Can't, Won't, Can, Do - Chance of Success

Managing Performance - High Performers

High performers stand out in any organisation. They consistently exceed expectations, and are management’s go-to people for difficult projects because they have a track record of getting the job done. However, managing high performers presents a different set of challenges in itself. Just because you often find your high performers working independently, with little need for direction or supervision, it does not mean that you can just leave them to it.

Just as with average performers, it is important to understand and appreciate the values and motivation of high performers. Only by doing this will you be able to effectively manage their work and ensure you consistently get the most out of them. You should also set clear boundaries and outcomes for the high performer who will need to be clear how they should approach work that they are likely to do quite independently.

Some of the key tips on guiding high performers are…

• Give lots of feedback as to desired outcomes. Then allow the high performer to work towards these targets without too much input from yourself although still allowing for opportunities to review how they are progressing.

• Let the high performer know the boundaries within which you expect them to work. It’s ok for them to strive to do things differently in order to be more effective, but this should not be at the expense of processes and procedures.

• High Performers want to be inspired by the leadership, not managed. Try not to micro-manage their work and get in the way of their progress.

• Encourage the high performer to work with others. Not only sharing their expertise, but also understanding the challenges others face. A high performer should be prepared to collaborate with others to drive results.

• Be prepared to challenge high performers - You can do this by providing new opportunities or projects to get involved in. This will help keep them engaged with the organisation and reduce the chance that they will get bored.

 

• Praise, but don’t over-praise. Of course the high performer needs and deserves praise. However, if this is overdone it can lead to the high performer over-valuing their worth and becoming complacent. It can also build feelings of resentment within the team, which leads to poor performance in others.

This is a short excerpt from the Trainer Bubble training course materials for 'Managing Performance', which you can purchase from our website at www.trainerbubble.com

 

Interview Skills - PRICE model

Effective interviewing is vital part of the selection process.  This means that we need a consistent approach that is both professional and efficient.

One reason that consistency is important is that we must ensure that all candidates we interview are given a fair opportunity. 

We believe that one way to achieve consistency is to use a structured approach. 

The approach we recommend is ethical and fair and you will be using it in a way designed to put interviewees at ease so that they feel confident to talk to you. It is also very effective at collecting quality information to help you make the best possible decision. This approach is called the 'PRICE' Model.

Prepare

The key to effective interviewing is good preparation and planning.  Skip this stage or prepare inadequately and it is unlikely that the interview will be effective.

As a minimum you should be setting the criteria you expect successful candidates to meet and the questions you need to ask to help you assess whether they meet those criteria.

We also advocate preparing a question plan to use as the basis of questions you will ask all candidates.

Rapport

At the start of the interview the aim should be to establish the right level of rapport with candidates.  It is important to remember that you are using the interview to obtain good quality information from candidates.  Put them at ease and they are much more likely to talk freely.

Interview

Think of an interview as a structured conversation. The role of the interviewer is to give direction to that conversation by asking appropriate questions.  

The aim should be for the candidate to do most of the talking and the interviewer to do most of the listening during this phase.

Close

Candidates must be given the opportunity to ask any questions of their own. Remember, they will also be using the interview to assess whether they want to work for you. 

At the end of the interview the interviewer should explain the next steps in the selection process and when and how the candidate will be contacted.

Evaluate

After the interview the interviewer needs to evaluate the information collected against the criteria established during the preparation phase.

 
This is a short excerpt from the Trainer Bubble training course materials for Interview Skills. Find out more about this and many of our other great training course materials at www.trainerbubble.com.

Communicating Change

Good communication is crucial when implementing a change. The most common error made by organisations communicating change is that they ‘tell’ people what the change is and how they should go about implementing it.

Effective communication is the central factor in managing change.  Openness and honesty, seeking feedback, recognising people’s contribution, delegation and teamwork are some of the main characteristics of good communication.   Effective communication is essential to build trust, motivate your people and establish confidence, particularly during times of change.

Principles

• Be as open as you can and tell the truth - this is your most powerful tool
• Build a powerful and compelling case by being:

Brief                - Well articulated

Clear               - Qualitative and quantitative

Credible          - Prepared with the facts

Compelling     - Create activities through effective communication channels

• Be creative - you need your audiences’ attention before you get their intention
• Tune in to different stakeholder groups’ needs and preferences
• Focus on the benefits of change

Benefits

Some of the benefits of effective internal communication are:

•  Good communication processes help people to understand where they fit in the big picture, or, in other words, how their job and team contributes towards achieving the organisation’s goals.

• Good leaders are often good communicators - great communication skills and practice helps leaders set direction and maintain morale. They appear credible to their team.

• People who know how their job contributes to the organisation’s goals know what’s important about what they do and can direct their efforts accordingly.  They also feel better motivated to do a good job. Hence they’re more productive.

 

• They have more opportunities to speak up about concerns, as well as ideas and suggestions.  A more trusting relationship can be created with colleagues and managers, given persistence and time.

•  Since your people are the organisation, if they’re well informed and motivated, it stands to reason that the company’s external reputation can only benefit. 

• It also stands to reason that good communication can help you manage the negative impact of change.

• Change is never easy to deal with, but good communication makes it easier for people.  They understand what’s going on, why, and (as far as possible) how it will affect them.  It won’t make them like change, but people will feel more comfortable, and better able to continue with their day job while change happens.

This is a short excerpt from the Trainer Bubble training course materials 'Planning for Change'. You can find out about these and our other training course materials at www.trainerbubble.com

Managing Conflict

Disagreement and conflict are perfectly natural occurrences in any organisation or team where people care about the issues. In fact, you should probably worry where conflict does not occur as it could mean that your employees do not care enough about the job.

Of course, no matter how usual conflict is, it can still be very difficult to deal with and can cause stress and concern for even the best manager. However, if you learn how to handle conflict effectively you can significantly reduce the frequency and seriousness of any disagreement.

Disagreement and conflict can be a really positive starting point for creating new ideas and developing different ways of working. Some useful tips to consider are…

Never Avoid

 

Conflicts are how priorities get set and decisions get made. It allows communication around issues that might otherwise get neglected and cause negativity and underlying tensions. A good manager will embrace negativity and use it to develop their interpersonal skills and create an inclusive culture.

Depersonalise It

Don’t take conflict personally, even if the person causing the conflict means it that way. Focus on the interests and issues involved and resolve things from that perspective.

Detach Yourself

Take an unemotional approach to the issues and observe from a detached position. If you lose your temper, you will lose credibility and people will not respect any decision you then identify. You may have some very strong feelings inside and want to explode, but remain focused and stay calm on the outside.

It can be tempting to use your power as a manager to make a unilateral decision quickly when conflict occurs. You should explore the position of those involved in the conflict and try to truly understand the viewpoints of those involved before you respond.

There will be times when conflict does become emotional and come to be difficult to deal with. When this occurs, the following simple model can help to diffuse situations and ensure you approach the problem positively.

There is a temptation to move straight to resolving a problem when conflict becomes emotional. However, this is rarely the best method of reducing the conflict as the individuals emotions will always get in the way. Therefore, you must first diffuse the person’s anger by providing empathy to their concerns. This means really seeing things from their point of view and stating that.

Once you have defused the emotions and demonstrated that you understand you can move on to agreeing what the problem is without the emotional element attached. This helps you to resolve the way forward.

 

At this point it is probably worth reminding ourselves of the old saying, ‘Win a friend, not the argument’.

 

 

This is a short extract from the 'Managing Performance' training course materials, which are available from the Trainer Bubble website. Visit www.trainerbubble.com today to find out more.

 

 

Blue Eyes, Brown Eyes Experiment - Diversity & Equality

We were delighted to come across this video clip recently, which perfectly demonstrates how division occurs in society. We think it would make a wonderful clip to use during training on diversity or equality issues.

Ms. Jane Elliott's "brown eyes, blue eyes" experiment in 1970 (the third one after her first in 1968). This "Eye of Storm" documentary was made by William Peters in 1970 for ABC News and later included in the documentary "A Class Divided" (1985), which included a class reunion (of 1984.)

The most telling moment is when Russell used "brown eyes" as a derogatory term to call John a name, only a couple of hours through. Though, the experiment was too short to allow it to get to the point when a "brown-eyes" person does so to another fellow "brown-eyes" person.




This clip would fit perfectly into any training course based around the topic of Diversity and Equality or where you need to highlight issues around Culture, Race and Religion.

The Four P's of Marketing

Marketing involves a wide range of activities and it is easy to see that it affects everything that a business does. In fact, effective marketing must be linked to all of the functions of the business. A key reason for this is so that all marketing efforts and activities across the organisation align with its goals.

A classic approach by John Kotler divided marketing into 4 aspects known as the 4 Ps. This is also referred to as the marketing mix by some people.

The 4 Ps of Marketing

The four elements of the marketing mix do not work in isolation but are interdependent of each other.

Product: There is no point in developing or acquiring products that nobody wants to buy. It is also important that products are reliable and meet the requirements of customers.

Price: A product is only worth what customers are prepared to pay for it. Customers will also want value for money. It can help to think of price in terms of ‘cost’ to the customer.

It is also important to remember that the price must provide a profit for the business.

Place: The place where customers can buy the product and the means of delivering it are also important. These must be convenient to the customer. In simple terms, products must be available to customers at the right place, at the right time and in the right quantities.

Promotion: This is the way in which a business communicates with its customers to tell them what it can and does offer. Communications may include advertising, public relations, information contained in packaging, branding and many other activities.

These communications must be consistent and provide customers with reasons to choose your products and services. Of course these communications also need to be accurate. If you make claims about your products and services it is important that they live up to those claims.

The Extended Marketing Mix

Most marketers recognise that the quality service customers receive is just as important as the product itself. Recent thinking is that the 4P’s of marketing should be extended to take account of this and that there are three other elements to consider. This extends the marketing mix to 7P’s.

This is sometimes known as the ‘extended marketing mix’. This is particularly important in service industries where there is no physical product (for example banking and insurance).

These three elements are added to the 4Ps in the extended marketing mix.

People

Processes

Physical Evidence

People: Customers judge a service based on the employees they interact with. Our people are essential to providing a service to our customers. It is important to recruit the right people with the right attitudes to customer service. It is also important that they are properly trained. They must have the right knowledge and skills (including interpersonal skills) to ensure that they provide a first class service.

Processes: It is of little use having excellent people working for you if your systems and procedures stop them from providing the service your customers deserve.

• Do we keep customers informed?
• Do they know how to use our products and our service?
• How do we deal with payments and refunds?
• Is it easy for our customers to contact us?
• What do we do when our service goes wrong?

Physical Evidence: This is important when a pure service is being sold. This is because it is not usually possible to experience a service before it is delivered. For example, if you buy an insurance policy you don’t really know how good the service is until you have to make a claim. This means that it can be difficult for customers because they are buying something intangible. The risk involved in this can be reduced by helping customers to see what they are buying.

There are a number of ways in which marketers provide some form of physical evidence to help overcome this. These include:

• Case studies and customer testimonials
• Brochures, catalogues and other documents
• Free trials


This is a short extract from the Trainer Bubble training course materials for 'Marketing Essentials', which can be purchased from our website at www.trainerbubble.com

Presentation of Your CV

Your CV is usually the first impression a potential employer has of you and it is important that you do not spoil your chances before they even get to read the content by making poor presentation choices or minor mistakes that become glaring mistakes to potential employers.

This means taking your time over your CV and ensuring that you have made it the best you can. Sometimes it is beneficial to leave a couple of days in between the time you first write it and your review, so that you come at it with a fresh pair of eyes. What is hugely useful is getting other people to take a look over your CV to see if they spot any errors or omissions as it is likely they will spot things you don’t.

When employers have to read a lot of CV’s, they will find it easy to dismiss those that have basic errors that should have been spotted. Therefore, it is critical you pay attention to some of the most common mistakes made…

Visually Unappealing and/or Difficult to Read

Unless applying for some type of creative role or attempting an ‘Alternative CV’ you should always print your CV on white A4 paper as although you might think decorative paper is eye-catching, it can be a real turn-off for potential employers.

It is also important not to try and include too much information, which can make your CV appear cluttered with long text and no white space. Remember, you want to try and make your CV as easy to read as possible as that helps the recruiter. Bullet points and clear headings are very useful as is an easy to read font that is a reasonable size. Also, don’t be tempted to use lots of different fonts, this is a sure fire way of making a CV look untidy.

Too Long or Too Short

The usual rule of thumb for CV’s is that you should not exceed two A4 pages (one side) and ensure there is plenty of white space on the page. This means being quite strict about what to put in and what to leave out and of course the less relevant information can be discarded if you need more space i.e. jobs you held a long time ago that aren’t relevant to the position you are applying for.

If you are at the beginning of your career, you might find that you don’t have enough information to pad out two pages and you should not be tempted to do so. It’s much better to have a really useful one page CV than a two page CV that has been filled up with irrelevant information.

Always keep the reader in mind and consider how your CV looks to an employer. How would you feel if the CV landed on your desk?

Typing Errors and/or Poor Grammar

Your CV is a chance to demonstrate the best aspects of your skills and abilities and although we all make spelling and grammar mistakes from time to time, you really can’t allow any of these to creep into your CV as potential employers will think that you’ve made no effort or that you don’t care. 

Although spellcheckers are wonderful tools, they cannot always be relied upon as they cannot differentiate between the word you meant to write and the one you might have spelled incorrectly such as ‘to’ and ‘too’ or even ‘aloud’ and ‘allowed’. Always ask someone else to read through your CV and preferably someone that is good at spelling and has a good grasp of English.


This is a short excerpt from our 'Writing a CV' training course materials that trainers can use to run their own training course on CV Writing Skills.

You can find this training course and many other training resources at our website www.trainerbubble.com

Change is inevitable - Deal with it!

The following image was sent to my inbox today and I love the change message delivered in a fun way! I think it gets the point across well and would be a fun addition to the slides of any change management training course you run....

22 Reasons why English is hard to learn...

1. The bandage was wound around the wound.
2. The farm was used to produce produce.
3. The dump was so full that it had to refuse more refuse.
4. We must polish the Polish furniture.
5. He could lead if he would get the lead out.
6. The soldier decided to desert his dessert in the desert.
7. Since there is no time like the present, he thought it was time to present the present.
8. A bass was painted on the head of the bass drum.
9. When shot at, the dove dove into the bushes.
10. I did not object to the object.
11. The insurance was invalid for the invalid.
12. There was a row among the oarsmen about how to row.
13. They were too close to the door to close it.
14. The buck does funny things when does are present.
15. A seamstress and a sewer fell down into a sewer line.
16. To help with planting, the farmer taught his sow to sow.
17. The wind was too strong to wind the sail.
18. After a number of injections my jaw got number.
19. Upon seeing the tear in the painting I shed a tear.
20. I had to subject the subject to a series of tests.
21. How can I intimate this to my most intimate friend?
22. The accountant at the music store records records of the records.

This fun bit of trivia can be used during training energisers to add a bit of interest to a training course and provoke a conversation around how misunderstandings can happen whether it be with language or the way something is said.

Simply add these statements to a PowerPoint slide and talk participants through them.

The following video clip is based on Robert Cialdini's ideas on persuasion and influencing and give a really useful insight into how people are influenced to make decisions. This clip would compliment any training course on influencing skills and the power of influence.




Trainer Bubble provide two main influencing skills training courses, which are: The Power of Influence and Influencing Skills. Visit us today to find out more.