English cricket - what a shambles. To see the England captain and coach resign on the eve of the team’s departure for a tour of the West Indies is appalling. There were many people who were sceptical about the appointment of Kevin Pietersen as England’s cricket captain. He is a strong-willed, somewhat maverick, individual who was not the most obvious candidate for working with the ECB bureaucracy or planning a way forward for the side. Read the rest of this entry »
When was the last time you received outstanding customer service? On reflection, have you ever received outstanding customer service? Read the rest of this entry »
Readers will have seen recent redundancies in certain sectors of the commercial world that were unimaginable 12 months ago – redundancies amongst professionals such as bankers, surveyors, architects and solicitors have recently become commonplace. The property, construction and financial sectors have been particularly badly hit and for those organisations that continue to trade under these adverse conditions, it is critical that they retain and maintain the best possible workforce to remain competitive. Read the rest of this entry »
As we are all well aware, the face of the business world is changing rapidly. There are not only new technologies to help (and hinder) us on what seems like a daily basis, but the economy is also currently playing a large role. High performers are desirable in any business but in the current climate they are a necessity.
A high performer is someone who can work smarter and faster, and take on greater responsibility and grow in strength when faced with challenges. It is fair to say that one superior person is worth as much to your organisation as a handful of mediocre people. But who are these high performers?
Over the past 30-plus years, I’ve been involved in thousands of searches, worked with hundreds of hiring managers, trained 3,000 to 4,000 recruiters, and worked closely with dozens of major companies. Following are some of the common threads among the best techniques, processes, and tools that I have seen and used.
Over the past decade, when it comes to human resources, the IT industry has been living in an atmosphere of doom and gloom. Many reputable organisations and individuals went on the record stating that the shortage of IT workers would reach critical proportions and severely impede economic growth. The contraction of the sector in 2001-2003 made the prophets of doom retreat for fear of being ridiculously irrelevant, as even the greenest of IT pastures, like the Bay area, were going through a severe drought.
Over the years, we’ve helped many companies apply the principles of Performance-Based Hiring to find talented and productive sales people. When we first engage with these companies their conversations often begin with similar words… “Help me find sales people who are competitive, multitaskers, closers who don’t take ‘No’ for an answer. It would be great if they came from our competitors and brought with them a few clients, contacts, or knowledge that will help them hit the ground running. And oh, by the way, I need them NOW.” At this point in the conversation we have to intervene and help our clients think differently about the process of consistently hiring outstanding sales professionals. Below are three common sense secrets for doing just that.
Today businesses are relentlessly looking to improve productivity, eliminate waste and grow revenues by driving the performance of front line sales people.
Whilst facilitated by an ever increasing investment in technology, such as CRM, the ability to recruit, motivate and retain the best people is more important. Every contact between customer and sales staff can gain or lose business as customers increasingly expect nothing less than service excellence.
Read the rest of this entry »