Read Our Blog On Culture Change

Does it sometimes feel that your business is fuelled more by optimism than reality? Do your colleagues tell you that customers are happy or (as in the case of a business I once encountered) that ‘no one’s complained yet’? Without putting a damper on things, there’s a very effective exercise you can run to perform a reality check on a big customer or a strategic project. We called it ‘Why did we lose the client?

Modern businesses invest time and expertise in shaping future strategies. Many go on to invest effort in communicating the chosen direction to employees. But often, when you talk to an individual staff member, team or department, you find they’re unaware of the strategy and clueless as to how they can help the organisation achieve it. People turn up to do their daily work but don’t much care about the broader outcome.

In work and life, we prize the ability to think quickly. We use the complimentary term ‘agile’ to describe someone who can handle a tough Q&A session. Or ‘sharp’ for an entrepreneur who spots and seizes a business opportunity before anyone else. But, in ascribing quick thinking to intellect, we are generally mistaken. When we make decisions, our brains use two systems. Let’s call them fast and slow.

Have you ever noticed that some patterns of behaviour repeat whenever you talk with certain people? Perhaps it’s a colleague who can never say no, but always fails to deliver. Or a relative whose constant criticism of your children puts you on the defensive. Each time you meet you hope it will be different, but it never is. The theory of Transactional Analysis was developed in the 1950s by psychologist Eric Berne to help people understand...

The merits of Influencer Marketing have been much vaunted. So excessively that many in digital circles see it as the primary form of marketing. The most effective influencers may already be right on your doorstep. Your employees. An obvious question here is whether employees should be financially incentivised to become influencers in the same way that external influencers are rewarded. The answer to this...

Ten months after the WHO declared the COVID pandemic over, we’re all living with the digital transformation it stimulated. There have been some changes in working behaviours but I’m not convinced that a positive ‘new normal’ has yet been defined. I’m sure you’ve been in online meetings where one or two individuals seem to dominate the conversation... ‘empty vessels make the most noise’ seems to ring true.