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Featured Content Cover Story
Business strategies for start-up growth Interview with Boomy Tokan
Features Strategy: Business strategies for start-up growth Boomy Tokan, business adviser and growth specialist shares his key tips for business start-ups, and strategies to achieve the dream of starting and owning a successful business.
Perspectives: What makes us feel good about our work? In his TED Talk Dan Ariely presents experiments that reveal our unexpected and nuanced attitudes toward meaning in our work.
Purposeful People: Ensure that your people know what you expect of them 6 ways to set clear expectations for high performance by Eszter Molnar Mills.
5 of the Best‌Quotes on strengths We believe leaders should focus on developing strengths rather than fixing weaknesses. Read our five favourite quotes on strengths.
Articles Impact and Influence: Being human… Judy Apps tells us why and how we should communicate and connect with others on a human level.
Strategy: Big Data by Bernard Marr A guide to the development of Big Data in which Bernard Marr explains how it will completely change the business world.
101: Gold standard strategies for recruitment & selection – Part 2: Selection Following on from our previous edition, Fiona McPhail shares strategies for effective employee selection.
Words to Lead By: Ann Francke CEO of Chartered Management Institute, author of Financial Times Guide to Management: How to Make a Difference and Get Results, shares the best piece of advice she has ever received.
Recommended Reads: Helping: How to Offer, Give, and Receive Help by Edgar Schein Michael Bungay Stanier, award-winning coach extraordinaire , recommends a book that provides deep insights that underpin coaching. Your feedback would make us happy. Tweet us your opinion at @People_Purpose If you’re interested in contributing don’t hesitate to contact us: support@peopleandpurposejournal.com
Editor’s Note Welcome to the April 2016 issue of People & Purpose - the Positive Leadership Journal. In the Northern Hemisphere spring has now firmly sprung, the sun has come out and new shoots are appearing. At this time of year our thinking naturally turns to new starts and growth. Please get in touch and let us know what are your growth plans? Are there any new developments you are working on? We would enjoy hearing from you via e-mail, or tweet us @People_Purpose. In our feature interview I spoke with Boomy Tokan, and asked him about the key drivers for business growth, especially in the start-up phase. We also consider growing your team in Fiona McPhail’s 101 article on the best approach to employee selection. Judy Apps challenges us to give up ‘thing talk’ in order to communicate and connect with others on a human level. We also share Dan Ariely’s excellent TED talk on what makes us feel good about our work and I prepared a brief piece for you on setting clear expectations to encourage high performance. As promised when it won its category in Management Book of the Year 2016, we review Bernard Marr’s book Big Data.
I hope that you are finding People & Purpose to be an interesting source of thinking on purposeful leadership, organisational strategy, change management and team development. We would welcome suggestions for future contributors. Is there a leader you would like to hear more from, a manager we should interview, or a consultant, specialist or speaker who has worthwhile views to share? If so please tell us at support@peopleandpurposejournal.com. Eszter Molnar Mills, Editor-in-Chief
Strategy Business strategies for start-up growth Interview with Boomy Tokan
Boomy Tokan, business adviser, business growth specialist and teacher, talks to Eszter Molnar Mills about his key tips for business start-ups, and his passion to help people to achieve their dream of starting and owning a successful business. Boomy suggests three key elements for new businesses to consider: 1. Mindset. There is a mindset for success, and there is also a mindset for failure. Tokan highlights that there is a common mindset of wanting to achieve growth and success quickly, whereas he states “you cannot bypass the learning curve� and highlights the importance of thinking for the longterm. 2. An effective system: the people, resources and process that make up your business.
3. Targeted customers: finding and keeping targeted customers, the people who are going to sustain your business over the long term. Instead of selling one product to one customer, he says you should think about the lifetime value of a particular customer, and how to we make sure you attract that customer or client and keep them. Expanding on the mindset, from his work with business start-ups, Boomy has identified two routes to business: one is to find an opportunity and exploit it. The second is to have a passion that you can take to the market place. Boomy suggests that many people focus on finding an opportunity, but success on this route requires more discipline, and also an entrepreneurial approach and risk taking. However following a passion may be easier, it means you have a mindset of being comfortable with what you have and who you are. By choosing a business that fits with your personality, your desires, your dreams and your passion then you will be more able to overcome the obstacles. “Having a start-up business is not the same as running a small corporation.” Boomy suggests people, especially those leaving a corporate environment, need to accept that a start-up is still fluid, that it doesn’t have all the resources and support of established businesses: “You are the finance person, you are the marketing person, and you are everything as far as the business is concerned”
Boomy’s key advice is simple; to built on the foundations of your niche and expand: 1. ‘Just start’ – don’t just talk about it take actions, small steps, such as writing down your idea, attending a seminar, reading a book, talking to somebody. 2. Find a niche: what is your targeted group for sales? Start with a small group 3. Test your ideas - talk with your niche, use feedback to refine and develop the product. Find out why people like your product 4. Make some sales. Focus on selling more to existing clients than seeking out new customers. 5. Learn from competitors: what are they doing in terms of marketing, products, etc. 6. Plan to grow. Build a business plan around this knowledge. In the video Boomy Tokan outlines a five-part business plan format to follow both for thinking about the future of the business, and for raising funding. Finally Boomy’s shares his advice for business leaders in al walks of life. He suggests bringing on board a partner that complements you, with strengths where your weaknesses may be. If you are a visionary leader, invite a manager to join your team and run day-to-day operations. You also need to continually develop yourself, read and attend seminars to stay up-to-date. Finally, develop other people who can eventually take your place in the company. Hear more about business building strategies from Boomy Tokan in the interview above. Boomy Tokan, Udemy Premium Instructor, Small Business Consultant, Speaker and Author of 5 business books. He has helped over 1000 enterprises to go from the "idea stage" to Startup.
Perspectives What makes us feel good about our work?
It is not just the money that can make us feel good about our job, it’s a lot more more complex than that. In his TED Talk, Dan Ariely, Professor of Psychology and Behavioural Economics tells us about experiments – involving Lego robots and origami – and points out that finding the meaning in our work is essential to our happiness. Ariely describes how those experiments showed that people are motivated to perform better when their work is acknowledged. With no acknowledgement, the motivation significantly decreases. Watch the video above or read the transcript. We’d love to know your views and experience: @People_Purpose This recording is reproduced with permission from TED.com. TED is a non-profit organisation devoted to spreading ideas, usually in the form of short, powerful talks of 18 minutes or less.
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Purposeful People Ensure that your people know what you expect of them When I talk to managers and leaders, the theme of high performance is a frequent topic of conversation. We can all agree that being a great organisation and providing exceptional products or services are important, but does everyone we work with know what we actually mean by excellence in the day-to-day? 6 ways to set clear expectations for high performance Too often, managers seem to lead through mental telepathy. Without clearly communicated expectations—in terms of standards or the milestones against which we test our progress—employees may not know what to do and how to do it. This can result in uncertainty, undermining effective teamwork, initiative and productivity. Properly setting expectations for employees or team members is a critical dimension in quality workplaces, according to a large study of managers undertaken in the 1990s by The Gallup Organization. Below are some tips on setting clear expectations that will set standards for excellence and results. 1. Start with creating a compelling vision. Describe and explain what you want the end result to look like. Not just what you want done, but the purpose and the results you want to achieve when the project is completed and the role of each person in its achievement. People want to know that their role, whether large or small, makes a difference. 2. Discuss what you mean by "excellent performance". This step is needed to make the vision ‘actionable’ and translate it into tangible performance measures. Set metrics where possible, paint a complete picture of the standards you are expecting. Refer to your performance review form or competency framework for behavioural standards.
3. Focus on the expected outcomes, rather than on the exact steps you want your team members to take. Think of this as coaching rather than controlling. Encouraging your people to design their own way of delivering positive outcomes allows each team member to use their strengths to their fullest potential. 4. Give frequent feedback. The annual appraisal or performance review is insufficient and often too late to let staff members know how and whether they are meeting your expectations. Give feedback along the way: describe the context, refer to the vision and give your reasons for the feedback. Next plan for a way forward, ask for more or less of what you observed. Take a coaching, rather than disciplinarian approach. The more two-way communication, the greater the clarity around the expectations. 5. Give positive reinforcement. Unless you are especially skilled at giving feedback, don’t use the ‘sandwich’ of positive – constructive –positive comments. As Ken Blanchard suggest in One Minute Manager, catch people doing things right and you’ll get more of it. 6. Give people the freedom to perform well. Once the expectations are clear get out of the way and allow people to meet them. Having set clear standards, milestones or deadlines, each team member will have the ability to track their own progress, check whether they are meeting the milestones and behavioural standards. This approach also allow individuals be accountable for delivering their own work, so that they can course correct where needed or stay on track to make their full contribution.
To find out more about Positive Leadership view our webinar. Eszter Molnar Mills is a strength-based leadership and organisation development specialist, qualified trainer, executive and founder of Formium Development. A qualified executive and team coach, she helps organisations and individuals reach enhanced performance by reflecting on what works, and developing skills and strategies for improvement. Through leadership training and CMI qualifications, Eszter helps managers build performance management skills and get the most from their people.
5 of the Best… Quotes on strengths The People & Purpose team believe in a strength-based leadership approach. Leaders should focus on developing strengths rather than fixing weaknesses. Practicing a positive approach will help you and your organisation to be more authentic and more effective. Here are our favourite quotes on strengths. “What great leaders have in common is that each truly knows his or her strengths - and can call on the right strength at the right time.” ― Tom Rath “Employees with managers who focus on their strengths understand that they are unique, an important part of something greater than themselves, not just a cog in the wheel.” ― Brian Brim and Jim Asplund “Your weaknesses will never develop, while your strengths will develop infinitely.” ― Don Clifton
"A leader isn't someone who forces others to make him stronger; a leader is someone willing to give his strength to others so that they may have the strength to stand on their own.“ ― Beth Revis “Climbing to the top demands strength, whether it is to the top of Mount Everest or to the top of your career.” ― A. P. J. Abdul Kalam
What’s your favourite quote on strengths? Tweet us your favourite quote @People_Purpose!
Impact and Influence Being human… Giving a talk on The Art of Conversation, I mentioned a kind of conversation called Thing Talk. Thing Talk is conversation about such subjects as weather, cars, fashion, computers, banks, money, widgets and whatsits, facts and information – any subject in fact except the people having the conversation – you and me. Subjects include abstractions such as management, quantitative easing, strategy, immigration, liberty, freedom, war against terror … how familiar we all are with such terms! But – note this – not a single personal pronoun: no I, no you, no me or us. Thing Talk forms the common vocabulary of business and politics. If you have a business document to hand, have a look and count the number of objects and abstract terms – quite a lot? And now count the personal pronouns – not so many? Thing Talk often uses passive grammatical constructions that dodge the necessity for personal pronouns, for instance, “It has been decided” or “Problems have been encountered”. It’s no surprise that business speakers use such non-attributable language to announce bad news: After due consideration the environmental agenda has had to be postponed. (not ‘we postponed’ or I ‘postponed’ – no personal responsibility) But good news? Out pop the self-validating personal pronouns! I’m very pleased to be able to announce that I have extended our flexible working scheme to include all of you, whatever your role.
People can tie us in knots with abstract language – it’s unspecified and unmeasured and therefore hard to pin down.
If you ever become mired in abstract Thing Talk and want to regain some control or get the other party to assume responsibility, bring you and me back into the conversation – that changes the dynamic! It has been decided that … bla bla … So what exactly have you decided to do? Yet how often people look down upon those who don’t have the business and establishment jargon. A highly successful rugby coach being interviewed for a sports programme was asked to talk about the factors that contributed to his phenomenal success with his team. The rugby coach, not highly articulate, struggled for a while to express himself. Abandoning the attempt, he suddenly burst out, “Oh, damn it – I just love the b*****ds!” – a pretty shrewd description in my book. Erich Fromm commented: Love is the only sane and satisfactory answer to the problem of human existence. You and me – personal connection. That’s where trust is born. Build trust, and influence follows. The hostage taking Personal connection helped to save the lives of Camilla Carr and Jon James. This week I had a cup of tea with Camilla, a kind, warm and highly inspirational woman who gives talks all over the world to corporations and NGOs, in schools and in prisons, on the power of choice in challenging situations. In 1997 Camilla Carr and Jon James travelled to Chechnya to set up a rehabilitation centre for children traumatised by war. After three months they were kidnapped in the night by armed Chechen rebels. Held hostage for fourteen months they experienced everything from threat of execution, rape and mental torture to moments of compassion and kindness. They survived by using Tai Chi, meditation, humour, and crucially by creating a dialogue with their captors, looking beneath their masks of fear and anger to reach the small flame of love and laughter unquenched by the demonising nature of war.
Camilla and Jon wrote a powerful book, The Sky is Always There, on their experiences. Time and again, in the worst experiences of their captivity, they emphasize human connection. The book begins with this quote: Being human our nature is love our nurture is fear.
The power of human connection “Being human….” When we converse on a human level and express personal thoughts, feelings and intuitions, we have the opportunity to draw nearer to each other and build understanding and trust. When we use impersonal and abstract talk we maintain our distance and tend to keep prejudices in place. Drawing near (‘our nature is love’) we can influence each other; maintaining our distance (‘our nurture is fear’) we are much less likely to influence or inspire. In our current world, all too often people’s use of language keeps them separated. You might want to spend a day or an hour listening to the everyday talk of your own environments to spot the language of personal connection and disconnection. It can be very revealing. Who uses which language? When do they use it? What about your own language? Abstract talk is not going to save our planet; personal connection might. This content is reproduced with permission.
Judy Apps, author, coach, public speaker and trainer. Specialises in Voice and Presentation, with emphasis on authenticity, connection, integrity and sheer life energy. Her book, The Art of Conversation is available at amazon.co.uk and amazon.com.
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Strategy Big Data By Bernard Marr
Big Data is an expression that we hear on a regular basis but not everyone knows what it is and how to use it beneficially. Bernard Marr’s book is a guide for all businesses on harnessing the power of data. He argues that data on its own is meaningless, data only has value if it is converted to insight – what he terms Smart Big Data. Marr explains why “Big Data is the heart of the smart revolution” - and details how every facet of our life and world has become smart: health, parenting, homes, sport and even love. Really successful companies understand who are their customers, what are they doing, what do they like, what are their needs now and in the future. Those businesses have that knowledge because they have collected their customers’ digital trace and know how to use that information.
Marr’s award-winning book is a practical guide, filled with tips for business owners, leaders, managers or anyone working in this field. It’s a reader-friendly book about what could have been a dry subject. For those who aren’t convinced in the importance of Big Data, Marr makes a convincing case that it is a phenomenon and sensible use can lead to success. The book is available at amazon.co.uk and amazon.com.
Ági Galgóczi is the Managing Editor of People & Purpose - the Positive Leadership Journal. You can contact her via e-mail support@peopleandpurposejournal.com or you can follow her on Twitter @galgiagi
We are always looking for contributors to keep our magazine fresh and interesting. If you would like to get involved, write for us, submit a review copy of your book or be interviewed, please submit your ideas to support@peopleandpurposejournal.com and we can discuss your options.
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9 Strengths-Based Interview Questions Making the full move to strength-based selection is a large task that involves extensive research. Here are 9 questions add to your interviews for a better understanding of what energises candidates for high performance.
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When people use their strengths, they perform better.
101 Gold standard strategies for recruitment & selection – Part 2: Selection In our last issue Fiona McPhail talked about the importance of analysing the role and establishing your requirements at the start of the recruitment process. In this second part of the article she shares strategies for effective employee selection. Shortlisting Make sure that the interview panel or a designated sub set from the panel shortlist. They should do so against the essential criteria specified for the role. As soon as a candidate fails to meet the criteria, that’s it, game over for that applicant. A clear record should be kept of why they failed to meet the requirement in case feedback is requested. Candidates who meet all of the essential requirements for the role and best meet the desirable criteria are called for interview. Keep in mind that clear records are needed for every candidate and they should be written in a professional manner as they may need to be produced. Advise shortlisters that they should ensure they are no hostages to fortune by writing personal comments about applicants! As part of your process, you should highlight to candidates that you will make all reasonable adjustments for candidates with a disability. If a candidate who has been shortlisted has a disability, a key member of staff will need to liaise with them over any necessary adjustments so that they can compete fairly in the process. It may be necessary to amend some parts of the process and interviewers might need briefing in how they conduct aspects of the process, including allowing additional time.
Tasks Many interview processes include selection tasks. This is helpful as it provides a rounded view of the candidate. Remember though that this is not the opportunity for free consultancy! Tasks should be examples of aspects of the role that would be difficult to assess within the formal interview itself. IT tasks are a good example, it is easier to see what someone can do, rather than to get them to talk you through it in an interview. Also, take into account the impression you make on your candidate when you ask them to prepare an interview task. Is it appropriate, how much of their time will it take? Have you given them enough notice? Be specific about the task and make sure that the candidate is clear what this is assessing so that they can ensure that they prepare against the brief and the criteria against which you are assessing them.
Interview The interview is the opportunity for the interviewee to shine. As such, the location and the approach should be designed to put the candidate at ease and the interview should be conducted in a friendly and approaching manner with pre-agreed competency-based questions which have been carefully developed and tested in advance of the interview. A pre-meeting just half an hour before the interview where questions are divided up is not a professional approach, especially given the financial investment which is about to take place. Train managers in competency-based interviewing skills
so that they are clear of the knowledge, skills and behaviour that need to be demonstrated in the interview and to what level. A straightforward approach to competency-based questions is the STAR format: Situation – Tell me about… Task – What was your role? Action – What did you do?
Result – What was the outcome? For each question set, the panel need to be clear and have already decided the target response that they need to hear. This way they can avoid the risk of using one candidate as an internal benchmark, rather than scrupulously returning to the role requirements. This approach will demonstrate whether a candidate meets the requirements and how well they do so. It will highlight areas where training is needed and will also show if a candidate is actually unappointable. It also helps to avoid unconscious bias and the effect of ‘they are like me, so they will fit in then’! References The value of the reference has diminished over time, although we still seek them. Many employers make it a policy to either provide no references at all, or to do so in such a minimalist way that they only confirm the date of employment of your candidate and the duration of the employment. It is best to provide a template for references, this way you can be clear about what you want the employer to comment upon in relation to the job role. This way, you can avoid the other extreme of the reference – the essay! Given the varying approaches of employers to the provision of references, they are best used to confirm your assessment of suitability and not as part of the assessment process itself. Feedback Don’t forget the need to give feedback to candidates who are unsuccessful. They have given their time and put effort into submitting an application to you. It is unprofessional to brush them off and fail to give feedback where this is requested. The feedback should be agreed for each candidate at the end of the interviews and should be drawn from the formal notes of the interview.
It should be factual and specific given in relation to the personal specification. It should be balanced so that they are aware of their strengths and their areas for improvement. Take into account that this may be a candidate you would like to apply again. At the very least, you want the feedback that they give about your company to others to be positive! If they have a poor experience at any stage of the process, including refusal of feedback, how many people will they tell? This is not only a professional matter, it is about your reputation. It is also good practice to seek feedback from them, what did you do well, what could have been better? Not only will they have learnt from the experience, but so will you! Fiona McPhail BA (Hons) MA FCMI Chartered FCIPD HR Consultancy, Equality and Diversity, Training and Professional Development An experienced HR Professional, Equality and Diversity specialist and trainer providing ongoing and interim support. http://www.mwaconsultancy.co.uk Contact her here.
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Words to Lead By Ann Francke, Chief Executive of the Chartered Management Institute and author of the Financial Times Guide to Management: How to Make a Difference and Get Results, shares the best piece of advice she has ever received:
Ann Francke says, this is true when it comes to the tasks and behaviour. “To be perceived as authentic or particularly good as a leader, you cannot be saying one thing and doing another, because people will spot it a mile off. You need to walk the talk - or as we said at Mars 'eat your own dog food'.� Find out more about Ann Francke in our next issue!
Recommended Reads Helping: How to Offer, Give, and Receive Help by Edgar Schein Michael Bungay Stanier, the interviewee from our last issue, recommended this book, saying that readers can get a real insight into coaching from this well-known and influential writer. Bungay Stanier says “Schein has written about corporate culture and understanding cultures and career anchors. He's been really influential in a number of different arenas. His most recent combination of books, one is called Helping and the other is called Humble Inquiry.” Schein provides great insight, strongly connected to the topic of the coaching habit, about why your help works so much less often than you hope it will. Bungay Stanier also shares Schein’s key insight: “When you offer somebody advice, you raise your status and you diminish their status, with this you create resistance immediately to the very help that you’re trying to offer up.” If you want to investigate this further, Bungay Stanier recommends to start with Helping: How to Offer, Give, and Receive Help. Helping was recommended by Michael Bungay Stanier, the founder and senior partner of Box of Crayons, – watch our interview with him where he talks about developing a Coaching Habit. The book is available at amazon.co.uk and amazon.com.
People & Purpose is published by Formium Development, a strengthbased leadership and organisational development consultancy in London, UK. The Journal’s Editor in Chief is Eszter Molnar Mills and its Managing Editor is Agi Galgoczi. We are privileged to have a great range of contributors – all leaders in their respective fields.
As a development consultancy Formium Development focuses on creating effective solutions, which allow clients to identify and build on their strengths and do more of their best work. Training and executive coaching is available for managers throughout their career path, including well respected internationally recognised qualifications in management and leadership from the Chartered Management Institute (CMI). Formium Development's aim is to help individuals and teams improve their performance and become more engaged and fulfilled within their work. Contact us: Website: www.formium.co.uk; www.peopleandpurposejournal.com E-mail: info@formium.co.uk; support@peopleandpurposejournal.com Telephone: 020 7416 6648 (International: +44 20 7416 6648)