Bite Sized Business Tips
2 minute reads for the values-led business leader
Snippets for purpose and values-led business leaders about meeting our responsibilities to our team, customers, owners, communities and suppliers. Context is everything, so these aren't dogma - rather a stimulus for thought. Subscribe below.
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Where your strategy goes to die #2: 30% of 10 ≠ 100% of 3
I remember sitting in a leadership team strategy awayday some years back where the team agreed on its 14 priorities. ... 14. Fourteen. ... More than double the number of company priorities than the number of members of the leadership team. You're on a hiding to nothing if your strategy ...
Accept bad behaviour to make it your culture
For "new behaviour model" read values or purpose. I don't think I've worked in or supported a company that hasn't gone through this dilemma. A "good" performer, i.e. one that nails their numbers or gets big wins or makes useful intros, but who doesn't live the values or has a ...
Where Your Strategy Goes to Die #1 – A wish-list of serious sounding business words
Here are 3 strategic objectives I’ve seen more than once:
- Employee engagement
- Marketing
- Customer retention
“Police stab vests are not built for humans with breasts”
Caroline Criado Perez is sadly spot on to highlight that we are collectively undervaluing both paid and unpaid work by women. Although there's some talk of the enormous value of women's unpaid work, in homes, families and societies, there's far from global recognition and subsequent action. And on women's paid ...
The importance of the internal compass
"Our ambition should not be to win, then, but to play with our full effort. Our intention is not to be thanked or recognized, but to help and to do what we think is right. Our focus is not on what happens to us but on how we respond. In ...
You don’t lead organisations. You lead people.
You don't lead organisations. You lead people. Obvious, but so often forgotten. I know many CEOs who are at heart very human and humane, but feel a peer pressure especially when in groups to do "what a CEO is supposed to do". And they lose sight of the fact that ...
Are you a mini-Boris? Am I? Are we all?
On climate, on social issues, on using business for good - are we all mini-Borises? Boris's climate policies and plans (inasmuch as they exist) fall a long way short of Boris's climate promises. If you're generous, you may flatter him with a "road to hell paved with good intentions". If ...
Not quite “Don’t Look Up” – but not unlike it either
I've often seen companies (and their teams) suffer unduly from something that was foreseen, planned for, but then not averted. So many "decisions" made but then not implemented. Captured eloquently in the readable and practical "Moments of Impact" by Chris Ertel and Lisa Kay Solomon. "Most of the time, not only do leaders of ...
Guaranteed business failure
You can absolutely do things guaranteed to make your business fail. But unfortunately, there aren't things you can do which are guaranteed to make your business succeed. It is the same asymmetry at play in Seneca's sage quote that _"an age builds up cities: an hour destroys them. In a ...
Where’s joy in the remote office?
Joy. You can feel the places that have it, and the ones that don't. It's not about en enforced fun - the organised pub quiz or bowling night. Not that there's no place for them, but it's at least as likely that they'll be cringemaking as it will that they'll ...
The main obstacle to scaling up
There's one main obstacle that stops agencies and consultancies from scaling up... ... CEOs / MDs being unable to step back from their business to focus on strategic work. I (really) hate the cliche, but it's true - Making time to work on their business rather than in their business ...
Moving from what my job is to what my contribution is
In the best leadership teams, Sales Directors evolve from "My job is sales" to "My job is to meet our company's goals through my contribution in sales". As it is for Sales Directors, so it is for Finance Directors or Product Directors or Delivery or Marketing or Technology or ...