I ride my cycle a lot. I’m used to numpty car drivers pulling out on me (if you’re a cyclist you know what I mean.) I don’t hang around, I cycle quite fast. This weekend due to a lack of patience a car overtook in the most incredible place and hit the vehicle coming the other way. Wing mirrors went spinning across the road. Cost, £300 all because one car driver just couldn’t wait a few seconds.

In the rush to get the job done, to get to our destination, or to get the business to grow, we knock things off. We knock people about…. whether they are customers, our people or suppliers and like the car drivers it costs money. People leave our business because they are not treated the right way. We become consumed by doing busy work rather than real work. We run round in circles, become less efficient and take our eye off the real ‘REAL’ ball.

It’s the equivalent of driving head down along the road without enjoying the ride, appreciating the view and taking the moment in. Business is a lot like that. We spend so much time trying to achieve but not understanding how to achieve.

The definition of patience is tolerance of delay. It implies self control, considering the options and sometimes just waiting. How many times have you jumped at a decision only to recognise later that delaying or self control would have put you in a better position or you would have made a better decision?

Just slow it down a little, think carefully, be patient, don’t rush it. Better to get there than never at all!

Leadership not management is now the key to driving out more production, outstanding creative work and new ideas. So why are we small businesses having so many problems? Well we’re selling more intellect and less material. The emphasis today is on managing the human imagination not production lines. Our peoples expectations have changed but ours haven’t and our customer’s expectations have changed but perhaps ours have not! Trust, respect and loyalty are missing and we only have ourselves to blame.

There are some key concerns….many small businesses have done just the opposite of what they should have done – order and conformity rather than free thinking and risk taking. Many small businesses could not have frustrated their people any more if they had tried to and as small business owners/managers we are so reluctant to let go. It all leads to limited growth and mediocre performance in many cases.

So, small businesses will need to be able to manage change better in the future. They will have to be less organised and less controlled by a single brain. Founders, managing directors beware! Growth will be limited not by production or developing the latest product but by your ability to recruit and retain the best people in the business.

The widespread trend towards interconnectedness will accelerate continuously leading us towards being more nimble, innovative and continuously self modifying. Small, autonomous, flexible businesses will be the ideal structure in the future and your people will have a share equity in those same businesses.

We’re going to have to share responsibility, demand accountability and drive towards common goals. Our jobs as Directors will be less about control and more about disrupting the status quo.

We are exposed to an average of 3500 brands a day. Brand orientated businesses are twice as likely to succeed. 80% of businesses with a strong brand focus have operating profits almost twice as high as the sector average. We’re shifting from profit generation to value creation for all stakeholders and we’re now operating in a world that’s no longer based on the manufacture and trading of tangible products but the creation and delivery of intangible services.

Some of the worlds strongest brands today were not even a twinkle in their creators eyes twelve years ago; ipod, eBay, Google, Innocent Drinks, Big Brother, Harry Potter. We are entering a new culture of mobile usage, organic, downloadable entertainment, male grooming and social networks.

It means instead of messaging people how good we are, we need to involve them. Instead of promising we need to deliver, interactive replaces passive, look and feel is history, it’s actually about experience. And finally, instead of having an audience as customers you have a community of customers!

What on earth is going on? Your most significant question at the moment; is your business strategy designed for a static world or for a changing one? And is it changing in a fundamental way?

Somehow we need to get a grip and work out how to make the intangibles tangible!

If you don’t want to do yesterday’s exercise try this one……in the next 10 days (okay it may take little more time to organise,) round up some of your colleagues and visit two ‘real’ businesses you admire. Hold an open minded discussion with them on what they do well, what they want to improve on, what their challenges are. How do they deal with some of the particular problems you have? What are their aspirations for the future?

Believe me you’ll learn a hell of a lot……

One of my most popular slides in the seminars I deliver is from the Leadership Challenge course we designed a couple of years ago so I thought I would share it with you. A few delegates reminded me the other day how it made a difference to them!

In an interconnected world where boundaries are increasingly cultural not geographic, where we are managing the human imagination not muscle power, where expectations are hugely different from 30 years ago and where change is spirally out of control, it’s important to understand and practice those things that help leaders of people make a contribution, add value and bring that extra dynamism to the organisation that ensures order, yet creativity at the same time.

So what is the difference between managers and leaders, well here is my stab at it:

1. Managers does things right, the leader does the right thing
2. Managers focus on the now, leaders focus on the future
3. The manager seeks control, leaders relish change
4. Managers appeal to reason not emotion, leaders appeal to both
5. A manager will use control, a leader relies on trust because they have created that culture
6. Managers organise and will often do the work, leaders engage people to do the work
7. Managers will often apply incentives (typically financial), leaders inspire
8. A manager will use the official approach, leaders will always appeal to the common approach
9. The managers goal is efficiency, the leaders, effectiveness and added value
10. A manager will often use positional authority, a leader personally influences
11. A manager will ask what contribution their staff are making, a leader will ask him/herself, what contribution am I making first
12. A manager will say they have all the answers, a leader will truly believe that together they have all the answers

I could go on and, okay, I accept that occasionally you have to be both, particularly in a small business. But and its a big but, if you are the head, director, owner, MD, of a small business, you should be behaving as a leader at least 80% of the time with your managers/supervisors, employees behaving like managers.

Behaving like a leader gives you time, time to catch your breath and think about where your heading. What the purpose is, the true purpose of your business and it gives you chance to stay ahead of the strategic curve and manage the rapid change more effectively.

On this hot, sunny day in the UK, I’m cheating on my blog today but then Seth Godin is just saying what’s key in marketing and as always I couldn’t have put it better myself. He has just posted a blog that is cut and pasted below: (it’s okay he is allowing people to do it!) I particularly like the one about static marketing budgets! For further information on Seth go to www.sethgodin.com

What Every Good Marketer Knows:

• Anticipated, personal and relevant advertising always does better than unsolicited junk.
• Making promises and keeping them is a great way to build a brand.
• Your best customers are worth far more than your average customers.
• Share of wallet is easier, more profitable and ultimately more effective a measure than share of market.
• Marketing begins before the product is created.
• Advertising is just a symptom, a tactic. Marketing is about far more than that.
• Low price is a great way to sell a commodity. That’s not marketing, though, that’s efficiency.
• Conversations among the members of your marketplace happen whether you like it or not. Good marketing encourages the right sort of conversations.
• Products that are remarkable get talked about.
• Marketing is the way your people answer the phone, the typesetting on your bills and your returns policy.
• You can’t fool all the people, not even most of the time. And people, once unfooled, talk about the experience.
• If you are marketing from a fairly static annual budget, you’re viewing marketing as an expense. Good marketers realize that it is an investment.
• People don’t buy what they need. They buy what they want.
• You’re not in charge. And your prospects don’t care about you.
• What people want is the extra, the emotional bonus they get when they buy something they love.
• Business to business marketing is just marketing to consumers who happen to have a corporation to pay for what they buy.
• Traditional ways of interrupting consumers (TV ads, trade show booths, junk mail) are losing their cost-effectiveness. At the same time, new ways of spreading ideas (blogs, permission-based RSS information, consumer fan clubs) are quickly proving how well they work.
• People all over the world, and of every income level, respond to marketing that promises and delivers basic human wants.
• Good marketers tell a story.
• People are selfish, lazy, uninformed and impatient. Start with that and you’ll be pleasantly surprised by what you find.
• Marketing that works is marketing that people choose to notice.
• Effective stories match the worldview of the people you are telling the story to.
• Choose your customers. Fire the ones that hurt your ability to deliver the right story to the others.
• A product for everyone rarely reaches much of anyone.
• Living and breathing an authentic story is the best way to survive in an conversation-rich world.
• Marketers are responsible for the side effects their products cause.
• Reminding the consumer of a story they know and trust is a powerful shortcut.
• Good marketers measure.
• Marketing is not an emergency. It’s a planned, thoughtful exercise that started a long time ago and doesn’t end until you’re done.
• One disappointed customer is worth ten delighted ones.
• In the googleworld, the best in the world wins more often, and wins more.
• Most marketers create good enough and then quit. Greatest beats good enough every time.
• There are more rich people than ever before, and they demand to be treated differently.
• Organizations that manage to deal directly with their end users have an asset for the future.
• You can game the social media in the short run, but not for long.
• You market when you hire and when you fire. You market when you call tech support and you market every time you send a memo.
• Blogging makes you a better marketer because it teaches you humility in your writing.

I know it’s easier said than done but by following just a few of his principles you might find your marketing works better. In my e-book I talk about some similar things. For a free copy go to www.clarityprojects.co.uk

I recently had a holiday in the Canary Islands and very nice it was too! Everyday, well almost everyday, we caught the free shuttle bus from the hotel down to the beach and village (a short 1.5km) to do what your average holiday maker does on holiday. What was interesting was that the bus driver (on his own accord) gave out small boiled sweets to all the passengers both going out and coming back! Small gesture but huge feel good feel factor. He didn’t need to do. His motivation, to make people feel welcome to his island and so he could engage in conversation!

This just proves that great customer service can be so very, very simple or should I say we need to keep it simple. It’s those things that make a huge difference and engender loyalty to your product, service and brand.

Intrinsically motivating your customer – making them feel good about the purchase, gaining their trust and respect, understanding their values, over delivering, saying thanks and appealing to them is far more powerful than extrinsically motivating them - giving them materialistic rewards such as money off vouchers and buy one get one free. It’s essentially making your only differentiating factor price which, of course, is not sustainable.

Provide customers with great service, a few simple, low cost great surprises along the way (the sweets) and ensure any customer retention strategy has gaining customer trust and respect at it’s core. That’s what customer service should be about. Perhaps a little more creative thought required but isn’t that the point?

Abandon everything you have been taught about marketing before. Take a cold quantitative look at your marketing activity and start again. All marketing should bring a return on your investment. Break from the past and think about:

- Beginning again – I feel a truly clean sheet of paper works well

- Start solving the root cause of why your marketing is not working as well as it should

- Create a strategy, yes I know it’s dull, but it will help shape your marketing and keep you on track when it inevitably gets tough

- Put a budget aside, you are going to need it

- You don’t need ten goals, two will do. But make sure they are the ones you can over commit to. If you do this, how successful would your business be?

Don’t be fooled, changing the marketing of your business is not going to be easy. You need a new marketing framework that will help you make sense of a new business environment where success is judged less on complex, sophisticated, financially driven factors and more on humanised customer relationships and new ideas that not have been used in the past.

For further marketing rules go to www.clarityprojects.co.uk and download the Marketing Rule Book. Hope you find it useful!!