Business Monitor
Give your business life a New Year boost
Early in the New Year the media is full of ways to improve your life – diets, detox and a lot of psychobabble which is commonly of precious little value. Or is it?
Marketing expert Paul Clapham explores how you can apply these ideas to your business. I
have picked out a group of ideas presented by such writers, which are aimed at the individual or family and found they are just as relevant to the business owner.
Aim to improve your working environment We all know when we’ve been into business premises that have a buzz about them. The people are essentially happy, working very effectively, co- operating with each other and as a result doing a good job. Clients like visiting such businesses and it’s always easier to sell on your home turf. The buzz in question isn’t about constant frenetic activity (although some of that isn’t a bad thing). It can often be about creating a calm environment. Again, if visitors feel relaxed they are readier to buy. So cut out the shouting and histrionics, especially if that’s coming from the business owner(s).
Set some rules Lots of business owners fight shy of this because rules are for schools. But you have some anyway. Do you enforce
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them? Timekeeping is a simple case. The person who consistently arrives late will also be the person who leaves early for vital, personal needs. It’s simply rude, treating the business and colleagues with a certain contempt. I’d put a stop to it. I worked in one company that operated
a clear desk rule. Your desk could be a pigsty for eight hours but if it wasn’t clear when you left for the evening, woe betide you. It’s a good discipline, because it pushes you to be organised through the day.
Reduce your multi-tasking Not being good at it, I was delighted to
read the words of Daniel Levitin, a neuro scientist working at McGill University in Toronto. He says that the human brain isn’t designed for multi-tasking and as a consequence does it poorly. Trying to do two or three complex tasks at the same time means that you do none of them as well as doing them in a linear sequence. Those business and political leaders
who appear to squeeze 25 hours out of a day are invariably linear uni-taskers, with a back-up team doing the mundane work. Collectively, they get great results, but it’s
not done by juggling four balls. If you are proud of your multi-tasking skills, consider this: would you like your dentist to be trying to solve the Times crossword puzzle whilst working on your teeth? Then try uni-tasking. A further point from Dr Levitin is: give
the brain a rest. Between complex tasks, take some time out, if only for 10 minutes. It’s like switching off a computer – it always works better after you switch it back on. So too the human brain. Multi-tasking interferes with or prevents that time out.
Improve your team-working I’ve always been a big believer that team-working is an important part of success in business. Nor am I alone; a large proportion of recruitment ads ask for that skill. The benefit is clear: each person in a business is an expert on something – marketing sales, technical issues, finance. Knitting those varied areas of expertise together well is what makes for success. But my enthusiasm is not shared by all. Felix Dennis a multimillionaire publisher and noted eccentric said: “Team spirit is
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