The hedgehog (much like its Australian equivalent the echidna) does not have a wide array of techniques to protect it from potential predators – it does just one thing really well: when it is attacked, it rolls itself into a ball and becomes pretty well impenetrable by virtue of its sharp spines. In a similar way, each of the American ‘great’ companies all shared the three core attributes at their core which collectively made them very hard to beat.

Read on to find out what they are!

When you are running a business, there are always important decisions to make: What should my sales target be? How much profit do I need? How should I position my products and/or services in the market place and which ones should I focus on? However, probably the single biggest decision a business can make concerns the staff that it hires. I am sure that you will be able to think of time when you worked with someone who had a massively positive impact on those around them as well as someone who was actually toxic to the company and brought the whole place down. Unfortunately, it is all too easy to hire the wrong person but extremely difficult and usually costly to get rid of them. So, with that in mind what are five key things that can be done to minimise the chance of a bad hire?

This might sound like a rhetorical question, but how do you know what your staff are actually thinking? According to Richard Branson:

“Clients do not come first. Employees come first. If you take care of your employees, they will take care of the clients.”

Often one of the hardest things leaders find to do is to let go of key areas of the business and let others take responsibility. This is especially true for business owners for whom their business is ‘their baby’ and where there is inevitably an emotional attachment.

It was the Scottish poet Robbie Burns (1759 – 1796) that once said:

“O, wad some Power the giftie gie us
To see oursels as others see us!”

which in modern English simply states ‘if only we could see ourselves as others see us’.

Sometimes the simplest of things can have immense value and these things are so easy to do, they can get either overlooked or postponed as something to work on when there is a spare moment, which of course there never is.

The Position Description (PD) or Job Description is one of these things. Read about the value to taking time to invest in getting this right.

Do you know what your USP is and does this matter anyway? A USP is a ‘Unique Selling Point’ or ‘Unique Selling Proposition’ which is a short marketing statement that differentiates a product, service or brand from its competitors. It therefore forms part of a business’ overall Value Proposition (which describes the advantages and benefits of using the products and services to the customer) and as it turns out, it does matter, let’s explore why.

The most common issue that business leaders suffer from these days is an apparent ‘lack of time’. 

Besides identifying what’s urgent vs what’s important, effective prioritisation and good planning, another approach that can get overlooked in amongst all the busyness is delegation.

Remarkable really since this action is essential to business growth (not to mention the business leader’s health and well-being) yet is deployed far less frequently than it should be with the result that business leaders get burnt out and staff feel like they receive the crumbs from the table. So why does it not happen as frequently as it should? 

Take a look at most small or medium sized businesses and Human Resources (or as it is now more commonly known ‘People and Culture’) is typically not a formally identified part of the business and hence has no champion for it; yet it turns out to be one of the most important.

As we move into a new year, now would be a good time to think about what you would like to achieve by the end of 2024 and consider whether your current role is likely to enable this or not. If it isn’t, then perhaps a change is in order and a new position in a different company might be the answer in which case here are five top tips to maximise your chances of successfully negotiating the interview.

The main reason most people go to work is that they like to feel they are doing something worthwhile. Perhaps surprisingly, this consistently shows up as more important than money but it is that feeling of doing something that makes a real difference which is incredibly satisfying. This sense of personal satisfaction can be greatly enhanced by leaders who take the time and effort to help people in their team understand why what they are doing matters.

Warren Buffet said: “Price is what you pay. Value is what you get.”

Seems like a pretty obvious statement to make, but when it comes to making sensible business decisions, I am frequently surprised by the number of business leaders who opt to save a few bucks in the short term, but end up paying more in the long term. The thinking is along the lines of ‘looks like a pretty simple task to me, how hard can it be?’

A recurring theme in many of the business articles and presentations that I do is the importance of adopting the right mindset in order to achieve. When considering ‘Growth Mindset’ Professor Carol Dweck’s studies of high performing children showed that their enhanced abilities derived primarily from their propensity to learn from their mistakes rather than any inherent talent or skills.

Personality profiling is a method by which a person’s natural ‘behavioural preferences’ may be understood with respect to a general population base and therefore predicts to some degree how we are likely to respond to given situations.

The question Steve Jobs often asked himself when hiring a new recruit was ‘would I enjoy going out for a beer with this person?’

Believe it or not, this is an important consideration in the hiring process of new staff members. Steve Jobs was often seen walking in the grounds of Apple with candidates to give the time and space to know them better and assess if they would be a good cultural fit within Apple at that time.

If I were faced with the situation of being able to provide just one business support session to a client, I would choose to do this on company culture. Why? Because company culture lies at the heart of every great business. In fact, I would go further and say that you can’t have a sustained, high-performing business unless the company culture is healthy.

So what do we mean by “company culture” and why is it so important?

Talk to most small business owners and they will likely tell you that they are working hard to provide for the family and create a better work/life balance for themselves. However, the unfortunate reality is that for most business owners (especially those that are passionate about what they do), they get less of both, particularly if starting a business. Further, any business owner that says that they can keep work and home life completely separate is likely to be deluding themselves.

Take a look at most small or medium sized businesses and Human Resources (or as it is now more commonly known ‘People and Culture’) is typically not a formally identified part of the business and hence has no champion for it; yet it turns out to be one of the most important. At first sight, this may seem like an exaggeration, particularly since it is not something that is typically required five days a week in a business, but this crucial function covers many key areas:

How much do you enjoy your job? According to the latest Gallup World survey (State of the Global Workplace 2022 Report), only 17% of employees in Australia are “engaged” or actually enjoying and actively contributing to their work. That means that 83% of staff are not engaged which implies anything from just turning up and doing what has to be done right through to actively working against the best interests of the employer!

Starting a new role with a business can be pretty nerve-wracking even for experienced employees. There seems to be so much to learn – getting to know team members, protocols and standards, systems and processes and of course the company products and services as well so it may well feel like the new member is drinking from the proverbial fire-hose for the first few weeks. However, the transition into a new role can be made much more pleasant, effective and efficient through the employer putting in place some simple steps.