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Unit 11, 61 Flynn St, Wembley, WA, 6014
08 9242 2085

Yearly Archives: 2014

Stop Micro-managing!

Stop Micro-managing!
I had a meeting with a client yesterday. Amongst other issues we discussed the fact that even as her company grew, she had to continually look over people's shoulders, tell them not only what to do, but also how to do it in a satisfactory way. When I asked her what was a "satisfactory way" she explained that it was the way she would have done it, the way her customers had come to expect how her company would do it. She gave me an example where her version of "satisfactory" included a hand-written note to the customer the next day to see if the product met his needs and if she needed to explain any aspect of it to him. In other words quality was not a fixed value but a set of behaviours that had come to represent what the customer wanted. Only, she seemed to be the only one in the growing company who seemed to understand that, despite her experienced (and expensive) new hires. Readers will tell me this is not uncommon. When you start a small business, often you and your key team members know exactly what to do, and how to "do it satisfactorily" because you...
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Change your business model with great care!

Change your business model with great care!
Businesses who decide to change the way they do business need to be careful of unintended consequences. They need to think of the effects to the customer first, but also to the not so obvious stakeholder groups.
For example businesses that generate significant business through referral networks need to be careful how any changes affect their referral base and not just their customers.
In some imagined country, the leading provider of accounting software to SME's is a company called Record Your Amazing Business or Ryab. Knowing that SME's made purchasing decisions about accounting software based on their accountants' opinions, Ryab provided their software free to all public accounting firms. These firms could use multiple copies of the software on a single free license as long as they used it on their own entities - clients would have to buy their own licenses, and accountants even received commissions on these sales to clients.
This was an extremely successful referral strategy to get the product in front of the ultimate customer. In short time, accountants played with the software, found it easy to use, used it in their own companies and personal business affairs and in doing so got to understand how to use it...
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Three things to check to find the “best-fit” staff to your team

Three things to check to find the “best-fit” staff to your team
I provide strategic consulting services to Not-for-Profit clients who perhaps are not best equipped or experienced to apply corporate procedures that most of us would find "normal". However, when an NFP has a highly-paid CEO that once worked senior positions in significant banking and investment companies, you'd expect better. I was asked to assist in recruitment interviews for a General Manager position by the CEO of an NFP that I have had a relationship with earlier in their history. In fact, I had participated in earlier interviews for various finance staff recruited by this CEO when he had first arrived, and in the process had provided to the organisation a recruitment "checklist" for those earlier interviews. So, imagine my surprise when the CEO asked me to assist in the GM interviews, and I discovered that a complete Job Description was still being discussed, that an advertisement had been published without reference to key details such as employer industry and location (regional town), and before other details such as remuneration ranges and basic terms had been agreed internally. Having heard this, it was no surprise to me to learn that various highly qualified potential candidates had made initial inquiries, and when told...
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Client service starts in the car park

Client service starts in the car park
My Post Office box is at the back of the Post Office, and I need to drive around the back to their car park to access the box. Directly next to the Post Office car park are the car bays of an architectural practice, leading to their back door.
One morning, as I was parked in the Post Office car park, opening mail I had just retrieved from my Post Office box, I witnessed an incident that showed me that client service starts, not only at the back door, but out in the car park.
As I sat in my car opening mail, I noticed a well-dressed middle aged man smoking just outside the back door of the architectural practice. It was clearly a professional and well-branded practice as the corporate colours and logo were not only at the front, but also splashed all over the back walls and above the back door.
A car drove up and parked in one of their bays. There are about 16 bays and at 8 am half of them were empty. As the driver got out and locked his car, the smoking man walked up to him and said "No parking here".
Clearly surprised, the driver asked if there...
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OTS Management