Engine Room Business Innovation: Recent Episodes
MIchelle Chafin
As part of the 'Change Agent' Manager Acceleration Program, the Managers and Future Leaders are provided with over 40+ tools and resources that they can download to be more productive in their role which is a huge benefit to the business.
They can also use these tools to coach others in the business.
One of these tools is the Cost Benefit Ratio - they use this as part of their Business Improvement Project.
Glenn Taylor explains how to use this tool and the benefits to the business.
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Positive energy strengthens connections, increases productivity and generates openness to change.
Change agents monitor their own energy levels and influence the energy of others in the team.
Mindset is our greatest asset, and a growth mindset is key to influencing and driving change.
Change agents embrace a growth mindset and influence others to embrace a growth mindset also.
Vision
This is when they realised that they had not slowed down to think deeply enough about their vision. This was a Powerful topic for participants - to ‘lift their eyes’ so to speak and tease out the vision, strategies and goals for the business, and to then move onto developing an action plan for the next 12 months. Observing the participants working through this process was gold for me.
Finance
The power of understanding the financial levers for a business - for example measuring and working the GP%, and the cash cycle - because cash is ultimately king. The 3rd ah-huh was the importance of understanding finances deeply enough to enable the right questions to ask of the internal finance person and external accountant.
Systems
They all recognised the power of systematising their business and that it is quite normal for businesses to grow ahead of their systems. A common dilemma for business owners is not knowing where to start to systematise their business - the coaching session really helped to clarify this - we worked with them separately on what they deemed as the highest priority process. This is when they learnt the practical application of the systems methodologies that Glenn has used over his 20+ years of business coaching.
People
The Engine Room HR wheel was the gold nugget here - The 24 pieces of the jigsaw model made the complex intangible topic of people management so much easier to comprehend and to know what elements to focus on in the short to medium term.
Marketing
Marketing is one topic in business that can be seen as non urgent and therefore can be delayed until a rainy day. Ironically some of the urgent priorities that gets in the way of marketing is a byproduct of inadequate marketing some time prior - for example dealing with a difficult client or submitting a quote/tender to a non ideal client in order to feed the work pipeline. The participants main ah-huh from this topic is that effective marketing will attract more of the right clients at the right rate. And Engine Room we suggest that two thirds of most business challenges evaporate if the right clients arrive at the right time
As business leaders we want to succeed, so creating a self-reflective environment can lead to the creativity, energy and motivation that we need for that success. The more people know themselves and others, the more the business can achieve through increased individual productivity and enhanced collaboration.
Glenn and Michelle talk about Building an Innovative Culture, Changes we have seen and how we need to hear others perspectives to invest and grow together.
Glenn Taylor and Nick Burnett discuss the future of education and the changes we are going to see.
Stacey Fall from Weeding Women talks about the importance of learning, asking great questions and gaining great breakthroughs when learning from other business owners.