10 Business reSolutions for 2010

1. Conduct a SWOT Analysis for 2009 and analyze your sales, operations, people, and financial commitments.
2. Conduct a Customer Satisfaction Survey to define benchmarks in your core competencies
3. Develop a Strategic or Business Plan for 2010.
4. Meet quarterly with your professional advisors (Accounting, Legal, Business Consultant, Financial Planner, etc.) to review progress and determine action plans.
5. Focus your energies on your talented people
6. Complete a course or take a workshop for self-improvement and/or business development
7. Focus on your strengths, the strengths of your people, and your processes.
8. Prioritize your tasks and make sure others do as well.
9. Remember that time management is personal management.
10. Celebrate success; offer praise and recognition to your top producers.

By Richard Hohmann, VP of Innovative Leadership
Business Consulting - Leadership/Management Development, Strategic Planning and more

March, Keeping to the Plan

It's March. Have you kept to your 2009 plan?

Use these 10 tips to stay on track or get back on track for your business or home.

• Determine a planning and administration system that works for you.
• Develop a budget for your business and your home
• Use Cash Flow as a key performance indicator for your activities
• Revisit your personal goals
• Provide the time for a Strategic Business Development Process
• Use your Professional Advisors to your advantage (Accountant, Lawyer, Business Consultant, Coach, Commercial Bank Representative, and Financial Advisor)
• Formulate metrics for your personal and business success and monitor them monthly.
• Maintain a positive attitude and be committed to change if the environment dictates
• Exercise and continue to pursue your recreational activities or hobby
• Focus on Responsibility, Accountability, and self-empowerment

Chewing Gum and Band-aids

I just received the Chamber of Commerce Southern New Jersey’s Board Council’s on Responsible Government Report – Phase III – Meeting the Challenge: Saving Taxpayer Dollars by Adopting Best Practices”. The publication pointed out the differences between the Private Sector Practices and that of State Government followed by recommendations to the State for improvement by implementing these best practices.

This publication focused on the following: Job Classification Systems, Hiring Practices, Employee Assessment & Pay for Job Performance, Professional Development, Disciplinary policies, Human Resources and Personnel Management.

This is not a political commentary but when hasn’t the private sector had to focus on hiring and selection, retention, performance management and people development. What I questions, is, “How many companies in the Private Sector do anything more than acknowledge the need or focus on the concern?" Most companies today are aware of the employment statistics facing us today and many have moved on to the planning stage and have started to develop Succession Plans, Behavioral Interviewing Scorecard, utilization of an Assessment Process, implementing some type of “three strike rule”, retention of Key Employees or Top Producers, and a Career Management program.

I still would bet that those same companies have not implemented formalized plans or more importantly, designed processes to compliment the needs and focus of the company. Band-aids and chewing gum are being used to cover the gaps created by the “good to great” employees that are bailing something better or we are doing everything in our power to keep the baby boomers from jumping ship. I really feel that this “quick fix” mentality will not hold for long.

We are loosing a talented management pool that we are not training and developing at a speed equal to that of the exodus from the workforce by the baby boomers. We will find ourselves with a inexperienced, non-communicative, non-inspirational management team that can only lead by example because they will not have the skills to move the workforce upward and onward. They will have to be task-masters to gain the knowledge that the exiting management team declined to share.

There is only one Best Practice out there that satisfies the needs of any company in the areas of productivity, performance, and passion. It can eliminate the worry about employee engagement or motivation and it can provide the foundation for performance management. The Best Practice that needs to be embellished by both the private and public sector is to spend the time and money on your middle management. In simplest of terms, train the immediate supervisor because he or she is the one that is going to make the difference in hiring and selection, personnel development, performance management, positive discipline, and more.

The ROI for the training and development of your management team will easily be satisfied when you look at turnover, key employee retention, knowledge sharing, cross training, and behavior in the workplace.

Leadership and Dysfunctional Behaviors

Leadership.

I have always related leadership to being influential in the workplace. Being able to influence the culture of an organization or being able to compliment the core competencies of an organization have always been integral components of a successful leader. I was intrigued by an article in the February issue of Training and Development that reported that 90% of leaders say dysfunctional behaviors have become acceptable in the workplace and the consequences that have resulted from this bad behavior are lower employee satisfaction, lower productivity, and decreased quality. Our organization focuses on the healthcare marketplace and we find that dysfunctional behaviors play a major role in decreased quality and lower productivity. Both patience and employee satisfaction is determined by those factors.

Is it because we don’t consider dysfunctional behavior poor performance? Inappropriate behavior in the workplace is destructive and must be considered a performance issue.
We should focus on the behavioral issues within an organization and make sure that they are addressed by our performance management system. According to a most recent survey completed by Joseph Glenny, A Provo-Utah based author and management consultant, “finger pointing” or shifting blame, gossiping, and creating territorial borders and boundaries are three of the most destructive behaviors in the workplace today. It also noted that 64% of leaders do very little or nothing to change these behaviors.

It appears that the leaders today are fearful toward addressing the issues because of the consequences…whatever they may be. Many leaders turn to HR or Training and ask them to sprinkle “magical dust” over the situation and expect instantaneous results from the training department or vendors.

Changing behavior is a process and it requires implementation of more than just “dust”. It requires expectations in the workplace from the top down. The leadership team and their management team must define what behaviors they would like to see while stating emphatically those behaviors that will no longer be tolerated. The Performance Management system must focus on the interpersonal side of managing and believe it or not, these behavioral changes can be measured. It appears that the influential leaders of today aren’t willing to view behavior in the same light as they do performance. Maybe we should redefine leadership and not associate it with influence. It obviously is not working!

Cautiously Optimistic

The Feds have reduced the rates and are forecasted to do it again this week and the American Corporation and small business owner are to let out a big “sigh of relief”.
I can tell you from my experiences this past week that no one is breathing a “sigh of relief”. Companies have put some of their spending on hold, like training and development, marketing and promotional materials, and are continuing to focus on the costs and related expenses that can be reduced.

Why is it that we as business people tend to hide in our caves until the storm blows over instead of getting out in the mix and making the necessary adjustments so that everything is more in order to weather the storm than ever before?

The return on investment for training and development expenses can be measured and defined. Believe it or not, there is a system where behavioral change can even be measured over time so why is it that we don’t take a more aggressive approach to an external threat like economic conditions, especially the prospect of a recession?

One of the reasons we are not more aggressive when threats affect our businesses is that we have not strategically planned for this threat. Any company that did a strategic planning exercise using S.W.O.T. (Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, and Threats) analysis or similar exercise certainly came up with economic conditions as a potential threat in 2008. If you didn’t record economic conditions as a possible threat, please retire now and/or transition or sell your business. The problem I see is that most people use strategic planning to set action steps when the climate internally and externally is at its calmest and not as a vehicle to help them through the periods that get the roughest.

So, let’s sit back down and make sure our external resources in terms of opportunities and threats are well reflected in our planning as well as our internal strengths and weaknesses.
Effective organizational effectiveness can minimize the effect that an external event has on businesses and people can become totally engaged when they know what they need to do to overcome the external challenge.

Awareness, planning, implementation and results…it sure sounds like something that focuses everyone on the challenge, defines a plan to get somewhere, allows for mid-course correction if the weather changes, and focuses everyone on the results. I guess if we all do that I can become cautiously optimistic….but I am not.

The Weather Outside is Frightful!

Don’t let this holiday song provide a foundation theme for 2008! You certainly can tell it is winter by the methodology being used by the weather forecasters to panic the local residents into spending hours at the grocery store buying all the necessities for a mid 1950’s blizzard. I sit there listening to them tell me that the potential for the front moving rapidly from the South up the coast colliding with the Arctic air being driven down by a Canadian high located over some Lake near Michigan should produce a tremendous snowstorm that supposedly we have all been waiting for. I wake up the next morning and I find a “dusting” if anything but the result of the forecast is that WAWA has sold more milk and bread compared to previous snow storm announcements (for those not in the Philadelphia market, WAWA is the leading convenience store where you buy milk and bread) We are starting to hear the same thing about a global recession. After conducting their annual S.W.O.T., it has now become part of everyone’s strategic plan to list an economic recession as the major external threat that may affect their business success for the upcoming year. I guess we better get in line at your local WAWA to buy cost reduction measures, recession-proof armor, revenue producing fairy dust, and more. Unfortunately, I can feel the cost-cutting measures starting to unfold as I am writing this article.

There is no question that the economy may more than likely turn “chilly” in the upcoming year and the predictions for the real estate market continue to appear “frigid”. Forecasters are predicting that there is a heightened interest in career development and paying down personal debt. Business leaders have learned in 2007 that employee loyalty is waning as employer commitment begins to weaken. The generational shift in ownership in small businesses and the retirement rush is the corporate environment has begun and will accelerate in 2008. Economic trends are being characterized by shorter job tenures, changing generational values, scarce talent, and a surplus of vacant positions.
Statistically it is well documented that these trends are real. These trends are affecting all levels within an organization and we need to focus on the acquisition of talent, identification and development of leaders within an organization, and the retention of good employees. Survey after survey demonstrates that most businesses believe there is a current shortage of quality leadership talent in the workforce and they measure personality or behavioral styles when identifying future leaders. It is also well documented that most companies have not implemented an adequate leadership development plan and not focused on the emotional intelligence of the future leader.
The real concern for me is that most companies still do not realize that their people offer them the most competitive advantage in any economic climate.
First, it is important that you do not let the business weatherpersons scare you into a cost-cutting frenzy in that areas of business that means the most to your employees. Second, leadership and career development cannot be achieved without an effective training and development process. Not a program, but a process! I ask you to be innovative in the selection of your tools and products for this process and of course, make sure they are cost – effective but most importantly, produce the desired results or behavioral change that your company needs to be more competitive in 2008. Don’t let the forecasters scare you into cutting the processes that will mean the difference for your future.


Innovative Leadership offers training and development for all levels of your employees. Executive Coaching, Manager Training, and even Customer Service. Get more competitive and make a difference with these programs and processes. Contact us to get started today!

HR Needs to Step Up to the Plate!

It is well documented that most companies have a formal strategic-planning process but don’t use it to make many of their most important decisions. Less than half of the respondents of a recent survey demonstrated that they are satisfied with their company’s approach to making strategic decisions. It has also been demonstrated that greater satisfaction could come from improving the company’s ability to align their people with their strategic plan and from monitoring progress against the plan.

So what are we doing wrong? Are we not looking at our current methodology for both the creation of the plan and the implementation of the needed actions? The missing link is usually found within the implementation or monitoring component. It is projected that 65% of the components of most plans never even get implemented. Is it because we aren’t willing to put the time and energy into the implementation process or we don’t consider it a high priority?

Strategic Planning is critical to the continued success of any organization yet most employees feel that critical decision-making is left to a select few. The two top suggestions for improving the company’s approach to strategic development are: improve the alignment with the strategic plan and develop better methods to monitor progress against the plan.

Surveys have also demonstrated that executive concerns about executing and aligning strategy are likely exacerbated by a perceived lack of integration between the company’s strategic-planning group and its human resource group. When asked to consider strategic planning’s integration with several corporate functions, respondents in a nationwide survey ranked HR as second-to-last in terms of degree of integration. Respondents who were dissatisfied with their company’s strategic planning see the least integration.

Isn’t it time that HR steps up to the plate and take the integration of strategy and people seriously? What does your Strategic Development Process look like? Who is willing to hold people accountable for the success of the plan? It sure sounds like HR or anyone else for that matter is not willing to focus on the outcome. It seems to me that we should all take time off and read the “Five Dysfunctions of a Team” by Patrick Lencioni. It talks about trust, conflict, commitment, accountability, and results……five things that we just seem like we don’t want to address. It sounds like no one is willing to stick around to see the outcome.