Core Disciplines

“Targets are not negotiable” – Dave Gammon

What’s the story?

I do love a good business story. I’ve been the business of participating in, and collecting stories, my entire life and largely without realising it so have you. The things that you, and other people, do that drive both success and failure within your business and life.

I’m interested in these stories, not to copy them or turn them into a ‘formula for success’. Copying others or follow success formulas doesn’t work. You can read Richard Branson’s life story ...

Just as I was about to start writing a follow on article from last week’s piece, I saw something pop up in a social media feed that I had forgotten all about. The 7^th September marked the five year since I left ActionCOACH and started my own coaching business, Sleeping Tiger.

I couldn’t let this important milestone (for all of you out there as much as for me) pass by without comment. The reason I left ActionCOACH is, in itself a ...

Channelling frustration

One of my clients had an epiphany moment last week. You know these. It is when you have a breakthrough in your thinking that either resolves a longstanding problem or presents a new opportunity that, until that point you had been blind to.

This epiphany was born out of that seemingly most negative of emotions: frustration. In this case it was a frustration familiar to everyone that runs a business with a team.  Team members not performing as you want ...

Something to pay attention to wherever you are and whatever you are doing

Its August as I write this so you may be on holiday at the moment. For some of you (myself included) its business as usual. I have an exercise for you that will effortlessly improve your results, wherever you are at the moment.

But first, a little background

I have a friend who is a business coach and uses a 1-10 scale so his clients can express their mood ie ...

Business is simple. People make it complicated

The commonest complaints I hear from business leaders, by a country mile, is the apparent lack of willingness of people to take responsibility when it comes to prospects, customers and profit margins.

When your team do the right things, with the right level of intensity they create a set of outcomes which are hopefully consistent with the results you are seeking. In business, there is never certainty of outcome because

Business is a contact sport

Being in ...

“Procrastinators Unite. Tomorrow” – A brilliant T-shirt I recently saw.

I’m running a session all about personal organisation this week.

Its very tempting to take the easy route and give out a load of time management tips and tactics.  These tend to get greeted with ‘oo’s and ‘ah’s’ as people get excited and mesmerised by the potential to eek out more time in their day.

These tips and tactics all make sense in the context of a classroom, but they rarely survive contact ...

“Who’s upset you now Alan?”. “People. Just people” – Alan Partridge

Everyone working in a company has to confront a key question. Am I on or off of this bus?

Am I willing to invest my time, energy and enthusiasm to make this business successful or will I just hang on here until something better comes along or I get sacked for being shit. Similarly, business leadership requires tough decisions to be made about the investments you are making in people verses ...

I was going through some video at the weekend from some of the programs I have been running lately. There are times when it feels like what I am doing is quite complicated. If you have worked with me you know I have an armoury of stories, experiences (both mine and my clients), metaphors and business models.

Yet at the heart of my work lies absolute simplicity. Every bit of this content points at four things that will give you the ...