Nothing is Certain but Death and Taxes?
The origin of the phrase is generally attributed to Benjamin Franklin. In a letter written to Jean-Baptiste Le Roy in 1789, Franklin says: “Our new Constitution is now established and has an appearance that promises permanency; but in this world nothing can be said to be certain, except death and taxes.” However, an even earlier version of this sentiment was written by Daniel Defoe in his Political History of the Devil, 1726: “Things as certain as death and taxes, can be more firmly believ’d.” (source: grammarist.com)
Our friends forgot to add one more thing: unpredictability. Some would encapsulate this as ‘change’, but unpredictability is what forces it. As the world evolves, nations grow, technology improves and knowledge increases, we’re capable of changing more of what goes on in our lives. We spend the rest of the time catching up.
Remember how the first airline hijacking back in 1948 changed airline travel? Between 1929-1957 there were fewer than 20 hijackings, but from 1958-1967 this increased to roughly 40. 1968-1972 saw 326. The terrorist attacks of 11 September 2001 began to transform air travel in waves. In the years that followed each fresh plot exposed an unforeseen weakness that required a new rule. First came locked cockpit doors, more armed air marshals and bans on sharp objects. Later, suspicion fell on bottles of liquid, shoes and laptops. Flying hasn’t returned to ‘normal’, nor has it established a new routine.
Major technological shifts that used to take hundreds of years or (at least) decades to spread around the world (e.g., the printing press, telegraph, telephone and television) now become ‘normal’ in just a few years. 20 years ago, modern smartphones did not exist. Today more than half the world’s population carries at least one.
Any leader who thinks their organisation or industry is immune to the increasing pace of change is unlikely to last long. Their problem is how to predict, react and cope? Just look at the arrival of COVID-19, where things are changing daily.
Change isn’t all bad, when we consider some of the benefits that come with today’s predictable unpredictability. Many people have always liked to work from home and now it’s considered part of ‘the new normal’. Remote services can be cheaper and more accessible and will grow. Other advances will occur in diagnostic techniques and (hopefully) the reduction of global warming.
Leaders need to learn to cope with this.
I’ve spent more than half my life delivering change in different world markets from the most developed to “emerging” economies. With a wealth of international experience in international financial services around the world running different operations and lending businesses, I started my own Consultancy to provide solutions for improving performance, productivity and risk management. I work with individuals, small businesses, charities, quoted companies and academic institutions across the world. An international speaker, trainer, author and fund-raiser, I can be contacted by email. My website provides a full picture of my portfolio of services. For strategic questions that you should be asking yourself, follow me at @wkm610.
Labels: Crisis Management, Customer Care, Financial, Leadership, Productivity, Risk, Strategy
Think of the Future
Communication is key in any business. Instructions, reports, press interviews, training all involve passing information to others.
One key part of communication I stress continually with clients is ‘communication with the future’. The key is passing information on in a way that it’s clear to them.
Much has been written about clear spoken and written communication and checking that people have understood. The situation I’m thinking about relates more to someone reading a document 1-2 years after it was written and still being able to understand it, despite not having been present at the time the events took place. This typically happens when auditors check over a business’ accounts before ‘signing off’ on them. Another example would be from my experience as a lending banker when I had to read credit proposals written in past years to get a full understanding of risk, exposure and the evolution of the business.
My focus tends to be on supposing that the person reading something 1 – 2 years down the line who doesn’t have the knowledge of current events doesn’t understand it and needs a clear explanation. Hence the key to preparing any document that may be used in the future is that the person reading it a year or so later has no clue of what happened and needs to work things out from the start.
We need to think of the future. We need to make sure that what we leave, others will understand. Notes on accounting documents, Client Relationship Management systems, etc, help auditors and future colleagues know what’s going on.
We need above to avoid situations where a ‘key person’ with the ‘critical knowledge’ is no longer with our business (for whatever reason) and we find ourselves unable to explain ‘What happened’ to the authorities, auditors or our customers. This reflects badly on our businesses and processes and could result in regulatory penalties, legal action or loss of reputation.
Some of the best advice I ever received was from one of my university tutors: ‘Imagine the person reading your assignment is an idiot’. He then went on to add, somewhat self-deprecatingly, ‘Especially if it’s me.’
I’ve spent more than half my life delivering change in different world markets from the most developed to “emerging” economies. With a wealth of international experience in international financial services around the world running different operations and lending businesses, I started my own Consultancy to provide solutions for improving performance, productivity and risk management. I work with individuals, small businesses, charities, quoted companies and academic institutions across the world. An international speaker, trainer, author and fund-raiser, I can be contacted by email. My website provides a full picture of my portfolio of services. For strategic questions that you should be asking yourself, follow me at @wkm610.
Labels: Customer Care, Leadership, Productivity, Teamwork
Remote Working – Here to Stay?
The country where I live and work is moving out of ‘pandemic’ and into ‘endemic’ procedures as it’s achieved a vaccination rate of over 80% of the general population. With the vaccination of 12–17-year-olds having received their first dose in November, this rate will increase dramatically as they get their second dose.
The country is slowly getting back on its economic feet after 2 waves of coronavirus and – contagious and dangerous third waves permitting – can now look to how things will go.
One thing is for certain: there will, of necessity, be more ‘remote’ activity. This will mean that many organisations will have to develop rules, guidelines and policies for Working from Home (WFH). Most of us are used to the concept of showing up at the workplace and have been brought up in the tradition that the boss has to see us for use to get raises, promotions and other rewards.
The situation has changed now, in that remote working, once the preserve of a select few, will now become commonplace, particularly if governments and businesses are to continue to operate. The excuse of ‘social distancing measures’ to justify substandard performance will not be tolerated much longer. As technology has improved, so has the ability of many to WFH.
Organisations will need to deal with:
- People wanting to WFH as a ‘right’ rather than a ‘privilege’
- Putting in place technical and logistical support for those working remotely
- Judging and promoting workers effectively through their outputs rather than the fact that they turn up before and leave after the boss
- ‘Office politics’ becoming a thing of the past
- Needing less physical space in which to work
I’m not advocating a total absence of all workers all the time. For one thing, we’ll all need to meet an ‘brainstorm’ and for another, most of us enjoy being with colleagues.
The next few years will see a radical shift in workplace and customer patterns. The more that ca be delivered remotely, the better a business’ chances of surviving.
How can we all adapt, based on our circumstances?
I’ve spent more than half my life delivering change in different world markets from the most developed to “emerging” economies. With a wealth of international experience in international financial services around the world running different operations and lending businesses, I started my own Consultancy to provide solutions for improving performance, productivity and risk management. I work with individuals, small businesses, charities, quoted companies and academic institutions across the world. An international speaker, trainer, author and fund-raiser, I can be contacted by email. My website provides a full picture of my portfolio of services. For strategic questions that you should be asking yourself, follow me at @wkm610.
Labels: Career, Customer Care, Leadership, Productivity, Selling, Strategy, Teamwork
COVID - No Longer an Excuse?
As I write this, the world is now under the threat of a new ‘omicron’ strain of coronavirus. From what I gather, it’s contagious BUT, if victims have been vaccinated, symptoms are milder.
Some of the problems arising from COVD that we’ve noted are:
- Many towns/cities in the UK (and other countries) are simply not “designed” for social distancing.
- Many businesses face the same problem.
- Travel has changed and will continue to change, with the results being higher prices, masks, blood tests, and last-minute alterations.
- Business travel will never recover to pre-COVID-19 levels
- More use will be made of IT and “big data” in tracking apps on our smartphones, (with all the privacy concerns that entails)…
- Health services need to gear up for another potentially deadly variant that is resitant to current vaccines.
- China will continue to face world scrutiny and (possibly) sanctions.
- Supply chains will no longer be centred on China.
- The world economy may never recover to pre-COVID-19 levels.
In the aftermath of 9/11, the world adopted a “piecemeal approach” to security threats as, quite naturally, some countries felt they were more at risk than others. In the face of COVID, we’re all equal and no one is totally ‘safe’.
What this means for the workplace is that we can’t keep using ‘COVID’ as a catch-all excuse. My question is, ‘Is COVID still a valid excuse for degraded service?’ We’ve had two years of living with it AND are likely to have to live with it for the foreseeable future. Governments, people and businesses use the phrase ‘the new normal’ as part of their daily vocabulary. We all need to understand, accept and change our way of living and working to fit this.
We’re seeing slow progress, particularly as the take-up rate of vaccinations grows in world populations and immunity levels increase. There remains a huge gap in the ‘developing world’. This needs to be plugged – fast.
There’s also a small (but vocal) minority of ‘anti-vaxxers’ who need to make a choice: be vaccinated or be excluded from many of the activities you take for granted (they’re not a ‘legal right’).
The question for businesses, especially those that need people to come in (and I don’t mean ‘essential’ businesses like supermarkets), is how they adapt to serve. This will mean rules for both employees and customers alike to protect both from the other.
The news for omicron’s effects is that, for those who have been vaccinated, it’s a mild case. This will be our target – to get to the stage where having coronavirus becomes like a dose of seasonal ‘flu’. Once this becomes the norm, we may well see business returning to ‘Business as Usual’.
I’ve spent more than half my life delivering change in different world markets from the most developed to “emerging” economies. With a wealth of international experience in international financial services around the world running different operations and lending businesses, I started my own Consultancy to provide solutions for improving performance, productivity and risk management. I work with individuals, small businesses, charities, quoted companies and academic institutions across the world. An international speaker, trainer, author and fund-raiser, I can be contacted by email. My website provides a full picture of my portfolio of services. For strategic questions that you should be asking yourself, follow me at @wkm610.
Labels: Crisis Management, Customer Care, Leadership, Productivity, Selling, Strategy
