Recognition Roundtable presents Shameless You! and Workplace Flexibility

Wed, Feb 24th, 2010 12:00 pm
Bob Drewel Building, 1st Floor, east, Public Mtg Rm #1
3000 Rockefeller Ave., Everett, WA 98201 US

Part One: Shameless You! We are fortunate to kick off our meeting with a presentation by Tracy Corley, Chief Strategist at Tracy A. Corley & Associates and Shameless You! Tracy's session, Shameless You! encourages employees to drop their shame so they can live, work, and play with confidence and integrity. This program helps individuals build personal strategies by identifying, acknowledging and accepting their strengths, preferences, and values. Tracy will lead us in a discussion about how a shameless workforce can lead to better alignment of personal and organizational values, one of the components of a flexible, effective workplace.

Part Two: Does Workplace Flexibility Matter? Theresa Chambers will present information on a) the workplace flexibility movement and how it is viewed as a business strategy to attract, retain and engage talented employees and b) the Alfred P. Sloan Awards for Business Excellence in Workplace Flexibility. Visit www.whenworkworks.org for more info. Deadline for nominations is March 5.

This event is for organization hiring leaders and managers who want to build and maintain great places to work for a talented workforce.

If you would like to attend, contact Theresa Chambers, Chief Motiviation Officer, Recognition Works, 206-353-8267 or theresa at recognitionworks dot net

Is there a Worker's Comp crisis? You decide.

During a Friday morning legislative update with WashACE, we discussed a few issues including education, tax changes, and worker's compensation. We reviewed how the recent election in Massachusetts and tax changes in Oregon impact Washington legislative policy. For me, a few key items stood out that will have a major impact on small business.

First, Washington business taxes comprise nearly 52% of all state and local tax revenue for the state (see the numbers). The success of small business is critical to the success of the state. Lawmakers should be working harder than ever to ensure that small businesses succeed.There is real concern that recent changes in Oregon could signal higher taxes for corporations. With businesses already struggling, an even higher tax burden will make it difficult for small employers to hire and could even drive them out of business.


Then we heard about the proposed changes in worker's comp. In addition to a controversially high rate, the program runs the risk of insolvency, which could trigger an insolvency tax. One small business owner shared that in 2010, her tax rate went up by 347%, though her company is claims free. This increase means that she cannot hire because of the increased cost. Bringing on new employees would risk her company's insolvency.

Washington desperately needs job growth so that consumer confidence will increase and improve the demand for the products and services of small businesses. The governor's proposed tax incentives will help offset the costs of hiring in the future, but small businesses need real breaks now to get Washingtonians back to work.

Our economic development leaders agree that small businesses will once again lead us out of this recession. We hope that our legislature will give them the opportunity to do that through job creation and innovation. The goal is to find a way to encourage job growth and keep your economy going without taxing small companies out of existence and sending large employers elsewhere.

What's so good about going green?

I've been hearing a lot both for and against the green economy. From the positive side of the aisle, the green economy aims to bring better energy efficiency and environmental stewardship into the consciousness of the American people. The country lags far behind the efforts of many other industrialized nations, and the green economy represents one of the areas in which the United States has all the financial, human, educational, and natural resources required to lead in almost all areas of green economics: clean energy, sustainable buildings, smart grids, sustainable agriculture, and closed-loop waste management.

From the negative side, the green hype frustrates many citizens. They don't know what to believe as public information and outreach use manipulated scientific data and half truths to tell only part of the story. Furthermore, accounts of green-washing furthers the frustration, leading individuals and groups to strengthen their opposition to green economy efforts. They don't want their tax dollars spent on initiatives in which don't have complete confidence.

The reality of the green economy cannot be avoided. Clean tech and sustainable industries have reached the tipping point, and that means that clean tech is here to stay. Whether you're an environmentalist on the forefront of green innovation or a climate change skeptic, many gains can be realized in the business world from the rise of the green economy:

• It's good for long-term growth. The green economy's focus on efficiency and sustainability employs practices of accountability and consciousness that all businesses can use as we reshape our economy. Shady business practices of the past show themselves quickly to the transparent environment fueled by the information age, and inefficiencies will cripple any poorly-run business. The conservation of resources and a focus on sustainability means that businesses have the tools and resources needed to make long-term plans for growth and viability. The focus on short term gains is no longer enough to build confidence in the success and brand promises of an organization.
• It's good for jobs and economic development. When regions focus on sustainability, its inhabitants receive clean air, fresh drinking water, renewable energy sources, reliable transportation, and overall prosperity. The rise in clean technologies, innovations, and practices brings new opportunities as the economy shifts from industrial age to information age, resulting in replacement of lost jobs due to dramatic changes in flailing or failing industry sectors. Our workplaces require healthy, well-educated citizens to meet the demand of changing jobs. Else, we will have to rely on imported and outsourced workforces to supply our workforce need.
• It's good for the environment. Yes, the environment is still important in all this. Former President Teddy Roosevelt first established Pelican Island in Florida as a national wildlife refuge, and the United States still leads the world in a great wealth of environmental diversity and beauty that can be found in few other places of the world (except potentially Russia). By protecting these natural resources, we have a viable asset for future generations to leverage and enjoy, unspoiled and minimally impacted through conservation and preservation that results from sustainable governance in all the ways we live, work, and play.
  
• It's good for health. With cancer and obesity rates out of control and on the rise, the American people can use as much help as it can get to improve health. I have four friends under the age of 40 going through chemo right now. I'm not going to fight against better-quality food, air, and water to keep our citizens healthy. Good health keeps people productive and happy. With healthy citizens, the green economy focuses our resources on supporting health and well-being instead of reactive social programs and overburdened, under-performing health care systems. We need a populace that contributes to, not drains, our national prosperity.
  

Going green is good for our businesses, our communities, and our environment. With businesses focused on long-term growth, economic development, clean environments, and healthy citizens, we can expect increased opportunities and more profitable businesses. The shift to a green economy affords real opportunities for new and existing businesses and individuals. More opportunities mean increased employment, lower violence rates, healthier communities, and a vibrant tax base. Whether you're pro-green or a green-skeptic, the green economy is here, and it's now up to smart leaders and business owners to dig through the hype to find the best opportunities to survive and thrive.

Rebuild Haiti and Your Career with Shameless You!

I usually don't talk much about our Shameless You! personal development program on the TsuluViews blog, but the current situation both at home and in Haiti demands that I do something. As I see what's happening in the current job market and with the tremendous suffering in Haiti, I realize that it's tough to have confidence when you don't have the basic tools needed for survival.

To help our unemployed and underemployed thrive at home, and to help the people of Haiti, I am donating a portion of all Shameless You! product sales to the American Red Cross.

For each order of our popular Shameless Self Promotion Audio CD and Workbook combination, we will send $5 to the American Red Cross. If you order the products separately, we will donate $2 for each Workbook or Audio CD purchase.

And shipping on all three options is free.

Just place your order by 2/1/2010, and you can:

• Toot your own horn with confidence and integrity.
• Overcome intimidation in your personal and professional life.
• Craft an elevator pitch so that employers and clients get it.
  
• Rebuild your career with actionable tools.
  
• Help the people of Haiti get the resources they need to rebuild their lives.

Don't miss out on this opportunity to rebuild both at home and abroad.

Order now at www.tsuluwerks.com/shamelessstore.

Start the New Year with New Revenues

As we've seen throughout 2009, our current economic climate has encouraged organizations to get creative. In my program The Profit Wrangler: Wrangling New Profits from Existing Assets, organizations identify their Golden Nuggets and the Action Lassos they need to generate new revenue streams. Golden Nuggets are the assets within an organization that have the potential to realize revenue for the organization. Many organizations develop process and acquire assets during the course of doing business every day and don't even realize it. They develop a new system or hire a specialized group of people to fill an immediate need. Without realizing it, they have uncovered Golden Nuggets. Until someone helps them mine and refine the discovery, the organization might never tap into these profit centers.

All organizations possess one or more of six Golden Nuggets:

• Products. Most folks think of products when they think of assets. They look at the inventory they have on hand and think about how to move those products and turn them into dollars. What companies overlook is using those products in ways not outlined in their business plans. As the market changes, a company has to be ready to think of new ways to leverage the products that they create or have in inventory. Through new uses, existing products can bring in dollars from new market segments.
  
• Services. Services are another part that folks don't always think of as a potential revenue source. Of course, service-based businesses have a core service that they provide for a fee. There might also be ways that product-based businesses can replicate their customer service or fulfillment system for other manufacturers. Or a service business might have value-added services that they have previously offered for free or almost intuitively. Those additional services can be transformed into a new source of revenue for an enterprising organization.
  
• Talent. Many organizations attract a very specific talent pool. This talent either fits with their culture or they possess unique skills and ways of thinking that apply specifically to their product or service offering. That group of highly specialized architects might be able to leverage their skills to do more than design assisted living facilities. They might be able to serve as consultants to design firms without that level of expertise. They might also directly advise existing assisted living facilities to realize new ways to translate their skills into organizational revenue.
  
• Processes. What distinguishes a business from a hobby is the development of replicable, transferrable systems and processes. All organizations have processes that they use to deliver on services and give themselves an edge over their competition. When times get tough, sharing the secret sauce (for a fee, of course) can provide a platform for clients and competitors to do it themselves and minimize additional investments in human resources for sustained growth.
  
• Capital (Real and Financial). Capital can be easy to measure, since it usually takes on the form of a physical item or a balance in an account. When that item is not being used or that account balance is not gaining interest, it is being underutilized. This goes beyond subleasing unused office space. Organizations can change how they invest their financial capital and use physical assets by getting creative and creating their own microcosms of capital outsourcing.The costs to access this capital, either as a lease, loan, or other use fee, can create new ways for an organization to bring new wealth to stagnant resources.
  
• Intellectual Property (IP). IP is the most often overlooked Golden Nugget within most organizations. When I surveyed an audience of diverse small business, nonprofit, and corporate leaders, only 15% had heard the term "IP". Like processes, content and information can be leveraged for a cost. If an organization is known as the leader in providing information, content, and resources in an area, most likely, folks will pay for structured access. It saves them time and resources, and the organization has created a new level for demand to help fuel its future endeavors.
  

I constantly refer to "organizations' in this article because these tenets are not just for businesses. Nonprofits, governments, and chambers of commerce can tap into their Golden Nuggets to offset a potential drop in tax revenue, membership, and donations as their stakeholders go into survival mode. On our web site, we have two examples of organizations who are leveraging their Golden Nuggets to generate new revenue streams: a nonprofit research organization and a for-profit financial services organization. Each is leveraging its services, talent, and processes to help member organizations gain access to the resources it needs.

Wrangling new profits from existing assets does not require years of strategic planning and a 10-year rollout plan. You might already have Golden Nuggets like under served talent, fallow capital, unharnessed IP, unique processes, intuitive services, and multipurpose products available within your organization. By getting a little creative, you can start developing new revenue streams from what you already have. Don't let this inspirational period in our economic history go to waste.

A few quiet trends taking the forefront for 2010

In 2010, I anticipate that there will be a couple "quiet" trends dominating the business landscape. If you have been waiting for our economy to return to business as usual, you will suffocate while holding your breath. "Business as usual" is gone for this millennium and a few under-reported trends lead in terms of economic and social recovery. Here are some of the many changes you can expect to see in the next two to five years:

1. Creativity will lead performance. If you don't believe this, just take a look at how creative organizations must be to survive this economic downturn. Many have changed their focus, broadened their offerings, and updated their strategies to be more responsive to volatile market changes. Why? Many left-brained, task-oriented jobs are being consolidated, automated, or shipped overseas. The current economic changes require that we reposition our skills and industries to be more creative. As I wrote in an earlier blog post, people are the most important asset in any organization. The ones who can think creatively and bring results are the ones who will lead.
2. Job titles will be reduced to a tagline. It will be more important than ever to get the right talent into the right positions within organizations. If innovative, performance-driven organizations want to attract the right people, then traditional top-down title systems won't capture attention. Job titles will be crafted to connect with the role that the individual plays within the organization. Each job title will reflect that the organization appreciates the three key areas of expertise needed in all successful organizations: strategists, integrators, and implementers. With these three areas working together in an organization, the "level" of someone's title will mean nothing.
3. The veil of intimacy created by social media will disintegrate. It's already starting to happen. Just because you're connected on Facebook or Twitter does not mean that you know someone or that you have a relationship. Individuals will increase their efforts to connect in person. Networking events saw a huge spike in attendance in 2009, simply because people were starving for true intimacy. The resurgence of networking, along with face-to-face meetings and phone calls in lieu of text messages and email, will help people reconnect with the subtleties of true relationship building and proper etiquette.
4. Social media will finally get relevant. On the flip side of intimacy, people are getting busier every day. Social media and technology tools will finally become integrated tools instead of separate things to do in the success of individuals and organizations. There are no social media experts. No doubt that phrase will be taken out of context. The truth is that there are marketing, business, communications, relationship, sales, and other experts out there who know how to successfully integrate social media tools into reaching goals. They will help everyone make better use of the time to connect in more meaningful ways. Do we care that @tsuluwerks is eating split pea soup for lunch. I'm sure that at least 90% of you are saying 'Of course not!' But if that split pea soup is part of a special sales effort to help feed the homeless, you might just want to join @tsuluwerks and have a bowl, too. And unless that relevancy is made in 140 characters or less, the rest of the online community will tune out.
5. Everyone will have to get flexible. That means that mom will have to check her Facebook account to keep track of her children (tactfully please! No mushy wall posts!) And the twenty-something aiming for the board room will have to accept that it's rude to check emails during a strategy session. Even making "cold calls" for sales people will mean making a call, sending a tweet, drafting an email, and using text messaging until you know which methods your target prefers. Systems and processes will require updating to ensure that you're reaching who you want in the best way that works for them, not you. So even if you hate picking up the phone, your best customer or top vendor who prefers to hear your voice will know that you're focused on the relationship above all.

I hope that these five of just many trends will help you prepare for the new year and build great relationships with team members, customers, investors, and family.

Happy holidays to all!

Tie Strategy to Performance with The Strategy String

I am excited to announce that on January 10, 2010, my new book The Strategy String will be shipping. The book is available for pre-order now on our web site. Here's a summary:

Our economy is driven by small businesses and organizations. That has become increasingly evident in this last recession. Small organizations, those with fewer than 500 employees, accounted for 50.6% of the non-farm jobs in our economy at the last census count. Unlike past recessions, during which small businesses only accounted for 9-12% of job losses, that number escalated to 45%. It will take two to five years for existing organizations to recover from this economic blow and start hiring in numbers again. Without small business to absorb the job losses from larger organization layoffs, we can expect new for profit and nonprofit organizations will flood the market. It’s happening right now, and unemployment figures don’t account for these new starts and existing entrepreneurs.

As these organizations emerge and existing ones seek to strengthen their strategies, they don’t have the luxury of spending 12 to 18 months developing a strategy like most large organizations. And new leaders don’t have the time to learn the ins and outs of business jargon to translate their visions of a successful organization into results-driven plans of action. They need to shape and launch strategies quickly, yet that will endure and deliver results.

That’s where The Strategy String shines. The author, Tracy A. Corley, has tested this concept and can guarantee that a small organization can craft and launch a strategy string in under eight weeks. Quick action is needed to be competitive in today’s market. Action backed by direction ensures that no activity is wasted and that the results can be easily measured.

The Strategy String: An Organizational Primer for Tying Strategy to Performance makes it simple for organizations of any size to develop and execute a performance-driven strategy. The Strategy String translates the concepts created by business thought leaders like Jim Collins, Michael Gerber, and Kaplan and Norton into easy to understand, ready to use modules that businesses can immediately put into action within their organizations. This book takes the best of the best, simplifies it, and combines it with easy-to-implement activities that time-starved leaders can get.