Businesses today make a lot of promises, to customers, employees, investors and the larger world. These promises help build trust, but they also add risk. The fact is, we live in an era of transparency driven by social media, in which businesses that don’t keep their word have nowhere to hide. It is troubling then, […]
Anyone attempting to lead change in an organization knows to expect some resistance; but this is no less frustrating for being predictable. Over time, you may find yourself gravitating toward those who support the change, and distancing yourself from those who openly or quietly oppose it. Unfortunately, approaching change with this sort of “us versus […]
Customer loyalty has always been the holy grail of organic growth – yet, as sales models shift toward subscription-based services, longer-term relationships have become more critical than ever before. In their classic study, W. Earl Sasser Jr. and Frederick F. Reichheld found that reducing customer churn by just 5 percent could increase profitability between 25 […]
I am pleased to share that this post on strategy + business, Liberate Your Team with Clear Processes, has just received a 2018 Azbee Bronze Award of Excellence from the American Society of Business Publication Editors (one of many awards for the magazine). My goal was to offer a way out of a recurring challenge […]
In my 20 years as an executive coach and advisor, I’ve found that “framing” is one of the common threads behind great leaders’ persuasive genius – both in formal presentations and one-on-one conversations. Great leaders do not rely on facts alone to communicate. Instead, they offer new frames for what facts mean, in a way […]
Some years ago, I met an ERP implementation team that was able to deliver tangible business results in just six months, where eight other teams at the same company had stalled. The successful team’s secret? Early on, its members had given up on planning, and instead focused their time on putting live customer orders through a […]
A few years back, a VP at a high-tech firm I was working with pulled me aside. “Our division is mired in distrust,” she said. “Teams are not talking to each other. Meetings are more about posturing than work. And no one is taking any real risks. But when I bring it up, I get […]
We’ve all experienced that “eureka” moment during a presentation or deep discussion with colleagues – where nifty slideshow visuals or a sketch on the back of a napkin help us see how to take our business to the next level. However, we’ve also experienced how easily these insights can fade once the presentation or meeting […]
Some time ago, I was consulting a senior director of a government agency who was two years into transforming his organization to be more customer- and results-focused. He had restructured his 200-person team, launched a few key initiatives, coached his staff on changing mind-sets, and made some difficult personnel decisions. Then, just as these investments […]
“I used to be the answer man. Now I’ve learned to listen. It is amazing what you learn when you open your mind,” said Gary, chief financial officer of a U.S. firm. As Gary explains, listening is a very powerful leadership strategy. When leaders are genuinely interested in what others are seeing, thinking, and feeling […]
