communication

A Conversation with my Wife

Posted on by edreidyork


Last week I discussed ‘permission.’ That my job is very often about giving an entrepreneur ‘permission’ to grow: to open the door and see what it could be like, to see the potential for himself and his company. But as I wrote last week:

…Going through that door can be painful. Because you’ll need to have a couple of conversations: one with your team, admitting that maybe you don’t have all the answers. And one with your spouse or partner, saying that you have room to grow: that you’ve had a dream, and you’re going to pursue it…

It’s the second of those painful conversations I want to look at this week. There’s no doubt at all that setting up and building a business puts a strain on a relationship. If you Google ‘business success leads to divorce’ the number of results is terrifying.

But sometimes a regular blog needs to go into deep water. Besides, we’ve tackled loneliness and depression in previous blogs: why not marriage guidance?

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(A note on pronouns before I start. As around 75-80% of TAB members are men, and as I’m going to relate this to my own experience, I’ve used ‘he’ for the entrepreneur and ‘she’ for the partner. But swap them round and every point I make is at least equally valid.)

So let me share some of my own story…

When I pushed breakfast round my plate in Watford Gap services and made the decision to start my own business, it wasn’t just a decision about me: it was a decision about my family as well. And yes, it lead to a lengthy conversation with my wife. It also lead to a couple of years of being largely dependent on Dav’s income: years when I was building TAB York and Dav paid the price in going without a lot of life’s luxuries.

Dav’s income allowed me to pursue my dream. You might say that in the same way I give an entrepreneur permission to look through the door, my wife gave me that same permission. I’ll be eternally grateful for that.

Were there some tough times in the first two years? Was the cash flow – with two young children – strained at times? Did it get a little tense occasionally?

Yes to all three.

As I’ve already said, starting a business puts a strain on a relationship. But it’s not just the cash flow – and now we move into real Venus and Mars territory.

The entrepreneur starts a business: his thoughts go something like this:

I’m starting this business for the benefit of my family. Sure things are going to be tough for a while, but ultimately we’ll all benefit. She must be able to see that – and she must be able to see that I’ll go insane if I stay where I am.

His wife takes a different view:

Our security’s gone out of the window. We might not be able to pay the mortgage this month. The kids need new clothes and I need a holiday. And all for what? So that he can spend his days trying to build “a better widget.” Like the world needs another widget…

Then there’s attention: or lack of it. As Dav would tell you, there were plenty of times in the early days of TAB York when I was ‘there but not there.’ All entrepreneurs are the same. Suddenly your head is full of staff who aren’t performing, suppliers who aren’t supplying, the inevitable cash flow problems. It’s all too easy to forget the things you used to do together: date nights, weekends away, the simple act of listening when your partner is talking to you…

Communication is vital in building your business. It’s vital when you come home as well – especially when you’re no longer the boss, but an equal partner.

I often write about the importance of communicating the vision you have for your business. There’s an exact parallel with a relationship. I don’t want to use the word ‘vision’ as it’s too impersonal: but you need to keep focused on the future; on what you want for the family, and for each other.

That’s what Dav and I had – and it’s what we still have. And more than anything, that helps you keep business in perspective.

So yes, there were tough times: some triumphs and some disasters. But as my pal Kipling would say, we tried to treat those two impostors just the same. And we met with pizza instead of steak and treated those two just the same as well…

Thoughts from a Mile High

Posted on by edreidyork


As you read this I’m in Denver: the end of August, and time once again for the annual Alternative Board conference.

This year there are more of us than ever from the UK, and we’re joined by TAB colleagues from Germany, Austria, Ireland, the Czech Republic, Australia and New Zealand, as well as Canada and the US. It feels truly international and I’m absolutely loving it.

I won’t say the conference is the highlight of my year – just in case my wife pops Ed Reid York into Google – but when I sit down in November to plan the following year the last week in August is at the front of my thoughts. I simply love mixing with colleagues from other countries and the exchange of ideas.

In many ways it takes me back to my days at Northumbria University, when I was Chairman of the sexily-named ‘Polyglot,’ the society for foreign language students. These days Polyglot has matured into ‘EU Students at Northumbria:’ it’s clearly sobered up since the days when my definition of ‘international collaboration’ relied heavily on Sangria…

Not that alcohol won’t make a fleeting appearance in Denver. So far the ‘Brit evening’ has featured Pimms, gins, an Irish pub, cocktails, real ale and bowler hats. Despite the best efforts of US counter-intelligence our plans for this week remain a closely guarded secret…

A lot of my American colleagues are old friends now. I first went to Denver in 2009. At the time Dan was seven and Rory four. So mixed in with the views on Brexit – and the unappetising choice between Trump and Clinton – there’ll be a fair amount of catching up with family news as well. And the issues are always the same…

Yep, whether you’re in Denver or Dringhouses, Colorado or Clifton Moor one of your children is having problems at school: your daughter is refusing to eat her vegetables and your teenage son has just come home two hours after he promised to be home.

And isn’t that exactly the same with business?

The conference in Denver will bring TAB franchisees from eight or nine countries together: without exception, their members will have the same problems.

Yes, local legislation may alter the fine detail, but the wider principles – and the worries – are the same the world over.

• How do I achieve what I’m capable of achieving?
• How do I stay in control of the business and make sure the business doesn’t control me?
• And how do I keep my work/life balance truly balanced?

And so on… The more time I spend working with entrepreneurs the more the common threads emerge – wherever the entrepreneur is based. Plus ça change, plus c’est la même chose needs a business equivalent.

I’ll be back in the UK after the Bank Holiday and next week’s post will be dated September. Is that a sign of me getting older? This year seems to have flown past. Then again I’ve a friend who’s now into his eighties. “Make the most of it, Ed,” he always says to me. “By the time you’re my age you’re having breakfast every half hour.”

I certainly do intend to ‘make the most of it’ – starting with the last four months of 2016. In many ways the September to December period is the most important part of the year. It’s the four months that’ll see you hit your targets for the full year, and it’s the time to lay all the groundwork for the following year – which I’m absolutely certain will be helped by the insights, wisdom and experience of my TAB colleagues from around the world.

Have a great bank holiday weekend.

Why You Should Hire a Scrum Half

Posted on by edreidyork


“Man on!!”

“Pick him up!!”

…And of course, Tony Adams marshalling the Arsenal back four of the late eighties, arm aloft and yelling “Out! Out!” like a fervent Brexiteer.

Yes, communication in football has always been a simple affair. But still, it appears, too complicated for today’s young players. You may have seen this story in the papers last week: Southampton boss Ronald Koeman is so dismayed by the amount of time his young team spend with their headphones on and/or playing on their mobiles that he’s sending them back to the classroom – to learn how to talk to each other.

So much for football: let me switch sports. When I read that article about football I realised how much time we spend with my son’s U14 rugby team bellowing one basic instruction: “talk to each other.” It’s simple: the more they communicate, the better they play.

I spent most of my short rugby career on the wing: but I was occasionally switched from that splendid isolation and thrown right into the thick of it. “Need you to play scrum half today, Ed.”

The scrum half’s job is simple: he’s the communicator, the instigator. You see it in nearly all school teams: the chirpy little livewire with no. 9 on his back.

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…And of course thinking about communication in sport set me off thinking about business. I read a great blog post recently from one of TAB York’s members, looking at the different roles and personalities within successful teams. The post referenced the work of British management theorist Meredith Belbin and looked at the nine different roles he identified within teams.

Was ‘scrum half’ one of them? No, not quite. Probably the closest role that Belbin identifies is the ‘Shaper’ – someone who ‘provides the necessary drive to ensure that the team keeps moving and doesn’t lose focus or momentum.’ And you don’t need to watch many games of American football to realise that’s an exact description of the quarterback’s role.

So does your business need a scrum half/quarterback? Or in business terms a ‘shaper?’ Someone whose strengths – according to Belbin – are that they’re challenging and dynamic and have the drive and courage to overcome obstacles.

In my experience what every business – and/or team within that business – really does need is someone who’s enthusiastic, who’s focused on the objectives and, above all, who communicates well.

That might well be the owner of the business – but it doesn’t have to be. I’ve seen plenty of successful businesses where it was the second-in-command, or simply one of the team members.

There’s another strand to good communication that is perennially important in business. Fortunately it’s one that Ronald Koeman doesn’t need to worry about. Footballers may occasionally telegraph a pass: there’s no evidence yet of them needing to e-mail each other.

But how many times have you received an e-mail from someone – especially one pitching their services – and thought, ‘you must be joking. If you can’t even write a coherent e-mail, how can you possibly expect me to do business with you?’

There have been plenty of times when I’ve quoted from Rework on this blog. A sentence that always stays with me from that excellent little book is this one:

If you’re trying to decide among a few people to fill a position, hire the best writer. That’s because being a good writer is about more than just writing. Clear writing is a sign of clear thinking.

Substitute the word ‘communicator’ for ‘writer’ and that exactly summarises my thinking. Communication is more important than ever in business – and good communicators will increasingly be at a premium. It’s not just footballers who are growing up with an addiction to headphones, mobiles and – as we saw last week – emojis.

So when a natural scrum half walks through your door – someone who’ll communicate your message inside and outside your business – tie him down to a long term contract.

The Clients You Don’t Want

Posted on by edreidyork


Good morning – and a very happy New Year from the blog. I hope 2016 is a brilliant year for you – and hopefully there’ll be a few ideas in the next 50 posts and around 35,000 words that will help.

I looked back at how I started the first posts of 2015 and 2014. Maybe I missed my calling as a foreign exchange trader… ‘The rouble has just about reached parity with the chocolate coin,’ I wrote last year. And sure enough it dropped 26% last year thanks to tumbling oil and commodities prices.

But it’s the first post of 2014 that’s more relevant this morning. Here’s what I wrote two years ago:

So may I once again commend to you a business practice that is traditionally held to be unthinkable, but which is nearly always profitable; not as painful as you thought it was going to be and which will definitely have you saying, ‘why didn’t I do that ages ago?’

Sack some of your clients/customers. [You will have] clients who cause you grief: who don’t pay on time: who make unreasonable demands: who simply don’t bring any joy into your life.

Let me return to that theme. All of us will be under time pressure this year: however much we plan, however much we delegate, whatever productivity app we install on our phone, we’re going to be short of time. And we all know that buried away in our client or customer banks are plenty of clients we could politely describe as ‘indecisive.’

Sooner or later I have to say, “I think you’d be a great fit for TAB York. I think you’ve a lot to gain from it. Shall we go ahead?” Or words to that effect. At that point there are four possible responses.

  1. Yes
  2. No
  3. Not right now but come back to me in three months
  4. Let me think about it a bit longer

1 is great. 2 I can live with. 3 is fine – and has given me some of my best Board members. 4 is the worst possible response. A long, drawn-out ‘maybe’ is no good to anyone.

So as you start 2016, mentally run through your clients – and if ‘Mr Indecisive’ is there, ask yourself a simple question. “Wouldn’t I be better spending my time on someone else?”

But sadly, Mr Indecisive isn’t alone. He has some colleagues. Unfortunately, you’ll recognise them all-too-well.

Mr. No-Power

Years ago my first sales manager took me to one side. “You need to talk to the MAN, Ed,” he said. “What man?” I naively asked. “The person with the Means, the Authority and the Need.”

…And that fundamental still applies. Someone must need what you’re offering, have the means to pay for it and above all, the authority to make a decision. If they don’t, you’ll simply end up jumping through hoops to inflate their ego.

Mr. Sceptic

We’ve all seen the cartoon of the machine gun salesman being sent away with the words, ‘I’m too busy’ ringing in his ears.

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Maybe the modern equivalent is ‘What’s the ROI?’ All too often it’s a question asked by people who won’t – or can’t – make a decision to give themselves the illusion of knowledge.

“So what’s the average ROI on joining The Alternative Board?”

I’m sorry, I have no idea. What’s the average ROI on seeing more of your children? What’s the average ROI on finally feeling in control of your life and your business? Sceptics sometimes ask me what the ROI is on this blog. Sure, I can point to clients who have probably come to me as a result of the blog: but the anecdotal evidence – comments, engagement, reputation, influence – is far, far more important than the analytical.

Mr Overthinker

Yes, you’ve got to weigh up the pros and cons. Yes, you need to take advice and yes, you may need to run it past your colleagues on the TAB board. But eventually you need to make a decision: ‘paralysis by analysis’ may be a cliché, but like all clichés it contains a large grain of truth. Decisions need to be taken: not analysed indefinitely.

So there they are. The indecisive, the powerless, the sceptic and the overthinker. Four clients who will take up far more of your time than they should. Four characters you should be wary of in 2016. And four behaviour traits that I – and everyone round the TAB table – will make sure you don’t copy in the coming year.

The Long and Winding Road

Posted on by edreidyork


Monday night, and I’m watching the Channel 4 news. There’s a story about small music venues closing all over the UK. But I’m only half paying attention, if that.

The reporter mentions the Cockpit in Leeds, a venue that’s hosted any number of famous bands and artists – White Stripes, Kaiser Chiefs, Amy Winehouse among many. We’re closer to home: I pay slightly more attention.

And then along comes James Bay, bemoaning the fact that artists today simply aren’t playing enough hours of live music. “After all,” he says, “The Beatles played 10,000 hours in Hamburg.”

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At which point my ears really prick up.

Did the Beatles really play 10,000 hours in Hamburg? If you’re on stage for 50 hours a week, that would take four years – and according to Wiki, they were only in Hamburg from August 1960 to December 1962.

But it doesn’t matter – because the 10,000 hours myth has received another boost. In his book Outliers, Malcolm Gladwell put forward the theory that it takes 10,000 hours of practice to achieve mastery in any field. Matthew Syed gave it extra weight in Bounce.

And now, 10,000 hours is accepted corporate wisdom.

Exactly as the Mehrabian Myth once was. Do you remember that? Sitting in a room while some genius at the front told you that 93% of communication is non-verbal. Thirty seconds of thought by an intelligent eight year old would tell you that it can’t possibly be true, but millions of men in suits have lapped it up, very often paying good money to do so. Anyway, here’s 3:30 of YouTube which busts the Mehrabian Myth once and for all and let’s never hear from it again…

…Because now we have the perceived wisdom of 10,000 hours.

Yes, if you do something for 10,000 hours you’ll obviously become very competent. Will you master it, become world class? Almost certainly not.

Consider golf. I remember reading a story about Greg Norman. I’ll paraphrase the quote, but it went along these lines: I’d practice every day. Six or seven hundred balls a day. I’d practice until my hands were bleeding and I couldn’t hold the club any more.

Now I occasionally go to the driving range – and about 100 balls is my limit. But even if I did hit ‘six or seven hundred balls,’ even if I did put it in 10,000 hours, would I master golf? Could I turn pro or – sadly in not that many years – play on the Seniors’ Tour? No, because I don’t have the X-Factor. The show may be going downhill but the name is exactly right: it’s the X-Factor, not 10,000 hours of practice, which sets a world-class performer apart.

The X-Factor is the dedication, the drive, and the sheer bloody-minded will to win. That’s what makes someone practice for 10,000 hours. It isn’t the practice that sets Greg Norman and me apart, it’s the will to win – and a fair sprinkling of natural talent.

I haven’t played golf for 10,000 hours – not yet, anyway – so let’s turn to three things I most certainly have done for 10,000 hours: been a husband, been a parent and been the owner of TAB York.

Have I mastered any of them? No. I’m competent, sometimes I think I might even be quite good, but have I mastered them? No, absolutely not.

A family and a relationship are constantly evolving and changing. You master one level as a parent, your children immediately move on to the next level.

Business is just the same. New clients bring new challenges. Existing clients – and their businesses – develop and change. Different goals emerge, plans and personal circumstances change, different challenges come to the fore.

And yes, the will to win is important in business, but so is the will to go on learning. As Stephen Covey put it, to constantly Sharpen the Saw. That, of course, is where TAB comes in: where the experience and wisdom of your fellow Board members can make such a big difference. After all, there are far, far more than 10,000 hours round that boardroom table…

Mr Motivator

Posted on by edreidyork


For any fledgling business it’s a pivotal moment. 8/30 one Monday morning and someone nervously opens the office door. Your first member of staff reporting for work. Day one. And it will never be the same again…

And as that great business thinker, Spiderman, would have said, ‘With your first member of staff comes great responsibility.’ He or she is going to need paying – at the same time every month, not when the cash flow can stand it: they’re going to need training and – if they’re going to help you move to the next level – from time to time they’re going to need motivating…

I’ve written about motivation before: but it’s one of those subjects that’s worth re-visiting. So for this week, here are my five favourite ways that owners of SMEs can motivate – and get the best out of – their team.

Vision

As I’ve written many times on this blog, you’re the leader and your job is to lead. Winning new clients, dealing with suppliers, sorting out the finance – they’re all crucial parts of running your business: but first and foremost you’re the boss, the CEO, the guv’nor. First and foremost your job is to say, “There’s the promised land; that’s where we’re going. Follow me.” If you don’t do that, then you simply can’t expect your team to be motivated. Their simple question, ‘Are we going anywhere?’ will be very quickly followed by a simple answer: ‘Yes. The door. Where’s my CV?’

Feedback

There are some interesting stats from the USA. Gallup conducted a year long survey of American workers – and found that 70% don’t believe they’re engaged at work. Chief reason for this? Lack of feedback from their boss. A global survey by Towers Watson found that a majority of people planning to change jobs cited infrequent and ineffective communication as one of the main reasons for their dissatisfaction. So feedback’s essential – and that can include criticism, as long as it is positive, constructive and – see the point above – it is clearly part of the company’s overall direction.

Lead by Example

‘I’d never ask my men to do something I wouldn’t do myself’ may be one of the oldest clichés in the book but it remains true – especially in business. If you’re not committed, you can’t expect your team to be committed. The same goes for punctuality, looking after the clients and taking the trouble to get it right. If you don’t, they won’t.

Trust Them

Many members of TAB York will tell you that delegation was one of the hardest skills they had to learn. Yes, it is your business – and yes, you probably can do everything. But if you’re going to build a successful team and a successful business you’re going to need to trust your team and empower them. Nothing motivates people more than knowing that their boss trusts them and will back their judgement.

Appreciate their work/life balance

Remember why you started the business? You wanted to be in control of your time: you didn’t want to miss the Nativity Play because some distant head office had decreed that you should go to a waste-of-time conference in an anonymous hotel off an anonymous motorway. Your team are no different – and as flexible working becomes more and more the norm they’re going to expect to be at those not-to-be-repeated family events. Without doubt the most successful teams I see when I visit the TAB York members are the ones where the boss really understands that everyone’s work/life balance is crucial.

Five simple ways to make sure you motivate your team. I could easily have taken the list up to a dozen, but these five are the ones that I’ve seen work consistently for SME’s. If there’s a crucial one that you think I’ve missed, let me know. In the meantime, have a brilliant weekend.

Bad Habits, Bad Decisions

Posted on by edreidyork


I read a great article in the Harvard Business Review recently: 9 Habits that Lead to Terrible Business Decisions. If you haven’t time to read the article in full, here we go with a whistle stop tour of nine deadly sins that I’m absolutely certain no member of TAB York ever makes…

  1. Laziness – a failure to check facts and gather new information: relying on past experience and – as the financial services industry might say – expecting past performance to be a guarantee of the future
  2. Failing to anticipate the unexpected – as I wrote last week, ‘don’t think it can’t happen because it can.’ And these days it increasingly is happening. You may have had a great idea, it may excite you beyond measure – but you still need to ask yourself, ‘what if…’
  3. Indecisiveness – with your colleagues round the TAB table behind you I hope this never happens, but sometimes the best decision is simply to make a decision
  4. Staying locked in the past – “we’ve always done it this way.” “Better the devil you know.” As you know I’m very fond of [slightly] misquoting Robert Kennedy: “see things as they could be and ask ‘why not?’’’
  5. No strategic alignment – no decision can be taken in isolation: it has to fit in with your long term goals. I’ll come back to this one, as it is so important.
  6. Over-dependence – no decision can be taken because X is waiting for Y who’s not sure because he’s waiting for Z. Just remember, the leader’s job is to lead, and sometimes that means not waiting for everyone
  7. Failure to communicate – entire forests have been wiped out by the amount of books, papers and essays written about the importance of communication. And yet still people don’t do it.
  8. Isolation – this may seem like it’s the opposite of over-dependence, but sometimes you do need to consult. You just need to get on and do it quickly.
  9. Finally, lack of technical knowledge. I couldn’t agree more: today the person with the right technical knowledge may be a 23 year old coder who’s been with you for six months. Knowledge is no longer the preserve of the boardroom and good leaders know there are times when they simply have to get out there and learn.

Let me go back to a couple of those points – no strategic alignment and failure to communicate. No major business decision should stand alone: every decision has to be part of your long term strategy – and move you towards accomplishing your long term goals. Everything should flow backwards: this is where we want to be in five years’ time. Fine, these are the decisions we need to take now to help us get there. And if the decision you’ve just taken isn’t helping you get there, you almost certainly need to re-consider it.

And as we’ve discussed many times on this blog, communication is the key to all things – not least because that 23 year old coding genius may well spot a flaw in your decision. You’ve got to take the team with you and, increasingly, you need feedback and expertise from the whole of your team – but they can’t do that if they don’t know what you’re doing or what you’ve decided.

I was talking to one of my Board members yesterday. He made the point very forcefully that some of the best ideas in his company come from the youngest and newest members of the team. Sadly, many businesses still have a ‘serve your time and then we’ll listen to you’ culture. Make sure yours isn’t one of them, because ‘years spent’ no longer equals the ideas, knowledge and insight you need in a changing world.

As the old saying goes, ‘the best meetings are held at round tables.’ Everyone’s opinion matters; everyone’s ideas are worth listening to.

Do All Those Numbers Really Matter?

Posted on by edreidyork


In the olden days – when I first dipped a toe into sales management – it was fairly simple. We recorded the number of calls our guys made, the average order value, the number of new customers and… that was pretty much it. And then every month we’d sit round a table and gradually cover it with a blizzard of paper.

Occasionally, a decision would float upwards and be acted on – but you know what? If I’m honest, decisions on the sales force were only one-third dictated by our analysis. The other two-thirds was gut feeling – unless there was a diktat from the top floor, in which case everything we’d decided was irrelevant anyway.

(More of diktats from the top floor in a minute…)

Now here we are in 2014. The year when you can measure everything. All the traditional metrics are still there – plus a myriad of new toys. How many people have visited our website? What pages did they click on? How many Twitter followers do we have? How many Facebook likes?

The list is endless. And the question is obvious – do all those numbers really matter? In fact, is there too much information? Are we in danger of having so much information that what really matters gets lost in the noise?

What we need to do as owners and directors of SMEs is cut through the noise. Twelve weeks today it’s Boxing Day, so I’m confident that your planning for 2015 will be in full swing and a crucial part of that planning is identifying the numbers that are important – and which are just noise.

Why? Because you can’t monitor everything. There simply isn’t time. You need to be at the Nativity Play remember? Not worrying about how many people from Chicago have clicked on your About page.

…Which – had it been available at the time – is what I would have been doing at Nestle. On the first Friday I was there I added them up: I’d inherited 25 ‘key’ performance indicators for my sales team.

Yep, the sales team was a massive overhead. So the diktat from the top floor was simple. Measure it to death. The problem was, the sales team had no idea what they should focus on. I’m proud to say I stripped the 25 numbers they wanted down to three monthly KPIs which never changed – and another three which did change depending on what our brand priorities were. The performance of the sales team improved significantly.

As many of you know, I talk to everyone I work with about the ‘pulse’ in their business. What are the key numbers you need to look at on a Monday morning? To some it’s money in the bank: for others it’s orders taken or new customers.

The key numbers vary enormously from business to business – and sometimes they’re not the ‘headline’ numbers. One of the most important functions The Alternative Board provides is to drill down into a member’s business and help them identify what really drives the business and which numbers determine the health – or otherwise – of the business.

So as you look ahead to 2015, how do you determine the numbers that are crucial to the success of your business? Rest assured that TAB will be tackling that in some detail between now and the year end, but the first step is simple. It’s to have a really clear idea of where you want the business to be in X number of years. Know that – and knowing what you need to measure and act on instantly becomes clearer.

And here’s my commitment. Whatever you want to achieve, however ambitious your plans, TAB will never saddle you with 25 KPIs. We’ll keep the numbers that matter short, sharp and focused – so that when you need to take action, you can take action.

The Big A4 Diary

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I’m not quite as up to speed with electronics as some of the other guys are, so I still use a big A4 diary.

Who’s the quote from? Andy Flower, team director (that’s ‘coach’ in old money) of the England team trying to retain the Ashes in Australia this winter.

The quote is in an article on the BBC website: you can read it here. Flower – the former Zimbabwean batsman who led England to the top of the test rankings – makes some excellent points, particularly on getting the best out of a team of individuals. It’s one of those times when business can learn a lot from sport.

Cricket’s always struck me as fascinating: it’s a team game and it’s an individual game. In no other sport is it so plainly evident that the team succeeded but you failed. The team can win by an innings and plenty: you can be clean bowled first ball and lose your place.

So the coach’s job is hard. The only way for the team to win is for individuals to perform to their best. But how do you get 11 very different characters to do that?

Well, the answers are in Andy Flower’s ‘coffee-stained A4 diary.’ And here are five of them that I picked out. None of them will be new to you – and you’ll instantly see that they’re every bit as relevant in managing your company’s team as they are in managing the England cricket team.

Communication Part of the preparation involved a camp [before the team left]. We wanted to educate the players on effective communication, leadership and how to give and receive feedback in a healthy and constructive fashion. I don’t think I’ve much to add to that. Anyone who’s ever played a team sport will know that there’s plenty of ‘feedback’ – just as there is in business. But you have to make sure it’s constructive feedback that builds the team, not negative stuff that breaks it down.

Growth Flower places a real emphasis on helping his players grow – both as individuals and as cricketers. They’re all encouraged to work towards continuously improving: We’ve been winning quite a lot. But if we don’t keep improving we’ll slow down and the opposition will catch us up.

Planning The planning has been meticulous. We’ve requested that the wives with younger kids arrive a few days earlier than we do, so they and the children are over jetlag by the time we arrive – so the players’ sleep isn’t affected. As you can see, there’s more to a cricket match than inducing Michael Clarke to nick one of Jimmy Anderson’s outswingers. In exactly the same way that there’s more to getting the best out of your staff than making sure they’ve been trained on the latest software.

Trust I don’t want them constrained by curfews. I want them to make decisions like adults. This may not seem a great idea when Joe Root is getting punched by David Warner at 2:30 in the morning, but I think Andy Flower is absolutely right. Sooner or later you have to trust people: and in my experience the more trust you place in them, the better they respond.

Fun We want them to have fun too. We want them to finish the tour of Australia saying it’s been the best three months of their lives. And doesn’t that apply in business as well? If you don’t enjoy it, then the chances are that in the long run it won’t be profitable.

I think there’s a lot of common sense in those points and if you’ve five minutes I’d recommend reading the full article. But how does Andy Flower himself stay focused, and make sure he’s also constantly improving? I have used an executive coach for two or three years now, he says. He’s a great sounding board and also challenges me about my own personal growth.

And with that remarkably sensible comment I’ll leave you for this week. Have a great weekend…

The Digital Nomad

Posted on by edreidyork


Tie? You must be joking, mate.

Socks? Not where I’m going.

Take my PC? No thanks. This is the week I joined the legion of Mac fans. An ultra-lightweight one at that…

In fact let’s just cut straight to the chase. Why are you wasting your time in North Yorkshire? Surely you can run your business from a laptop by now? What are you doing in Selby when you could be in Santorini? Malton or Monterrey? Pocklington or Pattaya? Sounds tempting, doesn’t it…

Maybe I’m being flippant, but it’s a serious point. If all your business needs is a laptop and an internet connection, well, there are plenty of places with more sunshine than our corner of the world and where you can live far more cheaply.

I’ve been thinking about this for a while – yes, we’re in Ireland next week but I promise we’re coming back – as the ‘digital nomad’ seems to be getting an ever-higher profile.

I read an interesting article on the BBC website recently about PR boss, Chris Ward, who hasn’t worked in an office for ten years, choosing instead to base himself in coffee shops and assorted McDonald’s throughout Europe. Chris has written a book about his thoughts, appropriately called Out of Office.

His basic premise is simple:

The great thing about the internet is that it’s freed people from the office. We don’t have to be tied to our desks any more. We can work where and when we like.

He goes on to argue that creative people would be far more fulfilled – and far more productive – if they were out and about, believing that the ‘noise and buzz’ of a coffee shop stimulates the imagination.

I can see his point: I know that if I’m working in say, a Costa, I have to concentrate that little bit harder; interestingly though, that extra concentration does produce some great – and often unexpected – results.

But at this point I’m just going to hide behind the sofa for a while – because I know this blog is read by a lot of people who simply cannot leave the office. I appreciate that those of you in manufacturing, the law, accountancy (not to mention any doctors out there) simply cannot slope off to the nearest beach with the latest MacBook Air.

Not every day, anyway.

‘If you always do what you’ve always done, then you’ll always get what you’ve always got.’ Yes, it’s a cliché, but like a lot of business clichés it contains a large slice of the truth. We go into the office, we sit at our desks, we go for a sandwich at roughly the same time every day and we have roughly the same sandwich. That’s not a pattern of behaviour that encourages creative thinking – and whatever your business, you’re an entrepreneur and you need to be creative.

So here’s my challenge for August. For one day, take your laptop/Mac/iPad/pencil and paper and work somewhere completely new. Different place, different sandwich at lunchtime – and hopefully a different way of working on your business. And then report back at the end of the month – let me know how it went.

In the meantime we’re off to Galway for the week. The blog will return – refreshed, invigorated and written in a coffee shop – on Friday August 16th. If you’re going on holiday in the next few weeks, have a brilliant time – and I’ll talk to you all soon.