Ch-ch-changes

You have heard the quote “the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results”. Some say it was Einstein; some say it was Franklin. The point is the meaning behind it.

Change is awkward and unsure. The ground begins to move beneath us and we crave for things to return to "normal". We are creatures of habit and like to feel safe and comfortable. We may scan the menu but there are usually only a handful if items we order each time we're back to the restaurant.

Rinse Don't Repeat

There are two significant issues going on – the sheer will of stakeholders to keep their status quo and the monumental task of building inspirational leadership.

Change is not this. Change can be exciting. Change is unproven. Change can be scary. Change requires a leap of faith. Change can conquer courage. When the bottom line is the only objective, affecting change can often be an illusive pipe dream.

We can't always predict the outcome of change.
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HBR – Leadership Mistakes

Being a leader has absolutely nothing to do what what it says on your business card or company org chart. A few years ago, the Harvard Business Review asked a simple question. Here are some valuable responses.


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The Revenue Diet Plan

A large cheeseburger with condiments is approximately 600 calories; an hour of high impact aerobics for a 200lb man will burn about 600 calories. A slice of pumpkin pie is about 350 calories; an hour of ice skating for the same man will burn about 340 calories. We know we need to eat better, work out more and take better care of ourselves but (on average) we don’t do that.

Often companies will look at the success of a certain campaign or promotion to get a sense of customer reaction or appetite. This kind of strategy is both flawed and short-lived. Patience is a virtue but rarely a business plan. We love cheeseburgers but don't want to gain weight; we want revenue but know it doesn't happen without effort.

Fries With That?

We want the customers now but can have trouble seeing the long term benefits of a sustained effort throughout the year. We wonder how these available channels can help us without realizing our contribution is critical to the equation. You and I have the collective patience of a three year old.

We are not built for strategy or long-term thinking. If things are bad, we want them to be good, immediately. If money is tight, we want money, right now. If someone promises that this campaign will help us get us out of this slide, we are happy to listen, right now. We want the burger and pie without the growing waistline.

Maybe this year we need more salad?
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Hurry Up!

A large cheeseburger with condiments is approximately 600 calories. An hour of high impact aerobics for a 200lb man will burn about 600 calories. A slice of pumpkin pie is about 350 calories. An hour of ice skating for the same man will burn about 340 calories. We know we need to eat better, work out more and take better care of ourselves but (on average) we don’t do that. We eat the cheeseburgers and the pie then get acquainted with the couch.

After a two decades in corporate life and a bunch of years consulting on my own, earlier this year I was recruited by a recruitment firm to become an executive recruiter. It's fun work. It's frustrating work. It's highs and lows and grinding and disappointments and victories. Oh wait, it's like every job!

We Want it Now!

Often companies will look at the success of a certain campaign or promotion to get a sense of customer reaction or appetite. This kind of strategy is both flawed and short-lived. Patience is a virtue but rarely a business plan.

Unless you won the lottery, mom and dad left you money, or you're independently wealthy, you need new business all the time. It’s admirable to see some who have as many customers as they will ever need but the rest of us need to constantly build our business. Not for a week, not once in a while, every day.

The Downside of Now

We want the customers now but can have trouble seeing the long term benefits of a sustained effort throughout the year. We wonder how these available channels can help us without realizing our contribution is critical to the equation. We want the quick wins to sustain our revenue line forever. You and I have the collective patience of a three year old.

We are not built for strategy or long-term thinking. If things are bad, we want them to be good, immediately. If money is tight, we want money, right now. If someone promises that this campaign will help us get us out of this slide, we are happy to listen, right now. We want the burger and pie without waistline.

Maybe we need to start the new year with a salad.
__________________________________________________________________

The Biggest Mistake a Leader Can Make?

Being a leader has absolutely nothing to do what what it says on your business card or company org chart. A few years ago, the Harvard Business Review asked that simple question. Here are some valuable responses.


__________________________________________________________________

Mistakes and Missteps

Think about someone you would consider a great leader. They may be your direct report, someone famous you’ve never met, your biggest mentor, a colleague or friend, they may not even be in a traditional leadership position.

Now think of someone you would consider a bad leader. Sadly that name often comes to mind faster. The Harvard Business Review asked a simple question:

What are the biggest mistakes a leader can make?

__________________________________________________________________
Kneale Mann | Leadership and Culture strategist, writer, speaker, executive coach engaging leaders, collaborative teams, and strong business results.

harvard business review

The Tricky Art of Scaling Your Business

"Anything you build on a large scale or with intense passion invites chaos." Francis Ford Coppola

I seem to have several conversations daily surrounding the same topic – scaling. There are millions of bright talented experienced business owners who want to grow their companies save a couple of crucial issues – time and money. There is no concrete way to control the speed of scaling but often it feels like it's not happening fast enough. Some days it moves at a snail's pace.

You want to grow your revenue line and you know in order to do that you need extra help but you can’t afford the extra help because you are too busy working on the current revenue stream. And you can't seem to grow the revenue because of all the prospecting and meeting and selling and trying to get your current client work done.

Sound Familiar?

This is an issue that has faced business forever. Others with much less money or experience have solved what each of us faces which perhaps makes our concerns even more annoying. We love to hear stories of people born of meagre means to fight and claw their way to a successful career.

We know we can do it but its a mix of our impatience and some pedestrian items we need to corral. Scaling is a challenge for everyone from sole proprietors to c-level executives of corporations with a global footprint.

Here is a list of things to think about (I know I do) when you look at how to scale your business...

Find the Quiet
Anyone who knows me, knows I have a busy brain. That does not always mean I’m getting it all done, sometimes quite the opposite. Busy doesn’t mean progress. Find those moments where you can shut it all off, listen to some music, put your feet up and clear your mind.

Be Honest About Your Effort
We can usually find external fault in the slower pace of our business growth. The truth is, we need to look inside to ensure we are doing all we can. That’s usually where the slowdown is occurring.

Stop Comparing Yourself to Others
We all do it and it is a complete and utter waste of time. We can claim that numbers and stature and position don’t matter (they don’t) but we make them far more important that they are, stop shaking your head, you do so.

Ask Often and Always
This is where most businesses fall apart. I know I see my work slow down when I stop asking for business. We get timid, we don’t want to appear to be selling, but without sales there is no business. Find your way. No ask, no business.

Get Help
Small business, large corporation, c-level executive, sole proprietor, no one makes it on their own. No one. Ever. Surround yourself with a mastermind group of people from all walks of life with two purposes – to tell you the truth and to offer advice.

It’s Not Their Fault
When played properly, life is a team sport but we need to own our part.

Find the Decision Maker
How often have you had discussions with someone who can’t make the sale for you? Why would you try and sell to someone who isn’t in the position of buying? We've all done it far too often.

Be Clear About Your Offer
Elevator speech, website, social profile, in-person meeting, if you don’t believe what you are then no one will. Often companies get stuck or worse go backward when they begin to get unclear on their offer. Qualifying the sale is essential too. There's no sense talking to anyone - decision maker or not - if they're simply not interested.

Decimate the Naysayers
They are everywhere. Stay away from them. Delete them from your life. They will do absolutely nothing but derail you. Advice is fine, negativity is destructive.

Walk a Mile
This is not about comparing yourself to others but rather learning from others. Find people who have gone through what you’re going through. This is why some of the best hockey coaches are former hockey players. This is precisely why the most successful people have mentors.

Take it Offline
The online social networks are wonderful for finding like minded people along thought silos void of geographical limitations. Get on the phone, book a coffee or lunch, get out of the office and meet people in person or hear their voice. No social networking tool is more powerful than human interaction.

Be Sure You Want This
Follow your gut. Find the quiet. Get help. Listen to yourself and learn what you want.

Let's get back to work!

Kneale Mann

image credit: newmoon | original: mar 2011

Business is Not an Overnight Success

Don't Wanna Wait

A large cheeseburger with condiments is approximately 600 calories. An hour of high impact aerobics for a 200lb man will burn about 600 calories. A slice of pumpkin pie is about 350 calories. An hour of ice skating for the same man will burn about 340 calories. We know we need to eat better, work out more and take better care of ourselves but (on average) we don’t do that. We eat the cheeseburgers and the pie then get acquainted with the couch.

Often companies will look at the success of a certain campaign or promotion to get a sense of customer reaction or appetite. This kind of strategy is both flawed and short-lived. Patience is a virtue but rarely a business plan.

Open for Business

Unless you have won the lottery, have rich parents or are independently wealthy, you need new business all the time. It’s admirable to see some who have as many customers as they will ever need but the rest of us need to constantly build our business. Not for a week, not once in a while, but every single day.

We want the customers now but can have trouble seeing the long term benefits of a sustained effort throughout the year. We wonder how these available channels can help us without realizing our contribution is critical to the equation. We want the quick wins to sustain our revenue line forever.

Downside of Now

As a business and marketing strategist, I am asked often if I can help companies improve and increase revenue. I can but I don't have magic dust to solve all their problems in an instant - no one does.

If you are in business, you have made some mistakes and enjoyed some victories but neither happened in a day or a week. It would be arrogant for anyone to claim they can help you improve in those areas in a short amount of time. You may want to find some quick wins but they are fleeting and impossible to scale.

We are not built for strategy or long-term thinking. If things are bad, we want them to be good, right now. If money is tight, we want money, right now. If someone promises that this campaign will help us get us out of this slide, we are happy to listen, right now. We want the burgers and the pie without the waistline.

Do you want wins or business growth?

Kneale Mann

image credit: directresponse
original: Mar 2011

Change is a Way of Life

You've heard the quote “the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results”. Some say it was Einstein, some say it was Franklin. The point is the meaning behind it.

I have worked with business owners who have tried it the other way around. They narrowed the focus, found the niche, then measured success against the wide mainstream. They did different things expecting the same results.

What Change Feels Like

There are theories that we build our set of values by the age of five. After that, it’s all experience and execution. Marriages split after decades of partners trying to change each other. Elections are won by candidates promising change.

Change is not easy. Change requires energy and focus and sustained attention. Change is something that sounds good when someone else says it. Change can fight you. Change can be elusive. Change wears many disguises. Change starts from our core, not our minds. Change is freely available when we want to grab it.

Change is Right Here

I was speaking with a colleague who was commiserating about a client who says she wants change in her organization yet her actions prove the opposite. And I reminded him that most of us like the concept of change but we don’t have a clue what it feels like when it’s happening. Most of us don't realize how deep rooted our habits are which often block change. And those habits once represented change.

Change is awkward and unsure. The ground begins to move beneath us and we crave for things to return to "normal". We like to feel safe and comfortable. We may scan the menu but there are usually a handful of items we order each time.

Say Change vs Do Change

This is increasingly more difficult in an organization. The economy is still down in many areas of the world yet on the threat of their very survival, companies often fail to realize a necessary organizational shift. Often the people uttering the decree for change aren't willing to change themselves.

There are two significant issues going on – the sheer will of stakeholders to keep their status quo and the task of building inspirational leadership. Knowing when change is necessary then actually taking the necessary steps to create it, is the challenge.

How do you affect positive change?

Kneale Mann

image credit: catnross
original post: feb 2011

Scaling Your Business

"Anything you build on a large scale or with intense passion invites chaos." Francis Ford Coppola

I seem to have several conversations daily surrounding the same topic – scaling. There are millions of bright talented experienced business owners who want to grow their companies save a couple of crucial issues – time and money. There is no concrete way to control the speed of scaling but often it feels like it's not happening fast enough. Some days it moves at a snail's pace.

You want to grow your revenue line and you know in order to do that you need extra help but you can’t afford the extra help because you are too busy working on the current revenue stream. And you can't seem to grow the revenue because of all the prospecting and meeting and selling and trying to get your current client work done.

Sound Familiar?

This is an issue that has faced business forever. Others with much less money or experience have solved what each of us faces which perhaps makes our concerns even more annoying. We love to hear stories of people born of meagre means to fight and claw their way to a successful career.

We know we can do it but its a mix of our impatience and some pedestrian items we need to corral. Scaling is a challenge for everyone from sole proprietors to c-level executives of corporations with a global footprint.

Here is a list of things to think about (I know I do) when you look at how to scale your business...

Find the Quiet
Anyone who knows me, knows I have a busy brain. That does not always mean I’m getting it all done, sometimes quite the opposite. Busy doesn’t mean progress. Find those moments where you can shut it all off, listen to some music, put your feet up and clear your mind.

Be Honest About Your Effort
We can usually find external fault in the slower pace of our business growth. The truth is, we need to look inside to ensure we are doing all we can. That’s usually where the slowdown is occurring.

Stop Comparing Yourself to Others
We all do it and it is a complete and utter waste of time. We can claim that numbers and stature and position don’t matter (they don’t) but we make them far more important that they are, stop shaking your head, you do so.

Ask Often and Always
This is where most businesses fall apart. I know I see my work slow down when I stop asking for business. We get timid, we don’t want to appear to be selling, but without sales there is no business. Find your way. No ask, no business.

Get Help
Small business, large corporation, c-level executive, sole proprietor, no one makes it on their own. No one. Ever. Surround yourself with a mastermind group of people from all walks of life with two purposes – to tell you the truth and to offer advice.

It’s Not Their Fault
When played properly, life is a team sport but we need to own our part.

Find the Decision Maker
How often have you had discussions with someone who can’t make the sale for you? Why would you try and sell to someone who isn’t in the position of buying? We've all done it far too often.

Be Clear About Your Offer
Elevator speech, website, social profile, in-person meeting, if you don’t believe what you are then no one will. Often companies get stuck or worse go backward when they begin to get unclear on their offer. Qualifying the sale is essential too. There's no sense talking to anyone - decision maker or not - if they're simply not interested.

Decimate the Naysayers
They are everywhere. Stay away from them. Delete them from your life. They will do absolutely nothing but derail you. Advice is fine, negativity is destructive.

Walk a Mile
This is not about comparing yourself to others but rather learning from others. Find people who have gone through what you’re going through. This is why some of the best hockey coaches are former hockey players. This is precisely why the most successful people have mentors.

Take it Offline
The online social networks are wonderful for finding like minded people along thought silos void of geographical limitations. Get on the phone, book a coffee or lunch, get out of the office and meet people in person or hear their voice. No social networking tool is more powerful than human interaction.

Be Sure You Want This
Follow your gut. Find the quiet. Get help. Listen to yourself and learn what you want.

What Did I Miss?

Kneale Mann | How can I help?

image credit: webtrafficroi

Finding the Quick Wins

Don't Wanna Wait

A large cheeseburger with condiments is approximately 600 calories.  An hour of high impact aerobics for a 200lb man will burn about 600 calories. A slice of pumpkin pie is about 350 calories. An hour of ice skating for the same man will burn about 340 calories. We know we need to eat better, work out more and take better care of ourselves but (on average) we don’t do that. We eat the cheeseburgers and the pie then get acquainted with the couch.

Once Not Enough

One blog post on a brand new site may get a handful of visitors – aka your friends – and hardly seems worth the effort. Three posts a week for three years may gain new clients as well as thousands of visitors and connections all over the world. That’s 468 articles. That’s a lot of work and discipline.

If you have a Twitter account that follows 39 people and has 24 followers with an average of 5 tweets a week, it is doubtful you will get much out of the experience. If you spend three years engaged in the channel several times each day, you may see new business, new contacts, more help and a large connected active network of colleagues and friends. That’s about an hour a day or 20,000 tweets or just over 1,000 hours.

Open for Business

Unless you have won the lottery, have rich parents or are independently wealthy, you need new business all the time. It’s admirable to see some who as many clients as they will ever need but they represent the minority. The rest of us need to build our business every day. Not for a week, not once in a while, but every single day.

We want the customers now but can have trouble seeing the long term benefits of a sustained effort throughout the year. We wonder how these available channels can help us without realizing our contribution is critical to the equation. We want the quick wins to sustain our revenue line forever.

Downside of Now

As a marketing and media strategist, I am asked daily what I can do for a company right this moment. Can I increase revenue, improve product lines, enhance messaging and advance the customer base, today. No I cannot. This stuff takes time. If you are in business, you have made some mistakes and enjoyed some victories but neither happened in a day or a week. It would be arrogant for anyone to claim they can help you improve in those areas in a short amount of time. You may want to find some quick wins but they are fleeting and impossible to scale.

Humans are not built for strategy or long-term thinking. If things are bad, we want them to be good, right now. If money is tight, we want money, right now. If someone promises that this campaign will help us get us out of this slide, we are happy to listen, right now. We want the burgers and the pie without the waistline.

Which is better – a quick win or sustained business growth?

Kneale Mann

image credit: jupiter

Motivation Can Be Our Biggest Obstacle

What Will We Do?

I technically own my own business. But really, I am an idea guy with a bunch of years of experience helping clients with marketing strategy and digital presence while ensuring it helps their overall business objectives. And it needs to make sense for their situation and abilities. In other words, theory won't help a soul without realistic actionable ideas.

One issue that is similar to every manager or owner I speak with is there is always pain and there are always items they want to improve, just like me and you. My clients and prospects are always looking for ways to  bring value and increase the revenue line, just like you and me. And I need to continue prospecting and I'm sure you do as well.

You Are Busy Enough

Some have suggested that I must be far too busy to speak with potential new clients or discuss new projects. If your local coffee shop had no customers for the next month, they would have no business. I'm always up for a meeting with someone new to discover how I may help them. How about you?

But wanting to grow and moving forward with the action you need to do it are two very different things. It takes motivation to keep moving forward. And as my friend Mitch Joel says, this isn't just business, this is personal. So if you own your own business, rejection can crush motivation.

Last week I met with someone in the morning who is starting a business and a senior executive from a large corporation in the afternoon and the conversations were remarkably similar. Both want to look at ways to better navigate what they could do to reach their goals. The same is true for the 100 people attending my upcoming social media workshop in March. The same is true for you and me.

Biggest Factor is Motivation

Whether you are a sole proprietor or a c-level executive running a publically traded organization with a global footprint, you must find ways to lead while motivating your team and yourself. Leadership can be a lonely journey within a team environment.

This is particularly delicate if you or your company is active online. You have to stay positive and you can’t post stuff that bums people out. No one wants to read it. You have to find the balance between connecting and selling while you navigate the overwhelming amount of data. Welcome to the human race.

To-Do List Keeps Growing

Much goes into running a business and this becomes especially clear when you are running your own company. You have to be the person finding new customers, developing and revising offerings, creating new content, while delivering the best results for clients.

Context is important but it can distract us. We can get preoccupied by what others are doing and comparing those efforts to our own. We can become unmotivated. We must remember that every situation is different and our perception is often not their reality.

How do you keep yourself and others motivated?

knealemann

image credit: sportsillustrated

Giving Lip Service to Change

You have heard the quote “the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results”. Some say it was Einstein, some say it was Franklin. The point is the meaning behind it.

I have worked with business owners who have tried it the other way around. They narrowed the focus, found the niche, then measured success against the wide mainstream. They did different things expecting the same results.

What does change feel like?

There are theories that we build our set of values by the age of five. After that, it’s all experience and execution. Marriages split after decades of partners trying to change each other. Elections are won by candidates promising change.

Change is not easy. Change requires energy and focus and sustained attention. Change is something that sounds good when someone else says it. Change can fight you. Change can be elusive. Change wears many disguises. Change starts from our core, not our minds. Change is freely available when we want to grab it.

Change is right here

I was speaking with a colleague this week who was commiserating about a client who says she wants change in her organization yet her actions prove the opposite. And I reminded him that most of us like the concept of change but we don’t have a clue what it feels like when it’s happening. Most of us don't realize how deep rooted our habits are which often block change. And those habits once represented change.

Change is awkward and unsure. The ground begins to move beneath us and we crave for things to return to "normal". We are creatures of habit and like to feel safe and comfortable. We may scan the menu but there are usually only a handful if items we order each time we're back to the restaurant.

Say or Do

This is increasingly more difficult in an organization. The economy is still down in many areas of the world yet on the threat of their very survival, companies often fail to realize a necessary organizational shift. Often the people uttering the decree for change aren't willing to change themselves.

There are two significant issues going on – the sheer will of stakeholders to keep their status quo and the monumental task of building inspirational leadership.

Change is not this. Change is unknown. Change can be exciting. Change is unproven. Change can be scary. Change requires a leap of faith. Change can conquer courage. When the bottom line is the only objective, affecting change can often be an illusive pipe dream.

How have you affected change?

knealemann

image credit: googleimages

Selling Stuff is Hard. Selling Yourself is Harder.

.

I enjoy assisting clients in expanding their presence online and offline and seeing those plans through to execution.

As I say to prospects and clients alike, there are a lot of things you can do but the important issue is what you will do. And simply having a Facebook page or being on Twitter or creating a LinkedIn group is not enough. Interacting in a human way is critical.

We Are All In Sales

Perhaps it’s easier to show someone the benefits of a gadget over the benefits of you. Techniques may be easier to apply to the cure for wrinkles or something to get a shinier car finish than explaining why you are a better solution than others. I have lost count the number of people who have asked me if this marketing tactic "will work" and anyone who can guarantee that will be a very wealthy person.

Years ago, I worked with a remarkable sales guy who reminded me that selling stuff was hard, selling yourself was harder. You and I can both cite examples of when we bought something quicker from someone we liked. It's not a steadfast rule, but it happens. And who likes to sell themselves and more importantly who likes to be sold?

Klout won't help your bottom line

The old adage, people buy from people has never been truer than in the ever growing digital channels. In fact, it is much more likely you will listen to the endorsement of a friend or colleague before you will believe an unsolicited advertising message.

You can claim to be the holder of the rules and keys. But all that falls away when you are face-to-face with someone who is looking to you – not some doohickey or theory, but you – for a solution that will help their business. I learn stuff every single day and it's often stuff about me. Self-doubt never helped anyone but overconfidence is equally difficult to digest.

Selling yourself is difficult. But is buying into others, complex?

knealemann | How can I help?

image credit: istock
This was also published on socialmediatoday

Simplifying Complex Problems

Life can be as complicated as we make it. How often do you hear someone or yourself use the word “busy” throughout your day? It’s as if we find comfort in being busy with tasks and deadlines, meetings and responsibilities. We wear busy like a badge of honor. After all, who among us would ever dream of admitting we have blocked off some time to think and plan?

Often when you check in with a colleague, they will predicate any response with the level of busy they are experiencing which is usually high.

Add to all this, we have this penchant for making simple things complicated while we find difficulty in making complex concepts rather simple. We do it in the business sphere when we have long meetings with no agenda and waste our time on stuff that won't lead us to solutions.

Eric Berlow is an ecologist who loves to study what you and I may find overwhelming to find the simplest concepts inside. [video]



knealemann | email

visual credit: TED

Marketing is Not a Department

Every industry, every job, every position within an organization has its fans and its critics. If you are climbing the corporate ladder right now you may be looking ahead toward those who are in positions above you on the org chart and making a list of what you will do differently when you get that gig. If you’re the boss, you may have found that deep dark place where you are completely honest with yourself and admit you don’t actually have all the answers to everything.

In the case of marketing, it appears far more people have an opinion than have any experience in the field. My plumber knows what he’s doing and charges me handsomely for his knowledge. My lawyer is a sharp dude who went to school and has letters behind his name so it must mean he knows his way around some law stuff. Yet with marketing, everyone is apparently an expert. That gets even more watered down when you replace the word 'marketing' with the words 'social media' but I digress.

Many moving parts

Clearly, advertising is part of an overall marketing plan yet it is not the sole piece of the puzzle. The look and feel of a company, how the phone and emails are answered, the design of business cards, presentation and business function execution and client correspondence are all part of the overall marketing of a company. In short, marketing is everything you do. I've had company owners tell me they weren't ready to do any marketing. If they're open for business, they have already started.

Many organizations take a campaign approach to some initiative or product launch or event and decide they need to “do some marketing”. And that, in many cases, means advertising. So they build a budget, put together the creative, decide what media they will use to spread the word and there, the marketing is done.

Return on Ignorance

What is then dangerous is when those who are not mathematicians seem to have a foolproof opinion on the return on investment. The success of an entire company should not hinge on a single event.

There is a myriad choices when it comes to external or outbound marketing options. There are the channels that have been deemed traditional such as print, radio, television and transit/outdoor. Additionally, there is the choice of direct mail, trade shows, presentations, conferences and face-to-face contact.

Choosing channels

The social web can be both daunting and enticing. On one side it looks too much like work when you can just place an ad on a flat surface but it can also give the impression that it’s a quick fix. It does require commitment and can garner results but not tomorrow.

We live in a customer centric world and we are all customers and providers. But that certainly doesn't mean everyone is equipped to steer marketing initiatives with guesswork and opinion. Or worst yet, adopting the strategy that what may have worked last year will work again this year.

I'd love to know your thoughts.

knealemann | email

image credit: flickr

Do You Feel Like An Alien?

We don't have time.

I was in a client’s office this week and they gave me a tour of the place and introduced me to the rest of the team. Nice, warm, friendly people all made me feel at home. I was introduced as the guy “here to help with the social media stuff”. It’s not all I do but in this case it was a workshop to explain tools, examine what they’re doing, find ways to better integrate all their efforts and most importantly ensure internal communication improves. That work continues.

I felt a bit like an alien, a strange being that was coming in with stuff that was foreign to most. My direct contact is doing a great job and it was as if she had found another from her planet to help explain it to the rest of the team. Love this client, love her team. They want to understand what they don’t understand. Perfect!

Does this sound familiar?

You seem to be the only one jumping up and down to embrace the power of the digital channels yet some look at you with confusion, claim there is no time for all this stuff and think Facebook is just a way to keep in touch with their college friends?

Everyone seems to have an opinion of the social web yet the organization has yet to embrace the full power of an integrated solution to improve communication and drive revenue. If you spend too much time on Twitter or Quora you are left with the impression that “everyone” gets this stuff. They do not. We are still in the early stages.

We're way behind!

You can read spaces such as Mashable, Wired, Gigaom or Business Insider and it appears you are in the dark ages if your organization is not completely firing on all social networking channels. Don’t worry, global companies are still working on it and there is no one answer.

If we take a campaign approach tied to return on investment of one YouTube video or a single blog post as the metric to social media success, we still have a lot of work to do.

What’s your story?

knealemann | email | How can I help?

image credit: wikimedia

Do You Have A Strategic Plan?

One Third Win
The numbers are slightly different depending on the study, but the number of businesses that launch then thrive is quite small. About 30% of all new companies actually see their way to black ink.

Why Is That?

I have worked on fifty-page Strategic Plans, it's a lot of work!

It requires people and meetings and the result is an extensive blueprint for the next fiscal year. For the most part, the Plan was followed and people were held accountable. Each tactic had dates and money and people attached to it so the Plan could be realistically and properly executed.

I would often test people’s knowledge of the Plan by asking them if they could recite our Three Strategic Objectives. Most did well on that point. But when it got to the tactics and time lines and who does what by when, their ability to recount the Plan began to decline.

But you don't need a fifty-page Plan to succeed. Trust me! Those things were behemoths. No wonder no one could remember what was in them.

Why do companies fall short of their goals?

Focus

This is often a catch-all that isn’t given the attention it deserves. If you’re in a well financed start-up, it can be intoxicating. Ideas are following, people are happy and it’s exciting. But once the balloons deflate and the actual real work begins and you experience that first difficult client, things may begin to wobble.

Market

It’s even more essential that you are aware of your market. That includes where you are geographically, the industry you are in, what your competitors are doing and the never ending changes in customer desires and demands.

A Plan is not something you put in a pretty binder to sit alongside previous years' Plans to simply collect dust.

Homework

No matter your industry or role, you need to be constantly educating yourself on opportunities and trends. We have the world’s largest encyclopedia at our fingertips but how many of us end up at the same websites every day?

Accountability

This has always been a hot button. It looks good on the wall or in your company propaganda or on your website. “We’re accountable!” Are you? In order for this to gain traction, everyone in your organization must be accountable to everyone in your organization. No exceptions.

Execution

Plans are useless without action. If you take the required time to set out a Plan, then actually carry it out.

I’m a guy, I hate reading instructions but I have often destroyed a purchase because I didn’t read the sheet of paper with the thing I needed to assemble. That is why the instructions are there. That is why you galvanize a Strategic Plan.

Then you do need to be nimble so you can react to opportunities that may not have been there when you developed your Plan. You won’t be able to do so if everything you do is by the seat of your pants.

Communication

This is the largest reason companies fail. We can discuss this at length another time but it is monumentally imperative that you keep clear collaborative communications open with everyone in your organization or the clock is ticking.

Fear

We are human beings. We mess up. We mean well. We have the best of intentions. But we miss steps and get frustrated and get filled with self-doubt which stops us from getting there. And we forget to ask for help!

Am I way off the mark?
What are your thoughts on this?

knealemann.at.gmail.com

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