10 Suggestions for Bettering Your Business This Year
“The Golden Rule: treat others as YOU want to be treated. The Platinum Rule: treat others as THEY want to be treated. ”
10 Suggestions for Bettering Your Business This Year
Employees Before Customers. It’s better for business and profitability, to retain talent instead of funding turnover. Putting a focus on the mental and physical health of your employees will help to ensure lower rates of absenteeism and higher satisfaction, and when you take care of them, they will take care of the customers. How you do this will require you to tap into your own leadership skills and to understand the wants, needs, untapped talent, and struggles of your team. Take interest in them and help them to not just “see” but to “feel” their value.
Rebalance Wellness. The term “wellness” continues to be a focus of people and workplaces. It centers into conversations about work-from-home and return to the office. With so much change over the last few years, have you assessed the wellness of your organization? Do you how to create it, or to recreate it if it is lacking? Illness is far more costly than wellness, in organizations too.
Model the way. Change is difficult and telling versus showing will impact the outcome. Modelling the behaviours and activities you wish to see will help employees to take part themselves and to know what you are expecting.
Curate a better culture. For anything to become a long-term behavior, it needs to be fully integrated into the corporate culture. Think strategically about how the changes you seek are helped and hindered by culture and work to shift the vibe of the business to a safe and welcoming place of belonging and inclusion.
Show Gratitude. People want to please. If an employee is going above and beyond take time to sincerely thank them for all they’ve done. Appreciate them openly. People are motivated by positive feedback even more than raises and bonuses.
Be Nimble. In today’s challenges of finding and retaining talent, you will need to be nimble. Can you offer options for work location, hours, days worked? Are you looking at a four-day work week? It’s coming, and hybrid models are here. If you are not prepared to be flexible, employees will find somewhere else to work.
Listen. I have been in many meetings with leaders who do all the talking. Your role as a leader is to hire well and get out of the way. How can you do that when you are so busy telling everyone what to do all the time? Listen more than you talk, guide problem-solving conversations, and let your staff make important decisions.
Vision. Have a 10-5-3-1 year plan. What is your Audacious Goal? Have you backed that up to today? Is your team aware of where you are heading? Take time to regularly plan, evaluate and revisit goals to ensure your short-term actions will lead to long-term success.
Enforce Development. As a leader you need to look at staff development hours and dollars as a debt to be paid – to them. Show you care about their skills and knowledge by requiring them to cash in the time and money promised to and for them. Make a “zero balance” on their development line item a successful outcome of their year and help them create the space to make it happen.
Require Days of Nothing. Not for “nothing,” but unstructured free time for working, doing, visioning, tidying. Stop overrunning people with meetings and more meetings to discuss meetings. Provide at least one day a week of nothingness and watch people relax about their workflow.
As a leader your own skills and success will always be related to the ongoing development of your own competence. Make sure you are surrounding yourself with people who know things you don’t, or who are in a place you want to go. Learn from them or hire a coach and accountability partner to get you there.
