Now...Build A Great Business

When you start reading Mark Thompson’s and Brian Tracy’s book called, Now…Build a Great Business!, you may feel like you are reading 200 pages of Blog posts, but the bite-sized approach to providing tools, practical steps and ideas, rather than theory, is precisely the authors’ intended approach.

The book thoroughly explains the seven keys for how to achieve business success:
1.  Become a great leader
2.  Develop a great business plan
3.  Surround yourself with great people
4.  Offer a great product or service
5.  Design a great marketing plan
6.  Perfect a great sales process
7.  Create a great customer experience

You’ll find a checklist at the end of each step (each chapter) where you can write down your action plan for applying what you’ve learned.

Particularly interesting is the chapter on strategic planning, where the authors recommend you should ask yourself these important questions before you act to create or reinvent the direction of your organization:

•  Where are you now? What is your current situation?
•  How did you get to where you are today?
•  Where do you want to go from here?
•  How do you get from where you are today to where you want to be in the future?
•  What obstacles will you have to overcome? What problems will you have to solve?
•  What additional knowledge, skills, or resources will you require to achieve your strategic objectives?

When it comes time to surround yourself with great people, Thompson and Tracy remind us that great people are:
•  Good team players.
•  More concerned with what’s right rather than who’s right.
•  Intensely results oriented.

And, great people accept high levels of responsibility for the outcomes required of them, and consider their company a great place to work.

Mark Thompson is an entrepreneur who sold his last company for $100 million and today coaches executives on how to lead growth companies. Brian Tracy speaks throughout the country about the development of human potential and personal effectiveness. I thank them for sending me a copy of their book. It’s a worthwhile read.

Why Giving Positive Feedback Is Bettering Than Giving Praise

There is an important difference between giving your employees positive feedback and giving them praise.

• Positive feedback focuses on the specifics of job performance.
• Praise, often one-or two-sentence statements, such as “Keep up the good work,” without positive feedback leaves employees with empty feelings.

Worse yet, without positive feedback, employees feel no sense that they are appreciated as individual talents with specific desires to learn and grow on the job and in their careers, reports Nicholas Nigro, author of, The Everything Coaching and Mentoring Book.

So, skip the praise and give positive feedback that is more uplifting to your employees because it goes to the heart of their job performance and what they actually do.

An example of positive feedback is:

“Bob, your communications skills have dramatically improved over the past couple of months. The report that you just prepared for me was thorough and concise. I appreciate all the work you’ve put into it, as do your team members.”

Use A Board Of Advisers Instead Of Mentors

Here is one of my Blog's most popular posts from last year...now with updated information.

David Burkus often provides valuable comments to my various Blog postings, and he's a person who effectively uses a board of advisers, instead of mentors, to help him achieve success.

"I've found that in my life, it was easier and more effective to set up a board of advisers," said Burkus, the editor of LeaderLab. "This is a group of people, three to five, that have rotated into my life at various times and that speak into it and help me grow. I benefit from the variety of experience these people have."

LeaderLab is an online community of resources dedicated to promoting the practice of leadership theory. Its contributors include consultants and professors who present leadership theory in a practitioner-friendly format that provides easy-to-follow explanations on how to apply the best of leadership theory.

Community users can download a variety of research reports and presentations about leadership and leadership versus management.

For example, a presentation on LeaderLab explains:

•  Management is made up of activities needed to run a business, unit or organization to help achieve its goals.
•  Leadership is what it takes to inspire and engage employees to contribute their best to achieve the goals, support the vision, carry out the mission, and embody the company's values.

Two of Burkus' favorite leadership books are:
•  The Starfish and the Spider -- A book actually about leaderLESS organizations. "This book examines organizations that didn't need leaders to thrive," said Burkus.
•  The Leadership Challenge -- "This book examines the practices that make leaders effective and teaches aspiring leaders how to inspire and lead others," explained Burkus.

David has written his own new book. It's called, The Portable Guide To Leading Organizations.

Use Job Descriptions

It's tempting to not write job descriptions, especially if you own a small business or lead a small team of employees.  But, don't fall into that trap.

Whether you have one or many employees, be sure each has a current and accurate job description.

A job description is a written document that should include the:

• employee's duties
• responsibilities
• outcomes needed from that position
• required qualifications
• reporting relationship

And, if you have job descriptions but they are poorly written or out-of-date, that will lead to confusion and misunderstandings.

Once you have a job description for each employee, you'll be able to ensure the descriptions all fit together logically and leave no holes in the duties that need to be assigned throughout your team or business.

• Check your job descriptions at least yearly to be sure they reflect the employee's proper title and current duties. Very often employees get new job titles or are assigned new tasks mid-year, and those don't get reflected in their job descriptions. Don't let that happen.

Finally, if you don't have access to a Human Resources department that can help you craft your job descriptions you can find lots of good examples online.