Remember when organizations used to talk about the “internal customer?” You still hear it sometimes, but it’s mostly fallen on the trash heap of yesterday’s useless business jargon – another example of a cutesy idea turned into a misguided metaphor.
You could argue that the proponents of that idea had their hearts in the right in place – i.e., coworkers should treat one another with the same regard and cooperation they give to customers. But think about the flipside of that comparison. One defining characteristic of a true company-customer relationship is this – if a customer gets sufficiently unhappy with the product or service they’re getting, they’re outta’ here.
That Ain’t No Way to Build Relationships
We like to think we’re fostering the kind of customer loyalty that will give us some wiggle room to recover if we screw up. But anyone who believes the typical disgruntled customer is going to stick around for long while you “work things out” is sorely mistaken. In fact, according to research, for every customer complaint a company gets, 25 more people have a similar problem, but instead of saying anything, they just quietly walk away.
Now, is that really the kind of relationship we want co-workers to have with one another? When things get tough and tensions run high and solutions are hard to find, do we want colleagues to bail out and say c’est la vie? Hardly. Fact is, we got it ass-backwards in the “internal customer” days. Instead of thinking of employees as customers, we should be thinking about both employees AND customers as partners.
No One’s an Audience Anymore
Luckily, we’re moving in the right direction. In recent years, there’s been a conspicuous shifting tide in employee communications – moving away from creating messages for an employee audience to engaging employees in conversations as partners and stakeholders. As it should be. After all, isn’t it a bit weird to think of the people who make everything happen in an organization as an “audience?” They ARE the organization. They certainly are NOT a passive recipient of messages – or at least they shouldn’t be.
But what about customers – the people communicators subject to a constant barrage of sales and marketing messages? Surely, THEY are an audience, right?
Engage your Partners – Inside and Out
Not according to the authors of the book Grapevine, who advocate WITH versus AT marketing. “AT marketing is about targeting, capturing, and one-way communication,” they say. (I won’t quibble for now over the faux pas of “one-way communication,” which is sort of like clapping with one hand.) “WITH marketing means that companies and consumers work with each other. They (companies) cease to think of consumers as targets. They find ways to … partner with them. In WITH marketing you don’t talk about capturing. You talk about listening. Targeting is a concept from the old days. Now it’s about engaging.”
Different organizations will take different approaches to engagement, to be sure. But the underlying premise is the same – messages don’t build relationships, conversations do – whether your partners are inside or out.
Les Landes, Landes & Associates
Buy Les’s webinar replay: Getting to the Heart of Employee Engagement
Looking to increase your business’ sales? Don’t spend all your time thinking about how your customers view your company. Instead, do your best to ensure that your employee view of corporate reputation is positive. And not just positive, but better than your customer view of your corporate reputation. Research suggests that sales tend to rise when employees’ views of the company exceed those held by customers, and that they stall when employee views fall below those of customers.
Reputation matters
A good external reputation is a source of competitive advantage. More reputable firms can charge premium prices; attract investors and employees; improve customer attitudes; lower a client’s perceived risk; and create higher credibility. However, reputation is fragile – it can get stronger but also get damaged easily. Samsunghas demonstrated how oneness and collective passion can top Sony, a premium Japanese brand. Samsung is now the industry leader in terms of both brand strength and financial performance. On the other side of the ledger, sudden damage to reputation can adversely affect performance, as happened when Arthur Andersen collapsed following allegations about its involvement in the Enron scandal. These were once regarded as reputable companies in various media rankings.It’s all about the gap
The key factor when it comes to sustainable reputation, then, is not just either its external or its internal reputation, but the nature and magnitude of the gap between the two. The internal reputation of a company is built on how employees perceive and feel about the company. This is important because these perceptions will in turn affect external stakeholders’ behavior. Our field interviews with 4700 customers and employees from 63 business units shows that when a company’s internal reputation perceived by employees falls below those held by the customers, their sales will fall. Companies with a good internal reputation are commensurately more likely to offer good service, while those with a poor internal reputation have less cheerful staff and lower service levels. Alongside this, customers have higher expectations of companies with positive reputations than they do of other businesses.
If you’re the head of your company, you have to be able to define not just what your company does, but why it does it.
Having difficulty? That’s normal. You can blame it on the way your brain works. The part of the brain that contains decision-making and behavior doesn’t control language, so when you’re asked questions about why you do what you do, it’s natural to get tongue-tied.
That’s where great leadership comes in. Leaders are required to put in to words what a group does; they’re required to cross over between the decision-making and behavior sphere and the language sphere. Leaders are great because they’re good at putting feelings into words that we can act upon.
So it’s up to you, as company leader, to define your “why.” Here are four reasons you should, if you want to survive as a company.
1. Your company’s “why” generates loyalty.
Apple can sell phones not simply because they have the smarts to make phones; every single one of their competitors can make phones too. What gives Apple permission to sell products beyond computers is the fact that it doesn’t define themselves as a computer company; rather, it is a company that stands for something. It represents an ideal: Down with “the man”; attack the status quo; champion the individual.
As long as Apple’s products are consistent with its cause, the company has the freedom to do things other companies cannot. Those who identify with Apple’s cause, in turn, will say they “love” Apple–even if they think it’s because of the products.
2. Organizational success (or failure) often dates from inception.
Most great companies were founded by a person or small group of people who personally suffered a problem, went through an difficult experience, or had someone close to them face a tricky challenge–and then came up with a solution or alternative. That original solution to that original problem is what they formed their company around; it’s why they do what they do.
Organizations that just look to capture some market opportunity, or are born out of some market research, often fail (or else need endless pools of money to keep going). No one has passion for a problem revealed in market research. People have passion to solve their own problems or to help those they care about.
Fortunately, it’s easy to build trust in a business relationship. Here are the rules, based on a conversation with a true expert in trust-building Jerry Acuff, author of The Relationship Edge: The Key to Strategic Influence and Selling Success.
1. Be yourself.
Everybody on the planet has had unpleasant experiences with salespeople, and many have walked away from a sales situation feeling manipulated. So, rather than acting or sounding like a salesperson, simply act the way you would when meeting with a colleague.
2. Value the relationship.
If you want people around you to value having a relationship with you, you must truly believe that relationship building is important. You must also believe that you honestly have something of value to offer to the relationship.
3. Be curious about people.
People are drawn to those who show true interest in them. Curiosity about people is thus a crucial element of relationship building. Having an abiding fascination in others give you the opportunity to learn new things and make new connections.
4. Be consistent.
A customer’s ability to trust you is dependent upon showing the customer that your behavior is consistent and persistent over time. When a customer can predict your behavior, that customer is more likely to trust you.
5. Seek the truth.
Trust emerges when you approach selling as a way of helping the customer–so make it your quest to discover the real areas where the you can work together. Never be afraid to point out that your product or company may not be the right fit.
I’ve been a “quality” person after reading Pirsig’s book some 10 odd years ago, and as I try to apply the quality principal to my clients as a freelance Web designer, there seems to be an increasing swing towards measuring ROI from online marketing in terms of the QUALITY of customer delivered rather than the quantities.
This is not really that surprising as the online market becomes more saturated, competitive and consumer-savvy. The interest in the volume of Web site traffic turns to an interest in conversion metrics which turns converts into ways or how often we can keep a customer returning for more.
As the costs of gaining a new customer go up, it becomes increasingly important to get the right (quality) customers, not just any old ones. Of course, the Internet makes it potentially easy to gain customers, but it is unfortunately often just as easy to lose them as well.
All of which got me thinking: Do different forms of online marketing typically deliver different qualities of customer, rather than quantities or volume? This has been my experience thus far:
Search Engine Marketing – can deliver quantity and quality. Quality will depend on the “quality” of your keyword targeting, timing, choice of search engines, etc.
- Affiliate Marketing – perception, rightly or wrongly, that the quality of customers delivered is lower in the long-term scheme of things. However, the volume of conversions can be very high.
- E-mail Marketing – this really depends a lot on the quality of the list, the quality of the offer, the timing, the brand, etc. It is the most effective for converting existing registered users or repeat selling to existing customers.
- Interactive Advertising – for something such as banner advertising, click-through rates drop, as opposed to a PPC text-based link, but I haven’t seen anything or read anything to know about the quality of the customer that gets through. Even though volume is lower on banner advertising, perhaps the quality of the customer is higher (wealthy, frequent visitor). PPC does deliver a high quantity of click-throughs, but depending on the quality of the keywords and program choice depends on the quality of the customer.
- Viral Marketing – volumes can be very high (or next to nothing), but the quality of those customers…? Conversion rates tend to be low but of those few who convert I guess it’s a potpourri of valuable customers and not-so-valuable ones.
Most businesses, and managers with targets to hit, need a mixture of volume of sales and value of customers, so as ever, it’ll be a choose-your-best-marketing mix scenario in terms of what, how and when to use the above online marketing avenues.
I’d be interested in hearing from others about their experiences with online marketing venues and results – email me at hk@sparkmaninternet.com.
~Holly Sparkman
Michael J. Petrillose, Ph.D. Assistant Professor, Hospitality Management, SUNY Delhi
Diane Gayeski – Ithaca College Ph.D., CEO, Gayeski Analytics and Professor, Organizational Communication, Learning & Design, Ithaca College
Abstract
Workplace violence is a worldwide epidemic and is a major financial and performance risk in any organization, especially restaurants and hotels. Synthesizing research on workplace violence and organizational performance engineering, this paper rejects the assumption that aggressive behavior is best prevented by screening, surveillance, and training. Rather, it asserts that many typical management and communication practices actually create an environment that breeds poor service, property destruction, anger, and even violence. A pilot tool for assessing an organization’s management communication infrastructure is presented, accompanied by recommendations for initiatives to advance this stream of research and practice in the hospitality industry.
From desk rage to homicide: threats to the hospitality industry
According to the U.S. Department of Justice, the workplace is the most dangerous place to be in America. Violence that leads to serious injury or death is merely the most visible tip of the iceberg of aggressive behaviors. Workplace stress can cause what has been coined “desk rage”, a syndrome that includes pushing, teasing, or yelling at co-workers or customers (Integra Realty Resources, 2001), damaging property or equipment, or purposely “hiding out” and not working up to standards (Girion, 2000). Belligerent behavior – from simple verbal abuse to actual homicide – represents a major financial and performance risk for any organization, especially for restaurants and hotels. These environments typically are characterized by many situations in which it may be difficult to control negative behaviors:
q Large staffs with a high turn-over rate and spotty performance in prior jobs and education
q Lack of ability to carefully monitor employee behavior (e.g. high employee to supervisor ratios, much work done independently such as housekeeping, night shifts done with minimal supervision, etc.)
q Complex work environments that create opportunities for mischief (e.g. kitchens where food can be contaminated, use of knives, etc.)
q Workplaces open to the public with constant mobility of customers (e.g. hotel public spaces)
q Hours of operation and environment that tempts crime perpetrators (e.g. late-night restaurants with minimal staff to protect people, property, and cash).
The hospitality industry has typically taken a person-oriented approach to preventing violence and aggressive behavior. The underlying assumption is that the tendency for negative behavior is situated in individuals: in other words, there are people who are prone to violence or who simply don’t know how to control their anger and be courteous. Thus, the common management interventions to preempt negative behavior have been:
q screening of prospective employees
q surveillance of the workplace through cameras, security guards, etc.
q training employees in customer service and harassment prevention
Although these assumptions and interventions are partially appropriate and effective, research indicates that rude and even injurious behavior is often prompted by factors in the organization itself – specifically policies, culture, and management communication (O’Leary-Kelley, Griffin, & Glew, 1996). The management system itself (rather than employees’ backgrounds, character, or training) may well be the most powerful factor associated with aggressive behavior. Because the hospitality industry is so susceptible to violence (Desk rage is on the rise, 2001) and its success is so intimately tied to safety and courteous customer service, (Petrillose, Shanklin & Downey, 1998; Petrillose. & Brewer, 2000), it is critical to:
q Conduct research about how organizations unwittingly create environments that breed aggressive behavior
q Develop practical assessment methods to screen organizations for management factors that are associated with aggressive and violent behaviors
q Create tools and techniques that hospitality executives can use to preempt aggressive behavior and violence through management interventions that go beyond the common practices of employee screening and surveillance
q Teach and model the management communication techniques that are required for future hospitality supervisors to sustain a courteous and safe environment.
This paper presents a foundation for these initiatives.
Review of workplace violence research
Persons in service–related fields are more likely to be victims of workplace violence, according to the Insurance Information Institute. Violence is most likely to occur in public and government facilities (17.2%) followed by restaurants and bars (14.6%) and hotel and motels (1.4%) (Desk rage is on the rise, 2001). One in four workers are attacked, threatened, or harassed each year, with instances of verbal violence being about three times that of physical violence. The cost of this is estimated to be as high as $36 billion in the United States alone, reflecting lost productivity (500,000 employees missing 1,750,000 days of work per year), diminished company image and customer retention, more than $13 billion in medical costs, and increased security and insurance payments. When there are aggressors in the workplace, employees and customers are repelled, causing tardiness, absenteeism, turnover, and lost sales (US Department of Health and Human Services, 2003; Johnson & Indvik, 2001; Reisenauer, 2002). In telephone surveys, employees across various industries admit that stress and anger at their employers is causing them to pick fights with and yell at co-workers or customers, cry on the job, purposely damage equipment or property, and intentionally work slowly or look busy while doing nothing (Girion, 2000). The personal and societal cost of poor work environments is also significant: many unhealthy patterns such as lack of sleep, abuse of alcohol and drugs, and overeating are common reactions to stress, and family and community relationships suffer.
What factors are associated with workplace aggression? Although most violent crimes are perpetrated by individuals who have some history of psychological and /or social problems, much belligerence is caused by factors in the work environment. Thus, it is important to avoid a “blame the victim” approach when instituting measures to reduce bad behavior. Based on a synthesis of the research on workplace violence, the following factors have been found to be indicators of the kind of problematic workplace environment that is associated with aggressive behavior:
q Highly authoritarian workplace
q Employees overloaded by work and stress
q Long hours and inadequate breaks
q Supervision is changeable and unpredictable
q Employees get mixed messages
q Management methods are invasive of privacy
q Extreme secrecy; management not open about goals, strategies, or current business data
q Employees are devalued; their unique contributions not solicited or recognized
q Short-term benefits are pursued at expense of long-term effectiveness
q Tolerance of moderate levels of aggressive conduct or rude behavior of peers or customers
q Recent downsizing, poor business performance, or other major changes in jobs
q Uncomfortable workplace (poor temperature, seating, etc.)
q Long, stressful commute
q Use of new technologies that cause information overload, require continual learning, and cause stress when they are unreliable (e.g. e-mail, new POS systems)
A communication and performance engineering approach
As indicated above, an emerging body of research finds that much violence and uncivil behavior in the workplace is caused by managerial and environmental factors rather than individual traits. O’Leary-Kelley and Griffin (1996) defined the term Organization-Motivated Aggression (OMA) which is based on social learning theory. Their exploratory study found that a major factor associated with workplace violence and aggression is modeling of peers’ or supervisors’ behavior, despite training or executive assertions that rudeness, harassment and violence are not tolerated. In other words, many supervisors operate according to the old saying, “do what I say, not what I do”. This study and others found that rude, patronizing, and punishing behavior by supervisors is common, especially in service industries, and thus a focus on managerial communication is essential because employees model the behavior they experience. Put simply, employees treat others as they are treated. Research specifically in hotel management has reinforced this assertion, finding that service behaviors and an orientation towards quality must emanate from top management actions (Withiam, 1996).
Another approach to reducing workplace aggression is provided by the field of human performance technology, a professional model for organizational improvement that focuses on assessing root causes of performance gaps and developing interventions that address both the workplace environment and the worker’s repertory of behavior (Van Tiem, Moseley & Dessinger, 2000). Thomas Gilbert (1978), one of the founders of this approach, developed the Behavior Engineering Model as a way to categorize the management approaches and personal factors that impact performance (see Figure 1).
Figure 1 Behavior Engineering Model based on Gilbert (1978).
Information | Instrumentation | Motivation | |
Environmental Supports
|
Data: (feedback, performance goals) | Instruments: (tools, materials, and work environment) | Incentives: (bonuses, non-monetary rewards, career development) |
Person’s Repertory of Behavior
|
Knowledge: (person’s background and experience, coaching, training, job placement) | Capacity: (capability of person to perform the job intellectually, physically, emotionally) | Motives (personal goals and preferences) |
Rummler (1999) asserts that the most influential factors in workplace performance are the organizational and job systems: policies, procedures, communication climate, information, and management incentives: “If you pit a good performer against a bad system, the system will win every time.” (p. 55). Even when organizations do focus on their management systems, decision-makers often inadvertently institute performance interventions that generate exactly what they wish to avoid. For example, rigid managerial control and surveillance develops a suspicious culture in which employees do not feel valued and trusted. This is precisely the climate that research shows is associated with destructive and violent behavior.
Sending employees to training on customer relations or harassment prevention can also lead to unexpected results. Employees may feel punished or insulted by being “sent” to training rather than having a say in this decision themselves. For example, one major study in the training industry reported that workers have a significant voice in the decision about whether they will receive training less than 10 percent of the time. More than seven times out of 10, that decision is made by a supervisor, manager, or higher executive (Schaaf, 1998). Patronizing content or approaches or exercises that bring up sensitive cultural or personal issues can be direct antecedents to violence. A workplace shooting in August 2003 occurred directly after the perpetrator attended a required ethics training course during which he apparently became agitated (Seven Dead in Chicago Workplace Shooting, 2003). Other studies find that sometimes front line employees actually perform more poorly after training: they are so overwhelmed with information that they return to the job and freeze. This information overload causes stress, which is associated with absenteeism, turnover, and hostile behavior – exactly what the training is trying to prevent.
Communication technologies such as voicemail, e-mail, the Internet and corporate intranets, cell phones, and instant messaging are also stressors. In a consulting engagement with a major restaurant chain, it was found that store managers were typically rising at 5 AM and beginning to listen to their voicemails as they dressed because they could expect to receive several hours worth of voicemails from various corporate sources throughout a typical day (Gayeski, 1999). Similar research has found that workers are typically interrupted by email or phone messages every few minutes. This overload of data, as well as the popular and unquestioned assumption that “more communication is better” have made these problems even worse. Communication and training activities take time away from one’s “real” work, further adding to stress because employees then have to somehow catch up on the work that accumulated while they were in meetings or courses. Too often, corporate messages come from different sources and are not coordinated; in fact, they may be contradictory and seemingly arbitrary. This dis-integration of the communication system is causing stress, an erosion of credibility, an attitude of cynicism, and poor performance focus (Gayeski, 1998).
Clearly, new approaches for not only interpersonal communication but also for selecting and managing formal communication and training are needed. Often the most powerful messages are embedded in the communication and training policies themselves rather than in the content of instruction or meetings. For example, employees may be required to attend “empowerment training” and to wear silly empowerment buttons – clearly sending the message that they are not, in fact, empowered. However, uncovering these unintentionally destructive patterns is not as easy as it may appear.
Prototype screening tool
To bridge the gap between theory and practice, the hospitality management field needs tools to screen operations for the typical management and business environment factors that have been shown to be antecedents to organizational-motivated aggression. Building on established models for organizational communication audits (Gayeski, 2000), and the review of literature on workplace aggression, a survey has been developed and is being piloted at selected hospitality operations. Each item will be rated by an individual employee on a 1-5 Likert scale, from strongly disagree to strongly agree. The statements noted here with asterisks indicate problematic factors; the rest of the statements represent conditions or policies that are considered “best practice” in avoiding aggressive behavior. (see Table 2).
Table 2 Hospitality communication analytics survey
Copyright Gayeski Analytics 2004 all rights reserved
1 Company strategies and performance information (such as sales figures and budgets) are made widely available and discussed with employees openly | ||
2 Training and communication materials, courses, and meetings regularly feature employees’ ideas, opinions, and their contributions to the organization’s success | ||
* 3 There is frequent turnover of management and first-level supervisors | ||
4 The company has policies and practices that protect employee privacy (e.g. personal information, salary and performance data, content and use of email and Web access) and employees are made clearly aware of these protections | ||
5 The organization values long-term performance and corporate values over short-term gains | ||
6 Professionals in communications (such as advertising, employee communications, HR) and training work together to clearly communicate strategic plans and messages to reduce any mixed messages sent to employees | ||
7 We have standards to ensure that everybody in the organization understands the culture and brand communicates in a way that supports the culture and the brand | ||
8 Employees are given frequent feedback on company goals and how their performance contributes to them | ||
9 Training, feedback, and other developmental opportunities, are made available to all employees, regardless of their position | ||
10 The organization is using methods (such as bulletin boards, print newsletters, or handheld computers to provide training and job aids to ensure that employees who don’t have computers are well informed and connected | ||
-* 11 Standards, policies, and performance expectations are set by upper management with little input of front-line employees | ||
12 Managers, in general, employ an “open door” style of management | ||
* 13 Managers tolerate a certain amount of teasing, arguing and “horseplay” among employees and typically let them settle their differences on their own | ||
14 Communication systems are in place that allow all levels of employees to contribute ideas and ask questions of upper management | ||
15 The company does not tolerate any level of aggressive behavior on the part of employees or customers | ||
16 We have training in place for all employees on workplace security including what to look for and how to react if there is any suspicion of danger | ||
17 The company has methods in place to reduce information overload and stress (such as initiatives to reduce e-mails, paperwork, or meetings) | ||
18 Most employees would say that our company treats its employees better than the competition (similar hotels, restaurants, etc.) | ||
* 19 Employees do not contribute to company materials like brochures and newsletters | ||
20 We have a strict set of selection and interviewing guidelines to screen out potentially violent employees while remaining compliant with the law. | ||
21 All employees feel free to deal assertively if a co-worker or customer appears to become abusive or violent or poses some other security risk | ||
* 22 We monitor employee emails and their use of the Internet | ||
* 23 We use cameras or other devices to monitor employee whereabouts and behavior |
Last year, a friend who works in corporate communication for a major local company advised me to keep my ears open to the topic of “offshoring” — the latest cost-reduction trend of sending service jobs to other countries. “This is going to be a big issue for communicators,” she warned.
I was aware that some companies already were exporting jobs, but sure enough, I began to hear more and more about it. More stories about “offshoring” appeared in business publications, more talking heads with creased brows lamented it, and I even saw more discussion in the public-relations industry press.
I have paid close attention to the topic, but two things keep bothering me. One is that the only thing new about “offshoring” is that it primarily affects white-collar and service-industry jobs. Exporting jobs as a cost-cutting measure is nothing new. It has been going on for years in the manufacturing sector, but white-collar managers essentially told their blue-collar employees to suck it up and get used to the global economy. Now that those white-collar managers are seeing their jobs disappear, the practice has a new euphemistic name and urgency assigned to it.
One of these days — and I hope I live long enough to see it, but I doubt it — business managers everywhere will realize just how condescending they often appear to the people they manage. This is a communication issue because an inappropriate attitude and tone can create huge barriers to open communication between bosses and employees.
The other thing that keeps bothering me is that “offshoring” would be considered a big issue. This is not to downplay the significance of exporting jobs as a workplace issue, but it is only a communication problem when business leaders try to dance around it. Telling people that some of them might lose their jobs is not fun. It’s not easy. The discussion won’t make managers the object of employees’ affections. However, people deserve to know why jobs are being sent to other countries and they deserve the opportunity to express their anger, fear and disappointment.
I was talking recently with an employee of a local company who described a new manager in her department. She contrasted the former manager’s style of keeping everyone in the dark with the new manager’s style of frequent and open communication. The former manager’s approach led to mistrust and dissension. The new manager’s talk of the reasons for upcoming layoffs was not easy to hear, but employees appreciated the honesty and candor.
One of my favorite newsletters for communication executives, The Ragan Report, recently published comments from an unnamed computer programmer for a high-tech firm that was planning to export jobs. She wondered about the degree of employee backlash to “offshoring” and then described why she believes it is not the best solution to her company’s problems. She described the amount of time it will take her to train workers in other countries, to overcome time and language barriers, and to adjust to the cultural differences.
I found the programmer’s points to be interesting, but I couldn’t help wonder how much more useful her ideas would have been if she had the opportunity to express them to the leaders of her business.
Our organization has been planning this summer. I want to be able to anticipate and prepare to build our business. To do that I need a forecast of where organizations are going rather than where they have been.
One of our crystal balls is an interview the Conference Board of Canada conducted with University of Michigan’s management guru, Dave Ulrich. He identified eight issues to plan for. Four have a special relevance to our work and we thought it would be useful for our readers to know where we will be skating as we go for the puck.
Leadership – Ulrich forecasts a redefinition of leadership to one that focuses on role rather than function. Individuals will be called upon to exercise leadership within their spheres of influence. Leadership will be exercised at many levels of an organization and the culture will encourage and demand leadership of all employees.
Engagement – Talent is increasingly more mobile with fully 58% of Canadian employees open to moving employment. Corporate strategies to engage employees are woefully inadequate and must be beefed up to succeed. Engaged employees are those who can find meaning in their working lives. Successful organizations are those that focus on instilling a high sense of organizational purpose in the minds of their employees.
Managers communicate – The major weakness in most organizations is the ability of line managers to effectively communicate. Employee motivation depends upon how well the line manager communicates face-to-face. Effective internal communication will be redefined in terms of the abilities of line managers to communicate and the degree of accountability the organization places on them to do so.
Measurement – The trend to accountability based upon returns on investment will continue. Measuring performance by the outcomes of work is replacing measures of work by outputs of activities. We will be required to measure success of our work by the contribution it makes to innovation, change and achievement of the organizations strategic goals.
As Ulrich points out that, for the first time in the history of management, it is the human mind that is the primary creator of value. Our priorities will be developing the quality of the workforce and its engagement in the business. These will be the critical success factors in corporate vitality and survival. – for us and our clients.
By Tudor Williams, ABC
Play at your work and work at your play. Do the right thing for the right reason in the right way. Anonymous
X is work. Y is play. Z is keep your mouth shut. Albert Einstein
The Master in the art of living makes little distinction between his work and his play, his labor and leisure, his mind and his body, his education and his recreation, his love and his religion. He simply pursues his vision of excellence in whatever he does, leaving others to decide whether he is working or playing. To him he is always doing both. Chinese proverb
You can discover more about a person in an hour of play than in a year of discussion. Plato
…when it comes to learning (play), play (learning) is not an accessory, but a partner. Bernie DeKoven
The creative mind plays with the objects it loves. Carl Jung
If you want creative workers, give them enough time to play. John Cleese
Communities of Practice Definitions
by Richard McDermott*
SHORT VERSION
A community of practice is a group of people who share information, ideas,
insights and advice about a topic or domain. In the course of doing so they
develop a common practice (a shared body of knowledge, process, rituals,
approaches, thinking. Over time they build a common history and develop a
shared identity.
LONG VERSION
A community of practice is a group of people who share knowledge, learns
together, and creates common practices. Communities of practice share
information, insight, experience, and tools about an area of common
interest. This could be a professional discipline–like reservoir
engineering or biology–a skill–like machine repair–or a topic–like a
technology, an industry, or a segment of a production process. Consulting
companies, for example, usually organize communities of practice around both
disciplines, such as organizational change, and industries like banking,
petroleum or insurance. Community members frequently help each other solve
problems, give each other advice, and develop new approaches or tools for
their field. Regularly helping each other makes it easier for community
members to show their weak spots and learn together in the “public space” of
the community. As they share ideas and experiences, people develop a shared
way of doing things, a set of common practices. Sometimes they formalize
these in guidelines and standards, but often they simply remain “what
everybody knows” about good practice. Since communities of practice focus on
topics that people often feel passionately interested in, they can become
important sources of individual identity.
You can find more in Etienne Wenger’s book Communities of Practice (Cambridge
Press 1988) or my Learning Across Teams (Knowledge Management Review Summer
1999).
*Richard McDermott McDermott, McDermott & Co., Phone: 303-545-6030, eMail: Richard@RMcDermott.com Fax: 303-545-6031.
In addition to keeping on the right side of the law, it’s important to realize that simply writing a policy does not protect the organization. The policy needs to be augmented with communication, training and monitoring. The policy is a living document which will need revision as the organization learns about social media. It will also need revision when missteps on social media occur – as they inevitably will. But with experience comes learning and that is a good thing.
The problem with many policies is that while they are often quite clear on what the company’s employees should not do, they leave some unanswered questions about what they should do. We believe a more useful approach for social media policy writing is to focus on the dos, rather than the don’ts.
Just telling someone what they should not do doesn’t automatically help them understand what they should do. In cut and dry situations – the ones we’ve all been through a dozen times before – it is easy to infer that if the sign says “stay off the grass” it means we should use the paved path instead. With social media, inferring the positive action that is desired from the negative action that is forbidden is not always so easy. Will every employee know how they can avoid violating applicable copyright laws and statutory requirements? Can they list the five signs that indicate when they are not appropriately safeguarding company assets?
For organizations to thrive in today’s hyper-competitive marketplace, leaders have to learn how to build a culture of trust and openness. Here are four strategies to help in this regard:
- Encourage risk taking – Leaders need to take the first step in extending trust to those they lead. Through their words and actions, leaders can send the message that appropriate and thoughtful risk taking is encouraged and rewarded. When people feel trusted and secure in their contributions to the organization, they don’t waste energy engaging in CYA (cover your “assets”) behavior and are willing to risk failure. The willingness to take risks is the genesis of creativity and innovation, without which organizations today will die on the vine. Creating a culture of risk taking will only be possible when practice #2 is in place.
- View mistakes as learning opportunities – Imagine that you’re an average golfer (like me!) who decides to take lessons to improve your game. After spending some time on the practice range, your instructor takes you on the course for some live action and you attempt a high-risk/high-reward shot. You flub the shot and your instructor goes beserk on you. “How stupid can you be!” he shouts. “What were you thinking? That was one of the worst shots I’ve seen in my life!” Not exactly the kind of leadership that encourages you to take further risks, is it? Contrast that with a response of “So what do you think went wrong? What will you do differently next time?” Garry Ridge, CEO of WD-40, characterizes these incidents as “learning moments,” where planning and execution come together, a result is produced, and we incorporate what we learned into our future work.
- Build transparency into processes and decision making – Leaders can create a culture of trust and openness by making sure they engage in transparent business practices. Creating systems for high involvement in change efforts, openly discussing decision-making critieria, giving and receiving feedback, and ensuring organizational policies and procedures and applied fairly and equitably are all valuable strategies to increase transparency. On an individual basis, it’s important for us leaders to remember that our people want to know our values, beliefs, and what motivates our decisions and actions. Colleen Barrett, President Emeritus of Southwest Airlines, likes to say that “People will respect you for what you know, but they’ll love you for your vulnerabilities.”
Thanks to the onslaught of technology and our need to constantly rush through everything, our grammar has gotten worse. Emails, text messages and other corporate communications are being sent without a thorough and professional proofreading, and using poor grammar in the workplace can have some negative impacts on your business.
It causes confusion.
If you use poor grammar in the workplace, you could end up confusing those people who need to read what you write or listen to what you say. Causing confusion will negatively impact your company’s productivity and require additional communications to clear up the confusion.
It makes you look unprofessional.
Poor grammar makes you look unprofessional. Nobody wants to do business with the company that has spelling and grammatical errors in their marketing materials, and no client wants to do business with the representative who doesn’t know the difference between their, there and they’re.
It hinders productivity.
Read full article on Every Marketing Thing
If employees are so connected, why is it so hard to communicate with them?
If you’re finding that your content isn’t being shared, these are most likely the reasons why:
1. You only talk about yourself.
Everyone has been around constant self-promoters before—they aren’t fun to talk to. Part of the reason they aren’t interesting is because they don’t involve you in the conversation. You probably won’t share their stories to anyone else since the stories relate only to the initial storyteller. The same thing happens online when people keep the conversation solely on themselves.
To increase your site’s shareability, start addressing the topics your readers want to learn and talk about. People will then view you as a resource and be more likely to promote you. The Golden Rule prevails here: talk about others as much as you would like them to talk about you.
2. You pick topics that aren’t timely.
In the age of the 24/7 news cycle, the pressure is always on to write timely content. If something happened last week and you take a full week to write a reaction to it, the post isn’t timely anymore. People like to share content that is relevant to what’s going on in their community at that moment, not content that was “so two days ago.”
You don’t always have to be rushing to create posts at the last minute. If you know which events will be happening, you can plan beforehand to write a post. Use an editorial calendar to help plan out your post schedule and ensure your posts are timely.
3. Your headlines aren’t catchy.
You don’t have to have gimmicky headlines, but you need to them to be interesting and relevant enough to capture the small attention span of your audience. Keep your headlines less than eight words to make them punchy and memorable, just like your favorite tweets on Twitter. Which headline would you be more likely to share: “My Favorite WordPress Plugins to Increase Your Blog Pageviews” or “Top WordPress Plugins to Increase Pageviews”? The second headline contains some of the criteria for a great headline: It’s exclusive and specific. Keeping your headlines short and sweet will make it much easier for your readers to share your content—all they have to do is click the “post” button!
I have friends who blog on all sorts of topics: childcare, politics, and family, to name just a few. So it’s a concept I was familiar with, but not one I had considered as a legitimate outreach method for my clients – until recently. The same goes for e-mail campaigns (expect an article in a future issue) and landing pages (see the article in issue three). I think what is happening is that I am finally coming to terms with the changing public relations and marketing landscape. To remain effective, it looks like we’ll have to accept, or at the very least acknowledge, some new rules. In my estimation, this is both good and bad.
The bad, I think, is temporary. The problem I see with Internet marketing (e-mail outreach, e-newsletters, blogging, landing pages, etc.) is that none of these methods is widely accepted by the public. So while you’ll invest a lot of time and energy perfecting and implementing these strategies, you may not see the same kind of results you can expect from traditional outreach (direct mail, advertising, earned media, etc.). Yet.
It’s only a matter of time before a Web-based marketing campaign nets the same results as traditional methods. And even now, while many people won’t respond in the same way to Internet outreach, they certainly expect it. I know that I prefer an electronic newsletter to a paper one (the environmentalist in me), and I love it when I have a chance to add my thoughts on issues addressed by an organization’s Web site (usually in the form of a listserv or discussion forum, but a blog that allows for responses does the job too). And I certainly give e-mail updates or event notices the same attention I give to paper solicitations or invitations. In this respect, I doubt I’m terribly unique.
The good, I think, is intrinsic in the Internet, and therefore is here to stay. Internet marketing is one of the least expensive ways to reach your audience. Registering a Web site can cost as little as $20, and maintaining it can be free (if you have the time, talent, and inclination). Sending mass e-mails (not spam, mind you) can be done from your current e-mail program at no cost, or for larger campaigns, through a service for a small fee (see Tech Tips in issue three). Blogs require only your time and your opinion.
This effectively puts cause organizations on financial par with anyone else trying to market a product, service, or behavior change. Although I believe that more money does not necessarily make a better outreach campaign, even I have to acknowledge that it takes some capital (often quite a lot) to launch a successful, traditional campaign. So while I am a fan of nearly all methods of outreach, I have to admit that I have a particular affection for anything inexpensive or free.
In truth, these days, successful campaigns need to combine the two approaches. But in the near future, organizations with little capital will be able to focus most of their energy on Internet-based outreach methods without seeing less of a response than if they devoted time and energy solely to traditional methods. I look forward to this future, because as you might guess, I love anything that levels the marketing playing field for cause organizations.
Amy Buringrud
Editor, Media Savvy eJournal
In the decade since Steve Jobs and former head of retail, Ron Johnson, decided to reimagine the retail experience, the Apple Store not only reimagined and reinvented retail, it blew up the model entirely and started from scratch. In his research for The Apple Experience, Carmine discovered ten things that the Apple Store can teach any business in any industry to be more successful:
- Stop selling stuff. When Steve Jobs first started the Apple Store he did not ask the question, “How will we grow our market share from 5 to 10 percent?” Instead he asked, “How do we enrich people’s lives?” Think about your vision. If you were to examine the business model for most brands and retailers and develop a vision around it, the vision would be to “sell more stuff.” A vision based on selling stuff isn’t very inspiring and leads to a very different experience than the Apple Retail Store created.
- Enrich lives. The vision behind the Apple Store is “enrich lives,” the first two words on a wallet-sized credo card employees are encouraged to carry. When you enrich lives magical things start to happen. For example, enriching lives convinced Apple to have a non-commissioned sales floor where employees feel comfortable spending as much time with a customer as the customer desires. Enriching lives led Apple to build play areas (the “family room”) where kids could see, touch and play on computers. Enriching lives led to the creation of a “Genius Bar” where trained experts are focused on “rebuilding relationships” as much as fixing problems.
- Hire for smiles. The soul of the Apple Store is in its people. They are hired, trained, motivated and taught to create magical and memorable moments for their customers. The Apple Store values a magnetic personality as much, if not more so, than technical proficiency. The Apple Store cares less about what you know than it cares about how much you love people.
- Celebrate diversity. Mohawks, tattoos, piercings are all acceptable among Apple Store employees. Apple hires people who reflect the diversity of their customers. Since they are more interested in how passionate you are, your hairstyle doesn’t matter. Early in the Apple Store history, they also learned that former teachers make the best salespeople because they ask a lot of questions. It’s not uncommon to find former teachers, engineers, and artists at an Apple Store. Apple doesn’t look for someone who fits a mold.
- Unleash inner genius. Teach your customers something they never knew they could do before, and they’ll reward you with their loyalty. For example, the Apple Store offers a unique program to help people understand and enjoy their computers: One to One. The $99 one-year membership program is available with the purchase of a Mac. Apple Store instructors called “creatives” offer personalized instruction inside the Apple Store. Customers can learn just about anything: basics about the Mac operating system; how to design a website; enjoying, sharing, and editing photos or movies; creating a presentation; and much more. The One to One program was created to help build customers for life. It was designed on the premise that the more you understand a product, the more you enjoy it, and the more likely you are to build a long-term relationship with the company. Instructors are trained to provide guidance and instruction, but also to inspire customers, giving them the tools to make them more creative than they ever imagined.
Some companies out there will charge you thousands of dollars to look after the SEO on your ecommerce website. In this article we’re going to look at some top tips and “quick wins” for ecommerce business owners in order to get websites as high up the rankings as possible with very little work.
Use lots of unique content: Don’t be tempted to use bog-standard manufacturer product descriptions. It might save time but your website won’t rank at all well.
Commission someone to write you a solid set of unique product descriptions of at least 300 words each. Unique content is the lifeblood of SEO so don’t go without it!
Use pictures: Buyers will buy with their eyes in a lot of cases – they won’t read your product description – instead they’ll look at the picture when making a decision.
Use pictures and lots of them on your website – don’t forget to fill in the alt tag section of the picture though – this helps greatly with SEO.
Pictures are great for search engines and visitors alike – throw in some other media like embedding related YouTube videos if you have time.
Fill in META info on every page: Make sure you fill in the META title and description on every single page on your website.
A crazy amount of sites out there are missing META data which means that they don’t sit as well as they should in the search engines.
Writing a short META description takes seconds – as does putting in an appropriate title. If you don’t have time to do it all, outsource it!
Be Brief
One of the worst mistakes email copywriters make is trying to shove the entire story into the email message. Think about when you open a marketing email in your inbox. Do you read every single word in there? Probably not. It’s more likely that you scan for important points so you can glean the overall message, and decide whether you want to take any action. So if you’re sending email with hundreds of words of copy, you’re making it much more difficult for recipients to decide whether they want to click through … because they can’t quickly sift through all of the information in your email!
Instead, find a way to summarize what the reader will get in a compelling way, and let them click through to a page on your website for more information. Take a look at how this HubSpot customer and Certified Partner Precision Athletics drafted a brief email that encouraged readers to click through for more information:
There are a few lines of copy used to set up the purpose of the email and, of course, thank the recipient for utilizing their free training session. But after that, Precision Athletics gets to the point of the email — delivering success stories from those who have completed the training program to motivate the email recipient.
Keeping your message on-point is the key to writing brief email copy. What’s the point you’re trying to make with your email? If you know the action your email is supposed to drive — recipient buys a grill the size of a Foosball table, recipient remembers to buy their Bruce Springsteen tickets, recipient gets motivated to work out — you’ll have a much easier time drafting succinct email copy that remains focused on that one end goal. And if writing succinct email copy isn’t enough of a motivator for you to narrow down your goals, remember that having just one primary call-to-action in your email marketing results in better click-through rates than emails with competing calls-to-action!
Use Actionable Language in Your CTA
That’s right, emails have calls-to-action, too! Well, the good ones do. First and foremost, your email call-to-action should be extremely easy to identify. Remember, people scan their emails, and if there’s one thing you want your recipient to pick up on, it’s your call-to-action. If you’re sending an HTML email, you may decide to include a button like this AmazonLocal email did below.
Here are five powerful ways online video interviews can help you grow your blog.
1. Create an opportunity to converse with your niche’s most interesting people
Getting on the radar of influencers in your niche is a great way to establish who you are and put your blog on the map. This can be done by asking influential people in your niche to allow you to interview them. With typical in-person interviews, it’s more difficult to secure because they may be in a different city, have a jam-packed schedule, or both. Either can make interviews unfeasible, especially if they aren’t familiar with you.
Conversely, the option of an online video interview is often more appealing. Essentially, you’re just asking them to sacrifice a few minutes sitting in front of their computer, rather than traveling to a specific location or totally rearranging their schedule.
2. Create a differentiation point between you and your competition
I alluded to this earlier. Think about the websites and blogs in your niche. Chances are only a few (if any) are creating content via online video interviews. How great would it be to separate your brand from everyone else’s? Online video interviews may be your ticket to do that.
3. Create compelling content
Online video interviewing gives you the opportunity to create compelling content. It is an awesome alternative to someone who wants to make a mark online, but lacks the writing skills or desire needed to create text articles. Or you may simply enjoy conversing with people, rather than emailing them the typical question-and-answer document that’s often reproduced on blogs. An online video interview will appeal to people who enjoy learning through an interactive conversation.
One of the most unique features of Google+ is the “circles”. Circles allow users to group followers into different groups for communicating different things.
This means brands are in a better position to share more relevant information with their followers, as against churning out the same information to everybody.
A good example of this can be seen with Intel, who invited users to select the photo which best represents the circle best aligned with the interests. This subtle but very effective move proved to be the right one as it ensured that people were getting exactly what they wanted.
Google+ is set to introduce more features very soon and if these stories are anything to go by, it’s about spotting an opportunity and going for it. It is important to keep a keen eye on these developments, as the opportunities are limitless.