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Leadership & Management

Forewarned is Forearmed

Graham, December 3 2024

The most common model for managing risk is what's known as the Ostrich Approach.  This appears to work reasonably well in many situations, and is based on 3 concepts fortuitously working together:

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Leadership & Management

The Edge of Chaos

Graham Birkenhead, January 16 2024

You don't build a business – you build people – and then people build the business. Zig Ziglar I was recently running a workshop for a client to address the way they worked (their processes and organisational structures) and they way they worked together (communications and culture). During the energised conversation, I was reminded once again...

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Leadership & Management

The Power of Purpose

Graham Birkenhead, August 1 2023

A sense of purpose is a crucial element of the well-being of any individual. Similarly, a sense of purpose can be a crucial aspect of any company’s culture and health. We like to think of a company’s purpose as being something much bigger than the company itself, something the company maybe couldn't achieve alone, something that they would...

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Leadership & Management

How do I have an environmental impact? Let me count the ways

Graham Birkenhead, July 18 2023

Most businesses do not have ESG reporting requirements; but there is increasing societal expectation that businesses will do the ‘right thing’.  Considering the environmental aspect of ESG, as the impact of climate change becomes more felt and real to larger proportions of the population (rather than abstract and something people elsewhere...

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Leadership & Management

E, S & G - Separate but Inseparable

Graham Birkenhead, July 11 2023

Environment / Planet, Social / People, and Governance / Prosperity can be, and often are, considered separately: Each of these is in itself a massive area; it's no wonder that we try to break it down into manageable chunks. But these 3 elements are actually inseparable. They form 3 key components of an ecological 'complex system'; achieving and...

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Leadership & Management

To Promote or Hire - that is the question!

Graham Birkenhead, April 11 2023

There are good reasons why you should do both, and actually, for a fast-growing company, you should try to do both. There are advantages to each option, but there are also reasons why you should take care. Let’s go back to first principles and consider what we are really trying to achieve. In an earlier blog, I said that people are not your most...

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Leadership & Management

Business owners, are you IN it? Or ON it?

Graham Birkenhead, March 14 2023

We are working with the owner of a $20M business that manufactures racking systems. Growth has been solid, and they have come out of the pandemic with a solid order book. Sounds good, but the problem is that they are having tremendous difficulty attracting staff, completing orders, and managing inventory in an overcrowded work-space. The owner is...

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Leadership & Management

Ready for the 4-day Week?

Graham Birkenhead, February 28 2023

The UK has recently carried out a trial-based study into the practicalities and impacts of a 4-day week - and the results are just in. The idea of a 4-day week has been around for quite a long time - with much anecdotal evidence suggesting that there could be considerable benefit.   This latest trial involved over 70 companies of all sorts and...

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Leadership & Management

How About Them There Apples

Graham Birkenhead, January 31 2023

Our client was experiencing significant turnover amongst the new hires they needed to expand their production. They told us, ‘No one wants to work anymore’. Digging deeper it became evident that a small number of senior employees had created an environment that worked well for them but made it difficult for any new-comers to fit in. And worse, it...

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Leadership & Management

6 Ways to become the Workplace of Tomorrow – Today

Graham Birkenhead, November 1 2022

Sun Tzu said many things concerning the art of war that are just as applicable to the art of business. For example, "In the midst of chaos, there is also opportunity.”  There are many aspects to the world today that we could describe as chaos, and in each there will be opportunity for those that care to

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