Witches of Glum? It’s Just Nonsense Isn’t It?
I’ve made a career out of creating engaging, innovative training exercises, used by professional trainers around the world. But even I have to admit that at face value, some of them might seem a bit, well, daft. A good example is Witches of Glum, recently added to Managers’ Library. (A slightly different version is also available as […]
Nelson Mandela: pragmatism and vision in leadership
Released from prison 11th Feb 1990 aged 71 after 27 years imprisoned, Nelson Mandela subsequently received the Nobel peace prize for his efforts ending apartheid, becoming South Africa’s first black Prime Minister in 1994. Paul Russell of Luxury Academy London looks at the combination of pragmatism and vision in leadership. Even Mandela’s names tell us […]
Do you appreciate your ‘sloggers’?
Jenni Russell commented in The Times (4/2/2016) that bosses don’t notice the strong and silent types. It pays to be one of the office jumper-uppers. She comments that if you are one of those “sloggers” that “work hard, be competent and self-reliant, never panic in a crisis, willingly volunteer for late hours, and never draw […]
How to combat the January blues
The third Monday of any January is traditionally known as ‘Blue Monday’, the most depressing day of the year. In 2016 Blue Monday fell on 25 January. This was apparently calculated through a formula of weather, debt since Christmas, the time since failing our New Year resolutions, low motivational levels and no real desire to take action. The […]
Body language on the phone? You must be joking!
You could say that because body language is non-verbal, then it is impossible to read the other person’s body language over the telephone – you can’t see them! However surprisingly there are a number of body language indicators that could be detected. These include: Smiling on the phone. It lifts the tone of the […]
customer services training
i am a new trainer and wondering if anyone can help with ideas for customer training many thanks trev noble i am a new trainer and wondering if anyone can help with ideas for customer trainingmany thankstrev noble
Managing Work while Having a Personal Crisis
We always try very hard not to bring our personal life to the office, but sometimes it just impossible. Unfortunately, we have to deal with difficulties that occur in our personal lives even at times when we have a lot of office work. Divorces, death in the family, health or personal crises make us re-evaluate […]
Launching behaviours – looking for an interactive activity
Hi, I have around 1 hour at our next team meeting to launch our new behaviour framework – its already been talked about and shared but this is an experiential session to get everyone involed with the behaviours to ensure they understand them and ultimately recognise why we need them. I am on right after lunch […]
The psychology of inspiring leaders
Many believe that great leaders of their time were born and not made. But are we really sure the likes of Margaret Thatcher, Gandhi and Winston Churchill to name a few, are examples of those were born to be powerful or did they apply their innate intelligence, confidence and judgement to lead from the front? […]
Soft Skills are not soft.
I once had someone suggest to me that I would not be capable of working amongst the “brutality” of business life. I listened with great interest as there might have been some truth in what they were saying. Upon extensive reflection, I considered what might be behind their comment, as it intrigued me enormously. It intrigued […]
The value of contrast
What if changing one thing in your message could impact four crucial purchase intent-related actions? Would you be interested? I’m here to tell you that you can do just that. New research shows that using one simple messaging technique can increase your influence on buying decisions by a statistically significant margin. Here’s how I reached […]
Infographic: Emotional IQ and you
Emotional intelligence (EI) is a person’s ability to understand emotions in themselves and others. EI is quickly becoming a more preferred metric than IQ for evaluating employee credentials. It is believed that up to 58% of the variations in personal success factors can be attributed to emotional intelligence. Better work relationships are seen more frequently […]
How to ensure your public speaking is pitch-perfect
Claire Rowland gives us public speaking tips from the perspective of a training venue. Although skills such as management, salesmanship and innovation are all perceived as key to the success of businesses and their employees, a similarly important skill, public speaking, is less developed within the UK workforce, with many employees lacking confidence. It’s easy […]
How to keep your ‘passives’ engaged
With the economy on the up and a dynamic recruitment marketplace in position, employees soon realise they can be more selective about who pays their salary. Gary Cattermole offers his advice on how to avoid losing the staff you’d like to keep. Normally we’re always talking about retaining top talent, but with the recruitment market […]
Why you can’t hire your way around the soft skills gap
Thinking you can cut corner when recruiting for soft skills competencies? Think again, says Bruce Tulgan. In fields, especially the STEM fields – where significant education and credentials are the very threshold criteria for most jobs, supply is far below demand. That puts most STEM field employers squarely in the middle of the technical skill […]
UK businesses lose out because of lack of cultural awareness
Gary Muddyman, CEO of global translation company, Conversis, and Bill Rivers, Executive Director at the Joint National Committee for Languages talk about how British businesses could be losing business to overseas competitors because of a lack of foreign language skills and cultural awareness amongst their staff. According to new research by Conversis, a quarter say […]
The 5 Ps of Vocal Impact in Presentations
When delivering a presentation, voice projection is essential. The 5 P's is a way of maximising all the vocal aspects. P ower – Too loud a voice can be annoying particularly for those at the front of the audience – Too quiet can say that the Presenter lacks confidence and others at the back can't […]
Insight: A quarter of UK workers suffer from uninspiring managers
As post summer holiday blues sets in as we return to our desks from breaks away, nearly a quarter (24%) of the UK workforce – 7.2m – are feeling the effects of uninspiring leaders in the workplace, according to new research by Investors in People, the standard for people management. Despite the importance of leading from the front, over […]
The four golden rules of persuasive presentations
Paul Carroll gives us some simple presentation tips. When it comes to persuading your audience while delivering a training presentation or pitching to a client, there are really only four golden rules – but what they lack in quantity they make up for in importance: Make sense and be brief You may remember the saying […]
The 12 most important missing soft skills
Bruce Tulgan identifies the top 12 missing soft skills among today’s young talent, pulled from research done by his consultation firm, RainmakerThinking, Inc. So many business leaders and managers at all levels fall for the myth that soft skills are 'nice to have' rather than 'must have' – simply a luxury they cannot afford to […]
