Creating the Environment for Success with Mike Frantz

By George Dise

What is success?  How do you achieve it?  According to Mike Frantz, a company like Starbucks maintains success through brand awareness and loyalty.  Mike believes that since a single negative experience stands out five times larger in the mind of a customer than a single positive experience, the number one most important thing to consider is consistency of service.  Well-picked co-workers tend toward providing positive service, but can occasionally lapse or make a mistake; the key to customer satisfaction is consistently providing the same service on a bad day that you’d provide on a good day.  While it may be difficult to maintain consistency throughout an entire brand, let alone a single franchise, it helps to formulate products and train employees to provide services that are always positive.  This is especially important for law firms like Frantz Ward- think about all the times people complain about “the lawyers” on TV.  “The lawyers say we have to do it this way,” “the lawyers say we can’t do this.” Like every business, law firms have to avoid being tarred as the company of no.  That’s why Mike thinks of- and advertises his services as- “figur[ing] out ways to get things done, not throw up obstacles.”  His firm exists to promote new ways of thinking to help clients get things done –to avoid obstacles.

Mike thinks the best way a lawyer should act in order to create an environment for success is as a “consigliere,” or trusted business advisor.  As a consigliere, he focuses both on what a client expects, and what a client needs.  In some cases, expectations may not meld well with needs, and clients need to be advised so they receive the maximum possible benefit from your company’s services.  In these cases, you have to give clients what they need packaged in a way that it appears to be what they want.  That requires a service provider to actively listen and figure out what keeps a client awake at night, then take an open-minded reconnaissance of the marketplace to figure out what other options are available.  With a thorough understanding of possible options, service providers need to take efficient and effective steps to resolve the issue.  Even if your client never figures out that their expectations and needs didn’t coincide, if you served them effectively, they’ll still ultimately realize that they did the right thing by hiring you, because your services provided a lasting benefit. Continue reading →

Recruiting the Not for Profit Executive Director: Avoiding Serious Pitfalls

By George Dise

Executive Director search committees fall into three common pitfalls: too many members on the search committee, dragging out the process, and seeking candidates just like the incumbent.  Here’s how to avoid getting tripped up.

How large should the search committee be?  Five members is good, since an odd number eliminates ties in voting, and there are enough members that two can be absent from interviews.  More than five increases the chance of personalities clashing and dragging out decisions.  Or, there’ll be too many opinions to balance, dragging out the process.

When you’re putting together a search committee, it helps to mix in people who’ve experienced a search committee before with people who haven’t.  You’ll have more people on the board at the end of the search who now have experience working on a search committee.  It has the added benefit of forcing experienced members to justify their methods to newer members, forcing them to evaluate whether they’ve been doing it right.  Any bad habits the experienced members bring with them from other committees will be diluted.  It also helps to include representatives from different groups within the organization in the search committee.  When I worked with a search committee for a local high school an alumnus and a teacher were included on the committee to help ensure that the candidates were compatible with the character of the school. Continue reading →

Succession Planning and Strategic Talent Management can help you avoid catastrophic risks and be more competitive now and in the years ahead

By Florian Kete

Mention the word “succession planning” in a small to medium-sized company these days, and you can see the eyes roll. Most leaders these days are worried about top line revenue, and how they’re going make the most productive use of the staff they have and may not want to be distracted by planning for potential vacancies or departures.

What many fail to understand is that there’s a correlation between managing your top talent effectively, overcoming the challenges of the economic downturn, and taking your business to the next level. The “rolling eyes” is precisely the reason someone needs to take it seriously—if your leaders don’t consider it a priority, you can guarantee that no-one else will.

Knowing what to do in case your CEO or one of your key players is hit by a bus is not the only reason to go through succession planning. There are other reasons- but mainly: “It will position your company to be stronger both now and in the years ahead.”

Succession planning is an integral part of strategic planning, Actually it’s somewhat of a misnomer because it’s really an exercise in “Strategic Talent Management.” As Jim Collins detailed in his acclaimed book “Good to Great”, step one to being a great company begins by having the right people on the bus! Unfortunately what works for mammoth organizations like GE and IBM; the firms that have pioneered succession planning—does not necessarily work for smaller organizations.

Succession Planning /Strategic Talent Management for the Small to Medium-sized Business

As you embark on your own Succession Planning Project /Strategic Talent Management Project, be sure to adapt it to the nuances of your business. Take a look at your talent needs over the next 3-5 years and decide how you’re going to fill those needs.

THE TOP FIVE SUCCESSION PLANNING/STRATEGIC TALENT MANAGEMENT QUESTIONS:

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