Be Different or be dead

May 25, 2015

3 simple things you need to know about authentic leadership

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3 simple things you need to know about authentic leadership.

There are no silver bullets to being a stand-out leader, but these 3 moves will get you ahead of the pack.

‘Serve around’ the workplace

Ask ‘How can I help?’, not direct ‘Do this’. Your employees need a champion to make it easier for them to do their job. Be that person. Become a regular fixture with the frontline. Be intimately familiar with their issues and challenges.

Fix the stuff for them that needs fixing. Bash internal barriers. Remove grunge. Eliminate dumb rules. Eradicate bureaucracy.

Make their job easier and they will pay you back 100 times over.

Encourage imperfection

Seeking ‘perfection’ in business is a fool’s game; perfection doesn’t exist. And while you are pursuing this mirage you aren’t moving forward. Your feet aren’t moving.

Better to create a just about right plan and start executing it. Learn what works and doesn’t work. Adjust your direction accordingly.

Leave the ponderers in your wake.

Let your right brain rule

Your employees may intellectual understand something, but that doesn’t determine how they personally FEEL about it. They may understand what the consolidation plan means and the high level benefits it will produce but if it eliminates their job they will likely oppose it.

The lesson for leaders is to move quickly from intellectualizing to feeling when executing change.

What YOU (don’t delegate critical changes) say to employees and how you say it will determine if the change you want to make to enhance shareholder value will actually happen.

Does this sound like Leadership 101?

If you say ‘yes’ you’ve missed the point.

Cheers,
Roy
Check out my BE DiFFERENT or be dead Book Series

• Posted 5.25.15 at 04:56 am by Roy Osing
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May 18, 2015

Small biz leaders are great; here’s 5 reasons why

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Small biz leaders are great; here’s 5 reasons why.

Large and small teams face the same challenges: getting and keeping customers, engaging employees, managing costs and so on. Performance of large vs small, however, is determined by how effective the leader is.

I’m a fan of small business. I admire their passion and commitment.

And their leaders, who can teach the big guys a thing or two.

Here are 5 priceless gifts from small business leaders;

1. Get hands on — Feel the ‘hot breath’ of the customer everyday.

2. Get dirty — Feel what it’s like to do your business with insufficient tools and order fulfilment processes that don’t work the way they should. Follow up on customer complaints and learn how painful it can be.

3. Get in the trenches with the frontline — Take customer calls. Learn what it’s like representing your company to ‘the outside’. Make a point of honouring your frontline folks who succeed despite of the support they typically get from your managers.

4. Deliver value as your personal priority — It’s not about the company, it’s about YOU, and your personal contribution to what your organization delivers to your customers. Don’t delegate it.

5. Be human — And make a fool of yourself.

Cheers,
Roy
Check out my BE DiFFERENT or be dead Book Series

• Posted 5.18.15 at 04:30 am by Roy Osing
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April 9, 2015

Why focusing on only 3 things will make you win

If you can’t focus on the critical things that need to be done little progress is made and winning is impossible.

Moving an organization or your career forward requires vigilance; chasing stuff dilutes your efforts and accomplishes nothing.

Nirvana is doing as little as possible to get the job done; you have neither the time, energy or money to do it all.

In the following articles, I crystalize in three points what you need to do to achieve extraordinary gains in the areas of an organization that are vital to us.

▪️Roy’s Rule of 3 for execution: focus on three things that determine 80% of what you want to achieve and do them brilliantly;

▪️Don’t flog your stuff; build strong sales relationships;

▪️If you can’t create amazing experiences for customers, they won’t stay;

▪️Building the business plan for your organization doesn’t have to be painful and complicated;

▪️If you don’t kill the grunge and cut the CRAP that gets in the way of execution, you can’t move forward;

▪️Marketing must morph to ’ME’ if it is to stay relevant;

▪️Your new business idea will die unless you do these 3 things;

▪️If you’re not the ONLY one that does what you do, then who are you?

Cheers,
Roy
Check out my BE DiFFERENT or be dead Book Series

• Posted 4.9.15 at 04:50 am by Roy Osing
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January 26, 2015

Why your amazing customers should get awards like employees do

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Why your amazing customers should get awards like employees do.

Many organizations have Employee of the Month awards.

I have no issue with employee recognition; it’s important to shout out those people who go the extra mile and make a solid contribution over time.

But what about customers who go the extra mile? Those who go above and beyond the call to help the organization carry on business successfully?

Don’t they deserve special recognition?

I’m not talking about customer appreciation events that cater to the masses and serve little but to quench the thirst of looky-loos.

I’m referring to individual recognition just like employees are afforded.

Do the same for customers.

Mr Smith of 110 Cedar Drive, Boston, Massachusetts deserves customer of the month if he excelled in delivering benefits to your organization. It may be new sales revenue, a testimonial to your service or it could be referrals.

It really doesn’t matter.

Set out the criteria and make a BIG splash about honouring the special people who contribute to your well being.

In fact how about taking it one step further and celebrate employee-customer teams who create magic together?

Too over the top?

Don’t think so. Anything you can do to involve one of your loyal customers in a recognition scheme is more than a good thing.

Cheers,
Roy
Check out my BE DiFFERENT or be dead Book Series

• Posted 1.26.15 at 04:14 am by Roy Osing
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