A Framework for Networking Movers and Shakers

Posted on April 4, 2012 | 4 Comments

Reid Hoffman’s face popped up unexpectedly on the TV screen in front of my elliptical machine. Fortuitous. He is the guru in professional relationship building. To get ahead as a manager you must employ the skills of networking.

Strength in Numbers

Reid is the Founder of LinkedIn, an early investor in Facebook and the author of the networking book best seller “Start Me Up.” I have always been a devotee of networking. Reid has taken the art and added science.

His networking guiding principles:

  • Be genuine and put the interests of others ahead of your own
  • Form ten alliances – people you would get up in the middle of the night for
  • 3rd degree relationships are the best – someone in the mix who knows you personally
  • Nurture your relationships

At the start, let’s agree that successful businesses and people stay in touch. They gain something from one another.

Here is a great example – publically traded Lululemon Athletica’s manifesto proclaims that “friends are more important than money” and since their IPO in 2007 their stock has climbed 263%. Top motivating speaker Tony Robbins states, “Proximity is power.” Combine the two and, voila, you have networking at its best.

Yes, networking is important. But how do I include it as an important aspect in my daily routine?

I see two problems for me:

  • Reid famously carries 5 phones/laptops to stay connected. I don’t!
  • And to stay that connected moves one into Information Overload – less productivity due to a never-ending barrage of distracting contacts and data.

So, let’s see what some of my network thinks. I randomly sent reconnecting emails to my allies and some 3rd degree connections. Responses were swift – perhaps because there was no ASK (“I need a favor”).

Here is a sampling:

“Sorry I haven’t been in touch lately. How are you?”

“I’ve been slammed. Glad you reached out.”

“No, I don’t do LinkedIn or Facebook. Too time consuming.”

One of my contacts responded with this actionable networking framework that she follows successfully:

  • Create a formal alliance of folks who agree to help each other. Agree to talk once a month.
  • Be disciplined in sharing leads and offering help and advice. Take this alliance seriously.
  • Look for articles/information that would be interesting or useful to a contact. Send with a brief email. This shows you are thinking about them, limits your investment of time and keeps you connected.
  • Make a personal decision to help someone in a big way. It will pay forward.
  • Routinely make introductions and ASK for introductions.
  • Send messages for key milestones (promotions, big business wins, awards).

More comes from networking than meets the eye. According to Harvard Business Review, being a good networker has other perks as well like moving from the non-promoted pool to being in the top 10% of getting promoted. By making a point to network up and down the ladder in your organization you keep yourself in the front of peoples’ minds and have allies in place who are ready to help you make that next move.

My conclusion – successful networking requires work and a personal approach. It is a snowball effect that gains momentum as you build and nurture it.

But designing your own framework of connectivity and working at it every day is absolutely doable.

By Debra Koenig, President of B2A Consulting

For further support around networking see Three Degrees of Separation: Building a Powerful Professional Network

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Great Teams Don’t Just Happen

Posted on March 28, 2012 | 3 Comments

A team must work together toward the same goal.

“The way a team plays as a whole determines its success. You may have the greatest bunch of individual stars in the world, but if they don’t play together, the club won’t be worth a dime.”  Babe Ruth

As a huge sports fan I am always amazed at teams that sign the highest priced athletes and then believe they will win championships. What teams seem to forget is how important team chemistry is.  Do some superstars really upset the team chemistry?  Do superstars believe they are more important than the team as a whole?  Those are great questions and the answers are probably yes and yes.

In Paul Azinger’s great book Breaking the Code he details how he took 12 “superstars” who played golf solely for themselves and turned them into 3 small teams of 4 all working for the ultimate goal of winning.  What Azinger writes about is the importance of matching personalities so they can reach the ultimate goal.  I know that through my work career I have worked with people who on their own were brilliant top performers but once paired on projects they failed to achieve and settled for mediocrity.

We all have “superstars” on our team and everyone always wants to hire more of them, but at what cost?  I know the Miami Heat and the New York Mets probably ask themselves this question quite often.  Were the players just not really what they seemed or did they take a sudden turn for the worse when they transitioned from one team to another?   Probably not. They were more than likely just mixed in with personalities they didn’t mesh with.

In Breaking the Code, the author speaks at great lengths about ensuring that the correct personalities and work ethics were matched so that the small teams or “Pods” as he refers to them, would give the entire team maximum production. Guess what?  It works.

I am sure that as you look around at your current and future teams and think to yourself that “Susie” was such a great hire and had such a great background, why is she not reaching her full potential?  The question you really need to be asking is whether Susie is matched with like-minded individuals in order for her to fulfill her potential?  Here at Red Book Solutions we take many personality tests ranging from Kolbe to DISC to ensure we are pairing our talent in teams and jobs that suit them well. Of course this costs a little more, but in the end it is much cheaper than the alternative—a self-destructing team does no one any good.

Great teams don’t just happen, they are crafted and cultivated. Really take a look at yours to understand its various traits. Be active in managing it at every level. It is a good investment of your time that will bring back a positive return in more ways than one.

By David Pettit, Business Development Director, Red Book Solutions

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Workplace Communication Twists and Turns create Turmoil

Posted on March 21, 2012 | 1 Comment

You may remember playing the game Grapevine when you were a kid. We sat in a circle passing a message from one person to the next only to laugh heartily at the end when what was said was nothing close to the original. Yesterday, I was reminded of the game because texting brought it into real life for me.My husband and I were dropping off the kids with a friend for a birthday party dinner, and I simply texted her “We are here.” Unfortunately, what I didn’t know is that my “smart” phone somehow changed it to “We ate here.” She proceeded to call her husband to let him know our plans had changed. He turns his kids around and begins to head back our way in anticipation of the new plans. Soon enough we reconnected and remedied the disconnect.

What may be a funny misunderstanding in this situation would be more frustrating in business—where managers and frontline employees must absolutely rely on one another to deliver and receive details correctly. Workplace communication is crucial to a team.

“Without communication and the team effort it permits, the successful completion of any important project can be jeopardized.” Applied Statistics for Business and Economics, Allen Webster

The importance of good communication is a core fundamental of better management. Everything a manager does involves a level of communication because they receive higher level direction and must be able to translate it to day-to-day actions.  Communication is the bridge between team members creating synergy within the team. When done correctly this is how we achieve organizational goals more rapidly and on target.

What are not always talked about are the ramifications of poor communication. Well, in a nutshell it directly affects task implementation in the following 3 ways:

  1. Lowers Morale – If you don’t “understand the task” it can be a main point of on-the-job frustration.
  2. Promotes Mistakes – When communication is poor it is harder to “perform the task” effectively.
  3. Jeopardizes Productivity – Employees cannot “accomplish the task” to expectation when the above two issues exist.

Knowing the issues may be half the battle but in this case there is more to it. Think about all the noise that can interfere with any of your communication efforts such as, differences in learning, listening/hearing, culture, and general audience diversity—not to mention—information overload, multi-tasking, and working memory. All of these distort the information received in some way. Let’s take a closer look at the learn piece to make a clearer point.

How We Learn William Glasser

10% of what we READ

20% of what we HEAR

30% of what we SEE

50% of what we SEE and HEAR

70% of what is DISCUSSED with OTHERS

80% of what is EXPERIENCED PERSONALLY

95% of what we TEACH TO SOMEONE ELSE

So what do we do about communication now? Here’s a start. Your workplace communication needs to meet the following four criteria to be deemed “100% successful” with anyone.

  • Simple
  • Visual
  • Action-Oriented
  • Quick and Easy to Remember

By following these communication criteria your message will cut through the clutter, become memorable, and even more so, become actionable. Now to refine these efforts further, communicate using both verbal and non-verbal behaviors. Hold a pre-shift huddle, do one-on-ones for harder tasks, and have it written down so everyone can refer back.

Now we’re talking good communication. You and your team will find yourselves motivated by the growing accomplishments bringing your morale and productivity to all time highs. Sounds like a great place to be.

By Shiloh Kelly, Vice President of Marketing, Red Book Solutions

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Stand Back, I’m Flipping my Sign Here

Posted on March 14, 2012 | Leave a comment

Already, the first quarter is almost done.  You may be wondering where you stand. How you get out of the gate in the first quarter can define the rest of your year. You started with a plan, determined what activities were needed to hit your plan and scheduled them out. Of course you did all the items in your plan too. Right?

My bigger question to you is, “Were you just going through the motions, or doing the activities with purpose and a level of pride knowing each action was bringing you closer to achieving your plan?” As time and experience have told us, the more you put into things, the more you get out of them.

If you’ve begun to notice my style, I like to break things down into simple Giving your all at workstories that paint a clearer picture of the message I am trying to get across; so here goes. When you were driving down the road last, I’m sure at the stoplight your eyes were drawn to the “sign flippers” now posted at most busy corners.  If you haven’t seen them, then they are failing miserably because that is their job—to get your attention.

Personally, I’ve seen all kinds of sign flippers. The worst one was in a t-shirt and jeans sitting on the ground with his sign propped against his legs, smoking a cigarette talking on his phone with a look of total annoyance. My guess is that this guy was not happy with his job, and it showed in more ways than one. I’m pretty sure this was not what the manager was going for when they hired him to bring attention to their business.  

Now there are some great sign flippers out there who bring a great deal of value to the locations they represent—you’re more likely to have seen these. They go the extra mile and have fun doing it. You can’t help but watch their antics and be entertained. They dance and jump about in pink gorilla outfits moving their sign every which way. They know their role, their goal, and they fully embrace it. In my opinion, life is incredibly boring and unfulfilling when you don’t. We spend too much of our precious time at our jobs not to make the most out of the experience. To be better than the rest, now that is fun.

What it comes down to is—there is nothing like knowing you are one of the best on the block. You dare all other sign flippers to stand next to you knowing the competition just can’t stand up to your commitment. It takes something more to achieve more. Instead of just planning and doing activities make sure you put more meaning behind what you do. And when you do, life is just plain better.

By Richard Goering, Executive Vice President, 3C Network, Guest Blogger

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Customer Frequency – one true measure of success

Posted on March 7, 2012 | 2 Comments

dissatisfied customers

Every day I ask myself, “Are our customers, or clients as we call them, really satisfied with our service?” Are they promoters of our products and services? Do our clients really value this type of service or are we just spending unneeded resources and maybe the right answer is to cut services and reduce prices? Every business I know has this same question, and yet not many of them effectively measure this.

In his book “How to Measure Anything”, Douglas Hubbard discusses that you can measure anything intangible if you just ask the right question. What I am going to talk about is how you can measure client satisfaction without spending a lot of time or money and how to act on the information received.

The importance of client satisfaction is simple. The more your customers come back, the more money you make. As a quick example, if a customer visits your establishment once a month and spends $25 each time you generate $300 a year from this customer. If you can get that same customer to come to your establishment twice a month, you have just doubled your revenue. If you could get all of your customers to double their frequency, you have just doubled your business and did not have to spend a dime on generating new revenue.

The key measurement for any location manager’s success is visits per customer. This is probably the most important measurement but very few companies seem to measure it. Why not?

For many business-to-consumer companies, getting this information is difficult. People believe they need a system that captures everyone who buys from them, tracks how many times they have bought and, once they have figured this out, determines why they keep coming back. In the end, it is just easier to hope and pray that they are doing everything right.

In “How to Measure Anything” Hubbard talks about the validity of using a small sample size to gain a larger perspective. His theory is that the error rate in a small sample is not significantly different than obtaining a large sample size or tracking 100%. Based on this, it is not difficult to implement a program where you can request your customer-facing people to ask five people a day how often they frequent your establishment on average. You can assume that these people are probably representative of your entire customer base. I recommend that you keep asking this so your data gets better over time. This tells you how often people visit your location. Ask yourself if you believe you are better or worse than similar establishments. If better, you are doing great and you need to figure out what makes you great. If worse, you need to go to work.

Next, determine their level of satisfaction. You need to determine if they are a promoter, a detractor or neutral. Remember, a detractor may visit you because they have no other viable option. Once a new option presents itself, they are gone.

 “The Ultimate Question”, by Fred Reichheld, states that there is only one true question to determine client satisfaction: “On a scale of 0-10 with 10 being the highest would you recommend us to a friend or colleague?”

A 9 or 10 earned means they are a promoter—6 or below means, they are a detractor. Anyone who gives you a 7 or 8 is a passive. Ask one other question depending on their answer:

  • If they are a 9 or 10 ask them why they like you so much.
  • If they are an 8 or below ask them what you could do to get them to be a 9 or 10.

Take this information and compare it to the number of times they visit your establishment to determine if the 9’s or 10’s frequent your place more often. My guess is you will find a direct correlation. Then determine if there are similarities regarding what they like. Michael Porter (renowned strategist) would say this is your value proposition; it is what differentiates you from the rest of the market. Focusing on this is what will make you better.

For the detractors or neutral people, determine if there are areas you want to change. Be careful making these decisions, because you could make changes that cause you to lose your promoters and still not satisfy the detractors. This would be the worst of all situations.

Do this exercise consistently throughout the year, and it will help you to stop guessing why business is good or bad and give you concrete areas to focus on.

You truly can measure anything, but you only need to take the time to measure what is important. A bunch of data is just a bunch a data. If you don’t take action on your findings, then everyone’s time is wasted and you won’t be any better off than when you started. Integrate these items into your daily tasks to ensure you don’t lose sight of your customer satisfaction goals.

By Greg Thiesen, CEO of Red Book Solutions

 

 

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Activate, Accelerate, and Advance Learning Curves

Posted on February 29, 2012 | 3 Comments

We all know that people learn in different ways.  Acquiring and applying new skills and knowledge is not done by every person the same way.

On the most basic level, you probably know people who hear something once and remember it years later.  You may also know someone who can’t remember something you told them 10 seconds ago. Memory is an important component of learning. The trick is to be able to take in information so it is stored in short-term memory and then ensure it is converted into long-term memory, making it accessible at a later date. 

If you think back to your elementary school years, you may recall weekly spelling tests and the workbooks where you wrote out the spelling words in lists, in sentences and in various other exercises.  You may also remember using flashcards.  Your teacher probably had you write out vocabulary words and their meanings or multiplication tables or other facts.

Your elementary school teachers may not have seen the latest scientific research, but they had evidence to show that the act of writing something down helps cement it in your memory.  Both the repetition of the information – first you read it or hear it, then you write it, then you repeat it – and the physical process of writing helps move information from your short-term memory to more permanent storage.

Since the focus of this blog series is about improving management performance, you’re probably waiting for some connection between spelling tests and daily effectiveness at your job today.  While some of us have trouble finishing all the things that need to be done each day, others of us have trouble maintaining focus on the key activities that should be the day’s top priorities.

Studies show that the act of writing about something (making a list, creating a reminder note, scheduling or assigning tasks) causes the writer to focus on that activity, use greater concentration and more effectively ignore distractions.  The brain science tells us that writing things down creates an imprint on the brain – engaging the “reticular activating system” which aids the learning process and the creation of working memory.

It’s often the daily distractions that keep us from being able to recall information. The process of writing increases the accuracy of our memories or learning – meaning that we are more likely to store, recall, and focus on those activities or priorities and get them accomplished instead of getting distracted by other concerns.

Finally, there is information to suggest that writing helps reduce stress by boosting overall cognitive capacity and increasing coping ability to deal with stressors.  Stress can certainly be a daily distraction, so if the act of writing can help control stress and increase focus, improved performance is a reasonable and desirable by-product for every manager.

By writing something down (and unfortunately studies indicate that typing doesn’t seem to have the same effect), you improve your ability to recall and focus on the items you have identified as important for your day.  This means better performance – for you and your team.  Use a daily planner or other tool to write down your priorities today and see if you agree that writing improves your ability to retain, learn and apply your management skills and help you to better achieve your daily goals.

 By Nancy Lane, Director of Human Resources, Red Book Solutions

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Three Degrees of Separation: Building a Powerful Professional Network

Posted on February 22, 2012 | 2 Comments

When you think of networking, are you turned off?

Do you have visions of asking someone you barely know if you can add them to your network because you want something from them?  Experts would call this approach transactional, unauthentic and not very effective. There is value to you but nothing in it for them. Building your network shouldn’t be like that. Let’s agree – connections are important and a truly helpful, professional network can be leveraged to get you your dream career.

In their book “The Start-Up of You”,Reid Hoffman (the founder of LinkedIn) and Ben Casnocha say the real way to create a network requires the ability to:

 

  1. be authentic to build a genuine relationship with another person
  2. work with the people you know
  3. create three degrees of separation for the people who can help you the most professionally
  4. prioritize the high-quality relationships across a large number of connections

To be authentic, start with a friendly gesture that immediately adds value to them by being associated with you. An example would be, “I have a management tool I think you’d love. I’ll send it to you.” The authors say it is essential to put yourself in the other person’s shoes to develop an honest connection. Then think in terms of how you can collaborate with and help the other person. That’s the authentic part that you just can’t fake your way through.

The best way to engage with new people is by working with people you already know but focus on deepening the connection. Most people maintain 5 to 10 active alliances.  An ally is someone you consult regularly for advice and proactively share and collaborate on opportunities together. An ally is someone you will cooperate with, sacrifice for and are few in number.

I cherish my alliances. Recently, a dear friend engaged in possibly acquiring a manufacturing firm to compliment her business. It was her first acquisition attempt. Though she had all of the right resources to perform due diligence and make the decision, we still spent endless hours walking, talking about the process and her feelings throughout. She, in turn, has been a resource for me several times during our relationship.

Looser connections are what sociologists call “weak ties”. These are folks whom you’ve spent limited time with but are still friendly. Why are they important? Because weak ties sit outside your inner circle and are more inclined to bring new information and new opportunities.
Friends of friends of friends are your third-degree connections. Why is three degrees the magic number? Because when you are introduced to a second- or third-degree connection, at least one person personally knows the origin.  And that’s how trust is preserved and credibility is established.

At three degrees of separation, your extended network can lead you to 50,000+ connections via a personal introduction from somebody you know.
How does it work – you leverage your network through an introduction from someone you know, who knows the person you want to reach. For your network to be successful, you need to be effective at requesting and making introductions.

“Relationships are living, breathing things. Feed, nurture, and care about them; they grow. Neglect them; they die,” according Hoffman and Casnocha.
They suggest that in the next week you:
  • Introduce two people who don’t know each other but ought to
  • Think about a challenge you face and ask for an introduction to a connection in your network who could help
  • Identify a weaker tie with whom you’d like to build an alliance. Help him/her by giving  a small gift such as an article or job posting

 

And their paramount tip on networking to build a great career – be authentic!

Debra Koenig, President, B2A

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