Category Archives: start-ups

Business management, coaching, consultancy, management, new writer, start-ups, vision

Mini-series: Business Management 2

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Vision and values

Vision is about how you see the future. It is not your mission statement, which is something quite different. A clear and inspiring vision is critically important to you and your company in every way. It is therefore worth investing time in being sure about what your vision is. Of course, a vision alone is not enough. You need to be clear about your values too since a vision will ensure that others will join you but values will determine whether they stay with you. Then, of course, you need a great team whose effectiveness is greater than the sum of its parts. You will also need to be clear about which vehicles you invest your precious resources into in order to make your vision become a reality. If you think about it, these things alone, not a large bank balance, have enabled individual leaders and managers to grow the most successful businesses in the world.

Articulating your vision

It is a good principle to be able to articulate your vision in the following formats:

  • one short sentence that sums it up (this often ends up as part of your company logo)
  • a three-minute summary that explains the vision in a little more detail
  • a thirty-minute summary that you could give, say, as a presentation to a new audience.

If you are unable to do this already and you are finding the management of your company to be a real challenge, then you have probably just made a very significant discovery!

Articulating your values

It is important also to be clear about your values. Most companies have about five core values, and the most important thing about values is that they should permeate absolutely everything that you do. It is also unlikely that your values will change much over the longer term.

Articulating your vehicles

Vehicles are the action plans, tasks or projects that you and your company will need to focus on in order to take you from A to B.These vehicles have to be carefully monitored and may need to change over time. Most companies have about five vehicles. If you have more than five, not only will they become difficult to monitor,  but it might be an indication that you are trying to be all things to all people instead of focusing on your unique vision and USP(s).

 

Business management, coaching, consultancy, management, start-ups, vision

Mini-series: Business Management 1

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Over the next few weeks I thought I might share some of my experience from business management. Comments and thoughts welcome, as always.

Principles of business management

Business culture

Managers and leaders determine the culture

It is important to remember that managers and leaders determine the entire culture of a business, even when they are not conscious of doing so. Typical examples include:

  • time-keeping (if managers arrive late to work, so will their employees)
  • lack of praise (if managers don’t use praise and encouragement often, neither will their employees)
  • poor team culture (if managers don’t emphasize the importance of team, their employees will neither feel part of a team nor behave as if team is important)

Take a look in the mirror

If you either want to know how your employees are feeling or are concerned that the atmosphere and work ethic in your company do not feel right, the number one principle is to ask yourself how you are feeling.

If you are feeling unduly stressed, overworked, frustrated and working too many hours, the chances are that your employees are feeling very much the same. This of course means that if you want to change how they feel, you need to make changes in how you are working.

I will have more to say about that in future posts.

Links:

Brian Tracy International

Harvard Business Review

Management Skills Blog