Cultural evolution is essential for the success of any organisation. The ability to flex and redefine culture underpins an organisation’s ability to future-proof for changing markets, different customers and new generations of employees. The right culture provides competitive advantage that can be consistently leveraged over time. That’s why senior leaders are so interested in it – culture is a true differentiator that can’t be copied. What’s more, it has a direct impact on the bottom line. In this week’s insight, ...

I want to start by busting a myth about communication skills.  Something I hear regularly is this idea that communication skills are simply ‘soft’ skills, and therefore don’t have a tangible impact on an organisation’s bottom line. I couldn’t disagree with this more! In this insight, I aim to well and truly bust this myth, by sharing examples from my own experience together with some hard numbers which together reveal the cost of bad communication skills in your organisation. Poor ...

Introduction One thing organisations truly covet is an engaged workforce. Often described as the ‘holy grail’, genuinely engaged employees are proud to work for their organisation and feel they are a vital part of the business. They are more productive, boosting performance by going the extra mile and inspiring people around them. This is great news for business leaders wondering how to achieve more with (apparently) less. There is a wealth of untapped, valuable resource at your fingertips. All you ...

One of the top issues operational leaders seek my help with is getting their people to take on more accountability. Many leaders I speak to are simply not fulfilling their potential because they are working one level or more below their job role – they are filling the accountability gaps as they can’t get people to step up. Is this because they have employed people who can’t or won’t do their jobs, or is something else going on? In my ...

Just last week we heard a great story from a senior manager who had come to a CommsMasters programme on driving up performance in their team. A key part of driving performance was for managers to implement regular, structured, one-to-one time with each team member. One manager was sceptical. He already knew his team well, but he’d give it a go. Having now been committed to one-to-ones for six months, the manager is a convert. He says he feels that ...

When we choose to label a conversation as difficult, we are using a word which has powerful negative connotations. This sets a distinct tone for how we think about and prepare for that conversation – we are on edge, nervous and worried about it. It makes us defensive before the conversation has even begun. That’s why in her latest post, Heather Campbell breaks down the idea of difficult conversations to help leaders reframe their approach and tackle them in a ...