Examples, Expand, Evidence – a simple technique for reviewing documents
An incredibly simple and effective technique I’ve been using to help when I’m reviewing a draft article. When I’m doing my read through, I simply drop one of these three words in as I go: ‘Examples’, ‘Expand’, ‘Evidence’. By scrawling these simple words in the margins or as a note in…
Productive Newbies – helping new starters feel valued and contributory, quickly
As a result of Covid-19, businesses are seeing a significant ‘capabilities’ gap, especially in industries that were unable to maintain training and employee development over the past couple of years. So how can you make sure that your new starts – who you will rely on more and more –…
Reframing stress.
Something leaders frequently face is their teams coming to them and sharing feelings of stress. But here’s the problem, stress is contagious. I came to write this article after hearing from my clients about the impact stressed employees have on them as leaders and subsequent impact on wider teams. They…
A promise (and an example of great leadership)
Sharing what I believe is a great act of leadership from Nikki Cunningham, MD at Curious. This ‘promise’, written and hand signed by Nikki, was handed out to each member of a team during a manifesto meeting exploring the future of Curious. It’s a strong statement which – I think…
The disappearing manager. Reasons your management team are defecting.
Managers are leaving and your best team members are unlikely to want to step into their shoes. How are they feeling and what can you do? I’ve commented before on the current middle management shift, and an article I read recently in Fortune highlighted in detail the pressures and problem…
Practical scenario planning – a simple model
An introductory guide to using scenario planning for smaller businesses During a recent workshop with a client I was once again reminded of the usefulness of scenario planning. I thought it was a great time to reshare a really simple model you can use in your business to try and…
etc is Hiring – Digital Marketing Manager (Part Time)
Role in brief: Digital Marketing Manager (Fully Remote / Part Time) – 3/4 days per week (approx 16 hours) Salary – up to £50,000 FTE (pro rata to agreed hours) We’re looking for an experienced digital marketing professional to support our business development efforts with communications to our prospective and…
Too busy leading to be learning
This article is centred around something I discovered for myself through my own personal coaching – namely being too busy leading that I wasn’t making the time to learn. Here’s the thing. If you’re the founder of a business – or indeed a leader of any sort within a business…
An idea: reverse mentoring
An idea that came to me a couple of weeks ago after a friend pointed out a potential problem with the name of one of our LinkedIn events, ‘Slack Slavery’. He noted the sensitivities around using the word, even when it was certainly referring to being at the mercy of…
Choose your hat.
Primarily, the article is about hats. In a small business, it’s sometimes difficult to be clear about your role at any given time. But, if you’re both a shareholder and a part of the leadership team – it’s so important to have absolute clarity about which of those roles you’re playing when…