Let’s Dance

Great Advice from a Paul!

If you've ever wondered how to get through the doors of buyers you need to talk to? 

Step One: 

Find someone with a key.

 They can open the doors you would take months to get through (if at all) because they already have a trusted relationship with the people you want to talk to. 

Too simple, too good to be true? 

Yes for most people, because many people in business rely on cold calling (strangers talking to strangers), ineffective advertising (they can't measure) or attending networking events (strangers not listening to strangers) that are nothing more than a social or pitch fest.  

No wonder they become impatient, frustrated, cynical. 

Step Two. 

Focus on closer relationships.

Focus your time on developing meaningful relationships with those people with the key to open the doors you want to walk through. Referral partners. 

Challenge. Most people think that a friendly chat at a networking meeting or even over a coffee is a relationship developed. Wrong. 

It takes time to demonstrate that you are competent, generous, reliable, trustworthy. 

It takes time to get past knowing what someone does to know who they want to connect with and why. Most people don't get past one meeting. 

The so-called relationship is superficial or maybe purely digital. 

Yesterday I was speaking with Mark Stonham (LinkedIn strategy guy) and we were discussing the challenges we all have connecting with people who are all on different social networking channels. People very distracted, busy, stressed and typing instead of talking. 

Perhaps now is the time to stand back and focus on meaningful face to face referral partnerships. People who already have the key to unlocking the doors to opportunity.

Obvious really. It's just two-steps that we need to practice if we want to dance. 

Paul Clegg will help you get in front of people who want to buy your stuff, so you spend less time chasing people who don't. Why can I guarantee that I can introduce you to potential referral partners who already have trusted access to the clients you are trying to reach. Because I've been doing it successfully for over 17 years

An awesome BBG Forum and Hotseat with Wayne Brightman as the Hotseater

Last Friday ended with an absolute high for me after attending Mark Pinhorn’s  BBG Hyd Sutherland forum.

Know Like and Trust (KLT)  with the group kicked in - and the forum was used to build trust with members focussed on adding value to each other with a real “spirit of generosity.”

The hotseat with Wayne  Brightman was gold - he has given permission to share the following email he sent following up of his klt hotseat - which got an immediate masssive response - and further offers for help from each of the bbg forum members:-

Wayne’s Letter:- 

“Good Morning all,

 

I’ve  attended many networking meetings/events over the last 4yrs - so without prejudice I can say we have an amazing group that should be a benchmark for BBG moving forward.

I would like to thank everyone for the feedback at yesterday’s meeting. Some I have called personally and as time got away yesterday I didn’t call all but please do not feel your forgotten I’ll call during the week.

 

Danielle if there is still seats I would like to take 2 tickets please, also I would like to assist more with “KC”, we’ve provided pens in the past but after engaging with you and another board member I now feel I can do better.

 

Craig, WOW I woke up Friday thinking I would have a chat to you about succession planning and now … I want to learn much more

 

Anna, Loved your presentation and I should have invested way more over the years as I had the ability to do so, it’s very refreshing to here you can over pay for a personal property because you can, I did that for my mum in 1993, (one day we’ll own it)

 

Mark…. Yeah you know mate”

 

Wayne Brightman Director at Promo-More A  6/63-73 Willarong Road Caringbah NSW 2229 P  (02) 9526 7751  M  (+61) 0410 415 093  E  wayne@promo-more.com.au  W  www.promo-more.com.au

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The klt hotseat

Hotseaters - you can use this to talk at - or you can use this to share an issue and ask for help - hint - people want to help and add value !!

The objective is not for the members of the panel to rant on and show people how good they are - the objective is to find out ways where they can genuinely help the person in the hotseat with a spirit of generosity. 

Not only for the 15 minutes they have to ask relevant questions and give advice  - but actively over the next month or year!! 

Who can you refer the hotseater to?

How can you help him/her?

What advice can you offer the hotseater solve that issue and help grow their business?

Over the months and years that The BBG forum meets -  its amazing to see how KLT  developed  - members  start referring - and they become each other’s advisory board! 

Guests are welcome and have an opportunity to network with members and guests and to contribute to the hotseater and take away gems that are given and have an opportunity to start developing relationships with people who they meet.

The hot seat for hotseaters and interviewers can be extremely powerful. 

Like everything in life - Depending on what you put into it - you get out of it

Some tips for the hotseater 

• Acknowledge the person and thank them for the advice - meet with them to further explore the gems that they give 
• This is an opportunity for you to actively build your business and create advocates!

2 things I’m going to leave you with:-

1. Who do you want to be in your BBG chapter? Be sure to invite them as a guest to the next forum

And 

2. What are you going to do to add value to someone in your BBG chapter this month?

Best

Ivan

Ps feel free to download my business card https://members.referron.com/bsivc. 

Thinktank on Continuous Improvement

At the recent October monthly meeting for BBG's Sydney Eastern Suburbs Chapter a diverse and experienced group of professionals worked on a range of topics around increasing business success through branding and digital marketing exercises.  

As part of the session, we had a Think Tank knowledge share breakout where we discussed related matters around "what is going well?" and "what needs to be improved?" in our collective businesses.  

In my 40 years experience of hiring and working with "A" players, my maxim has been that they always know what they do well and what the resulting impact to the business has been.  In equal parts, they also acknowledge mistakes or areas for improvement.  This group verified that maxim.  They quickly produced a revealing and salient list of positives and "kaizen" points.

The ideas revealed the imperatives of customer focus and service delivery as being paramount.  A part of this is the enablement and support of staff through training and marketing communications.  

It was a useful exercise to learn from each other and engender trust in a breakout group of professionals put together for a short session.

Here are the two lists.

Current Successes

• Speed and accuracy of responding to customer requests
• System and rules based processes
• Strategy with objective and measurable outcomes
• Track record
• Ease of doing business
• Flexible business model
• "Can Do" attitude
• Go anywhere attitude - ".com" compared with .com.au and no fixed address
• Niche market clearly defined
• Holding inventory to speed response

Kaizen Points

• Training for all staff
• Constant marketing
• Meaningful, value-add "Invitation only" customer events
• Value proposition - re-visit and reset
• Messaging: Advertising, Marketing, Internal communication
• Personal Motivation for business growth
• Consistency of delivery

Craig Saphin Managing Director www.craigsaphin.com craig@craigsaphin.com

csaphin Australia . Singapore . Japan

Hard demand for soft skills

Jobs with soft skill expertise will account for over 67pc of all jobs by 2030 (Deloitte Access Economics 2017 report) 

Google did a study called “Project Oxygen”. -of what made a good employee great - and what their top characteristics were 

The 8 top characteristics were all “soft skills”

1. Critical thinking - Problem solving skills
2. Connecting critical ideas and people 
3. Coaching
4. Communicating
5. Collaborating 
6. Creativity and Innovation 
7. Customer experience 
8. Empathy - putting yourself in someone else’s shoes - and understand the issues on the customers mind 

Stem - Science Technology Engineering and Maths - came last 

The 2017 Deloitte Access Exinomics  study found that having staff with more soft skills could increase revenue for the average business by more than $90,000.

The cool thing is that soft skills can be taught - and if practiced - can be embedded into the culture of an organisation

It’s not just about learning behaviour and soft skills - it’s about implementing them and living them.

Matt Geaham, PWCs managing partner says that soft skills are at the heart of the PwC set of 5 values - it’s how we treat people. 

• Act with integrity
• Make a difference
• Care
• Work together 
• Reimagine the possible

BSI’s values are based on the word TREAT

Team first - people need to feel a sense of safety

Respect - people need to respect the organisation, each other and their clients

Energy - people need to act with a positive energy and have passion in what they do

Adventurous - it’s ok to go outside the box and take risks - It’s on to be innovative - the team needs to be comfortable in doing this

Trust - this is a non negotiable - people need to act with honesty and integrity .

Our values are a based on ohow we behave - on how we treat each other and our clients 

We need to continually upskill and learn and using  70/20/10 formula

70pc on the job and practice

20pc feedback

10pc formal training 

Google did another study - Project Aristotle - which identified how innovative, inventive and productive teams were - and here is a real interesting observation :-

The study found that the most productive and inventive ideas did not necessarily came from the brightest “A teams”

The teams that shone , boasted a range of soft skills generosity, curiosity , empathy, emotional intelligence and emotional safety.

Feeling safe to be adventurous - to fail, to go outside the box, to make “silly comments” 

For companies to survive and thrive - they will need to embrace the “soft skills” and continue to “learn”

What does this mean for accountants ?

Technical skills will not cut the mustard for an accountant to survive and thrive 

The accountant of 2030 will 

Highly creative

Digitally savvy

Have a high degree of empathy and creativity

Do you want your form to thrive and survive in 2030? Speak to Geoff Hirsh at www.bbg.business to see how we can collaborate, learn and grow together 

Best

Ivan

Ps feel free to download my business card https://members.referron.com/bsivc. 

Collaboration, Learning and Growth with Glen Campbell of Brandheart

A lunch of power and how to grow your business through effective branding with the Legendary Glen Campbell of Brandheart.

 Over a period of 27 years, Glen has been a Director and Chief Executive of some of the world’s best and brightest brand and communications companies like Clemenger BBDO, Saatchi & Saatchi, Leo Burnett, Love Communications and IdeaWorks.

 Ten years ago he founded Brandheart and developed unrivalled methods for Leader’s Best Self Identity (aka Personal Branding) and Organisational Brand Identity and market connection strategies.

 A few years back, Glen worked with BSI to develop our "Brand, and over a period of time, we had our "Pulse" (our reason for being) , our Value Proposition to our clients (clear and concise) and a 5 core values that were identified that our entire team bought into. (we call it TREAT)

 Glen agreed to be the keynote at our mastermind lunch which was sensational!!

Glen has agreed to run an exclusive 2-Day highly intensive Masterclass at the end of October, where he’ll share with you his unique ’secrets' to developing a highly successful brand. The objective of the programme is for you to work out your "Pulse" , the same as I did mine. 

If you think this could be for you,  I suggest you take advantage of a 45 minute FREE Strategy call with him asap.

Here’s the link to schedule time in his diary: 

https://bookme.name/brandheartmethod/lite/brandheart-masterclass-review