Blog

I had lunch with a friend the other day, a local business owner.  She was frustrated with her employees, who never seemed to know what she really wanted.  They required constant direction and even micro-managing. I asked, “What is the first thing you look for when hiring?” She was a bit surprised by the question,…

As companies emphasize process to accommodate growth, a key concern becomes what to do with one’s “heroes.” “Heroes” are those people in your company whom everyone depends on to fix things and get things done. So what is the conflict between “heroes” and growth? Here are three. “Heroes” are unable to be duplicated. Each “hero”…

Building a service culture is something I get asked about often. Those words may not be the exact ones used, but it is what they mean.   It more often is asked as: How can we improve our teamwork? How do we instill a mindset of customer service? What is needed to tear down “silos” in…

The one thing you can’t do for yourself… is to coach yourself. Here’s why. You can’t see what you can’t see. Everyone has blind spots. A coach can be an extra set of eyes to assist you in “seeing” and understanding things going on in your organization, marketplace, or even within your leadership team, that…

At times in my career I was asked to take the helm of organizations that were struggling. Sometimes it required a turn around. Other times a jumpstart out of malaise. Either required a closer than usual monitoring of financial performance. Here are the first three questions I asked each week. Do We Have Enough Cash?…

As a CEO coach, I’m often called on to help address a specific problem. But as the solution is identified and put in place we then turn to how the problem occurred, or more often, why. The answer to why is someone made a decision (or didn’t make a decision) in line with the company’s…