Targets or Employees

How do you view your staff?

You know, the people that you pay to live out the mission and vision that you have for your organization. The people you hired because of their skills, talents, experience.....yeah, those people.

Do you view your staff as a mechanism to add value to your company? Have you thought about how well you treat, train, pay and communicate with them?

Staff, employees, work teams, sales force - whatever you choose to call them can really make or break any organization. I think that we can agree that employees are important players in any business. So why do we sometimes think of them in a way that appears that we have them walking around with a bulls eye painted squarely on their backs?

I ask this because in conversations over the past month about how bad the economy is and is going to get - I have heard people making recommendations and plans to cut staff.

They are overhead.

An expense.

But these are the same people that you have, hopefully, trained and invested your time and your money in. They have been with you through the tough times, but now as tougher times approach, they are the first to be sacrificed.

Business decisions are hard and business decisions in murky economic times are harder - but let's not enter into these tough times by first strapping targets on the backs of those that have the power, training, skill and experience to lead you to the light.

If you need to cut back on things look at the overhead expenses and things that can be taken away with out effecting your human capital. If you take away or cut back your human capital, service, sales, and your bottom line could potentially suffer a great deal more.

By putting targets on the backs of your staff you could be costing your business a lot more than you will save.

Is that the direction you want to take your business in?

Checking your brain at the door...

Today's topic.....

Dumb sales people say the stupidest things to paying customers......

We are in the process of making some changes to a fitness membership that my husband and I have.

So let's be clear on the facts:

We have a joint membership to a gym
It expires in May 2008
We want to split the membership
keeping my husbands the same
deleting mine
we are paid current and have met the terms of the contract on our end

BUT and here's where it gets good...
The fitness center is being extremely difficult in assisting us with what we want to do. WHY? That I am not sure accept that I think that with the recent grand opening of a newer, bigger more advanced fitness center in town this place is scared to lose customers.

OH yeah...and then that's what a salesperson actually said to me over the phone...that they are not able to discuss letting contracts expire because they are losing too many people to the competition.

Nice.
This poor treatment also shows in how we have been treated and the run around we are getting. I often think in these situations, how can I handle this better? Is it me? Am I not communicating? Am I not seeking to understand the other side?

Well in this case I am confident in my answers...yes to all.
Is fear of competition a reason to get dumb in business? I don't think so. I hope that as business people we are better able and prepared to handle it when a little competition comes our way. If not I guess we are just left with checking our brains at the door.

In this case the brain is one muscle that is not getting a 360 degree work out with these employees!

The weather...

It's been cold here in northwest Ohio for the last several days. I mean really cold. I am beginning to wonder if I have somehow been transformed back to the ice age. I don't like the cold, I like snow, but no the cold. I am getting lots of things done though inside that do make me happy even though my mood and attitude has not been the greatest - all because of the cold.

This has got me thinking...about how much we let external things get in the way of what our internal hearts and minds say we should be doing. I wonder if we really get off track, not because we are unorganized and unfocused but if we let little external things have control too often. I know it happens, you may be setting there saying, "Suck it up, don't let the weather get in the way of running your business..."

Yeah - I hear ya....but really how many of you have thought twice about going out for that next sales call, or driving across town at sunrise to meet that client, or going to an early morning networking meeting just wasn't going to happen. Come on, fess up...I know you are out there.

It's okay to let those things happen once in a while, but we know we should not make a habit of it. It's touch to get up and at em when that means putting on four layers of clothes and knee high insulated snow boots. Weather is an external thing that can easily get us side tracked.

But let's not let the weather get us down....this too will pass. AND it will pass into hot, humid, northwest Ohio summer where we won't want to leave the air conditioned office.

So let's make the best of the weather...don't let it get you down, don't dwell on it. Let's bundle up and chat about what great business we could do together over a nice hot cup of coffee!