM 0 comments
Business Ethics Training
Business Ethics Training - Why Important? by Steven Ross
Many people wonder if business ethics is just a buzzword that has been tossed around lately, due to some of the aggressive business tactics we have seen them as we enter the 21st century. I assure you, it is here to stay. What needs to be done is for more people to brush up on their ethics, as they relate to business, to make sure they always operate with a high standard of moral conduct. In this article, I will discuss with you why business ethics training is important to help you with your business.
Business ethics training comes in two forms -- one for the employer and one for the employee. For the employer, a good sense of what type of ethics are required as a business owner is needed, because the owner is the one who makes all the final decisions. They need to be a good leader and a representative of somebody who has strong moral and ethical ideology, if they are going to expect the same from their employees.
For the employee, business ethics training is even more important. Especially for somebody who is new on the job. If you start early, and instill a good sense of ethical conduct within your employees, or as an employee cultivate these ethics within yourself, then you can be assured of working in a company that will not fall prey to deceptive practices and fraudulent processes.
It is important that you take the time to develop your own sound business ideology, as it relates to ethics. You must consider what is acceptable, and what is not, as far as business practices are concerned. On your own, you can only do so much. But, if you consult with professionals to help you design your own code of ethics, you will be that much better off.
Consider the facts -- every day there are certain ethical codes in business that are being violated, even by people who otherwise have been upright and outstanding citizens. How does this happen? How can a three to seemingly honest person one day do something stupid, and jeopardize the company, or even worse -- get thrown in jail?
It was because they did not have a well developed ethical business code, which you can receive with the proper business ethics training. So consider this type of training a valuable resource, if you want to build a strong solid foundation and business environment.
About the Author
Want to learn more about Business Ethics? Steven Ross has written many more fascinating articles at http://www.businessethicsreport.com Business Ethics
Many people wonder if business ethics is just a buzzword that has been tossed around lately, due to some of the aggressive business tactics we have seen them as we enter the 21st century. I assure you, it is here to stay. What needs to be done is for more people to brush up on their ethics, as they relate to business, to make sure they always operate with a high standard of moral conduct. In this article, I will discuss with you why business ethics training is important to help you with your business.
Business ethics training comes in two forms -- one for the employer and one for the employee. For the employer, a good sense of what type of ethics are required as a business owner is needed, because the owner is the one who makes all the final decisions. They need to be a good leader and a representative of somebody who has strong moral and ethical ideology, if they are going to expect the same from their employees.
For the employee, business ethics training is even more important. Especially for somebody who is new on the job. If you start early, and instill a good sense of ethical conduct within your employees, or as an employee cultivate these ethics within yourself, then you can be assured of working in a company that will not fall prey to deceptive practices and fraudulent processes.
It is important that you take the time to develop your own sound business ideology, as it relates to ethics. You must consider what is acceptable, and what is not, as far as business practices are concerned. On your own, you can only do so much. But, if you consult with professionals to help you design your own code of ethics, you will be that much better off.
Consider the facts -- every day there are certain ethical codes in business that are being violated, even by people who otherwise have been upright and outstanding citizens. How does this happen? How can a three to seemingly honest person one day do something stupid, and jeopardize the company, or even worse -- get thrown in jail?
It was because they did not have a well developed ethical business code, which you can receive with the proper business ethics training. So consider this type of training a valuable resource, if you want to build a strong solid foundation and business environment.
About the Author
Want to learn more about Business Ethics? Steven Ross has written many more fascinating articles at http://www.businessethicsreport.com Business Ethics
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Posted by Handoko T Porrung at 12:36 PM 0 comments
Workforce Planning
Without Workforce Planning, Your Organization Could Become Extinct by Lucy Caudle
Workforce planning is a key workforce management step for long-term survival in a situation where workers are aging or leaving, and business environments are constantly changing.
You need to replace over aged workers and workers who leave. You also need to adapt to new business environments by getting people with needed skills.
Workforce Planning Goals
Existing workload determines current workforce levels. So the first step of workforce planning is to assess this workload, its skills set composition and location requirements. To assess this requirement, you answer the following questions:
* What kinds of skilled workers do you need to achieve your organizational purpose?
* How many persons with each kind of skill are needed to achieve targeted performance levels?
* Where would these persons be needed - geographically and departmentally?
Answering the above questions is only the starting point of workforce planning. A complete plan would also identify the strategies needed to get the people required to man your workforce, and to keep the people with you.
For the longer-term, you need to estimate:
* The number of workers who would retire or leave and have to be replaced
* Additional numbers of differently skilled persons who would have to be added to meet expansion needs
* Likely developments affecting your business and the likely changes in the number and composition of your workforce under the new environments
Workforce planning is a continuous process that needs to be updated as the requirements and forecasts change.
Implementing the Workforce Planning Process
The key requirement for successful workforce planning is to get your managers to understand the significance and key importance of workforce planning. Without their active involvement, you cannot expect to develop realistic plans that are affected by diverse factors.
Create a workforce planning team consisting of employees from different departments, with required knowledge and interests. Define the team's role and responsibilities.
Use modern software tools and planning systems to speed up the processes of data collection, analysis and generating preliminary plans. These can then be human-reviewed for fine-tuning.
Start carefully with a smaller scope, review the processes, get feedback and improve the effectiveness of workforce planning exercise.
In the case of large enterprises with geographically spread operations, the workforce planning exercise should be decentralized and the unit plans should be consolidated.
Workforce Recruitment and Development Strategies
Workforce planning is not just an exercise with numbers, though numbers are important. You have to look at the labor market and competitive conditions, and develop strategies to attract and retain the kind of workforce you need.
Think through the policies and practices you need to attract and retain talented people. Build your brand as a good place to work in. Create working conditions and a managerial culture that would make your people want to remain with you.
Spell these out and include them in your workforce plan.
Conclusion
For organizations to survive in the long term, they must be able to attract the right kind of talented persons and to keep them. Workforce planning helps you to assess your people needs, in both skill sets and numbers, and start developing and implementing strategies and policies to attract, develop and keep the kind of workforce you need.
About the Author
About author:
Lucy Caudle, Marketing at SMART, writes about the benefits of Workforce-Planning
Workforce planning is a key workforce management step for long-term survival in a situation where workers are aging or leaving, and business environments are constantly changing.
You need to replace over aged workers and workers who leave. You also need to adapt to new business environments by getting people with needed skills.
Workforce Planning Goals
Existing workload determines current workforce levels. So the first step of workforce planning is to assess this workload, its skills set composition and location requirements. To assess this requirement, you answer the following questions:
* What kinds of skilled workers do you need to achieve your organizational purpose?
* How many persons with each kind of skill are needed to achieve targeted performance levels?
* Where would these persons be needed - geographically and departmentally?
Answering the above questions is only the starting point of workforce planning. A complete plan would also identify the strategies needed to get the people required to man your workforce, and to keep the people with you.
For the longer-term, you need to estimate:
* The number of workers who would retire or leave and have to be replaced
* Additional numbers of differently skilled persons who would have to be added to meet expansion needs
* Likely developments affecting your business and the likely changes in the number and composition of your workforce under the new environments
Workforce planning is a continuous process that needs to be updated as the requirements and forecasts change.
Implementing the Workforce Planning Process
The key requirement for successful workforce planning is to get your managers to understand the significance and key importance of workforce planning. Without their active involvement, you cannot expect to develop realistic plans that are affected by diverse factors.
Create a workforce planning team consisting of employees from different departments, with required knowledge and interests. Define the team's role and responsibilities.
Use modern software tools and planning systems to speed up the processes of data collection, analysis and generating preliminary plans. These can then be human-reviewed for fine-tuning.
Start carefully with a smaller scope, review the processes, get feedback and improve the effectiveness of workforce planning exercise.
In the case of large enterprises with geographically spread operations, the workforce planning exercise should be decentralized and the unit plans should be consolidated.
Workforce Recruitment and Development Strategies
Workforce planning is not just an exercise with numbers, though numbers are important. You have to look at the labor market and competitive conditions, and develop strategies to attract and retain the kind of workforce you need.
Think through the policies and practices you need to attract and retain talented people. Build your brand as a good place to work in. Create working conditions and a managerial culture that would make your people want to remain with you.
Spell these out and include them in your workforce plan.
Conclusion
For organizations to survive in the long term, they must be able to attract the right kind of talented persons and to keep them. Workforce planning helps you to assess your people needs, in both skill sets and numbers, and start developing and implementing strategies and policies to attract, develop and keep the kind of workforce you need.
About the Author
About author:
Lucy Caudle, Marketing at SMART, writes about the benefits of Workforce-Planning
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Posted by Handoko T Porrung at 12:35 PM 0 comments
Workforce Management
Work-Life Balance and Workforce Management by Lucy Caudle
Individuals face demands on their time from work and life requirements. If they cannot balance the requirements, it could mean an unhealthy life or unemployment. Work-life balance has become an important topic of study and discussion because of its impact on public health and business results.
Public health is affected as high-pressure work demands can lead to stress-related illnesses. The situation is aggravated because work can affect the way one lives, and unhealthy life choices are all too common.
Business results are affected because stressed employees are poor performers and unhealthy life choices lead to greater incidence of sickness absences.
With both governments and businesses interested in the issue, work-life balance has indeed become a center of considerable attention.
How Work Can Affect Life
A healthy life requires attention to important life areas such as family, children, friends and hobbies. A high-pressure work situation and time spent on commuting can eat into the time available for workers to attend to these areas. As a result, these important areas tend to be neglected.
Job security has also suffered with changing trends in industry. Information technology and competitive pressures have led to the practical disappearance of the earlier phenomenon of lifetime employment with one employer.
Employees are generally looking for better opportunities while employers might be seeking ways to reduce costs by replacing employees. Both these lead to frequent job changes and even to re-locations, adding to the stress and pressures faced by employees.
Add to these the stress of constant technological changes and the need to learn new things, and you get a future-shocked generation.
Results of Unbalanced Work-Life Situations
Rise in workplace violence, increase in levels of absenteeism and rising trend of workmen's compensation claims have made employers keenly aware of the need to attend more to the work-life balance of their employees.
In the personal lives of employees, inadequate time for family life and parenting lead to marriage problems and a generation of children increasingly addicted to harmful substances and ways of life.
Pressures created by the work situation are also affecting health and sexual lives.
Achieving Better Work Life Balance
Personal ambitions, a consumerist culture, an emphasis on "work-ethic" to the neglect of personal lives and the time squeeze caused by the demands of work, commuting and personal affairs are all contributing to the upset work life balance.
Remedial measures need to focus on certain key areas, including in particular:
* Personal training to focus employee attention on the important things for a healthy life of fulfilling relationships
* Employers realizing the benefits of helping their employees find a work-life balance, through training programs, flexible working hours, and other measures
Studies have indicated that by allowing some degree of control for employees to choose when, where and how they work, employers can realize significant business benefits.
Conclusion
When demands of work leaves little time for important areas of life like family, children, friends and hobbies, work-life balance gets upset. The result can be felt in employee health, levels of stress, marriage, problem children, low work performance, absenteeism and so on.
Achieving better work life balance requires both employee training and employer orientation changes.
About the Author
About author:
Lucy Caudle, Marketing at SMART, writes about the benefits of Work-Life-Balance
Individuals face demands on their time from work and life requirements. If they cannot balance the requirements, it could mean an unhealthy life or unemployment. Work-life balance has become an important topic of study and discussion because of its impact on public health and business results.
Public health is affected as high-pressure work demands can lead to stress-related illnesses. The situation is aggravated because work can affect the way one lives, and unhealthy life choices are all too common.
Business results are affected because stressed employees are poor performers and unhealthy life choices lead to greater incidence of sickness absences.
With both governments and businesses interested in the issue, work-life balance has indeed become a center of considerable attention.
How Work Can Affect Life
A healthy life requires attention to important life areas such as family, children, friends and hobbies. A high-pressure work situation and time spent on commuting can eat into the time available for workers to attend to these areas. As a result, these important areas tend to be neglected.
Job security has also suffered with changing trends in industry. Information technology and competitive pressures have led to the practical disappearance of the earlier phenomenon of lifetime employment with one employer.
Employees are generally looking for better opportunities while employers might be seeking ways to reduce costs by replacing employees. Both these lead to frequent job changes and even to re-locations, adding to the stress and pressures faced by employees.
Add to these the stress of constant technological changes and the need to learn new things, and you get a future-shocked generation.
Results of Unbalanced Work-Life Situations
Rise in workplace violence, increase in levels of absenteeism and rising trend of workmen's compensation claims have made employers keenly aware of the need to attend more to the work-life balance of their employees.
In the personal lives of employees, inadequate time for family life and parenting lead to marriage problems and a generation of children increasingly addicted to harmful substances and ways of life.
Pressures created by the work situation are also affecting health and sexual lives.
Achieving Better Work Life Balance
Personal ambitions, a consumerist culture, an emphasis on "work-ethic" to the neglect of personal lives and the time squeeze caused by the demands of work, commuting and personal affairs are all contributing to the upset work life balance.
Remedial measures need to focus on certain key areas, including in particular:
* Personal training to focus employee attention on the important things for a healthy life of fulfilling relationships
* Employers realizing the benefits of helping their employees find a work-life balance, through training programs, flexible working hours, and other measures
Studies have indicated that by allowing some degree of control for employees to choose when, where and how they work, employers can realize significant business benefits.
Conclusion
When demands of work leaves little time for important areas of life like family, children, friends and hobbies, work-life balance gets upset. The result can be felt in employee health, levels of stress, marriage, problem children, low work performance, absenteeism and so on.
Achieving better work life balance requires both employee training and employer orientation changes.
About the Author
About author:
Lucy Caudle, Marketing at SMART, writes about the benefits of Work-Life-Balance
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Posted by Handoko T Porrung at 12:35 PM 0 comments
Mind Control
Using Irrational Belief as a Tool of Mind Control by sas_mc101articles
You'll find that most people are in some way irrational, even superstitious. They may be "superficially" superstitious and base their behaviors on things that have no basis in reality. They may be literally superstitious and think that some action or inaction will irrationally effect their desired results.
Uncovering someones irrational belief is easier that you might think. Simply observe and you'll see it. You can also test it out. What would happen if you could uncover their irrational belief and use it as a tool to drive their thoughts and actions? You would be using their "map" of the world to influence them. That's true mind control.
To influence someone in this way, it's important to just assume that people have some irrational fear, belief or superstition. Then uncovering those fears, beliefs and superstitions is all a matter of just observing and asking yourself "Does this persons response have a logical origin?" What you'll find is that answer is almost always "No."
Most people will in fact behave according to events based on automatic reactions that are completely irrational. They often do this because that reaction has worked for them in the past... sometimes only ONCE, but it's enough for them to conclude that it's the best response they have.
Other people will be more overt with their superstitions and demonstrate what Karl Jung called a "complex" in which strong emotions are triggered automatically as if they were programmed to respond this way by trauma. Guess what? It's very likely they were!
Begin to look at peoples behaviors and run them through the "irrational belief" filter and you'll see just how often this behavior occurs.
You can test it by simply asking their opinion in a "what would do" type of fashion. Most people love to believe that you value their opinions and will tell you eagerly.
To take advantage of this new information see what you can do to use it to influence them your way. You can do this by presenting them an two options one of which would trigger this irrational belief.
In most cases it's always best to only point out the irrational belief to them as a last resort of influencing them.
Regardless of how you use this new insight you'll always seem much wiser than you are if you act unaffected and "above it all" as if you are wise, compassionate and filled great wisdom based on a rich life experience.
About the Author
JK Ellis is a researcher and author on the field of <a href="http://mindcontrol101.com">mind control. He proposes that in itself mind control is neither good nor evil but a <a href="http://theforbiddenbook.com">tool that can and should be used for self improvement.
Submitted by: Super Article Submitter
You'll find that most people are in some way irrational, even superstitious. They may be "superficially" superstitious and base their behaviors on things that have no basis in reality. They may be literally superstitious and think that some action or inaction will irrationally effect their desired results.
Uncovering someones irrational belief is easier that you might think. Simply observe and you'll see it. You can also test it out. What would happen if you could uncover their irrational belief and use it as a tool to drive their thoughts and actions? You would be using their "map" of the world to influence them. That's true mind control.
To influence someone in this way, it's important to just assume that people have some irrational fear, belief or superstition. Then uncovering those fears, beliefs and superstitions is all a matter of just observing and asking yourself "Does this persons response have a logical origin?" What you'll find is that answer is almost always "No."
Most people will in fact behave according to events based on automatic reactions that are completely irrational. They often do this because that reaction has worked for them in the past... sometimes only ONCE, but it's enough for them to conclude that it's the best response they have.
Other people will be more overt with their superstitions and demonstrate what Karl Jung called a "complex" in which strong emotions are triggered automatically as if they were programmed to respond this way by trauma. Guess what? It's very likely they were!
Begin to look at peoples behaviors and run them through the "irrational belief" filter and you'll see just how often this behavior occurs.
You can test it by simply asking their opinion in a "what would do" type of fashion. Most people love to believe that you value their opinions and will tell you eagerly.
To take advantage of this new information see what you can do to use it to influence them your way. You can do this by presenting them an two options one of which would trigger this irrational belief.
In most cases it's always best to only point out the irrational belief to them as a last resort of influencing them.
Regardless of how you use this new insight you'll always seem much wiser than you are if you act unaffected and "above it all" as if you are wise, compassionate and filled great wisdom based on a rich life experience.
About the Author
JK Ellis is a researcher and author on the field of <a href="http://mindcontrol101.com">mind control. He proposes that in itself mind control is neither good nor evil but a <a href="http://theforbiddenbook.com">tool that can and should be used for self improvement.
Submitted by: Super Article Submitter
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Posted by Handoko T Porrung at 12:35 PM 0 comments
Great Leadership
How to Design a Great Leadership Team Off-site Meeting by Dan McCarthy
Taking a leadership team off-site for a few days is a great way to develop strategy, get creative, develop a team, learn, and re-invigorate a team. Here's a proven design method I've used:
1. What's the overall purpose of the meeting? To develop a 3 year strategy? Improve teamwork? Solve a big hairy problem? Sometimes it's a combination of a few things, but try to keep it to just a few. A great off-site agenda should not look like an extended staff meeting. This is an opportunity to take the time needed to strategize, brainstorm, debate, reflect, and learn.
2. What's the "desired outcomes"? Desired outcomes are a tangible set of deliverables that describe what a successful meeting would look like at the conclusion. Examples: "A list of 3-5 three year goals", "A shared vision", "a shared understanding of each other's concerns". Desired outcomes give you a target to shoot for and a way to evaluate the success of the meeting. It also helps drive the creation of the agenda - a way to screen out the clutter that everyone always seems to want to bolt on.
3. Determine participants and roles. Usually there's one meeting leader, participants, maybe a facilitator, and sometimes guests.
4. Do a "stakeholder assessment". Who are all the key stakeholders for this meeting and what would a "win" look like for them. Stakeholders may be attending the meeting or they may not. For example, the manager of the meeting leader is a key stakeholder. You won't be able to pleased all stakeholders but it helps to least be aware of their needs.
5. Consider the context. What's going on in the environment that may influence the participant's behavior, mindset, or participation? For example, is their a pending downsizing? A new team member? A restructuring?
6. Establish the dates. Three days is often ideal, two is OK, and anything more than four can turn into a death march.
7. Notify the participants - just have them hold the dates for now.
8. Select an overall "theme" for the meeting. The theme will emerge based on the purpose, desired outcomes, and context. The theme could be "Leading change", or "A winning team", or "playing to win". Having a central theme allows you to creatively tie all of the meeting elements together: agenda, venue, activities, gift, etc...
9. Find the right venue. Work with your corporate meeting planners, your meeting facilitator, or do your own search. Most resorts and hotels cater to corporate meetings and can help you select the best room, meals, and activities. You'll probably work with a conference planner. Make sure you specify AV needs, room set-up, meals and breaks, and any other details.
10. Begin to work on the key design elements. This is a creative process, where you begin to come up with ways to accomplish the desired outcomes. There could be teambuilding activities, strategy or problem solving sessions, training, and/or presentations.
11. Design the high level agenda. The pieces begin to fit together like a puzzle. I often write the key agenda pieces on post-its, and move them around until they begin to form a nice flow.
12. Confirm any outside speakers or other guests.
13. Develop the detailed agenda. For each major agenda segment, determine the what, who, how, when, and how long.
14. Select activities. Activities are a great way to informally build the team and keep the energy high. Pick activities that support your meeting purpose and theme.
15. Send a high level agenda to the participants and any invited guests, including all of the logistical information, including maps, dress code, pre-work, and any activities.
16. Select a parting gift - some kind of special memento that supports the theme and creates a lasting anchor for the experience.
17. Fine-tune the agenda, trouble-shooting potential snafus and making the inevitable last minute adjustments.
Once the meeting starts, be prepared to make adjustments. Things never go as planned, but if you follow these steps, you'll improve you chances of having a great leadership team off-site. Good luck!
For more advice and information on leadership and leadership development, please visit my blog at http://greatleadershipbydan.blogspot.com/
About the Author
I've been a practitioner in the field of leadership development for over 20 years. I'm currently the Manager of Leadership and Management Development at a leading provider of payroll and human resource services outsourcing.
Taking a leadership team off-site for a few days is a great way to develop strategy, get creative, develop a team, learn, and re-invigorate a team. Here's a proven design method I've used:
1. What's the overall purpose of the meeting? To develop a 3 year strategy? Improve teamwork? Solve a big hairy problem? Sometimes it's a combination of a few things, but try to keep it to just a few. A great off-site agenda should not look like an extended staff meeting. This is an opportunity to take the time needed to strategize, brainstorm, debate, reflect, and learn.
2. What's the "desired outcomes"? Desired outcomes are a tangible set of deliverables that describe what a successful meeting would look like at the conclusion. Examples: "A list of 3-5 three year goals", "A shared vision", "a shared understanding of each other's concerns". Desired outcomes give you a target to shoot for and a way to evaluate the success of the meeting. It also helps drive the creation of the agenda - a way to screen out the clutter that everyone always seems to want to bolt on.
3. Determine participants and roles. Usually there's one meeting leader, participants, maybe a facilitator, and sometimes guests.
4. Do a "stakeholder assessment". Who are all the key stakeholders for this meeting and what would a "win" look like for them. Stakeholders may be attending the meeting or they may not. For example, the manager of the meeting leader is a key stakeholder. You won't be able to pleased all stakeholders but it helps to least be aware of their needs.
5. Consider the context. What's going on in the environment that may influence the participant's behavior, mindset, or participation? For example, is their a pending downsizing? A new team member? A restructuring?
6. Establish the dates. Three days is often ideal, two is OK, and anything more than four can turn into a death march.
7. Notify the participants - just have them hold the dates for now.
8. Select an overall "theme" for the meeting. The theme will emerge based on the purpose, desired outcomes, and context. The theme could be "Leading change", or "A winning team", or "playing to win". Having a central theme allows you to creatively tie all of the meeting elements together: agenda, venue, activities, gift, etc...
9. Find the right venue. Work with your corporate meeting planners, your meeting facilitator, or do your own search. Most resorts and hotels cater to corporate meetings and can help you select the best room, meals, and activities. You'll probably work with a conference planner. Make sure you specify AV needs, room set-up, meals and breaks, and any other details.
10. Begin to work on the key design elements. This is a creative process, where you begin to come up with ways to accomplish the desired outcomes. There could be teambuilding activities, strategy or problem solving sessions, training, and/or presentations.
11. Design the high level agenda. The pieces begin to fit together like a puzzle. I often write the key agenda pieces on post-its, and move them around until they begin to form a nice flow.
12. Confirm any outside speakers or other guests.
13. Develop the detailed agenda. For each major agenda segment, determine the what, who, how, when, and how long.
14. Select activities. Activities are a great way to informally build the team and keep the energy high. Pick activities that support your meeting purpose and theme.
15. Send a high level agenda to the participants and any invited guests, including all of the logistical information, including maps, dress code, pre-work, and any activities.
16. Select a parting gift - some kind of special memento that supports the theme and creates a lasting anchor for the experience.
17. Fine-tune the agenda, trouble-shooting potential snafus and making the inevitable last minute adjustments.
Once the meeting starts, be prepared to make adjustments. Things never go as planned, but if you follow these steps, you'll improve you chances of having a great leadership team off-site. Good luck!
For more advice and information on leadership and leadership development, please visit my blog at http://greatleadershipbydan.blogspot.com/
About the Author
I've been a practitioner in the field of leadership development for over 20 years. I'm currently the Manager of Leadership and Management Development at a leading provider of payroll and human resource services outsourcing.
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Posted by Handoko T Porrung at 12:34 PM 0 comments
Succession Planning
Succession Planning by Louis Jordan
If you are a front-line sales person - How much time does your supervisor spend genuinely helping you develop an existing skill or learning a new one? How much time do you spend developing skills for your next position rather than the one you currently hold?
If you are supervising sales people - how much time do you spend making them better, rather than just focusing on getting them to hit their quota?
It can be difficult, and often, you will not receive the full support of your superiors, but, to build a great team and to improve your skills you must look long-term and develop today, the skills you will need, for the challenges of tomorrow.
Thinking of personal development as "Succession Planning" can be a great help. It forces us to view the bigger picture.
- Could my development have a positive impact on those around me?
- Can my growth come as a by-product of focusing on others?
- Can I improve my skills by developing those of my direct reports, or influencing growth in my colleagues?
The simple answer is yes.
If you are already in a leadership position you need to develop those around you to back-fill your position within the organization. What can often hold strong leaders back is their inability to develop their own replacements.
If your team's performance is important to your organization what is the benefit to that organization of promoting you away from your team? Unless they have confidence that the team's performance will be maintained after your departure they will be better off leaving you where you are and finding someone else for the promotion.
Again, your development today must be to prepare you for the challenges of tomorrow. Thinking of your development as Succession Planning ensures you are focusing on the right skills, for the right reasons.
Good luck and good hunting.
My colleagues and I hold Sales Leadership positions within some of America's largest and most successful companies and have complained, often, about the lack of good quality sites our sales people could visit for advice and sales tips.
So, we decided to build the type of site that we would like our sales people to use. It has integrity as its corner-stone and relies on real sales people, real sales leaders and industry experts for its content.
About the Author
Our goal is to provide honest recommendations on all aspects of sales and leadership, including: Sales Strategies, Selling and Leading with Integrity, Cold Calling
If you are a front-line sales person - How much time does your supervisor spend genuinely helping you develop an existing skill or learning a new one? How much time do you spend developing skills for your next position rather than the one you currently hold?
If you are supervising sales people - how much time do you spend making them better, rather than just focusing on getting them to hit their quota?
It can be difficult, and often, you will not receive the full support of your superiors, but, to build a great team and to improve your skills you must look long-term and develop today, the skills you will need, for the challenges of tomorrow.
Thinking of personal development as "Succession Planning" can be a great help. It forces us to view the bigger picture.
- Could my development have a positive impact on those around me?
- Can my growth come as a by-product of focusing on others?
- Can I improve my skills by developing those of my direct reports, or influencing growth in my colleagues?
The simple answer is yes.
If you are already in a leadership position you need to develop those around you to back-fill your position within the organization. What can often hold strong leaders back is their inability to develop their own replacements.
If your team's performance is important to your organization what is the benefit to that organization of promoting you away from your team? Unless they have confidence that the team's performance will be maintained after your departure they will be better off leaving you where you are and finding someone else for the promotion.
Again, your development today must be to prepare you for the challenges of tomorrow. Thinking of your development as Succession Planning ensures you are focusing on the right skills, for the right reasons.
Good luck and good hunting.
My colleagues and I hold Sales Leadership positions within some of America's largest and most successful companies and have complained, often, about the lack of good quality sites our sales people could visit for advice and sales tips.
So, we decided to build the type of site that we would like our sales people to use. It has integrity as its corner-stone and relies on real sales people, real sales leaders and industry experts for its content.
About the Author
Our goal is to provide honest recommendations on all aspects of sales and leadership, including: Sales Strategies, Selling and Leading with Integrity, Cold Calling
Powered by ScribeFire.
Posted by Handoko T Porrung at 12:34 PM 0 comments
Competition
Running a Productive Sales Team Meeting - Part Two by Louis Jordan
Knowledge leads to confidence and confidence leads to better performance. During your meetings your Team should strive to:
Know their customers better than anyone else
Know their products better than anyone else
Know their competition better than anyone else
I understand the amount of pressure many of you are under to attain quota and sales goals. I have also experienced the urges generated by that pressure to focus exclusively on the present, on the numbers.
Too often, in our attempts to keep our teams focused on "this month's quota", today's performance or to make sure we are not "keeping them out of the field" we simply fail to provide them with tools for tomorrow.
Do not take this the wrong way. Staying in the present, not clinging to past victories or worrying about future issues is essential for great sales people. But, you are no longer a sales person, you are now their leader and, as a result, you need to be looking toward the future for your team to ensure they are prepared for it.
As an example, take a moment to think about how Tiger Woods approaches his profession. When competing in a golf tournament, the only thing he thinks about is his current shot. He never worries about what happened on a previous hole, or concerns himself with what will happen later in the round.
He is focused exclusively on the present.
He can only focus on the present because during his practice times he is able to learn from past experiences and look forward to future challenges.
He will work on specific shots for specific holes on specific golf courses he is scheduled to play in the future. So that when he reaches that hole he has already hit the shot hundreds of times and has complete confidence in his swing.
During his practice time he will also focus on areas of his game that he feels need improvement - thinking back to where he dropped shots in previous rounds. How he practices, and the fact that he does actually practice, allows him to fully focus on the present when competing - he is confident that he is prepared for anything, so he can relax, he can focus and execute his plan.
As their leader you MUST create an environment during meetings that allows your sales reps to become confident, prepared and relaxed, so they can focus and execute their plan.
One of the best tools I have used with my teams to increase their knowledge is a short quiz. Often referred to as the "dirty dozen", it contains twelve questions about products/policies, customers and competitors.
The team is given ten minutes to complete the quiz, in silence, so they are forced to think for themselves. Upon completion I would call on each member of the team to read a question and provide an answer. If you are animated about the answers, whether right or wrong your team will join in the fun and start calling on each other.
If you have a member of your team who struggles with policies or keeping up with current products, assign them to produce the quiz for a few weeks. You will quickly see an improvement in their knowledge, confidence and performance. If you announce that the person with the lowest score produces the following weeks quiz the level of competiveness increases and the whole concept takes off.
But, be consistent - if you decide to institute a quiz you need to have it on your agenda for every meeting, you should not cancel it because you are struggling for numbers. This is a tool for tomorrow's business. Do not sacrifice it because you are concerned about today.
For more information on this subject, and others like it, please join us at http://www.integrity-sales-leadership.com/Effective-meetings.html
Our goal is to provide honest recommendations on all aspects of sales and leadership, including: Sales Strategies, Selling and Leading with Integrity, Cold Calling, Telemarketing
About the Author
My colleagues and I hold Sales Leadership positions within some of America's largest and most successful companies and have complained, often, about the lack of good quality sites our sales people could visit for advice and sales tips.
So, we decided to build the type of site that we would like our sales people to use. It has integrity as its corner-stone and relies on real sales people, real sales leaders and industry experts for its content.
Knowledge leads to confidence and confidence leads to better performance. During your meetings your Team should strive to:
Know their customers better than anyone else
Know their products better than anyone else
Know their competition better than anyone else
I understand the amount of pressure many of you are under to attain quota and sales goals. I have also experienced the urges generated by that pressure to focus exclusively on the present, on the numbers.
Too often, in our attempts to keep our teams focused on "this month's quota", today's performance or to make sure we are not "keeping them out of the field" we simply fail to provide them with tools for tomorrow.
Do not take this the wrong way. Staying in the present, not clinging to past victories or worrying about future issues is essential for great sales people. But, you are no longer a sales person, you are now their leader and, as a result, you need to be looking toward the future for your team to ensure they are prepared for it.
As an example, take a moment to think about how Tiger Woods approaches his profession. When competing in a golf tournament, the only thing he thinks about is his current shot. He never worries about what happened on a previous hole, or concerns himself with what will happen later in the round.
He is focused exclusively on the present.
He can only focus on the present because during his practice times he is able to learn from past experiences and look forward to future challenges.
He will work on specific shots for specific holes on specific golf courses he is scheduled to play in the future. So that when he reaches that hole he has already hit the shot hundreds of times and has complete confidence in his swing.
During his practice time he will also focus on areas of his game that he feels need improvement - thinking back to where he dropped shots in previous rounds. How he practices, and the fact that he does actually practice, allows him to fully focus on the present when competing - he is confident that he is prepared for anything, so he can relax, he can focus and execute his plan.
As their leader you MUST create an environment during meetings that allows your sales reps to become confident, prepared and relaxed, so they can focus and execute their plan.
One of the best tools I have used with my teams to increase their knowledge is a short quiz. Often referred to as the "dirty dozen", it contains twelve questions about products/policies, customers and competitors.
The team is given ten minutes to complete the quiz, in silence, so they are forced to think for themselves. Upon completion I would call on each member of the team to read a question and provide an answer. If you are animated about the answers, whether right or wrong your team will join in the fun and start calling on each other.
If you have a member of your team who struggles with policies or keeping up with current products, assign them to produce the quiz for a few weeks. You will quickly see an improvement in their knowledge, confidence and performance. If you announce that the person with the lowest score produces the following weeks quiz the level of competiveness increases and the whole concept takes off.
But, be consistent - if you decide to institute a quiz you need to have it on your agenda for every meeting, you should not cancel it because you are struggling for numbers. This is a tool for tomorrow's business. Do not sacrifice it because you are concerned about today.
For more information on this subject, and others like it, please join us at http://www.integrity-sales-leadership.com/Effective-meetings.html
Our goal is to provide honest recommendations on all aspects of sales and leadership, including: Sales Strategies, Selling and Leading with Integrity, Cold Calling, Telemarketing
About the Author
My colleagues and I hold Sales Leadership positions within some of America's largest and most successful companies and have complained, often, about the lack of good quality sites our sales people could visit for advice and sales tips.
So, we decided to build the type of site that we would like our sales people to use. It has integrity as its corner-stone and relies on real sales people, real sales leaders and industry experts for its content.
Powered by ScribeFire.
Posted by Handoko T Porrung at 12:34 PM 0 comments
Productive Sales
Running a Productive Sales Team Meeting - Part Two by Louis Jordan
Knowledge leads to confidence and confidence leads to better performance. During your meetings your Team should strive to:
Know their customers better than anyone else
Know their products better than anyone else
Know their competition better than anyone else
I understand the amount of pressure many of you are under to attain quota and sales goals. I have also experienced the urges generated by that pressure to focus exclusively on the present, on the numbers.
Too often, in our attempts to keep our teams focused on "this month's quota", today's performance or to make sure we are not "keeping them out of the field" we simply fail to provide them with tools for tomorrow.
Do not take this the wrong way. Staying in the present, not clinging to past victories or worrying about future issues is essential for great sales people. But, you are no longer a sales person, you are now their leader and, as a result, you need to be looking toward the future for your team to ensure they are prepared for it.
As an example, take a moment to think about how Tiger Woods approaches his profession. When competing in a golf tournament, the only thing he thinks about is his current shot. He never worries about what happened on a previous hole, or concerns himself with what will happen later in the round.
He is focused exclusively on the present.
He can only focus on the present because during his practice times he is able to learn from past experiences and look forward to future challenges.
He will work on specific shots for specific holes on specific golf courses he is scheduled to play in the future. So that when he reaches that hole he has already hit the shot hundreds of times and has complete confidence in his swing.
During his practice time he will also focus on areas of his game that he feels need improvement - thinking back to where he dropped shots in previous rounds. How he practices, and the fact that he does actually practice, allows him to fully focus on the present when competing - he is confident that he is prepared for anything, so he can relax, he can focus and execute his plan.
As their leader you MUST create an environment during meetings that allows your sales reps to become confident, prepared and relaxed, so they can focus and execute their plan.
One of the best tools I have used with my teams to increase their knowledge is a short quiz. Often referred to as the "dirty dozen", it contains twelve questions about products/policies, customers and competitors.
The team is given ten minutes to complete the quiz, in silence, so they are forced to think for themselves. Upon completion I would call on each member of the team to read a question and provide an answer. If you are animated about the answers, whether right or wrong your team will join in the fun and start calling on each other.
If you have a member of your team who struggles with policies or keeping up with current products, assign them to produce the quiz for a few weeks. You will quickly see an improvement in their knowledge, confidence and performance. If you announce that the person with the lowest score produces the following weeks quiz the level of competiveness increases and the whole concept takes off.
But, be consistent - if you decide to institute a quiz you need to have it on your agenda for every meeting, you should not cancel it because you are struggling for numbers. This is a tool for tomorrow's business. Do not sacrifice it because you are concerned about today.
For more information on this subject, and others like it, please join us at http://www.integrity-sales-leadership.com/Effective-meetings.html
Our goal is to provide honest recommendations on all aspects of sales and leadership, including: Sales Strategies, Selling and Leading with Integrity, Cold Calling, Telemarketing
About the Author
My colleagues and I hold Sales Leadership positions within some of America's largest and most successful companies and have complained, often, about the lack of good quality sites our sales people could visit for advice and sales tips.
So, we decided to build the type of site that we would like our sales people to use. It has integrity as its corner-stone and relies on real sales people, real sales leaders and industry experts for its content.
Knowledge leads to confidence and confidence leads to better performance. During your meetings your Team should strive to:
Know their customers better than anyone else
Know their products better than anyone else
Know their competition better than anyone else
I understand the amount of pressure many of you are under to attain quota and sales goals. I have also experienced the urges generated by that pressure to focus exclusively on the present, on the numbers.
Too often, in our attempts to keep our teams focused on "this month's quota", today's performance or to make sure we are not "keeping them out of the field" we simply fail to provide them with tools for tomorrow.
Do not take this the wrong way. Staying in the present, not clinging to past victories or worrying about future issues is essential for great sales people. But, you are no longer a sales person, you are now their leader and, as a result, you need to be looking toward the future for your team to ensure they are prepared for it.
As an example, take a moment to think about how Tiger Woods approaches his profession. When competing in a golf tournament, the only thing he thinks about is his current shot. He never worries about what happened on a previous hole, or concerns himself with what will happen later in the round.
He is focused exclusively on the present.
He can only focus on the present because during his practice times he is able to learn from past experiences and look forward to future challenges.
He will work on specific shots for specific holes on specific golf courses he is scheduled to play in the future. So that when he reaches that hole he has already hit the shot hundreds of times and has complete confidence in his swing.
During his practice time he will also focus on areas of his game that he feels need improvement - thinking back to where he dropped shots in previous rounds. How he practices, and the fact that he does actually practice, allows him to fully focus on the present when competing - he is confident that he is prepared for anything, so he can relax, he can focus and execute his plan.
As their leader you MUST create an environment during meetings that allows your sales reps to become confident, prepared and relaxed, so they can focus and execute their plan.
One of the best tools I have used with my teams to increase their knowledge is a short quiz. Often referred to as the "dirty dozen", it contains twelve questions about products/policies, customers and competitors.
The team is given ten minutes to complete the quiz, in silence, so they are forced to think for themselves. Upon completion I would call on each member of the team to read a question and provide an answer. If you are animated about the answers, whether right or wrong your team will join in the fun and start calling on each other.
If you have a member of your team who struggles with policies or keeping up with current products, assign them to produce the quiz for a few weeks. You will quickly see an improvement in their knowledge, confidence and performance. If you announce that the person with the lowest score produces the following weeks quiz the level of competiveness increases and the whole concept takes off.
But, be consistent - if you decide to institute a quiz you need to have it on your agenda for every meeting, you should not cancel it because you are struggling for numbers. This is a tool for tomorrow's business. Do not sacrifice it because you are concerned about today.
For more information on this subject, and others like it, please join us at http://www.integrity-sales-leadership.com/Effective-meetings.html
Our goal is to provide honest recommendations on all aspects of sales and leadership, including: Sales Strategies, Selling and Leading with Integrity, Cold Calling, Telemarketing
About the Author
My colleagues and I hold Sales Leadership positions within some of America's largest and most successful companies and have complained, often, about the lack of good quality sites our sales people could visit for advice and sales tips.
So, we decided to build the type of site that we would like our sales people to use. It has integrity as its corner-stone and relies on real sales people, real sales leaders and industry experts for its content.
Powered by ScribeFire.
Posted by Handoko T Porrung at 12:33 PM 0 comments
Sales Management
Effective Sales Management - Using Competition by Louis Jordan
This article is closely associated with the articles titled "Running a productive sales-team meeting" because much of the competitive spirit needs to be generated during those staff meetings.
Competition can breathe life into any sales organization and is an essential element for sustainable growth. What is often overlooked, though, is how competition, if managed incorrectly, can lead to both successful reps and innovative managers holding onto their best-practices.
If this hoarding of information continues unabated the gap between the productive and non-productive employees widens. As the gap widens jealousy and resentment increases and any chance of cooperation is lost.
As the leader of a team, channel or organization it is your responsibility to force the issue and demand that all best-practices are shared and, as importantly, implemented.
The best sales people tend to be perceived as being selfish and having no interest in helping those around them. In my experience, this is not always the case.
Great sales people are like great athletes, they relish being challenged, especially if they will receive public recognition for meeting that challenge.
To better understand this take a moment to think through why recognizing performance can be such a powerful tool:
1. Targets are set.
2. The top sales people exceed their target.
3. Those employees receive public recognition.
4. The employees recognized thrive in the spotlight and enjoy being held as an example to their co-workers. They become determined to repeat their success to receive further recognition.
5. A large number of those who were not recognized become determined to be one of the sales people recognized next time - whether next month, quarter or year.
It is the deep desire for recognition, acknowledgment and acceptance craved by so many sales people that needs to be used to drive them to share their skills and to help develop those around them.
A few comments on a conference call or a few lines on an email can herald a new initiative or idea from one of your employees.
Take the time to think how best to position the message, give the person who developed the best-practice a chance describe how he/she has used it - this puts pressure on him/her to truly share and will quicken adoption of the initiative by his/her peers.
It only takes a handful of these instances to get the competitive juices flowing and suddenly you start to receive a regular flow of information which can then be shared with your entire organization.
The next step is to inspect which employees are actually using the new initiatives. Unfortunately, ego can often get in the way of using an idea or best-practice from a peer. You must force all leaders within your organization to understand how much more they could sell, how much more they could earn and how much easier they job will be if they become open to adopting ideas from their peers without prejudice.
To read more about this subject please join us at http://www.integrity-sales-leadership.com
Our goal is to provide honest recommendations on all aspects of sales and leadership, including: Sales Strategies, Selling and Leading with Integrity, Cold Calling, Telemarketing
About the Author
My colleagues and I hold Sales Leadership positions within some of America's largest and most successful companies and have complained, often, about the lack of good quality sites our sales people could visit for advice and sales tips.
So, we decided to build the type of site that we would like our sales people to use. It has integrity as its corner-stone and relies on real sales people, real sales leaders and industry experts for its content.
This article is closely associated with the articles titled "Running a productive sales-team meeting" because much of the competitive spirit needs to be generated during those staff meetings.
Competition can breathe life into any sales organization and is an essential element for sustainable growth. What is often overlooked, though, is how competition, if managed incorrectly, can lead to both successful reps and innovative managers holding onto their best-practices.
If this hoarding of information continues unabated the gap between the productive and non-productive employees widens. As the gap widens jealousy and resentment increases and any chance of cooperation is lost.
As the leader of a team, channel or organization it is your responsibility to force the issue and demand that all best-practices are shared and, as importantly, implemented.
The best sales people tend to be perceived as being selfish and having no interest in helping those around them. In my experience, this is not always the case.
Great sales people are like great athletes, they relish being challenged, especially if they will receive public recognition for meeting that challenge.
To better understand this take a moment to think through why recognizing performance can be such a powerful tool:
1. Targets are set.
2. The top sales people exceed their target.
3. Those employees receive public recognition.
4. The employees recognized thrive in the spotlight and enjoy being held as an example to their co-workers. They become determined to repeat their success to receive further recognition.
5. A large number of those who were not recognized become determined to be one of the sales people recognized next time - whether next month, quarter or year.
It is the deep desire for recognition, acknowledgment and acceptance craved by so many sales people that needs to be used to drive them to share their skills and to help develop those around them.
A few comments on a conference call or a few lines on an email can herald a new initiative or idea from one of your employees.
Take the time to think how best to position the message, give the person who developed the best-practice a chance describe how he/she has used it - this puts pressure on him/her to truly share and will quicken adoption of the initiative by his/her peers.
It only takes a handful of these instances to get the competitive juices flowing and suddenly you start to receive a regular flow of information which can then be shared with your entire organization.
The next step is to inspect which employees are actually using the new initiatives. Unfortunately, ego can often get in the way of using an idea or best-practice from a peer. You must force all leaders within your organization to understand how much more they could sell, how much more they could earn and how much easier they job will be if they become open to adopting ideas from their peers without prejudice.
To read more about this subject please join us at http://www.integrity-sales-leadership.com
Our goal is to provide honest recommendations on all aspects of sales and leadership, including: Sales Strategies, Selling and Leading with Integrity, Cold Calling, Telemarketing
About the Author
My colleagues and I hold Sales Leadership positions within some of America's largest and most successful companies and have complained, often, about the lack of good quality sites our sales people could visit for advice and sales tips.
So, we decided to build the type of site that we would like our sales people to use. It has integrity as its corner-stone and relies on real sales people, real sales leaders and industry experts for its content.
Powered by ScribeFire.
Posted by Handoko T Porrung at 12:33 PM 0 comments
Sales Team
Changing The Behavior Of Your Sales Team by Louis Jordan
Many sales people will not make changes unless they are made to feel uncomfortable.
EXAMPLE - If your team feels comfortable forecasting numbers below their quota, or reporting numbers below their forecast they will continue to do so. Unfortunately, that means you must be able, when necessary, to make them feel so uncomfortable that they would rather do anything other than report bad numbers. They must feel that doing the hard work, or prospecting, or telemarketing etc, is the more comfortable option.
If you have something to say to an employee, say it. If you just attended an appointment with them and they did something that you did not like just tell them. The same integrity and honesty you have coached them to use and elicit from their customers must be uppermost in your coaching of them.
If you know they will be disheartened or disappointed with your feedback use that to your advantage. You will probably have a temptation to make them feel better. That is exactly the wrong thing to do, at least initially. Most people only make changes when they feel a certain level of discomfort - how can you make them feel that discomfort if you start the coaching session by telling them how good they are at a different aspect of their job?
You should be coaching them to bottom-line the conversations they have with their customers, to get to the point, to ensure they set the tone for the relationship. Their one-on-one or coaching session needs to be conducted in an identical manner - it is the most effective way to make your point and can be used as an example of how they should be interacting with their customers.
Let us, for sake of argument, say you need to explain that they talked all over the customer and failed to use their ears and mouth in the ratio they have been provided on their head. Above anything else avoid starting the conversation off by trying to make them feel comfortable - "John, the agenda you set was very good, you got there on time, you sounded professional and ended the meeting well". The entire time you are trying to make yourself feel better about the coaching you need to deliver AND MAKE NO MISTAKE, YOU ARE TRYING TO MAKE YOURSELF FEEL BETTER, John is thinking "Okay, it must be bad if he waffling this much before telling me what I did wrong".
If there is no way I can convince to completely do away with the "touchy feely" comments, then at least put them at the end of your meeting. In the same way all sales meetings must always start with the "numbers" coaching sessions must start with the reason for the coaching.
Trust me, and please learn from my mistakes, doing it any other way simply dilutes the coaching. Your employee must leave the session with a clear understanding of what happened, what could have been done better and some tips on how to do it better next time. They should fully understand how making the change will help them sell more, they must feel grateful for your honesty and - where necessary, must feel that no matter how hard it may be for them to change it is a lot more desirable than having to explain to you why they have not made the change.
To read more about this subject please join us at http://www.integrity-sales-leadership.com
Our goal is to provide honest recommendations on all aspects of sales and leadership, including: Sales Strategies, Selling and Leading with Integrity, Cold Calling, Telemarketing
About the Author
My colleagues and I hold Sales Leadership positions within some of America's largest and most successful companies and have complained, often, about the lack of good quality sites our sales people could visit for advice and sales tips.
So, we decided to build the type of site that we would like our sales people to use. It has integrity as its corner-stone and relies on real sales people, real sales leaders and industry experts for its content.
Many sales people will not make changes unless they are made to feel uncomfortable.
EXAMPLE - If your team feels comfortable forecasting numbers below their quota, or reporting numbers below their forecast they will continue to do so. Unfortunately, that means you must be able, when necessary, to make them feel so uncomfortable that they would rather do anything other than report bad numbers. They must feel that doing the hard work, or prospecting, or telemarketing etc, is the more comfortable option.
If you have something to say to an employee, say it. If you just attended an appointment with them and they did something that you did not like just tell them. The same integrity and honesty you have coached them to use and elicit from their customers must be uppermost in your coaching of them.
If you know they will be disheartened or disappointed with your feedback use that to your advantage. You will probably have a temptation to make them feel better. That is exactly the wrong thing to do, at least initially. Most people only make changes when they feel a certain level of discomfort - how can you make them feel that discomfort if you start the coaching session by telling them how good they are at a different aspect of their job?
You should be coaching them to bottom-line the conversations they have with their customers, to get to the point, to ensure they set the tone for the relationship. Their one-on-one or coaching session needs to be conducted in an identical manner - it is the most effective way to make your point and can be used as an example of how they should be interacting with their customers.
Let us, for sake of argument, say you need to explain that they talked all over the customer and failed to use their ears and mouth in the ratio they have been provided on their head. Above anything else avoid starting the conversation off by trying to make them feel comfortable - "John, the agenda you set was very good, you got there on time, you sounded professional and ended the meeting well". The entire time you are trying to make yourself feel better about the coaching you need to deliver AND MAKE NO MISTAKE, YOU ARE TRYING TO MAKE YOURSELF FEEL BETTER, John is thinking "Okay, it must be bad if he waffling this much before telling me what I did wrong".
If there is no way I can convince to completely do away with the "touchy feely" comments, then at least put them at the end of your meeting. In the same way all sales meetings must always start with the "numbers" coaching sessions must start with the reason for the coaching.
Trust me, and please learn from my mistakes, doing it any other way simply dilutes the coaching. Your employee must leave the session with a clear understanding of what happened, what could have been done better and some tips on how to do it better next time. They should fully understand how making the change will help them sell more, they must feel grateful for your honesty and - where necessary, must feel that no matter how hard it may be for them to change it is a lot more desirable than having to explain to you why they have not made the change.
To read more about this subject please join us at http://www.integrity-sales-leadership.com
Our goal is to provide honest recommendations on all aspects of sales and leadership, including: Sales Strategies, Selling and Leading with Integrity, Cold Calling, Telemarketing
About the Author
My colleagues and I hold Sales Leadership positions within some of America's largest and most successful companies and have complained, often, about the lack of good quality sites our sales people could visit for advice and sales tips.
So, we decided to build the type of site that we would like our sales people to use. It has integrity as its corner-stone and relies on real sales people, real sales leaders and industry experts for its content.
Powered by ScribeFire.
Posted by Handoko T Porrung at 12:33 PM 0 comments
Team Meeting
Running A Productive Sales Team Meeting by Louis Jordan
A well run sales meeting can have an incredible impact on the confidence and development of your team. Conversely, badly run meetings will under-mine your leadership and retard the growth of your team.
It is possible to influence your employees simply by how you conduct a sales meeting - this is a much subtler method of coaching, as subliminal messages are to advertising and - if done correctly - as effective.
The structure, poise, professionalism and candor required for a great sales appointment must also be present in a great sales meeting. So, by running great meetings you are providing your team with a real-life example of how to run great appointments.
Your ability to create an environment that is receptive to this type of meeting is the first step in your team's growth.
The general rules for a successful meeting are:
Be consistent - with time, place and content.
Be prepared - spend time developing the content of the meeting and use an agenda.
Be concise - Be selective in your agenda items, if you can accomplish your goals in thirty minutes then do so.
Be respectful - avoid last minute changes, last minute cancelations or not being prepared. Never keep them waiting for you.
Be creative - Bring new ideas to the table as often as possible.
Be empowering - Give your employees opportunities to develop content and/or present to the group.
Be demanding - Demand that each member of the team becomes fully engaged in the meeting, to be prepared, to be on time, to know their business and to be positive.
In the second article on this subject we will review using meetings to increase your team's knowledge and confidence.
For more information about this subject, please join us at http://www.integrity-sales-leadership.com/Effective-meetings.html
Our goal is to provide honest recommendations on all aspects of sales and leadership, including: Sales Strategies, Selling and Leading with Integrity, Cold Calling, Telemarketing
About the Author
So, we decided to build the type of site that we would like our sales people to use. It has integrity as its corner-stone and relies on real sales people, real sales leaders and industry experts for its content.
Our goal is to provide honest recommendations on all aspects of sales and leadership, including:
A well run sales meeting can have an incredible impact on the confidence and development of your team. Conversely, badly run meetings will under-mine your leadership and retard the growth of your team.
It is possible to influence your employees simply by how you conduct a sales meeting - this is a much subtler method of coaching, as subliminal messages are to advertising and - if done correctly - as effective.
The structure, poise, professionalism and candor required for a great sales appointment must also be present in a great sales meeting. So, by running great meetings you are providing your team with a real-life example of how to run great appointments.
Your ability to create an environment that is receptive to this type of meeting is the first step in your team's growth.
The general rules for a successful meeting are:
Be consistent - with time, place and content.
Be prepared - spend time developing the content of the meeting and use an agenda.
Be concise - Be selective in your agenda items, if you can accomplish your goals in thirty minutes then do so.
Be respectful - avoid last minute changes, last minute cancelations or not being prepared. Never keep them waiting for you.
Be creative - Bring new ideas to the table as often as possible.
Be empowering - Give your employees opportunities to develop content and/or present to the group.
Be demanding - Demand that each member of the team becomes fully engaged in the meeting, to be prepared, to be on time, to know their business and to be positive.
In the second article on this subject we will review using meetings to increase your team's knowledge and confidence.
For more information about this subject, please join us at http://www.integrity-sales-leadership.com/Effective-meetings.html
Our goal is to provide honest recommendations on all aspects of sales and leadership, including: Sales Strategies, Selling and Leading with Integrity, Cold Calling, Telemarketing
About the Author
So, we decided to build the type of site that we would like our sales people to use. It has integrity as its corner-stone and relies on real sales people, real sales leaders and industry experts for its content.
Our goal is to provide honest recommendations on all aspects of sales and leadership, including:
Powered by ScribeFire.
Posted by Handoko T Porrung at 12:32 PM 0 comments
Leadership Development
6 Ways to Measure the Effectiveness of a Leadership Development Program by Dan McCarthy
Much has been written about the importance of measuring the impact of leadership development programs or systems. Over the years I ve been looking for practical, meaningful, and effective metrics. Heres what Ive settled on for now, and although Im not completely satisfied with any single measure, a combination of these should give you a pretty good dashboard.
1. Company performance. The ultimate measure, nothing else really matters. In most cases, consistent great company performance can usually be attributed to great leadership. And of course, lousy leadership is usually the root cause of business failures.
2. External perception of leadership. External perception can be measured by awards, such as CEO Magazine œBest Companies for Leadersand hundreds of individual leadership awards (CEO of the Year, CIO of the year, CFO of the Year, etc).
3. Internal perception of leadership. Internal perception can be measured in two ways. First, if you are using 360 leadership assessments, you can maintain an aggregate score of a singleoverall effectiveness question, or run a report that aggregates the average score for all questions. Second, you can pull questions out of your annual employee survey pertaining to leadership and look for year over year improvement. You can also compare your leaders to other companies if youre using questions provided by a third party vendor, such as Gallop or the Leadership Practices Inventory.
4. Succession planning measures. Keep tract of the number of key positions filled by internal candidates or the number of “ready now candidates for each key positions (bench strength). Individual Development Plan (IDP) progress or completion. Track the completion of development activity for key leaders and succession candidate pools.
5. Leadership development training measures. Use the basic Kirkpatrick measures, satisfaction, knowledge, behavior change, and business results. Easier said than done for the last one, but it works in some cases. For example, you would expect a decrease in turnover and improvement in sales after the implementation of a successful sales manger hiring or coaching program.
6. Finally, the easiest measure and perhaps the one that has the biggest impact on your funding and career opportunities: ask your key stakeholders. Regular meetings with your top executives and other key stakeholders will ensure youre efforts are hitting the mark. These meetings are a great way to continuously assess current and future needs, communicate your accomplishments, and check for satisfaction
For more on leadership and leadership development, visit my blog at: http://greatleadershipbydan.blogspot.com/
About the Author
Ihave been a practitioner in the field of leadership development for over 20 years. Im currently the Manager of Leadership and Management Development at a leading provider of payroll and human resource services outsourcing.
Much has been written about the importance of measuring the impact of leadership development programs or systems. Over the years I ve been looking for practical, meaningful, and effective metrics. Heres what Ive settled on for now, and although Im not completely satisfied with any single measure, a combination of these should give you a pretty good dashboard.
1. Company performance. The ultimate measure, nothing else really matters. In most cases, consistent great company performance can usually be attributed to great leadership. And of course, lousy leadership is usually the root cause of business failures.
2. External perception of leadership. External perception can be measured by awards, such as CEO Magazine œBest Companies for Leadersand hundreds of individual leadership awards (CEO of the Year, CIO of the year, CFO of the Year, etc).
3. Internal perception of leadership. Internal perception can be measured in two ways. First, if you are using 360 leadership assessments, you can maintain an aggregate score of a singleoverall effectiveness question, or run a report that aggregates the average score for all questions. Second, you can pull questions out of your annual employee survey pertaining to leadership and look for year over year improvement. You can also compare your leaders to other companies if youre using questions provided by a third party vendor, such as Gallop or the Leadership Practices Inventory.
4. Succession planning measures. Keep tract of the number of key positions filled by internal candidates or the number of “ready now candidates for each key positions (bench strength). Individual Development Plan (IDP) progress or completion. Track the completion of development activity for key leaders and succession candidate pools.
5. Leadership development training measures. Use the basic Kirkpatrick measures, satisfaction, knowledge, behavior change, and business results. Easier said than done for the last one, but it works in some cases. For example, you would expect a decrease in turnover and improvement in sales after the implementation of a successful sales manger hiring or coaching program.
6. Finally, the easiest measure and perhaps the one that has the biggest impact on your funding and career opportunities: ask your key stakeholders. Regular meetings with your top executives and other key stakeholders will ensure youre efforts are hitting the mark. These meetings are a great way to continuously assess current and future needs, communicate your accomplishments, and check for satisfaction
For more on leadership and leadership development, visit my blog at: http://greatleadershipbydan.blogspot.com/
About the Author
Ihave been a practitioner in the field of leadership development for over 20 years. Im currently the Manager of Leadership and Management Development at a leading provider of payroll and human resource services outsourcing.
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