Saturday, 10 October 2009

Don't let SEO burst your budget

SEO (Search Engine Optimisation) is specialist, expensive and you need to know what you are doing.. don’t you?

SEO-image-small Right?… wrong!

The commercial and financial climate that we are operating in is causing most of us to tighten our belts and think twice about spending. This especially true for Training, HR and other small consultancies and entrepreneurs.

The challenges for new startup firms and those that are trading but need a change of strategy to keep the work coming is:

“How are we going to get seen on the web in order to market ourselves effectively?”

Who can do this for us – it’s hard to get seen on the web isn’t it?

Your web designer will say that they can offer SEO and indeed a search on the web will give you 1000s of people and firms promising to get you on page one of Google. And all for £500-£1000 per month… ouch!

In good trading times this may be hard to justify – but in tough times?

The reality is that it is easy to get seen on page one of Google or other search engines – the ‘con’ a lot of providers will do is to help you find a “key word phrase” that is almost unique to you, and get that on page one of Google – easy.

Take a look at the phrase “squarespace template design” if I search for the term without quotes I get:

(See the current results yourself here – http://bit.ly/ASXKQ )

And with the quotes we get:

(See the current results yourself here – http://bit.ly/B4dRS )

This is a great ‘trick’ with the first search term Google only shows 6,730 results, getting to the top of only 6000 pages is not that difficult. On the second example where the search is for the exact phrase, there are only 4 results. Now after this blog is published the results will be very different. So using some simple techniques (that I will share with you) watch the results change over time. (this article is being written on 10/10/09).

The real test of SEO is getting to the first page for a popular search term- one with 10,000s or millions of results.

I say this is a ‘con’ as who would look for a product name? very few in the business world – our customers are looking for solutions to their problems. They wont be looking for “ABC Inc” – they will be looking for “train the trainer provider” or “train the trainer provider in London”. You need to think like your clients and find key words and phrases that they will be looking for.

So what are the secrets to doing SEO for yourself?

1) Research your customers and find out what they are looking for – you need to discover key words and phrases. (if it is things like “leadership development” “management development” or “train the trainer” then good luck for there are millions of sites with these words and while it is possible, it is very tough and time consuming. One way of making the achievable is to have a specialism i.e.:

Management development in the care sector
Train the trainer in Berkshire
Leadership development for women

The more specialist you can be the more likely your success at getting seen on the web .

2) Get your web developer to add your keywords to your site – in the title, in the description and in the other meta-tag areas of your pages – have different key words and phrases for each page

3) Write copy for those pages which make use of your keywords – repeat the phrase 3-5 times (each page MUST be very different)

4) Write a blog(off your site and free Wordpress or blogger), ensure that the content is supportive of your key words and include these in some of your articles – then have these articles link to your site (relevant pages) – yes put the links in the article, not just links on the blog itself

5) Promote your blog – on forums, on other blogs and on twitter. The ‘trick’ or secret is content and links. One powerful and low cost strategy is:

Where you use tools like Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook, Ning and forums to promote content that you have written on your blog. These are articles that are of interest to your audience. Your goal is to build a ‘name’ in your potential clients heads that you:

a) can be trusted

b) that you know what you are taking about

c) that you can solve their problems

d) you are confident enough that you ‘give away’ valuable material

As Robin Elliot said “Enthusiasm is contagious. When you are absolutely convinced, sold, passionate, enthusiastic and confident about what you're offering, it's hard NOT to sell.”

Have compelling reasons in your blog for readers to explore your site.

6) Encourage others to promote your blog, use Linkedin and other vehicles - with great content people will link to your blog – I recently (yesterday!) had a major US training provider send a link to a blog post to over 14000 of their clients – wonderful

7) Have good value material on your site, answer the questions purchasers want to ask, make sure your contact details are easily found – keep the site up to date. the site does not need to be large – but it must be kept fresh.

In SEO content is king.

The more you specialise the easier it is to write unique content, the more niche the content the greater the opportunity you have of attracting visitors, the more visitors the greater conversions you will have. SEO is no longer about the technical “stuff” that developers do – its is all about content and people valuing your content

The ultimate goal is to have people buy you and your service not you having to pitch and sell.

Purchasing SEO

Before you pay anyone for SEO work on your site check out their site. If they advocate using a blog – what is their blog look like? If they claim to be able to get you on page 1 of Google for your search terms – look and see if they have done it for themselves (use view source in your browser and Google the text they are using under “keywords”) – make sure they walk their talk – if they don’t – walk away!

Summary

Wow this is a lot of content for you to get your head around.

In follow-up articles I will share:

Step by step HOW to do each of the above (not the meta-tag – best left to the programmers)

I’ve already told you all you need to know – i.e. the WHAT

Then WHERE and WHEN will also feature.

SEO is best done by yourself, or in the very least as a partnership – don’t outsource this core part of your business – your Internet reputation.

PS if you want to check out these techniques for yourself, I have a ’secret’ project running. For 3 weeks I have been trying to get “train the trainer” with and without the quotes ranked in Google. This is a difficult one to break, I tried once before using old techniques and failed.

I am now hovering between pages 1 & 2 with over 3m results! Watch my progress http://bit.ly/sXDXE (staying on page 1 is my goal – not being at the top)

You do not need to do ALL the things I have talked about, but do link your strategies… http://rapidbi.com/management/2009/10/dont-let-seo-burst-your-budget/
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Friday, 9 October 2009

Why Organisational Development often fails to deliver

organisation pieces Organisational Development (OD) is the name or label given to many HR and training related strategies, but it is more than that.

Bennis in his early work “Organizational Development: nature, origins & prospects” defines OD as:

“a response to change, a complex educational strategy intended to change the beliefs, attitudes, values and structure of organizations so that they can better adapt to new technologies, markets and challenges”

This is just as true today as it was in 1969!

Research carried out within the Business Link organisation in the late 1990s and Warwick university looked at SME (Small and Medium sized Enterprises) (50-500 employees as an autonomous business unit or legal entity) with the view of identifying why management development strategies did not work. In summary the conclusions were:

Activity not linked to organisational objectives
No overall strategy for corporate development
Corporate culture not taken into account
Purchasers not clear about what they are buying
Suppliers finding solutions to problems they can solve
Lack of evaluation
Time pressures on managers
Change process not managed

These factors were found to be true for: training, organisational development, change and business support and improvement activity.

Starting out on the right foot

Some time ago I undertook a survey called “Developing the Developers” and one of the significant findings of this was the fact that the missing element in the majority of interventions was that of appropriate diagnosis. This is also true in organisational development at a holistic level. For any OD strategy to be effective we need to have a base of understanding of “where are we now”, we need to undertake a review of our business that can act as a benchmark measure. This will also enable evaluation of policy and strategy to be more effective. In other words before undertaking any OD activity we need to undertake some form of quantitative diagnostic process. This will then act as a reference point for all future development interventions and aid the evaluation of success (ROI etc).

Get the diagnostic process right and you have a great chance of success, miss it out or get it wrong and the chances of success are little to none. As the saying goes “fail to plan… plan to fail” planning in an OD context is diagnosis AND prioritisation.

The Business Improvement Review was designed to provide a holistic overview of an organisation with the view of undertaking OD or business improvement… http://rapidbi.com/management/2009/01/why-organisational-development-fails-to-deliver/
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Tuesday, 6 October 2009

Innovation, the first step - dare, change, take a risk

Innovation is about the first step

Innovation is the buzzword of the late naughties, but what does it mean?

“Innovation is the act of introducing something new“

Often we focus on the act of creating, indeed many training and development programmes look to developing creativity in order to create innovative cultures. Is this right?

Innovation can mean two very different things, I suspect that often we confuse the two. many organizations take innovation to be something to do with product and R&D or technology. This is indeed a very specialist area, however it is not for the technology people to hijack a valuable culture and change methodology and approach. In the service sector, in public sector and the NHS we need to look at the culture (how we do things) and the behaviours to deliver added value. This piece looks at innovation as a strategy everyone in an organisation can use to increase productivity, morale and the business as a whole.

You only need to look around. Look at - peoples houses, their gardens, their cars, their sense of fashion – creativity is everywhere. Unfortunately the culture of many work places encourages people to leave their creative brains at the door when they come to work every day. We need to focus not of the act of creation, but the ability to allow people to be creative. To do something with the ideas. This is about culture.

In western society we seem to treat risk as bad. Indeed even the dictionary defines it as:

The possibility of suffering harm or loss; danger

A factor, thing, element, or course involving uncertain danger; a hazard

source: answers.com

Without a ‘risk of loss’ there is no opportunity of gain. Lets look at how we may feel if we change the definition:

The possibility of winning or being successful

A factor, thing, element, or course involving uncertain success or achievement

source: rapidbi.com

The ability to “take a risk” is essential if we want to change the status quo. We need to embrace change. Indeed I would go as far as to say:

Innovation is achieved through creativity AND change preparedness

What are the barriers for you taking a chance, daring do take the first step. I love this video – what does it mean for you in the context of innovation and change?

In the Innovation Equation by Byrd & Brown Innovation is defined as:

Innovation = Risk Taking * Innovation

If Risk taking (act of doing something) is the same as change preparedness – then this is indeed a valuable approach to changing the culture in our organizations.

What will you dare to do… http://rapidbi.com/management/2009/10/innovation-the-first-step-dare-change-take-a-risk/
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Monday, 5 October 2009

Action Learning & Action Learning Sets - Reg Revans

Action Learning & Action Learning Sets

Introduction to Action learning

So what is Action Learning?

A definition of Action Learning

Action Learning Set Who is in it?

A ‘Set’ Meeting

Action Learning Projects

Participating in an Action Learning Set

Structuring your time

Introduction to Action learning

When devising a management development programme, it is important to ensure that participants are not only ‘taught’ or trained, but that they have an opportunity to put learning into action. Experience has shown us that unless we practice new skills and ideas soon after a programme we tend to forget the lessons learnt.

Action Learning is one of the methods effective programmes use to help participants apply learning. Other formal approaches will include your Line manager and your mentor.

Action Learning works best when a ‘Set’ of individuals are put together as a support group for the duration of the learning activity.

Action learning is a form of experiential learning, where “

Experiential Learning is the process of making meaning from direct experience”

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So what is Action Learning?

Action learning is based upon the concept of learning by reflection (or reviewing) on an experience. It is underpinned by the cycle of experiential learning as shown below, where the stages of reviewing and concluding are worked through with the Set.

In practice many of us tend to short circuit this cycle and often ship the reviewing phase as it is often difficult to do out of context.

Action learning will help ‘close the loop’ and ensure our learning is as effective as possible (more about learning cycles in module one). Action Learning Sets are primarily focused on the individual’s learning.

An Action Learning programme involves the following key elements:

The Set: a group of 6 – 8 people who meet regularly.
The Projects: each participant works on a project or task over the life of the set

The Set Adviser: a facilitator who helps the group to work and learn together.

Although Action Learning is flexible, it is not unstructured and focuses on the individual and their need NOT on the programme.

Participants on Action Learning Programmes have quoted many benefits which they have gained from action learning:

learning a more ‘disciplined’ way of working
learning to network
learning to relate to, and communicate with, others more effectively
gaining increased self-confidence
gaining increased awareness
gaining increased readiness to take responsibility and initiative.

In summary, the values which underpin action learning are:

membership of a set is voluntary
commitment must be demonstrated in making the process work
a positive, constructive approach to life
reflection as the key to learning
the presenter is focused (on her/his own issue)

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A definition of Action Learning

“Action Learning is an approach to the development of people in organisations which takes the task as the vehicle for learning. It is based on the premise that there is no learning without action and no sober and deliberate action without learning.

The method has three main components: people who accept responsibility for taking action on a particular issue; problems, or the task that people set themselves; and a set of six or so colleagues who support and challenge each other to make progress on problems. Action Learning implies both self-development and organisation development.” Mike Pedler (1991)

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Action Learning Set Who is in it?

An Action Learning Set is a group of 6-8 people who meet regularly to help each other to learn from their experiences. A Set Adviser is appointed to help manage the process. The set is not a team since its focus is on the actions of the individuals within it rather than on a shared set of work objectives.

Experience has shown that sets often work better when participants come with a similar level of experience. The Set Adviser is part of the set in one sense but has a particular responsibility to create a learning environment by encouraging, challenging and focusing on learning. Some Action Learning Sets are self-facilitated.

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A ‘Set’ Meeting

The Set will decide on its own way of working but usually a ‘meeting’ involves a series of individual time slots where participants take turns in presenting their project/ challenge/ issue to the set. This will normally involve:

an update of progress on actions from the last meeting
a presentation of current issues/problems
an agreement on actions for the future.

Throughout this, other participants will work with the presenter (by listening and questioning) to help them to decide what actions to take.

Time is always a limited resource in a set meeting and the Set Adviser must ensure that set participants get their full allocation (it is not a free discussion).

Some Sets develop a fixed agenda to speed up the start of the meeting but in any case, all participants should come fully prepared for the meeting.

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Action Learning Projects

The project is the piece of work around which the participant learns. It does not need to be linked to specific outcomes such as setting up a safety audit carrying out a particular task but could also be about acquiring skills or knowledge. For the purposes of this programme, however, the project must have a learning focus.

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Participating in an Action Learning Set

Preparing for a Set meeting:

Before the meeting it will help to get the best out of the session if participants can think through what to focus on with their set. The set may be somewhere that participants can ‘experiment’ with different behaviours such as consciously asking more questions than usual or being more reflective if they are usually very talkative. Presenters should:

prepare for meetings
structure their time
be clear about what they want – or want the set to – focus on
learn to ask for what they want
listen
generate action points for them self.

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Structuring your time:

Usually, the presenter will use their time to report on action taken as a result of the previous set meeting. It is useful to think about:

what I did
what happened
what was different from what I expected
what I did not do – why – what I did instead
what can I/have I learned from this?

This can form the basis for reporting back to the set who will then ask questions. The presenter can continue with:

what is the issue now
what actions could I take now
what action points can I identify

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Alternative Approaches
A presenter may wish to concentrate on a particular aspect of their project that s/he thinks the set can really help with. This gives a depth of focus which may be a more appropriate use of time than an overview.

Alternatively, the presenter may wish to ask the set to talk about a particular problem and s/he will listen and only ask for clarification at the end of an agreed time. This is helpful if the presenter is stuck for ideas to take the work forward.

The reverse of this is where the audience remains silent and the presenter talks through the project. A listening, attentive audience may help the presenter to clarify thinks for her/himself.

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Reviewing your time
At the end of each participant’s time slot it is useful for the presenter to review with the set the process by which the action points have been identified. S/he might ask for feedback on how s/he presented the project or might give the set feedback on what was helpful or unhelpful about the set’s interventions.

This can also be done by the whole set near to the end of the meeting. It helps the set to develop a supportive learning climate to work in.

A typical meeting might follow this format:

Introduction – a warm-up activity and confirmation of programme for the meeting
In agreed order each person in the Set:
- 10 Minute presentation of current ’state of play’/ position
- 10 minute of exploratory questions from the Set to help the presenter think through the issue
- 5 minute presentation to the Set on the action plan.
Closing session – time taken for the whole group to finish the meeting rather than drift off at the end. Would include an element of evaluation – what will we do differently next time.

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For more information on Action Learning & Action Learning Sets contact Mike
Morrison @ tracking

How to receive feedback from your manager

As my good friend @Quicklearn said on twitter a few days ago:

“So much written on how to give feedback. What help is out there for those destined to receive it?”

It promoted me to think.. in this light hearted reply (well it is the August silly season) lets look at the feedback methods and what they actually mean for you the recipient:

The feedback sandwich:

Praise (Bread)
‘Feedback’ (Meat)
Praise (Bread)

This approach is not to help us the recipient feel good – it is to soften the message for the giver. We all learn very quickly that when ‘good’ stuff is mentioned we know that “here come the message” – we hear the criticism and are so busy focused on the negative that we do not hear the follow on good stuff. This is not helped as the ‘good stuff’ is usually so fluffy that it is meaningless.

Managers – do not use this.

McGill provide these useful suggestions about giving effective feedback, here with comments for the recipients as to what is attempting to be achieved:

Clarity — Be clear about what you want to say. - as recipients we understand the purpose
Emphasise the positive — This isn't being collusive in the person’s dilemma – we are not all bad just this one mistake
Be specific — Avoid general comments and clarify pronouns such as "it," "that," etc. – we need to know exactly what we did wrong/ incorrectly
Focus on behaviour rather than the person – we are human and our intension was positive although our action may not have been appropriate
Refer to behaviour that can be changed – the manager is trying to help us here
Be descriptive rather than evaluative – they are giving use the facts as they see it without bias
Own the feedback – Use 'I' statements – the feedback is from them as a person
Generalisations – Notice "all," "never," "always," etc., and ask to get more specificity — often these words are arbitrary limits on behaviour - the more general the manager makes the feedback the more defencive we get as it feels like we are being attacked.
Be very careful with advice – People rarely struggle with an issue because of the lack of some specific piece of information; often, the best help is helping the person to come to a better understanding of their issue, how it developed, and how they can identify actions to address the issue more effectively.- we will only listen to ‘advice’ if we trust the person and have respect for their views

Ref Action learning: A practitioner's guide”, London: Kogan Page, 1994, p. 159-163

What good and bad experiences have you… http://rapidbi.com/management/2009/08/how-to-receive-feedback-from-your-manager/
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Friday, 2 October 2009

25 great tips on employee engagement - morale boosters

25 great tips on employee engagement – morale boosters

In difficult and tough economic times we still need to engage with our employees. While the big budgets may not be available any more there are lots of things that we can do which are effective.

The strategy for boosting employee morale – fast, is based on Abraham Maslow’s hierarchy of five basic human needs. He arranged these needs in the shape of a pyramid with each level forming the foundation for the next level.

Maslow hierarchy of needs

Self-Actualization needs – realising personal potential, self-fulfilment, seeking personal growth and peak experiences.
Esteem needs – self-esteem, achievement, mastery, independence, status, dominance, prestige, managerial responsibility, etc.
Belongingness and Love needs – work group, family, affection, relationships, etc.
Safety needs – protection from elements, security, order, law, limits, stability, etc.
Biological and Physiological needs – air, food, drink, shelter, warmth, sex, sleep, etc.

Below are ten ideas to start your thinking. many of these are obvious, but they are good to have in your employee engagement and morale-building tool-kit:

Praise people – look to “Catch People Doing it Right”, rather than trying to catch people out
Welcome Ideas – employee morale improves when people feel they are valued. Share and implement their innovations and ideas
Say thank-you. Even when there’s no money that changes hands, it can be extremely rewarding for an employee to know that his/her boss appreciate the work he/she is doing. Use the SMART approach – be specific about what you are thanking people for
Write a letter or email of appreciation. This doesn’t have to be expensive or even on a greeting card that is bought from a shop
Award a certificate of appreciation. The real value to the employee is in the realisation that their contribution is recognised and appreciated
Take the employee to lunch or out for a cup of coffee. Simply spending time together with the opportunity to say thanks and to exchange ideas is valuable
Buy a scratch-card or a lottery ticket (assuming doing so is compatible with everyone’s values) and give it along with a short note or card. Lottery tickets are fairly inexpensive, but can be fun and (in some instances) financially rewarding
Bring in donuts (or a selection of fruit if you’re health-conscious) for your people
Have a pot-luck breakfast or lunch. This is something that everyone can participate in and enjoy. The cost is manageable and it provides an opportunity for some enjoyable interaction
Hold a silly contest. In an office context, for example, you could award a prize for the most cheerful office or around holiday time in December for the most brightly decorated office or office-space
Give a new, interesting assignment. The key here is to make sure it’s something interesting to the employee. Sometimes all that’s needed to boost morale is a little bit of variety and a change of pace
Do a short employee survey to find out what employees like and don’t like about their jobs – and take action (where possible and sensible) to minimise the dislikes
Ensure that all senior managers spend a day on the ’shop-floor’ or customer-facing once a month
Have senior managers have lunch/ breaks with staff on a regular basis
On hot days arrange for ice-creams or iced drinks to be provided
Have senior people say ’sorry’ publicly when something has gone wrong (I am sorry – not we are sorry – needs to be personal)
Make time for fun. Incorporating some fun into your workday is a terrific morale booster
Encourage peer recognition. “People like to be recognised personally by their peers”
Encourage people to ‘decorate’ or personalise their working space – people perform better in comfortable surroundings
If deadlines or targets have been met then let people go home early on a Friday (not every week – its supposed to be a reward not an expectation)
Offer stress relief activities. Hire a local massage school to offer free 10-minute chair massages
Help people feel valuable. Talk with employees about the types of projects, training, or experiences they would like to have. Times may be diffivult and tough for people to get jobs, but your best people are also the most marketable
Celebrate peoples birthdays. Empower managers to ‘do something different’ for each person, help them feel special
Measure It, keeping a watch on the levels of morale in your business/ organization/ firm by regularly measuring employee satisfaction
Fire Staff. Sometimes the root cause of low employee morale can be an employee whose negativity brings down the team. Even a top performer can bring down staff behind your back (didn’t see this one coming… or did you?)

Remember these are meant to be boosters – so the effects they will have are short term individually – but a culture of going the extra mile and doing the ‘little things’ builds engagement. These techniques work best when they are not done to a formula – this feels impersonal and will defeat the objective.

For information on RapidBI’s cost effective on-line (customisable) employee engagement and satisfaction survey - The EESS.

Feel free to add your top morale booster tips as comments:
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Saturday, 26 September 2009

Twitter as a learning aid - learning beyond university to informal learning

Learning beyond university to informal learning using micro-blogging

formal university learning Twitter can be used as a great aid to learning, but is it a replacement for traditional learning strategies?

Following the publication of a recent post Why Twitter is good for learning we have received a significant amount of supportive feedback. However some academic based sites have criticised the piece without understanding some of the fundamentals of learning and what Twitter and other micro-blogging platforms are capable of offering. Certainly learning appears to be stuck in the confines of “formal learning”, apparently missing the 80% of real learning that most of us do on a day to day basis.

It is interesting, as I sit and write this I am thinking about getting ready to attend the IITT annual training conference, one of only two “formal learning” interventions I will have undertaken for several months. But is this the only learning I do? .. no. I learn far more in an informal way from reading blogs , twitter and networking with like (and unlike) people.

This short piece has been written to provide some clarity on the application of the first article.

Firstly let me clarify my thoughts:

I am not advocating that Twitter can replace e-learning, classrooms or books, nor indeed any formal learning tool or strategy, however I am advocating use of twitter as an adjunct to learning strategies as a blended approach to re-enforce learning and key messages. We know that the most effective learning needs to be ‘just in time’, in a styles (learning or communication) that suits the learner, and that repetition helps.

Having read comments on other sites about this piece it is interesting that some people equate learning to be education, and only effective from university or books. Learning to me is very different from education and knowledge. Indeed our own model:

Knowledge >>> Understanding >>> Action = Learning

shows this – where education often only provides the knowledge.

Our work over the past 10 years with many owner-managers and entrepreneurs (many educated at some of the worlds leading MBA courses, UK, US & EU) clearly demonstrate that people gain knowledge on such courses, however real Understanding comes from making real world mistakes after putting it into action. Not from comprehension at an academic level. Many exiting from MBAs and other such programmes believe they have understanding – however as is often shown using the model – the four steps to learning we don't know what we don't know (unconscious competence), is often the mental state we are in after completing such a course. This is not to say that these programmes are not of value, they are – but not in the way many expect.

Not all learning occurs within the confines of a university or other establishment

Twitter is a tool which appears to have been adopted more by those in the age group 30-45 and little in the group 18-25. This says a lot about the platform and its relevance. Twitter as a learning tool is by its nature adhoc, sporadic, informal and most of all unstructured. Exactly the way we learn when we are not on a fixed programme of study. It is very much about learning what you need to learn at a given point in time.

So twitter and other micro-blogging tools:

great to create a spark – a desire to learn
great to find current thinking – and to start the journey of learning in a given area
excellent for adhoc information and knowledge acquisition
excellent as a refresher to existing learning
excellent for learning from peers and their experiences

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Tuesday, 22 September 2009

2-minute Twitter guide for marketing

Twitter is currently one of the fastest growing communication tools available to organizations big and small. While origionally designed as a social networking/ chat tool, it is rapidly finding its way as a marketing and training tool.

Twitter is both a social and marketing tool – don’t abuse either approach. If your tweets are mainly business – tell people in your bio or DM (if you must). If its mainly personal declare it too – sure you many lose some followers in the short term, but gain in the long term.

Some simple rules to help you get the most out of this marketing tool:

* Don't over-promote. Twitter is not just a marketing tool
* Send a key message a couple of times at different times of the day
* Don’t send the same message begging people to support your site 100s of times – let them choose to support or not
* Be helpful. Offer advice and useful links – not just to your site
* Don't stay on Twitter all day. Treat it like a visit to the coffee machine
* ReTweet messages you think your followers will value
* ReTweet reciprocal tweets to blogs from your followers and they will do the same
* Ask questions, get involved in debates
* Be polite
* Be yourself. Never pretend to be someone else
* If you want to send something sensitive, send a direct message
* Never swear
* Never flame
* Have fun – lots of it

See 24/7 tweet on Twitter
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What is happening in the world of L&D (Training)? Is it changing?

Experienced L&D people are bleeding out of organisations and going freelance

training room While talking to a colleague, he confirmed that there appears to be a trend in the training world at the moment. This trend is supported by the change in readership of both my site and blog are getting.

Here is the thought – I’d appreciate your views on this:

Experienced professionals are leaving organisations and going freelance, leaving behind managers and less experienced individuals to carry on delivering.

The evidence:

Times are tough for many organisations and firms are looking to reduce costs. Learning and Development (Training) is seen as a “luxury” so cuts are targeted. People with experience and significant qualifications and competence are seeing the opportunity to take redundancy and “go freelance”.

At networking events there is a distinct increase in the number of “new” coaches and trainers – mainly coaches!

On forums and online networks, there is a trend for a lot of self promotion, and on the whole it looks like people new to the industry, rather than established people “desperate for work”. This activity I have seen on a number of forums and discussion groups I moderate (TrainingZone and LinkedIn)

Types of articles being read. There is certainly (on this site) a trend towards some of the basic articles on “basics of training”, the How to… type of article. The reading numbers for these have gone from 10-12 a day to 30-50, for each article. The numbers here are going through the roof. The extent to which this is L&D professionals looking to information, or people from outside L&D (managers) I do not know – maybe I should add a poll to the site… now there is a thought…

E-Learning

Are those colleagues left behind looking to e-learning as a cost effective way of meeting their organisations needs? certainly, some of our advisers have just undertaken significant contracts providing “Instructional Design” expertise to some of the UKs biggest E-learning providers, as they have a large and growing order book.

Is it that E-learning is more effective? or because it is easier to purchase? E-learning is great for knowledge based acquisition, but not effective (at the low cost end) for behavioural change and improvement. It also requires little skill from the purchaser to have a product, as the role of the “training professional” is to write the basic spec and project manage, not to look at the design itself.

Coaching

Why are so many people leaving industry and setting up as “coaches”? Why are so many people still confused by coaching? Well this latter question is harder to answer – why are new people going freelance and calling themselves “coaches” – simple.. research being published by organisations like the CIPD show that coaching is on the increase, and must be in demand. over the past 2-4 years many people have completed “accredited” and prestigious coaching courses so deem themselves ready for the coaching market.

The CIPD reports says that “90% of organisations now use coaching” which in the context of “Coaching at work” is correct – coaching as a MANAGEMENT STYLE is prolific and has been encouraged. However the growth of the executive or performance coach market (from a purchasers point of view) has not increased at the same rate. Indeed one-to-one coaching seems to be on the cost cutting list. Coaching at work and employing external coaches are not the same thing.

People that call themselves “coaches” but actually deliver “training” are doing themselves and there clients a disservice.

Sustainability

Sustainability needs to be maintained both within the organisation, sustainable standards, skills abilities etc, and in the market place. If too many people pitch for the same work, then often the purchaser will use price as a differentiator. This is not healthy for either side in the long run. A freelance individual must have a sustainable business model, and client organisations must have a sustainable supplier. If you are paying £100 for a current service – what will you do when that provider goes bust – and the going rate is £1000? How long will your budget last?

Outsourcing

One advantage of outsourcing e-learning is that the activity can be done anywhere in the world. India and other parts of the world have high quality software people, but English and grammar is not as good as many of us require it to be. Outsourcing has its own dangers.

Conclusions

When looking to cut costs – be careful what the “price” is of that activity – better to get added value than a “lower cost”.

While an experienced L&D professional my look expensive on the budget sheet, what is the overall saving they are providing your organisation over a year? The purchase of one wrong. ineffective training intervention can easily outweigh the salary and benefits package of a good performer.
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Tuesday, 15 September 2009

Flow - The formula for optimal success (Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi)

Flow is a concept developed by Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi, in his book “FLOW” he describes peoples experience of what makes an experience genuinely satisfying or what it is like to be in the state of flow.

Flow is a state of consciousness which can be achieved on an individual path, providing optimal performance.

Dynamics of flow or optimal experience

In the book Csikszentmihalyi lists a number of fact which accompany an experience of flow:

1. Clear goals (expectations and rules are discernible and goals are attainable and align appropriately with one’s skill set and abilities).

2. Concentrating and focusing, a high degree of concentration on a limited field of attention (a person engaged in the activity will have the opportunity to focus and to delve deeply into it).

3. A loss of the feeling of self-consciousness, the merging of action and awareness.

4. Distorted sense of time, one’s subjective experience of time is altered.

5. Direct and immediate feedback (successes and failures in the course of the activity are apparent, so that behaviour can be adjusted as needed).

6. Balance between ability level and challenge (the activity is neither too easy nor too difficult).

7. A sense of personal control over the situation or activity.

8. The activity is intrinsically rewarding, so there is an effortlessness of action.

9. People become absorbed in their activity, and focus of awareness is narrowed down to the activity itself, action awareness merging.

Not all are needed for flow to be experienced.

In the past when looking at top performers, business has looked towards sport, and in particular individual based events like athletics. The concept of “being in the zone” during an athletic performance fits within Csikszentmihalyi’s description of the flow experience.

Flow can happen when you're "really into" what you're doing. It also has positive benefits. When you're in a flow state, you're not normally thinking "I'm happy doing this" or "I love this," because you're too focused on the activity. Afterward, though, you might think something like: "That was fun."

Some points about flow:

“People seem to get more flow from what they do on their jobs than from leisure activities in free time.” It turns out that watching TV is not at all a flowful activity. People generally report higher levels of stress, depression, and tension after watching TV. It seems that TV’s main virtue is that it occupies the mind undemandingly. Flow is hard to achieve without effort. Flow is not “wasting time”.
Some activities lend themselves to flow. Immediate feedback, commensurate challenges and skills, and clear goals are all precursors to flow. Lack of these makes flow difficult to achieve.
Some people are inclined to flow. They set goals even when apparently doing nothing, and are able to focus their attention easily. These sorts of people can experience flow even in difficult situations–prison camps and harsh jobs being two examples Csikszentmihalyi studied.
Flow tends to result in personal growth. By engaging in flow, your skills develop, requiring greater challenges to maintain the balance needed for flow.

Biography – Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi

Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi (pronounced “ME-high CHICK-sent-me-high-ee”) is a professor in the Department of Psychology ( University of Chicago).

He has devoted his life’s work to the study of what makes people truly happy, satisfied and fulfilled. Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi is a fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences and a member of the National Academy of Education and National Academy of Leisure Sciences. He has been a Senior Fulbright Fellow and currently sits on several boards, including the Board of Advisor’s for the Encyclopedia Britannica.

Mihaly’s work is sort and respected both inside and outside academia, demonstrated by significant and popular articles in Psychology Today, the New York Times, the Chicago Tribune, the Washington Post, and Newsweek, and his appearances on foreign television networks such as the BBC and RAI (Italian television), and in several hour long segments of “Nova.”

His current interests include the study of creativity, especially in art; socialization; the evolution of social and cultural systems; and the study of intrinsically rewarding behaviour in work and play settings, all being connected by a conceptual approach based on systems theory.

Watch Mihaly talk about the topic:

Books by Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi, include:
Flow: The Classic Work on How to Achieve Happiness
Flow: The Psychology of Optimal Experience
Good Business: Leadership, Flow, and the Making of Meaning
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Learning Styles Questionnaire - Honey & Mumford style LSQ - TRAP

A ‘lite’ version of a learning styles questionnaire:

This Learning Styles Questionnaire is loosely based on the model developed by Peter Honey and Alan Mumford this ‘lite’ version can help you identify typical strengths in your learning habits.

Instructions:

Look at the following statements – if they are usually true for you tick the appropriate white box

Question	A	P	T	R
I find it easy to meet new people and make new friends
I am cautious and thoughtful
I get bored easily
I am a practical, “hands on” kind of person
I like to try things out for myself
My friends consider me to be a good listener
I have clear ideas about the best way to do things
I enjoy being the centre of attention
I am a bit of a daydreamer
I keep a list of things to do
I like to experiment to find the best way to do things
I prefer to think things out logically
I like to concentrate on one thing at a time
People sometimes think of me as shy and quiet
I am a bit of a perfectionist
I am enthusiastic about life
I would rather “get on with the job” than keep talking about it
I often notice things that other people miss
I act first then think about the consequences later
I like to have everything in its “proper place”
I ask lots of questions
I like to think things through before getting involved
I enjoy trying out new things
I like the challenge of having a problem to solve
	Activist style	Pragmatist Style	Theorist style	Reflector style
Total number of 'ticks'

The higher scores on the learning styles format questionnaire suggest this is an area of preference. All of us use all of the styles to a greater or lesser extent, using your profile you can better identify learning methodologies suited to your preferences. For descriptions on the four preferences see our other pages:

learning-styles-honey-mumford

http://rapidbi.com/created/learningstyles.html

http://rapidbi.com/management/2009/06/four-learning-styles/

While this simple (unscientific) instrument can be a useful discussion tool, we would highly recommend using Honey and Mumford's LSQ instrument, this questionnaire contains 80, well researched questions and effective analysis. www.peterhoney.com
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Monday, 14 September 2009

The four steps to learning

Four step learning ladder – a model for learning to learn

Personal learning four steps, conscious competence

The Learning Ladder describes the steps we go through when learning a new skill.

Four levels or steps of learning

Unconscious incompetence – We don’t know what we don’t know

Conscious incompetence – We know what we don’t know

Conscious competence – We know what we know

Unconscious competence – We don’t know what we know

It can be applied to virtually all learning scenarios but the example we will use here is learning a second language. Suppose we think about learning to speak German.

How might we understand this learning model?

I begin as a child, at a level of Unconscious Incompetence. I cannot speak the language but I am not aware of this.

I may not even know Germany or language other than my mother tongue exists. One year we go on holiday to Germany. As my awareness expands I move to a level of Conscious Incompetence - I am aware that the language “German” exists and I am aware that I cannot speak it. I now have the option to do something about it.

I embark on a German course and become a proficient speaker. However, I am not yet fluent, I have to concentrate hard to get it right and am aware of my limitations. I am at a level of Conscious Competence.

Finally, after many years of learning and practise I become fluent in German, start to think in German and even dream in German. Speaking a foreign language becomes second nature to me and I no longer have to concentrate hard on the formation of the language. I have reached the level of Unconscious Competence.

Think of some other learning scenarios and see how these steps apply. Consider how you can use this information to help people learn more effectively.

“Until you make the unconscious conscious, it will direct your life, and you will call it fate.” – Carl Jung

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Four levels of learning - Conscious competence

The personal competence model

Unconscious Incompetence – We don’t know what we don’t know
Conscious Incompetence – We know what we don’t know
Conscious Competence – We know what we know
Unconscious Competence – We don’t know what we know

How to use the Personal competence awareness model:

To communicate with and influence learners it is a prerequisite to prepare them for your ideas and for them to accept the ideas of others (in the group).

Preparing them requires you to understand how and why they react.

An ideal way of understanding an audience is to remember what it was like for you when you first started learning a subject which you subsequently found to be quite difficult.

You may have gone through the four levels of competence or learning chanels.

1 To explain these levels you need only think your own experience when you

first started learning to drive to drive. Before your first lesson, you may have been full of confidence thinking it would be easy. This first stage is described as the level of unconscious incompetence – you don’t know how bad you are yeti You are unaware of your own incompetence.

2 When you started to drive you would have then found out how difficult it

was and you would have been aware of your own inability or incompetence. This stage is the level of conscious incompetence when you know how little you know. It is at this stage that people feel most uncomfortable.

3 After driving for some time you will have gained more confidence and you

then became aware of how well you were doing – this is the level of conscious competence, when you are aware of your own competence.

4 Finally, you passed the test and started driving without even having to think

of the sequence of steps needed to drive a car, you simply did it. This final stage is the level of unconscious competence where being good at something no longer requires a conscious thought process. You are now unconsciously competent. The second stage of the cycle is the one that causes us the most anguish. Human beings as a rule don’t like to know, they don’t know and this is where preparation is of vital importance.

How you prepare an audience will have a great bearing on how much you will communicate with them and how much they will allow you to influence them.

We start by acknowledging possible discomfort. We explain that what may be said may be new but that with sufficient time and explanation things will become clearer and easier. We recognise that there may be certain apprehensions, perhaps even misgivings about the subject. We point out that others, who may have felt the same thing before, benefited and are now using what we are talking about. The preparation is simply to put people at ease about themselves.
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Sunday, 13 September 2009

Developing entrepreneurial skills into business people

HAVE-DO-BE or DO-BE-HAVE?

In business we often hear terms like 'business person' or 'entrepreneur' but what do they mean and can we train these skills.Let's look at what these terms mean before we explore a route to development:Business person "a person engaged in commercial or industrial business (especially an owner or executive)"Entrepreneur "An individual who, rather than working as an employee, runs a small business and assumes all the risk and reward of a given business venture, idea, or good or service offered for sale. The entrepreneur is commonly seen as a business leader and innovator of new ideas and business processes".
Definitions taken from www.answers.com

"First say to yourself what you would be; and then do what you have to do." – — Epictetus

If this is true, the key difference in 'common understanding' of the terms ‘business person’ and ‘entrepreneur’ include:

Running or owning the business… and
Assumes all the risk and reward… and
A leader… and
An innovator of ideas, products or processes

This could mean that with having achieved the right experiences and doing the job they become a business person.

Where as an entrepreneur becomes the innovator, does something to get the idea or product to market and as a result has (have) achieved the acquisition of skills and knowledge.

In the book The reality game: a guide to humanistic counselling and psychotherapy by John Rowan published in 1983, the authors say:

"Most of us think that if we have enough worldly goods, then we can do what we want to do, and then we can be happy. The sequence "HAVE-DO-BE". But what we say in humanist psychology is exactly the other way around. If we can be who we really are we will find ourselves doing things which genuinely satisfy us and give us enjoyment, and then we shall have all we really want. The sequence for us is "BE-DO-HAVE""

So how does this translate to business and entrepreneurship?

Over the past 10+ years I have been fortunate enough to work with 1000s of business owners and entrepreneurs. The difference is often striking.

The business person wants evidence, facts, resources. They often wait for you to go to them to initiate the relationship in some form. (Have information, do… be)

The entrepreneur wants ideas, thoughts. The entrepreneur will often seek out like minded people; they do not wait to be approached. (Be inquisitive, do … have)

Is this the missing link? All to often we are asked to develop entrepreneurial thinking, to encourage innovation and to generate empowerment. We often look at skills and culture, but do we really look at the psychology of the individual(s) and explore their current thinking preferences?

Developing the skills

The HAVE-DO-BE approach (which is where most employees are) is there, and this seems to be culturally driven. The shift to an entrepreneurial approach of DO-BE-HAVE seems to be one of attitude, and so can be developed.

A development programme would then take the existing journey HAVE-DO-BE for many things and develop the confidence to DO-BE-HAVE. Reflection on each step as well as coaching and mentoring can support the development process.

One approach may well be to coach individuals to take some risks, to challenge current thinking and to adopt a DO-BE-HAVE approach. We need at the same time to put in mechanisms to support the risk-taking and the increased likelihood of errors and mistakes – i.e. the output from learning taking place!
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Friday, 3 April 2009

HRD 2009 - are you off to Excel this year?

HRD 2009 is nearing, while this year I will not be able to attend the whole conference I will be attending the exhibition.

What are you going for?

What are you hoping to achieve?

Mike Morrison is director of RapidBI, an organizational effectiveness consultancy. He has been involved in HR, OD and strategic development for over 20 years. He can be contacted via www.rapidbi.com/

© This article is copyright RapidBI 2006, 2008 – it may be copied providing the authors are credited, and direct links maintained

Tuesday, 20 January 2009

rising cost of learning and training

Monday, 19 January 2009

Can Twitter make money?

A thought today, as I was working on adding a background to my twitter page I thought it would be great if this were like my blog or site.
Twitter needs to find a business model - so

One of the missing features is the ability to have links on the 'twitter background' and this is worth paying for - what about offering for a sum the ability to have an active link in the background area? pay per additional link and pay to have an RSS feed.

I want Twitter to survive and if the sums are right I think this could ensure the future of this brilliant service.

Twitter people are you listening?

Friday, 12 December 2008

Entrepreneurial Innovation - Fad or key to success?

The world economy is changing… are we reacting fast enough?

For many entrepreneurs innovation is just not happening fast enough according to recent articles and research from Boston Consulting Group’s annual study on innovation.

Many organisations know that first in order to survive and then to grow they need to innovate. In recent years the focus of innovation has been on creativity and the innovative process, but the lack of results show that this is only half the picture.

Background to entreprenural innovation
In the 1960s and 70s Dr Richard Byrd developed some research which led to the publication of a model he originally called the C&RT or creativity and risk taking (1986). This model was adopted by the Pfeiffer publications company as a key part of a methodology they called Applied Strategic Planning. They realised that for successful strategy, risk and innovation as behaviour (rather than a process) was fundamental. In the 1990s Byrd’s daughter, Dr Jacqueline Byrd further refined and developed the C&RT and used the technology available on the web to make the Creatrix model more robust and provide the ability to delve deeper to ensure any development activity resulted in effective behaviour change.

Innovation everywhere but little progress
Many organisations have innovation departments, functions or teams and yet little progress is actually being made in terms of productivity, cost saving or market share. Certainly organisations are developing new and innovative products, but as technologies collide and merge and economies tighten, the consumer buys less. For example the markets or phones, music players, cameras and GPS systems are merging fast – where there used to be four markets increasingly there is one.
Innovation needs to be at all levels and in all elements within an organisation to be effective. In the 1990s benchmarking processes to identify the most effective way of working was everywhere, not organisations need to innovate internally to deliver best value in all that they do, not just product development. This is where entrepreneurial innovation leads the way.

The fish rots from the head
Is the old saying, but innovation grows from the head. When introduces from the top as part of an organisations culture innovation can really make a difference. The key is the culture of the organisation, effective culture change starts from the CEO or COO.
Using tools like the Creatrix, executive or entrepreneurial innovation can be easily developed and nurtured, then when entrepreneurs see the results they will soon want the whole organisation to behave this way too.

Innovation assessment
The Creatrix starts as a personal profile, with each individual involved in the change process undertaking a simple online inventory. The results of this single profile show the individual on the Creatrix grid, a combination of the individuals risk taking assessment and creativity assessment. In addition the individual gets an output showing the seven drivers and their respective strengths.
Collectively all the individuals involved in the team or organisation are plotted on one matrix or grid providing an overall innovation assessment.
This enables the entrepreneurial team to review the current position of innovative behaviours and plan where is appropriate (there is no right or wrong profile – just more or less effective at that point in time). Then using the language of the Creatrix it is straightforward to develop a change based programme using the (now) common language to inspire and motivate appropriate change.

Dan Coughlin said
“Apply the same process you do at work by asking the following questions:
1. What does this individual or the members of this group want to achieve?
2. What is keeping them from achieving their objectives?
3. What can I provide or remove that would increase their chances of success?
4. How can I combine my answers to question three in a way that will add the most value to them?
5. Stop writing and move into action!
Mother Theresa was a classic example of this behaviour. She identified opportunities to add value and moved into action. We can do the same over and over again.“

Identifying opportunities and taking action are the two critical elements, simple, and yet many organisations still have barriers in place. Some of these barriers are obvious, many are invisible and should not exist… but they do

For innovation to be commonplace in our organisations we must stop looking at innovation as a process and start to look at it as a culture or set of behaviours.

Product innovation is one thing – entrepreneurial innovation is quite another.

Thursday, 11 December 2008

Fun police - channel 4

Watched this programme and..
The h&s consultant was showing staff in a glazing firm and did manual handling poorly - that is what he was training!

H&s office in a local council and tripnhazzards everywhere !

Saturday, 22 November 2008

Twitter - corporate friend or foe?

The world of business has slowly started to welcome and adapt to blogs, but will the SMS of the web 2.0 world do the same thing? Is there a place for short 140 character entries? Do we want to know that someone has walked the dog this morning?

Certainly Twitter has taken the media world by storm and many journalists are using the platform for short, up to the minute Soundbites.

Over the coming months I am going to experiment with Twitter and share some of the interesting facts, quotes and ideas. I am not going to be doing this on an hourly basis.. but more like a daily entry (or so) a lite blog if you like - I'd be interested to hear your views and links to your tweets.

Tuesday, 11 November 2008

Starting change from the bottom - or without support from the top

On a change management forum recently I come across this interesting post:

Does anyone have any comments or experience about how it is possible to change the culture within a department without support from the top?
In fact the very top may actually be part, in no way all of, the cultural problem.
Cultural issues have been identified such as fear of top, lack of innovation, mistrust, low motivation, negativity
Managers and sample of staff are happy to try to work on this Senior management who will sanction any action are seen to be part of the problem
The question is whether it is possible to effect any form of cultural change without support from the top?

This I am sure is not an uncommon situation faced by many HR, L&D and project teams. and to those members it is a perfectly reasonable problem to solve.

Having been involved with change at all levels in organisations and as an external adviser, I know that culture change like this can be initiated in this way (indeed it happens when you bring any new manager in) the challenge is to have the consistent culture across the organisation.

BUT - and it is a big one...who wants the change? Why?

Incremental change when individuals enter the organisation and adapt the micro culture in their part of the organisation is one thing, but without the commitment and desire of the owners or key stakeholders do we have a right to change the culture? Do we fully understand why the culture is what it is - the advantages this style may well have?

Often while a culture may APPEAR to be a distractor - it may well be the factor that is keeping the organisation afloat.

I feel that too many of us have read the books on empowerment and have started to believe the hype... some of the most successful organisations are autocratic (look at Jack Welch and GE) - who is to say that a style is effective or ineffective - sure it needs to be consistent and that people employed 'buyin' or accept the culture.

Case study
Once I worked as an adviser to a successful office supplies organisation - £22m t/o. the owner wanted to reduce his working week from 7 to 3 days, and to do that he needed to use the managers he had as 'managers' rather than as highly paid office staff. So even with the full engagement of the owner we started a change process. Over the months there were some manager casualties - they were not up to the job and left - but the remaining five were sound individuals. Having achieved the goal within 12 months things looked fine - but when a slight downturn occurred - the managers lacked the ability to adapt the culture to suit - and 3 years later the owner/ manager was back in the driving seat - having host t/o slashed by 45%. This was due (we discussed this at some length) to the culture, most of the people were originally hired into the 'old' culture and could not work as effectively under a more open environment.

Conclusion
Do we as change agents look at culture as something that needs to be 'right' or 'perfect' ? While we may understand the principles of culture do we stop and take the time to understand just how culture is integrated in everything the organisation does - and do we undertake a full analysis of what impacts what and why before making grand plans for change. I suspect on the whole not. Culture is a factor of the person or persons at the top. It is created by their actions and inaction's. In my view unless the person(s) at the top want and demand the change - leave alone - or at least enter with extreme caution, and above all do not believe the hype in the latest book on organisational fads...

So can you make bottom up change - yes
should we make bottom up change - No!

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Mike Morrison is director of RapidBI, an organisational effectiveness consultancy. He has been involved in HR, OD and strategic development for over 20 years. He can be contacted via www.rapidbi.com/

© This article is copyright RapidBI 2006, 2008 – it may be copied providing the authors are credited, and direct links maintained

Friday, 7 November 2008

Evaluating the impact of training - another failure

On one forum I regularly visit was the question:

I am currently trying to answer a question for my course, but have hit a slight problem.
The question I need to answer for my written project is:-
Conduct an analysis to determine the effects that training has had on the success of your organisation.
I was planning on writing about Customer Service training we have been running on going for the last 18 months, but all the recent reports I have read have shown our customer satisfaction has actually gone down.
I thought I could use another topic but it has come to light that my organisation is very poor at evaluating the impact of training so could not produce me with any hard proof that our training is helping.
Has anyone got any ideas on how else I could answer this question?

This is a common challenge

From the little information the individual have provided it does appear that there is strong anecdotal evidence that training is having a negative impact - this is helpful and a an effect on the success of the organisation.

If I were the L&D or Training manager I would be looking at the training we are doing, the customer satisfaction results and looking for correlation - unfortunately this impact is common but because it is negative people tend to dismiss it - it is information plain and simple.

Was it Einstein that said "the definition of insanity is doing the same things and expecting different results"?

The fact that the initial results have show that training is NOT helping, is a legitimate evaluation result - just not what many have been expected to obtain.

Evaluation in the marketing world requires a number of different attempts and to progress with the strategy which is the most successful - they trial - in many training interventions it is the first solution that is deployed. This is a side effect of training becoming a commodity - the reality is that training is and never will be a commodity - but for as long as it is treated this way organisations will not get the best of returns.

Solution
As an L&D or training function we need to look at what we can learn from other parts of the business world, and in the case of evaluation from the world of marketing. When rolling out a programme for a significant number of people that needs to have a substantial business impact we need to make sure we understand the needs and the audience, then we need to run a number of controlled pilots (not just one) and then to evaluate which method delivers the best business benefit - or indeed to go back to the drawing board.

This is a reason why L&D must be strategically aligned to the business and its objectives, otherwise we just will not have the time to research and develop effective solutions and run the 'first solution' off the starting blocks - and then wonder why as a function we are often not seen as strategic in many organisations - time to stop the catch-22 situation and educate our managers.
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Mike Morrison is director of RapidBI, an organizational effectiveness consultancy. He has been involved in HR, OD and strategic development for over 20 years. He can be contacted via www.rapidbi.com/

© This article is copyright RapidBI 2006, 2008 – it may be copied providing the authors are credited, and direct links maintained

Tuesday, 14 October 2008

The rising cost of learning…

First there was decimalisation, then the Euro, the litre and now the e-book. Isn’t it interesting that to many of us the actual increasing costs of things are not so obvious when there has been a change of culture or context?

With the introduction of decimalisation in the early 70s and latterly the Euro across central Europe many products were rounded up in price. Even more recently the move from selling petrol from gallons to litres allowed the price to jump without many people causing a fuss. I recall when I first passed my test often driving to another garage for ½p price difference on a gallon – but now the price varies by often up to 10p per litre in the same area. People have just accepted it.

What prompted this thought and is it relevant to Learning and Development?
Today I was told that I was a ‘lucky winner’ and had won a prize in a competition (well I had completed a survey and agreed to be entered into the prize draw). Great I thought, I was provided with a web link and £75 worth of vouchers to spend on downloads of training activities, exercises or icebreakers… hey £75 worth of resources free – not to be sneezed at. Until I realise what they cost – 2*£5 credits per item – itself not outrageous until you look at the printed pack this one activity is derived – 100 items for £249 – or £2.49 each – printed and an electronic copy on disc… now what is the better value… 20 separate purchases or 100 activities? All for the same price. In addition mots if the items were 2 or 4 credits per activity - so that would leave £5 credit or I would have to 'top it up' - very clever.

I want it and I want it NOW
Now I know that we are in a world where we all want it today…now – but is it really that sensible? In the social period that is the credit crunch will people be changing their on-line and resource purchasing habits?

Having looked at this one example I looked at a couple of competitor sites – basically they all do the same thing , but, reading between the lines and looking at the statistics that some of these site show the number of downloads of a single item is not that great. Often in single or low double figures. If you only want one item then £10 is good value – but if you think over time you will need more is it worth paying the price of instant gratification?

The wonderful e-book
This leads neatly on to a conversation I had with a fellow trainer this morning, we were talking about website and selling product and the discussion got round to e-books. Now a good book, with nice pages and bound costs £6-29 – most around the ‘tenner’ mark. So why o why do people pay £29, £39 or £49+ for an e-book?

Often these e-books have poor layout, spelling mistakes and generally not very good in terms of content. What is more we usually pay to print them on our own printer.

Our discussion concluded that people buy e-books because they have learnt to trust the author; after all the web site was written by the author and this builds trust. Personally I wonder if it is more simple that that; we believe an e-book is more like software than a book and we know how much software costs (indeed many used to come with huge free books – manuals!).

Books like the one minute manager cost £6.99 or £3.49 on Amazon…. These books have 107 pages of content – few e-books have this many and often cost almost 10 times more, and more often than not still sit on the shelf of 'will read one day' books and articles.

Is this us as purchasers really buying a quality product – or have we been conned into the currency of the ‘download’ on the web? Are e-books and e-activities over priced? We can all read a book in a shop and make the decision that it is right for us; but that is not the case with these electronic products.

Now I am not saying that people should give all their work away for free – far from it – but as purchasers we need to understand that when comparing one technology with another it is OK to do that and to help the market find the ‘right’ price for the product on offer.

Food for thought?

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Mike Morrison is director of RapidBI, an organizational effectiveness consultancy. He has been involved in HR, OD and strategic development for over 20 years. He can be contacted via www.rapidbi.com/

© This article is copyright RapidBI 2006, 2008 – it may be copied providing the authors are credited, and direct links maintained

Monday, 29 September 2008

CSI in organizations – a valid approach?

We are in the beginnings of massive change for both the way we employ people and the way organizations are financed and run. To prepare us for the ‘new world’ we need to look at things from a different perspective.

At first glance Crime Scene Investigation (CSI) in organizations and organizational development may look a little out of place, but when things go wrong it can help the rest of the OD world to understand why the ‘victim’ died, who was involved and could anyone have prevented it.

Conventional OD
In the normal course of events we use metaphors of machines or organics to represent change and growth. Stories like the life cycle of the butterfly, human development – infancy, childhood, teens, young adults etc. are prolific, indeed we have many models to reflect this. But most of them seem to focus on growth, not the decline. What are we as OD and change agents supposed to do in times of decline? Much like the state of the business word, with the recent collapse of several key (and perceived to be strong) UK and US financial institutions suggests that we need to move away from models of growth to that of survival (at least in the short term) for some organizations. Which organizations… well read on to see…

A new model
Let’s look at adult cycles of organic change and see what we can learn:

Human life cycle organizational development model RapidBI

The illness part in organizations is where things start to go wrong. Where there is dis-ease with people, process or product. There are not many of us that run to the doctor or specialist at the slightest little sign, we prefer to ‘ride it out’ hoping for it to ‘get better on its own’. well in organizations that just does not happen. dis-ease does not go away unless people leave and take it with them - very rare!

As OD and change professionals we regularly undertake organizational diagnostic reviews or staff surveys – or preferably both. The question is what happens when something is identified as ‘not being well’? What do we do about it? Who do we tell? Will senior people in the organization react appropriately to our concerns? Or will they ‘deny’ there is a problem? Those that do not undertake regular health checks (diagnostics and surveys) take note – it is easier to deal with a problem when it is identified earlier than later.

If the situation is denied or not taken seriously then usually a second stage diagnostic opportunity is missed (going to the specialist in a hospital) and the situation gradually worsens until it is terminal or critical in nature.

Then radical action is required, and radical action is always fighting against the odds. The patient goes into Intensive care (of change teams or liquidators) and becomes unconscious. Soon the organism stops to breathe. Specialist fight, but again the numbers are stacked against survival. The longer it goes on the less opportunity of survival. As things deteriorate the body is put on to a ventilator, providing the patient with essentials (oxygen and food) while key systems have a chance to repair themselves – Often in such cases the patient is beyond ‘self repair’ and soon the brain stem dies – but for a while the rest of the organism keeps on ‘business as usual’ and when the time comes the ‘business as usual’ elements suddenly stops as certain resources are no longer available. For some time parts of the organism carry on working at an individual cell level. Until eventually all activity stops. It is only at this point the CSI team is introduced to the situation.

How often do we notice our organisations are about to be put on the ventilator? How often have we worked inside an organisation when someone has already turned off the ventilator?

After careful investigation the lead CSI reports that the cause was often one of two main factors:

Lack of timely action

Long term poisoning or systems failure due to damage (poor information)

Worse – the metaphor of a machine
If we think that organic metaphors are bad news lets look at the common metaphor of machinery, supply chains, systems etc.

Even the most expensive motor vehicle needs love care and the occasional service. More than that, on occasions it needs its oil replacing and on occasion new parts as they wear out. But even the most expensive motor vehicle has a finite life. There comes a point when much of what was there has been replaced (much like many of the organizations we work for), and then the stage beyond that when the vehicle, no matter how much it is loved, it is just beyond economical repair. And so it goes off to the scrap heap (sorry recycling centre!). How often have you had ‘just one more MOT’ on the car that should have been written off a year ago? Are you in a job that ceased being cost effective some time ago?

Organizations are like this too – for some their time has come. Lets just make sure that when an organization ‘dies’ it dies of natural causes and not a premature death that could have been avoided by good management and effective organizational development.

Whatever the metaphor, we as OD and change specialists need to be sensitive to the environment we work in, keep up with the health checks or preventative maintenance, notify other teams when we sense things are not quite the way they should be, and above all we need to be brave and take appropriate action as early as we dare.

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Mike Morrison is director of RapidBI, an organizational effectiveness consultancy. He has been involved in HR, OD and strategic development for over 20 years. He can be contacted via www.rapidbi.com/

© This article is copyright RapidBI 2006 - 2008 – it may be copied providing the authors are credited, and direct links maintained

Friday, 26 September 2008

The PocketSurfer2 – a great tool or late to market solution?

As a professional often on the move, I am always on the look out for new technology or gadgets that will help me communicate and work remotely more easily. Courtesy of Training Journal I have been given a PocketSurfer2 from Datawind to review.

I used the device for a couple of weeks. In fact this article had been started on the PocketSurfer2. (Unfortunately I had to stop here... you will find out why later).

Overview of the PocketSurfer2
The PocketSurfer2 is a pocket diary size device with 'instant' mobile phone technology connection to the web. It uses a Motorola RAZR style keyboard. So anywhere you can use a mobile, this device will allow you to do most things you can do in a browser on a desk top (except flash, video and audio).

Claims
The manufactures DataWind claim that you get a 'full' web experience, rather than the limited experience on most mobile phones. The manufactures also claim that the surfing experience is fast - broadband speed over a GPRS phone network.
First experiences

The device arrives in a box 250 x 173 x 69mm, inside the box is a well protected (using plastic and foam) carrier for the PocketSurfer2 and its accessories.

In the box is the PocketSurfer2, mains charger (mini USB), a quick guide, a soft protective 'sock' and manual on CD.

Powering the PocketSurfer2 up
The device arrives with enough power to start the device and to go through a simple registration process. Throughout the registration you are shown how to navigate the various controls - the 'mouse', tab functions etc. the buttons on the keyboard are large enough to use your thumb. Once registered the device needs a solid 4+ hours of charging. Try to shortcut this and when you attempt to connect to the net the device tells you that your 'registration' is still pending and to allow up to 4 hours...

Charging the PocketSurfer2
The good news is that the device can be charged via a mini USB and a charger is supplied, unfortunately access to the USB socket is so slim that a standard mini USB charger will not fit! This means that if you have a universal car based USB charger (although some PocketSurfer units do ship with this lead) it just won’t work. It is a real shame that this is not a standard connection - forget your special lead and you cannot borrow a lead to charge your device!

Going On-Line with the PocketSurfer2
Once charged and registered it could not be easier - push the 'Go' button, type in the address you want and hit enter. The quick as a flash the page loads - brilliant. The graphics and text are washed out but for a basic surfing need the device is more than functional. You can change the contrast to make it a better surfing experience with clearer text and graphics – but these settings ‘drop’ and have to be reset if you turn the device off.

Getting used to the 'mouse' took some time. For the technical readers - this device appears to use a thin client to a secure server running IE, hence the speed and lack of clarity on the graphics. It also explains how you get 'the full web experience'. Thin client basically means you are using the PocketSurfer2 to access a more powerful computer doing most of the work for you - all the device in your hand does is give keyboard commands and show the screen.

Most of the pages I have initially visited performed well, although the tab function does not appear reliable in moving between data fields on some sites. When I started posting this blog the input to reading on screen was very slow - correcting typing mistakes was difficult and highlighting text to insert a hyperlink was impossible (no ability to select text). Typing and correcting errors is a slow and unreliable process - as the tools for simple navigation around a text field are missing - i.e. basic arrow keys.

Email

The device has the ability to access POP3 and most other forms of email services - this provides an easier access to your emails than many phone based products.

Instant Messaging
For many this will be a welcome feature - especially those of us that want to keep in touch with our teenagers while we are away. Easy to set up but the slow nature of the keyboard makes fluent conversations difficult, although I am sure this will come with practice.

Calendars and organisers
While the device does not provide any diary type system you can access services like Yahoo Calendar as an organiser.

Added business functions

As well as basic surfing the device provides access to online secure document storage and basic applications, word processing, spreadsheets and presentation from a site zoho.com. The downside is that this device cannot connect to a printer - nor can it download data to a local memory device (i.e. USB or SD card), although the online storage will be satisfactory for many.

Use your home PC and software from anywhere
You know the situation - you are away from home and need to read THAT file... how can you do it? The PocketSurfer2 is compatible with Logmein. Logmein is a small piece of software that runs on your home PC which allows you access to your programs and document files at any time from any internet connection. I have been a user of Logmein for 4 years and it has saved my bacon on many occasions. With military level security encryption this service is fantastic and the PocketSurfer2 implementation is unfortunately of limited usability due to the screen resolution and navigation options, this is a real shame as few if any mobile phones can do satisfactorily.

GPS

The PocketSurfer2 comes with a built in GPS which links neatly to Google maps, always a useful function. Unfortunately as the PocketSurfer2 does not have a 'contacts list' you will need to bookmark the address previously - or have the address in another device. The GPS system is quick and will aid those on foot finding a venue at street level, however remember the system does not have any sound capability so do not expect turn by turn voice directions - This device is not suitable for use in a vehicle.

Battery Life
This is claimed at several hours and I certainly did not experience any difficulties with this even though i was using the PocketSurfer2 regularly throughout the conference.

Charges

The PocketSurfer2 is supplied with 12 months connection to the Internet with an allowance of 20 hours per month, this should be more than enough for most people. The subscription for the second years is just under £40. For an additional £5.99 per months unlimited Internet access is available.

The device in use on the road
Use of the Pocket Surfer 'in the field' rather than in the office on trial are different things. I had occasional difficulty connecting (something I would not usually expect in west London) and my use would be for managing my website or blogging - neither of which it did very well. I actually found it easier to use my PDA phone and stylus than the keyboard, and many modern phones, while they do not have a screen size of the PocketSurfer, do have better navigation control - right click and click and drag were difficult.

Ideal applications
One of the 'best' applications for the pocket surfer I can imagine is in the use of mobile survey completion - providing most of the survey is multiple choice and optimised for a 640 wide screen. Using the device for basic surfing and finding information was great - but as for actually using web based application... no not yet.

What happens when the device is lost?
Well this happened - on the last day of the CIPD annual Conference in Harrogate I took my jacket off and it must have fallen out of my inside pocket...
I did not realise until the following day but then it was the weekend. On Monday morning I called the UK helpline and after a wait was through to a very helpful lady who after taking my serial number and confirming my details stopped the device. She was able to tell me that the device had been used over the weekend, but could not or would not tell me what sites had been visited or where in the UK the device was.
Well the next time the person tries to use the device it just will not connect! This is good because if this had been a phone much of the connection data would have been available to the phone user (inc passwords) even if the sim was stopped – so from a security point of view this is a significant advantage.

The acid test
Having been given this one for review will I buy a replacement? Interesting question.. There are some things this device is particularly good at - and not so good at others. Had I lost the device 2 years ago my answer would have been a swift yes... now..... er... no I will not be buying one for myself.

Needed on PocketSurfer3

This device is usable as a tool for those that are 'on the move' and in many ways is better than 95% of the available mobile devices. Features that need to be included to make this a truly powerful mobile device:

Touch screen to operate the mouse/ or improved mouse navigation

An 800 pixel wide screen resolution

SD or USB local storage

Reliable 'tabbing' between fields on web pages

Standard mini USB connector for universal charging

Remove the PocketSurfer 'top bar' this uses up valuable screen space for no real functionality

Ability to navigate through text with basic arrow buttons

Video & sound through an earphone

Ability to store 'user settings' - brightness, contrast etc.

To make the device a truly 'must have'...

Wi-Fi/ Bluetooth or cable for 'monitor out'

Ability to 'run' PowerPoint slide shows

This device is not a PDA, and nor should it be - but as low cost laptops get cheaper it needs to provide a little 'extra value' than just a limited surfing experience.

Overall

In today's market this product is more of a gimmick than a serious tool for the mobile professional. For its cost and Internet access it is good value for money - but is it a must have for the mobile professional? No not yet. The product is a great as a 'get out of jail' device when you cannot connect to the net by any other means, it will allow limited yet functional access to most sites, but if the task is too complex then this is not the solution for you.

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Mike Morrison is director of RapidBI, an organizational effectiveness consultancy. He has been involved in HR, OD and strategic development for over 20 years. He can be contacted via www.rapidbi.com/ © This article is copyright RapidBI 2006 - 2008 – it may be copied providing the authors are credited, and direct links maintained

Tuesday, 23 September 2008

Writing and training managers in SMART objectives

This is always an interesting topic. the following was recently posted on a community forum:

"We are currently reviewing our appraisal process and have realised our line managers need training on how to set clear SMART objectives. Has anyone got any information that they have used to train managers on this area?
I am looking for something to use that is clear and easy to understand for the managers to be able to go away and set SMART objectives during employee appraisals.
Any help or information would be great."

My reply to this was essentially...
Much of the material on the page mentioned above (www.rapidbi.com/smarter ) has been used at one time or another for training managers..

It all depends what type of objectives you want to train them in - I have found that most trainers think you can train the acronym and that is job done.. well it is not.

Managers need to understand the context and this needs to be a fundamental part of any training or development solution. - for example managers rarely have a problem with the SMART but have problem deriving the context - so I would run different sessions -

writing SMARTer learning objectives
writing SMARTer performance goals... etc

The managers inability to write effective objectives is usually a symptom of another problem. Why do many of those involved in learning and development insist on training people on techniques when actually the problem is somewhere else - lack of goals, understanding of the process, wrong person without the skills, attitude?

If as professionals L&D and consultants need to get smarter themselves ans stop putting plasters (Band aids) on wounds that actually need a different solution...stitches anyone?

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Mike Morrison is director of RapidBI, an organizational effectiveness consultancy. He has been involved in HR, OD and strategic development for over 20 years. He can be contacted via www.rapidbi.com/

© This article is copyright RapidBI 2006, 2008 – it may be copied providing the authors are credited, and direct links maintained

Saturday, 13 September 2008

Employee engagement and satisfaction measures

As the economy bites harder organisations of all sizes are having to tighten their belts, yet at the same time engaging with employees and retention of key people have never been more important. Over the past 12 months the development team at RapidBI have been preparing for this time.

At the NFEA annual conference RapidBI showcased its new EESS - Employee Engagement and Satisfaction Survey.

The EESS is a unique combination of four key factors:

An employee engagement survey
A staff satisfaction survey
A ready to run 'out of the box survey'
An easy to integrate custom question module (included)

On-Line

The whole process can be managed on-line and requires no specialist training or accreditation. Users have the option of 'pay as you go' or for freelance consultants or providers becoming a 'listed' user and having instant access to the family of diagnostic tools available.

Customisation

To keep the process as quick and cost effective as possible the EESS allows users to have up to 10 of their own unique questions in addition to the standard question set.

Usage

Once a user has purchased the survey for their organisation (or client) they are taken through some simple steps to configure the survey and add their questions. When they are ready to go they communicate their customised user-names and passwords, and when the 'closing date' of the survey has passed the administrator logs in to their control panel and downloads their reports - easy!

Comparison Graphics

The EESS automatically produces graphics and analysis of results and runs a comparison of your organisations results against those held on the database. In addition when you re-run the survey you have the ability of seeing any change against previous results.

Easy, ready to run and low cost - a welcome in the challenging economic climate we find ourselves in.
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Mike Morrison is director of RapidBI, an organizational effectiveness consultancy. He has been involved in HR, OD and strategic development for over 20 years. He can be contacted via www.rapidbi.com/

© This article is copyright RapidBI 2006 - 2008 it may be copied providing the authors are credited, and direct links maintained

Thursday, 4 September 2008

CPM -v- CPD

The phrase CPD - continuous professional development has been around for a long time but do many organizations actually do it or do they practice CPM - Continuous professional maintenance - only doing enough to keep people at the same level, sure it may involve some learning but it is not about developing the person.

In some professions practitioners have to take annual or bi-annual assessments - not to show progress but to show that they have stayed still. Now in some areas I can understand this, for example in my voluntary work I am re-assessed for competence every 3 years - this is to check that the initial training has stuck and that I perform at least at a minimum level. On the other hand there are some professional qualifications that require people to stay at a level. Some of the 'train the trainer' qualifications for example - participants do not have to show progress against a previous identified gap - but to show that they still 'conform' to an arbitrary standard and not to have 'progressed'.

So what do you want or expect your people to do - develop of maintain a minimum level... do you as an organization promote continuous development of skills maintenance?

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Mike Morrison is director of RapidBI, an organizational effectiveness consultancy. He has been involved in HR, OD and strategic development for over 20 years. He can be contacted via www.rapidbi.com/

© This article is copyright RapidBI 2006, 2008 – it may be copied providing the authors are credited, and direct links maintained

Friday, 29 August 2008

CIPD Annual Conference 2008

RapidBI have been invited to attend the CIPD Annual Conference 2008 and we will be blogging here visit and comment.

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Mike Morrison is director of RapidBI, an organizational effectiveness consultancy. He has been involved in HR, OD and strategic development for over 20 years. He can be contacted via www.rapidbi.com/

© This article is copyright RapidBI 2006, 2008 – it may be copied providing the authors are credited, and direct links maintained

Monday, 18 August 2008

Stop Start Continue Change - a Management and facilitation Model

The Stop - Start - Continue - Change four step change model is a simple yet often overlooked organizational and individual development tool. Suitable for a wide range of applications including individual, team and organisational, the SSCC model provides a valuable facilitation framework.

For a facilitated team activity simply:

Get four pieces of flip chart paper and label them Stop Start Continue and Change
Next then ask your participants to work in four small groups:
First group brainstorms answers to the question: "In order to (increase revenue by xx USD/GBP/EU, solve this issue, etc.), what do we need to STOP doing?"
Second group does it with "In order to (increase revenue by xx USD/GBP/EU, solve this issue, have a better product etc..), what do we need to START doing?
Third group brainstorms this one: "To (increase revenue, cut costs, solve this issue, have a better product etc..) what do we need to CONTINUE doing? Hint: Brainstorm about what's working really well.
Fourth group brainstorms this one: "To (raise revenue, cut costs, solve this issue, have a better product etc..) what do we need to CHANGE what we are doing? Hint: Brainstorm and capture feedback from staff and customers about what would be better if changes.
Then rotate everybody around so that everyone gets a chance to give each question their best shot. Now you summarise all the points, assign a financial impact to each point that's been raised, make it all into a report that says exactly what you will do (lay someone off? cut a program?) if your stuff doesn't work.

The Stop start continue change model is a simple yet effective model for organisational change, as well as for individual change. It is best used as a facilitation technique.

The Stop start continue change (SSCC) model works well in association with the PRIMO-F model or many other organizational development or individual development methodologies

For more information on this please visit our Stop Start Continue Change page or our main change management or articles pages

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Mike Morrison is director of RapidBI, an organisational effectiveness consultancy. He has been involved in HR, OD and strategic development for over 20 years. He can be contacted via www.rapidbi.com/

© This article is copyright RapidBI 2006 - 2008 – it may be copied providing the authors are credited, and direct links maintained

Saturday, 2 August 2008

Do management models and theories work?

"What Management & Business Methods, Models and/or Theories have provided executives/managers and their organizations (e.g. company, institution, team) benefits and improvements"

Over the years I have used many of the management, leadership, business and change models and theories and unfortunately the answer to "do they work?" is YES and NO.

One of the difficulties with any management, business or leadership models is that we forget that the original success for using a given strategy was withing a given set of circumstances:

business life cycle
culture
environment
economic cycle
financial position
staffing/ resource levels
growth phase/ maturity... etc

and if used again in a similar situation I am sure that the model would work fine.. The problem is that many practitioners fail to take notice of culture, growth phase etc and apply their 'favourite' model - either because it 'worked before' or they have just read about it and want to apply it.
I have been on several management and organizational development diploma programmes, and none of which have highlighted the culture prevailing at the time of success. They talk about the models, what its aim is, sometimes where it came from.. but rarely WHY it was selected or developed in the first place.

As consultants and change agents we need to understand where the client is now (holistic) and where they want to get to - and only then design the BLEND of models and strategies required.

Authors and the major consultancy organizations want us to believe that a 'single' model or theory is the 'right' one, but as most experienced consultants and changes know - its the right tool for the job that works....

Management and business models change

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Mike Morrison is director of RapidBI, an organizational effectiveness consultancy. He has been involved in HR, OD and strategic development for over 20 years. He can be contacted via www.rapidbi.com/

© This article is copyright RapidBI 2006, 2008 – it may be copied providing the authors are credited, and direct links maintained

Tuesday, 29 July 2008

Rapid Organizational Improvement - ROI

ROI - Rapid Organizational Improvement
It's four in the afternoon on a Wednesday and you boss or internal client says that they want to launch a major change program ... next week. Ever been there?

We strive to be business partners, we seek to build meaningful relationships - then out of the blue we get recruited for 'Mission Impossible'. Do our employers truly believe we are magicians... masters of illusion, or do they just think 'change is easy'?

Change is certainly easier if we are prepared, and that could mean on a regular basis undertaking a holistic organizational review (just in case) so that when situations like this happen we are ready, ready to avoid the reasons why change programs often fail:

No clear vision for the change
New activity not directly linked (or integrated) to organizational objectives
No overall agreed strategy for organization development
Tactical rather than holistic diagnostics
Existing organizational culture not taken into account
Purchasers not clear about what they are buying
Suppliers of consultancy only finding solutions to problems they can solve easily
Lack of predetermined metrics and evaluation of performance and success
Time and financial pressures on the management of the organization
The change process not managed effectively within the organization

What methodologies do you employ to maximise the opportunities of success?

Change management management articles
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Mike Morrison is director of RapidBI, an organizational effectiveness consultancy. He has been involved in HR, OD and strategic development for over 20 years. He can be contacted via www.rapidbi.com/

© This article is copyright RapidBI 2006 - 2008 – it may be copied providing the authors are credited, and direct links maintained

Monday, 28 July 2008

Talent Management and nine box grids

In recent months, despite the Credit Crunch impacting budgets there appears to be an increasing interest in talent management. Now is this because there is a real interest in managing talent, or is it an attempt to show that firms are interested in people but cannot or will not invest? It must be the cynic in me.

Many firms are looking at using nine box grids on which to map individuals. These are usually 3x3 grids with potential plotted against performance. For example:

Matrix or grids like this are often used, and managers and HR teams asked to identify names of individuals into each of the nine boxes. As a short term tool this has its place, however the danger is when names are not reviewed. It is not unusual for an individual to be under performing due to outside influences - sick children etc, and performance does change over time. To ignore these dynamics is putting an organizations whole talent management strategy at risk.

Once people have been identified it is not unusual to focus all development activity on high performers - attempting top get more out. Ironically there is evidence to suggest that if effort is put into the low and middle performers - they raise their game. High performers are already performing well and any investment is not likely to increase performance, so the ROI on these people in the short to medium term is often poor. Sure it is important not to ignore these people, but they are often self motivated and need opportunities to SELF develop - not structured events.

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Mike Morrison is director of RapidBI, an organizational effectiveness consultancy. He has been involved in HR, OD and strategic development for over 20 years. He can be contacted via www.rapidbi.com/

© This article is copyright RapidBI 2006, 2008 – it may be copied providing the authors are credited, and direct links maintained

Friday, 25 July 2008

Going Green

Increasingly organisations are looking at increasing their 'green credentials', but all too often the usual factors of buying recycled products is often the limit...

If you run an organisation think about the following:

Interestingly many recycled products use more energy to recycle than produced in the first place... so be careful of which recycled products you purchase and why.

Look for products that are made from sustainable sources.

ask your suppliers to reduce the packaging on items - or for them to taks packaging away after delivery

Certainly use products and new furniture from sustainable sources, reduce products with plastic/ man-made fibres.

Put electrical timers on to make sure all power is off at key times reduce the frequency of toilet flushes and the volume of water - some new systems are water free!Encourage the use of web conferencing rather than meetings.

Buy products with reduced packaging.buy milk in glass or card containers,don't chill the water in the water dispenser if you have kettles - go for these heat as you need style Consider going back to the old fashioned 'annual shutdown' - good for staff & the environment.. you can (often) manage customer expectations.

Stop using laser printers and standard ink jet printers and use ink jets with Continuous ink systems - saves money as well as plastic, heat and lots of chemicals - not to mention reducing landfill.

Turn air conditioning up one degree, turn heating down one degree

Reduce the need for standalone equipment like faxes, photocopiers etc and go for all in one machines - they use less standby energy.

Encourage cycle to work - offer changing and shower facilities

Encourage home working

Use trains for long distance travel rather than cars - yes modern trains have wifi so you can work at the same time...

Talk to local bus providers and ask for additional routs to be run at rush hours to make public transport easier - consider sponsoring

buy services from local providers - esp consultancy, training, accountancy, design etc - reduces travel and mail costs.

Email rather than post

How green is your business? how big is your carbon footprint?

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Mike Morrison is director of RapidBI, an organizational effectiveness consultancy. He has been involved in HR, OD and strategic development for over 20 years. He can be contacted via www.rapidbi.com/

© This article is copyright RapidBI 2006, 2008 – it may be copied providing the authors are credited, and direct links maintained

Wednesday, 16 July 2008

Key Performance Indicators

Key Performance Indicators are increasing in popularity again. In the 1990's they were one of the key drivers in organisational change, today due to the pressure many organisations are under they are once again becoming an important organisational (OD) strategy.

What is a Key Performance Indicator?
A key performance indicator is a financial or non-financial measure used to help an organisation measure progress towards a stated organisational goal or objective.

KPI's are used not only to run the organisation, but as a communication channel to people throughout the organisation.

The big mistake

When people are new to KPI's they do their research and then introduce KPI's throughout the organisation. Miller in his 1956 research on Capacity for Processing Information suggested from his research that the human mind can deal with approximately seven chunks of information (plus or minus two) - Miller's magic 7.

While there has been a lot of controversy about this, it does appear to remain true that a number of measurable chunks around this number are optimum for performance, hence an organisation should use this as a principle or 'rule of thumb' for Key Performance Indicator development, not a 'law' for their use. This does not mean that an organisation is limited to seven key indicators. the process can be cascaded - for example at a strategic level the KPI's may well be:

Marketing impact, finance, customer satisfaction, stakeholder satisfaction, employee engagement - then each of these in turn can be broken into finer granularity to another seven factors. etc.

For more information read:

http://www.rapidbi.com/created/KeyPerformanceIndicatorsKPIs.html
http://www.rapidbi.com/created/SampleKeyPerformanceIndicatorsKPI.html

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Mike Morrison is director of RapidBI, an organizational effectiveness consultancy. He has been involved in HR, OD and strategic development for over 20 years. He can be contacted via www.rapidbi.com/

© This article is copyright RapidBI 2006, 2008 – it may be copied providing the authors are credited, and direct links maintained

Monday, 30 June 2008

Developing a team and managing change

Today we received a request:

"I need some ideas and help please. I need to run
a simple first team meeting within the start up division I am employed.
There are 20 people in the division, and all have been employed no more than 6
months. Usual growing pains and fall outs and frustrations of no one quite sure
what they are doing. Do you have any ideas?"

Our reply to this request was...

It all depends on your goals… The following is an outline structure you may consider of value...

A structure like:
Agree the objective(s) of the meeting

Have your one as "how do we get even better at what we do?" - what the most effective organisations and teams know...

Introduce the concept of personal change
Say that as individuals we all have change that impacts us in different ways

Introduce the personal change model….

Give an example of personal change (see www.rapidbi.com/created/changemanagement.html for an example)

Allow people to realise that change is normal and impacts people in different ways – sometimes a change can be quick… sometimes slow. This is about helping people realise that it is ok to feel uncomfortable or not sure. Ask them to give examples of when they have experienced different parts of the model.
One example I give is when my wife asked me to decorate… I said we only did it 5 years ago (denial)… then to finding excuses not to look at the colour charts and catalogues or reasons not to go to the DIY shops (resistance)… then when I started to say… well if we….. then we can…. (exploration)… once the exploration phase is reached then commitment usually follows.

Personal Change Model - the tarzan swing

The danger occurs when a person does the ‘Tarzan swing’ from Denial straight to Commitment without passing through the other phases (even for a brief time).

The risk is that as they have only ‘intellectually’ bought in.. not emotionally, when something goes wrong (even a little thing) these people may well say… see told you so.. knew it would not work. These people ‘swing’ back to Denial, and because there is no forward momentum – they are the hardest of all to change from this point forward.

The best way to avoid this is to spend time working on the resistance and exploration phases… allow questions to be asked – and the challenges is not to be defensive – of this show reason for the resistance.. our goal is to allow them through the resistance phase without confirming their real doubts…

Then when you have explored personal change…

Introduce The Tuckman Team Development model:

The Tuckman Team development Model

Split the group into 4

Ask each group to draw a flip chart describing what each phase of the model might look like – one for form, another storm… etc
Ask them to think about activities they can use to start moving from their part of the model to the next… Form --> storm….Perform --> Adjourn etc..
Give them 15 mins

Then each group to present back

Then ask the group where they thing they are as a team… ask why and to give examples

Then open up the team for ideas and to develop a plan as to what they can do to move the team on…

This should get the ball rolling…

I have used this type of structure with great impact.

For more information on change management visit our change management page or our management articles page
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Mike Morrison is director of RapidBI, an organizational effectiveness consultancy. He has been involved in HR, OD and strategic development for over 20 years. He can be contacted via www.rapidbi.com/

© This article is copyright RapidBI 2006, 2008 – it may be copied providing the authors are credited, and direct links maintained

Monday, 23 June 2008

Organizational Diagnosis and diagnostics

Organizational Diagnostics

In the area of Organizational Development there are many activities and disciplines. One of those is the area of organizational diagnosis and the use of structured organizational diagnostic tools.

The effective diagnosis of organizational culture, and structural and operational strengths and weaknesses are fundamental to any successful organizational development intervention. As Beckhard said in the preface to his seminal work

... in our rapidly changing environment, new
organization forms must be developed; more effective goal-setting and planning
processes must be learned, and practiced teams of independent people must spent
real time improving their methods of working, decision-making and communicating.
Competing or conflicting groups must move towards a collaborative way of work.
In order for these changes to occur and be maintained, a planned, managed change
effort is necessary - a program of organizational development.

This was written in 1969 and while much has been learnt it is just as true today.
Since the beginnings of organizational development as a profession, diagnosis has moved from the purely behavioral towards a strategic and holistic business diagnostic approach. Moving away from looking at human interventions in isolation, to exploring the interactions of people in the context in which they operate. equally as organizations are increasingly collaborative in nature, the traditional silo approach to diagnostics is becoming increasingly rare. Organizational development and in particular the diagnostic phase of activities is spreading from the occupational psychologists towards main stream business. This is important for OD practitioners as the role is increasingly holistic in its nature.

The Consulting Process
The organizational diagnostic phase is often integrated within an overal OD process, commonly called 'a consulting process'.
An example of such a process is:

Entry --> Diagnosis --> Action Planning --> Implementation --> Termination

As the second phase in most change of consulting cycles it is also the first fully operational phase of the consulting process or cycle. The purpose of the diagnosis is to examine the problem faced by the organization in some detail, to identify factors and forces that are causing the problem and prepare all information needed for deciding how to orientate any possible solutions to the problems identified.

The diagnosis of the problem is a separate phase or set of activities from the solutions themselves.

The BIR is a holistic organizational diagnostic tool designed to enable organizations to explore the strengths and weaknesses of their current situation, to plan a journey and to measure progress along that journey. The BIR does not follow a single management model or fad, but allow the organization to look and reflect without judgement, yet using perceptions from the key stakeholders

References
1. Organizational Development: strategies and models - Beckhard 1969
2. Management Consulting - Kubr
3. Organizational Diagnosis - Harry Levinson 1972
4. Organizational Diagnosis - A workbook of theory and Practice - Marvin R Weisbord 1978
5. Organizational Diagnosis - A practical approach to company problem solving and growth 1988
6. Diagnosing and Changing Organizational Culture - Cameron & Quinn 1999

Written by mm and submitted to wikipedia 2008
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Mike Morrison is director of RapidBI, an organizational effectiveness consultancy. He has been involved in HR, OD and strategic development for over 20 years. He can be contacted via www.rapidbi.com/

© This article is copyright RapidBI 2006-2008 – it may be copied providing the authors are credited, and direct links maintained

Green Recruitment - environment or business sense?

As fuel prices climb ever faster and people begin to struggle paying mortgages etc what policies have organisations put in place to play their part in protecting the environment?

How many organisations are putting max distances from home as a legitimate recruitment filter?

Some years ago I had access to some population data in one London borough, it transpired that every morning almost 150 thousand people left the borough for work - and another 155 thousand travelled in!

In London why would people have to travel more than half an hour to work? (this will be different in diff parts of the country).

This will not only benefit the environment but - will reduce congestion, increase work/life balance and potentially increase retention.

Is it time for us to start taking this more seriously?
What are your thoughts?

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Mike Morrison is director of RapidBI, an organizational effectiveness consultancy. He has been involved in HR, OD and strategic development for over 20 years. He can be contacted via www.rapidbi.com/

© This article is copyright RapidBI 2008 – it may be copied providing the authors are credited, and direct links maintained

Sunday, 15 June 2008

Employee Engagement and Satisfaction Survey

Many organizations large and small are interested in measuring and monitoring how their people feel about the organization.

Many consulting businesses offer satisfaction or engagement surveys, however these are often very expensive and are not 'owned' by the business. Other organizations develop their own. This is great in that they measure exactly what they want but they then cannot benchmark with other organizations easily to compare engagement or satisfaction results.

To meet this need rapidBI have developed the Employee Engagement and Satisfaction Survey - Our EESS™ a unique combination of methods in one easy to use instrument.

The EESS is a simple, rapid staff survey which looks at the engagement of your people and measures how satisfied they are. It looks at board, managers and staff views of what is happening. Results can be reported as an organization as a whole or by division/ department.

The process can be used to benchmark externally and automatically compares previous results to the current one.

Users can chose to use accredited consultants or to use the system straight of the webb - with or without support.

The EESS is designed to be a cost effective solution to designing and running your own surveys. to find out more Employee engagementy and staff satisfaction surveys
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Mike Morrison is director of RapidBI, an organizational effectiveness consultancy. He has been involved in HR, OD and strategic development for over 20 years. He can be contacted via www.rapidbi.com/

© This article is copyright RapidBI 2006, 2008 – it may be copied providing the authors are credited, and direct links maintained

What is Business Transformation?

Increasingly in the worlds of project management, change and organizational development the term Business Transformation is being used. But what does it mean?

Is it change re-branded? is it outsourcing? is it a way for IT companies to sell additional services?

In this unique piece Mike explores Business Transformation and looks at how this approach can be used in your company. He gets behind the hype and looks at what can be done at a practical level to manage transformational change.

Read the full article on What is Business Transformation?

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Mike Morrison is director of RapidBI, an organizational effectiveness consultancy. He has been involved in HR, OD and strategic development for over 20 years. He can be contacted via www.rapidbi.com/

© This article is copyright RapidBI 2006, 2008 – it may be copied providing the authors are credited, and direct links maintained

Friday, 13 June 2008

New consultants using the Creatrix as a leadership development tool

On Wednesday 6 June 2008 at the IoD in London another group undertook training in use of the Innovation Equation developed by Byrd.

The Innovation Equation:

INNOVATION = CREATIVITY x RISK TAKING

is a behavioural based approach. Under the two main components (Creativity and Risk Taking) are seven behavioural drivers. Using these drivers organisational development specialists can identify current and desired culture and map a change plan to enable the organisation to achieve its goals.

The Creatrix is a model derived from the Innovation Equation and helps to identify strengths and weaknesses in culture and individuals behaviour.
There are 8 orientations in the Creatrix profile:

Innovator
Challenger
Sustainer
Dreamer

Practicalizer
Sythesizer
Planner
Modifier

To find out more visit the Creatrix Innovation site
To engage a certificated Creatrix Consultant

Dr Jacqueline Byrd has used the Creatrix and the Innovation Equation in her book - The Innovative Leader

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Mike Morrison is director of RapidBI, an organizational effectiveness consultancy. He has been involved in HR, OD and strategic development for over 20 years. He can be contacted via www.rapidbi.com/

© This article is copyright RapidBI 2006 - 2008 – it may be copied providing the authors are credited, and direct links maintained

Time for change in the world of SEO?

How do you get your site seen on the web?
To enable your business web site to be found on the web - it heeds to be indexed. Over the years many have used Wikipedia and social networking sites for this purpose - some have done it very careffully - others may be considered just SPAM.

Have you also found that you can never really find what you want on the web any more? Sure we have country filtering - but maybe now it is time for a radical change.

For search engines to become reputable again.. all it will take is Google (and others) to ignore the social network sites and all will be restored.

Increasingly the web is becoming a 'big boys' game - where to be on first page for Google for a b2b service you will need to throw a lot of cash at it.the sooner that great god Google starts to ignore wikipedia and all of the social networking sites the better.either that or we have 3 search engines - B2B & B2C and C2C. Three different sets of results for three different purposes - I suspect that people looking for holiday stuff are fed up with seeing trade material and trade people fed up with the latest package deal from their competitor.

The web has grown up - not sure I will call it web 2.0 - but the search engines certainly need to change the rules of the game and start (as AJ started) to become find engines rather than search engines...

Find out more at www.getseenontheweb.co.uk and www.rapidbi.com/getseenontheweb/

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Mike Morrison is director of RapidBI, an organizational effectiveness consultancy. He has been involved in HR, OD and strategic development for over 20 years. He can be contacted via www.rapidbi.com/

© This article is copyright RapidBI 2008 – it may be copied providing the authors are credited, and direct links maintained

Tuesday, 20 May 2008

when is training 'old fashioned"?

It is 1800 and I am on the 1640 train back from Leeds to London after meeting with a potential client. I overhear a telephone conversation where an individual described a training room as basic.
Yes it had the required tables and chairs, windows, space, a rail to clip flowcharts around the room - lots of wall space etc.. but you have to take your own projector and loud speakers.

So is this 'basic spec' old fashioned - or do we expect different things?
What is considered fit for purpose?
so we need to use PowerPoint every time? Certainly I use PowerPoint from time to tile buy for most training courses I ca take it or leave it.

So if this is 'old fashioned' what is current? what is high tech? What makes a room old fashioned?

Are PowerPoint and interactive whiteboards THE minimum or are these just tools.
what do you think?

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Mike Morrison is director of RapidBI, an organizational effectiveness consultancy. He has been involved in HR, OD and strategic development for over 20 years. He can be contacted via www.rapidbi.com/

© This article is copyright RapidBI 2006, 2008 – it may be copied providing the authors are credited, and direct links maintained

Sunday, 18 May 2008

Do you need to find a trainer?

Are you a manager or HR professional? Do you hire trainers?
With the marketplace changing rapidly it is getting harder and harder to find the right trainers for your business.

Purchasers cannot use day rates as the deciding factor, as generally speaking the lower the day rate the less professional the trainer (to run a sustainable business costs money) - if the rate looks too good to be true - it is too cheap - stay away!

With many trainers claiming to be able to deliver everything from Appraisals to Zoology, we all need to recognise that not all trainers are super hero's - all trainer have limits. Indeed of the material many propose to deliver they can often do:

20% of topics very well...
60% OK and ...
20% of topics - well... why bother?

The question is when you are looking to find a trainer what skill are you looking at...their top or bottom 20% of capability?

We as purchasers need to identify an independently assessed and verified standard on which to use as part of our selection process for finding and hiring a trainer. TrainerBase - the trade association for trainers has recently launched the CLP - or Certified Learning Practitioner standard. This looks to be a robust and at last one of the first 'fit for purpose' standards. Written by practitioners for purchasers it moves the focus for standards away from the government and academic sectors and firmly puts it in the private training sector space.

As a representative of RapidBI, I have just been through this process and can say with some feeling - this is the toughest assessment process I have ever undertaken - and I have done a few in my time! In this process as a participant there was no place to hide, no tricks to get you through and it is not an automatic pass process.... worse participants have to renew every 2 years.

As a participant I can highly recommend this as a learning experience - it has certainly helped the RapidBI team to focus and we are making changes to what we do and how we do it.

TrainerBase publishes some excellent bulletins on training for purchasers - links to two great ones are listed below:

TrainerBase Training Purchaser Bulletin:
Training Purchasers Bulletin 01
Training Purchasers Bulletin 02

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Mike Morrison is director of RapidBI, an organizational effectiveness consultancy. He has been involved in HR, OD and strategic development for over 20 years. He can be contacted via www.rapidbi.com/

© This article is copyright RapidBI 2006, 2008 – it may be copied providing the authors are credited, and direct links maintained

Monday, 12 May 2008

Get seen on the web - build your NetRep

With the web being increasingly important for purchasers to find training providers, use of the web is critical to many training providers.

Over the past 3 years I have been developing and using web search engine optimisation (SEO) techniques to get my business seen on the net. Recently I was asked to present a session at the TrainerBase conference on this topic. As a result I have been asked to put together a jargon free workshop helping typical trainers improve their web profile.

With this in mind I have developed a process called get seen on the web - a one day programme with practical activities to raise you profile and tap into the work available.

For more information see http://www.getseenontheweb.co.uk/

This one day programme is suitable for Trainers, Consultants and other freelancers, or anyone that wants to establish or develop their NetRep (interNET REPutation).

Thursday, 8 May 2008

Fair request for free help??

This morning I received the following request:

Hi Mike,
I am working on designing an e-learning course ware for the managers, to help them understand the company's rating scale which we use for performance evaluation. we have five scales for performance and appraisal. the problem is most of the managers can't differentiate between the 1st scale and the second for example, Significantly exceeds targets and exceeds targets. these to scales are the one where most of the managers are not able to differentiate. so i am designing an e-learning module a continuum of our whole performance management system e-course. i am facing problem in producing case studies for the course which can define parameters or benchmarking the performance. i will be using according to roles and the organisation but needs a starting point or an example case study. if you can give me your expert opinion on this i will be grateful.

Thanks
Regards

My polite answer was...

Hi
Sometimes we are asked to develop solutions to help people understand - when actually the best solution is to change the system!

There are a number of ways of communicating this type of information, however by far the best is to get case studies from within the client organisation.

If you want help in writing this type of material my hourly rate for this type of advice is .....

Now this post raised a number of questions in my mind -

why was this person doing the work when they clearly do not understand the basics of learning
to be writing e-learning (or any other learning content) one needs a level of attention to detail, and judging by the number of spelling errors this was not this individuals strengths
do people really expect others on forums to solve their problems specifically for free?

I think it is a sad state of our profession that while the views of 'competent' people are sort after, that as a profession many of the people appointed to roles (or indeed commissioned for consultancy roles) are 'not yet competent' and inexperienced to the point off not being able to do the job yet.

Another day to save the world..

Mike

ps As I write this article I feel it would help readers if I were to post the actual request so that you can see the extent of the errors - so here it is:

Hi Mike,
i am working on desinging an e-learning coursware for the managers, to help them understand the company's rating scale which we use for performance evaluation. we have five scales for performance and appraisal. the problem is most of the managers cann't differentiate between the 1st scale and the second for example, Significantly exeeds targets and exeeds targets. these to scales are the one where most of the managers are not able to differentiate. so i am desinging a e-learning module a continuim of oru whole performance management system e-course. i am facing problem in producing case studies for the course which can define parameters or banchmaring the perfomrance. i will be using according to roles and the organisation but needs a starting point or an example case stufy. if you can give me your expert opinon on this i will be grateful. you can email me on my personal email address as well *****@hotmail.com

Thanks
Regards

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Mike Morrison is director of RapidBI, an organizational effectiveness consultancy. He has been involved in HR, OD and strategic development for over 20 years. He can be contacted via www.rapidbi.com/

© This article is copyright RapidBI 2006, 2008 – it may be copied providing the authors are credited, and direct links maintained

How often to re-survey employees

Today I was asked an interesting question about staff surveys:

I have recently conducted a Global Employee Survey with my current organisation. There is a lot of discussion around when we should repeat this exercise, this ranges from 6 months to 24 months.

Do you have any advice?

My reply:
This all depends what you want to and are willing to do with the results of the employee survey.

I suspect that the organisation you are in now is very different from the one you knew 2 years ago (assuming you have been there that time). The currency of the results is limited to impacts of change by culture, goals, market place % of manager changes etc...

The question I would want to ask is; how would staff react to a repeat survey?

Great - a lot changed last time or ...
Not again - they did not listen last time so why this time?

How often do you do your employee surveys?

How do employees react?

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Mike Morrison is director of RapidBI, an organizational effectiveness consultancy. He has been involved in HR, OD and strategic development for over 20 years. He can be contacted via www.rapidbi.com/

© This article is copyright RapidBI 2006, 2008 – it may be copied providing the authors are credited, and direct links maintained

Tuesday, 6 May 2008

Action Learning

So what is Action Learning?
Action learning is based upon the concept of learning by reflection (or reviewing) on an experience. It is underpinned by the cycle of experiential learning as shown below, where the stages of reviewing and concluding are worked through with the Set. In practice many of us tend to short circuit this cycle and often ship the reviewing phase as it is often difficult to do out of context.Action learning will help 'close the loop' and ensure our learning is as effective as possible (more about learning cycles in module one).

Action Learning Sets are primarily focused on the individual's learning.An Action Learning programme involves the following key elements:

The Set: a group of 6 - 8 people who meet regularly.
The Projects: each participant works on a project or task over the life of the set
The Set Adviser: a facilitator who helps the group to work and learn together.

Although Action Learning is flexible, it is highly structured and focuses on the individual and their need NOT on the programme.

To find out more visit http://www.rapidbi.com/created/actionlearningregrevens.html

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Mike Morrison is director of RapidBI, an organizational effectiveness consultancy. He has been involved in HR, OD and strategic development for over 20 years. He can be contacted via www.rapidbi.com/

© This article is copyright RapidBI 2006, 2008 – it may be copied providing the authors are credited, and direct links maintained

Sunday, 20 April 2008

Director of Oomph

Does your business have a director of oomph?
For a business to be successful not only must it have a marketable product, but it needs to be effectively led and managed. Many larger organisations lack 'oopmh' within.

In our experience many organisations would benefit from ensuring that all staff were not only fully engaged but that strategies are put in place to create a level of oomph to motivate and encourage productivity.

A director oomph may be recruited from anywhere in the organisation, their role is to inject a sense of fun and participation beyond that of the local manager.

Who is your formal or informal director of oomph?

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Mike Morrison is director of RapidBI, an organizational effectiveness consultancy. He has been involved in HR, OD and strategic development for over 20 years. He can be contacted via www.rapidbi.com/

© This article is copyright RapidBI 2006, 2008 – it may be copied providing the authors are credited, and direct links maintained

Thursday, 17 April 2008

Going nuts at HRD

When the stand is quiet what do exhibitors do?

Wednesday, 16 April 2008

HRD 2008

Have you visited?
Mike has been on the TrainerBase standalong with Peter, Heather, Charlotte and others from the TBteam.

The exhibition has its usual mix of training providers, venues, tests and assessments , e-learning providers and publishers.

Along with Trainerbase, other membership based organisations including CIPD and BILD were also in attendance.

Friday, 11 April 2008

Resources for business

The RapidBI Team have been busy writing new free content covering strategic and tactical business theories, tools, thechiques and methods appropriate for people involved in the development of organizations or themselves. below are some of the newer pages.

Key Pages:

Holistic Diagnostic Tools - Find out what using a holistic approach can offer you and your organization Scanning the Business Environment - Why do this - is it just a waste of time or the critical factor? Management Models - 100+ Management Models - a page full of graphical management models, covering organizational growth, leadership, coaching, change management etc. Porters five forces - Michael Porter's five forces is a model used to explore the environment in which a product or company operates. The PESTLE Analysis - The PESTLE analysis - a powerful tool for exploring the external environment of an organzation Force Field Analysis - The Force Field analysis is a valuable tool in any decisionmaking process SWOT analysis - The SWOT analysis - a powerful tool for exploring the strengths of an organzation Personal Development Plans - Need to develop a Personal Development Plan - all you need is here PRIMO-F_- Business_Growth_Model - The PRIMO-F business growth model, a holistic approach Continuing Professional Development or CPD - CPD has been around for some years, now the need for personal responsibility is ever increasing. Write SMART objectives - Description on how to write SMART and SMARTER objectives for individual and business performance Learning Logs - We have had requests for material to complement our PDP and CPD pages... here it is Critical Success Factors - What are Critical Success Factors and how to use them Corporate Social Responsibility CSR - How does Corporate Social Responsibility impact smaller businesses Learning Styles - Want to be a more effective learner? hers is a summary of the main learning style theories and applicationWrite a Mission Statement - How to write a mission statement for your business. more coming soon...Psychometric_Personality_Testing - What psychometric testing is and how to use it Career Anchors - A powerful tool to help individuals understand their career strengths Business Values -how to use values to create an effective organizationChange Management - Understanding the impact of psychology on change

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Mike Morrison is director of RapidBI, an organizational effectiveness consultancy. He has been involved in HR, OD and strategic development for over 20 years. He can be contacted via www.rapidbi.com/

© This article is copyright RapidBI 2006, 2008 – it may be copied providing the authors are credited, and direct links maintained

Saturday, 5 April 2008

Strategic development: Are we missing the point?

We often talk about strategic programmes and actions, but are we taking the appropriate first steps?

This article looks at the steps we take and explores if we can be more strategic and add more value.

Introduction

Often we know where we want to get to, or at least have a good idea, but often as the old saying goes: "If I was going there, I would not start from here."

That is a very logical reply, even if it is not advice that is of much immediate practical value to the questioner. If you don't know where you are going, you are not likely to get there.

It is sound advice to know where you are and where you want to end up before starting the journey. Is this why many of the tourist maps have a 'you are here' marker?

Where are we now? Where do we want to be?

This is a simple yet basic step in any intervention, at any level within our respective organisations. Yet what is the extent to which we really do it? Where is the 'you are here' marker in our organisations? Sure, some of us have tools like customer satisfaction and staff engagement data (as well as the basic business financial measures), but holistic, strategic data?

In the 2007 survey, Develop the Developers (by Morrison & Ritchie), responders to the survey provided the following answers in response to development activities:

Use of diagnostic approaches:
Always (8%); usually (33%); sometimes (46%); rarely (10%); never (4%).

Use of evaluation approaches:
Always (37%); usually (43%); sometimes (15%); rarely (2%); never (2%).

This highlights why much of what we do in organisational development (OD) and human resource development (HRD) fails, on a regular basis, to make the desired (and recognised) strategic impact.

"How can we ever hope to evaluate any intervention effectively if we do not know where we started from?"

We have read many threads on community forums such as HRZone.co.uk and TrainingZone.co.uk about the difficulties of evaluating activity. How to calculate a return on investment (ROI) or show value for money is a commonly recurring theme.

How can we ever hope to evaluate any intervention effectively if we do not know where we started from? We will only know this by having the same measures at the beginning of an intervention as we want to use for measuring success after the event.

In business we do it – we look at the financial position (profit, turnover etc), we set a plan to achieve it and then we measure after an agreed period of time. In medicine, before a person starts treatment we have some measures – pulse, respiration, blood pressure and so on - we measure before and after (often on going) treatment. Why, in HR and HRD, do we not do the same? Often we do for things like retention, sickness and attendance – but not for the more strategic elements.

What is a diagnostic process?

It is often simpler than it sounds. It is a tool that identifies 'where you are now', the dot or arrow on the map if you like. Tools like SWOT and PESTLE are OK to start with, but often these tools are not used as effectively (or broadly) as they were originally intended.

Diagnostic tools that only look at the area of the business you are interested in, for example culture surveys, have their place, but how do you know that culture is the issue – where is the diagnosis to show that a specific tool like a culture survey is the right one? There may be a need with a higher priority.

"A regular, yet effective organisational diagnostic process not only evaluates previous actions but the same data can be used to identify future needs"

It's like going to your doctor - they will not send you for a special test or scan, until they have undertaken a more general diagnosis. In HR and OD we need to do the same. We need to use holistic diagnostic tools to help us orientate to real needs – often we react to the symptoms. It is easy to treat the cut to the hand from a fall, but if we miss the reason for the person falling – for instance, a minor stroke - sure the hand will get better, but in the mean time the stroke can do more damage.

Making evaluation easier

The more robust the diagnostic process, the easier the evaluation. Some would argue than an evaluation is just a repeat of the diagnostic but with different analysis on the results. The diagnostic is looking for an action plan; an evaluation is looking for change since the last measure. So a regular, yet effective organisational diagnostic process not only evaluates previous actions but the same data can be used (in association with a business plan) to identify future needs. Here is a simple strategic cycle:

Holistic diagnosis

Analysis

Plan

Action

Diagnosis

Insanity in our world?

As the saying goes, the first sign of madness is doing the same thing as before and expecting different results. It can be a bit like watching a replay of a race and expecting someone else to win. Obvious when we think about it, but why do we do this with our business activity?

Looking back at the results from the Develop the Developer survey, I wonder why many interventions are evaluated, but with little or no formal diagnostic processes undertaken at all; then we wonder why evaluation is so difficult.

Do we, as professionals, not learn? Do we keep doing the same things (evaluation but no initial diagnosis) and wonder why we do not add as much value as we expect? Are we 'mad'? Maybe we are just reluctant learners?

Mike Morrison is director of RapidBI Ltd, a consultancy specialising in helping individuals and organisations improve their business performance through people and organisation effectiveness.

This version first published: - HR Zone, 1st April 2008
Categories: HR Strategy

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Mike Morrison is director of RapidBI, an organizational effectiveness consultancy. He has been involved in HR, OD and strategic development for over 20 years. He can be contacted via www.rapidbi.com/

© This article is copyright RapidBI 2006, 2008 – it may be copied providing the authors are credited, and direct links maintained

Thursday, 27 March 2008

Quick and Painless interventions and solutions

Quick and Painless?

In our fast and busy lives we are often looking for that ‘quick fix’ the ‘painless solution’ – but are they? Does it work?

All too often on professional forums and networking groups I hear people asking for quick and painless solutions. Do they really exist in the worlds of business, Human Resources (HR) and Organizational Development (OD)?

Just because a solution is quick does not mean it will work in the medium or long term, nor does it necessarily mean it will support the culture and direction of the business.

Short term pain = long term gain?
What is pain in a professional context? Hassle? difficulty, effort? All of the above? Are many of us now so much under pressure that we ignore the real problem and are happy to stick on a sticking plaster to all problems we face? Do we care about the medium term consequences? – will we still be in the role in 12-24 months to care?

With the current economic climate I believe so – more and more of us will have to face the facts that the interventions we started just did not work – works in many situations they exasperated the problems. Time for us to start slowing down and doing an effective job.

Proof in the pudding

In the 2007 survey Develop the developers – the results highlighted that many in HR and OD are involved in evaluating activity and intervention, and that this trend was increasing, however less than 50% were actively involved in structured diagnosis before launching an intervention – and while there appeared to be intent to do more this will still mean that in 5 years time less people will be using diagnostic techniques than currently evaluate. And we and our clients often wonder why interventions do not add the value expected…

As the old saying goes – if you always do what you have always done – you will always get what you have always got. Or as I prefer – the real sign of madness – doing the same things time and time again and expecting different results!

For us as professionals to help our clients we must start to employ a robust diagnostic process on all our activity before committing to an intervention.

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Mike Morrison is director of RapidBI, an organizational effectiveness consultancy. He has been involved in HR, OD and strategic development for over 20 years. He can be contacted via www.rapidbi.com/

© This article is copyright RapidBI 2008 – it may be copied providing the authors are credited, and direct links maintained

Wednesday, 26 March 2008

Strategy and Tools in Business

Strategy and tools in business

Over the years a lot of good and bad stuff has been said about SWOT. Sure it is not the most robust of tools but when used in the way it was originally developed – it is a powerful tool.
Some people have argued that it is time to move on from SWOT to other things – in this piece we explore SOAR an appreciative Inquiry tool.

An interesting article on this topic was published in Ai Practitioner magazine ( http://preview.tinyurl.com/2bvobg ) (it is available here http://preview.tinyurl.com/26wk4v )for those that are not subscribers).

Having read the article, the SOAR approach to my mind makes the same mistake that many using the SWOT analysis do - and that is they miss the context. When the (highly researched) SOFT was changed to SWOT the new authors missed the point which is why the tool is often miss-understood. It was never designed to stand on its own, nor was it ever to be part of the direct action phase - it was a diagnosis and data capture tool.

The authors of this article to my mind make 2 fundamental mistakes:
1) they assume that all applications of SWOT are in the way they describe
2) they appear to ignore weaknesses and threads - apparently believing that their solution will soar (pardon the pun) over any difficulties.
Would the shareholders of Enron be in the position they are now in (extinct) if they had faced up to their threats and weaknesses, rather than focus on what they thought were their strengths?

The article clearly states in its summary
"This article has attempted to address the strategy-to-execution gap. In doing so, we have discussed SOAR, a strengths-based framework that builds on the best points of SWOT (strengths and opportunities) in order to move beyond the “as-is” state of the organization’s environment to the “to-be”."

Yes this as a framework can be used as the authors state to take SWOT data and apply it - but SOAR in itself is not a diagnostic or orientation tool. Anyone using this as a diagnostic tool is going to make the same errors as 1000's of people have done with inappropriate use of SWOT.
This thread has been started to help CIPD students (and others) complete their studies - and for that they must use SWOT and PESTLE - if they chose to use other tools they will need references - I cannot see any on the article .

Appreciative Enquiry has its place.
Appreciative Inquiry is a particular way of asking questions and envisioning the future that fosters positive relationships and builds on the basic goodness in a person, a situation, or an organization. In so doing, it enhances a system's capacity for collaboration and change. Appreciative Inquiry utilizes a 4-stage process focusing on:

DISCOVER: The identification of organizational processes that work well.
DREAM: The envisioning of processes that would work well in the future.
DESIGN: Planning and prioritizing processes that would work well.
DESTINY (or DELIVER): The implementation (execution) of the proposed design.

The basic idea is to build organizations around what works, rather than trying to fix what doesn't. It is the opposite of problem solving. AI focuses on how to create more of what's already working.
This method is more positive in nature than many others, however it is as a strategy naive in that it assumes success breeds success - many organizations are in fact where they are now because they did solve problems and did not just focus on what works.

Would a company that currently makes plastic carrier bags be advised to use SOAR - or look at the external factors which may bring about the end of the need for their product?

Equally any diagnostic process needs to look holistically at the people and the processes - not just one or the other.

Is SWOT redundant?.....

No but it is sure made more reliable with additions of other models in the transition to application.

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Mike Morrison is director of RapidBI, an organizational effectiveness consultancy. He has been involved in HR, OD and strategic development for over 20 years. He can be contacted via www.rapidbi.com/

© This article is copyright RapidBI 2008 – it may be copied providing the authors are credited, and direct links maintained

Friday, 14 March 2008

Strategic Organizational Development

OD professionals are the CEOs allies in creating a top performance culture for the organization.

Organizational Development professionals are specialists in Change Management and Culture Development. However many find themselves in positions that make it difficult to get a straight line of communication to the CEO. Mainly because of the Organizational structure and the fact that OD-Organization Development is located under HR. Ideally the OD Head would have a position on the same level as the HR Head according to Dr. William Rothwell from Pennstate University who is an authority in HR. However reality is that most OD professionals still work under the more traditional structure.

Some years ago I held an OD role that reported directly into the CEO - HR did not!! - so to some extent this is down to the CEO and their experience of what an OD professional can and cannot deliver in relation to their needs and vision for the organization.

OD as a discipline is getting is only recently starting to grow an a standalone profession. More so with the pangs of growth that many of the new organizations are now facing. Talent acquisition, retention, organizational culture and people development are now starting to hinge more on the OD professional more than the HR. Recognizing this aspect, many organizations are allocating independent structures for the OD function. However, in cases where the OD has to work under HR, whether he/she can connect to the CEO solely depends on what he/she is capable of taking to the table. If a OD professional can sparkle with out-of-the-box ideas which can directly contribute to the growth of organization, the CEO cannot turn a blind eye.

Back in the 60's and 70's OD focused on people, behaviours and their actions and interactions with each other, in those days the majority of organizations did not know how to look after or engage with their people -

Things have now changed, much is different

CEO’s are having their valuable time ever squeezed and as such will only be able to have people reporting directly in that can add directly and measurably to their primary objectives. They have to focus on the big picture or strategic matters.

Unfortunately it is not very often that OD practitioner can demonstrate primary change. If we want to be engaged at this level we need to re-evaluate what we do and what is classed as OD activity. For example, traditionally when undertaking diagnostic processes we seem to focus on people and behaviours, or on the culture, now we need to be more integrated and holistic. This means starting to look at factors which traditionally have not been the domain of OD practitioner. If we are to truly facilitate change then our diagnostic process need to map the PRIMO-F model – that is to cover:

People,
Resources,
Innovation,
Marketing,
Operations and
Finance elements,

For it is how these factors interact that provide the organization with either an advantage or disadvantage in the market place. When undertaking a SWOT analysis for your organization do you cover all of these elements appropriately? Sure we may not be in a position to solve any issues raised here but as OD facilitators our role is to identify any blocks in the organization, then help to facilitate a solution.

So if we really want to get noticed we need to really get strategic and start looking at interactions with people and systems in all elements of our respective organizations.

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Mike Morrison is director of RapidBI, an organizational effectiveness consultancy. He has been involved in HR, OD and strategic development for over 20 years. He can be contacted via www.rapidbi.com/

© This article is copyright RapidBI 2006, 2008 – it may be copied providing the authors are credited, and direct links maintained

Thursday, 21 February 2008

Diagnosing Organizational Culture

Today I read a thread on Diagnosing Organizational Culture, where someone was asking for recommendations on tools to use to undertake this task.

If you are only looking for isolated culture tools then the following should be considered (in no particular order):

Diagnosing Organizational culture - Harrison

Denison Organizational Culture Survey - Denison

Corporate Culture Questionnaire - SHL

The Creatrix - Byrd (http://www.creatrix.com/ ) looks at the culture for innovation and effective leadership

Organizational Dynamics - Kotter (book with diagnostic)

Diagnosing & Changing Organizational Culture - Cameron, Quinn (book with diagnostic)

and many many more....

Many instruments will claim to be 'normed' - be careful of this - we know the difficulties in 'norming' personality psychometrics - well imaging that complication multiplied ten fold per person employed... each person acts and interacts with another in a different way - I would love to see the data to be verified for this - the psychometric publishers would love to have such technology!

Context based Cultural Review

There are many approaches to looking at culture and for each firm their will be an appropriate tool based upon:

Current culture (ironically)

Goals of undertaking the survey

Desired outputs

I have been part of a team looking at what makes an effective firm for over 10 years now and have used many, many instruments from around the world looking at organizational culture. To my mind they all have one fundamental flaw - they assume there is a right way to run a business.

While there may well be a preferred approach of empowerments, engagement etc, I have worked with many firms that use an autocratic style very effectively, and when changed often people feel less secure and over time those firms fail to perform to the level they once did.

Change the culture at your peril

Having worked with over 700 firms in the last 10+ years I have discovered that the best culture to have is the culture that best suits the owner/ CEO and their natural style, then it is about getting consistency across the organization.

To change the culture without the TOTAL commitment from the CEO (and the CEO having appropriate one-to-one support to change their own style first) is pure folly. Change of culture must be led from the top if it is to be sustained and add value to the organization.

It's more than just culture change

In addition, looking at culture on its own is meaningless - the systems, structure and processes need to be congruent with the culture, and just looking at culture in isolation is folly for short term feel good but little long term added value.

Any diagnostic process as part of an organizational development intervention needs to be as holistic as practical to avoid duplication of effort at a slightly later stage (clients get diagnostic'ed out)

Going truly Holistic

Many OD practitioners talk about holistic reviews - but are they truly holistic? Do they look at the way Finance, Marketing and Operations are run in the organization? are these put in the context of the culture and the stated/ desired goals of stakeholders?

The BIR (Business Improvement Review) not only looks at culture, style and values but puts it in the context of operations and the goals of the organization. It does not assume there is a 'right' or a 'wrong' to run a firm, nor does it assume a single management model. The BIR provides the coach or consultant to start a meaningful discussion based upon a common understanding. This creates ownership in the key decision makers and as a result has a high proportion of participants take meaningful action post diagnostic. They own the results and the reason for change.

If you would like more information on the BIR please visit www.rapidbi.com/bir or email me for further details.

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Mike Morrison is director of RapidBI, an organizational effectiveness consultancy. He has been involved in HR, OD and strategic development for over 20 years. He can be contacted via www.rapidbi.com/

© This article is copyright RapidBI 2008 – it may be copied providing the authors are credited, and direct links maintained

Sunday, 27 January 2008

Free Material - open source training content

On an ASTD thread (http://tinyurl.com/2kl2sa) today I caught up with a discussion on free course material.

The debate was an interesting one and where one individual raised the comparison with the software market - where great programs like Open-office etc are available free.

So having reflected I wondered if this could work for the training and consultancy fields.

Open source - would it work for training materials?

Taking the similarity with open source software - lets look at how this works...

Generally a number of like minded people start and build the basics - they then make this available to the wider world.
Then as people take and add to it they also make their additions (not usually deleting anything previously added) available to the world - often they bundle it with their product - generating an income stream.
So if the same were to happen in T&D...

Person A would create an outline
Person b would add some content and then publish
Person c would add more content.. etc.

It seems that many in our field are happy to take and add - but few prepared to put back into the public domain again for further development.

So if we want to do this we need to be more open - are we willing to do that? Where would the publishing space be?

Would users honestly include a page of contributors at the back of their handouts - in the same way this is often embedded in software? Recognition of contribution seems to be important in the software model - so why not for a training model.

Training - a commodity market place
As we become a more commodity based market this is not a bad idea - but it needs to start somewhere... ultimately though this will impact on professional products.

For example - on a thread on another forum recently there was a discussion about mind-map/ concept mapping software. Several people said 'why buy when you can get free versions?'.. the reality is that someone somewhere has to put time in - they cannot do it as a charity.

The fact that the paid for products were better seemed to be missed by a population that has learnt that just because material is free why pay.. Its like having a website - why pay for hosting when you can have a free site - all be it with adverts for stuff you do not own - and reasons for people to leave your site! Buy hey it is free.

Copyright

One of the barriers we have is use of 'proprietary' models. For an open source approach we would need to re-engineer much of what we use. Could we persuade some of the 'old school' like Peter Honey, Pedler, Kolb, etc to ally use of their models if appropriate copyright was attributed?

May be access to existing theories may well be one of the limitations of such a system, unless this issue can be overcome, in a way which engages original thinkers and current authors.

The 'open source' market is a good idea but we all need to realise the implications. Will this be started in the UK, US, AU or some other part of the world first?

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Mike Morrison is director of RapidBI, an organisational effectiveness consultancy. He has been involved in HR, OD and strategic development for over 20 years. He can be contacted via www.rapidbi.com

Change Curve Debunked?

Today I read an interesting post by Rob Robson on the change curve at his blog (http://preview.tinyurl.com/2rywg5) .

This sparked some thoughts which I share below.

Change Curve debunked... really?

Rob asks is the Kubler Ross change curve an over simplification - yes of course... all models are over simplifications of reality - isn't that what they were created for, to take a complex theory and enable the PRINCIPLES to be more easily understood?

He raises some interesting points that many authors do ignore that fact that many people welcome change. This is so very true, in OD and HRM we seem to assume the worst in people - when this is just not true. Sure people will reach different under change, and that is to be expected - our role is to ease that process - not offer therapy for change interaction!

We all need to remember that these are just models and not reality.

As a framework and common language they do have a value - indeed as he says

"By all means, keep the five-stage model in our armoury, but let’s not get carried away with it. Let’s not present it as an unequivocal truth. And let’s not let it get in the way of attempting to truly understand how people really experience change."

As is said in the change management article there are 3 rules to leadership (or change):

Rule# 1 - people are different
Rule# 2 - people are different
Rule# 3 - people are different

And we need to treat each individual in the way that is appropriate for them.
Rob's headline is to Debunk the Change Curve ... which one there are many? Rob focus's is on the Kubler Ross curve - which as he points out was actually developed for use in a clinical environment, and users need to be aware of that.

Many practitioners will use a simplified model for use in a general business environment business environment.

What we do need to be careful of is people search the web (or a library), finding a model and using it without understanding what it is, where it come from or indeed its limitations.

All models have a place - the question we all need to ask is - is it here and now?

Mike

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Mike Morrison is director of RapidBI, an organisational effectiveness consultancy. He has been involved in HR, OD and strategic development for over 20 years. He can be contacted via www.rapidbi.com
© This article is copyright RapidBI 2006, 2008 – it may be copied providing the authors are credited, and direct links maintained

Tuesday, 15 January 2008

Develop the Developer - who is the typical developer?

Develop the Developer was a survey run in the summer of 2007.

Slowly we are unpacking the results. The summary is nearly complete but in the mean time as we discover key elements they will be posted here.

The typical developer in 2007 is:

Female, aged 36-56 (mostly 36-46), employed in a developer role, a member of the CIPD. They have been in a development role for five or more years and to date completed at least 30 days of CPD - many over 100.

For more information and background on Develop the developer visit the project site - www.developthedeveloper.com

Mike Morrison - January 2008

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Mike Morrison is director of RapidBI, an organisational effectiveness consultancy. He has been involved in HR, OD and strategic development for over 20 years. He can be contacted via www.rapidbi.com © This article is copyright RapidBI 2006, 2008 – it may be copied providing the authors are credited, and direct links maintained

Sunday, 13 January 2008

How to Write a SWOT analysis

SWOT Analysis

A SWOT is a planning tool used to understand the Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, and Threats involved in a project or in a business. It involves specifying the objective of the business or project and identifying the internal and external factors that are supportive or unfavourable to achieving that objective.

SWOT is an acronym for Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, Threats.

There are several ways of graphically representing the SWOT analysis matrix or grid. Several versions are shown on this article - use the one which is best suited to your application. (More templates can be seen on our website SWOT analysis templates )

While at first glance the SWOT looks like a simple model and easy to apply, I can say from experience, that to do a SWOT analysis that is both effective and meaningful, requires time and a significant resource. This cannot be done effectively by just one person. It requires a team effort. The SWOT methodology has the advantage of being used as a 'quick and dirty' tool or a comprehensive management too, and that one can lead to the other. This flexibility is one of the factors that has contributed to its success.

The term "SWOT analysis" is in itself an interesting term. To my understanding, the SWOT is not an analysis. It is a summary of a set of previous analyses – even if those were not more than 15 minutes of mini-brainstorming with yourself in front of your computer. The analysis or more correctly interpretation comes after the SWOT summary has been produced.

The SWOT Model

Positive	Internal		Negative or potential to be negative
	Strengths	Weaknesses
	Opportunities	Threats
	External

	Strengths	Weaknesses
Opportunities	Offensive - make the most of these	Defensive - watch competition closely
Threats	Adjust - restore strengths	Survive - turn around

Strengths

Weaknesses

Opportunities

Offensive -

make the most of these

Defensive -

watch competition closely

Threats

Adjust -

restore strengths

Survive -

turn around

Definition of SWOT

A SWOT analysis process generates information that is helpful in matching an organization or group’s goals, programs, and capacities to the social environment in which it operates. Note the SWOT itself is only a data capture - the analysis follows.

Strengths

Positive tangible and intangible attributes, internal to an organization.
They are within the organization’s control.

Weakness

Factors that are within an organization’s control that detract from its ability to attain the desired goal.
Which areas might the organization improve?

Opportunities

External attractive factors that represent the reason for an organization to exist and develop.
What opportunities exist in the environment, which will propel the organization?
Identify them by their “time frames”

Threats

External factors, beyond an organization’s control, which could place the organization mission or operation at risk.
The organization may benefit by having contingency plans to address them if they should occur.
Classify them by their “seriousness” and “probability of occurrence”.

Background to the SWOT Analysis

The SWOT analysis technique is credited by Albert Humphrey, who led a research project at Stanford University in the 1960s and 1970s using data from top companies.

The goal was to identify why corporate planning failed. The resulting research identified a number of key areas and the tool used to explore each of the critical areas was called SOFT. Humphrey and the original research team used the categories “What is good in the present is Satisfactory, good in the future is an Opportunity; bad in the present is a Fault and bad in the future is a Threat.” This was called the SOFT analysis.

In 1964 Urick and Orr at a conference changed the F to a W, and it has stuck as that, soFt to sWot

On its own a SWOT analysis is meaningless It works best when part of an overall strategy or in a given context or situation. This strategy may be as simple as:

Goal or objective
SWOT / SOFT
Evaluation or measures of success
Action

Introduction to SWOT

The SWOT analysis tool is great for developing an understanding of an organization or situation and decision-making for all sorts of situations in business, organizations and for individuals.

The SWOT analysis headings provide a good framework for reviewing strategy, position and direction of a company, product, project or person (career).

Doing a SWOT analysis can be very simple, however its strengths lie in its flexibility and experienced application. Remember the capture is only part of the picture.

Applications

A SWOT analysis can be used for:

Workshop sessions
Brainstorm meetings
Problem solving
Planning
Product evaluation
Competitor evaluation
Personal Development Planning
Decision Making (with force field analysis)

The SWOT is a great tool that can be used in association with PESTLE

Overview of SWOT

POSITIVE/ HELPFUL

to achieving the goal

NEGATIVE/ HARMFUL

to achieving the goal

INTERNAL Origin

facts/ factors of the organization

Strengths

Things that are good now, maintain them, build on them and use as leverage

Weaknesses

Things that are bad now, remedy, change or stop them.

EXTERNAL Origin

facts/ factors of the environment in which it operates

Opportunities

Things that are good for the future, prioritize them, capture them, build on them and optimize

Threats

Things that are bad for the future, put in plans to manage them or counter them

Aim of a SWOT Analysis

Reveal your competitive advantages
Analyze your prospects for sales, profitability and product development
Prepare your company for problems
Allow for the development of contingency plans

A SWOT analysis is a process to identify where you are strong and vulnerable -- where you should defend and attack. The result of the process is a 'plan of action', or 'action plan'.

The analysis can be performed on a product, on a service, a company or even on an individual.

Done properly, SWOT will give you the BIG PICTURE of the MOST IMPORTANT FACTORS that influence SURVIVAL and PROSPERITY. As well as a PLAN to ACT ON.

How to do a SWOT

Irrespective of whether you or your team are future planning for specific products, work, personal or any other area, the SWOT analysis process is the same.

Step 1 – Information collection - In the here and now…
List all strengths that exist now. Then in turn, list all weaknesses that exist now. Be realistic but avoid modesty!

You can conduct one-on-one interviews. Or get a group together to brainstorm. A bit of both is frequently best
You'll first want to prepare questions that relate to the specific company or product that you are analyzing. You'll find some questions and issues below to get you going.
When facilitating a SWOT - search for insight through intelligent questioning and probing

Step 2 – What might be…
List all opportunities that exist in the future. Opportunities are potential future strengths. Then in turn, list all threats that exist in the future. Threats are potential future weaknesses.
Step 3 – Plan of action…
Review your SWOT matrix with a view to creating an action plan to address each of the four areas.

In summary:

Strengths need to be maintained, built upon or leveraged.
Weaknesses need to be remedied, changed or stopped.
Opportunities need to be prioritized, captured, built on and optimized.
Threats need to be countered or minimized and managed.

A SWOT analysis can be very subjective, and two people rarely come-up with the same final version of SWOT. It is an excellent tool however, for looking at the negative factors first in order to turn them into positive factors. Use SWOT as guide and not a prescription.

For more detailed examples, templates etc visit http://www.rapidbi.com/created/SWOTanalysis.html

Mike Morrison

Thursday, 10 January 2008

Trainerbase: making the most of your membership

Are you a member of TrainerBase? Are you making it work for you?

In this article Mike Morrison describes how he as made it to be number 1 listing in TrainerBase

Ok so you have ‘signed up’ but what is TB and how can you make it work for you?

Note – if you are a not yet an enhanced member you will not be getting the most from your subscription! I looked at the options and realised that the membership option for the highest ‘price’ provided by far the best value… No such thing as a free lunch…

Introduction

If you are expecting work and purchasers to come beating a path to your door – then you have a misunderstanding of not only TB but the marketplace as a whole.TB is a marketplace, a marketing tool, not necessarily a selling tool. This paper sets to outline how I have used TB to generate activity and how you can too.

What is the difference?

Marketing is “everything a company does to acquire customers and maintain a relationship with them”
Sales is “income (at invoice values) received for goods and services over some given period of time”How can TrainerBase help you grow your business?

TrainerBase is primarily a marketing tool – the sale comes when you have created your place in the market.

So how can you use TB to better effect?

1) Raise your profile on TB and the TB search listings

2) Use your TB membership to help promote your website (increase Google position)Visit http://www.trainerbase.co.uk/edit/EditProfile_Rank.asp (view your profile position and purchase points) and look at your position. Where are you? Make a note of these figures. These will provide you with your benchmark, the ability to see the changes in position based on effort. No matter how low, do not be put off. All improvements will help you.

Next, search the database for your key words/ associated disciplines. You need to be on the first or second page of results. If not, there is little point in being listed. You may need to accept that you need to specialise for a while until you gain more points.

While you may aspire to being in the top 20 (absolute position <20)

You goal is to have a relative position

For example if you search for ‘coaching’ you will find over 1400 trainers with this skill – if you are not in the first couple of pages for your ‘main offer’ there is little point being in the list. There are trainers with paid profiles on page 25!! Why??

The members that ‘sign up’ and do not pay anything also start on page 25!!

Be bold… be brave … only select the things that you love and you excel at – remembers this IS A COMPETITIVE market place. You need to be seen over the ‘background noise’.

Gaining points

The more points you have the higher you show in the search results. Other less known ways of increasing you position in the listings is to minimise the number of “associated disciplines” that you offer. Focus on the ones you excel at. The ones you can use as a ‘hook’ for potential customers. If you claim to do too many you risk looking desperate for work – this is not a position of strength and will undermine your perception. All the others can be listed on your enhanced listing pages.

Be careful – the more associated disciplines you have the more dilute you are seen to be by potential purchasers.

Ways of earning points:

Visit the site – each visit earns one point – so if you have Firefox or IE7 set up 2 home pages – each time you start your browser you earn a point
Contribute to the forums – again that earns points
Upload and encourage clients to put testimonials
Upload resources you have – just be careful of copyright
Refer other trainers – make sure they quote your reference
Mention TB as a reference source on forums – any forum – but make sure you do it as a hyperlink. That usually means typing http://www.trainerbase.co.uk/ – tip many forums stop this so always include at least 2 sources of info with TB being one. This way it looks less like direct advertising.
Be creative – find new forums, invest time giving quality answers. Build a reputation in that arena.
If someone wants a resource and you have it – rather than send it – upload it as a resource (earn points) and promote where to get it (more points!).
After each posting – screen grab a copy of the posting (alt & print screen) and paste it in your email software and sent to Ed – if you don’t tell him – it doesn’t happen! By the way the forums can be ANYWHERE in the world – not just UK ones – UK ones promote the services of TB, world wide help keep TB high on the search engines – good for you… good for me

Value of points

In the current FAQ section the value of points is given as:

1 point per visit to the site
5 points per testimonial uploaded to your profile
10 points for a posting on the forum20 points per resource uploaded to your profile
50 points per referred friend that signs up to TrainerBase (if they then subscribe you get £10)
50 points minimum per article published (really useful ones will attract more)
50 points minimum for promoting TrainerBase to other networks
Note this may be subject to change – so look up the current ‘rewards’

Don’t try to beat the system – work with it… if you upset Ed, he will keep an eye on you.. work with the system and promote TB not just yourself.

You start your TB membership with 1000 points, then for each day that passes and you do not contribute you lose a point – so even if you just click on the website once a day you are holding your position….

You need around 1000 additional points to be a contender – so build a short/ medium term plan:

How many resources can you upload, how many daily visits to the site, how many ‘mentions’ on forums and other sites? – aim for a 3-6 month plan. What are your long term (sustainable) plans?
How many website visits per week? How many resources per month?, how many mentions on other site per month? Treat this as a long term investment, not a quick return.

Shoot for the stars?

Being in the top 5 is not necessarily a strength – people will make assumptions about you, some are advantageous, some are a hindrance. How often do you ignore the first couple of results in a Google search??

If you want to you can also buy points - But earning is a much more sustainable activity. I have seen people buy points then slide as other who have a more sustainable model gain ground – sure buy points to ‘get in the game’ but sustainability is the real name of the game. Build momentum first – then top-up if needed (to get in the game). This is not a strategy I have ever done nor will I do.

Potential purchasers will read your posts on to this and other forums – you are your own press agent – so be aware of your image – it is what you want your customers to know you as? Posting and answering questions is not only valuable ‘spare time’ activity, but it helps to raise your profile, and helps other TB members and purchasers to understand your strengths. – this is all marketing!

Your Profile

One of the best kept secrets of the TB profiles is the enhanced listing. This is for 2 reasons:

Potential customers can find out about you really easily, see the course you run etc. it is a great shop window.
Often your TB listing will be placed higher in Google than your own site. This is because of the changing content and number of external sites pointing to TB (hence the reason for posting on forums).

The real power of using the TB profile is to have links to your own site, not just one to your home page, but several links to important pages with good content. From a purchaser point of view, they do not need to see your home page – your TB page becomes that, if they want more specific information – take them straight to that page. Keep changing and managing your profile pages, the search engines love changing content, and it will encourage people to re-visit. I have several people re-visiting to see what I change. Sometimes I change a lot, other times a little.

Google appears to LOVE multiple links from TB (or other places) to your site. The links from Google alone could easily cost you £100-£200 pa for quality links from a related high profile site! – why do you think links and adverts from sites like TrainingZone cost £1000s !!!

Talk to other members – exchange discrete links on their TB pages too! Link with people that offer compatible services – not competitive ones.

Building your database

Do you monitor and keep a list of people that visit your site? Do you have a newsletter? Are they added? Keep adding download/ resources – as people download – you get their data, the more you have the more people will visit…

While many visitors may well be other trainers – if they see you as an expert in an area, they may well approach you to partner for pitches, and if they have the lead and see you as a strength….well enough said.

Collect the data, follow up on the data, remember marketing is about building a relationship – one email contact is not a relationship!

Are you making the most of your investment?

If you are not using your membership to best effect you are wasting money. Simple as that!

Visit http://www.trainerbase.co.uk/VIP/RapidBI to see what I do – I’m not saying I am an exemplar – but the site DOES work for me on many levels.

Does this stuff really work?

I know this stuff works… I did it this way. I had stages of growth and targets – first was to be on page one for some searches My next goal was the top 20 trainer list, then the top 10, then the top 5 then number 1. In the same time frame I have seen parts of my business site grow from a Google rank of 3 to 5 – not bad for a small training site. Unique hits have grown from 10’s to over 3500 unique visitors per month and growing. With increasing numbers come increasing sales….

If this works why share it now?

I have considered doing this for some time – but did not want to give away what was working for me – I estimate that only 5-10 other members of TB actually understand how TB really helps them in the long term. With the changes to TB, the trade association and my commitment to growing the community, it is now in the interests of the community for more people to ‘use the system’.

In time other rankings will need to come into play – including I suspect geographic ones – are you ready? Many trainers for example will ‘work anywhere’ – but if the client has green policies they will more likely hire a ‘green’ supplier, and one who says I only work within 75 miles of x may well get the work above a person prepared to travel. Values are becoming increasingly important. Will your name be higher in the listing than your competitors? Will purchasers see you first – or will you GRAB their attention?

TrainerBase will grow – will you grow with it?

I wish you well with your TB marketing plan.

Mike Morrison - http://www.trainerbase.co.uk/VIP/RapidBI

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Mike Morrison is director of RapidBI, an organisational effectiveness consultancy. He has been involved in HR, OD and strategic development for over 20 years. He can be contacted via www.rapidbi.com

Tuesday, 8 January 2008

Marketing OD & HRD: From tactical to strategy

Summary

With the need for internal marketing activities increasing, Mike Morrison offers some tips and advice on how to develop your skills in branding and promotion, so as to meet the specific needs of the business.

Introduction
As the business environment changes, so does the potential contribution of HR and organisational development (OD) teams. As the day to day workload increases, often the profile of these functions diminishes.

Increasingly, the challenge of HR and OD is to undertake marketing activities internally. This is a need which is increasing and often requires a skill set not readily available within the function.
Why do it?

Many of us say that as a function we are not strategic enough. To a great extent that is true, since the business does not want us to be strategic most of the time.What we need to do is to avoid re-branding the whole function, and concentrate on re-branding offers and services. For example, an organisational development function may have the following services:

OD strategy
HR strategy
Recruitment
Compensation and benefits
Employee relations
Development
Talent management
Training
Learning

We need to recognise that all elements have their place, and many, if not most, of these are operational and tactical in nature. Let’s not try to make something operational look strategic – it just does not work.
This is a big jump from the direction many HR-related functions have been making in recent years.

Changing Mindsets

This is a double challenge. Firstly we need to recognise the need to communicate what we do to the wider world. Secondly we need to be prepared to start advertising our services and celebrating our successes. It is about seeing things from the perception of others.

Available resources to help

There are some books and publications to help HR undertake this role; however more has been published under the umbrella of marketing training. The principles and audiences are the same, so we can use these resources as well as ones aimed at promoting professional services in a wider context. That said, we can also use some of the excellent materials available in the general marketing arena.

Making it happen

When I have done this in corporate life, it’s about spending time with your customers. How much of your week do you spend building relationships? If it is less than two days a week then you are not doing enough. The better we understand our clients and their specific needs, the stronger our position is to offer a customised service. For many HR teams now involved in business partnering, leaving behind the (standard) menu driven offers is an increasing fact of life. Don’t get me wrong, our clients want and often demand a menu – what is different is that we will have a menu specifically for them.

Each customer is unique

It’s also not about advertising or promoting all of your services to everyone - identify a given group or audience and promote relevant services to them.
For example,there is no point promoting talent management services or recruitment strategies to front line staff - they are just not interested. Equally, hard selling career development to managers is not effective - many managers will want to keep their best people and (wrongly) believe that by not encouraging them to develop, they will stay in the team longer. I know this is not best for the business, but if we are trying to raise the profile we need to see things from our customers’ perspective.
From a professional and holistic point of view we want to tell the world about what we do, yet the reality is they (the public, our customers etc) are just not interested. We need to frame our offer for each audience.
As HR or OD professionals, we need to learn from how companies market to their diverse audience. As a function, do you use your internal communication or marketing team to help communicate key messages?
You would not use a training consultant to design your comp and benefits systems would you? So why look at marketing any differently? As the saying goes – different strokes for different folks.
Who is the audience?Whilst that is for you to work out, the following is a useful guide:

Directors
Senior managers
Middle management
Team leaders/ supervisors
Front line / operational staff
Professionals

While there may be overlap - there is nothing to say that any given person does not receive two or more different messages – it’s a language thing, not a conflicting message. We must ensure that we do not communicate conflicting messages as this can undermine the whole communication strategy.

The step up to strategic interventions

By driving HR and OD services to meet the specific needs of each part of the business, we are in effect taking HR from policy driven methodology to strategy driven, thus enabling the business to achieve its goals effectively.

Summary

Identify your audience, Build relationships, Promote only relevant offers, Get to know your customers, Build brands or labels for each discrete offer, Promote services directly to your clients needs

Did I mention – build relationships and position offers to the client’s needs?

Footnote - This article is not intended to encourage HR departments to re-brand to OD; indeed the challenge is to celebrate what you do and tell people in an appropriate way for them. Any department or function that calls themselves an OD function, I would ask them, “what business diagnostic tools do you use to identify business needs and to position your offer?” OD requires a completely different positioning from inside the organisation, and this positioning needs to be driven from the top; not from within a function.

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Mike Morrison is director of RapidBI, an organisational effectiveness consultancy. He has been involved in HR, OD and strategic development for over 20 years. He can be contacted via www.rapidbi.com © This article is copyright RapidBI 2006, 2008 – it may be copied providing the authors are credited, and direct links maintained

Networking or not working? - The value of social networking

For those of us that use the net during work time, there are two types of networking sites, those that can aid learning, productivity and build business relationships and those that can slow or even stop work in its tracks. In this article, I explore the risks to individuals and businesses in the growing use of personal contact sites.

Personality types
Are you the type of person that enjoys getting post or personal emails. For some of us, personal messages from people they know (or don’t know) causes excitement and fun. The feeling is almost addictive. What am I talking about? Well do you have your MSN or Yahoo messenger running while at work? Ready for people you know to chat to you? Do you feel compelled to talk when someone you know appears online? At best, this is a distraction; at its worst, it can disable some individuals from doing any work at all. But this is not the worst of it. With people we know our feelings and reaction to people we know is more often or not within reasonable control.

Are you ‘addicted’ to instant messaging?
Checking your email once or twice a day is one thing, but being permanently connected is quite another.

How can you tell if you are addicted to messaging? For some this can be quite easy. It is about how far you go to get your ‘fix’ of chatting with people you know.

If you work for a company that has blocked your favourite messaging site, then you use search engines to find alternatives – you use one of the ‘framed’ or java based sites, as the chances are your IT department has not blocked that yet… One of the better known MSN/ Yahoo replacements is ebuddy. This is a great site which allows you to access your instant messaging site and avoid the block on some company firewalls. When your company stops one you happily spend time searching for another.

Taking it to extremes
What knocks some people ‘off balance’ is the use of personal/ social networking and dating sites. Here users await messages from people they do not know, checking in many times a day. When a new message appears in your inbox this causes a completely different reaction to messages in ‘conventional’ email inboxe. For many it causes a flood of adrenalin and endorphins as the thought of a message causes excitement, wondering who it is from and whether it is the start of a new relationship or not. For a few, it is stronger than that, with married people looking for that illicit encounter. Then once contact has been made, that individual is then added to a messenger contact list – making talk that is more frequent inevitable. For some people this takes ‘office relationships’ to a completely different level. Then some people start to carry another (second or third mobile phone) just for contact with these ‘special friends’. This can not only lead to reductions in productivity, it can lead to individuals taking longer lunch breaks, disappearing early, well you get the picture.

Where are we spending our time?
Research has shown that the sites with us spending the most time on are: Myspace, Yahoo, Msn, ebay (being the top 4) with an adult dating site in the top 20. Sites like Myspace , Facebook and Youtube have little/ no legitimate place in the world of professional networking. As for dating or chat room sites…well that goes without saying. Yes, all of these can be great places to spend our hobby or down time, but as business tools – no.

Networking –v- Social Contact sites
Here I am going to make the distinction between the two types of networking sites. Networking sites tend to have forums and ways of finding people that have skills or experiences we are looking for. The forums tend to me places where people can share thoughts, questions and solutions, but they do so in a way that does not encourage a ‘conversation’. These sites include HRZone, TrainingZone, CIPD, TrainerBase, Linkedin etc.. Sites that can help us solve a business problem have a legitimate place in our ‘toolkit’ of solutions and organisations should encourage their use to help remain competitive and cost effective.

Are Blogs – social networking sites?
Yes and no. For me there are two types of blog – those that use social networking sites, and those that are on an individual’s professional website. For me that latter is a professional too, the former is not. In this day and age of personal networking, we need to be careful about our image. What happens if we go for a job and someone ‘Google’s’ our name – and all they find is a blog with not very business like language on it?.

For this reason, I do not encourage blogs on social networking sites for professional networking or learning.

How do we stop this excessive behaviour?
The short answer is with difficulty. While on one hand we need to educate workers to the advantages of ‘professional’ networking, we need (for reasons of productivity) to prohibit social networking. Technology can help a lot here, by blocking access to these types of sites, but as many have found out as one gets blocked another ‘route’ is discovered. Equally, many mobile phones can access these sites now, so stopping employees using their mobile may become the next big HR challenge!

How are you going to encourage appropriate networking and discourage inappropriate networking… Off to answer that flashing little orange box in the bottom of my screen….

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Mike Morrison is Director of RapidBI, a company specialising in the development of high performing businesses and individuals.

Monday, 7 January 2008

Action Learning for Leadership development

Introduction
When devising any leadership programme, it is important to ensure that as participants students are not only ‘taught’ or trained, but that they have the opportunity to put learning into action. Experience has shown us that unless we practice new skills and ideas soon after a programme we tend to forget the lessons learnt.

Action Learning is one of the methods good development programmes use to help leaders apply their learning. Other formal approaches will include your Line manager and your mentor.

Action Learning works best when a ‘Set’ of individuals are put together as a support group for the duration of the learning activity.
The concept of Action learning Sets was developed originally by Reg Revens.

A definition of Action Learning
"Action Learning is an approach to the development of people in organisations which takes the task as the vehicle for learning. It is based on the premise that there is no learning without action and no sober and deliberate action without learning. The method has three main components: people who accept responsibility for taking action on a particular issue; problems, or the task that people set themselves; and a set of six or so colleagues who support and challenge each other to make progress on problems. Action Learning implies both self-development and organisation development." Mike Pedler (1991)

So what is Action Learning?

In practice many of us tend to short circuit this cycle and often ship the reviewing phase as it is often difficult to do ‘out of context. Action learning will help ‘close the loop’ and ensure our learning is as effective as possible (more about learning cycles in module one). Action Learning Sets are primarily focused on the individual's learning.

An Action Learning programme involves the following key elements:

The Set: a group

Rapid Business Improvement

Saturday, 10 October 2009

SEO (Search Engine Optimisation) is specialist, expensive and you need to know what you are doing.. don’t you?

Friday, 9 October 2009

Tuesday, 6 October 2009

Innovation is about the first step

Monday, 5 October 2009

How to receive feedback from your manager

Friday, 2 October 2009

25 great tips on employee engagement – morale boosters

Saturday, 26 September 2009

Learning beyond university to informal learning using micro-blogging

Tuesday, 22 September 2009

Experienced L&D people are bleeding out of organisations and going freelance

Tuesday, 15 September 2009

A ‘lite’ version of a learning styles questionnaire:

Monday, 14 September 2009

Four step learning ladder – a model for learning to learn

The personal competence model

Sunday, 13 September 2009

HAVE-DO-BE or DO-BE-HAVE?

Friday, 3 April 2009

Tuesday, 20 January 2009

Monday, 19 January 2009

Friday, 12 December 2008

Thursday, 11 December 2008

Saturday, 22 November 2008

Tuesday, 11 November 2008

Friday, 7 November 2008

Tuesday, 14 October 2008

Monday, 29 September 2008

Friday, 26 September 2008

Tuesday, 23 September 2008

Saturday, 13 September 2008

Thursday, 4 September 2008

Friday, 29 August 2008

Monday, 18 August 2008

Saturday, 2 August 2008

Tuesday, 29 July 2008

Monday, 28 July 2008

Friday, 25 July 2008

Wednesday, 16 July 2008

Monday, 30 June 2008

Monday, 23 June 2008

Sunday, 15 June 2008

Friday, 13 June 2008

Tuesday, 20 May 2008

Sunday, 18 May 2008

Monday, 12 May 2008

Thursday, 8 May 2008

Tuesday, 6 May 2008

Sunday, 20 April 2008

Thursday, 17 April 2008

Wednesday, 16 April 2008

Friday, 11 April 2008

Saturday, 5 April 2008

Thursday, 27 March 2008

Wednesday, 26 March 2008

Friday, 14 March 2008

Thursday, 21 February 2008

Sunday, 27 January 2008

Tuesday, 15 January 2008

Sunday, 13 January 2008

Thursday, 10 January 2008

Tuesday, 8 January 2008

Monday, 7 January 2008