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The 10 Most Common Pitfalls in Running a Business

If you are searching for factors that separate successful businesses from the herd, sooner or later you will seek out a meeting with a business transformation specialist. Business transformation specialists make their career in exactly that: they arrive at companies which are performing sub-optimally, and guide those businesses to greater profit and achievement. For organizations which are experiencing difficulties, transformation specialists are ambulance, fire service, analyst, strategist, psychologist and motivator, all rolled into one.

When Ross Stuart arrives at an assignment, what does he usually find? “Almost all of the problems I find in one business I will have seen before on other assignments,” says Ross, “in fact the pitfalls management fall into are the same both within and across industry sectors.”

Here are the ten management pitfalls Ross encounters most often:

The Ten Most Common Pitfalls in Running a Business

1. Ineffectual, poorly trained senior management
2. Lack of leadership and robust governance: no clear direction and support from the top
3. Senior management in denial
4. Poor quality
5. Narrow customer base
6. Poor financial systems
7. Poor communication with the employees
8. Poor stock control
9. Little or no marketing expertise, a depleted and demotivated sales force
10. High overheads

Ross encounters these pitfalls so often that he has written an ebook detailing how he detects and deals with these issues, and what you can do to deal with them in your business. For a free copy of the ebook visit www.mitchellphoenix.com/resources.htm

There is no Planet B - We need some Action Heroes

In September last year James Donnelly, President of Mitchell Phoenix USA, attended BizClimate 2010. In an article which first appeared in Mitchell Phoenix's Autumn Newsletter, he summarizes his thoughts on the event, and what will be required of managers in the future.

Leading is no longer enough.

I attended BizClimate 2010 last week, part of a series of conferences taking place at New York Climate Week headlined by the Bill Clinton Initiative (only $30,000 a ticket). Climate Week revolved around the opportunities for business in investment, cost saving and the creation of climate wealth.

BizClimate 2010 used Moore’s Law of Sustainability as a vision for the way in which business would drive the carbon economy in the future. Gordon Moore was a founder of Intel and changed the face of the technology world when he predicted that the density of semi-conductors on a chip would double every year.

By setting this expectation, it drove investment leading to innovation. In the same way the conference set out to explore the potential in exponential growth of green energy management and solutions.

The core themes explored by expert panels were Innovation, Investment, Expectation and Leadership. What was reinforced over the course of the event was a consensus that action was needed, that governments were loath to take the lead and that any advancement towards a ‘better world’ lay in the hands of business leaders.

We are at the start of a pioneering age with potentially greater significance than the industrial revolution. There are fortunes to be made. So what’s holding it up?

There is no measurement. No price on carbon, no visibility on regulation, no obvious clean energy horse to bet on. Perceived risk is the barrier. Everyone is waiting for someone to break from the pack. We don’t want the dot.energy race to become another dot.com farrago.

It takes courage to decide on a new course of action. It takes strength to stand your ground and deliver change. It requires inner conviction and determination to succeed against the status quo. The world needs leaders who believe in a cause, who can communicate a vision and inspire others to great heights. We need action heroes.

What is the difference between an action hero and a leader? I think, today, ‘manager’ is the new leader and leader has now become ‘action hero’. It is no longer enough to lead.

Generating new action is the route to change, learning and growth. The term ‘leader’ has lost connection with urgency, decisiveness and a link with future security and prosperity. When you see an action hero you are reminded of what is important. They are a walking billboard for direction and purpose, immediately inspiring a sense of confidence, energizing those around them.

Inertia is the enemy, generated by habit, fear and greed. Time for Sir Isaac Newton’s Laws of Motion! Action orientation is a commitment to change and a commitment to the future that generates results, produces measurement and reinforces progress that is being made.

Sustainability, climate wealth, green energy, carbon markets will figure large in all our futures. Leaders are not doing enough. There is no Planet B. Where are the action heroes?

Who should Sponsor a Leadership Development Initiative?

Mitchell Phoenix' Managing Director Kevin Yates recently published the ebook, How to Build a Successful Leadership Development Project, in which he outlines the central factors required if a leadership program is to yield real return on investment. In this extract, he explores who the sponsor of the project should be...

It is quite likely that an incoming senior executive has identified the opportunity for an improvement in the leadership skills of the management group. This may be a promoted MD, CEO or someone brought in with recent experience of greater leadership capability in another organisation (competitor perhaps?) This sponsorship is the best possible start point for gathering support from the board and will be a natural step to engage the wider management population.

Three levels of management need to be converted for the culture change to take effect. This means CEO, board and senior operational management. In a large organisation you will also need to engage the best of the next tier down to make it complete and secure. After that, leadership by example and sweeping demand for better practice will permeate the business. In the longer term, standards of behaviour have to be rigorously applied and defended. (This latter effect will be determined by the quality of leadership thinking delivered by the development project itself).

What happens when only HR or a more junior group have identified the need? Clearly we have to build more support into the senior operational areas and the CEO has to be sold on this need. By highlighting concrete examples of sub-optimal behaviour; raising questions about succession, ownership of goals, poor meeting management, and crisis culture we can lay the groundwork for a decision to be made. In addition, issues of falling standards of recruitment and greater attrition can be flagged. Lack of choice and quality in promotions and honest performance review will further bring the messages home. Leadership profiling tools can be brought to bear to display, empirically, the opportunities for personal growth.

There has to be acceptance of this need at the highest levels. Ready & Conger, in their analysis of why leadership development projects fail, identify lack of ownership as the principle ‘pathology’. Their solution, ‘everyone should own it’, is long on good advice but short on how to achieve it. In this article, I discuss the 5 steps necessary to build a successful leadership development project. Click here to read.

What are the symptoms of poor leadership?

Mitchell Phoenix' Managing Director Kevin Yates recently published the ebook, How to Build a Successful Leadership Development Project in which he outlines the central factors required if a leadership program is to yield real return on investment. In this extract, he explores the initial situation - the reasons why companies might decide to strengthen the leadership capabilities of their staff.

Recognizing the Overall Need
Firstly, what is the problem? Presumably your organisation has a sense of what it needs to achieve in broad terms and in detail - strategy, business plan, distributed goals etc. There will be people in place (mostly) and the wherewithal to achieve the goals. All of these lend themselves to analysis and verification: what is the current capability to enact the organisation’s strategy?
If there is a perceived lack of leadership in your organisation, this implies two things:

1. An observer (or observers) has compared the current standard of leadership in the business with a higher standard known to exist elsewhere (at a previous company, at a higher level of management, etc) and found it wanting
2. This observer understands the drag on business performance that poor leadership exerts, and the potential boost to business performance that higher quality leadership will provide

Needless to say, where there is no perceived gap between current standards of leadership and a higher standard, the link between leadership and business performance will not be understood, and there will be no investment in leadership development.
If we are going to measure improvements in leadership then what is it that we are to measure? We are all likely to have a definition of leadership, and who is to say if my definition is better than yours? Let’s sweep this debate aside for now, it requires time not available in this paper and is not entirely necessary. What counts is your recognition of potential. At this stage, it is enough if you and/or your organisation have recognised a leadership gap to exploit and the potential to exploit it. Here are some clues as to the extent of that potential:
* Ownership of initiatives and/or goals is patchy
* Blame culture when things go wrong
* Complaints of phoney reward systems
* Pockets of ‘resistance to change’
* Upward delegation prevalent
* No trust between people and divisions
* Gaining commitment is like herding cats
* ‘Yes but’ begins every sentence
* …and finally the simplest of all – you prefer not to battle against it!
These are the symptoms of poor leadership. There is a neutral position where leadership is adequate and displays few of the negative factors and some positive attributes. Most organisations occupy this position.

click here to download the full ebook

INVITATION - Sir Richard Branson at BizClimate 2010 in New York on 21 September 2010

Mitchell Phoenix are staunch supporters of sustainability and the leaders who take responsibility.

Next Tuesday in mid-town Manhattan, many of the world’s leading thinkers will be participating in both the Clinton Global Initiative and BusinessClimate 2010. This invitation offers you an opportunity to participate in one of these important events – the one that does not cost $20,000 to participate.

The theme is finding Moore’s Law for Sustainability – or how Expectation drives Investment yielding Innovation.

Confirmed list of speakers includes:

Sir Richard Branson, Chairman of the Virgin Group
Costa Rican President Jose Maria Figueres
Dan Kammen, Professor of Energy at the University of California, Berkeley
Craig Cogut, Co-founder, Pegasus Capital
Matt Arnold, Principal, PricewaterhouseCoopers
Mindy Lubber, CEO of Ceres
Lounette M. Dyer, CEO of Soledeo Energy
Jigar Shah, CEO, the Carbon War Room
Hannah Choi Granade, President, Advantix Systems
Andrew McKeon, Founder and Principal, carbonRational
Claire Tomkins, Director of Research, the Carbon War Room
Sunil Paul, founder of Spring Ventures and leading architect of the Gigaton Throwdown
Marc Gunther, Conference Chair of Brainstorm: Green
Vladas Lasas, CEO/Founder Skubios siuntos UAB Kaunas & UPS/Lithuania
Strive T. Masiyiwa founding executive chairman of Econet Wireless
Andrew Winston, a globally recognized expert on the greening of business
Fabien Cousteau, Founder, Plant-a-Fish
Paul Dickinson, CEO, Carbon Disclosure Project
Rich Lechner VP of Energy & Environment at IBM
Clay Nesler, Vice President, Global Energy and Sustainability, Johnson Controls, Inc.

BusinessClimate 2010 takes place at The BlackRock Building, 51 West 52nd Street next Tuesday September 21st . Registration is 8:30am, proceedings from 9am – 5:15pm, cocktail reception to follow. The fee for this all day event - including lunch and cocktail reception - is $495.

As a friend of Mitchell Phoenix you are offered a discount on your ticket. Use code: bcdiscount and receive $100 off – your final cost for the full day event - $395. Only a few seats remain available.

So, if you can’t make it to the Clinton Global Initiative - and even if you can - please join us at BusinessClimate 2010 - a summit of leaders whose ideas and actions on sustainability and innovation are transforming the global economy and our planet.

Password protected registration site:
http://businessclimate-2010.eventbrite.com/
Pswd: carbonrational1
Discount: bcdiscount

For more information visit: http://www.businessclimate2010.com/

Looks like Mayor Bloomberg and Governor Schwarzenegger will be turning up for a press conference along with Sir Richard Branson later in the day.

Latest results from Mitchell Phoenix management training

Here is a sample of the latest results from their Foundations of Management programme today.

A cornerstone of Mitchell Phoenix's approach is that participants on their programmes are required to create concrete business results by applying what they have learned in the seminar room back in the workplace.

For this reason Mitchell Phoenix programmes are structured a day a month for five or six months. In between the days delegates apply the material in the workplace and create results to be reported at the following seminar.

A sample of the results from the latest Foundations of Management programme:

Making a business more profitable

A chef at a restaurant was tasked with improving sales over the Christmas period. He noticed that team meetings were usually held between three and six pm on a Friday, when the team were distracted by the thought of the busy evening ahead. So one Friday he asked his team to go away and think of ideas on how they could increase sales, and to bring those ideas to a special meeting which would be held on the following Wednesday afternoon.

Suggestions included:

Selling mulled wine and mince pies at the bar
Improving the children’s menu – giving them colouring books, pencils, balloons and better drinks
Making a Christmas party menu – which they had never done before
By the time the chef reported his results to the Foundations group, the Christmas party menu was proving popular, and they were selling approximately 50 mince pies a day from behind the bar. When he was asked why this particular idea had been so successful, the chef replied that it was the member of staff who works behind the bar who proposed the idea. Because it is his idea, he is working hard to make it a success. The chef commented that his staff are more engaged, and the restaurant is more profitable.

Retaining a valued employee

A sales team manager ran an appraisal with a salesperson who had become so demotivated they were ready to leave the organisation. The manager used the tools acquired on the Foundations programme to explore the reasons why the salesperson had become so demotivated, and used the salesperson’s own ideas to define what action they would take. Based on what the salesperson said, the sales manager created a series of concrete actions to be achieved in the months following the appraisal. This process has restored the salesperson’s confidence and passion for the job, which in turn have led to more consistent performance on a day-to-day basis.

Developing your people resource

A manager in a charity had to construct a proposal for an external body to fund a three-year project. Usually the manager would write this funding proposal alone, shutting herself in her office for a considerable length of time. Using the material from the Foundations programme, she decided to consult her project team manager, asking the team manager a number of carefully considered questions about how the proposal should be constructed.

The project team manager, seeing the way in which her manager was working with her, called her team together and asked them the same questions she had been asked. Then the two managers and the project team met and shaped the proposal together.

The feedback the manager received from the project team manager and the project team was that they had enjoyed the process and were looking forward to the changes in their way of working that the suggestions in the proposal implied. They were more motivated and confident than they had been before. This was unusual because it is more natural for teams to resist change than support it. The manager had made the chore of writing a proposal into a motivating exercise on selling change.

Creating resilience

A manager in a bank runs a team whose busiest period is in December. Last December was no exception, and the manager noticed the team were struggling to meet their timescales, the staff had concerns about some of the tasks they had been set, and they needed a boost. The manager decided to speak to each individual in the team every two days, find something to praise them about and praise them. As a result of this, the people in the team felt they were valued and coped with the pressure of the December rush.

Final Evaluations of the Programme

This course has made me analyse every aspect of my management style and made me aware of how important my influence is. Being spread over 5 months it has enabled me to really absorb and practise many tools that I know I will continue to use to enhance my practice. I feel it has given me confidence to go forward and be successful. - A manager at a national charity. Final evaluation = excellent

This course is presented in a fun and interesting way and the huge amount of information has been presented in a way which has meant that you don’t realize the volume until the end. - A manager at a bank. Final evaluation = excellent

It definitely makes you a better manager. It takes you out of your prejudices and is good input on how to create a good and happy company. - A chef at a restaurant. Final evaluation = excellent

It does change the person. It is very useful. It gives me the tools so I can do my job better. It is very dynamic and it is over five months so results have to be delivered. - A manager at a bank. Final evaluation = excellent

The last five seminars have taught me how to become a structured, effective and professional manager. Mitchell Phoenix, and especially Sean, are an asset to any company that wants the best from their managers and directors. - A manager in a technology company. Final evaluation = excellent

Quite apart from the fact that I learnt a lot about the role of managers in business and was able to practise all the theory learnt in a real working environment, I feel that my confidence with presentations and my ability to achieve and the feeling that I am capable has improved remarkably. - An executive at a specialist ship operator. Final evaluation = excellent

The next Foundations of Management programme starts on February 2nd in London.

Manager expectations define employee performance

There was a study carried out by psychologists at Minnesota University in 1977 that demonstrated how other people’s expectations of us influence how we behave. It is as if we sub-consciously pick up how others view us and start to behave accordingly.

Those of you familiar with the Iceberg Theory from the Governing Change management training program will recognize the first law of the iceberg; “We always influence and there is always a reaction (either conscious or sub-conscious)”. From a management perspective the study supports the fact that our expectations of our employees influence their performance. If we see them as high performing they will be. If we view them as ordinary, they will be. I am a firm believer in ‘People are only as good as they are allowed to be.’ When employees are marked as a 3 out of 5 (which is most of them) in their annual appraisal what is the subtle damage to morale and self-esteem? How challenging are people’s goals? What do managers delegate as a result of low expectations?

It is important to expect the best and provide the right resources and encouragement. Change your expectations and change performance.

Happy 100th Birthday Peter Drucker!

Peter Drucker, the man who is credited with modern management thinking would have been 100 years old last week. Let's not forget his vision and wisdom. Here are some quotes from many of his writings and interviews.

"In fact, that management has a need for advanced education – as well as for systematic manager development – means only that management today has become an institution of our society."

"The best way to predict the future is to create it."

"Management is doing things right; leadership is doing the right things."

"What's measured improves."

“Efficiency is doing better what is already being done."

“People who don't take risks generally make about two big mistakes a year. People who do take risks generally make about two big mistakes a year.”

“The most important thing in communication is hearing what isn't said.”

“The purpose of business is to create and keep a customer.”

“When a subject becomes totally obsolete we make it a required course.”

"Rank does not confer privilege or give power. It imposes responsibility."

"To focus on contribution is to focus on effectiveness."

"People in any organization are always attached to the obsolete – the things that should have worked but did not, the things that once were productive and no longer are."

"Wherever you see a successful business, someone once made a courageous decision."

“The worker's effectiveness is determined largely by the way he is being managed.”

“A superior who works on his own development sets an almost irresistible example”

Sport’s Contempt for Management Shines Through

Take a manager who has never played rugby before. Make him captain of England for his very first game. What would happen?

Martin Johnson was a fantastic player. Journalists struggled to put into words just how fearsome he was: “beetle-browed”, “lion-hearted”, “indomitable.” We are regularly reminded that he “achieved everything in the game.”

Johnson the manager is a different proposition, and the press are channelling their own fearsome aggression at him. His England are desperately lacking in creativity, it is said; in 18 months they have gone nowhere.

Sport’s contempt for management is so complete that “achieving everything in the game” is often enough to qualify a famous player to become manager of a top-flight team, when they have had little or no experience of management. Johnson had served no apprenticeship of any kind. He had not spent a single day managing a club side. As a player his qualifications were matchless. Under “Management”, his CV was blank. But, sport seems to be saying, what is management compared to playing? What is the ability to mould a team, to create long-term strategy, to forge agreement where there had been none before, to deal effectively with a host of interested parties, compared to the thrilling exploits of the people on the pitch? “Crash-bang” wins every time.

What is at the root of the attitude to management that is on display here? Simply, that it is not understood. No manager would be promoted to playing for the England rugby team on the basis that he had won everything in management. Why not? Because what it takes to play for England is clear for everyone to see. The physical attributes – strength, stamina, technique – are obvious, and playing just five minutes of international rugby without the wherewithal would have gruesome results. What seems to be less clear to those who make the appointments is what it takes to be a manager.

Consider the challenges which might face a manager. How to create an environment in which others can excel, how to unite disparate elements of a team, how to forge understanding between a range of stakeholders, how to mould a way of playing which utilises the strengths of the players available. There might be some overlap between the skillset of the indomitable player and some of these situations, but not much. What is available to the star ex-player once the chance to lead by example on the pitch has gone? Whatever managerial gifts he was born with, and no more.

Last week a function was held to celebrate those football managers who had presided over 1000 games or more. What was the characteristic they all had in common? “All the lads here who've done 1,000 games worked their way up the ladder,” said Harry Redknapp. “They've not gone in at the top and taken over a massive club. They had to learn their trade and that's why they survived so long." In other words, they treated management as a separate skill from playing, and learned it for itself. What is being asked of the admirable Martin Johnson now is that he learn to be a manager not while managing a low profile club side, but while managing England. Such is the contempt in which management is held that Johnson is being criticised for every mistake he makes as he learns his new job. The attitude seems to be, if he could achieve so much doing all that exciting stuff on the pitch, surely he can turn his hand to this boring behind-the-scenes chat.

Johnson’s erstwhile colleague Josh Lewsey recently criticised the coaches under the England manager, exasperatedly pointing out that one of them achieved nothing as a player. Clearly Johnson still commands great respect among players, as Lewsey confined his comments to those who report to his former captain. But who do the coaches work for? Who is responsible for moulding the talents and input of those beneath him into a coherent approach? That is management.

How Long Should a Leadership Development Course Be?

You have been asked to find a leadership development programme for the managers at your organisation. The choice is bewildering, with companies offering a host of courses which last from one day to six months. What factors should guide your decision making?

First consider what you want the target group to be able to do at the end of the course. If you are looking for them to behave differently when they get back to work at the end of the leadership development programme, and for their new behaviour to be profitable for the company, then the chances are they’ll need more than a two day course.

If you went to university, how long did you spend there? The chances are you were there for three years, and possibly longer. What about other professional training you might have done, whether in the forces, medicine, or in areas such as accounting, corporate finance, etc? How long did it take to gain the relevant experience there? When viewed from this angle it is difficult to see how two days, no matter how engaging they may be, will develop something as demanding as leadership.

What’s the minimum time required for a leadership development course to be effective? Kevin Yates, Managing Director of leadership consultants Mitchell Phoenix, thinks that five or six days over five or six months is the optimum length for a leadership development programme. “The only way we learn and develop something like leadership is to put the principles into practice in the workplace and then to regularly report back on results achieved to a group,” he says. “This requirement to perform, to adapt one’s behaviour and create results through doing so, is only achieved in leadership development courses which are run for a day a month for five or six months. Anything shorter than that, and gains may be made in the first few weeks after the course, but after that they will quickly fade and the investment will be lost.”

Interim CEO Ross Stuart, who has used Mitchell Phoenix in a number of companies including Astir, Linpac and Alderley Group, agrees: “One of the unique features of Mitchell Phoenix courses is that they are done over 6 months, 1 day per month which allows the techniques and training to be used in between sessions and each manger reports back on their successes, embedding the techniques much better that the normal 3/4 day courses.”

What is the effect on delegates? Darren Lewitt, a director at Midwich Ltd, sums up much of the feedback Mitchell Phoenix receive, “I have been on a number of courses in my time. Forget the rest, this is the best. It holds your attention all the way through. Unlike other courses, you are not distracted or fighting to get out. An amazing experience.”

The Four Secrets of Choosing Management Development Programmes

Have you been tasked with choosing a management or leadership development programme for your people? Are you uncertain about what to look for? What are the pros and cons of sending your people to a hotel for a five day residential or a back to business school?

Follow these four simple steps to ensure you make the right choice:

1. Choose a programme that produces business results. Why do you want your people to become better leaders and managers? So that they create stronger business results. A course that does not produce results will not justify the expenditure. Choose a course that produces tangible results in your business from the very first seminar – after all, why wait to see the ROI?

The material covered in Governing Change can be turned into results quickly. This is why my interest remained for days 1-6. The theory can be put into practice and, to paraphrase my own presentation, I have the results to prove it.
Tim Palin, The Metal Centre

2. Look for robust, proven content. If your people are going to create real results, they’ll need practical input which they can implement quickly and effectively. It will be hard for your people to call complex models and abstract theories to mind when they are under pressure – and when they are under pressure is precisely when they’ll need to use what they’ve learned from the course they’re attending.

For any manager it bears relevance to their principal objectives for success. Every session had content that I could relate to my everyday working environment and equipped me with the tools to improve myself and my team between each session.
Jane Bradshaw, Gould Alloys

3. Insist on a structure which demands that delegates implement what they are learning back in the workplace, and supports them in doing so. The best structure for this is a day a month. That way delegates can experiment in modifying their approach, create results, report their progress back to their group, and build their understanding over five or six months, rather than attending a three day event and then not implementing half of it and forgetting the rest.

Anyone in management, no matter what level of experience they have, will learn from this course. This is not a course where you go away feeling inspired but then never apply what you’ve learned. The course forces you and supports you in developing your skills.
Sophie Davies, Victim Support

4. Ensure that the programme is run by people who are expert in developing the leadership and management capabilities of others, rather than experts from your particular industry, who may have little to impart other than a dressed up version of their autobiography.

A 6 month Mitchell Phoenix management programme that, frankly, changed my life. It broadened my outlook and since completing it my enthusiasm soared and the techniques he showed us to deal with difficult or sensitive management challenges have been invaluable to me, and of course my business.
Ian Ford, Watts Group

Finally, if you are looking to develop not only a group of individuals, but the whole culture of your organisation, choose a development initiative which is robust enough to scale up to produce an organisation-wide effect.

The Governing Change training course has equipped our managers with the necessary tools to manage their teams and achieve a high level of success. It enables all of us to take a consistent approach when managing our people
Andy Howitt, Regional Director, Aalco

And of course, treat any tangential approach with caution. A programme which seeks to achieve improvements in the business environment through participation in an unrelated activity, such as outward-bound sessions or actor’s trust games, is unlikely to create lasting results.

Having been on numerous training courses I have no hesitation in recommending the Mitchell Phoenix Course as the best yet. There is no management-speak or pointless exercises - instead the course is tailored to each and every delegate due to the focus on practical results and making improvements in your workplace.

Mark Lowe, Midwich Ltd


Can You See the Business Opportunities?

As economic conditions improve, it will be those managers and organisations which can see the opportunities which will flourish. And what we see is a function of how we think.

We normally imagine that things work the other way round: that we see, and on the basis of the evidence in front of us, we alter our thinking. But without a certain level of understanding, we cannot interpret the evidence we are looking at. It is tempting to think that Galileo looked through his telescope and saw the evidence for the Earth orbiting the Sun. In fact, if he had not had the benefit of Copernicus’ theories which argued that that this was so, Galileo might have looked through his telescope and not understood what he was seeing. In other words, Copernicus thought it, then Galileo proved it – not the other way around.

What do most senior managers think? They think that they have been in management, and been successful at it, for long enough that they don’t need any further input to sharpen their thinking. Or they think that there is no-one out there who can develop their understanding in such a way that when they look at their business again, they see it with fresh eyes.

With most senior managers thinking this way, this in itself is an opportunity to gain an advantage. Where can you find a programme which will develop senior managers’ thinking, and create results as a consequence? Mitchell Phoenix have been developing the leadership and management capabilities of senior managers for over twenty years, opening their eyes to new possibilities:

Puts a completely new perspective on managing. A truly inspirational course.
Paul Skipton, Aalco

The course has allowed me to look at myself and others in a differing way and will allow both my own and others’ potential to be fulfilled.
Robert Hillman, Watts International

The course is excellent in opening your mind to managing your business, people, targets, time, etc and is invaluable in everyday use. I would recommend this to anyone who would like to develop as a manager and personally.
Paul Temple, Aalco

How equipped are you to see the opportunities – both internal and external - which will arise over the next period? How sharp is your thinking? Can you see
the way forward?

When Vision does not Equal Reality, Innovate

Mitchell Phoenix believe that organisations should Govern Change, which means anticipating and responding actively and flexibly to the changing circumstances in which businesses operate. In doing so, companies create an advantageous, profitable future for themselves. Blind adherence to past processes and procedures, failure to ask searching questions about our business and the environment in which it exists, and unwillingness to really listen to those around us are all factors which can prevent us from Governing Change successfully.

In Innovation and Entrepreneurship Peter Drucker explores a number of situations where there was an incongruity between business’s vision of reality – of what they thought was happening – and the actual reality which was unfolding around them. In the following three examples, Drucker shows how certain businesses identified gaps between their vision and the true reality, and then responded creatively to effectively Govern Change.

1. Incongruity Between Reality and Assumptions About It

When erroneous assumptions are made about reality, businesspeople are not concentrating their efforts on areas which will generate results. Those who see the true reality may also see the opportunity to innovate.

For example, in the early 1950s ocean freighters were thought to be dying. They were a slow, high cost method of transport. Why was this? The shipping industry had made an incorrect assumption – they had focused their efforts on reducing the cost of running fully loaded freighters at sea, by developing smaller, faster ships which ran on less fuel and required fewer crew. But the reality was that as a piece of capital equipment a ship is most expensive when it is not working, and ships were spending significant periods of time queuing at ports waiting to load or unload. This time spent queuing was the main reason why freighters were deemed to be so slow and expensive.

So instead of focusing on reducing the already low cost of running a fully loaded ship at sea, it was decided to uncouple loading from stowing, and container and roll-on, roll-off ships were born. Queuing time at ports was reduced, and freighters became more profitable. Crucially, the techniques for doing this were already in use in the railroad and trucking industries; they simply had to be applied to shipping.

2. Incongruity Between Perceived and Actual Customer Values and Expectations

No customer is as immersed in or committed to the product as the supplier, and therefore often what the customer buys is not what the supplier thinks the customer is buying.

Drucker argues that the prime motivation of those who work in the large financial institutions on Wall Street is to get rich, and that they therefore assume that this is the prime motivation of all their customers. He then charts the rise of a securities firm which appealed not to customers who wanted to become rich, but to customers who wanted to protect their money. These customers included local professionals, small businesspeople and substantial farmers. The firm’s strategy was based on protecting its clients’ money, and because of this only one eighth of its business was stock exchange business.

Drucker goes on to underline the power of those who see a mismatch between what suppliers think customers want and what they actually want:

“The big Wall Street houses cannot even imagine such customers [who want to protect their money rather than get rich] exist because they defy everything the houses believe in and hold true.”

If your competition cannot even imagine your customers exist, it will be difficult for them to steal your market share.

3. Incongruity Between the Rhythm or Logic of a Process

A manufacturer of lawn care products had a similar catalogue to its competitors, composed of fertilisers, pesticides and the like. All the competition promised ‘scientific’ products which had been extensively tested and would make your lawn look fantastic. Precise instructions were given on how much of each product should be applied to your lawn, depending on soil conditions and the desired effect.

Customers bought the products because of the promised benefits, and were receptive to the idea that each fertiliser had been scientifically developed to deliver those benefits. But when it came to actually applying the products, the logic of the process fell down. Customers found it difficult to be as scientific as they felt they should be in putting the correct amounts onto their lawns. Then one particular manufacturer produced a ‘Spreader’. This was a lightweight wheelbarrow with adjustable holes which would deliver exactly the right amount of product as the customer walked over the lawn. The ‘Spreader’ boosted sales significantly.


What can we learn from Drucker’s examples? Asking open questions about the environment in which we operate, listening, and remaining open to new ideas and approaches will all help us to capitalise on situations where the vision of what is happening around us does not match the reality. How close is the relationship between your vision of what is happening in your business environment and the reality? Which of your past processes and procedures are holding your organisation back? What can you change tomorrow in order to take advantage?

Can You See Opportunities to Govern Change?

Governing Change means seeking out opportunities to innovate and adapt to the change which is taking place all the time in our business environment. It means having the flexibility, creativity and resourcefulness to ensure that we are commanding change, rather than simply reacting to it every day.

Where can we find opportunities to Govern Change? A useful place to start is to look for instances in which our idea of what is happening - what we want or expect to be taking place around us - is not matched by the reality. Wherever there is an incongruity between our vision of reality, and the actual reality, there is a chance to Govern Change.

In Innovation and Entrepreneurship, Peter Drucker cites an example of just such an incongruity. A pharmaceutical company salesman wanted to go into business for himself. He looked for an instance where the vision of what people wanted did not match the reality.

He found it in eye surgeons’ experience of conducting routine cataract operations. The surgeons were highly skilled and felt comfortable in conducting every stage of cataract procedures except one. When they had to cut a particular ligament and tie off the blood vessels the eye was in danger, and surgeons dreaded this short section of every procedure. The surgeons’ vision of how they would like to feel and the control they wanted to have did not match the reality of this section of the operation.

The pharmaceutical company salesman considered how this might be done differently in the future, and soon found an answer. An enzyme had been discovered in 1890 which would dissolve the ligament in question. At the time it was discovered, science did not have a method of storing this enzyme for any length of time, and so it had never been considered for use in cataract operations. The salesman set to work and in a few months had discovered a preservative which would extend the shelf life of the enzyme without reducing its power to dissolve the eye ligament. Within a short space of time, eye surgeons were using his patented compound to make this short section of the operation run to their satisfaction.

What would have prevented the salesman from Governing Change? If he had not asked questions about established practice, if he had not really listened to the people he wanted to do business with, if he had accepted the received wisdom that eye operations had always been done like that, if he had not dared to challenge the established procedure, he would not have been able to find a solution. He did not need significant research and development funding because the enzyme had already been discovered. What he did need was a willingness to ask questions, to listen hard and to see how what was already available to anyone who cared to look could be used to advantage. This is Governing Change.

The Power of Silence

A couple of years ago I phoned a client who told me that I had just made him $40K. He was negotiating a pay off and wasn't satisfied with the first offer. He simply remained silent while the offer grew and grew. The generous fellow that he is credited his Mitchell Phoenix experience to the result.

I received an email from another client yesterday asking if I had watched "Into the Storm", a movie covering Winston Churchill's war years. On the Governing Change program there is a story about how Churchill became Prime Minister. Lord Beaverbrook, the newspaper tycoon, made Churchill promise that he would remain silent for 3 whole minutes before giving Halifax the okay. Below is the clip from the movie showing the power of silence. It is a 1min 22secs. (Thank you, Piers)

The Power of Silence

Hidden Secrets of Management Training – Look Inside the Box!

I recently added 20 yards of distance to every club in my golf bag with no effort whatsoever (and the chipping now is sublime). For the non-golfers out there, this is quite a significant improvement. For the golfers out there, send cheques to…

I have played the game for about 15 years achieved a reasonable standard and plateaued, content in the knowledge that I know enough to be competitive and to enjoy myself. Over the years I have taken, on average, two lessons per year, read copious amounts in magazines, watched my heroes on the TV, dreamed of faultless rounds, practiced my bad habits at the driving-range and, of course, played once a week.

I would say that I qualify as a golfer. My discovery was so basic, so fundamental, that I had classified it years ago as something I already did and, therefore, dismissed it from the long list of possibilities for making improvements. This raises the question; what else do we discount as known and, therefore, applied?

In my first year with Mitchell Phoenix I remember a meeting I had with the CEO of Ferranti and fell into the trap of proudly telling him about everything we did. After listening patiently he said, “Yes. We do all that. What more is there?” Years later I came up with the perfect response. At that moment, I was flummoxed.

In management, “What more is there?” The answers are likely to have been staring us in the face for eons; it’s just that they were part of the furniture. When things are taken for granted it’s hard to see their true value. This is what managers are up against and the challenge is to rediscover the hidden power of simple truths that have disappeared from consciousness.

I see Mitchell Phoenix management training programs as containing the kind of insights to bring about substantial gains personally and corporately with little effort. Some of these insights may never be uncovered in an entire career in management. If you want to add 20 yards to every club in your management bag re-examine your application of everything you know. Look inside the box.

Management Development or How to Make a Soufflé

The Four Pillars of Successful Management Development

Pillar 3: Structure

You are choosing a management development programme for yourself or others in your organisation. Of all the factors you take into consideration – the cost, the content, whether the course is residential or not, whether you’ll be able to swim and sauna before the gourmet evening meal at the venue –probably the last thing to cross your mind will be the structure of the programme.

Of course, you might discount a week-long programme on the basis that you can’t afford the time out of the office (or alternatively you might choose to shortlist it because you’ll do anything to get away for a few days). But beyond the length of the time commitment, what else is there to consider?

Management and leadership are activities which are done, not known. It is one thing to know the recipe for a soufflé, for example (any good cookbook or search engine can furnish you with the relevant knowledge), but it is something else to be able to walk into a kitchen and make a soufflé. Similarly, it is one thing to sit in a seminar room and receive input on how to lead and manage a team, and it is another to go back into the workplace and actually lead and manage your team.

You would not teach someone how to make a soufflé without asking them at some point to go and make a soufflé. There is little to be gained from management development programmes which do not demand that managers to go back into the workplace and apply what they have learned to create results. This is like training chefs but never asking them to cook, like coaching golfers but making sure they never go out on the golf course, like banning aspiring swimmers from getting wet.

The only structure which will produce a real return on investment in development is a structure in which delegates attend the first part of a programme, then go and apply what they have learned in the workplace to create results, then attend another section of the programme, then go and apply what they have learned in the workplace, and so on. This is the only way we learn how to do anything – from our own experience. If opportunities to accumulate experience – and a strong demand to create results – are not built into the structure of a management development programme, you can be certain that no real experience has been gained, and no results created.

After over 25 years in management development, Mitchell Phoenix’ Managing Director Kevin Yates is convinced that the only viable structure is a day a month. “A day a month is often as long as senior people can be away from the office,” he says, “and it keeps the focus firmly on the delegates and their responsibility to use the material to create results. The quality of the results which come back gets stronger and stronger as the programme goes on and participants gain in skill and experience, so that the results on day 6 are often much more sophisticated than those reported on day 2. The whole process is cumulative, and designed to spotlight the participants and how they are changing and adapting what they are doing in the workplace.

“On the other hand, programmes which are geared towards input for the delegates, rather than output from the delegates (ie results), are often more cost effective and conveniently accessed via a book.”

Few CEOs Cite Paint-Balling as their Chief Leadership Influence

The Four Pillars of Successful Management Development

Pillar 2: Robust Content

Few CEO’s Cite Paint-Balling as their Chief Leadership Influence

Rare quotations:

“I paint-balled my way to the top”
“karaoke made a leader of me”
“I now run all meetings on an assault course”
“all new employees have to fall backwards off a desk”
“the Captain and flight crew improved safety 14.6% by singing light opera”

One morning, walking back to your cubicle from the kitchen, you detect a subtle change in the atmosphere of the office. You look around and realise none of your colleagues are at their desks. A fan buzzes. On a notice board, sales targets flutter in the breeze. The first pellet catches you on the leg. The second and third thud into your chest, splattering blue and yellow dye. A fourth pellet smacks into the mug you are holding, and you feel a scalding sensation as you throw coffee all over your shirt and tie. “That leadership through paint-balling course,” you think to yourself, “has caused more trouble than it was worth.”

For comedians training is one of the most fertile areas of business life. The tenuous links made between a host of activities – from actors’ trust games to orienteering – and our working practices are hilarious because we can all recognise the scenario. Whether it is making the accounts team go through an army assault course or asking the production division to do a karaoke for leadership programme, everyone knows someone who has done something ridiculous in the name of development, or – worse still – has had to take part in something ridiculous themselves.

And, if you have spent your development budget on paint-balling, cooking and actors’ games, you should have gone to the pub instead.

If you want a development activity which is useful, rather than simply entertaining, what should you look for? After more than 25 years in development, Mitchell Phoenix’ Kevin Yates concludes that there are four pillars of successful development programmes. “Look for expert facilitation, an unwavering focus on the creation of results, a structure which will allow the creation of results, and tried and proven content,” he says.

What should this content consist of? First of all it should be usable in the workplace. Under pressure in a real life work situation, anything overly complicated, such as a theoretical ‘model’, will not come to mind or be used. Second, content should be useful, so that when it is applied it will solve a problem and/or generate concrete results. This means the content should focus on how to conduct the key activities managers and leaders undertake. Whether the focus is delegation, persuasion, motivation or anything else, concrete detail on how to do each of these things is vital. It is not enough to define the problem, the content must take us towards the solution and then prompt us to take action back in the workplace.

“Perhaps most important,” says Yates, “is that the content is based on strong, ethical business principles which senior managers can relate to, and on which they can build. They must see clearly how what is being suggested to them fits with the business principles they already hold, or with principles they aspire to and are likely to adopt.”

Management Development and the Middle Ages

The Four Pillars of Successful Management Development

Pillar 1: Focus on Results

Businesspeople are good at measuring a return. Stereotyped from at least the Middle Ages as bean-counters with abacuses, the Blackberry-wielding modern version of the medieval merchant knows how much things cost and how many of them s/he is selling. You measure the impact of lean manufacturing techniques on the bottom line. You measure the ROI of developing and marketing a new product. You can even measure how much each individual salesperson pulls in for the business.

But modern businesspeople are useless at measuring the return on investment in management development. Research conducted by DDI found that only around 25% of organisations formally measure the results of leadership development programmes. A recent IRS survey polled 74 organisations which ran management development programmes, out of which 13 said they were a failure, 22 said they hadn’t achieved a return on investment, and only six believed their programmes had been a great success. Both sets of findings suggest that today’s management development is a long way from the shrewd calculations of yesterday’s merchants.

What can the past teach us? In the times when Powerpoint, flip-charts and break-out groups didn’t exist, the closest businesspeople got to management development was the apprentice system. Of course, no-one would advocate asking managers to live in poverty for seven years, sleeping on their boss’s floor and only having Sundays off if they are lucky (if you recognise any of that, it’s time for a move - depressed job market or not). What is instructive about the apprentice system is that it asked apprentices to produce something to prove they had learned the skills of their trade. This “masterpiece” was visible proof of whether the apprentice had become a master or not.

Management development programmes which do not create measurable results are like apprenticeships where no masterpiece is required. In fact, they are like apprenticeships where no work is required at all. What guildsman would accept an apprentice into the stonemasons’ guild without visible evidence that he could carve stone to an acceptable standard? As turnaround specialist Ross Stuart observes, “if you can’t see any results, you have to question whether there are any.”

Management as we know it did not exist seven hundred years ago, but Mitchell Phoenix’ Kevin Yates is convinced that we should judge the development of our managers by the same yardstick that guildsmen used: the evidence of our eyes. “Only by creating results in response to the challenges of the workplace can managers truly measure their development,” he says, “and that’s the only way you will be able to accurately judge ROI.” Because of this, Mitchell Phoenix programmes are designed to create results from the first day. “Focus on results is one of the four pillars of successful management development programmes,” says Yates, “and in conjunction with a unique structure, robust content and expert facilitation, they will repay your investment many times over.”