A new year is almost here and by now you’ve probably got a pretty clear idea of what you would like to accomplish in the coming twelve months.  Targets have been set, budgets allocated, and plans developed.  How likely are your plans to be a success?  Well, that is in a large part, going to come down to how well the plans are executed by the team which is largely a function of how well the management team communicate, lead and manage in their roles. As your organisation grows, it doesn’t always need more staff, but it does need better or more skilled staff.  This is why inv ..read more

When things get a bit crazy, especially leading up to Christmas, yesterday’s “important” often becomes today’s “urgent” and the issues you have to face have an untimely tendency to illuminate the cracks that need filling in your organisation. As nimble as your abilities may be, there is only so much of yourself you can throw into resolving issues so prioritisation is key to your survival and sanity. First things first. As you’ll often see us mentioning, keeping your desired outcome in focus helps when leading at times the going gets tough.  This also applies to prioritising ..read more

As a business and leadership coach for the past fifteen years, I’ve worked with organisations both large and small to enable them to be more effective and efficient in their business operations. Efficient meetings are a great use of everyones’ time when properly planned and executed. Today I want to share with you some of the secrets to making meetings work well for you, no matter whether you are a manager or an employee. Keep in mind that all organisations are in one of four stages, startup, growing, stagnant or declining. Meetings are a tool that should be used to improve communication throu ..read more

If you sell business to business (B2B), then you may have noticed that it’s getting harder for your sales team to get traction at times. So, what has changed? Traditionally, the relationship between marketing and sales has been considered somewhat linear, where marketing does it’s job and the sales department takes over the reins and offers a solution to the customer. Today, buyer behaviour is dramatically different and needs a new approach.  B2B buyers are showing a distinct preference for seeking information and solutions online, often by-passing the sales rep altogether. In fact, HBR r ..read more

Who hasn’t found themselves in this situation?  You have somewhere to go, and instead of asking for directions, you decide to try find it yourself unaided. Before you know it, despite your best efforts, you’re somewhat lost. In business it’s all too easy to fall into a similar trap.  Year after year, working away hard at your business on your own without quite finding the results you had hoped for. That’s where a business coach can make a world of difference, but is business coaching really worth it?  These three reasons may hold the answer for you. You don’t know what you ..read more

What do you make of this?  Something like four million people in the US reportedly quit their jobs back in August, from professionals to front line workers, many in the thick of it all during the height of the pandemic. It’s not surprising that so many people have, and are, re-evaluating what’s important to them after such a difficult time.  Even if a tsunami of resignations doesn’t reach us, it has thrown an important light on the growing expectation of workers, trending well before COVID, for more meaning in their jobs and greater life-work balance – here and around the world. We’r ..read more

There has been much written on the topic of the value of diversity in organisations and more recently, you may have seen some of Australia’s larger organisations appointing roles like ‘Head of Diversity’ or setting diversity quotas in an attempt to embrace this concept.   While this may sound like a good idea in theory, it’s worth considering in more detail before rolling it out in your organisation. While diversity in organisations and teams has been shown to be advantageous when a culture of trust, psychological safety and equal participation exists, making diversity a target can e ..read more

Here we are again.  Just when we thought we were on top of COVID-19, Delta came along and pulled the rug out from underneath us….and then some! To say it “sucks” hardly cuts it.   BUT, this is the situation we face.  It is what it is. Although in lockdown many people are facing fear and enormous uncertainty, what we DO KNOW is that as people we do NEED connection. Extensive research shows that personal connection helps to Support mental health Increase level of happiness, and Improve your ability to be resilient when the going gets tough. When you’re trying to bala ..read more

It’s an age old conundrum, why bother investing in training for frontline staff at a time when employee loyalty seems to be at an all-time low? What if the employee uses the training to push for a pay rise or shop their new skills around to the marketplace to get a new job? As a business and leadership coach for over 15 years, I’ve encountered this mindset with many managers.  “What if I train my employee and they leave?”, the manager says. “What if you DON’T train them and they stay?”, I typically ask in response. The real secret to building a great organisation is how you attract and re ..read more

I don’t have the time”, “I’ll get to it soon”, “No because I need the flexibility to be able to change my plan if I need”, are all common excuses I hear business owners using to justify why they don’t have a business plan. If you are like the majority of small business owners, you’re running your business without a proper business plan and significantly reducing your chances of survival or success. Many business owners make the creation of a business plan much harder than it actually is but here’s the bottom line, “In business, if you fail to plan, you are planning to fail.” So, where to sta ..read more