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Dr. Rick Johnson's Articles in Management Show All|Display Category|Title|Newest|Oldest Training -- You Have to Walk the Walk Most company executives decide to spend money on training because it is popular, especially when economic times are good. There is a view that it is “good” and it is also something that responsible leaders are “supposed to do” to prepare for the future. However, just spending money on training isn’t the only answer. Training alone will not produce the kind of results that training combined with coaching and mentoring can produce. Training can increase specific skill sets but education, coaching and mentoring is necessary for complete employee development. Empowerment -- The Rewards are Greater than the Risks Empowerment is a common trait used by most effective leaders. The rewards of empowering your employees are far greater than the risk. Give them some independence in choosing their work schedules or other factors that won’t affect overall objectives. Empowering employees allows them to use their own initiative and creativity to accomplish things you never imagined they could. Consultants Can Be Scary --Utilize the Discovery Analysis to Ease Your Fear of Using a Consultant Some consultants are so skilled at presentations and proposal writing that deliverables become very intangible and they are not measurable. If they are not measurable, accountability goes out the window. This alone can turn your consulting experience into a nightmare. The scope of the project may have a continuous creep that costs you more and more money. Deliverables should be clearly defined and documented. However, even if you have done your homework and feel you have clear expectations things can go wrong. Margin Management-----Using the Supplier Profitability Ratio to Hold Your Vendors Accountable Ultimately to create margin improvement, your entire sales team must have good judgment of market potential as it relates to margin improvement. They must be self disciplined and make intelligent decisions based on fact. Each territory manager must develop his own plan for profit improvement and be flexible on the implementation of that plan. They must be action oriented and customer driven and yet be extremely conscious of profitability objectives. Success During Recessionary Times --- It Begins and Ends With Leadership Creating change, managing during turbulent times, or fostering growth in a recession all depends on a balance of this type of leadership. No one person can make a company successful. It takes a lot of people, but one person with a command of leadership can transfer enough influence, creating enough leadership amongst the management group to guarantee success. Hey Mr. Manufacturer-- Distributors Are not Catfish Some manufacturers may think of their distributors in the same vernacular. They may believe distributors are slick, quick, and eager to feed on the almighty dollar. They say distributors "bottom-feed" on rebates, discounts and special promotions, preferring lowered prices (i.e., dead stinky bait) as opposed to the hard work of selling value. Manufacturers believe some distributors have grown large and lazy, demonstrating the "Cadillac and Boat" syndrome. "I have all I need, a Cadillac and my bass boat, so why break my neck trying to capture even more market share?" R2 = EOC --- Recruitment & Retention = Employer of Choice Problems with staffing and retention may not be due to bad hires or a low unemployment rate. In fact, they may be related to poor management insight by not recognizing your employees as a core competency in your business strategy. Although employees may not fit the strictest definition of a core competency, it is a fact that your employees are the ones responsible for creating many of your core competencies. It is an undisputable fact that failure to recognize the importance of employee contributions will lead to failure regardless of your business strategy. The Leadership Thought Provoker Checklist “The ideal leader is courageous, strong and persistent, wise – but what really separates him or her from the pack is passion and vision. It’s not enough to be skilled administrator or a world-class manager. No, to be a true leader, we need the passion of our dreams – and a vision of how to make them real. Passion and vision are transforming forces that will fail unless we fuse them into one powerful source for change. “Jack Welch, the former CEO of General Electric” Effective Leaders Are Driven by a Model “Effective leaders are driven by a model. A model is a tool used to predict future outcomes of current decisions. Effective leaders build their models on the sum of their experiences, knowledge and deeds as well as their mistakes.” “Employees will not have faith in their leader until their leader shows faith in the employees” “Employees will not show respect for their leader until their leader shows respect for the employees” Footprints to Success: The Five Priorities of Strategic Planning Strategic planning is a management tool. It is used to help an organization clarify its future direction – to focus its energy, and to help members of the organization work toward the same goals. The planning process adjusts the organization’s direction in response to a changing environment. Strategic planning is a disciplined effort to support fundamental decisions and actions that shape and guide what an organization is, what it does and why it does it, with a focus on where it wants to go and how it is going to get there. The A B C's of Scenario Planning There are a number of approaches to scenario planning, and they differ greatly based on the people doing the planning and the type of industry the planning is done for. Some of the best examples come from Citibank and Royal Dutch Shell and although the BASIC’s of each are the same the actual scenarios will be very different. Where Shell would be concerned with the Middle East cutting off oil supplies to one political entity or another while Citibank might be more concerned with Japan or the European economy going into a recession. P.A.P. The basics of Pipeline Management Pipe Line Management is fundamentally, a time management problem. It begins with answering the following questions. • Are there alternatives to a sales person spending the majority of their time doing demand fulfillment tasks? • How much time should be spent on maintenance accounts? • How much time should be spent on prospecting? • Do you have a plan for account qualification? • What is your company’s value proposition? • What is your competitive advantage? • Do you have a penetration strategy? Are Employees Really Your Most Precious Asset? Listen carefully, if you don’t treat your employees like your most important asset --- Then they certainly will not act nor will they perform like your most important asset. And that means you are missing the greatest opportunity in the world to leverage talent in creating competitive advantage in your market place. Make no mistake, it is your employees that create core competencies and core competencies create competitive advantage. B.O.S.S. Boisterous - Omnipotent - Self Indulgent- Sociopath People who attain positions of power, whether it is C.E.O., Vice President of Sales, C.O.O., Sales Manager, Branch Manager or another position of authority, reach these positions for a variety of reasons. The reasons are not always a result of competency and hard work; these positions are not always earned. Alternative reasons for being promoted to positions of power include: • Nepotism • Politics • Being in the right place at the right time • Personal relationships • Extraordinary suck-up behavior • Being the tallest in the land of midgets • Failure to recognize the “Peter’s Principl Discretionary Energy Discretionary energy can be the difference between doing what is expected and performing in an outstanding manner. Consequently, our people skills and leadership skills play a paramount role in determining whether employees give freely of their discretionary energy. Does that mean that we must let the inmates run the asylum and do whatever they want to make them happy? Of course not. But, it does mean that we must utilize effective leadership skills in dealing with issues, problems and just day to day training, coaching and mentoring. Lone Wolf -- Lead Wolf "The Evolution of Leadership" Times have changed, leadership has evolved. The days of the “Lone Wolf” leader at the top who dominates with power are gone. Successful privately held organizations have gone through the leadership evolutionary process. They understand that today’s leader must create change in the organization to meet the needs of their customers, to meet the needs of their employees and to meet the needs of their vendor partners. It involves a particular life cycle change. 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