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Food for thought

May 24
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Negative Team Culture To Watch Out For

By Blogpost, challenges, Food for thought, Goals, inspirations, Leadership, management, opportunities

A winning team culture can easily give your company that extra advantage over the competition. The team or corporate culture is one of the foundations of a strong business. This can greatly contribute on how fast you can achieve your goals or better yet, be a factor in your company’s longevity.

Take a look at today’s most successful and long running companies and examine their respective corporate cultures. You can probably see how similar their corporate team culture is to their brand image and the quality of their products. The corporate culture in one way or another reflects what the company’s image is.

A winning team culture is achievable by any organisation but does not come easy. A team culture is developed over time. It takes time, discipline and good leadership. A leader’s job is to encourage positive values and prevent negative ones. There are negative values that need to be stamped out before they can become deeply ingrained in your team.

Poor Communication

This is the easiest one to detect and is easily one of the most toxic. Poor communication goes against the very concept of a team. Communication between team members is essential if they are expected to work with each other to achieve their common goals. Poor communication stifles creativity and hinders great ideas from being implemented. This can also turn off high-performing members – causing them to quit and look for another company to work for. Give the team members the freedom to speak their minds. Encourage open communication but do not force. Just like any value you want to instill in the team culture, it takes time.

Micromanaging

Managing your team is indeed your job as the leader but do not overdo it. You hired these people because you are confident that they can do their jobs. This is what the hiring and the interview process is for. The fact that they are already employed means that you have already decided that they are the right people for the job at hand. Micromanaging can put your staff under unnecessary pressure and can stress yourself out. Whether it’s you or a person of managing position in your company, avoid micromanaging. Trust the team. Guide them but give them enough freedom to do what they do best.

Too Profit Focused

Ensuring that your company makes a profit is important but should not be the be-all and end-all. This can lead to aiming for short term results and focusing more on the bottom line. A profit focused culture can lead to poor employee engagement. Just like having a culture of poor communication, this can lead to individuals, possible high-performing individuals, leaving for another company. Strike for a good balance between profit and employee engagement. Remember, without employees, you cannot run a business.

May 17
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Changing Your Team Culture for the Better

By challenges, Blogpost, Food for thought, habits, Leadership, management, opportunities, purpose

No company is perfect. Not even yours. There is always something to improve on. And that is a good thing. Those flaws keep you on your toes and if you have the right mindset for it and you love a good challenge every now and then, you can consider it as the fun part of running a business.

One aspect of the company that you can improve is the team culture. As I have mentioned in one of my previous articles, Building a Winning Team Culture, team culture is the sum of the beliefs, values and attitudes shared by the team members. Since a team is composed of different individuals with different personalities and attitudes, there is a tendency that bad habits will form overtime. It can start with one or two members and would then rub off onto their teammates thus becoming part of the team culture. If left unchecked, it can negatively affect the team and in turn your company. As the business owner, the challenge is to look out for these bad habits and change them. It is not easy to change a deeply ingrained habit in the team but it is never too late to change it.

Choosing What to Add or Change

Changing or adding a value in the existing team culture is a long process. It can take months or years depending on how deeply ingrained the value is. Since it can take a lot of time and effort, let’s make sure that those resources are not wasted. Carefully consider which value is worth adding or changing. Think how big of an impact it can make in the team. Ask yourself if adding or changing a value can come into conflict with some of the existing values in the team culture. Careful consideration and forward thinking are essential when making this decision.

Keep on Repeating

If you want a value to sink in to the team, you need to keep on repeating it. A team meeting is not the only way to remind the team, you can use different mediums to get the point across. You can use e-mail to talk about it or tell stories that are related to that value or habit. You can even build a company event around it. Be creative and fun when going about it. You may sound like a broken record, but you will achieve the results that you are aiming for.

Lead by Example

You are the leader and the team culture is not something that is posted on the wall or a fancy presentation. It’s your team’s core values and attitudes on how you face challenges. If you want the team to adopt a new value or remove an existing one, then you as the team leader should lead by example. Show them how you live by those values and how to apply them.

Apr 26
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Challenges to New Team Members

By Attitude, Blogpost, challenges, Entrepreneurship, excellence, Food for thought, Goals, Human resources, Leadership, management, stress, Success

You have now successfully hired new team members to your organisation. The team is ready to take the journey with you to achieve your business goals. Everyone is onboard and have a clear understanding of your company’s mission and vision. Morale is high and everyone is pumped up. Everything looks perfect and good to go.

But is it really? Even with a tried and tested onboarding process, new staff members can experience problems in the first few weeks of working in your company. As time goes on, it is very unlikely that they will speak up about the challenges and issues that they are facing. This can lead to further problems that might affect their productivity and the business as a whole. As a leader and business owner, you can watch out of for these things and hopefully resolve them as soon as possible.

Adjustment to Relocation

Some of your new hires might have relocated from another city or even from another country to work for your company. They might have brought their families with them. This can cause issues especially if they are unfamiliar with the new location. Despite this being a personal issue, it might negatively affect their work. They might even start to rethink if they made the right decision.

One way of handling this is simply through communication. Your HR can schedule a meeting with the employee and come up with suggestions to resolve the issue or at least lessen the burden of the problem. They can also have them talk to another employee who had gone through the same issue so they can get advice and share their experiences.

Managerial Issues

It can be common for new employees to not be able to form a good relationship with their managers. This can be due to conflicting ideas, or the managerial style not fitting the employee’s style.

Once signs of this problem come up, it is best to have your HR or your onboarding department to get in touch with the employee. It’s important to get to the root of the problem and smooth things out. They could advise the employee and manager to stay in touch regularly so they can get a feel for each other’s way of doing things. It all comes down to understanding and working as a team.

Expectations and Results

Sometimes, new employees tend to take on too much too quickly. This is done to hopefully impress their supervisors or co-workers without knowing that this can lead to unnecessary overload and eventually burning out.

Regularly remind everyone in your organisation to take on reasonable expectations. Trying to achieve impossible expectations can be stressful and is counterproductive in the long run.

Apr 23
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Keep Focused: Ways To Shy Away From Distractions

By Attitude, Blogpost, challenges, Food for thought, Goals, habits, mindset

Having focus to achieve what you want is not as easy as it sounds, not with all the distractions that we are facing in our daily lives. Having said that, how do we keep the main thing – the main thing? We are already in the second quarter of the year – do you have a concrete plan on how to spend the next 90 days? Here are some questions I need you to ask yourself and let’s see how these can help us achieve our goals this quarter and on the next.

  • How do you limit distractions?
  • How do you keep the noise out?
  • How do you keep focus?
  • How do you keep the main thing, the main thing?

Typically, this coming quarter we got so many distractions. If you choose to give in to these distractions, we need to consider some things. We’ve got a lot of holidays coming up that the team members can take, clients can take. So,

  • How do you keep focus?
  • How do you ensure that stuff still gets done?
  • How do you ensure that you stay on track?
  • How do you minimize the noise?

How do you keep focused?

There are a couple of things that we do with our clients to help them keep their focus on different tasks or things that they need to do:

  • Phones off unless you’re making phone calls;
  • Emails off unless you’re on email time; and
  • One of the most important things is – who you need to be here right now?

We have over 555 different characteristics. We need to tune in to that person that we need to be for that specific task, for that specific focus on that we need to be focused in.

If it’s making calls, fantastic! Who does that need to be? Who do you need to drop on more of that?

If it’s putting to your proposal, fantastic! Who do you need to be more of that?

So, it’s tapping into that “beingness of you,” it’s all inside of you to ensure you maintain that focus, maintain those characteristics in order to achieve that result.

What happens so often is that people bounce. They bounce from emails to phone calls, to team – like a lucky pinball machine. And what happens when we bounce? Our energy goes up and down. We get overwhelmed so much easily and quicker, and we get frustrated because we feel that we’re not going forward.

Who do you need to be right now?

Now, let’s focus on how do you need to be? This is where an ideal week comes in a place, but more importantly with the ideal week is – who do you need to be in those chunks of time?

That’s the goal thing! That’s the missing link so often I see with people when they’re creating an ideal week, is who do you need to be in that time frame? Not that task associated but who do you need to be in order to do that task on that focused time.

So, there we go! Let’s keep the main thing – the main thing.

Let’s keep the focus.

Let’s keep the drive.

Let’s minimize the distraction.

Let’s achieve some great results today.

Mar 22
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Five Reasons Why Outsourcing Fails

By Blogpost, challenges, Entrepreneurship, Food for thought, Goals, Human resources, Leadership, management, outsourcing, stress, Success

Why Business Owners Fail When Outsourcing Tasks

Your goals are set. You are now ready to grow your business. You have decided to take the outsourcing path to help you reach your business goals. Once you have outsourced those specific tasks, it should be smooth sailing from there, right? But outsourcing is not a miracle solution. Some businesses still fail, despite outsourcing. Here are 5 common reasons why outsourcing fails.

Hi, I’m James Short. As you already know by now, I always encourage entrepreneurs to outsource if they want to have that edge over their competitors. But over the years, I found out that some businesses still do not experience significant growth even after outsourcing. What went wrong and what could have been done? With that said, I’m going to share with you five (5) reasons why business owners fail when it comes to outsourcing those tasks.

They Don’t Have a Clear and Effective Plan

Just like anything in business, we need to have a plan that outlines what your needs and requirements are. This is no different when it comes to outsourcing. Plan out which tasks need to be prioritized. Be specific and detailed in what exactly do you want to accomplish with the given task.

Choosing the Right Outsourcing Partner

Just like with any partnerships, we need to do the due diligence to ensure you’re partnering with the right type of outsourcing partner. Do your research before partnering up with an outsourcing firm or a freelancer. Ask other business owners for feedback on what their business relationship is like with the firm or individual. That way, you can get a good idea if the firm or individual is the right one for your plans and goals.

Too Much Too Soon

Giving your outsourcing team too much too soon and thinking that it’s just going to magically all get done. Outsourcing tasks is a learning process for both you and the outsourcing team. The team needs a bit of time to figure out the most efficient way to do their appointed tasks. Give them that time and you will reap the benefits.

Set and Forget

So many times, I hear business owners just set their outsourcing team on their way but without any follow-up and without any directions, no difference to a team onshore. You’ve got to manage them similarly. Set up regular meetings with the team to check up on progress as well as to get feedback.

Lack of Communication

This is where business owners fall down when it comes to outsourcing. Ensure that you are constantly in touch with your team. There is absolutely no reason not to do this since today’s communication is so much easier and accessible.

So those are the five (5) main reasons why outsourcing fails when it comes to those business owners wanting to outsource.

I’m James Short, looking forward to speaking to you soon.

Mar 12
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Advantages of Outsourcing Your Business

By outsourcing, Entrepreneurship, Food for thought, Human resources, management, opportunities

In my previous posts I often stress the importance of finding your genius. Finding what it is, that lights the fire in you and makes you want to go through your day. We all have that. We all have a task that we look forward to doing.

You may like talking to your clients, and building a relationship but you may not like preparing the paperwork, or working on email follow ups. Whatever it is that enables you to maintain your flow, keep doing it. Stick to your genius – and outsource the rest.

 

Benefits of Outsourcing

I have been outsourcing for several years and let me tell you, the benefits of outsourcing are massive. I discussed some of these in the Power of Outsourcing. Let me add a few more details:

  1. You can delegate tasks and focus on what lights you up. There are tasks that I do not enjoy doing, but are necessary for the business to run smoothly. Outsourcing allows me to delegate these tasks and concentrate on doing what I do best. It gives me time to connect with clients, to talk, and listen. It gives me time to be present.
  2. You save on costs. In any business, the goal is to bring down operating costs and increase revenue. When you outsource, you do not need to pay for utilities. You do not have to rent an office. You are able to save on costs when these are taken off the expense list.
  3. You have less concerns to attend to. You do not have to worry about equipment breaking down. If there’s a problem with the computers, the power or the internet, they’ll be the one to sort it out. All of these get taken off your plate when you outsource. Have you ever used a self-cleaning oven? It cleans itself and all you have to worry about is what you’re cooking. It’s the same way when you outsource. You concentrate on the actual tasks, all the rest are taken care of.
  4. You have more time for other things. Our lives are so much more than work, work, and work. Spend time with your family. Pursue that hobby. Have fun with friends. Go out on vacation. You have to have time for other things, and outsourcing allows you to do that.
  5. You have a wider pool of candidates to choose from. Outsourcing allows you to hire globally. Because of the difference in our currency rate, you can hire candidates with the same skills for a lot less than if you are hiring in-house locally. I’m not saying that you go and hire the cheapest one you can find. It is important to make sure that the team you hire have the necessary skills in order to do the job well. Find a team that you know will have your back, and take care of the business like it’s their own.

So what do you think? Is it time to outsource? If you want to learn how to outsource your business, comment outsource below or get in touch and I will give you the link to our webinar. Let us help you really grow your business.

Feb 05
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Breathe, Visualize and Move

By Blogpost, Attitude, Food for thought, habits, mindset

Was there ever a time that you felt overwhelmed by so many things that are going on around you? Tasks that you need to finish, work that are piling up by the minute? How did you cope?

I want to share with you today the importance of B.V.M.: B for Breathe, V for Visualize, and M for Move. It’s a cool exercise that we do with a lot of our clients.

This is also an opportunity to really give you a tool that’s going to help you to get through the next couple of weeks at least.

So often, we have so many plates that are spinning around and around at the same time. What I notice is that people go from one plate, starts spinning, and go to another plate – and start spinning, and so on and so forth.

And what it does, it actually results to headache. People get overwhelmed with too much going on at the same time. People get frustrated.

So B.V.M actually allows you to transition those plate spinning. Transition those different tasks, activities or deliverable that you need to be working on throughout that day.

And this process really gets you centered, and it allows you to get clear on who you need to become and what you need to step into.

Breathe

Obviously breathing is a huge component. We all breathe, but how deep and how often do we actually really breathe? So, what happens is that when emotion is high – when you got so many stuff happening, your emotion’s through the roof – logic is usually low.

What happens is that, when we become quite emotive, we start to breathe from the neck part up. And we start to take short breaths, and we start to get more emotional.

And so, by breathing – it has to be some nice deep belly breaths. It enables you to decrease that high stake emotional component and start to get into more of a logistical kind of way of thinking.

Then, it starts to ground you. It starts to decrease that frustration and decrease that feeling of being overwhelmed. And when we do just a couple of, say 3 nice deep breaths, it starts to center us and it starts to ground us on where we are at right now.

If you are feeling overwhelmed then you can try this step right now. Clear your mind and take three deep belly breaths. How did that make you feel? It’s not time to move to the next step –

Visualize

Second component is Visualize. V for Visualize. Visualizing then moving into that next task. Moving into who I need to become or what am I about to do. You, seeing that task. You, visualizing that task in your mind.

Because what happens is that, when we play up our video screens in our internal mind – it starts to shift our behavior. It starts to shift our physiology. It starts to shift that internal reaction, those reactive models inside of us.

When it starts to shift our responses, then our physiology changes. Our behavior changes. Then our activity changes. Therefore, our results also change. So, V is to Visualize what’s coming up in your mind.

Visualizing the task is you preparing your mind and body to do the task. It may be a task that you do not particularly enjoy. It could be something tedious. Instead of putting it off, visualize yourself doing the task. Get a clear picture in your mind of yourself doing it.

Move

The last component is M for Move. And what I love to do, and I love to suggest to clients is, when we’re going through this B.V.M – we’re energetic beings. So, the more you move, energy creates energy. When people go out and don’t have enough energy on time – it’s like, nope, wrong.

Movement helps you do more, it creates more energy. And so, you know, if it’s a lap around the block – if it’s a lap around the office, if it’s a lap around your chair – by shifting your energy, by utilizing that movement, it starts to release those endorphins. Release those hormones that you can start to then find the energy to do the activity that you need to move in to.

So B.V.M: Breathe, Visualize and Move – this really helps you to transition from task to task. Really helps you transition from going to one conversation, then to a different conversation. And starts to help you get through the day and get through the activities, and obviously help you to achieve the goals that you want to achieve.

Feb 01
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Internal vs. External Pressure

By Blogpost, challenges, Food for thought, stress

Now that all the craziness of the holidays have died down, I’d like to talk about an interesting subject – pressure.

Where is the pressure coming from?

Now, you must have experienced going to shops and people are pushing. The prams, and you’re pushing the trolleys, and it’s just absolutely crazy sometimes. And it’s like – “where’s this pressure all coming from? Where’s all this stress coming from?”

It’s really an interesting opportunity just to take yourselves out of the situation and go – “Wow! Am I buying into this pressure?” And is this pressure or stress – whatever you want to call it – is it an external part?

Is it the people around you? Family? Is it friends – wanted to catch up. Wanted to do this, wanted to do that. You know, the pressure of – got to get presents, I got to do this, I got to do that.

Or is it an internal pressure? Is it the internal pressure of your own internal expectations? Is it the internal pressure of your own beliefs, patterns that you’re playing out?

And particularly within your business environment. What pressure are you putting on yourself or what pressure are you thinking is coming from an external component?

How do I lessen the pressure?

It’s always good to just stop and realize where’s this pressure coming from. Where’s this stress coming from? Is it internal? Is it something you’re putting on yourself?

Or is it external that you’re taking on?

And a good little strategy to actually just go – Wow! It’s just a stop. It’s just a (deep breath). Take that deep breath and go – alright, let’s just have a bit of a time-out here.

What am I feeling? How am I feeling? Where’s this feeling coming from?

Give yourself time to stop and realize what is really happening. You can control the pressure by just taking a couple of deep breaths and giving yourself time to analyse the situation.

Ask yourself some good, key, quality questions. Identify where the pressure is coming from. Then let it go. Do not let yourself get consumed by worries. Just have a laugh. Just have a joke.

So if you feel stressed or pressured today, stop, and think. Where’s this pressure coming from? Is it internally or is it externally? Take a few deep breaths and ask yourself some good, quality questions, and remember, don’t buy into it!

Looking forward to speaking with you soon.

Jan 18
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Opportunities Are Everywhere

By Blogpost, Food for thought, inspirations, opportunities

Hey guys! Hope you are well. So, what’s been some of your wins? What’s been some of your lessons over this last week? Today I just realized something very important – opportunities are everywhere.

I am on my way back from a client meeting, heading back to the office and I thought I’d share my experience with you. When you start off your day you’ll never know who you meet. You’ll never know who you come across.

Recognize and Acknowledge Good Opportunities

I’ll give you a little example. On the way to a client meeting in the city, I called an Uber and I started chatting away – chatting away, lovely guy. And he started saying, “what do you do? Who do you help?”

We were about, you know, all the different things that I’ve been doing and who I’m helping – and guys, you know what? I think he’s someone I might need.

I said, “Okay, so tell me a bit about you.” And the next thing he’s telling me this whole story of coming from India and so forth. And he’s a structural engineer but he’s got a company set up, and he’s got all these other business partners.

The next minute, we had this amazing conversation, and he goes – “look me up on LinkedIn. Let’s continue the conversation.”

And I thought to myself as I got out the Uber, it’s just, you’ll never know. You’ll never know who comes across your path. You will never know who you gonna meet. You’ll never know what the next step is.

We Should Learn to Recognize the Opportunities

Yes, we can do the planning. Yes, we can do our goals but when we actually stop and we actually be present – and be present with ourselves and be present with other people, opportunities come up.

And so, those opportunities are everywhere. You just have to know when to recognize the opportunities for what they are.

Most of the time they come unexpectedly. They can be circumstances that you did not expect, or people that you did not expect to meet – like that Uber driver.

You just have to be present, and conscious enough to know when you come across these opportunities, so you can use them to your advantage. Even situations that are less than ideal can be turned into an opportunity.

So, I’d love to hear – what’s some of those little stories you may have had over the past couple of years. And, what’s been some of your wins and lessons throughout this week?

So, there we go! You’ll never know who you gonna run into.

Dec 11
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How Engaged Are You?

By Attitude, Blogpost, challenges, Food for thought, habits, mindset

It is another week! And we are on our way again to face new challenges, learn from them and share whatever it is that we know will help us in the future.

So, today I want to share with you about ENGAGEMENT.

How engaged are you? How engaged are you in what you do and what you learn?

Engage with People with the same Goal

Little story to segway this into this quick little topic today. A number of years ago, I was fortunate enough to help out the Rich Dad Crew, Robert Kiyosaki.

I was up in a live event up in the Gold Coast. Gosh! This was close to 15, 16 years ago – and, I looked around and these people are coming in time and time again to learn and to grow.

And I start to question these people – so, what have you done between these courses? What have you done between then and now? And you could see, you could hear the blankness.

So what we did, what I actually did is I formed a relationship with nine other people who are actually from Sydney, but they are up at Gold Coast for this event. And we formed a “Master Mind” group.

From that Master Mind group, we met for – I think it was close to three years every single fortnight – and we implemented our learnings. We implemented what we’re taught, what we learnt from previous courses, from books, from what we discovered throughout the fortnight.

And being held accountable to a group was so powerful. Knowing that you had to report in what you were going to do over the last fortnight, which is huge. So much different from, I guess, going one on one.

The whole group environment where you had ten people around looking at you going – “hey, dude! You’re committed to this? What happened? What worked?” This somehow led me to fast forward to today.

What’s next?

“How engaged are you?” That question has kept me thinking what my next step would be and how I can make it meaningful. So, we read books, we attend courses, we were taking programs. But what do you do? What’s your strategy to maintain your own engagement? How do you maintain your own engagement?

What do you do once you read a book? Do you just go – “Ah, that was nice!”, then put it back in the shelf and away you go? Or do you actually take notes and do you highlight, and you go write this next month I’m going to implement X?

What do you do about your courses? What do you do about podcasts? How do you implement the material? Because, knowledge is great. Knowledge is fantastic. But unless you have the implementation of that knowledge, it’s just knowledge.

And so, I’m going to ask you guys today. How are you maintaining your engagement? How do you ensure that you are engaged in what you do? And how do you ensure that you take that engagement, and you take action?

So, there we go! How engaged are you in what you do and what you learned?

I’d love to hear your thoughts. I’d love to hear your comments. Comment below on how you keep engaged and looking forward to speaking to you soon.