Idea Time with Dr. Jo North: Recent Episodes
ideatime
Wouldn’t it be fantastic if everyone who had a great idea that they really loved created a flexible, do-able plan and then went for it – un-self-consciously, unapologetically and with the mindset of simply making the idea become as amazing as it can be?
This is what my podcast is all about. Helping you, your team and your business create your own legacies that you didn't even imagine were possible through innovation, co-creation, intrapreneurship and facilitation.
I'm here to cheer you on and walk alongside you, an independent thinker, who wants to pioneer, create more and regurgitate less, and blast through gloss and BS to get into the substance of what really matters and really works.
Let's trust in ourselves and listen to our own intuition. We'll consult others, learn, listen to views, then take our stand and unapologetically do us. Bring on the ideas...
Intro:
Innovation is the lifeblood of business growth – yet research shows 70% to 90% of innovation initiatives fail hbr.org. How can your organization beat these odds? In this episode, I unveil the Big Bang Innovation Framework, a proven 6-step innovation process designed to take you from a spark of an idea to scalable success. Whether you’re a corporate innovation leader navigating internal hurdles or an entrepreneur hustling to disrupt the market, this framework provides a structured roadmap to consistently turn ideas into impact.
I’ll break down why innovation efforts often fall flat and show how you can ignite creativity, expand possibilities, and accelerate growth using a science-backed approach. Get ready for an in-depth, actionable guide to supercharge your innovation strategy!
What You’ll Learn:
- Why innovation fails (and how to fix it): The common pitfalls – from chasing the wrong problems to lack of strategy – that cause innovation efforts to falter, and how a strong framework solves these issues.
- The Big Bang Innovation Framework (3 Phases, 6 Steps): A step-by-step walkthrough of the framework’s three phases – Ignite, Expand, Accelerate – and the six essential stages that will transform how you manage innovation, from ideation to execution.
- Practical techniques & best practices: How to apply design thinking, open innovation, prototyping, and innovation metrics at each stage to ensure your ideas are validated and impactful.
- Real-world application: How corporate leaders can align teams and innovation projects with strategic goals, and how entrepreneurs can use this framework to test and scale new business ideas faster without wasted resources.
- Tips to sustain innovation culture: Learn how to maintain momentum after launch with continuous improvement, and build an agile innovation culture that keeps your company ahead of the curve.
If you find this episode valuable, please 👍 give it a like to support the podcast and 🔔 subscribe for more insights on innovation and strategy. Have questions or your own innovation experiences to share? Comment below – I’d love to hear how you’re driving innovation in your organization. And if you’re ready to put the Big Bang Innovation Framework into action, check out the link here for additional resources and contact information. Let’s spark some breakthroughs! 🚀
Do you want to build a thriving innovation ecosystem for your company or organization? If you’re looking to create an environment where ideas, people, and opportunities come together to drive real results, this episode is for you. Here’s what we’ll cover:
- What an innovation ecosystem is.
- Why a thriving innovation ecosystem is critical for collaboration, growth, and staying competitive.
- Key components of a successful ecosystem
We’ll look at shared purpose, diverse participants, and the communication that ties it all together. Steps to build and sustain your ecosystem - from setting a clear vision and mapping stakeholders to promoting open innovation and encouraging collaboration.
This session is practical, to the point, and full of useful tips. It also features current, real examples. Whether you’re a leader, innovator, or part of a team working on partnerships or development, you’ll walk away with ideas you can put into action.
I'd love to read your questions and thoughts in the comments. I'll reply personally to them all.
For the article that accompanies this webinar, go to: https://bigbangpartnership.co.uk/how-to-build-a-thriving-innovation-ecosystem/
For my book, Leading Sustainable Innovation, order here and use the discount code KOGANPAGE20 : https://www.koganpage.com/responsible-business/leading-sustainable-innovation-9781398616684
Sometimes a promising idea or discovery is so exciting that it's tempting to rush ahead, risking missing key steps along the way. Other times, it's challenging to figure out how to progress the innovation at speed and scale, causing it to get stuck.
In this episode, I explain how Technology Readiness Levels (TRLs)—originally created by NASA in the 1970s and now used internationally—provide a valuable framework for identifying and communicating the maturity level of your sustainable innovation. TRLs can help you build a roadmap to ensure your innovation makes the impact you want it to make. Don't let the term 'Technology Readiness Levels' put you off if you're not in tech. TRLs are used for all kinds of sustainable innovations, including new products and services, materials, engineering, medical solutions, and more.
I cover what TRLs are, where they came from and why, how to use them, and most importantly, how to progress your sustainable innovation from an idea to an applied solution that makes a real impact.
For my article on this topic, please go to What are TRLs? Technology Readiness Levels Explained.
Company values are more than words on a wall or a website. They're the heartbeat of an organization, guiding decisions and behaviors. Yet, bringing them to life is where many companies struggle. In this show, I share practical ways to help your team infuse your company’s values into your everyday work.
I’ll share:
- How to facilitate workshops with your team to identify behaviours for every role that embody your values
- Why and how to make your values the foundation of your business decisions, hiring practices and recognition programs
- Keeping your values front-of-mind with storytelling and visual communication
- How to check-in and monitor your progress
Join me in this dynamic session on creative thinking techniques to elevate your strategy and innovation sprints, workshops and meetings.
Whether you're looking to tackle complex problems or pave the way for fresh, more ambitious ideas, this session will equip you with practical techniques to think creatively and act innovatively.
We’ll cover:
- Foundations of Creative Thinking: Understand the core principles that underpin creative thought and how it can transform your approach to strategy and innovation.
- Techniques and Tools: Explore a range of tried-and-tested techniques to stimulate creative thinking and apply these tools in your work.
- Real-World Applications: See how organizations have successfully applied creative thinking techniques to solve problems and innovate.
This show is ideal for business professionals, team leaders, managers, and anyone looking to:
- Enhance strategic thinking with creative approaches.
- Drive innovation within teams or organizations.
- Solve complex problems with out-of-the-box solutions.
creativethinking #psychologyofcreativity #innovation #strategy
This podcast, "How to Facilitate a Scenario Planning Workshop", will guide you through using scenario planning to help you to develop and strengthen your sustainable innovation strategy.
Key takeaways:
- Understanding sustainable innovation: Balance environmental, societal, and economic impacts for long-term success 🌱.
- Scenario planning insights: How to prepare for various futures, mitigating risks and spotting opportunities 🔍.
- From theory to practice: Real-world applications that show the impact of effective scenario planning. 🚀
- Tools and processes: Effective strategies and tools for developing actionable plans based on critical scenarios 💡.
Who should listen?
Leaders, strategists, and anyone interested in sustainable innovation and strategic foresight.
I hope you can join me live or on replay to explore how scenario planning helps to innovate towards a more sustainable future. 🌱
🚀 Build a Successful Innovation Team 🚀
🎥 🎙️ In this week’s Idea Time show, I explore how to build an innovation-driven team.
Highlights are:
- Innovation as a Core Value: Essential for product development, adding technical, process, and functional value.
- Innovation Time Off (ITO): Learn from Google, 3M and others . Balance innovation and productivity.
- Set the Innovation Stage: Effective communication and real-life examples to spark creativity.
- Lean Start-up Approach: Validating ideas early with a Build-Measure-Learn cycle.
- Diverse Team Composition: Diversity fuels creativity. Importance of a guiding team leader.
- Skills for Innovation Teams: Creative, critical thinking, empathy, curiosity, problem-solving, and collaboration.
- Sustaining Innovation Culture: Top management’s role in fostering an ongoing innovative environment.
Stakeholder mapping is a strategic process used in innovation, project management and business planning.
It involves identifying and analyzing individuals, groups, or organizations that can impact or be impacted by a project or business activity.
The goal is to understand these stakeholders' interests, influence, and the nature of their involvement.
By mapping stakeholders, innovators can better navigate complex environments, minimize risks, and leverage support for successful outcomes.
In this mini-show, I share helpful ideas on how to facilitate stakeholder mapping, an essential tool for innovators, design thinks and project leaders.
We cover some practical techniques for identifying, mapping, and prioritizing stakeholders, how to develop tailored communication strategies and why keeping your stakeholder map updated is vital.
In this content-packed live show, I dive into Horizon Scanning & Foresight for Innovators.
No crystal balls, prophecies or predicting the future, though!
Horizon scanning is about detecting weak signals of potential change before they make it big. It keeps you prepared, and gives you and your innovation strategy a competitive edge.
In this show, I share:
- What horizon scanning is, and why it’s important
- The differences between foresight, forecasts and prediction
- What ‘weak signals’ are, and how to spot them
- Emerging trends
- Tips and approaches for horizon scanning in a fast-moving, information-dense world
- How to do horizon scanning with your team
- Data for horizon scanning
- A horizon scanning toolkit, including:
- Seven Questions interview technique
- The Delphi technique
- Futures Wheel
- Text Mining – using AI to scan through large sets of text data, spotting trends in news, social media, or academic publications.
- Cross-impact analysis
- Scenario planning
- Importance / certainty matrix
- Transformation maps
It really is a value-packed whopper of a show – ideal for you if you’re planning your innovation and business growth strategy. I also share how you can access my free horizon scanning toolkit.
As always, I'd love your comments and questions on my social channels!
This episode is a really good one if you're interested in leading sustainable innovation in your business. I go in-depth on how to facilitate a successful Business Sustainability Workshop for your team.
I give you a start-to-finish guide on how and what to prepare, a workshop agenda with specific activities and tips to turn your ideas into action after your event.
What I cover:
- Workshop Preparation: Why having a solid plan for your workshop or sprint is crucial and what materials and information you should prepare in advance.
- Circular Economy Principles: How to incorporate these into your business model and why it matters.
- Resource Flow Analysis: Pinpoint waste and inefficiencies in your processes and develop a plan to tackle them.
- Stakeholder Perspectives: Understand sustainability concerns from various stakeholders' perspectives, enhancing your corporate social responsibility efforts.
- Building a Roadmap: Building your sustainability plan.
As always, please do share your ideas and questions in the comments on my social channels, it will be great to hear from you!
In this episode, I dive into the world of sustainable business model innovation and discuss why it’s essential in the contemporary business environment.
Key topics I cover are:
- The rising demand for sustainability from customers and the global trend towards sustainable value propositions.
- Examples of businesses committing to Net Zero targets.
- The role of sustainability in attracting and retaining talent, and the link between environmental ethics and job satisfaction.
- The creation of new opportunities through sustainable business model innovation, such as supply chain innovations.
- The definition of a sustainable business model and the purpose of innovating one.
- Steps to build a sustainable business model: deconstructing products and services, walking through business processes, focusing on people, and using data for continuous improvement.
Open innovation is all about expanding your business horizons. Instead of keeping all your ideas and projects in-house, you collaborate with external partners, startups, or customers. This approach speeds up innovation, cuts costs, and could give your business the competitive edge it needs. Tune into my livestream to learn how you can make open innovation work for you.
Get to Know Open Innovation
I'll start off by demystifying what open innovation really means. I’ll explain the difference between open and closed innovation models.
Real-World Cases
Hear about companies that have thrived by adopting open innovation. Their success stories could be inspiration for your business.
Practical Benefits
I'll cover the ROI of implementing open innovation strategies. Learn about faster product development, cost reduction, and increased creativity within your organization.
How to Get Started
Thinking about jumping in? I'll provide actionable steps on how you can integrate and facilitate open innovation into your business operations.
In this episode of the Idea Time show, I cover what Appreciative Inquiry is and show you how you could use the process of Appreciative Inquiry to create and facilitate highly effective, strengths-focused innovation.
Appreciative Inquiry means recognising, exploring and building on the positive, aligning with strengths-based development. It is all about reframing, and, starting from the position of asking, ‘What are we doing well?’, ‘What are the good things?’, ‘What are we great at?’, ‘What are the positives that we have got to offer?’
Having a positive focus is optimistic, empowering and motivational, and for these reasons Appreciative Inquiry can be a powerful ingredient for achieving positive change, innovation and growth – for people and organizations.
My focus in this episode is how to do this in practice, including a full agenda for an Appreciative Inquiry-based workshop or sprint, with tools, techniques and activities that you can use.
Having a lot of ideas after a brainstorming session? Unsure which to pick? I've got you covered.
In this show, I'll introduce you to 8 proven innovation frameworks that can help. These tools can be used individually or in group settings. Pick what's best for your scenario.
Innovation Frameworks to Discuss:
- Idea Sorter
- MoSCoW Method
- The KJ Method (Kawakita Jiro Method)
- RICE Scoring Method
- Kano Model
- WSJF (Weighted Shortest Job First)
- Eisenhower Box (or Urgent-Important Matrix)
- Ivy Lee Method
Think I've overlooked one? Let me know in the comments, and I’ll include it!
Looking forward to seeing you there.
innovation #facilitation #designsprints #designthinking #innovationstrategy
In this podcast episode I’m joined by my very special guest, TV producer and presenter, entrepreneur, 2x award-winning author, and elite carp angler, Ali Hamidi.
Ali is the founder and CEO of One More Cast Ltd, a big dream that has become reality. Ali’s focus has been to create a brand with premium fishing tackle and outdoor products to cater for a wide range of situations. He’s obsessive about customer engagement to drive future product development alongside the business’ extensive experience in the fishing tackle industry, accessories and clothing.
Not only does Ali love producing fishing products, he’s also a passionate content creator with new TV series on ITV and Viasat (International) called the Grand Fishing Adventure and of course an ever growing YouTube channel and Social Media platforms.
Ali was the marketing and media talent that helped grow the Korda brand from a kitchen table business to a multi-million company. He’s also produced and starred in tv shows The Big Fish Off, Thinking Tackle, Monster Carp, Fishing All Stars.
In this episode, we explore Ali’s entrepreneurial business journey to date, and how he builds online relationships and communities of people who support the brand. Ali shares how he has taken a hands-on approach to successfully teaching himself new product design and development. He also tells us how he got into tv, developing relationships at Sky and ITV.
I loved catching up with Ali. He’s such an inspiration, and this episode is packed with down-to-earth tips, insights and advice. Ali and I hope you enjoy it. We’d love to hear what you think.
To connect with Ali Hamidi:
- YouTube
entrepreneurship #innovation #newproductdevelopment #npd #businessgrowth #contentcreation
Harness the power of Design Thinking! A dynamic approach to problem-solving that promotes human-centricity, encourages creativity, and celebrates practicality.
Join me as we explore:
🎯 The art of understanding user's needs
❓ The science of defining precise problems
🧠 The fun in brainstorming innovative solutions
📐 The creativity involved in designing a prototype
✔️ The thrill of testing it, and
🚀 The satisfaction of implementing the solution
🎯 The ultimate goal? To devise user-friendly solutions that are both feasible and commercially viable, driving innovation and fostering a unique competitive advantage.
In this episode of my Idea Time Show, we’ll delve into 'Design Thinking 101.' Together, we will uncover:
- How to apply Design Thinking to your day-to-day challenges
- A detailed rundown and visual representation of the six pivotal phases of the Design Thinking process
- A ready-to-use Design Thinking workshop agenda, complete with activities to get active engagement from your team
Welcome to another exciting episode of the Idea Time podcast. In this episode, we have the pleasure of hosting Brian Tam, a renowned creative strategist based in Lisbon. Brian is dedicated to helping small to medium-sized businesses and entrepreneurs globally innovate and grow.
Here’s a rundown of what you can expect from this episode:
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Global Experience and Perspectives on Innovation: Brian has a wealth of experience working in various parts of the world, from the US to Shanghai, and now Lisbon. His unique perspectives on innovation, moulded by his rich global experiences, bring a refreshing take on the subject.
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The Importance of Reflection and Thoughtful Thinking: Brian shares his insights into the pivotal role of reflection in personal growth and business innovation. Discover how taking the time to think critically can propel your innovative endeavors forward.
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Adapting and Thriving in a Changing World: We delve into how businesses can navigate the continually evolving global landscape, especially in the context of ongoing technological advancements.
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Artificial Intelligence (AI) and Its Potential Implications: We discuss the impact of AI on our daily lives and its possible future roles. Brian provides useful tips on leveraging AI for enhancing creativity, brainstorming, and driving efficiency.
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The Power of Workshops and Collaboration: Brian and I explore the significance of collaborative efforts in workshops. Learn about various techniques that can supercharge collaboration and result in successful business strategies.
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Brian’s Passion for Business and Strategy: Get to know more about Brian’s love for all things business and strategy and how this passion is shaping his approach to helping businesses innovate and grow.
This episode is packed full of insights, tips, and inspiring conversations. Whether you're an entrepreneur, business owner, or simply someone interested in the world of innovation and strategy, there's something here for you. We'd love to hear your thoughts, so don't hesitate to get in touch with us after the episode. Enjoy!
Contact Brian on Instagram at @letsmakegreat
Links:
- www.letsmakegreat.com
- www.proto-start.com
- Book: https://www.amazon.co.uk/Awrignawl-Creativity-Inspirations-Originality-Transformation/dp/109692837X
Brian’s Biography:
Brian loves entrepreneurship! Since founding Let’s Make Great! in 2013, he has worked with hundreds of founders and innovators to systematically develop new products, services, and brand. Using a combination of empathetic coaching and startup consulting, Brian guides clients to both examine blind spots and attack new opportunities, leading to accelerated growth. From discovery to diagnosis, and experimentation to execution, he guides clients in a step-by-step process, to methodically achieve breakthrough results together. In addition to keynote speeches at conferences like TEDx and PechaKucha, Brian has written over 500 articles on creativity, innovation, and entrepreneurship. Furthermore, in 2017 he led the creation of PROTO, a successfully crowd-funded storytelling game to inspire innovators. Born in New York and proudly raised in New Jersey, Brian spent the past 14 years in Shanghai, China to drive the dynamic changes emerging there. Also an avid cyclist, he has cycled around Taiwan and is currently enjoying his next big adventure in Europe.
creativestrategy #entrepreneurship #innovation #businessgrowth #businessstrategy
I’m joined by my special guest, Patrick Dunne, for an in-depth exploration of innovation and entrepreneurship in the boardroom.
Patrick Dunne is an experienced Chair with extensive experience of working with boards in Europe, Asia and North America. Currently Chair of board consultancy Boardelta, the charities The EY Foundation and ESSA- Education Sub Saharan Africa as well as Chair of the oversight board for the Chartered Management Consultant and trustee of the Chartered Management Institute.
He’s the author of the award-winning “Boards” and three other successful books on the subject and was a member of the Higgs Review.
He also has extensive experience of developing social enterprises.
In this episode, we delve into the common attributes shared by successful, innovative boards and outline strategies for nurturing these qualities.
Highlights from the Discussion
- Decoding Innovation: More than just inventing new products or processes, innovation embodies the creation of successful solutions that make a genuine impact. This often requires challenging conventional thinking and the willingness to pave new paths.
- Problem Identification and Evidence-Based Strategies: Innovative solutions are often born out of clearly identified and thoroughly understood problems. These solutions should be anchored in robust evidence and rigorous research, thus blending bright ideas with thorough testing and validation.
- Complacency and Over-Innovation in Boards: While complacency can curb innovation, an excess of innovation without realizing the value from existing products or services also carries risks. The optimal approach is to understand and exploit the lifecycle of your product or service, planning for the next growth phase before hitting a plateau.
- Encouraging Innovation through Diversity: Innovation can be fostered by integrating diverse viewpoints. The use of horizon boards or shadow boards, which include younger or non-board members, can introduce fresh insights and challenges. Understanding changing trends and diverse consumer behaviors is essential.
- Cultivating a Culture of Innovation: The goal is to nurture a culture that invites challenges, appreciates various skillsets, and values everyone's contribution. Hiring driven individuals, fostering a challenging and creative environment, and recognizing the importance of delivery-focused individuals can all contribute to a vibrant innovative culture.
- Self-Awareness in Board Members and Leaders: Leaders must be self-aware to make effective decisions, coordinate activities, and manage conflicts. Seeking feedback, reflecting on performance, observing, and learning from others, and having a good mentor or coach can significantly assist in this development. Practical tools like 360-degree feedback can be valuable when used correctly. Also, understanding the impact you have on others can be a powerful tool for self-awareness. Open conversations and genuine humility can help enhance this understanding.
- Traits for Aspiring Board Members and Leaders: To foster an innovative environment, leaders must be open-minded, promote curiosity, encourage diversity, stay updated about relevant trends, and view failures as learning opportunities. A blend of humility and confidence can also be particularly powerful.
- Building Confidence and Combining it with Humility: Confidence building can be achieved through self-awareness and a willingness to ask for feedback. Self-awareness should apply to both strengths and weaknesses. Over-interpreting or misinterpreting people's responses can sometimes hamper confidence. A focus on the outcome, rather than individual interactions, can help.
- Effectiveness and Pressure Management: There is a relationship between how effective people are and the pressure they're under. Delegating tasks appropriately and focusing on things that make a material difference can help maintain the right balance between effectiveness and pressure.
Our hope is that this episode offers valuable insights into promoting innovation within your organization. Being innovative isn't just about constant disruption; it's about fostering an environment where everyone feels enabled to contribute and create. It's about transforming the spark of an idea into a successful, valuable solution.
Patrick Dunne’s Biography
Experienced Chair with extensive experience of working with boards in Europe, Asia and North America. Currently Chair of board consultancy Boardelta and the charities The EY Foundation and ESSA- Education Sub Saharan Africa.
Executive experience with Air Products and FTSE 100 investor 3i Group plc where he was Communications Director, a member of its Operating committee and Chair of its Operational Risk forum. He is also a former member of the advisory Board of Bridges Social entrepreneurs fund and has started up 3 successful social enterprises in the UK and in Africa.
He has also helped Chairs across a wide range of sectors to transform the effectiveness of their boards through Boardelta and is the author of the award winning “Boards” and three other successful books on the subject.
Patrick was member of the Higgs Review and has helped to establish many successful courses on board skills over the last twenty years including for the BVCA, Invest Europe and the Financial Times as well as for numerous commercial and social sector organisations.
He has a passion for education and was a member of the General Council of the University of Warwick from 2006 to 2015. He is a Visiting Professor at Cranfield School of Management an Associate Fellow at Warwick Business School and a former Trustee of the Chartered Management Institute and Chair of the Oversight Board for the Chartered Management Consultant accreditation.
Patrick also has extensive experience of developing social enterprises, most notably with Leap Confronting Conflict where he is Patron and was Chair, from 2006 to 2015, with ESSA- Education Sub-Saharan Africa which he founded in 2016, the EY Foundation and with Warwick in Africa which he founded in 2006. Warwick in Africa has now benefitted over 750,000 young Africans with transformed Maths and English teaching.
In this week’s show, I'll explore the powerful synergy between growth mindset and lean innovation.
I’ll share how to create a culture that fosters creativity, resilience, and efficiency, empowering your business to innovate effectively and stay ahead of the curve.
Here’s what I’ll cover:
Growth Mindset 🌱
- The science behind growth mindset
- Key characteristics of a growth mindset culture
- Strategies to develop and nurture growth mindset within individuals and teams
- How to assess and improve your organization's growth mindset culture
Lean Innovation 🎯
- Introduction to lean innovation
- The agile approach to success: customer-centricity, rapid experimentation, and iterative development
- Building minimum viable products (MVPs) and learning from feedback
Integrating Growth Mindset and Lean Innovation 🔗
- The connection: how growth mindset and lean innovation complement each other
- Case studies: successful companies leveraging growth mindset and lean innovation
- How to identify opportunities within your business
In this episode, guest Amanda Webb of Spiderworking guides us on using Google Analytics and social media data for innovation and growth.
She discusses the transition from Universal Analytics to Google Analytics 4, emphasizing its role in providing crucial insights into website visitors and their behavior.
Amanda illustrates how to use these tools to test market reception of a new product idea, guide content creation, and drive engagement. She also shares how businesses can use these analytics to understand and engage with new audiences.
A valuable listen for business owners and marketers, this episode demonstrates how to leverage free, easily accessible data to boost digital marketing ROI.
Access Amanda’s brilliant, free guide to Google Analytics for Idea Time podcast listeners
Connect with Amanda on LinkedIn
More about Amanda Webb
Amanda from Spiderworking works with businesses to improve their digital marketing ROI. When you don’t know if your marketing is bringing sales, or don’t know how to get more sales, she’s the person you turn to. Her content on the Spiderworking blog has won her awards nationally and internationally and she just loves to talk marketing. She has written for international websites including Social Bakers, Social Media Examiner and AgoraPulse. When she’s not working she loves watching Dr. Who, playing with her cats and watching films.
I’m excited to introduce special guest, Ian Anderson Gray, to my show this week.
Ian helps us to gain confidence in front of the camera, improve communication skills and feel even better about live video and presenting in online meetings.
Ian is the founder of the Confident Live Marketing Academy and is the host of the Confident Live Marketing Podcast. He helps entrepreneurs to level up their impact, authority and profits by using live video confidently. He's also the founder of Seriously Social - a blog focused on live video and social media tools.
He’s an international speaker, trainer, teacher, and consultant. He has a passion for making the techno-babble of live video and social media marketing easy to understand. As well as being a geek, husband, and dad to two kids, Ian is a professional singer and lives near Manchester in the UK.
As always, please share your questions, comments, and ideas whether you’re watching live or on replay. Ian and I will respond to every single one.
In this fascinating episode, I have the absolute pleasure of sitting down with Dr. Joanna Berry, an esteemed professor at Durham University and a luminary in the field of entrepreneurship. Dr. Berry is not just an academic, but a seasoned entrepreneur who successfully transitioned from running her own business to developing the next generation of entrepreneurs.
We delve deeply into the fascinating world of entrepreneurial mindset - a subject often misunderstood and underestimated. Dr. Berry demystifies what it truly means to have an entrepreneurial mindset, going beyond the confines of business startups and corporate environments. She offers insights into why this mindset is not just a luxury for the business-oriented, but a valuable life skill that can unlock potential in various facets of our lives.
Dr. Berry generously shares her wealth of knowledge on how to cultivate this mindset. She provides practical tips and strategies that listeners can immediately apply, whether they're embarking on a start-up venture, climbing the corporate ladder, or simply navigating life's challenges.
What sets this episode apart is Dr. Berry's personal journey. Her story is a testament to the power of the entrepreneurial mindset. From starting her own business to becoming a distinguished Professor of Entrepreneurship, she illustrates the transformative power of applying entrepreneurial principles in real life.
One of my favorite takeaways from our conversation is a quote from Dr. Berry: "You can't climb a mountain by starting at the top." It's a powerful reminder that the journey to success is a process, and each step, no matter how small, brings us closer to our goals.
This episode is packed with insightful perspectives, practical advice, and inspiring anecdotes. If you're looking to understand the entrepreneurial mindset, learn practical strategies to cultivate it, or simply enjoy an engaging discussion with a leading figure in entrepreneurship, this episode is for you.
Dr. Joanna Berry and I would love to hear your thoughts on the episode. Did you have a favorite moment? What did you take away from our discussion? We welcome your feedback and encourage you to share your reflections. Enjoy the show!
Dr. Joanna Berry’s biography
As Associate Dean, External Engagement for the Faculty of Business Joanna works closely with regional, national and international industry partners, as well as the School Executive Education team. She undertakes a wide variety of public and media activities on behalf of the School and University.
Joanna is Associate Professor (Entrepreneurship) at the Business School, and Director (Business, Enterprise and Innovation) of Durham University's globally renowned Durham Energy Institute ("DEI"). She sits on the University COP Steering Group and is Co-Programme Director of the new MSc in Energy Engineering Management, a joint programme run with Durham’s Engineering Department which launches in September 2023. She is Pathway Leader for the MBA Entrepreneurship Pathway, winning the 2020 Durham University Enhancing Learning and Teaching: Digital and Online Learning Award.
Joanna is a trustee and Board member of Acumen Community Buildings (where she focuses on community businesses and social enterprise). She was Regional Chair for the Chartered Institute of Marketing and Regional Vice-Chair for the Institute of Directors' Northeast branch. She is a Governor at Newcastle's Royal Grammar School where she sits on the Strategy and the EDI Committees, and she is an International Governor at Gifted Minds International School, Hoofddorp, Netherlands.
Joanna's professional experience runs from her Oxford University law degree in 1985 and encompasses not only law (mostly company and contract, practiced in South Africa from 1985 to 1987) but also science, creativity and technology. These interests are underpinned by significant and long-term exposure to new developments in media, marketing and advertising. Joanna's entrepreneurial spirit is underpinned by a deep and broad range of regional, national and international corporate and public sector contacts which she builds into her day-to-day activities. Her MBA dissertation focused on the impact of broadband connectivity on the TV industry, and her PhD took this one step further, looking into the impact of technology on the music industry's business models and value chains.
Her research and teaching interests encompass Problem Based Learning, energy and renewables, innovation, entrepreneurship, big data, ageing and health and the digital/creative industries. She has a particular emphasis on supporting women in business, and women in STEM in a variety of ways. She works closely with the Executive Education team and undertakes a wide variety of public and media activities on behalf of the School and University.
She is nominated as Mentor of the Year and Agent of Change in the 2023 Northern Power Women Awards, was delighted to achieve a position on the Northern Power Women Power List from 2020 and is a member of the NPW Newcastle and Teesside Power Circles.
Connect with Dr. Joanna Berry
Email: joanna.berry@durham.ac.uk
Links
Northern Power Women
Social Enterprise Acumen
Durham University Business School
Durham Energy Institute
innovation #entrepreneurship #growthmindset #entrepreneurialmindset #strategy
Welcome to Data Pioneers: A Digital Innovation Case Study, featuring Simon Jefferson from Catsurveys! In this episode, we're shifting the spotlight from big brands to small and medium-sized B2B companies that are trailblazing their way to innovation success.
Joining us today is Simon Jefferson, who will share how Catsurveys has masterfully introduced a game-changing, data-driven digital innovation alongside their existing business model.
We'll dive into topics that are crucial for businesses seeking to innovate, including:
- Collaborating with customers across various industries from traditional sectors to more progressive ones, as they embrace innovation
- Fostering an innovative culture and nurturing a dynamic workplace that drives innovation success
- Seamlessly integrating innovation into the company's core DNA, rather than treating it as an add-on to everyday tasks
Tune in and uncover invaluable insights from Simon's experience in driving Catsurveys towards innovation excellence!
About Catsurveys:
Catsurveys, an award-winning multidisciplinary surveying company, specializes in delivering comprehensive data solutions for large-scale infrastructure projects across the UK. With a focus on underground utility detection, they play a vital role in the successful execution of critical national infrastructure developments, earning their clients' trust and confidence. By merging top-tier talent, a dedication to quality and continuous improvement, and state-of-the-art technology, Catsurveys offers detailed data for both above and below ground environments. This enables customers to design, plan, and complete construction projects safely and sustainably, ensuring optimal outcomes for significant infrastructure endeavors.
About Simon:
Simon has 20 years’ experience in the utilities sector holding senior commercial roles across both regulated and non-regulated businesses, developing successful commercial strategies in a variety of markets. Simon is responsible for the commercial oversight of the business ensuring that all Catsurveys’ activity is commercially viable and underpins the strategic direction of the business. Simon’s also accountable for developing new business opportunities and expanding Catsurveys’ brand into new markets and sectors ensuring that the business has a robust commercial strategy that supports growth. A passionate advocate of innovation and positive disruption Simon is focused on how Catsurveys can maximise the value of innovative new technologies and digital solutions, collaborating with customers to introduce these in a positive way that delivers real value.
In his spare time Simon tries to find time between a busy family life to run a little bit, preferably in the hills.
Contact Simon
Simon Jefferson on LinkedIn
Catsurveys Ltd on LinkedIn
Catsurveys Website
Are you looking to enhance your organization's understanding of the customer perspective and provide a better customer experience? If yes, then a customer journey mapping workshop is just what you need.
Int his podcast, I will guide you through the fundamentals of customer journey mapping, share how to facilitate a successful workshop, and create insightful before-and-after customer journey maps.
Here's what I cover:
- What is Customer Journey Mapping and why it's invaluable for all types of businesses
- Key steps to creating an effective Customer Journey Map
- Examples of successful Customer Journey Maps
- Preparation for your Customer Journey Mapping Workshop
- Co-creating a Customer Journey Map with real customers
- Customer Journey Mapping Workshop agenda and activities
- Validating your new Customer Journey
- Examples of Customer Journey Mapping software tools
- Useful references and resources
Please do share your questions, comments, and ideas on LinkedIn. I'll respond to each one of them.
Don't miss this opportunity to enhance your organization's customer experience and become even more customer-centric.
Lead Productive, Effective, and Fun Retrospective Meetings
How are your retrospective, or ‘lessons learned’, meetings going? 🤔
Are they full of energy, actionable insights for your future projects, or have they become a bit stale and same-y?
Are you even doing them at all? Or have they never even started or fallen by the wayside because everyone is “too busy”?
Retrospectives are workshop-style meetings that take place after key phases of project activity, innovation, events, or sprints. They are designed to give you and your team light bulb moments about your success, and how to replicate it, as well as the root cause of things that didn’t go so well, so you can learn from that too.
💡💡💡💡💡
Effective retrospectives drive continuous improvement and are a fundamental part of how high performing teams achieve their goals faster, with less risk and better outcomes.
In this live episode, I’ll share a comprehensive guide to leading productive and effective retrospective meetings. I’ve designed the content for leaders who want to facilitate open and honest discussions that drive real results.
I’ll cover:
- The importance of retrospective meetings
- What makes a great retrospective
- Practical tips for leading a successful retrospective meeting, from preparation to facilitation and follow-up
- How to handle difficult situations
- Different retrospective activities, along with example agendas
- How to create a culture of feedback and continuous improvement
Whether you're new to leading retrospective meetings or looking to improve your existing approach, my aim is that this show will give you the tools and knowledge you need to succeed.
As always, please share your questions, comments, and ideas whether you’re watching live or on replay. I’ll respond to every single one.
20 times published author, international speaker and facilitator Paul Sloane is my guest on this episode of the Idea Time Innovation Podcast.
Paul Sloane is an author and speaker on lateral thinking, creativity, and the leadership of innovation. He has written over 20 books on these subjects. The latest, published by Kogan Page, is Lateral Thinking for Every Day. He gives talks and workshops and his corporate clients include Nike, Microsoft, Bayer and Unilever. His most recent online course on Udemy is entitled, How to be a Brilliant Thinker.
Topics we cover in the episode include:
- What lateral thinking is, and why it’s important for business, even in challenging times
- How to avoid over-conformity and group think
- How to build and lead workplace innovation and build a more creative culture
- Strategies for low cost, low risk innovation
- Creative facilitation tools, activities and techniques that get teams thinking more innovatively in brainstorming sessions to generate more, even better ideas
- Real examples of lateral thinking and innovative growth in organizations
For my articles and tips on Innovation Culture:
Ten Steps to an Innovation Culture
How to build an Innovative Culture in 2023 - 8 top tips
Paul and I would love to hear what you think. Do please let us know in the comments.
Follow Paul on Twitter @paulsloane;
Contact Paul on Linkedin
Paul Slater from the change shed is today's podcast guest.
Paul's an expert on change culture and transformation. In this episode we focus on how to build an innovative culture in your organisation. We talk about what an innovative culture is, what it means in practice, what it means for leaders, and speculate on the future of AI and its interaction with employee creativity.
Topics include:
- What is an innovative culture?
- Why is it important to build an innovation culture in organizations?
- The essential ingredients of a positive innovation culture
- Practical steps that leaders and senior managers can take to build an innovative culture, with real examples.
- The role of internal innovation ecosystems in creating intellectual capital in organizations.
- How AI might complement and extend employee creativity
Articles and tips on Innovation Culture:
Ten Steps to an Innovation Culture
8 Top Tips for Building an Innovative Culture in 2023
Paul Slater’s Biography
Paul is an accomplished facilitator and management consultant with a wealth of experience in helping companies innovate, change, and grow. His mission is to help businesses become more valuable, enjoyable, and future proof. Paul helps leaders develop growth cultures by focusing on clarity of purpose, vision, values, and aligning them with performance and operating models. His systems thinking approach spans multiple dimensions of growth and innovation, from strategy to process and technology. Paul is passionate about enabling people to develop themselves and their businesses in a sustainable and scalable way.
Paul has worked with many household names including General Motors. He enjoys translating his big company experience into meaningful strategies for smaller businesses and start-ups/scale-ups. He spent the early part of his career at Accenture before joining Oakland Consulting, where he led their People and Change service line as a Partner. For the last 7 years, he has been MD at The Change Shed Ltd.
This episode focuses on harnessing AI, technology, and innovation in online learning. I'm joined by Taryn Haynes-Smart, Head of Product Development at the Digital Campus in Johannesburg, South Africa.
Taryn is a creative innovator who loves to use AI, technology, and innovation to create fantastic learning experiences for people participating in online University programmes.
We talk about online learning and some of the tools and approaches that Taryn takes uses. We also explore what the impact of technology such as AI means for the future of learning and development, and how we can work with it and incorporate it in a healthy way into what we do.
Taryn and I would love to hear what you think. Do please let us know in the comments.
Taryn Haynes-Smart Biography:
As an innovator and creator, Taryn Haynes-Smart fuses intelligence and creativity to craft unique experiences that ignite the imagination. With a passion for exploring the world through digital tools, AI, and data, Taryn brings a wealth of expertise and experience to the table across multiple domains. With a background in learning and development, product management, and content creation, Taryn has a proven track record of success in a variety of fields.
Whether creating innovative learning solutions, management product development from ideation to launch, or crafting engaging content that resonates with audiences, Taryn brings a unique perspective to every project she tackles. From sharing personal stories of creative inspiration, discussing best practices, or exploring the intersection of technology, knowledge, and creativity, Taryn’s dynamic and visionary approach to problem-solving and solution design is sure to engage, educate, and inspire audiences.
Links:
Taryn on LinkedIn
Taryn on Instagram
Digital Campus
AI video creation platform, Synthesia
Contact options for Taryn Haynes-Smart:
Connect via LinkedIn
Contact via email
artificialintelligence #innovation #onlinelearning #digitalcourses #facilitation
In this podcast episode about knowledge exchange and innovation, I'm joined by my guest Amanda Selvaratnam, Associate Director of Research and Enterprise at the University of York in the UK.
Key topics we cover are:
- What is Knowledge Exchange and why does it matter?
- Collaborative Learning: Strategies for Effective Knowledge Exchange
- From Theory to Practice: How to Implement Knowledge Exchange in Real Projects
- Building Strong Networks for Effective Knowledge Exchange
- Maximising the Impact of Knowledge Exchange: Tips and Techniques
- The Future of Knowledge Exchange: Trends and Innovation
Amanda is an expert on commercialising innovation and getting research out there being used in the community for real by communities, businesses, and organizations so that it can make impact. She shares some great examples.
We talk about how businesses and other organisations can connect with universities for knowledge exchange and innovation to access and optimize research opportunity.
It really is a value-packed episode, thanks to Amanda's insight and the generosity of her sharing her experience.
I'm sure you're going to enjoy it and get lots from it.
Amanda and I would love to hear what you think. Do please let us know in the comments.
More about Amanda Selvaratnam:
Amanda Selvaratnam, Associate Director Research Innovation and Knowledge Exchange (Impact), University of York
Following a scientific career in research and industry, Amanda moved into business intelligence with GlaxoSmithKline prior to joining the University of York in 1999. Amanda is responsible for the engagement of the University with business with a focus on impact through the development and delivery of professional development and executive education courses, technology transfer and regional economic development.
Amanda is also the Founder and Director of the Training Gateway, an organisation that supports UK training and education organisations to win training and education contracts and develop partnerships overseas. Working extensively in the Gulf and South East Asia, Amanda has led over 30 trade missions and supported dozens of UK training and education organisations develop international business partnerships.
The links we mention in the episode are:
- Amanda Selvaratnam on LinkedIn
- Business and working with the University of York: business@york.ac.uk
- Praxis Auril Knowledge Exchange organisation and conference
- University video knowledge Exchange
- StreetLife Video
- StreetLife Video 2
- York City Video
enterprise #innovation #highereducation #commercialisation #knowledgeexchange
Problems are simply the gaps between where you want your business to be and where it currently is.
And of course, helping customers with their problems is what we are all in business to do.
In innovation terms, some business problems are “messy”, that is, they are connected to other problems.
Or they might be “wicked” problems, meaning they’re unclear and keep changing and evolving.
Just a few examples are:
- Creating a new marketing campaign that works
- Bringing diverse stakeholders together to collaborate on a joint plan
- Formulating work-winning solutions for new business proposals, bids, or tenders
- Working on a more sustainable business model
- Social or community challenges and opportunities…
So, wouldn’t it be fantastic if you could tap directly into the collective wisdom, experience, and skills of the people in your organisation to access more useful, creative solutions to some of your messy or wicked problems?
In this episode, I’ll share evidence-based tools for creative problem solving for business. I’ll also give you a step-by-step guide to facilitating problem-solving workshops that will generate fresh thinking, stronger collaboration, and more productive results.
Are you excited by your business goals for 2023? Have you got clear plans in place to achieve them, with contingencies mapped out in case other things get in the way?
In this live episode I’ll be sharing evidence-based insights, tools, and approaches on how to facilitate a goal achievement workshop for your business, or a mini “retreat” if you’re working on your own.
I hope you’ll join me, either live or on replay, to de-risk your important business goals falling by the wayside as the year progresses!
I’ll help you to act smarter, build and maintain momentum over weeks and months, and identify strategies for likely obstacles before they happen.
You’ll get a full agenda and activities for a time-efficient team workshop or individual away day that will give you clarity and greater motivation for sustained action.
Are you thinking about working with your team to regroup, reset and refocus for a healthy, enjoyable, and high performing year ahead?
In this episode, I share evidence-based insights, tools, and approaches for facilitating a High Performing Team Reset and Refocus Workshop.
The definition of ‘High Performance’ I use is about achieving sustainably and well, over the long term. Wellbeing, connection, purpose, values, individual and team strengths are integral to true success.
I also share:
- Research, and practical ways you can use that research, to help your team to perform at an even higher level
- An example of a focused agenda for your High Performing Team Workshop, along with purposeful, engaging, interactive activities you can use – activities that apply directly to your business and lead to agreed actions and commitments
- Tips and techniques for opening up constructive, progressive conversations within the team
How well are your products and services performing? When was the last time that you sat down and did a strategic review of your portfolio?
For some businesses, it’s a regular, ongoing activity. They’re always on top of what’s working and spotting early signs that something needs to be tweaked or changed.
In many cases, entrepreneurial leaders know what’s going well and what isn’t, based on intuition, but don’t get thoughts out on paper often enough to help them think through their next moves and strategies to get clarity on future plans.
If you’d like to take a snippet of time (30 minutes or so) to hit pause and reflect on your business’ performance, join me for this show, either live or on replay.
I’ll be sharing how you can use some classic frameworks that are just as valuable today as when they were first created to take a snapshot of your business offer and gain clarity on your next moves.
I bet that you are familiar with these frameworks – but are you actively using them to help your business grow?
Work alongside me to use three classical innovation and business growth concepts – the Product Lifecycle, BCG Matrix and the Innovation-Adoption curve – for your new product development, business planning and strategic thinking.
I’ll also stop off to take a very quick look at the Gartner Hypecycle and their Technology Trend Summary for 2023, but don’t worry if tech isn’t your thing! The principles apply to so many other things, and it’s great to have a quick look at what might be ahead.
Mintel have published their Global Consumer Trends for 2023, too, so I’ll give you a heads up on those.
One of the members of my Idea Time for Workshop Facilitators Facebook Group asked me for some ideas for creative facilitation activities to use when working with groups to establish their Mission, Vision and Values.
So, in this show I’ll share a toolkit that will help you to facilitate a super-successful Mission, Vision & Values Workshop for your team or client.
You can use my tried-and-tested toolkit to lead your delegates through the steps to co-create their Mission, Vision and Values from scratch, or to refresh and update the ones already in place.
As well as the toolkit, I’ll share:
- An agenda to save you loads of planning time
- Activities that have been tried and tested in a wide range of organizations
- Fresh ideas and approaches to build into your wider toolkit
- Tips for leading a workshop that achieves a great delegate experience AND valuable outputs
Have you considered a growth hacking sprint for your business?
It could help you and your team achieve a flying start to the year ahead, in just a couple of hours.
Growth hacking is an approach that helps businesses to scale by combining powerful data, technical expertise and marketing flair to find and test promising new ways of driving growth.
It’s not about ‘hacking’ in the sense of too-good-to-be true short cuts. Growth hacking means finding creative, low-cost strategies to help businesses acquire and retain customers, testing those strategies and learning fast.
A growth hacking sprint is a short, focused event that gets all the right people in the physical or virtual room to collaborate on growth solutions for your business.
Growth hacking sprints are designed to get the very best collective creativity and wisdom from everyone present in an efficient, dynamic, and creative way, in a short space of time.
If you’d like to know more, listen in as I'm sharing...
- More about what growth hacking is, how it works and how to get started
- Example agendas for growth hacking sprints, and what to expect
- How to set up and deliver a growth hacking sprint for your business
- How to use your first growth hacking sprint to accelerate and maintain momentum throughout the year – by working smarter, avoiding burn out and building a more resilient business
"We cannot solve our problems with the same thinking we used when we created them.” - Einstein
It’s brilliant that so many businesses want to be part of the solution when it comes to combating climate change and protecting natural resources through improving day-to-day processes.
And, as Einstein observed, new challenges call for new solutions.
In addition to Government decarbonisation target dates looming ever closer, consumers and communities are demanding more transparency and products that are environmentally and socially responsible.
Eco innovation is aimed at driving progress towards sustainable business models and green economic growth, through new technologies, services, products or processes.
Eco innovation involves:
- Thinking about the full life cycles of products and services, to gain maximum use from materials and retain their value in the economy
- Making strategic changes to build sustainability into the DNA of every business process
- Collaborating with customers, suppliers and partners to drive sustainability across the full supply chain
In this show, I’ll be giving an overview of what eco innovation is and sharing some examples of eco innovation in business.
ecoinnovation #sustainableinnovation #sustainablility #innovation #entrepreneurship
You don’t have to be a person of influence to be influential. In fact, the most influential people in my life are probably not even aware of the things they’ve taught me. – Scott Adams
In my day-to-day, I encounter so many great innovators who have what they think are brilliant ideas. However, some of them struggle to get these ideas across the line, because others don’t see the opportunity the same way. What’s obvious to an innovator may not be obvious to others.
Influencing skills go hand-in-hand with entrepreneurship and innovation, to onboard team members, customers, suppliers, stakeholders or investors to make great ideas happen.
I see influencing as a reciprocal process. It’s not all one way. Listening and taking other people’s good ideas on board often makes a promising idea even stronger.
In this show, I’ll provide a process and toolkit to support your influencing strategies for your innovation ambitions.
Sharing my Innovation Influencing Mix, I’ll cover:
- Prioritising stakeholders
- Innovation collaboration between organisations
- Making your case using fundamental influencing principles
- Building trust in business relationships
The focus will be on external partners, organisations and stakeholders, but these approaches work internally, too.
I’ve always been fascinated by what makes some people innovative and enterprising – or intrapreneurial – at work, and why some people prefer to be more risk averse and focus on managing the day-to-day, rather than actively seeking to shape the future.
Businesses need both, of course, to be successful.
It was this sheer passion and joy for all things intrapreneurship, entrepreneurship and innovation-related that led me to study for 6 years part-time to achieve my doctorate in my late forties (whilst working full time too).
In this show, I’m going to do a deep dive into intrapreneurship, including:
- What is intrapreneurship, how is it different or similar to entrepreneurship?
- Why and how all businesses benefit from intrapreneurship
- Characteristics of successful intrapreneurs – based on research, including my own
- How to develop intrapreneurial skills in yourself and others
- Intrapreneurial culture
…and much more!
Whilst always grounded in evidence and research, the insights I share will be packed with practical things that you can do to improve intrapreneurship where you work.
iintrapreneur #intrapreneurship #corporateentrepreneurship #innovation #businessgrowth
"Rowing harder doesn’t help if the boat is headed in the wrong direction." — Kenichi Ohmae
Setting meaningful, stretching but realistic goals is one of the keys to success in business innovation and growth.
When individuals and teams collaborate to set goals, they create an environment where team members work towards a shared vision, collaborate and perform better overall.
In this show, I discuss some of the science and evidence that inform effective goal setting for teams.
I also share a proven goal setting workshop agenda and toolkit of activities that you can use to facilitate your own goal setting workshops.
goalsetting #facilitation #virtualfacilitation #innovation #businessgrowth
Are you looking ahead yet to 2022? Now’s a good a time to start as any, and I’ve done a bit of the hard work for you.
I’ve reviewed a range of the leading trends reports for 2022 and will be sharing my overview for innovators, entrepreneurs and business leaders in this episode.
Join me for a practical, evidence-based view of what’s likely to be important for consumers and businesses as the world continues to change in these unusual times.
You’ll get some useful tips and suggestions for how to use the 2022 trend insights that I share for your own business.
Plus, I’ll point you to all the original 2022 research references in case there’s a theme that you’d like to explore more deeply.
innovation #entrepreneurship #innovationleadership #intrapreneurship #2022trends
Do you want to put a ding in the universe?
Steve Jobs did. And I think many of us want to, as well, in our own way.
It doesn’t have to be a huge ding. Lots of smaller dings add up.
As ding-making team members, innovators and leaders, we can all develop our innovation mindset to massively multiply the positive impact that we create.
We can learn to strengthen and maximise our unique, personal innovation thinking style by understanding it, and then by using approaches, tools and practice to help our minds work their magic in wise, brilliant and sometimes surprisingly cool ways.
The more we take our innovation brains for a spin and give them a great workout, the better, smarter and faster they’ll get at spotting interesting dots and connecting them to shape new opportunities.
We can learn to get better at hanging in there when ding-creation gets tough (it invariably does) because we recognise that there can be no great breakthroughs without having something to break through first.
Innovation mindset is at the origin of every successful – and unsuccessful – endeavour.
The ideas you and your business have, and how well you execute them, are what separate you from your competition. At the root of your innovation is the quality of your individual and collective thinking.
Mindset is a hugely important and, for me at least, endlessly fascinating aspect of innovation that is underexplored.
In this episode, I cover:
…What an innovation mindset is and why it’s important
…How to work out your own innovation thinking style preferences, and how they might affect the people you work with, and your own decision-making
…Practical, scientifically-proven and often fun and enjoyable ways that you can power up your own innovation mindset, and help your team to do the same.
Collaborative innovation happens when different organisations, or teams from the same organization, work in partnership to create new products, services or solutions.
It can be a brilliant approach to solving big, important challenges that need diverse inputs, pooled resources, and shared learning.
Collaborative innovation also has its ups and downs, at times! The key to success lies in understanding the potential challenges and benefits, being prepared for them, and developing the discernment and skills to both lead and contribute well.
In this episode, I’ll cover:
…What collaborative innovation is and how it works in practice at its best, with examples
…When collaborative innovation might be useful for an organisation, and when not
…The importance of selecting great partners for your collaboration, and some tips that might help
…Common pitfalls and critical success factors
…Collaborative innovation leadership skills, and how to develop them.
This is a content-rich episode, packed with pragmatic insight based on years of first-hand experience!
It would be great to hear your experiences of collaborative innovation, too.
- What works or doesn’t work from your perspective?
- What questions do you have that you’d really like me to answer?
As always, let’s see what insights and ideas we can co-create in the moment.
Looking forward to collaborating with you.
I believe innovation is all about coming up with great, new ideas and using them to make a positive difference in the world.
Of course, innovation has always been with us. Everything we use or enjoy today is the result of an innovation from someone, somewhere.
But it feels like we have never needed innovation as much as we need it now: emerging from the pandemic, tackling climate change, building a fairer, safer society and more.
Businesses of all sizes collectively play a major role in driving innovation. They also need to innovate.
And the most successful businesses are those that are purpose-driven.
Research by Deloitte in 2020 shows that purpose-driven companies experience higher market share gains, grow on average x3 faster than their competitors, and achieve higher employee and customer satisfaction.
Creating and implementing an intelligent, agile, dynamic and purpose-led innovation strategy makes a significant difference to business performance, resilience and sustainability.
In this episode, I’ll cover:
…What an innovation strategy is, and how an innovation strategy can accelerate purpose-driven business growth
…When an innovation strategy might be useful for an organisation, and when not
…How to get started with creating an innovation strategy that’s right for your business
…Some common pitfalls and critical success factors
It will be great to hear your experiences of shaping and implementing innovation strategy, and what works or doesn’t work from your perspective.
As always, let’s see what insights and ideas we can co-create in the moment.
Looking forward to collaborating with you.
innovation #cocreation #innovationleadership #intrapreneurship #facilitation
How do innovation sprints, also known as design sprints, actually work?
If you’ve not experienced one before, an innovation or design sprint is a short, focused, purposeful event designed to achieve solutions to a specific challenge or opportunity.
Together your delegates from inside and often outside your organisation will collaborate to collectively define what success looks like for your challenge or opportunity.
They’ll generate and develop ideas to achieve that success, and create early prototypes and action plans.
Innovation sprints can be online, in-person or hybrid events.
I love designing and running sprints and have been facilitating them for years.
In the last few months alone, at the Big Bang we have facilitated sprints for our clients on themes such as:
- New product development
- Customer experience
- Digital technology solutions
- Business growth acceleration
- Employee engagement
- Long-term environmental strategy
- Climate change
… and more.
But to be successful – which means achieving the target outcomes at the same time as creating a positive experience for delegates – a fantastic sprint needs to be expertly designed and facilitated.
In this episode, I’ll cover:
…How innovation sprints work, and what makes them successful
…When an innovation sprint might be useful for an organisation, and when it’s not
…How to organise an innovation sprint for your business, avoiding some of the common pitfalls that can compromise success
It would be great to hear your experiences of running or participating in innovation sprints and what works or doesn’t work from your perspective.
As always, let’s see what insights and ideas we can co-create in the moment.
Looking forward to collaborating with you.
innovation #cocreation #innovationleadership #intrapreneurship #facilitation
Wouldn’t it be fantastic if …
…everyone in business felt inspired, confident and unapologetic enough to think independently, create more and regurgitate less?
…people trusted in themselves and listened to their own intuition?
…they consulted others, took on board different perspectives, and then came to their own conclusions, thinking creatively AND critically?
Never before have we had so much access to such a huge diversity of opinion, data, information, and so many opportunities to connect with and follow people from around the world.
In some ways, we are in a wonderful golden age of shared thought and enlightenment because of all the online conversation and connections.
But is all that volume creating a reduction in the impact for us as innovators and consumers of content?
There’s a lot of noise out there, a lot of copying, as well as a myriad of insights and wisdom.
How might we find strategies to cut through the noise and find the gems that help us, as innovators, to create, communicate and consume for more meaningful outcomes?
I’d love you to join me for this show where I’ll be exploring the theme of thought-leadership and innovation.
Let me know what you think.
Contribute to the debate.
Let’s see what insights and ideas we can co-create in the moment.
Looking forward to collaborating with you.
People behave differently in groups than when they are on their own or one-to-one.
This episode is a deep-dive into group dynamics for workshop facilitators. I’ll share some fascinating and useful insights into group dynamics that are invaluable for remote and in-person facilitation.
Themes include:
- How our human need for social connection influences our behaviors in a group setting
- Insights into group psychology
- Creativity and the group norms
- How to structure your workshops, sprints and meetings to support collaboration, innovation and achieve results
Group dynamics are a key element that we work with every single day as facilitators. I can’t wait to see your comments and questions. As always, it’s great to hear from you.
You’ll also enjoy my article here on how to facilitate group dynamics and creative tension:
https://bigbangpartnership.co.uk/do-people-behave-differently-when-they-are-in-groups-insights-into-group-dynamics-for-facilitators/
For free facilitation and team building resources, go to https://www.bigbangpartnership.co.uk/resources/ and fill your boots with lots of great stuff!
To find out more about my virtual facilitation, have a look at https://www.bigbangpartnership.co.uk/virtual-facilitation/
I’d love to hear from you and answer any questions you have. Please do let me know what you think in the comments.
Join me and my special guest, Andy Jenkins of MyLeadership Strengths, for this episode on strengths-focused innovation.
Leading innovation in organisations brings great responsibility as well as opportunity.
In Andy’s decades of work developing leaders, he’s seen a common response to that responsibility: leaders strive to be good at everything. Research, and his experience, show that the ‘perfect’ leader does not exist. In fact, evidence shows great leaders:
- Have a strong understanding of their own unique strengths and capitalise on them
- Address their most important individual weaknesses
- Understand and tap into the strengths of others
In my conversation with Andy, we explore:
- How strengths-based leadership is an essential ingredient for high-performing innovation teams, and successful innovation outcomes
- How you can identify your own innovation leadership strengths, and how to put them into action to get the best results
- Ways in which you can spot and leverage the strengths of the people around you to harness the collective capability of your full team
- Tips and techniques for strengths-focused facilitation
To get in touch with Andy:
hello@myleadershipstrengths.com
Links to Andy’s information and resources:
https://myleadershipstrengths.com/resources/
About Andy:
Andy is Co-Founder of My Leadership Strengths, who enable busy managers to prioritise their own development and make learning happen at work. Combining business design with organisational psychology expertise, Andy has built leadership capability in SME’s, not for profit, public and private sectors in the UK and Australia. He is at his best working with individuals and organisations setting up for growth, navigating unfamiliar organisational challenges, and public sector transformation. Andy is a Chartered Member of the CIPD, a qualified strengths practitioner and coach. People who have worked with Andy describe him as curious, insightful, practical, intelligent, fun and open
For free innovation leadership resources, go to https://www.bigbangpartnership.co.uk/resources/ and fill your boots with lots of great stuff!
To find out more about my virtual facilitation, have a look at https://www.bigbangpartnership.co.uk/virtual-facilitation/
Psychological safety is the key ingredient of high performing teams. It is defined as "a belief that one will not be punished or humiliated for speaking up with ideas, questions, concerns, or mistakes” (Professor Amy Edmondson, Harvard Business School).
This episode is a great guide to psychological safety for innovators, facilitators and change makers. I share:
- A definition of and deep-dive into psychological safety, plus why it is important for team working, specifically including innovation, business growth, design sprints and learning environments.
- Spotting the signs of psychological danger and psychological safety in teams.
- How to nurture a climate of psychological safety in remote, hybrid and co-located teams and in virtual and in-person workshops and innovation sprints.
For free facilitation and team building resources, go to https://www.bigbangpartnership.co.uk/resources/ and fill your boots with lots of great stuff!
To find out more about my virtual facilitation, have a look at https://www.bigbangpartnership.co.uk/virtual-facilitation/
To explore more content on how to get ideas flowing in online meetings, you might enjoy this article, too https://www.bigbangpartnership.co.uk/how-to-get-ideas-flowing-in-online-meetings/
I’d love to hear from you and answer any questions you have. Please do let me know what you think in the comments.
In this episode, I share all the essential information you need to know to do a brilliant job of facilitating a business strategy workshop, either for the company you work for or for your clients.
The tools, tips and techniques I share can be flexed for virtual / online, in-person and hybrid or blended meetings.
I’ll help you to think through:
- The purpose and objectives of the session
- Planning, preparation and delegate pre-work
- On-the-day facilitation
I’ll go through a suggested strategy workshop agenda, and detail each of the activities I recommend that you consider for your delegates.
For free facilitation and team building resources, go to https://www.bigbangpartnership.co.uk/resources/ and fill your boots with lots of great stuff!
To find out more about my virtual facilitation, have a look at https://www.bigbangpartnership.co.uk/virtual-facilitation/
To explore more content on how to get ideas flowing in online meetings, you might enjoy this article, too https://www.bigbangpartnership.co.uk/how-to-get-ideas-flowing-in-online-meetings/
I’d love to hear from you and answer any questions you have. Please do let me know what you think in the comments.
Hybrid working, which is sometimes called “blended working”, is a form of flexible working that allows employees to split their time between attending the workplace and working remotely (usually from home).
In the current climate, more and more teams are considering or doing hybrid working.
This week’s episode is a guide to hybrid working – the upsides, potential downsides and how to make it work for you and your team.
When some team members work remotely for some of their working week or carry out other forms of flexible working, performance can be harder to observe and collaboration more challenging to achieve. Effective team leadership of hybrid-working colleagues therefore requires a different approach, although many of the fundamentals of good performance management (objectives, feedback and timely conversations) remain the same. The tips I share can support you in managing hybrid teams effectively.
For free facilitation and team building resources, go to https://www.bigbangpartnership.co.uk/resources/ and fill your boots with lots of great stuff!
To find out more about my virtual facilitation, have a look at https://www.bigbangpartnership.co.uk/virtual-facilitation/
To explore more content on how to get ideas flowing in online meetings, you might enjoy this article, too https://www.bigbangpartnership.co.uk/how-to-get-ideas-flowing-in-online-meetings/
I’d love to hear from you and answer any questions you have. Please do let me know what you think in the comments.
In this week’s episode, I share some of my facilitation techniques, skills and tips to help you take your facilitation skills to the next level.
Facilitating a workshop or meeting can be challenging at times, and that’s why I’m here to share my experience of facilitating thousands of people in different sectors in countries all over the world.
For more free innovation and facilitation resources, go to https://www.bigbangpartnership.co.uk/resources/ and fill your boots with lots of great stuff!
To find out more about my virtual facilitation, have a look at https://www.bigbangpartnership.co.uk/virtual-facilitation/
To explore more content on how to get ideas flowing in online meetings, you might enjoy this article, too https://www.bigbangpartnership.co.uk/how-to-get-ideas-flowing-in-online-meetings/
I’d love to hear from you and answer any questions you have. Please do let me know what you think in the comments.
You’ve got a great business idea…
How do you know if it stacks up financially? What about the other, non-financial risks and benefits?
How do you decide if it’s a go-er or not, and how do you influence the people you need to support you and maybe even invest in your innovation?
These are the questions that I’ll help you to answer in this week’s show.
I’ll walk through how to create a realistic, credible business case for your innovation that not only gives you confidence in your decision-making but also helps you to engage and influence your key stakeholders.
For more free innovation and facilitation resources, go to https://www.bigbangpartnership.co.uk/resources/ and fill your boots with lots of great stuff!
To find out more about my virtual facilitation, have a look at https://www.bigbangpartnership.co.uk/virtual-facilitation/
To explore more content on how to get ideas flowing in online meetings, you might enjoy this article, too https://www.bigbangpartnership.co.uk/how-to-get-ideas-flowing-in-online-meetings/
I’d love to hear from you and answer any questions you have. Please do let me know what you think in the comments.
Leading and managing change is one of the most essential skills leaders, managers, innovators and entrepreneurs need in business today.
Everything around us is always changing, and our businesses need to be able to respond dynamically to those changes.
Plus, resistance to change gets in the way of great ideas happening. Imagine if all the unused, uncommunicated great ideas that people in the business had thought of over time were stacked in a room.
Not all of them would be gold dust, but the combined potential of the best ones would be massive.
Often people have great ideas that just don’t go anywhere due to lack of confidence, know-how or self-imposed constraints and limiting beliefs. Sometimes because of the fear of how leaders might react.
This episode will help you to become a driving force for the business ideas you believe in, becoming a stronger, positive changemaker for your business.
The purpose of this week’s show is to give you the tools, techniques and confidence to develop, communicate, and influence to make your great initiatives and progress happen within the business.
Content includes:
- Blockers and accelerators – and what to do with them.
- Implementation bulletproofing, and stakeholder engagement.
- Understand resistance, why it happens and how to overcome it to motivate others to get on board and act.
- How to influence peers, leaders and the wider organisation with integrity to make new initiatives happen.
For more free innovation and facilitation resources, go to https://www.bigbangpartnership.co.uk/resources/ and fill your boots with lots of great stuff!
To find out more about my virtual facilitation, have a look at https://www.bigbangpartnership.co.uk/virtual-facilitation/
This week’s episode provides innovators, facilitators and change makers with the tools and confidence to engage, inspire and move others to make progress, take action and get on board with new initiatives through the power of stories.
Business storytelling is a powerful communications tool for connecting with and moving people, and it’s a learnable skill.
It includes:
Why we are all wired to engage with stories, and how to apply that to the work environment.
How to use stories to support innovation, transformation and change.
How to use stories to make strong connections with teams, including when working remotely.
For more free innovation and facilitation resources, go to https://www.bigbangpartnership.co.uk/resources/ and fill your boots with lots of great stuff!
To find out more about my virtual facilitation, have a look at https://www.bigbangpartnership.co.uk/virtual-facilitation/
To explore more content on how to get ideas flowing in online meetings, you might enjoy this article, too https://www.bigbangpartnership.co.uk/how-to-get-ideas-flowing-in-online-meetings/
I’d love to hear from you and answer any questions you have. Please do let me know what you think in the comments.
As the world is fortunately starting to open up once more, many workshop facilitators need to lead “mixed mode” meetings. These “mixed mode” meetings combine some delegates attending virtually, others in person.
The advantages of combined virtual and in-person workshops are that people across large distances can connect. Mixed mode does need special consideration and planning, however, to make sure that everyone gets the best experience from the meeting, and that you achieve the target outcomes from the meeting in your role as workshop facilitator.
Tune in to learn some really useful tools, tips and techniques that you can use to make your mixed mode meetings and workshops a resounding success.
For more free innovation and facilitation resources, go to https://www.bigbangpartnership.co.uk/resources/ and fill your boots with lots of great stuff!
To find out more about my virtual facilitation, have a look at https://www.bigbangpartnership.co.uk/virtual-facilitation/
To explore more content on how to get ideas flowing in online meetings, you might enjoy this article, too https://www.bigbangpartnership.co.uk/how-to-get-ideas-flowing-in-online-meetings/
I’d love to hear from you, and answer any questions you have. Please do let me know what you think in the comments.
In this week’s episode, I’m joined by Dr. Tim Whitworth and Paul Knight from the National Nuclear Laboratory in the UK.
National Nuclear Laboratory works globally at the forefront of nuclear science, providing knowledge, technology, and access to cutting-edge facilities to partners and customers.
Their innovative approach means their people embrace the opportunity to make new scientific discoveries, using them to create market-ready products and services that drive the nuclear industry forward in performance, safety, and impact.
In this episode we discuss:
- Who National Nuclear Laboratory are and what they do
- A day in the life of a 'nuclear innovator'
- Defining and discussing ‘Disruptive Innovation’
- How long does innovation take at NNL?
- Looking for innovation outside your own sector
- Innovating in a highly regulated and safety-critical environment
- Testing fast and failing fast
- Innovating using Tiger Teams - opening the innovation process to external teams
- Favorite innovation tools and techniques
For more free innovation and facilitation resources, go to https://www.bigbangpartnership.co.uk/resources/ and fill your boots with lots of great stuff!
You can sing out more about Dr. Tim Whitworth and Paul Knight and the National Nuclear Laboratory at https://www.nnl.co.uk/contact-us-national-nuclear-laboratory/
To find out more about my virtual facilitation, have a look at https://www.bigbangpartnership.co.uk/virtual-facilitation/
To explore more content on how to get ideas flowing in online meetings, you might enjoy this article, too https://www.bigbangpartnership.co.uk/how-to-get-ideas-flowing-in-online-meetings/
I’d love to hear from you and answer any questions you have. Please do let me know what you think in the comments.
Our ideas are our competitive currency. They are what differentiate us, our team and our organisation from everyone else. They’re at the heart of innovation because, of course, everything starts with an idea.
But getting your team to have great ideas in your online meetings and remote workshops can be a challenge. Especially these days, when we are still spending so much time on Zoom, MS Teams, Google Hangouts and other platforms.
In this week’s show I’ll share some of my favourite, tried-and-tested idea generation activities that will add some creative sparks to your remote meetings and online events. They’ll infuse your virtual facilitation with dynamism, and your online workshops, innovation and design sprints with purposeful positivity and energy.
To find out more about my virtual facilitation, have a look at https://www.bigbangpartnership.co.uk/virtual-facilitation/
Tune in to find out how I use these innovation, brainstorming and creativity techniques in my virtual facilitation to get everyone engaged, problem-solving and solution finding:
- Thirty circles
- Random stimulus
- Exaggeration
- S.C.A.M.P.E.R.
- Exaptation
- Inspired by greatness
- And more…!
For more free innovation and facilitation resources, go to https://www.bigbangpartnership.co.uk/resources/ and fill your boots with lots of great stuff!
To explore more content on how to get ideas flowing in online meetings, you might enjoy this article, too https://www.bigbangpartnership.co.uk/how-to-get-ideas-flowing-in-online-meetings/
I’d love to hear your favourites, too, and answer any questions you have. Please do let me know what you think in the comments.
Do you have great ideas for your business, but never seem to have the time to make them happen?
Have you got so many plates spinning that innovation, initiatives that would grow your business and potential opportunities fall by the wayside?
This episode of the Idea Time Show will help you with practical tactics that you can use, starting right now, to turn those great ideas from a “maybe one day” to a right-now reality.
Find out:
- What we all need to achieve challenging goals
- How to create time to make your ideas happen
- What is great “project hygiene” and how you can achieve it
- Top tips for turning innovation into action
Learn more about Dr. Jo and her company, The Big Bang Partnership Limited, here: https://www.bigbangpartnership.co.uk/what-we-do/
For great resources that will help you to innovate to grow your business, visit https://www.bigbangpartnership.co.uk/resources
For my Idea Time book on Kindle, go to https://www.bigbangpartnership.co.uk/idea-time-book-one
In this episode, I share 5 of my favourite quick, creative, fun and effective energizers for your online meetings and remote workshops. They are awesome to have in your virtual facilitation toolkit!
And if you’d like even more where these came from, you’ll find 26 brilliant energizers for your online meetings here in my blog:
https://www.bigbangpartnership.co.uk/26-online-energizers-for-virtual-teams-and-remote-meetings/
In the show, I explain how and why energizers work so well and are so important for your virtual meetings and remote team working.
I then share how to facilitate these energizers with your delegates:
- An active online quiz, poll or voting activity
- A virtual treasure hunt
- Desk pilates, desk yoga - and box breathing, as a bonus!
- The giant paper loop challenge
- The ‘what if…?’ random numbers and questions game
You might like to access the free resources here on my website: https://www.bigbangpartnership.co.uk/resources/
If you’d like to get in touch to book me for a live virtual session in your business, just comment below or contact me https://www.bigbangpartnership.co.uk using the contact us section.
Join me and my special guest, Nick Bradley, founder of Mandala Leaders, for this week’s podcast on leading innovation and change. Don't forget to get a free copy of Nick’s book, Zero to Authentic Hero.
Zero to Authentic Hero is designed to help you be the best version of your authentic leadership self and achieve much more success with much less stress.
Nick is a successful businessman having worked in investment banking and management consultancy for 30 years. He has a passion for inspiring individuals and businesses to achieve their purpose. He has travelled to support companies throughout Europe and the US and his skills have been geared to both leading and supporting individuals and teams through times of crisis and then to travel that hard path to create growth and success both personally and professionally.
Nick is qualified in Leadership from The Cranfield University School of Management. He is a qualified Business and Leadership Coach with the European Mentoring & Coaching Council (EMCC) and a member of the Association of Business and Leadership Coaches (ABLC). In addition, Nick is qualified in Sports Psychology in Business.
In the show, we discuss the 7 key steps of the leadership of innovation, change and challenge:
- Step 1: Understanding your beliefs
- Step 2: Having a clear purpose
- Step 3: Living your core values
- Step 4: Improving your skillset
- Step 5: Communicating with clarity
- Step 6: Living your legacy
- Step 7: Building in resilience
If you’d like to access more free resources on innovation and business growth, head over to https://www.bigbangpartnership.co.uk/resources/. There’s loads of great stuff waiting for you!
An unfair disadvantage is behind every single business or career success story.
In this episode, I’ll show you why it’s important to identify your own Unfair Advantages and how to apply them to your business or career.
You’ll need more than hard work and determination, and I’ll explore the importance of money, intelligence, insight, location, education, expertise, status and luck in your success journey.
I’ll show you how you can apply your Unfair Advantages and how to create, demonstrate and communicate them in a way that’s relevant and appropriate.
Together we will think about 12 different types of Unfair Advantage:
- Your ideas
- How you do business
- What you know
- Your network and connections
- Brand equity, recall and reputation
- The right “expert” endorsements
- Your brilliant team
- Personal authority and “thought-leadership”
- Community
- Existing customers
- First mover advantage
- Intellectual property
I’ll give you some questions and thought-provokers, so that you can think along with me, and develop your own Unfair Advantages statement.
You might like to access the free resources here on my website: https://www.bigbangpartnership.co.uk/resources/
If you’d like to get in touch to book me for a live virtual session in your business, just comment below or contact me https://www.bigbangpartnership.co.uk using the contact us section.
The purpose of this episode is to create space and insight for you to think about some useful, pragmatic competitor analysis for your business, to support innovation and growth.
Competitor analysis evaluates the strengths and weaknesses of competitors’ current strategies to help identify opportunities and threats for your business to enhance your own strategy.
When seen through a customer-focused lens, competitor analysis is not about head-to-head comparisons. Instead, it’s about assessing how much better or worse a product or service is at helping the customer get a job done.
Together in the show, we’ll explore the context of the changing world and why competitor analysis is important for you and your business, including these key global trends for 2021 and beyond:
- Health and wellbeing
- Collective empowerment
- Back to basics
- Community focus
- Virtual living
- Sustainable spaces
- Digital challenges
I’ll share how you can access the benefits of competitor analysis:
- Nail down or create your value proposition
- Better understand current market trends
- Better target your current customer base
- Uncover untapped markets that your competitors aren’t selling to
- Gather benchmark data to measure your growth against
- Find errors and gaps in your competitors’ strategies
You’re looking for learning to create opportunity.
It’s not about copying - it’s about outperforming, finding gaps and opportunities – innovation.
Be savvy.
Avoid "comparisonitis”.
Tune in to learn more, and access my 7-step process for effective competitor analysis:
- Who are your competitors?
- How do your products & services compare?
- What additional intelligence on them do you need and why?
- Get the intelligence
- Combine the intelligence with customer needs and trends
- Identify gaps and opportunities for innovation and competitive advantage
- Create and communicate competitive differentiation
You might like to access the free resources here on my website: https://www.bigbangpartnership.co.uk/resources/
If you’d like to get in touch to book me for a live virtual session in your business, just comment below or contact me https://www.bigbangpartnership.co.uk using the contact us section.
If your customers don’t care enough about your innovation, or if they simply don’t understand it, they won’t buy.
How to Create Your Value Proposition focuses on how to make sure that your business ideas for new products or services, and product or service improvements, meet and exceed your target customers’ expectations.
It’s the focus of one of the inhouse online live programmes that I run for my clients. The approach and insights have made a significant difference to my clients’ innovation and business growth results, so I wanted to share some of the key principles from the content with you on my show.
This episode takes a realistic, pragmatic view of how you can innovate in a way that creates “value proposition fit” – which means that it will be of direct relevance to your target customers.
It’s also important that you can communicate your value proposition simply, concisely and clearly.
In this show, I cover:
- Definition of a value proposition for your innovation, and why it matters
- Why it’s important to have a clear view of your target customers – needs, wants, motivations, aspirations, how they might use you’re your innovation and why – from the very beginning of your innovation process
- Ways in which your innovation will need to create value for your target customers
- How to achieve “value proposition fit”
- Why and how you’ll need to consider the whole customer experience and your monetization strategies in your innovation planning
If you enjoyed this episode, you might also like to access the free resources here on my website: https://www.bigbangpartnership.co.uk/resources/
If you’d like to get in touch to book me for a live virtual session in your business, just comment below or contact me https://www.bigbangpartnership.co.uk using the contact us section.
Leading Remote Collaboration focuses in creating an environment and culture for effective cross-functional team working.
It’s the focus of one of the inhouse online live programmes that I run for my clients. The participant feedback from the programme has been fantastic, so I wanted to share some of the key principles from the content with you on my show.
This episode takes a realistic, human view of how collaboration can feel and work in business and gives actionable insights that you can use straightaway with your team.
In this show, I cover:
- The difference between co-operation and collaboration
- Why collaboration matters – the multiplier effect on performance
- The principles of successful collaboration, including the role of psychological safety, insights from Google’s Project Aristotle and the latest research on remote team working from 2020 and 2021
- The importance of leadership role-modelling
- How to build successful relationships in an online environment
- Healthy challenge and collaboration – how to challenge and be challenged
- What to do when collaboration gets tough, why it’s more important than ever to keep collaborating through it and how to do it
If you’re ready for a whole new way of thinking and doing, tune in -and please do share any comments or questions about innovation and remote collaboration here in the comments.
If you enjoyed this episode, you might also like to access the free resources here on my website: https://www.bigbangpartnership.co.uk/resources/
If you’d like to get in touch to book me for a live virtual session in your business, just comment below or contact me https://www.bigbangpartnership.co.uk using the contact us section.
Innovation has never been more important for you and your business.
It used to be that only fashion and technology companies had to reimagine themselves every year.
Now everything, from accountants, estate agents, food brands and travel companies are under constant pressure to stay ahead of the curve and keep and attract customers with new, better and smarter products, services and business models - before the competition gets there first.
Join me for this show to find out more about business innovation, market disruption the risks of standing still, and think about how you might use some of these proven, practical ways to help to innovate in your business.
I’ll take you through a simple step-by-step process that will help you to think differently about your products and services, why customers buy them, how they use them, and how to innovate.
We’ll explore:
- Definitions of innovation
- Innovation triggers
- Creating value through innovation
- Types and levels of innovation
- The innovation process
- Strategic fit
- Lean innovation
- Disruptive innovation
- Strategic drift
- The innovation iceberg
- Risk and reward
If you’re ready for a whole new way of thinking and doing, tune in -and please do share any comments or questions about innovation here in the comments.
If you enjoyed this episode, you might also like to access the free resources here on my website: https://www.bigbangpartnership.co.uk/resources/
Today I have a special guest on the show, Kathryn Creed. Kathryn is a clinical hypnotherapist who works with clients using the power of hypnosis to help them to connect with their unconscious minds, helping them to whatever outcome they would like to achieve. Her career in Education gave her the relevant experience, as for her, like therapy, teaching is all about helping a person to learn and grow by finding their inner strength, potential and capacity for change. Kathryn works with adults as well as children to remove the obstacles which hold them back from the life that they want. She believes that to be involved in that process is a tremendous privilege.
You can learn more about Kathryn at her website https://www.angitia.co.uk/
I would like to let you know, for the sake of full disclosure, that I work with Kathryn as her client and she has helped me tremendously using the power of hypnotherapy.
Kathryn will be talking about how hypnotherapy works, what it can do for you and explore it further.
By listening in you’ll learn more about how hypnotherapy can help with:
- Changes in your personal life
- Changes in your business life
- Stress, Anxiety, past hurts
- Performance with work
- Ability to adapt to situations
You’ll also learn more about what hypnotherapy is and the science behind how it works.
Instagram: @ideatimestudio
Facebook: @ideatime1
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jonorth/
Join me for this podcast episode which is all about daring to be different as virtual facilitators - what does that mean? how to do it? - practical tips on how to be braver and stand out as a virtual facilitator for all the right reasons.
You might also enjoy my special blog and free resources on how to dare to be different which you can find here.
In this solo episode I share my experience of facilitating online at Northumbrian Water Innovation Festival 2020.
The sessions I led were on the value of water, and climate change with Kielder Forest and Water Park.
You can find out more about the Innovation Festival 2020 here.
For more free tips and advice on virtual facilitation, have a look at my blog here.
I loved learning more about visible thinking, thinking routines and virtual facilitation in this episode with my special guest, Claire Bown founder at Thinking Museum.
Claire is based in Amsterdam and works internationally. She has always been fascinated by developing methods that help people to engage with art and museums creatively and in a thought-provoking, inquiry-led way.
Claire does a great job helping museum teams to ask great questions, to achieve discussion-based programmes around art and to make visits much more interactive using a simple structure. She helps museum and art gallery teams to share their deep knowledge and enthusiasm in an interesting way that goes beyond sharing facts.
Visible thinking enriches learning and thought. Its central idea is making thinking visible.
Thinking routines are short, easy-to-learn practices and steps that can be used regularly in different ways. For example, "see, think, wonder" provides a structure for being curious about and questioning an object or theme. The approach teaches users to ask better questions.
Thinking routines can also be combined and each has a different focus.
We discussed the relevance of this to innovation sessions and how they will work well in a number of settings such as customer experience, brand development, business growth and more.
We also explore how museums and galleries have been innovating through the covid-19 lockdowns and social distancing measures and building their virtual facilitation and digital skills.
Claire shares her top tips for engaging, interactive virtual facilitation.
Claire runs a membership, and holds great training sessions on visible thinking and thinking routines.
You can find Claire by searching Thinking Museum on Instagram, Facebook and Twitter. On Linkedin search for Claire Bown.
Tune in for my mindfulness tools, tips and techniques for virtual facilitators.
Learn how to slow down your digital facilitation in your online meetings to go faster and be more productive overall!
In this episode I share practical things that you can do to increase your energy and support your wellbeing when you're going from online workshop to online workshop.
Everything I share is scientifically-backed, so you can have the confidence that these insights will work for you.
I cover:
-
Different types of meditation for improving creativity and increasing focus.
-
How to prepare and deliver your digital workshops, training and design sprints mindfully
For oodles more free tools, techniques and advice to help you expand your creativity, confidence and impact through your virtual facilitation, check out my website, starting here: https://www.bigbangpartnership.co.uk/resources
In this solo episode I share why taking time to build trust between delegates and an environment that helps with psychological safety is essential for generating engagement in online meetings and workshops.
I share some of the latest science on trust and psychological safety, along with practical tips to support you with your virtual facilitation.
To join my free private Facebook group, Idea Time for Workshop Facilitators, please use this link.
Join me and innovators Mark Whittaker from Velresco and Chris Wilson from Adamo to hear the story of how Mark created a new virtual whiteboard for online meetings and workshops called VWall back in 2010, well ahead of the curve, and how VWall has developed to being an invaluable tool for many facilitators here and now.
Mark and Chris share how VWall is a great facilitation tool, and how easy it is to use with platforms such as Zoom, Microsoft Teams and others to optimise delegate engagement and participation.
VWall allows we facilitators to intuitively capture and instantly analyse ideas from our workshop participants. Personally, I really enjoy using it in sessions for sticky note activities, mind mapping, polling and much more.
I found it inspiring to listen to Mark and Chris sharing the innovation journey of VWall, from an idea borne out of frustration and opportunity to becoming a super-useful, easy-to-use and successful commercial facilitation product.
If you'd like to know more about VWall and have a demo with Chris, and / or sign up for a free trial, just reach out to him on Linked in here.
Thank you Chris and Mark for a really interesting conversation!
In this solo podcast I share practical tips and advice for facilitators on how to get ideas flowing in your virtual workshops and online meetings.
I also share information about my free online programme for facilitators, Supercharge Your Virtual Engagement on Zoom, which you can join for free HERE.
In the podcast you'll learn:
- How ideas are formed and why that's important for your online sessions
- How to design online workshops that work for diverse thinking and learning styles
- How to use different creativity techniques through movement, words, numbers, objects, images and more to get and keep ideas flowing and make sure that delegate engagement stays high
- Why creative idea generation techniques such as 'crazy eights'. co-consulting, expert interviews and lightning talks help with idea generation - and how to use them
- Why traditional 'brainstorming' doesn't work - and what to do instead
- Why it's important to give idea generation time and space
I hope you enjoy the show - let me know what you think, and share the things that you do to get and keep ideas flowing in your online workshops.
Join me and Mahmood Reza, the Numbers Rockstar, for this special edition episode to celebrate the first year of the official #lovemyaccountantday on 25th August.
Mahmood has worked to officially get this day into the annual event calendar.
Listen in to find out:
- How Mahmood created an official day in the event calendar and why
- Why Mahmood is so passionate about helping business owners to really understand and feel comfortable with using their numbers to tell the story of their business
- How we, as business owners, can work more effectively with our accountants so that we can help them to help us more
- Why and how our attitudes and beliefs about money influence our business decisions
- Why money is important for all organisations, including purpose led businesses, not-for-profits and organisations in the arts and creative sector
You can find out more about Mahmood here, and join in #loveyouraccountantday on his social feeds:
Twitter: @mahmood_reza
Instagram: @mahmoodnumbersrockstar
Mahmood's podcast is I Hate Numbers, and you can find his live show on his Facebook page.
In this solo episode I share my top Productivity Hacks for Virtual Facilitators.
My FREE Supercharge Your Virtual Engagement on Zoom Challenge starts on 7th September - you can find out more and sign up here.
Here are the links to the tools I mention:
SessionLab for planning and designing sessions.
Ecamm Live for video recording and live videos.
Canva for designing great presentations and graphics.
Slidemodel for PowerPoint templates for virtual flipcharts and worksheets.
Mentimeter for interactive polling and quizzes.
I love SessionLab and Ecamm Live so much I actually became an affiliate - just to let you know and to be transparent about that.
Join me and my special guest Richard Hall, founder of Pd-m International Limited, an innovation, product design and manufacturing consultancy.
We discuss the success factors of getting a product from concept to commercialisation or use in practice.
Richard shares his definition of innovation and the different levels and types of innovation, from incremental to disruptive.
Richard and I both use design thinking in our workshops, and we explore what it is and how we use it. Richard gives the example of how he has used design thinking to create medical innovations for surgeons.
Richard gives us his six trigger points for establishing a successful innovation, innovation process and the 'fog of uncertainty' and how innovation in the beginning can be like the flight of a bumblebee! Also why the process of co-design with customers is so important and how he has continued to do that through Covid-19 using online platforms.
I share why designing the "fog of uncertainty"- sometimes also known as the "groan zone" in innovation sprints and workshops is important.
Finally we discuss approaches and techniques that can be used in workshops and innovation more generally to achieve success, and different mindsets to challenge thinking - including asking "so wot?", "wot now?" and then "wot next?".
Richard also shares how he has pivoted his business to manufacture face shields that carry the CE mark. He plans to continue innovating and growing the business.
Thank you Richard for a great conversation, I'm sure you and the team will go from strength to strength.
Here is the Design Council reference we talked about for the Innovation Process : https://www.designcouncil.org.uk/news-opinion/what-framework-innovation-design-councils-evolved-double-diamond.
To join me free private facebook group for facilitators, Idea Time for Workshop Facilitators, use this link here.
For Force Field Analysis, Risk Register and Reverse Brain Storming workshop templates for delegates, please email me at jo@bigbangpartnership.co.uk and I will send them across to you.
Richard's bio:
Richard started his career aged 16 in 1986 as an Engineering Apprentice at Rolls-Royce Plc. After four years of training Richard was posted to the Engineering Drawing Office at the Derby fan blade facility. After studying part-time night class whilst working Richard then studied BA (Hons) Industrial Design full time. On graduating in 1994 Richard worked for 11 years in industry in the UK, Eastern Europe, the US and China. In 2005 Richard founded Pd-m International Limited, an innovation, product design and manufacturing consultancy. In addition to running the business Richard has been the lead mentor for the Design Council spark innovation fund, a visiting tutor at the Royal College of Art and Leeds Becket University. Richard currently consults for Innovate UK and is studying a Masters Degree part time in Senior Leadership at The University of Leeds Business School. In 2018 Richard was awarded Fellowship at the Royal Society for the encouragement of Art, Manufactures and Commerce.
To find out more about Richard or get in touch with him you can find him here:
Instagram @pdm_productdesign Linked In here https://www.linkedin.com/in/richard-hall-pd-m/
Web site www.pd-m.com
Join me in this episode with my special guest Leila Ainge on Virtual Facilitation using Microsoft teams. We also discuss ambitious goals and goal-setting as well as Leila's 'Pavilion Ponders' and more!
Leila shares tips on how to use Microsoft Teams for facilitated sessions, including setting up breakout groups by setting up channels in advance, using other tools that integrate with Teams and how to chat and messages before your session starts to begin engagement.
Leila also updates us on some new features in Microsoft Teams that are coming out in the autumn.
We discuss the differences, benefits and challenges of using Zoom or Teams and the collaborative tools we use.
For more facilitation tips and techniques and be part of a great community of facilitators, come and join my free Facebook Group, Idea Time for Workshop Facilitators. I'd love to see you in there.
If you'd like to learn more about Leila or connect with her, you can find her at:
www.aingeconsulting.co.uk
www.aingeconsulting.co.uk/blog (home of the ponder)
https://www.aingeconsulting.co.uk/goal-magic-preview Free online course, taking action.
@leila_ainge Instagram
I love that we can unexpectedly find light in unexpected places.
Through lockdown I sat here in North Yorkshire and made a new friend in Christine Francis in Beirut. Christine is a highly qualified and accomplished change leadership expert and coach, and it was an absolute pleasure to spend time with her on the latest episode of my Idea Time podcast.
Christine and I found each other on Instagram, began a dialogue, worked on virtual facilitation together and found that we have so much in common, especially our values, love of learning and joy of facilitation.
We discuss how Christine has been working a lot with the Change Curve and the Transition Model to support people transition in the uncertain world we're living in. She helps them to tap into their growth mindset, especially when they are at the bottom of the curve because this is either where magic happens or nothing happens at all. Christine explains how she uses her deep knowledge and training, along with her own personal experience of change, to enable people to connect to their magic at a personal level and at the business level, because we always have a choice, no matter what the situation is, and choose actions based on their values.
Christine also shares her experience and tips on virtual facilitation, and how she has been running change and transformation workshops online for businesses, and the experience of getting back into a physical meeting room with social distancing measures in place.
To learn more about Christine, or to get in contact with here, you'll find her here: Christine@viviticoaching.com Instagram is christinefrancis72 https://www.linkedin.com/in/christine-francis-b0207714/ Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/Christine.Francis.Asmar
Sarah Price is Strategic Manager and Director of a Community Interest Company that delivers physical activities for schools. She is an Idea Time programme member, and has also joined the new Business Growth Club run by Mahmood Reza and me.
Sarah shares her leadership story through recent months and how she has navigated the challenges of lockdown with her school customers and remote team engagement.
She is an absolute inspiration, and I'm delighted that Sarah has joined me on the podcast. The insights and experiences that Sarah shares will resonate with you too, I'm sure.
You can connect with Sarah here on Linkedin, and as always I'd love to hear your thoughts on the episode.
And if you'd like to find out more about the Business Growth Club, please click here.
In this podcast, which celebrates the upcoming launch of our new Business Growth Club with Mahmood and Jo I share the key success factors for scaling up your business.
I cover:
- The importance of testing that the demand exists for your product or service
- Why it's important to have solid, streamlined and replicable business processes to support your scale up and some easy ways that you can get ready to delegate or outsource your behind-the-scenes activities
- The key financial and cashflow considerations you need to bear in mind, and why
I also refer to Mahmood Reza's excellent free resources to help you work through the cashflow implications of your scale up which you can get here.
Join me and my special guest Mahmood Reza, The Numbers Rockstar, in this special edition podcast to launch our Business Growth Club for entrepreneurs and business owners who want to scale up successfully and sustainably.
“Ideas are cheap. It is building them into profitable companies that is hard. Ideas are like insects. Many are born but few live to maturity.” William Hertling
Imagine that business idea you have. Your business idea could be floating in and out, or it may rest heavy in your thoughts.
Either way, you want that idea to turn into something meaningful. Who wouldn’t want their business to make a mark, a difference and an impact?
Meaningful needs to be more. Whatever your business, you need to make money if you are going to survive and thrive.
How you make that money, what you do with that money is part of the deal.
If making money is not one of your business goals , then all you have is a time consuming and expensive hobby.
Let’s get real. Ideas are the easy part of your business journey
If you expect success to fall into your lap, you have inspiration but no application, and want it all for free, then this program is not for you.
If you'd like to find out more, listen in - and get on the waiting list here - we have only 12 places available, and some of those have gone already! If we've convinced you already, then sign up now for £99+ VAT.
Really hope you can join us :)
More about Mahmood:
Mahmood is the Owner Manager of Knowledge Grab and Pro Active Resolutions. The businesses help business owners make money & save time by using their numbers, through accounting and tax support, training and mentoring
Mahmood’s business career of over 25 years has been about supporting business and entrepreneurs of today and tomorrow, as well as social enterprises and charities. He has been described by some clients as “Not your normal boring Accountant!”
Before Mahmood started his own business from his back room, he started his paid for career in teaching. He has taught at all educational levels, from primary to post graduate, vocational to academic.
Mahmood then made a transition into Industry, working for a brewing and drinks company as a divisional accountant reporting to board level.
He then made his next pivot and started his own business in Feb 1995.
Mahmood is highly qualified in accounting, tax & business, and has picked up qualifications, passed exams beyond accounting: FCCA, ATT, FRSA, DMS, PGCE, BSc (Hons).
He also publishes regular content, guides, and resources to support business. His weekly podcast ‘I Hate Numbers’ is one way of helping your business get friendlier with your best business friend. The friend that doesn’t lie to you, your Numbers.
In this podcast, I share some more tips on how to facilitate a virtual innovation or design sprint.
I cover:
- What is an innovation or design sprint
- A typical format
- Different sprint methods - Google sprint, Design Thinking, Creative Problem Solving
- Toolkit and delegate resource examples
- How I use tools such as Mentimeter and Milanote to get delegate engagement
To download the slides that accompany this podcast for free, go to:https://bigbangpartnership.co.uk/resources/virtual-facilitation-tips/
Ackoff statement
This episode focuses on how to create great challenge statements for innovation and growth.
Whether you are an innovator, entrepreneur or facilitator, starting off with a challenge statement helps you to focus.
In this podcast I cover:
- What is a challenge statement, and how they can help with innovation and business growth.
- Why questions are great for problem-solving and innovation.
- The characteristics of a great challenge, and different types of innovation problem - i.e..tame, wicked, messy problems.
- The 4 Ingredients of a great challenge statement.
- A 4 step process for creating a great challenge statement.
- The importance of getting info, insights and data together before moving straight to idea generation, including a great template to use.
- How to use the 'problem family tree' method for deconstructing challenges and generating ideas.
If you'd like to download the slide deck that supports this episode for free, please go to https://bigbangpartnership.co.uk/resources/
www.bigbangpartnership.co.uk
Download the slide pack from this podcast from my free content studio at https://bigbangpartnership.co.uk/reso...
From March 2020, with the outbreak of Covid-19 and the changes it has brought, how to pivot seems to have been one of the most prominent business themes in the media, after of course the financial and operational impact of the pandemic.
As a result of Covid-19, we have seen gin manufacturers pivot to making hand sanitiser, engineering firms to producing ventilators and medical equipment, and clothing companies to supporting with PPE (Personal Protective Equipment). That said, pivoting is something that businesses have been doing since people started to trade goods and services with each other, and the core principles of successful pivoting remain constant.
In this podcast, I share the content of an innovation masterclass that I have been running with businesses to help them decide if and how they should pivot.
It's important to balance the decisions you need to take right now to survive and thrive with the impact that these decisions will have longer term on your business.
You may be thinking about pivoting - which means making a change - large or small - to your business - if your current products and services aren't performing well for you.
I provide a pragmatic checklist and process for you to use if you are thinking about pivoting in your business.
By listening in, you'll gain insights on how to:
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Make your business more relevant
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Implement business changes to generate more cash and profit
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Benefit from new opportunities quickly
Instagram: @ideatimestudio
Facebook: @ideatime1
Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jonorth/?...
Join me for my conversation with Sales Marvel, Keith Rozelle, on Selling in these Challenging Times.
Keith mentors Business Owners, Sales Professionals and Entrepreneurial Students to win more customers. He creates highly effective sales strategies for his clients and is a globally experienced sales leader – both as a Director setting strategy and also as an individual contributor selling complex solutions. Keith has worked at C-level level for many years across a broad range of sectors including Financial Services, Agri-food, Hospitality, IT/Telecoms and Higher Education.
Much of Keith’s professional experience has been in Technology, Outsourcing Services and Education.
He also has substantial international business experience, having lived and worked in the US, Europe and the Far East.
Keith is a visiting lecturer at Aston University and believes that selling is an art, science and craft that should be valued more as a profession.
We all need to be able to sell, but not everyone is comfortable selling – often because of fear of rejection.
People today want to choose to buy – they don’t want to be sold to. The power is with the customer. Product and service differentiation is really important because it means that the choice will be made on factors beyond simply price.
In this episode, we discuss:
- How to sell in challenging times, and why it’s important to take different approaches as people experience different stages of the change curve.
- Sales being about P2P - people-to-people – not B2B or B2C.
- The need to find a new way to trade that will help us move forward in this situation and the potential future process of ‘cocooning’ even once the lockdown has passed.
- There is a broad diversity of how people have been affected by the current Covid-19 outbreak.
- That a good deal of TV advertising has adapted its messaging to sell in an appropriate way right now.
- Whether it’s a good idea or not to drop prices or discount.
- The importance of protecting existing revenue and getting the business onto as sustainable a footing as possible for the next few months.
- How to start selling successfully with more confidence.
- How to see objections as requests for more information instead of a rejection.
- The importance of not forcing the sales cycle onto the buyer – instead adapt the sales cycle to what works for the business.
Key to surviving and thriving is making sure that products and services are differentiated in ways that are relevant to target customers.
For small businesses, the business owner or leader may be the key differentiator.
Keith shares a sales process in the Covid-19 context and references the Zyman Pyramid to explain moving from a ‘me too’ provider competing on price to becoming a preferred provider by truly understanding and responding to customers’ needs and building customer trust. Be crystal clear about your value proposition, says Keith, and he points out that all this is true in other, less anxious times too.
Co-creation with customers is much less likely to lead to rejection as the customer has been integral to the process of developing the solution.
Ultimately, sales is about communicating how you can solve your customer’s problem – and it’s essential to keep going and help your customers solve their challenges, as well as protecting your business.
To contact Keith, email him at keith@salesmarvel.co.uk , or you can find him here on LinkedIn.
To attend one of Keith’s free webinars find out more here.
It’s wonderful that we can connect through a variety of brilliant, intuitive and affordable online meeting tools, especially during times such as these. These tools, such as Zoom, Teams and others, make it so easy that I’ve witnessed a lack in creativity and engagement in some online sessions I’ve attended as a delegate.
To get the best results and deliver a great experience for our delegates, as facilitators we need to innovate how we design and manage our online workshops. That means all the way through, not just going for a quirky icebreaker before settling back into the ordinariness of a boring and uninspiring core.
You'll especially enjoy this solo episode if:
• You already facilitate online meetings, manage a remote or socially distanced team, and want your online work to be more creative, collaborative and effective • You want to make your online training and development sessions more engaging and inclusive • You want to lead online meetings that are just as, if not even more engaging and effective than in-person sessions
I’ve written this blog with the aim of helping you, as a virtual facilitator, to:
- Overcome any perceived challenges of virtual facilitation; and
- Suggest some ways in which you can be more creative and add more value in your sessions.
I’d also love to hear from you on any other challenges or tips that you have, so please do leave me some comments below.
Listen in to hear the top 10 challenges of virtual facilitation and practical things you can do to easily overcome them.
If you'd like to read more about this, check out my blog on the topic here: https://bigbangpartnership.co.uk/virtual-facilitation-10-top-challenges-what-to-do-about-them/
If you’re interested in facilitation and developing your professional practice as a facilitator, I’d love you to come and join me in my free, private Facebook Group, Idea Time for Workshop Facilitators.
As well as a fantastic community of likeminded people, you will get access to free facilitation trainings, tools, techniques and time savers.
If you’d like to book us to deliver some professional virtual facilitation for you and your team, or would like a one-to-one virtual facilitation training and coaching session, you can find out more about what we do here, or contact me direct and I’ll get straight back to you.
Hope to hear from you in so that we can chat about all things virtual facilitation! x
With so many people in business experiencing slow down, cancellations and having to adapt to more remote working, plus others finding brand new business opportunities, I wanted to do something to help and support.
These are unprecedented times for many of us, I’m sure. But knowing that we have got a flexible plan to get through, make the most of opportunities and emerge stronger on the other side is a massive help.
In this podcast I share how to:
- Take a step back from your business, think about your immediate priorities and get an action plan together for dealing with the challenges and opportunities ahead
- Work out how you can adapt more of what you do to be delivered online – and quickly
- Use any additional time to prioritise and progress some of those things you’ve been meaning to do for ages
If you'd like to download my free resources or join my free online programme to help bullet-proof your business, here is the link to access them.
In this solo episode, I share some of the easy, proactive & free things I have been doing to both help me through this lockdown period as a facilitator, as well as to develop my facilitation skills and continue to strengthen my business.
Activities include:
- Journaling my facilitation experiences, ideas, getting creative and emptying my head
- Asking for structured, specific feedback on perceptions of my social media brand and image, so that I can build on the positives and spot and work on development opportunities
- Going out of my way to experiment with new and creative virtual facilitation tools and techniques
For more information and free resources for facilitators, go to my free Content Studio on my website.
In this episode I explain why and how using story-based techniques can increase the creativity and impact of your workshop facilitation.
I share 10 story-based creative facilitation techniques that you can use in your workshops, too - and if you'd like to download the free resource pack that goes with this episode, please go to my Content Studio here, scroll down to the section called 'Facilitation Toolkits' and grab the Story Techniques for Facilitators toolkit.
Join me and Gareth Harrison, professional video and podcast editor, for his 10 top tips on how to create and level up your own videos and podcasts.
Gareth is a freelance video editor based in Leeds, West Yorkshire – with over 15 years experience in post-production, editing content for tv and online commercials, corporate videos, internal communications, live events, charities and social media.
Gareth also has a mobile edit suite, if required, offering the flexibility to work on location or from his own office (when we aren't in lockdown, of course).
Using the current lockdown to create more and better video and podcast media is a great, productive and creative use of time.
Listen in for Gareth's advice on how to make better videos and podcasts cheaply and effectively, if you're just starting out or want to take your output to the next level.
If you'd like to contact Gareth direct, you can reach him via his website here.
You can also connect with Gareth on Linkedin.
notes for the Top Ten Tips:
TIP 1. Sound Make sure you’re getting good sound Do a few practice runs to make sure the sound level is ok - not too quiet / not distorting from being too high You don’t have to spend a lot to get a good microphone, but it’s worth investing There is a lot you can do to improve what you see on screen, but you’re limited when correcting sound
TIP 2. Lighting You can get away with a lot these days with cameras being able to shoot in low light But set yourself up for success by having a well lit environment And natural sunlight is always the best Have the light facing you - illuminating your face So ideally facing a window or if it’s a nice day go outside But make sure it’s not too windy, because that can ruin the sound
TIP 3. Static camera I recommend you place yourself in the middle of the shot Not too close, not too far away In what’s called a mid-shot And keep the camera still - you’ll have a lot more control over things like focus and composition if you use this method And have the camera at the same level as your eye-line - a tripod is good for this if you’re presenting stood up
TIP 4. Use second camera Using a second camera helps when it comes to editing - this can simply be a camera on a phone But it allows you to cut from one camera angle to the other and keeps the video interesting The second camera also gives you the option to cut around any mistakes during filming, helping the video to flow The second camera should be positioned about 45 degrees to the main camera
TIP 5. Get a tight Script Writing it down beforehand will help you focus on the points you want to make It will give you structure to your video or podcast - using storyboard is a good idea Even if it seem like someone has done it on the fly - there will have been a lot of work done before the camera was even switched on Try and learn the script or the points you want to make - so it comes across naturally rather than it being read
TIP 6. Don’t make it too long Attention spans aren’t very long these days So it’s far better to create 5 2min videos than 1 10min video Less is definitely more Plus then you’ve got 5 separate videos to post up and share through your social platforms, instead of having just one hit
TIP 7. Regular content Produce content on a regular basis Give your audience a reason to return People like the reliability of regular updates If your channel isn’t providing new content people quickly move on
TIP 8. Offers You need to give something away This doesn't have to be a free gift It can be information / tips / insights But you need the audience to feel that they’ve gained something from watching or listening to your content
TIP 9. Replicate Look at the videos or podcasts you like and use them as a source of inspiration for yours Don’t copy them but try and work out what it is that you like about them Once you’ve figured this out you can then apply your own personality and brand to that style
TIP 10. Have a go! It might be that you create a video and realise it works better as a podcast There’s no substitute to experience Without trying you’ll never know what works and what doesn’t
Here’s the microphone Gareth mentions, the Apogee MiC 96k: https://www.dv247.com/en_GB/GBP/Apogee-MiC-96k-/art-PCM0012816-000?campaign=GShopping/UK&ProgramUUID=HADAqJarPzAAAAFlea9yjI.G&gclid=EAIaIQobChMI9If867DF6AIVWfBRCh2TtAb_EAkYASABEgLNSvD_BwE
This episode is all about you and your ideas. An idea is when two thoughts connect. Having an idea is a physical activity. It is chemical and electrical. Sometimes we think we are having a moment of insight that comes from nowhere, but actually our mind and our creative subconscious have been working on it in the background. It is only when it becomes apparent that a connection is made, that the background work surfaces to create an idea.
I share science-based insights on how ideas happen and give you some practical, fun tips on how you can become even more creative! There’s a great activity for you try – check out my video here, too. And check out my article here for even more info and tips: You and Your Ideas. Learn How to Be More Creative At Work.
Dr. Mo Khan is my guest on this special edition podcast on innovation culture and opportunities in challenging times.
Mo is the founder of Enhance Innovation and author of the e-book, The Innovator's Treasure Chest, which you can download for free here.
Mo has had a fantastic career and worked internationally with world-class engineering businesses. We discuss how important innovation is in challenging times, how some businesses don't give their employees the scope and space to innovate, and how collaboration fuels innovation.
If you'd like to find out more and sign up for the free Creative Reset programme for small to medium-sized businesses that I talk about in the podcast, just click here.
You can see Mo in action on his YouTube Channel
Connect with him at:
Listen in for my productivity hacks that I have put together specifically for workshop facilitators.
Save time and energy, so that you can spend the time doing what you do best. Being creative, engaging and facilitating your delegates and getting your target results and impacts from your workshops.
If you'd like to go one step further, you'll also love my free playbook download, Productivity for Innovators, available here. Just scroll down to the Personal Development section at the bottom of the page and you'll find it there.
Join me and Georgia Duffee from Benedetto in this special podcast episode to help with planning and strategising in these exceptionally challenging times.
The episode was recorded at lunchtime on Friday 20th March 2020.
Georgia has participated as a delegate in both my paid and free programmes for business leaders, including one that I'm running right now - Creative Reset - to support business owners to navigate through these unprecedented times. If you'd like to join my free Creative Reset programme, you'll find more details here.
Georgia is also a member of my free Facebook group - Idea Time for Workshop Facilitators - which she mentions in the podcast. If you'd like to join, here's the link.
She also talks about my free Resilience playbook, which you can download here.
In this episode, Georgia shares the tools and techniques that she has used to shape her business plan for dealing with the current coronavirus situation, plus how she has successfully launched and sold out three online programmes for her different target customer segments.
Georgia would love to hear from you.
To find out all about Georgia's services and programmes, here are the links:
Benedetto Accounts & Tax Website
Let me know what you think of the podcast - I'd love to hear from you!
In this solo episode I share my thoughts, experiences and tips on how to maintain a resilient, focused and healthy mindset when navigating your business through what is a period of change and uncertainty.
I explore the theme of resilience and why it's important, and show how we can use the change curve to manage our own wellbeing and business decision-making to get better outcomes.
If you'd like to find our more about and join my free Creative Reset programme, you can see all the info and sign up here.
You can also download my free Resilience Playbook from the resources section in my Content Library.
In this special edition podcast with Mahmood Reza, the Numbers Rockstar, Mahmood shares advice on what small businesses can do to navigate these exceptional, challenging times.
He's an accounting and finance specialist and has also created a special blog focused on Covid-19 and cashflow here.
Mahmood gives a step-by-step guide for entrepreneurs who want to do a cashflow forecast for the next 3-4 months, reduce spending where possible without negatively impacting the business and create a plan. He gives an update on the support available for Government, correct at the time of recording at 7.30am UK time on Friday 20th March 2020.
We discuss the importance of creating a business plan - and you can access my own free programme and resources, Creative Reset for 2020, here. You can also download my free Business Plan playbook in my Content Studio here.
Mahmood and I move on to developing and growing an online business and the importance of consistent investment in effort and money in promotion.
Creating a course or an online offer is pretty straightforward, the challenge is to grow an audience and sell it. Planning of an online product or service is really important, and Mahmood recommends creating a separate business plan for it to make sure that it generates profit.
Mahmood would love to hear from you. You can contact him here:
Free resources
Website
Welcome to this episode on Appreciative Inquiry for Facilitators.
In this podcast I explain what Appreciative Inquiry is, how it is a strengths-based approach, and how it can be useful for facilitators.
I share an Appreciative Inquiry facilitation process and a variety of tools, techniques and activities that you can use in your own facilitation.
If you'd like to download the free toolkit, go to the Content Studio on my website here, scroll down to Facilitation Toolkits and you will find it there.
To find out more about the academic theory on Appreciative Inquiry, look up the work of David Cooperrider here.
In this podcast, How to Facilitate Workshops with Broken Teams, I explore dysfunction in teams and why teams might be broken, and move on to the theme of trust. I then share a suggested agenda with you that you can use and adapt and tweak if you are planning to facilitate a session with a team that is not connecting.
For those of you who haven’t met me, I am Jo North and I love facilitating, and I facilitate thousands of people every year, I facilitate all over the world, and I also help facilitators to learn how to facilitate as well. I run the Idea Time Academy, which is a membership site full of training and resources to help facilitators expand their creativity confidence, and skills in facilitating, and expand their impact as well.
You can also access some free, great resources to accompany the podcast here:
- My 60 second video on Trust at Work
- Insights into Group Dynamics
- How to facilitate delegates with different perspectives
- How to develop your meeting and workshop facilitation skills
Plus, here's more info on the Lencioni model I mention.
I hope you enjoy the episode and find it useful - let me know what you think.
The theme for this episode is How to Facilitate Business Growth Workshops.
I take you through how you to design and facilitate a full business growth workshop that takes you from looking at changes and trends in the outside world through to looking internally at the business, and thinking about its strengths, the aspirations, the capabilities.
These are my favourite business growth activities. I run business growth events, strategy and business planning events a lot, with all sorts of different organisations. These facilitation tools and techniques work with all sorts of business, large and small, and in any industry sector. They are tried and tested.
For more free business growth resources and activities, head over to my Content Studio at https://bigbangpartnership.co.uk/resources/.
Hope you enjoy the episode and find it useful - let me know what you think.
The focus of my podcast here is on how to facilitate business improvement events. Business improvement is about efficiency, effectiveness, it is about the business operating as well as it possibly can.
That means with no waste, no duplication, no quality issues. It is all running really smoothly. There are some deep techniques on business improvement, such as Lean and Six Sigma. I am not going to go into depth on those techniques, although what I am going to share with you today is consistent with those, and is in many ways inspired by them.
I am going to give you is a step by step process, so that if you need to, or want to run a process improvement event for your business, or even if you want to look at process improvement and business improvement in your own business, then you have got some tools and techniques to do that with. I have also provided you with a free called Business Improvement Playbook. Download it here.
Business improvement can be incredibly powerful. I remember doing a business improvement event for a specialist electronics manufacturer, and they had never actually mapped out the process before, from a customer sending in an enquiry, and them receiving it through to the goods being dispatched from the warehouse. When we mapped it out, it was taking them three months to get from enquiry through to dispatch of the order. With some revisiting of what was going on we were able to get that down to between 6 & 8 weeks depending on the product. It was a very specialist and technical product, so that might sound a long time, but they saved 4 to 6 weeks on every product. You can imagine the difference that makes to customer satisfaction, because the customer is getting the products quicker, and also the efficiency and the cost, in terms of production, so profitability is better. They are also able to grow more because they can get more manufacturing done through the line. This doesn’t apply just to manufacturing. You can do this with any sort of business in any sort of process - whether you're a solopreneur consultant or a massive, global business.
One of the members of my Idea Time for Workshop Facilitators Facebook Group asked me for some ideas for creative facilitation activities to use when you're facilitating groups to establish their vision, mission and values.
Vision, mission and values really help connect people. They support a shared sense of purpose and direction and are important ingredients for collaborative team working and performance at organisation, team and project level.
In this solo podcast, which was originally a Facebook live broadcast, I explain what vision, mission and values are and why they are important, and share some techniques that you can use with teams when you're facilitating these sessions.
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A vision is aspirational. It’s a statement of where the business, team or person wants to be in the future. A great vision looks ahead, is purposefully ambitious and realistically stretchy.
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The mission of a team or a business is the core purpose. It’s why that team or business actually exists, the very reason a team or business has been set up. The mission really defines the ‘why?’ behind what what the organisation does, and its reasons for doing it.
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The values are the important principles, important beliefs, ways of behaving and seeing the world that connect everyone. They represent how the business does business.
The podcast is packed with creative facilitation suggestions so that your session is interactive, engaging and generates the input and ideas of the whole team.
If you'd like to read more about this, you can see my blog on how to run this sort of session here.
This podcast is all about innovation culture, and I am really pleased to welcome Mark Brown. Mark is Chief Executive of the Dolphin Index, a business that helps individuals and teams be more creative and shape more successful workplaces. Mark is also a published author on innovation and a real superstar in the innovation world.
Mark explains how he is particularly interested in the work that referred to The Three Principles, which is a sort of DIY guide to having a quieter mind at work. He thinks that if you look at a lot of businesses it’s actually unhelpful to have a busy, rushing mind all the time. Mark shares that by being a bit quieter and more centred, people actually perform better, make better decisions and are more creative.
Mark shares his first memory of being interested in innovation. He says: “When I try to go back the story, I probably go back to age 18, when I remember standing by a particular gate at a house we had in Wales, and making a decision that went along the lines of, I am not going to believe anything, because so often when you believe something, people seem to become too certain and stuck. So, I sort of made my first vow, to try to think openly, but of course, what I didn’t realise, is the decision not to believe anything was in itself a fixed mindset, so I was already caught in my own dogma! I’ve got a dogmatic dislike of dogma, and that may have something to do with my family. That was one angle. Some people seem to be more open, and some people a bit more closed.”
Mark explains that in many jobs he thinks it is now possible for people to have really quite brilliant lives at work because they are deeply engaged, in a way that drives a brilliant organisation and helps to create a more brilliant world.
He references Daniel Pink’s book, called Drive, which is a summary of the research on motivation that shows clearly that if you give people autonomy, an opportunity to learn, and a purpose larger than profit, they really are unstoppable.
In our discussion, Mark also mentions Kelly’s Repertory Grid, a tool that helps us to see the 'personal constructs' which we use to view the world. Everyone has their own unique model.
To contact Mark, his website is www.dolphinindex.org or email mark@dolphinindex.org.
This podcast is all about leading innovation, and I am really pleased to be joined by Phil Marsland, founder and director of Blue Tree Consulting.
We talk about one of my favourite books, The Writer’s Map by Huw Lewis-Jones, before discussing Phil’s leadership expertise. Phil says:
“I have got all the certificates, the bells and whistles, however, through my experience, what I have learnt is that you need to be pragmatic, in terms of what organisations need. So, part of how I have positioned my business is just under four words. It is listening, diagnosing, creating and implementing. So, what those 4 words say is that I will endeavour to really listen, and really understand, what is going on in an organisation, and I will conduct both bespoke psychometric tests, as well as my structured diagnostic process, to come up with a picture of what is happening in the organisation. In sharing that I will offer to create solutions that might be to improve leadership capability, perhaps management, and more generally, the overall culture of the business, and then through myself and a number of associates we will implement the appropriate solutions...Really one size fits none. You need to understand each organisation and come up with solutions that fit and work for them.
Phil tells us about his business, Blue Tree Consulting, and how he came up with the name and metaphor. He says: “I think my business, as you kindly introduced at the start is called Blue Tree Consulting, and that is a metaphor for my beliefs about business really. So, the roots of the tree are really the organisational purpose. The strength of the trunk is really the leadership capability. Then as you move into the lower boughs, that is all about your whole approach to people. You can put the HR badge onto it if you want, but it is really about how we are treating people in our business. Then as you move up into the leaf canopy, you are looking at growing management capability, for managing not just process and performance, but also individuals, and around all of that is your people capability. Now the reason why it’s a tree is not just because I like trees, which I do, is it conveys to me that whole sense of working as one unit, and everything being aligned. So, one of my beliefs that I really push with my clients is that whatever you do, whether it is growing leadership capability, or training managers how to do a disciplinary, or identifying talent, all that has to be aligned to your organisational purpose.”Before making the leap to set up his own business, Phil was Head of HR at Portakabin. He shares his tips and advice for moving from a corporate job to self-employment. His recommendations include these words of advice:“Try and create a network of support around yourself, whether that is through associates, mentors, you know, to help you along the way, people who have made this journey, people who can give you real pragmatic advice, sometimes emotional support.I certainly felt I had to figure out how much money I needed to earn, what sort of buffer amount of cash that I had, how long that was going to last, and how things were going to work from a financial point of view, in a worst case scenario, but in a best case scenario as well." Thank you very much, Phil, for a great conversation. I really enjoyed spending time with you on my Idea Time podcast.
Paul Slater, Founder and Director of leading business growth consultancy brands The Growth Shed and The Change Shed joins me on my Idea Time - www.ideatime.co.uk - podcast to discuss how businesses can achieve compound growth by combining key initiatives in specifically targeted areas.
Big company thinking adapted for small companies
Paul has led change and growth initiatives as a consultant working for brands such as Velux, Oakley and Estee Lauder. He has taken his recipe for success and adapted it to help small to medium sized businesses accelerate and sustain profitable growth, in a way that combines just the right level of structure with time-efficient, pragmatic diagnosis and action planning to create an individually tailored roadmap for every company he works with.
Compound effect Paul helps businesses to achieve great results from compounding initiatives – 2 or 3 carefully targeted plans implemented simultaneously generate much higher levels of success than when they are each actioned one at a time.
Keeping up with change and development
Paul works with his clients to help them keep up with changes and developments in growth and marketing and shares his tips for success. These tips include being really clear about change leadership, and we had a great conversation about leaders using their emotional intelligence to help people through the change curve.
If you have any questions and want to get in touch with Paul, you can email him at paul@thegrowthshed.com.
Anthony Main, Founder and Director of one of the UK’s top UK mobile app development companies, The Distance, joins me on my Idea Time - www.ideatime.co.uk - podcast to talk apps, business growth, entrepreneurship and more.
The Distance specialises in creating intuitive bespoke mobile solutions for their customers on iOS and Android smartphones and tablets.
The company is one of the longest serving UK app developers, having celebrated its 10th birthday this year. Anthony and his team have been crafting apps since the first iPhone launched. Over the many years they have worked with a wide range of brands from household names to global enterprises and has outstanding Clutch reviews – Clutch is like the TripAdvisor for apps.
Starting as a side hustle (before side hustle was a thing!) Anthony worked in digital agencies and started working on his own projects in the evenings and at weekends. Demand for his services grew and he set up a small team working from his garage. Since then the business has gone from strength to strength and now employs around 20 people, all based in York in the UK. Ingredients of Success Anthony shares how his business success is down to the key ingredients of resilience, being very thick skinned, working hard, staying focused and a non-negotiable emphasis on customer service excellence.
He also shares how investing in his own leadership and entrepreneurship development, plus the support of a close network of like-minded entrepreneurs in different sectors have helped him to grow the business.
Thinking of an App for Your Business? Anthony shares his honest and invaluable top tips for you if you’re thinking of developing an app for your own business. He also strongly recommends the book How to Build a Billion Dollar App, by George Berkowski.
May King Tsang, the #FOMO creator, joins me on my Idea Time - www.ideatime.co.uk - podcast to talk about events, Twitter and getting genuine engagement on social media.
She shares how she creates buzz and excitement around events for delegates and people who are thinking about buying tickets in the future.
May King started by live tweeting and then approached social media superstars and creatives Andrew and Pete to help them promote their Atomicon conference, to include Instagram and Facebook as well as Twitter. Her results spoke for themselves and since then she has been working with other influencers such as Janet Murray, for major festivals and more, making a quantifiable difference.
Every ‘No’ is a Step Towards an Incredible ‘Yes’ We talk about pitching, the fear of hearing ‘no’, imposter syndrome and May King shares her tips on how to overcome it.
She reflects on her successes and failures, her fear of rejection and now she believes that every no leads to the next, incredible yes. She bounced back from a short series of knock backs and has come back stronger. There is no failure, only learning and resilience is key when you’re growing a business, as is hanging out with like-minded souls. May King says that we are in business to make an impact, and that helps to not make any rejection or failure about you.
Top Twitter Tips for Business May King’s top Twitter tip is to listen, engage and not to sell. Social media marketing has really changed how businesses need to approach sales, as customers now have greater power and more freedom to choose.
It’s important to get involved in conversations, and really engage with chats and events rather than just spend time ‘lurking’. Also ‘documenting’ any events you attend, using the event hashtag, also leads to new contacts and opportunities.
May King says that Twitter is possibly the most misunderstood of all the social media platforms, but if you create a list and focus on the people and themes that interest you, Twitter can be really useful for business.
The #FOMO Process May King explains how she creates pre-FOMO as well as live FOMO for a podcast conference in the north, culminating in a movement and community of delegates, and amplifying the voices of the podcasters attending. Facebook groups featuring content such as delegate video interviews before the event help people to get to know each other in advance. On the event day itself, May King provides live interviews and social media coverage across different platforms. Her content is real, showcasing the real vibe rather than a polished, less authentic version of events.
Writing a Book We give a shout out to Tim Lewis from Stoneham Press who has been mentoring May King in the creation of her book – from May King Mistakes, to May King it Happen, and discuss May King’s book-in-progress and the forthcoming launch of my Idea Time book.
If you have any questions and want to get in touch with May King, you can contact her on any social platform - she’s May King Tsang or May King T and easy to find on Twitter, Instagram, LinkedIn and Facebook.
Andrew Palmer, Founder and Director of leading communications consultancy The Gravitas Matrix, joins me on my Idea Time podcast to discuss how he left a senior corporate role to tap into his entrepreneurial ideas and start his own successful business.
Self-confidence to build your authentic personal brand
Andrew helps business leaders and entrepreneurs to stand out in a crowded and competitive market, leading to significant performance improvements by increasing confidence, impact and authority. On this podcast we have a great conversation about how to build your self-confidence and skills in networking, video and on-stage presentation to promote your personal brand and increase visibility, enabling you to maintain your competitive edge through a compelling narrative.
Trust and authenticity
We discuss the key ingredients of trust in business relationships: credibility, reliability, openness, and a genuine desire for a win-win solution, and the important role of authentic personal branding when it comes to trust.
Keeping up with change and development
Andrew works with his clients to help them keep up with changes and developments in social media – including video – and shares his top tips for video success. These tips include being really clear about what you want to say and why; making audio and good lighting (natural daylight is fine) a priority; the importance of practising.
Idea Time – Andrew’s Big, Hairy, Audacious Goal Andrew is a member of my Idea Time Academy. One of his big, hairy, audacious goals (BHAGs) was to successfully transition from a corporate senior leadership role to founder and director of his own thriving business.
He explains how the Idea Time programme helped him to make the leap by truly seeing the potential and possibilities.
If you have any questions and want to get in touch with Andrew, you can email him at Andrew.palmer@thegravitasmatrix.com.
Andrew tells us lots more in the podcast. Have a listen for yourself and let me know what you think.
What a great podcast – thanks Andrew!
And if you’d like to content me direct, please email me at jo@ideatime.co.uk. Thank you for listening!
Andy joins Dr. Jo North on her Idea Time podcast to discuss; his business, his BHAG and his experience with Idea Time.
The danger of not changing your updating your strategy in an ever-changing, unpredictable world Businesses need to be agile and dynamic to move forward, whether it be with consumer demand, technological advances or Industry 4.0.
At the start of Andy’s career after leaving university with a degree in Product Design Management, he started working for an engineering firm in Leeds. The firm paid for Andy to invest in his management training, where he completed an MBA over 3.5 years. Even though the company paid for his training, they weren’t ready to take his advice and make changes, throughout management and lower level parts of the organisation. Andy had all this new knowledge and they just weren’t ready to listen to him. He had so much energy, enthusiasm and drive and wanted to make use of it, so Andy left to work for his friend who owned a design and print business.
The engineering business that Andy used to work for has since been reduced in size, and doing the opposite of growing – this is what can and will happen if businesses don’t keep up to date with new innovations and change their strategy with the ever-changing, unpredictable world.
Starting his own business Whilst working for design and print business, Andy and his friend noticed a gap in an expanding and fast developing market – website development. Andy worked for this business for 7 years before deciding to break free and start something of his own – Ascensor.
Andy started Ascensor nearly 12 years ago. Today, as Andy says, “they build everything, as long as it’s online”, such as bespoke software development, all aspects of digital marketing, driving traffic towards websites etc. – Andy is a strong believer it doesn’t matter how good your website is, if nobody finds it then it is of no benefit.
Keeping up with change and development Ascensor are at the forefront of change. As a digital marketing agency, they are always being asked for the latest things and this is so exciting. They get to work with different types of businesses across different sectors and are learning something new every day.
Turning your side hustle into your full-time job Andy talks about how doing something you love is important. You need to be passionate enough about a topic to constantly want to learn new advances and get ahead of the game. Making your side hustle your full-time job requires time, effort and dedication. Andy then goes on to explain how Ascensor have recently reached a new peak of expansion.
Idea Time – Andy’s BHAG This is where Idea Time comes in. Andy’s big, hairy, audacious goal was to move into new office building by September 2019 – something that they are on track with, as they are currently working on the legal contracts for the big move.
Andy explains that working with Jo helped him to make the leap, as when he mapped out the pros and cons of the move, it made him realise that standing still was more of a risk to the business than making the move. He said that “just by having the confidence, everything has just fallen into place.” Andy is now having the “best months, month after month” and says it is all because Idea Time made him realise that “it is so important to take the time out to focus on the business and yourself”. It’s essential to “really thinking about the things that matter, and, by doing that, often doors open that you didn’t expect”.
How businesses can get the most out of working with a digital marketing agency Andy explains how it is important that customers understand the time that it takes to develop software that works with the expanding list of appliances that use the internet, from the obvious ones such as computers and mobiles to the probably less expected, fridges and washing machines.
Customers have to understand that time is money and if we are designing software that is specifically unique to both their business and an appliance that we haven’t worked with before, it is going to cost more than designing an app for a phone or tablet. Personally, I love the complex jobs as it gets me thinking and learning new things!
The other thing that businesses need to understand is that we need quality images to work with. Images are really important on websites as they create the first impression. Andy explains the issue with slow loading websites, which have poor quality images, that are not accessible on a phone, and how these types of websites will do more harm than good for a business.
A website is like a shop window for a business – it’s somewhere where customers will do due diligence on you. For a small investment on some good quality photography and getting the content and copyrighting right, and also having one of our websites (which is extremely cost effective from a bill perspective) and some sort of digital marketing to go with it, is the way for a business to get, certainly on a smaller level, a really good quality, but cost effective website.
Free starter guide Andy has created a free starter guides which you can download from www.airwebsites.co.uk. The guides are on there as well as range of various packages at different price points.
The guides are as below:
- Essentials Guide: covers everything about Air Websites; what they are, the benefits, and how the process works
- Google Ads Guide: provides you with tips and hints for setting up ad campaigns, and how to get optimal return on your budget
- Local SEO Guide: explains how you can grow your business, by optimising your website for local search results.
There are over 100 case studies on the website for you to have a look through, so you can see different types of templates that are available.
If you have any questions and want to get in touch with Andy, you can email him at andrew@ascensor.co.uk.
Andy tells us lots more in the podcast, but I don’t want to give too much away. Have a listen for yourself and let me know what you think at jo@ideatime.co.uk
What a great podcast – thanks Andy!