A Coach is a must at the top is the extract form the Sunday Times reviewing the book written by Steve Tappin & Andrew Cave called “The NEW Secrets of CEOs”

The book looks at what it is really like to be an CEO and tells us what life is really like at the top and reveals the views of heads of global businesses as diverse as GE International, NASCAR, China Mobile and Unilever.

One quote from Richard Baker, former CEO of Alliance Books “It is extraordinary to think you can be excellent at something without a coach, the notion that Roger Federer would not have several coaches is ridiculous. One of the best things to happen to me was to get a coach. when the waves were breaking over me, I got a coach. Within 10 minutes, he had correctly identified the one thing I needed to do. As CEO, the idea you can do it on your own is extraordinarily arrogant”

As a coach,  you would expect me to be biased towards the benefits a coach can give high level executives. The analogy that Richard Baker gives about Roger Federer using a coach is a good one. The coach isn’t about telling you what to do, the very fact that that the CEO is in the position they are, there must be something about them. Roger Federer knows his game, the coach will challenge, question, encourage, and hold them accountable.

A perfect illustration of this is given by Lord Davies, at Standard Chartered who used a management coach, “I got someone who catalogued how I spent my time and went through my diaries and measured my progress on a 360-degree basis. It was brutal, but I am a great believer in courageous conversation. I don’t think I agreed with him; I was allowed to argue.”

The key thing here is that how Lord Davies didn’t always agree with his coach. This is good, the last thing you want from your coach is someone who is going to tell what you want to hear, or worse still be your yes person.

One of the common things that come out of the work I do, is how managers and leaders want some kind of behaviour or attitude change from their staff, that they feel would benefit the company. One of the ways I do this is through an Amnesty meeting. Before the meeting I have a few sessions with the leader/s to really establish what kind of changes they are looking for from the team. Before I talk to the staff, we would go through a number of things that the leaders CAN do that would facilitate these changes. In isolation these could be quite small, however it is amazing the changes that the leaders can make, both in their behaviour and attitude, the very same they are looking for from their staff , that can start to take effect in the company, even before the amnesty meeting takes place.

The rules of engagement of the Amnesty meeting are as follows

• Everything you say must be within the rules of professional integrity
• Anything you say must serve the company in some way
• Only ask for things you want changing where you are prepared to take the first action
• Each person is committed to hold each other accountable to the actions agreed, irrespective of position held

The individuals can say anything in the meeting and it will not be used against them outside the meeting. Theses rules however, ensure that everybody knows the pupose of the meeting and allows everybody to take something away from the meeting they would find useful.

So a Coach is a Must both from the point of view of getting the best out of the leaders and staff in a company.

Whatever your status we all buy stuff, whether its products or services, for personal or business use. The money we give is in exchange for the product or service, however what keeps that purchase in the memory is something that is intangible but nonetheless as valuable.

The 90’s was all about take take, the noughties was about customer service, the twenty teens is about the customer experience. Following a talk given by Royston Guest some weeks ago, he explained what needs to happen if we are to gain more customers. It is an old sales and marketing adage, that it is easier to sell to your existing customers than to sell to new customers. Royston talked about the difference between customer service and customer experience.

This got me thinking. What are the kind of services/products I have stopped going back to and which ones do I keep on buying, and in a lot of the cases it was about the experience.

By shifting your focus to ensure the experience of your existing customers is so good, that they NEVER go anywhere else, is the holy grail of increasing your sales. We need to change our focus from offering good customer service to giving the ultimate customer experience. Customer service is about doing enough so that no one can be accused of not doing that little bit extra. But customer experience is going beyond the call of duty and doing something that stays in the memory of the customer.

An example where this is demonstrated perfectly is the hairdressers I go to. I have been going to her for the last 22 years. What I remember was the very first time I went to her she made a point of knowing my name, then everytime I went back, she would greet me by my first name, always offered me a cup of tea and all the useful niceties. Now you maybe saying, great customer service, and yes it was, but she ensured that my experience was something that I would want to repeat again and again.

She moved to different Salons and I moved with her, there was a time when she worked from home and she kept most of her customers, ensuring the experience was as good as ever. She could have easily saw me as another haircut, but if you think about those first few experiences it meant I stayed with her for the last 22 year.

So thinking about the customers you have now, what kind of experience are they getting from you? Is it the kind that will mean they will still be with you in 22 years time? Will they need/want what they buy off you today in 22 years time? If the answer is yes, look at the kind of things you can change that will ensure your customers like what they experience when dealing with you.

The difference between customer service and customer experience, as Royston explains (and I agree!!!) is as follows

1. Tangible needs – with the hairdresser example, the quality of the cut, styling etc
2. Informational needs – Hairdresser gives me more of what I need/want, appointments when I want, tea, advice on products etc.
3. Intangible needs – Meeting my emotional needs, making me feel wanted, calling me by my first name, letting me know when she is available, telling me when she moved salons
4. Affiliation needs – does it make me feel good to be part of something that regards me as special and visa-versa

To gain customers, we focus on the tangible needs of the product or service we are selling, and hope that we are given the opportunity to show what informational, intangible needs we can also offer. However it is often the case that once the sale is done, we fall into the trap of thinking the job is done and don’t focus on what makes the customer experience that much special.

Social media is all about experience, whether you are exchanging conversations with friends or prospective customers, if you make the experience enjoying, the relationship will be that much more solid making the likelihood of any business relationship that much more concrete.

So, looking at the sequence Royston described above, its vitally important that you provide the INTANGIBLE NEEDS to a customer BEFORE they buy. Wow, then once they buy, it will be partly because you met their emotional needs first. Commonly it is the smaller and medium size companies that get this social media thing and big corporates are slow on the intake, not all I must say but most. Social Media allows us to give that customer experience before they buy.

Looking at your own business what can you do with your marketing and sales, to ensure you give intangible needs that your customers crave?

Reading many personal development websites, as you do, I came across Jack Canfield’s 7 tips for success, and reading through them, it struck me how these are the steps I took,in various forms to get from the 9-5 job to running my own coaching and training company 2 1/2 years on.

Tip 1

Take 100% Responsibility for Your Life.

What Jack says – “One of the greatest myths that is pervasive in our culture today is that you are entitled to a great life-that somehow, somewhere, someone is responsible for filling our lives with continual happiness, exciting career options, nurturing family time and blissful personal relationships simply because we exist. But the real truth is that there is only one person responsible for the quality of the life you live. That person is YOU”

Back in 2006 I knew I had to leave my 9-5 and start my own business, it is then I really tool responsibility for my life 100% and started to create an environment to leave on MY terms, as opposed leaving without no clear vision. Some people I have met who wish to start their own business, say they wish they could be made redundant, so then they have no choice but to do something, this is not taking 100% responsibility for their own lives, be brave and take a decision that is going to empower you.

Tip 2

Be Clear Why You’re Here.

What Jack says – “I believe each of us is born with a life purpose. Identifying, acknowledging and honoring this purpose is perhaps the most important action successful people take. They take the time to understand what they’re here to do-and then they pursue that with passion and enthusiasm.”

My 9-3 was in Sales and I was earning good money, but it didn’t feed my soul. The last few years in my job I stopped getting excited by the challenge. As time went on, I became more and more clear about what my purpose was and helping others, challenging them to achieve and getting others to realise their potential. This is why I am here

Tip 3

Decide What You Want.

What Jack says – “One of the main reasons why most people don’t get what they want is they haven’t decided what they want.  They haven’t defined their desires in clear and compelling detail… What does success look like to you?

What i wanted is to live life on my terms. 2 1/2 years in I can honestly say that I love working. I get a buzz when I am with clients. This may not have rung tru a few years a ago, however what I would say now is that, even if I didn’t need to earn,  I would still do what I am doing now.

Tip 4

Believe It’s Possible.

What Jack says – “Scientists used to believe that humans responded to information flowing into the brain from the outside world. But today, they’re learning instead that we respond to what the brain, based on previous experience, expects to happen next…In fact, the mind is such a powerful instrument, it can deliver to you literally everything you want. But you have to believe that what you want is possible”

As soon as I decided I was going to leave and really believed I could make thus happen, everything changed, my confidence, opportunities, people around me, all of it. As soon my aura was one of making this happen the energy around me flow in the same direction.

Tip 5

Believe in Yourself.

What Jack says – “If you are going to be successful in creating the life of your dreams, you have to believe that you are capable of making it happen…Whether you call it self-esteem, self-confidence or self-assurance, it is a deep-seated belief that you have what it takes- the abilities, inner resources, talents and skills to create your desired results”

This for me is linked with Tip 4, as soon as I believed in myself, I started to believe it was possible. I used to think, these things only happen to others, you need a lot of luck for it to happen, you need lots of money. All of these things became true as soon as I started believing in myself. I became the others, started getting luckier, and money started coming!

Tip 6

Become an Inverse Paranoid

What Jack says - “Imagine how much easier it would be to succeed in life if you were constantly expecting the world to support you and bring you opportunity. Successful people do just that.”

This is what I started doing, if things started to happen to me, how would I react? i.e. would I allow the success to come. People hold many fears, two prominent fears, are fear of failure and fear of success. If I wasn’t ready, would I have been fearful of the success?

Tip 7

Unleash the Power of Goal Setting

“Experts on the science of success know the brain is a goal-seeking organism. Whatever goal you give to your subconscious mind, it will work day and night to achieve… To engage you subconscious mind, a goal has to be measurable. When there are no criteria for measurement, it is simply something you want, a wish, a preference, a good idea.”

My first goal was to know how much I needed to survive for a year, without earning, while i was setting up my business. Once i got this figure, i then looked at ways of getting this money, my method was property investing and within a year of this decision, I got the amount I needed and left my job. Achieving this goal gave me the confidence to achieve any goal I set from the on.

What are your current challenges, go through each of Jack’s tip and see if you are playing full out and if you are holding back!

Carrying on talking, the phone rang again, this time I had a quick glance, it was my daughter?!  Its 1pm, she at school, why is she ringing? Immediately I thought what can be wrong. I said to the person I was talking to it was my daughter and she wouldn’t ring unless it was for a very good reason, so I took the call.

Like any dad, I said “Is everything alright? ” “Yes dad it is “ she said (Sapna), ” I got my GCSE module results today and got A* in Chemistry and B in Biology”, “Fantastic” I said, then I still said “…is there anything else, is everything OK.”, “Yes”.

The only reason my daughter called me was to give me her good news, the assumption I made because she doesn’t normally ring me during the day is that it has to be bad news! Is this an adult thing? Sapna didn’t think twice about ringing me, she was really happy and wanted to us to know straight away.

What would it be like if we just gave each other a call now and again to give some good news?  Who could you call now, just to give some good news?

Paulo Coelho, author of the bestselling book The Alchemist, has written a boo titled Warrior of the Light. It is a collection of short notes on accepting failure, embracing life and rising to your destiny. The Warrior, as Paulo describes is someone who knows that he is free to choose his desires, and he makes these decisions with courage, detachment, and sometimes with just a touch of madness.

On the surface to approach life as a Warrior may seem impractical. The focus, as a Warrior is on what you have control over, what you can do and let go of the things you cannot control. Stress is often caused by the y we choose to react to outside events. The Warrior is all about accepting these stresses and then letting them go.

Living life with the mindset of a warrior takes some skill. However the pursuit of this way of living can open many doors, the first of which is in our minds.

One such note in the book talks about the two columns on either side of the door he is trying to open.

One is called Fear and the other is called Desire. The Warrior looks at the column of Fear and on it is is written: “You are entering a dangerous, unfamiliar world where everything you have leaned up until now will prove useless.”

The Warrior looks at the column of Desire and on it is written: “You are about to leave a familiar world wherein are stored all the things you ever wanted and for which you struggled long and hard.”

The Warrior smiles because nothing frightens him and nothing holds him. With confidence of one who know what he wants, he opens the door.

So what we can learn from this? That whatever choices we come across in our lives, whatever choice you make will be the right one. How many choice have you made in your life that looking back were based on fear?  Courage is doing something or making a decision when fear is present. Desire is dictated by how much you want it. When you want something bad enough and you act on it, it is amazing how the feeling of fear subsides.

Do you have a decision to make? If you knew you would succeed what would you do?  Think about Usain Bolt, the 100m Olympic Gold medallist. He knows he is the fastest man of earth. Does that mean he doesn’t train, eat the right things or get enough sleep? Absolutely not. He wants to make sure that when he is standing at the staring line he is in the best condition possible, that the actual race result is a forgone conclusion. So, Usain, knowing he will succeed, puts in all the work necessary to get the result he wants.

What can you do today, to ensure your success tomorrow?

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I am now into my 3rd year running my own business and I feel quite lucky that the internet and social media revolution has come about in time for my business to take advantage. If a sure if I was in my early twenties or thirties I’d be even more pleased.Editor, My Top 5 Social Media Video’s, Apr 2010

You should read the whole article.

When Alexander Graham Bell invented the telephone, he didn’t give any instructions in how you should use it, or what you should say. In the process of looking for an alternative to the telegraph system, Bell was looking to improve the current system so that multiple messages could be sent at the same time. This led to the accidental discovery that sound could be heard over the telegraph system.Baiju, Dinner and Desktop Social Media for Business

You should read the whole article.

Last week I attended a seminar where they talked about the importance of diversifying your financial portfolio. Any good IFA worth their salt will tell you that you should never have your investments in one place, or even in one type of investment, i.e. stocks & shares, property, ISA’s, the list goes on. Financial wealth is determined by the number of sources of income you have. The more sources the more financial wealth you can acquire.

This got me thinking about Emotional Wealth. Do we allow ourselves to have a diverse portfolio of emotional wealth? Before I carry on, I think it important to give you how I interpret emotional wealth. Assuming that financial wealth is being financially abundant, that gives one freedom to have the life they want, I see emotional wealth as something that ensures we have balance in our lives and have many more good days than bad days. As a starting point I believe it starts from within, understanding how our emotions impact on all our parts of our lives. Being emotionally wealthy is about have numerous sources that feed our emotional well-being.

The diversification of your financial portfolio is dependent of your mindset and attitude to risk. Does your emotional wealth depend on your mindset and attitude to risk? Well maybe. The sources of achieving financial wealth have already been mentioned, what could be the sources of emotional wealth?

Well for starters I would say

These are the ones that I can think of. Are these in order, well they are in the order I thought of them. Mindset and risk play a part in the number of sources you have. For example from a finance point of view if you are risk averse you are more likely to put your money in a savings account than into stock & shares. If your personality allows you to take more risk you may invest in the stocks and maybe property. How does this relate to emotional wealth?

If you are risk averse you maybe reluctant to have many sources, i.e. the fear of all these people letting you down, or them judging you would be too painful. Allowing yourself to be open to others can be a risk for some. However once you start to communicate and start contributing the joy and reassurance this can give you is invaluable.

Social Media is something relatively new, however here to stay. When you look at the activity of social media forums, there is an overriding contribution to emotional wealth. Social media has allowed us to be more open about our needs in the business community. This is shown by the number of people giving testimonials, recommendations or generally saying nice things about each other, without the attachment of wanting anything back.

One immediate tool that has allowed this is twitter. By only allowing up to 140 characters you have to be succint in your message. Follow Friday (#FF, where you recommend people other’s could follow) feeds ones emotionally well-being. When someone recommends you to thousand’s of others, that they could follow you, it makes you feel good.

One of the sources of emotional wealth I mention is advocates. An advocate, in this context, is someone who speaks and recommends you when you are not there. Ultimately this is the role social media plays. The different platforms that are available, twitter, facebook, ecademy, linkedin etc, allow us to communicate not only to people we know, but to people we don’t. If they read or see something that interests them, there is a chance they would want to share this with others (how keen are you to tell your friends if you’ve been to a nice restaurant or seen a movie you liked).

Two things happen when this occurs, one you feel good (increase emotional wealth) they like you, as you have not attached anything to this recommendation( their emotional wealth increases). The likelihood is they will do the same for you and recommend you to others.

Do we need multiple sources to be emotionally healthy, no, however like finance, if you do have multiple sources the chances are, that most of your emotional needs will be met. This includes business. It is very easy to think that emotional needs are only valid in personal relationships with your spouse, children, family or close friends. We all know this is not true, to be emotionally wealthy within your work setting is essential.

Various surveys show, when you feel valued in your place of work, performance increases results are better and morale is high, all because the emotional needs are being met.

With the demands we put on ourselves to be successful in what we do, it is essential that we are emotionally wealthy. So like an IFA would do a financial health check, conduct a emotional health check on yourself, or better still get an expert to do it. Looking at the list above, how many of these sources do you benefit from? Can you think of other areas where you can increase your emotional wealth.

Working from home for 2 years now, it took me about 6 months to get used to being my own boss, and working when I wanted to work. But when it comes to schools holidays, all the rules change.

I have 3 beautiful children Sapna (13), Milan (11) & Suraj (6) as you see on the right.

When they are at school its great, I set them off in the morning, (well my wife does, same thing yeah!) and I then  fully focus on the task at hand.

Last week was half term and, well lets just say, it was different, no different to other holidays, just that I felt different. My wife works 4 days a week, so I took one day ‘off’ to be with the kids, the other daysI was working talkingsome time to be with them and the kids we either doing some homework, or playing on the Wii.

By Thursday there had been numerous occasions when I was either on the phone or working and they were either shouting, playing loudly or just generally being happy.

Now the sound of children playing and being happy is fantasitic, but when you are in that moment looking to focus it can be quite frustrating.

It all came to a head on Friday, they were having a difference of opinion about playing on the Wii, it was about 3ish and I came downstairs, to find out what was going on and then in a moment of complete lack of awareness I said the most stupid of statements.

“Don’t you know I work from home?”

The look on their faces, well I wish I had a camera, their expressions were one of, ‘and your point is’. It was in that moment that it was my issue to deal with that fact it was holidays, not there’s to be quiet and how to behave when I am working at home.

During the holidays it is up to me to adjust my week, not the children.  The reason I do what I do is for more choice and so my family get the best of me.

Do you adjust your day when its schools holidays? Do your children act differently.

Love to hear your stories

If you ever feel like giving up on something, think again. Its not about how many times you fail, but how many times you keep getting up…