Innovation comes from freedom to find, not from obeying someone else’s orders. Future talent will demand autonomy and this goes past the simple solutions of the past such as empowerment and being allowed to use initiative. For those that are really talented, will not relinquish their abilities in a career limiting move and hide behind a subordinate role being told what to do.

In the future you will pay people based on their value, on their financial and non financial contribution to your business, not whether they rocked up and worked a 60 hour week. Work is changing. Its become more challenging, more sophisticated, more time pressured, more collaborative, more engaging, more equal, more technological and less reliant on control, command and power. Companies are having to change their decision making processes, their reward structures and abandon their heirarchy.

It means opening up. It is becoming increasing less productive to make decisions in isolation, since in the future, it will require so many different specialists from niche areas to support those problem solving solutions. Its a blinding flash of the obvious but a group of people, almost always, will have more knowledge and expertise than any individual. Future success will depend on leaders being able to pull together and engage the talents of a cross functional nature from inside and outside the organisation.

This type of working increases opportunities to add value but they will bring about significant changes in business infrastructure including, co ordinating people on and off the payroll as well as co creating products.

Like sand in the Sahara, there is plenty of it around. Complacency seems to be the inevitability of lots of business, no matter what size. A visit to No.15 Cafe in Penrith, Cumbria at the weekend was a very visible and tangible example of complacency. The service was terrible, the care of customers of tertiary importance and the experience non existent. It left me feeling extremely irritated. They truly didn’t give a stuff.

It’s tragic because with the advent of abundance, there is too much scarce exceptional experience. The introduction of some ‘branded’ cafe’s shouldn’t make a jot of difference. Competition should not keep us on our toes, we should be there already. An old boss of mine used to say, the worst thing you can do is become complacent, he was more than right.

This experience is a jolt into reality. It got me thinking about my business and whether we are complacent. Every three months, all businesses need to be asking “where have we got complacent?” It’s our obligation to ensure we don’t let ourselves down nor our clients.

Think into the future (there is one I promise) three years from now. Look back and identify what are the big decisions you have implemented that have made all the difference to performance/growth/survival. You now know what to do next….!!! 

You don’t watch a boring television program do you? You don’t listen to a mediocre seminar, do you? Or at least you don’t pass it on to others. No one can hardly hear you shouting from the rooftops about going to see something you struggled to stay awake in. Nor do you pass on a tedious email. You don’t rave to your friends about the latest meal you had at a restaurant if it’s just bored the pants off you either! If it’s lousy, or even average, we don’t shout or create a noise about it. And you certainly don’t post on DIGG the eye shutting, snoozing blog comment you read earlier, (present one excepted of course!)

What we do make a noise about is those positive things that make you jump up and down. The products or services that get you excited, that are interesting, that are a little out of the ordinary. Those are the things that make you rush and tell your friends that you’ve just had an amazing experience at the latest car wash! It takes something special to make a customer an advocate (someone who tells everyone about you without an incentive from you.) 

What makes you an advocate? Was it something stable, dull even reliable? Chances are it wasn’t. How would someone describe the experience they have with your business? Engaging? Energetic? Important? Simple? Influential? Sincere? Weird? Exuberant? Human?

I’ve just come across these eight videos on the Orange website. They include Hiro Harjani, Angus Thirlwell, James Murray, Wilfred Emmanuel Jones, Will King and a few more. They are all talking about starting and running their own business. Useful, interesting and worth the time to watch….good stuff Orange. Link is below:

www.business.orange.co.uk/servlet/Satellite?pagename=Business&c=OUKPage&cid=1044136938032

Running a small business is sometimes like trying to push an elephant up hill. Small business owners are forever trying to do everything themselves. Understandable I know, because often they feel they can’t afford it or can’t justify the cost. And that’s the point, we see it as a cost not an investment.

Looking at small businesses that are successful, what is clear is that the founder, managing director, chief executive, who provided the early, initial motivation, products or service were quick to recognise that it’s not just about products and customers, it was actually about putting the right people around them. Not just employees (if you choose that route) but if you outsource too. They understood that when they had a problem or challenge they hit the right button with an outside person to get them over the hump.

So when you have a marketing problem, go get a good marketing consultancy. If you have a financial issue, go get a financial adviser who understands business. If you have a management problem, go get a management consultancy. Be clear about what you want, what you need to change and what the return on investment is going to be.

Success is about putting the right people around you. Invariably you really can’t do it all yourself, if you do, your business will experience complete limited growth.

There is no such thing as a sole entrepreneur! So do you want to grow your business or not?

I read Chris Anderson’s book a while ago and have just re read it. Its an interesting look at the future trends using the media and entertainment industries as an example. I’d recommend the book to anyone who has an interest in how business could work, actually is working now and in the future. You can see a preview of his thoughts in a video on YouTube at www.youtube.com/watch?v=0Yku0GTrcuw and have an option to download the full video when you are there.

Enjoy.