Increase Sales Blog

Posts Tagged ‘Business Productivity’

Working with individuals and organizations to improve the results is always interesting. One ongoing challenge is very large gap between knowing the results and then doing, taking the necessary actions to secure them.  Of course, some people have asked me this common sense question,  “How is this possible?”  Why do people not understand results?

I realized part of the source of this problem again as I heard a new economic statistic to demonstrate the results specific to the efforts to stimulate the US economy and grow business productivity.  This new, never before used figure, is called lives touched through the stimulus dollars.

Beyond being just plain ridiculous (using the talent intelligence of common sense) what perked my ears was the word “feelings.” This new metric would give people  good feelings about the stimulus and potentially may make people feel better about a proven ineffective government program. There have been very few government programs that have demonstrated a positive return on investment as government is inefficient and ineffective.

Remember E.T. and how his finger touched people and made things better? I am not sure how a cost of $194,000 per job can make anyone feel better and only adds to the confusion about results.

When the government is not honest about results and continually changes the metrics to measure results, how can the average employee who wants to do a good job not be confused?

Last Friday’s editorial discussed lies and business ethics. As long as those in management be them government officials or for profit management executives continue to ignore reality, these individuals will be living in the land of “Da Nile”  (denial) and the real lives touched will experience far more negative feelings and consequently negative results than positive ones.

Stress continues to have significant negative impact to organizations and individuals.  For example stress:

• Is linked to the six leading causes of death – American Psychological Association (APA), 2005
• Affects 36 million people in the workplace – APA
• Is responsible for one third of employees considering leaving their jobs with 14% actually taking action and quitting – Wall Street Journal
• Identified as the reason for 1 in four workers taking off a “mental health day” – APA Survey 2004
• Drains business productivity and consequently  profits by $300 billion or $7,500 per employee – American Institute of Stress 2006

There are many definitions for stress yet what is important is how an individual handles stress and that is indeed a talent intelligence.  Innermetrix defines this ability as:

Being able to “balance and defuse inner tensions and stresses” and it is not the physical actions to handle stress, but rather the “ability to appropriately separate themselves from each stressful situation and maintain” their own sense of inner peace.

The ability to maintain inner peace is the key and one that is not actively discussed unless you are speaking about yoga or meditation. And in the workplace, assuming the Lotus position is probably not practical.

So again, how can someone return to that quiet within the numerous stress storms experienced on a daily basis?  One could count to ten. However, that may not be enough time nor it may not create a wide enough distance between the stressful situation and the required inner peace.

Possibly a more helpful strategy is to put your mind someplace else for under 5 minutes. This may be listening to classical music, reading a book or even watching an inspiring DVD such as this one by Simple Truths – Nature’s Inspiration.

Individuals have the ability to handle stress, but it is a learned one and that is why it is a talent intelligence. Being able to know this talent and then focus on what you can control by changing the incoming channels of your mind allows you to continue both positive mental and physical health.

P.S. Also having a personal growth action plan where you have more control might also be a great idea.

Businesses from the entrepreneur to the multi-billion Fortune 100 organizations face challenges every day. Yet, there is one huge looming challenge that is currently not being addressed affecting business productivity.

This week when listening to the news, I heard about New England school districts that are giving As in efforts as part of the overall grading system. As a young child back in the dark ages when classes had 30 to 40 students, the effort (which is totally subjective viewpoint by the educator) was part of the report card. Of course for some students for example who found reading simple and easy, their efforts probably were not as strong as those who found reading complex and hard.

I know this to be true because I consistently scored As in the results from reading and Cs in the effort.  These marks were fairly consistent from third grade to high school when efforts were no longer part of the overall  grading process. (Note:  My father and his entire family were avid readers. By the age of 12, I was reading about 1,000 words a minute with 95% comprehension and all without any formal reading course. So reading for me was literally effortless and remains the same today some 40 plus years later.)

Years ago one of my colleagues Doug Brown of Paradigm Associates made this statement that still resonates with me:

People confuse motion with progress and activity with results.

By just focusing on effort at the exclusion of results, can potentially create a very unproductive workforce. Given right now from employee productivity research (the most recent being a Gallup poll), the majority of employees are not giving 8 hours of work for 8 hours of page (8 for 8), then the future looks very dim indeed if the up and coming workforce believes efforts trump results.

This trend of rewarding effort appears much in line with the other public education trends such as eliminating Valedictorian and Salutatorian or worse yet giving multiple Valedictorian awards because some students or rather their parents are upset that they are not number one or two. Yet, these many of these same parents probably believe in the supporting the best player (number 1) in any given sport and probably engage in conversations with others about who should be ranked number 1 or number two.

As many have argued against this type of behavior is let’s eliminate any playoffs and give everyone the #1 award.  Of course, this would significantly impact performance in future events.

How future American businesses deal with this challenge remains unclear.  However if these small business owners, entrepreneurs to C Suite executives thought they had productivity problems in the past, they haven’t experienced anything yet.

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Small business owners who employ less than 9 employees make up over 50% of all organizations according to the Small Business Administration (SBA). Due to their limited resources, they rely on outsourcing more so than larger organizations to enhance their overall business productivity.

By purchasing specific services related to business operations including marketing, sales training, executive coaching, human resource and technology just to name a few, these industrious entrepreneurs can truly focus on what they do best while maximizing both profitability and business productvity.  Small Business Coaching Tip:  Any dollars invested on outsourcing are really redirected profits.

The challenge is how to decide what company to select.  Referrals from trusted colleagues and clients are probably the best way. Yet for those who watch Holmes on Homes (one of my favorite television shows) this does not always ensures  the desired results.

From my observations, the decision rests between these two key criteria:

1. Experience
2. Expertise

There are a ton of people who have experience. With baby boomers comprising the greatest percentage of the workforce until their forthcoming retirements, experience abounds. However, experience does not necessarily equate to expertise.

According to Webster’s New World Online Dictionary, experience means “direct observation of or participation in events as a basis of knowledge.” The same resource traces the word expertise back to the word expert which means “having, involving or displaying special skill of knowledge derived from training or experience.”

From my observations, expertise must go beyond just having special skill or knowledge, but it must be directly connected to results through the demonstration of positive core values (business ethics).  For bottom line it is all about results.

For example, each day I receive at least one email or telephone call from some local to offshore web design firm sharing with me how they can propel me to page one on Google. In fact one of my colleagues, Alan Boyer, a small business coach in Kansas City, MO, shared with me his recent conversation with one of these firms.  They had a good sales pitch and guaranteed they could get him on page one and if not, they would refund his $4,000 small business outsourcing investment.

As the conversation continued and this firm explained how they would do it using long tail keywords and buying some links.  Alan said that was what he was currently doing both long tail keywords and link exchanges, but he still could not get on page one for “Small Business Coach.” All of a sudden this firm with experience and expertise backed down from their initial claim because they knew they could not guarantee the desired results.

Jill Konrath in her new book – SNAP Selling – discussed expertise and the connection to results. She advocated being very specific with the results you deliver when speaking with potential qualified customers.

Also, I remember when my husband had his own business – repairing and rebuilding chimneys. He came across numerous masons who had built hundreds of chimneys. Their brickwork was exceptional (think form), but the overall chimney (think function) was less than desirable. These professionals had the experience, but not the expertise. Their lack of expertise resulted in my husband being called out because the fire would not burn properly to the homeowners experiencing chimney fires.

Many firms who supply outsourcing will share they have helped hundreds of businesses and this goes to their experience. However, the question you as a small business owner need to ask and be very firm in this compound question:

Can you share with me the specific results you have delivered for at least 3 of your customers and their names to follow-up with personal conversations?

By taking this one action, you will convert your redirected profits into sustainable results.

P.S. Years ago I came across this Chinese proverb:  Vision without action is a daydream; Action without vision is a nightmare. This reminded me that Expertise without experience is a daydream; experience without expertise is indeed a very costly nightmare.