By Wayne O'Neill
As a 30-year sales manager for a big corporation, my dad used to advise his team, “Lead the pack. But if you are not in first place, then stay comfortably in the middle.” But with tremendous competition and pressures to win deals, organizations are no longer safe with strategies that keep you in the middle of the road. As Jim Hightower, the colorful Texas populist, said, “There’s nothing in the middle of the road but yellow stripes and dead armadillos.” It is no longer enough to be pretty good at everything and just chase any deal that crosses your path. Continuing to do things the same way will not produce new and better results. In order to win in today’s tough market and transform your company to top-line growth, you and your team need to be motivated to change and take the necessary action to gain the competitive edge and build sustainable accounts faster. You need to know how to motivate your team to excel.
By Wayne O'Neill
In the athletic world, you win by crushing your opponent. But in the business world of cross-cultural negotiation and global economy, you win by learning secrets from experts. Here are nine secrets for negotiation from Dr. Karen Walch, professor at Thunderbird School of Global Management who specializes in international negotiation, cultural competencies and the global market…
By Wayne O'Neill
Have you ever wanted to draw a line with people in your life and say “Do NOT cross this line!” On the other hand, have you ever had to cross the line or work around someone’s boundary in order to make progress in a relationship, business and organization? How can you set healthy boundaries and also maneuver around boundaries without destroying relationships personally or professionally?…
By Wayne O'Neill
Building a cohesive, productive team is challenging. Even the best teams struggle to improve effectiveness. Some teams have individual team members who are excellent in their own silos, but are not that interested in working as a team or achieving team goals. How do you get them to look to the forest beyond the trees? Other teams have weak team members who don’t pull their fair share for the team and lack genuine teamwork. How do you move a team from dysfunctional to productive?
By Wayne O'Neill
How can the rising percentage of women executives benefit your bottom line? What do women executives do differently that positively affects the bottom line for organizations? According to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, 43% of management, business & financial operations executives are women. Understanding gender differences in management styles can benefit your bottom line…
By Wayne O'Neill
When things aren’t working, change needs to happen. For change to happen, someone has to act differently. That sounds simple. The challenge is first to figure out what to change and then to motivate people to want to start behaving in a new way or to move in the new direction that you want them to go. You can announce changes. You can explain how the changes will take place and why they are important, but if you can’t motivate people to actually change, you will meet resistance or failure. By applying the change management concepts similar to what is presented in the book, Switch: How to Change Things When Change is Hard, by Chip Heath and Dan Heath, we have found counterintuitive ways to help our clients make transformative changes successfully.
By Wayne O'Neill
Have you ever unknowingly sabotaged your own ability to build trust and loyalty? You are not alone. This happens in relationships and in business. Left untouched, these failures can lead to losing your business or your relationship. Implementing these powerful practices at pivotal moments can transform fears into triumphs, trust and loyalty.
By Wayne O'Neill
You only get one chance at a first impression. How do you craft that first impression to make it impactful? Coaching and preparation are the keys. Knowing your target client’s style can make all the difference.
By Wayne O'Neill
Each of us has attended tedious, boring or ineffective meetings that we dreaded and couldn’t wait to finish. Each leader knows the importance of meetings and wants them to make an impact. But how do you do that? The powerful and thought-provoking book, Death by Meeting, by Patrick Lencioni centers itself around solving one of the most painful problems in business. It offers a blueprint for how to eliminate waste and frustration among your teams and create environments of dynamic, passionate, and focused engagement.
By Wayne O'Neill
Today’s great companies have more than profit in mind. Great companies today understand that their business is an intrinsic part of society. They invest in the future while actively building on people and society. According to ongoing research on admired and financially successful companies in more than 20 countries on four continents, Rosabeth Moss Kanter […]
