Sunday, April 26, 2009

Using great relationships


We need a strategy for developing great relationships where synergy, innovation and creativity between ourselves and others really can lead to business situations where one and one makes three or even four.

The first step has to be to do with getting out more. We need to choose the right ‘events’ both online and offline. It may be better spending two hours on Linked In for instance, than two hours at a breakfast meeting. We need to be relaxed, trying to get to know people gradually rather than ramming ourselves down their throat from the word go.

The second step is that we have to be clear about our own externally validated expertise. The words that we use to describe this expertise are absolutely essential because they convey our confidence, our sense of purpose and the benefits that we are offering to others. The sharper this particular arrow the more penetration we will have in the market place.

The third and final step has to be that we are the person we would like to do business with. I’m not talking about talent or personality or knowledge. I am talking about the things we look for in a business relationship with others. It does not matter what these values are because they are unique to everyone; this is not a judgement call.

But if for example, you value people that are open, honest, straightforward and transparent in the way that they behave, then that is the way you have to behave too!

No one can expect or deserve great relationships if they say they want one thing from others, when they themselves are at variance with this.

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Monday, April 13, 2009

Slapper straps


With the sheer speed of change in this business world we are being forced to make new meaningful relationships with people we don’t even know. And at the same time, we need to make decisions about other people that we are not so confident about.

And because this state is so immediate – I mean how many people reading this, have a pile or several piles of business cards in their office that have been more or less processed? – we need some way of trying to sort potential and actual relationships out.

When I was eight there was a school assembly where the headmaster told a story amounting to “You can’t tell a sausage by its skin” and the moral in the story is absolutely right, but then how do you tell a sausage? Well I reckon that one good way is to watch what people do, rather than pay too much attention to what they say.

We know a business couple from some consultancy work that I have been doing. They are about our age and the senior partner in the practice is well known both locally and nationally. He writes a lot, Chairs a professional body, speaks at conventions and so on. After having met socially a couple of times and noticing how much we appeared to have in common, I suggested they come and stay one weekend. We could do the mountain walks, Hay on Wye bookshops and various other local delights. They sounded pleased and we gave them a couple of dates, three months hence. After a month, I emailed to see if they had decided which weekend to take. They were still “sorting their diaries”. Another month went by and we hadn’t heard anything. With just a couple of weeks left before the first option date we had heard nothing. So we assumed..................well what do you assume?

I think the moral of this story is that we are all finding it difficult to build relationships under pressure. You’ll win some and you’ll lose some too.

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All dried up


Now I’ve notched up a couple of hundred blogs these last three years I frequently get asked how best to do it.

For me, I experience something, think about it, try to turn that event into something that might have value for others and then I write it down. Usually on paper first.

It doesn’t always happen that simply. There are occasions, even when you are in your favourite blogging spot, having had lots of exposure to good raw material, and nothing actually happens. You sit in front of a blank piece of paper. A myriad of thoughts go through your head, but they don’t connect up; it’s like a kaleidoscope of colour but without any pattern. And even when you shake the glass, it still doesn’t add up to anything.

Blogging is only one way of developing brand, some prefer Twitter, others do podcasts, yet others spend their time on Linked In. Some do a bit of everything.

So there is no definitive answer on how best to proceed other than try things and see what works for you. And since it is also hard to evaluate these activities, because they do not always lead directly to fresh or enhanced income streams, it is important to enjoy the journey, to enjoy doing it for its own sake.

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Thursday, April 09, 2009

Goodbye John Humphries, goodbye Hamish McRae


The news media can seriously damage our mental health both at work and at home.

For many years we have turned Radio Four on at ten p.m. and let it run through World Service at 1a.m. and then back to Radio Four at 0530 and on until getting up time. But the fact is that 90 % of stories chosen by the news programme producers are depressing in one way or another. That is not all. The vast majority of the listening public can do absolutely nothing to make a material difference to the reported situation.

So in addition to starting each working day feeling more or less depressed, that is accompanied by an overwhelming sense of impotence. There is a third angle. We heard the latest crisis feature about the NHS one morning last week. At nine I had an appointment with my local GP, so I grabbed the Independent newspaper from the porch floor, and on the walk round, it was only natural to wonder how they are faring. Yet the care and service and support I received was second to none. So in the back of my mind is some kind of confusion between what I heard about doctors' surgeries on the radio and what I had actually just experienced.

In the Waiting Room, I had time to absorb the screaming headline on my paper about the imminent catastrophe facing the City of London, the wealth it creates and the jobs it sustains. The supporting article was not for the squeamish.

Now I was with a client at 0930 and part of my job is working with business clients to help develop and sustain competitive advantage. My demeanour, attitude and approach are crucial. So why do I want to start the day like I do, like I have done for twenty years? The answer is that I don't anymore, so Radio Four News is no more and I have cancelled the Independent.

It is more important than ever to be the driving force behind your own business model, rather than an unwitting participant in someone else's.

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