30th of June, 2022

With the information-overloaded world we live in, you would be forgiven for believing that what we do in our businesses and lives would/should have clearly given us the winning edge. But it is often not so.

Is your businesses and you as a person, merely rising and ebbing with the tide?

16th of June, 2022

It has taken me a year to fess up to this one. The entire world refers to performance reviews (PR): it is just part of the standard business vocabulary. Typically, they are carried out annually, especially in the corporate world, they are linked to an employee’s remuneration and mostly everyone hates doing them.

2nd of June, 2022

Calling is usually the best way to put yourself in direct communication with your prospect. I have often been amazed at how often my call seems to be made at the exact time that the prospect has been ‘discussing’ the need for my exact service. I guess fortune favours the brave :).

19th of May, 2022

Do you belong to a local business association? There are the big ones like Auckland Chamber, but then there are hundreds of local ones. If you don’t belong to one it could be in your interest to seek one out, they are there to support local business.

5th of May, 2022

Business can be a little hectic, and often we yearn for stable conditions where the variables are predictable and consistent. When we operate in an inflationary economy, few things are stable. There will be casualties, but so too will there be significant opportunities for the focused and brave.

21st of April, 2022

For a service-based business the cost of employees is often the biggest single cost. Compare this to an importer who ties up a lot of their capital in stock and warehousing, their employment costs as a percentage of total costs are a whole lot lower. But this difference masks the reality that in almost every business the employment cost, is the ‘cost’ that is the biggest driver in influencing the bottom-line performance of the business.

7th of April 2022

The human brain still autonomously judges everything as either a THREAT or a REWARD. Pretty much like we have been doing for thousands of years.

17th of March, 2022

Dependency is a good thing: without it, tyrants develop, and they have no boundaries to what they believe they control. Without the need for dependency the narcissistic personality can flourish, usually with devastating consequences. We saw this with Hitler, we are seeing it now with Putin.
These individuals are high profile examples. Possibly on a more mass-scale, we witnessed this affect during the Trump presidency and again right now with the Covid pandemic.
I am still unsure if I should be writing on this potentially polarizing subject, after all, I am going to be taking a neutral stance, so should you be angered, hold on – ride this out.

3rd of March, 2022

Ensuring that your employees are fully engage in delivering at work is a moving target. The world continues to change. Are you?

17th of February, 2022

When we are looking for a new recruit, typically what is the first thing we do? I suspect for most people, we think about the person we are looking for and their role, 10-minutes later we place an ad.

27th of January, 2022

As a business owner your business may be affected by one or more of these factors. If you have not seen these effects yet, you will almost certainly see them soon.

13th of January, 2022

When it comes down to you considering your future, there are two forces at play: 1. External forces, and 2. Internal forces

The message here is set goals sparingly, and when you do, stack the odds in your favour to ensure a better hit rate.

16th of December, 2021

Where are you mostly sitting, 1,2 or 3? Whatever is your selection, there is one insight that I encountered numerous times during 2021. Perhaps it is not earth shattering, but certainly impactful.

2nd of December, 2021

Have you come across or experienced the ‘Great Resignation’ concept that many companies are facing?

Employees are looking for more meaning in their work; they have higher expectations in relation to what they must ‘give up’ in order to secure employment; for many they have boundless opportunities to improve their quality of life and potential earnings through alternate employment options. Add to this, our current unemployment rate is critically low (yes, that is not entirely good for the economy!), so based on the traditional Supply-Demand curve, the headwinds are against us as employers.

Lasting business improvement is made by making continual and consistent 1% improvements – this is one of those 1%’ers you should consider.

19th of November, 2021

It is a legal requirement for you to be reporting your numbers back to the Government of the day, this being your GST and company tax numbers. Most businesses have a bookkeeper or accountant managing this process to ensure it is done correctly. It is non-negotiable, you must do it and you must do it correctly.

4th of November, 2021

At face value it is very difficult to measure how accountable people are in your business. After all, we all have different perceptions of what accountability is. So rather than delving into that murky water, I will rather assume that you would like to (and should be) continually working to improve the culture of accountability in your business.

21st of OCtober, 2021

The technical definition of a False Positive is when a test result indicates the presence of a condition. The doctor says you have X, when in fact a later test confirms you don’t (wow, nearly back into virus talk here.) In business life we meet False Positives often.

7th of October, 2021

You’re Dumber in the Afternoon

Studies have further demonstrated that our individual traits like personality and even IQ are not stable but fluctuate enormously over time. This time being within a day, the week, over seasons etc.

16th of September, 2021

While in lockdown, our BIG community have been meeting at least weekly. Having a sense of community, one where we can safely share and learn from one another is invaluable.

1st of September, 2021

It’s not just headlines, it’s true. More billionaires are made during the hard times than in the good times. While I checked the accuracy of this, I was equally startled to read that in China alone, in the last year they have produced a new billionaire every 34 hours!

19th of August, 2021

A plan is merely an intent, and this is what 90-day planning is all about. The intent needs to be strong, in fact bulletproof, but the exact steps on how we deliver on the intent need to have wriggle room as the environment we operate in is dynamic.

5th of August 2021

Imagine if you could build a team within your business that would perform as if they were podium placed Olympians?

22nd of July, 2021

As leaders and business owners do you sometimes wonder about how much of an expert you really need to be? Personally, I have subscribed to this quote: “Even if you don’t do the work, you should know the work.”

8th of July, 2021

If you are implementing 90-day planning, then you would have just completed Quarter 1. What worked well, what did not work out? First to yourself and second to your team, I encourage you to expand on reflecting Q1’s performance. However, most importantly, explain the behaviour that did or did not happen resulting in these results.

24th of June, 2021

Of the many such statement I have come across, the over whelming majority focus on explaining what the company does at a ‘practical level.’ These statements result in little to no benefit to the company at all. They go something along the lines of: “ABC purpose is to serve our country with great toilet rolls.”.

24th of June, 2021

If you employ staff, why do you? I am not referring to legal semantics here, like are they employed or are the subcontractors etc. What I am asking here is: are you employing staff just to lay your hands on, well, more hands? Or in the ideal world, should these people be contributing to the overall improvement of the business?

10th of June, 2021

Here are some valuable questions that will directly indicate how ready you are to lead others.

27th of May

Heard of the power of 1? Like compound interest, just a 1% improvement in 1% of your business, made consistently results in spectacular performance improvements. Well, research has shown that if you fix this #1 mistake, expect to get at least a 10% improvement in employee productivity. That’s mind bogglingly big!

27th May, 2021

Have you ever been in a situation where you don’t really know what to do: you have essentially been thrown into the deep end and you need to take action immediately or drown? At first you just grapple at anything and hopefully survive, but after some time you realise that you have in fact made progress. After a long while you either become okay at it, or if you are committed, an Ace. Well thinking is the same, and with the help of Pink Sheets you could soon become an Ace.

13th of May, 2021

Want to tap into your creativity? Follow these tips: 5 no-brainer things you can do that don’t require models, learnings or cryptic code to get right.

29th of April, 2021

We all have opinions about what is right and what is wrong: the challenge each of us faces is facing up to the fact that our paradigms are limiting ourselves and sometimes what we believe is wrong, is in fact not so.

8th of April, 2021

In the business, problems and errors are inevitable. A reoccurring, costly and massively irritating problem that you think should not really be that hard to fix, except you seem to be failing in finding a permanent fix. Here, you will learn a solution that will benefit you in your business.

18th of March, 2021

Creating your budget in the first place may be the biggest hurdle to overcome. If so, and you have not created one before then just make a start.

4th of March, 2021

Endurance and leadership do not mean that you have to burn yourself out. You set priorities, make a plan on how you are going to achieve them and communicate at the workplace then stick to it. But modern life is not only about your grit and stamina. To gain long-term performance be a leader!

18th of February, 2021

Newsbrief that explains the super easy way on how to achieve lasting improvement in businesses.

19th 0f November 2020

Understanding what is Open Book Policies. It is when you open the books in a controlled manner, to all your staff, so that they have a better understanding of exactly how the business is performing financially.

It is not about giving them access to your bank account, or sensitive information such as everyone’s salary.

1st of November, 2020

News brief that tackles furthermore about Open Books Policy.

16th of October, 2020

News brief that tackles furthermore about how to systemize or process your business.

1st of October, 2020

News brief that tackles about ways on creating some form of structure within your business that allows the business to operate smoothly without being dependent on the business owner.

16th of Sept, 2020

News brief that tackles about using free dictation features on your Google Docs, Word or Apple products and be more productive.

1st of Sept, 2020

News brief about stripping some of the basic fundamentals of your business to become more efficient and have stable and simple foundations to build on.

10th of Aug, 2020

News brief describing how Loom application can be a powerful tool in your business most especially in these times of pandemic.

16th of July, 2020

News brief about using POMODORO Technique to overcome time management and become time-efficient in your day to day work.

2nd of July, 2020

News brief about using TextExpander, Phrase Express , and AutoTextExpanderForChrome softwares in your business.