Choosing the right coach can be a minefield, following some simple steps can help to make sure you get it right.
Whether you are looking for a coach for your organisation or for you personally, there are a few things that you can do to make sure you hire the right coach. If the answer is 'no' to the following questions, read on:
You’ve probably heard it said that change is the one constant in business currently, and that’s true, it’s also true for our lives outside of work.
Many people will say they don’t like change, it makes them uncomfortable or it’s something they fear, but if you break things down a little, you’ll find that we all deal with change on a daily basis.
One of the key themes was the pace of technology changes. Specifically, how does it affect organisations & its people? It brought back vivid memories of my Digital Transformation experiences. On reflection, I can definitely share three gotchas & lessons. If you are leading a Digital Transformation or being a part of one, keep an eye on these three gotchas!
Gotcha #1: Partial digitalisation and/or digitalising bad process are not good.
In today’s complex, interconnected and rapidly changing environment, it is more important than ever that organisations can respond quickly whilst still achieving efficiencies of scale. A key enabler of this is having the right organisational design, and recognising that the design of yesterday (designed for efficiency and assuming predictable patterns) will no longer work in the digital age, where agility and speed of response is key.
Matrix working – please click to enlarge the image
I’ve used Uber a few times, but have to say I’ve been a Black Cab kind of girl for years and there is something familiar about them that makes me stick with them.
Yesterday though I started to think differently. My last few trips to London have involved a Cab ride, none of the drivers have known where to go and the cost, compared to what an Uber would have been almost double the cost and the card machines haven’t been working so cash has been paid, one driver even dropping me at a cash machine.
Change is hard but there are levers that can make it easier. Using a network of the right people to act as your change agents is one of those levers. I am a huge believer in getting employees to drive change, but the design is key as Change Agent networks are often implemented badly. Here is the usual chain of events.
If you’ve ever had the opportunity to work at a summer camp you’ll know it’s one of the best “jobs” you’ll ever have. I use the word job in inverted commas intentionally because more often than not it doesn’t feel like work at all. There are deep and meaningful conversations with people who start to feel more like your family than your colleagues. There is the cold embrace of a dip in the lake after a late afternoon game of capture the flag that always gets a little too intense. There’s the jaw-ache you get after laughing too hard for too long at some silly in-joke.
Change has fast become the one constant in businesses today, but can there be a point when too much change is no longer good for business?
If the changes aren’t fully considered, fully implemented and the people are not engaged with the process, then yes.
In 2013 a large London based organisation commenced a two-year transformation programme looking to change everything from their systems, processes, policies, procedures, structures, IT infrastructure and nationwide office locations.
We are far better at planning for the short-term than we are for the long-term.
Think about when you get in the car. If you don’t know where you are going, you tap in the details to a sat-nav system to tell you the route. You might have an advanced system that updates itself to find quicker routes if there is traffic.
You probably know what you’re doing this weekend and maybe even the weekend after. You might even have planned your summer holiday.
Over the last few months' we’ve seen the likes of retailers such as NEXT and Tesco scale back their growing empires. Where they had started to sell everything to everyone online and in stores, the decline in the retail sector has seen a significant change. Store closures, redundancies and a change in the goods being sold seem to be just the start of the changes being implemented in retail.
Companies who have always been slightly more niche and specialist such as Aspinal, instead of a decline in sales and store closures, are on an incredible journey of growth.