You can lead a horse to water.....

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You can lead a horse to water.....

Does the following scenario sound familiar? Your company invests a significant amount of time, effort and money on a new sales, leadership or customer service training programme. It is launched with a certain degree of fanfare. The launch goes well – there is plenty of initial excitement and enthusiasm. However, in the end, there is little or no tangible improvement in performance and a few years later, more time, effort and money is spent on a new initiative.

Why does this happen? 

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How well tuned is your sales 'engine'?

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How well tuned is your sales 'engine'?

Organisations manage their production process to within an inch of its life - quite right too. However do they also manage the process that produces new business with quite the same precision? If we think of the sales operation as a business generation 'engine', perhaps we can identify where appropriate fine tuning could lead to significant improvements in sales.

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Three Steps to Behavioural Change Heaven

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Three Steps to Behavioural Change Heaven

Human beings are resistant to change. Nothing new in that statement however over the years, many a change programme has floundered on those rocks. In truth, the business world has never really got to grips with the challenge. However, this is no longer an option. The business world has changed forever and no-one will be left untouched by the need to change, adapt and acquire new skills.

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Training that forms new habits - that would make a change!

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Training that forms new habits - that would make a change!

One of the great failings of training in organisations is that far too often it doesn’t lead to the behavioural change that is either desired or required. For anyone who has been around L&D for any length of time, this is hardly a revolutionary statement. What is the typical organisational response? Often, it has been to change the training. Find the latest new technique and try that. However, there is a much bigger issue at play here that holds the key to whether investment in behavioural change pays off or not.

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Hang on a minute, haven't we been here before...

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Hang on a minute, haven't we been here before...

Is it just me or is there an ever increasing number of schools of thought on how to manage the human psyche in the workplace? Many years ago, and with the publication of Daniel Goleman’s book, it was Emotional Intelligence. Then NLP (Neuro Linguistic Programming) became popular. Now mindfulness is very much in vogue. As is managing unconscious bias. Not to mention Neuroscience. So what’s next?

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Empowerment....yeah, right!

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Empowerment....yeah, right!

Empowerment has got to be one of the most over used words in the modern business lexicon. Everyone talks about how important it is but if there is ever a word that qualifies for the “Easy to talk the talk but walking the walk, that’s completely different” award, then surely it’s the word empowerment.

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Lessons FOR sport FROM business

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Lessons FOR sport FROM business

A huge amount is written about what business people can learn from great sports people. In fact, entire post sporting careers have been built on speaking engagements that pass on the insights from sporting success to the workplace - much of which makes good sense. However, being a champion of good business practice and a self-confessed sports nut, I wonder if we can invert this and look at the lessons managers in sport can potentially learn from managers in business. 

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