To follow on from last week, I thought I would have a more detailed look at my clients results over the past year to see if my optimism was well founded or not. As it turns out I am delighted to say, that in nearly every case it is, with businesses in many different fields flourishing and growing.

Taking a cross section of clients from building to IT, engineering to plumbing, and retail, the worst increase in turnover last year was +9%, with the best at +50% and the majority in excess of +20%. On top of this margins have also increased, and the business owners have on the whole been able to increase their drawings.

In addition because of the increase in turnover and margins, they have all been recruiting new staff, and have as a result been able to free up more time for themselves to work on the business, concentrating on strategy and further growth in the future.

In fact several of my clients have also started up or taken over a new business (all related to their current one), so that they are now jumping forward in quantum amounts. In fact only yesterday another of my clients asked my advice on growth through acquisition.

So would all these businesses have achieved such success without the input and driving force of my coaching? Certainly in some cases some of the growth and changes may well have happened anyway. But on the whole it is the controlled and managed way in which these things have happened which ensures that the positive changes are planned and permanent. Without coaching this would not be the case.

Should we believe all we hear and see on the news, or should we ignore it, and rely on our own observations and beliefs. I am referring to the general doom and gloom which is currently being thrown at us by the media, convincing us that the optimism of 12 months ago is already long gone, and we should prepare ourselves for a general downturn in the worldwide economy.

It would be naïve to completely dismiss all these depressing reports, and far be it from me to suggest that I know better than these erudite economists and journalists. However, isn’t this in part how we found ourselves dragging along the bottom for so long in the recession, creating self fulfilling scenarios, and refusing to believe that there might be something better out there?

From a rather parochial aspect, there is still plenty of good news around, and from my networking experiences, on the whole I would say that things are looking very positive. Building work is going ahead very positively which is always a good sign, and all my clients are growing and becoming more profitable, be they engineers, gas and heating suppliers, luxury goods retailers or service related. So, as I said, all I see and hear around me is optimism and positive feedback. The drop in oil prices I believe to be positive also, for the majority of us, and we should all be able make savings on this front, both privately and in our business.

Of course if we look hard enough it is always possible to find businesses which are struggling. But on the whole I would suggest that if we maintain a positive outlook, keep investing where appropriate, and keep setting goals which will continue to grow the business, then we can keep the economy growing, and we will all benefit.

A belated “Happy New Year” to one and all. I hope you all had a good break over Christmas, and are now raring to go.

Lots of uncertainties face us in the coming year, weather anomalies, terrorist threats, and economic problems in particular emanating from China. So it is all the more important to do everything you can in your business to ensure its safe passage through times of turbulence.

Make sure you have clear financial targets in place, and have set a marketing plan that will allow you to achieve them. Have you set targets for individuals as well, so that you can hold your team accountable?

What are you going to do differently this year so that you don’t just keep getting the same as previous years? You may think that to match last years results is O.K., but a business which doesn’t keep growing, can easily run the risk of stagnating and bit by bit shrinking and then dying.

Have you looked at your product/service portfolio recently and decided if this needs refreshing or updating? Have you raised your prices recently? Do all your customers know everything that you do, or do you just assume they know?

Are you a bit too comfortable in your business at the moment and settling for good enough? When did you last actively get out of your “comfort zone” and challenge yourself and your team?

So lots of reasons to pause for thought, and decide on the best ways forward. Take a good hard look at yourself and your business, make some decisions as to where you want to go, and make 2016 a great year.

In the past I have likened business coaching to sports coaching, whereby the coach helps the person they are coaching to improve in as many aspects as possible, not by doing it for them, but by teaching them better methods and techniques, setting the actions and milestones to achieve certain goals. They don’t work on their strengths, but on their weaknesses, thereby slowly improving their overall performance.

I have been coached in many sports, and because I love my sport, I was open to being pushed and pulled, and challenged to take myself to the best of my abilities. Although I might have complained from time to time when it got really tough, or even at times a bit repetitive, ultimately I wanted to be really good at what I was doing so was prepared to make the necessary sacrifices.

And so it occurred to me that surely the same should, or indeed must apply to business owners. For the most part their business is something they love and enjoy (not all the time of course), and therefore why shouldn’t they want to become the best among their peers. To excel at anything is a great feeling, so just because it is work rather than play, why no strive to be excellent in as many aspects of running your business as you can be.

Now to be fair, it is likely or even probable, that you won’t be able to be the best at all business skills, much like there a few top decathletes. However, instead of concentrating on the things you are good at, be it numbers, sales or people management, why not invest in yourself to work on your weaknesses, and become a business person who people respect and look up to.

So if you have an O.K. business but would like it and you to be better, instead of setting yourself a new fitness regime, or buying a new bike to cycle to John O’Groats next year, instead you can set yourself goals which will push you to your limits, and which will give you a great sense of achievement.

I was recently talking with a business owner who had made changes in his business which had meant that one of his team was no longer needed. Being a kind man, and one that cared about his staff he approached the subject as sensitively as possible, and went through all the right procedures to ensure that everything was covered both from a legal point of view, and as much as was possible that his employee was let down gently. However, for various reasons things turned nasty, and it became a rather fractious parting of the ways, rather than an amicable one.

Now that the dust has settled, it seems that actually this employee had not been following processes properly for some time, and they have found numerous mistakes which are going to cost the company significant amounts. Now of course you should always trust your employees (why would you employ them otherwise) but the salutary lesson here is one whereby the owner had more or less abdicated responsibility rather than delegated i.e. the management of that role, and the occasional checks which should have been made had not been happening, and as a result corners were cut, and now there is a lot of sorting to do.

What this shows is that there is a very fine line between over-management and interference in your employees’ responsibilities, and the sensible level of reporting and checks which should be in place to ensure things are being done correctly. Just assuming everything is going smoothly is not necessarily the best course of action. Holding people accountable for their actions by having controls and systems in place is always advisable, because you never know what could be lurking below the surface if things are not properly transparent and properly managed.

Do you ever get to a stage where you begin to get short of leads, and the pipeline is looking a little empty. I imagine it happens to us all from time to time, and I am no exception. The reason in my case is almost always because I have become a little complacent, and possibly even a little bit lazy in maintaining my activity levels, to ensure the pipeline is constantly being topped up.

So what do I do? I find that invariably the best way forward for me is to increase my levels of networking and doing one to one meetings with people who I meet at these events. Sometimes I am uncertain about the likelihood of a networking meeting actually providing good contacts and leads, and sometimes I’m pretty unsure about the validity of the one to one meetings I set up, but almost always between these activities, positive leads soon start to appear again. It isn’t always directly from the meetings I go to, but just by re-energising myself through contact with new people, I find that my enthusiasm is re-kindled, and the positive energy I start putting out, soon reaps rewards.

I’m pretty sure it isn’t just me who finds this method beneficial. One of my clients has been a little down recently, sales have been slow, and he was becoming a little disgruntled. So I invited him along to one of my networking meetings, and I could tell from his body language he not only enjoyed it, but also was making some useful new contacts. In fact I have heard that within the last few days since the meeting he has generated some really good new leads and some significant orders.

Coincidence you might say, but I know it has a good influence on my results, and I can feel the positive effect it has on my general demeanour every time I attend an energetic new group. So next time you are wondering what to do to increase business, why not find a networking group and go along to see if it works for you. And if you want some help in finding the right groups why not give me a call.

I am reading a very interesting book at the moment called “Triggers” by Marshall Goldsmith. Not a western novel as the name might suggest, but more about the things that spark positive and permanent changes. The most recent section I have been reading is about how to trigger change in other people, which is naturally extremely relevant when managing a team.

I have recently written about leadership and getting your team to take responsibility, and this is another tool which I believe could be very useful. Essentially he talks about “magic moves”, of which three, apologising, asking for help and optimism are fairly self explanatory i.e. they are highly likely to produce a positive behaviour in people. However, the fourth is a little different, and is described as asking active questions, but more than this it is getting people to ask themselves active questions. He explains that when your staff does this, they become more engaged, and instead of being able to blame the environment or someone else, it is down to them to take full responsibility for changing things. This is not just a theory, he has done active studies to prove it, and a couple of examples are, instead of the passive questions “How happy were you today?” and “How engaged in your work were you?” They suggested “Did you do your best to be happy?” and “Did you do your best to be fully engaged?” As I said it is therefore down to the individual to make sure they do something about it, by setting their own goals and direction.

So if you are having trouble getting your team to be more engaged in your business, perhaps you should consider getting them to ask themselves active questions. The results would seem to extremely positive.

What is the point of setting targets if you don’t hold people accountable to achieving them? I put this to one of my clients recently because it was evident that whilst his sales team had been set clear targets, in 5 out of 9 months they had not hit them. The interesting thing was that overall they were both quite close to their total year to date budget, having had a couple of really good months to help offset the bad ones. So, you might say, does it really matter?

Well in my opinion I think it does for a number of reasons. First, and perhaps the most practical reason, is that it can and had caused some quite serious issues with cash flow. Secondly, it potentially leads to complacency and even laziness from the sales team, because if they secure a couple of big contracts from time to time, in theory it can lead them to coast along for the rest of the year. Lastly it comes back to one of my pet favourites, being that because they have not been held to their monthly targets and there have not been any negative consequences to them for missing budgets over 50% of the time, there is a risk that lethargy will creep in, and the sales team will start to think that no-one really cares what they achieve, good or bad. Once that attitude starts to encroach, then you are on a slippery slope to encouraging mediocrity, which can be hard to turn around.

As I will have said on many occasions it is essential to set targets in all aspects of the business, but once you have done so don’t neglect to follow them up and hold people to them. Be it sales, maintaining stock levels, productivity, customer service or anything else make sure you hold your team responsible and accountable. That way they will know you care, and results are far more likely to keep on improving throughout your business.

One of my clients was up for a “Business Person of the Year” award last week.

He had made it through to a short list of three, and we were very hopeful that he would win the award. However, sadly it was not to be, and we headed home from the ceremony a little downcast.

There wasn’t really any need to feel despondent, as he had done fantastically well to get to the final, and of course all the things he has achieved for himself, his team and his business are still in place, and therefore there is a still lot to be proud of.

You can react in many ways to disappointment. You can get down about it, and you can wallow in it for as long as you please, or you can take the momentary feeling of having failed at something, and then bounce back all the stronger and more determined.

As it happened I had a meeting scheduled for two days after the ceremony with this client, and as I would expect he was in the latter camp. Certainly disappointed that he had not won, but all the more fired up to win it next year, but furthermore push himself and his business forward with even greater drive and enthusiasm.

He was kind enough to recognise that I had helped in the process to get him to where he was, but equally well he wanted me to hold him more accountable, and set tougher and tighter deadlines to ensure that he would achieve his end goals even quicker than originally planned.

I suppose I shouldn’t be surprised, as the people I work with tend to have this kind of attitude, but it is very gratifying to know that they do appreciate the coach’s role, and recognise the benefits it can bring. I love to see people get what they want and what they deserve from their efforts, and I would happily help many more. Do if you would like to reap the rewards of your hard work, why not give me a call.

I have a wide range of clients, in many different business sectors, different sizes, and at different stages of development. When I start working with a client I tend to see them regularly, at least once every 3 to 4 weeks, but over time my clients may feel they don’t need quite such intense input, and tend to spread my visits out more. Initially perhaps to once every 6-8 weeks, and then once every quarter, or possibly even twice a year. However even when I am only seeing them at such intervals I still find that there is real value to be given, as invariably some aspects have slipped.

More often than not this is on the numbers side, where cash flows have been neglected, and the actual figures are no longer being entered into the spreadsheet, to see how they are faring against their forecast. As a result of this the business owners are often unable to answer my questions, and things come to light which have been swept under the carpet, or simply ignored. Sometimes this brings to light some unprofitable areas of the business, sometimes it can highlight changes in the break-even figure, but it always reminds them of the importance of keeping in control of the numbers.

Of course it isn’t always the numbers, sometimes it is the business owners being sucked back into doing too many tasks which should be delegated, so they are being overstretched. Sometimes it is allowing team members to get away with things, thereby breaking the “rules of the game”, and potentially causing disharmony in the team.

The point is that even though these successful business owners have thriving businesses, they will almost always keep benefiting from someone to challenge them and hold them accountable. In other words a coach isn’t just for Christmas……!