Be Remarkable James

How to recession-proof your business in 13 steps (Part 2)

2008-06-13T10:29:00.001+01:00

Bubble about to burst? Pic credit: Flickr CC FotoDawg

OK, here's part 2 of my thoughts about how, in these times of financial hardship, you can go some way towards making your business recession proof.

(If you missed part 1, go here to see it.)

8. Your product is your marketing. Too many companies come up with a product then think about how to sell it. That's the stupid way. You should have your market in mind when your potential product is still in R&D. Marketing isn't a bolt on service, it's an integral part of the whole enterprise. (Want ideas for products? See point 5 and listen to your customers!)

9. Stop advertising. Start RED marketing instead if possible. If you won't do that, just stop throwing same-old, same-old ads out there. They cost too much and the best you can hope for is 2% response. So 98% of people ignore you. There was a name for people at school who got ignored by 98% of the other kids - losers. Ads have a place in the marketing mix, but save your money where possible and throw it into the other ideas in this list.

10. Build relationships with suppliers. I mean real relationships. Get to know them. Understand their business model. Not only are they valuable sources of information about the market, they might even be able to help you in ways you haven't thought of. So take them out for lunch (yes, you pay!), pay invoices on time, play golf, ask about their families. Networking is key. Suppliers might traditionally be lower on the food chain but in this interconnected world that's BS that you should forget about.

11. Build relationships with your competitors. I mean real relationships. Whilst it may seem counter intuitive (less business = more fighting, not more cooperation, right?) it's definitely the way to go. More heads are better than 1 and even in a recession there should be enough business around for you and your competitors to thrive, as long as you have real relationships. Plus, you're going to be so busy rocking your new niche focus (see point 6) that you won't have to worry about your competitors soon enough. So it's all good networking.

12. Embrace the fear. Scarcity, strife and difficulty all lead to trouble, right? Wrong! They also lead to innovation, if you're smart! Let your superstars (point 3) and your customers (point 5) lead you down the wonderful path of innovation. Then you get to point 1.

13. Look around you once in a while. Plenty of organisations thrive in a recession. Plenty come out of it stronger than ever. Look at what other people are doing and copy it where you can. Recessions come and go, economies are cyclical. You can sit around whining about it or you can get down to business. (And if you've read this far, I reckon you're more likely to go with the latter, right?)

There's my 13 points. As I said in part 1, more intended as a starting point for a conversation than a complete 'how to' guide. What do you think though?

Am I completely off the mark? Am I on the right track? What have I missed? What would you ignore? What are you already doing? Is the whole recession thing a load of crap anyways? I'd love to hear answers to these questions and comments generally so shout up if you want to get involved. Comments or email, I love 'em both.

P.S. Like this post? Well you could sign up for more like it...

P.P.S. Like some of the ideas in this but no idea how to execute? Why not drop me a line and I'll be happy to help out. In case you don't know, I'm a freelance marketing guy (the non-evil type) and I love talking to people about ideas and strategies for their business. See my site for more info, or just give me a call (07732 083 548) or drop me an email (james at jamesparronline dot com)

Sign up for updates - your options

2008-06-12T13:36:00.002+01:00

I've sorted out my subscription options so you can now sign up for updates either via RSS or email. See the bar to the right for details; simply pick which option suits you best and click the relevant link.

Let me know if there are any problems, or if there's anything else you want/need when it comes to syndication of my content.

How to recession-proof your business in 13 steps (Part 1)

2008-06-11T11:51:00.005+01:00

Pic credit: Flickr CC aturkus

More and more people I talk to seem to be increasingly worried about the potential impact of the credit crunch and the possibility of a recession. It seems pretty likely now I guess, so I can see where the worry is coming from.

It's had me thinking the last couple of days, and with all that financial doom and gloom in mind, I knocked up a list of positives to balance things out - 13 things you can do to make your business recession proof.

This isn't intended as a guide really, more as a talking point. I've broken it down into 2 parts, to save you reading a damn long post all at once. Part 2 will come later this week. I may flesh things out at a later date too, but for now, here are my thoughts...

1. Be Remarkable. Goes without saying really. If your business is remarkable (i.e. people will remark on it) then you stand a much better chance of succeeding (whether there's a recession on or not).

2. Cut your dead wood. Controversial one, but you should really get rid of all those people in your business who don't do any good. If they're not right for you, cut them. (If it makes you feel better, if they're not right for you then you're definitely not right for them.)

3. Pay the 'dead wood' money to your superstars. All that money you save by getting rid of those people you can do without should not just be squirreled away. If you do that the you're not going to get out of any ensuing slump. Your superstars will get you out of the slump though. This is where they really show what they're made of. Give them all a hike in pay, tell them what needs doing and watch your business sail through problems. (N.B. If you don't have any superstar employees, then you're in trouble. Now is definitely the time to invest in some.)

4. Build a permission asset. You need to have an ongoing relationship with potential clients pretty much all the time. In a recession though, it's even more important. the best way to do that is to build permission assets for your business, i.e. people who are willing to give you something (usually their email and name, possibly more as time goes on) with a view to you sending them useful, relevant, timely information. This is called leading people down the path to a sale and it is (almost) completely foolproof. (Read Seth Godin's book Permission Marketing for more on this.)

5. Listen to your customers. Follow that up by doing what they tell you to. It's not about how you sell to people in a recession, it's about why they buy. (Actually this is also true outside of a recession).

6. Quit things. Another Seth Godin inspired one (read his book The Dip too). You know the things that you do that don't make you very much money, but you still do them? Quit them. Now. (And see point 7...)

7. Embrace the 'long tail'. Specialise, focus, find a niche. You're far more likely to find people who want to buy from you than if you try to be a jack of all trades. The long tail is a far better place to be when times are tough, and leaves you with a potentially profitable niche to dominate when the economy starts to chill the hell out.

OK, that's part 1, part 2 will follow later in the week. If you don't want to miss it you could sign up to my feed, so you're notified whenever I throw something new up on the blog. Also, what do you think of the 1st part? Making sense so far or all absolute rubbish? I'd love to hear from you whatever your opinion on it. Hit me up in the comments if you want to join in!

Friday fun

2008-06-06T12:12:00.002+01:00

I was looking for something fun and interesting to link to today and found the following story on the Beeb website. It's not fun-crazy (like the video of the man smashing up his office - sort of nsfw) but rather fun-wonderful.

Today, June 6th 2008, is the birthday of an exceptional man - Henry Allingham. Amazingly, he is 112! Yes, one hundred and twelve years old. And still going strong!

Read the story and watch the video; he really is an inspiring man (and not because of his long life, but because of what he's done with it).

If you need some inspiration today, then I reckon you should be able to take it from him.

Still here

2008-06-03T13:13:00.002+01:00

Despite the evidence to the contrary (my disappearance from twitter and this blog particularly) I am not dead.

No plan behind the sabbatical from all things social-networking related. I've been thinking hard about my business, blogging, the appetite in the UK for the brand of marketing that I espouse and many more things. All that thinking has led to more questions rather than more answers unfortunately. Such is life, as they say.

Going forward I'm going to try and get back into the swing of blogging regularly. I still believe that all this new social stuff is inherently good for people and good for business and am hoping that approaching it with renewed vigour will lead to my bank balance backing up that assertion at some point in the future. (The general costs associated with setting myself up to fly solo make a case to say that money is a very intangible thing, and easier to acquire when you're in possession of a rather large amount of it already...)

So I'm still here and will be for some time yet, all being well.

(Thanks as always if you're reading this y'all - the conversations rather seem to be the point, in and of themselves really, in my mind.)

Eliminate the barriers to 'yes'

2008-05-19T16:21:00.002+01:00

Just a quick one today, inspired by a text I just received. It brought to mind the title of this post, which I'm sure I've heard somewhere before but after a quick search can't find the source of.

The text is from my service provider, Orange. It reads as follows:

Hi from Orange. To donate £2.50 to UNICEF's Myanmar (Burma) Cyclone appeal, text DONATE to 864233. £2.50 will be added to your next bill. Thank you.

My thoughts? This is a brilliant idea.

A marketer's job is to eliminate the barriers to 'yes'. The less barriers, the more chance the person you're communicating with will do what you want them to do (i.e. say 'yes'). In this case Orange and UNICEF have teamed up to make it exceptionally easy to donate to the Burma appeal.

Personally, I probably wouldn't have donated at all if I hadn't got this text because I'm both busy and lazy - a terrible combination. However this approach has made me do it. One barrier to 'yes' (my laziness) is eliminated by this approach.

The other benefit is that because the money just goes straight on to my phone bill, it doesn't feel like a burden at all. If I were stopped in the street by a 'charity mugger' I may put my hand in my pocket for 50p or £1. I'd be pretty unlikely to cough up £2.50. Like buying things on the internet though, when you don't have to physically part with money, it doesn't seem as real. Another barrier to 'yes' eliminated.

My question today therefore is:

What barriers to 'yes' can you eliminate from your processes?

[Hint: Think about complicated sign-up forms, unnecessary login procedures, excessive post and packing costs, difficult to read brochures, poor customer service etc etc]

P.S. If you read the above and thought 'that doesn't apply to me because I'm not a marketer', then think again. Whether you're collecting for charity, selling your own product, signing up people to your latest seminar, managing a store, teaching primary school children, giving mortgage advice or arranging a conference, you're a marketer.

'Marketing' is part of being human, and learning that can make a heck of a lot of difference to your business and your life.

I'm in London today and tomorrow

2008-05-15T10:33:00.003+01:00

I'm going to the Recruiters Network event, organised by uk:recruiter, in London tonight. So I'm getting the train at 1pm and should be in London by half 3. Staying in a hotel near the venue of the networking for convenience (it's on City Road, nearest tube is Old Street). If anyone is about therefore and wants to meet up, either later this afternoon or tomorrow morning (maybe near Euston before I get my train back) then let me know. Best to call me rather than email. My mobile is 07732 083 548.

P.S. If anyone wants to go to the networking thing, I'm pretty sure there are still places available. You can register here, or I'm sure Louise wouldn't mind you dropping her an email for details (visit her site here for the email address).

What social networking do you do?

2008-05-13T17:02:00.003+01:00

Are you savvy when it comes to social networking? If not, you're missing out. If you're a social networking virgin then I'm happily volunteering here to be your first with some of the most popular services! See below for the 3 most prominent profiles of mine. Click through to link, friend and follow me...

My Linkedin profile (best for business)

My Facebook profile (best for friends)

My Tw itter profile (best all round in my opinion)

Give it away

2008-05-06T14:42:00.003+01:00

There's an interesting piece in the Guardian today on Chris Anderson's theories about the spread of 'freeconomics'. The idea that many products and services are on the way to 'free' definitely holds water. Well worth a read.

Get the article online here if you can't get hold of a copy of the paper (or just prefer web-print to news-print). The very fact that you can get it for free online rather than buying the publication highlights Chris' point nicely.

(Note: This story did the rounds in the blogosphere some weeks ago. Traditional media catches up eventually...)

Perfection requires commitment

2008-05-05T11:00:00.000+01:00

Someone sent me the link to this video today. It's of a group of students with a bit too much time on their hands. Nevertheless, all credit to them; they've practised their asses off to get this good.

[IMPORTANT: Before you click the link below, be aware, the page it's on is definitely, 100%, totally and utterly Not Safe For Work. If you're at all offended by rude images, rude words and what is essentially pornographic content then please don't click. The video is safe, bar I think one swear word, but the site that hosts it isn't. Don't say I didn't warn you...]

Beer Pong - the most impressive video I've seen in a good while

Who are your Champions League Final fans?

2008-05-01T18:50:00.005+01:00

Pic credit: Flickr CC - edwin.11

(This post is about sport; football in particular. I try not to do that so often because sport is a pretty divisive topic. I promise this one has relevance to your business though, so I hope it’s not a turn-off for too many people. As a bit of background for the non-football fans out there, the Champions League competition that I talk about below is the premier European club football competition. It sees the best teams in Europe compete to reach the final, which this year is held in May, in Moscow. For the first time ever, two English teams have reached the final – Chelsea and Manchester United. For anyone who is completely sport-phobic, football is a game where two teams of eleven men chase a spherical ball around a grass covered pitch. It’s only marginally less ridiculous than it sounds.)

The end of the football season is upon us, with all the inherent agony and ecstasy that brings. For me, as a Liverpool fan, the knowledge that my team won't be lining up in Moscow to compete for the biggest trophy in the club game is quite frankly gutting (Liverpool were knocked out at the semi-final stage by Chelsea). Whether you’re a fellow fan, or just one of those lucky folks who don't care a jot about football though, there are lessons to be learned from the coming final in May.

The word on the street (and the 6 o'clock news) is that supporters of Manchester Utd and Chelsea will need to divvy up in excess of £2000 to go and watch their team in the final game of the season. Additionally, a combination of factors (visa issues, shortage of flights and hotels in Moscow etc) mean that it’s also going to be exceptionally difficult to get there. Yet still somewhere in the region of 40-50,000 English fans are expected to make the journey to support their team in person.

So here's the question for you with that exceptional situation in mind: would any of your fans (i.e. customers and clients) do anything even similar for you?

Let's say you’re a regular speaker at a variety of events and corporate functions but you’re going to take a break for at least a year. Would people pay far more than the going rate just to be at that big event?

Or if you were ending a product line, would people do whatever they could (and pay whatever they could) to get hold of the last few items you had for sale?

What about something smaller: if technical problems with your website meant that to make a purchase customers had to log in several times to complete the transaction, would they persevere or give up?

Clearly it's unlikely that you'll engender the kind of passion that a football team does no matter what line of business you're in, so don't worry if the answer to all of those questions was no. I’m definitely not suggesting that it’s necessary to have your customers worship you like the average football fan worships their team. However, I think there are two important takeaway lessons from the example of the Champions League final.

Number one: if you have a chance of your customers having for you even 10% of the passion that a football fan has for their club, do everything you can to nurture it. A ‘fan’ of your product or service will not only pay your efforts back directly but will act as your best ambassador and salesperson. True fans, loyal customers who believe in what you do, are worth it.

Number two: if your customers aren’t going to be as loyal and fervent as the average football fan, then you must commit to making things as easy and satisfying as possible for them. Die-hard Man Utd and Chelsea fans may be happy to spend their savings, travel thousands of miles and sleep on a railway platform in Russia to ‘make a purchase’; your customers won’t put up with a bad website, over-inflated prices, poor customer service or anything else negative to make a purchase from you.

[Bonus lesson: most people don’t really choose their football team, it chooses them. How about your business? I’d bet most people have a choice about ‘supporting’ you or not…]

Whatever you do, be it football, plumbing, consultancy or recruitment, your fans/customers are your biggest asset. Without them you’re in trouble, so do what you can to nurture them and help them support you. To use one last football metaphor, in business it really does matter to your fans how your team performs on the pitch.

What do you do? (a game)

2008-04-24T16:09:00.008+01:00

Pic credit: Flickr CC, Altemark

Right, first let's get something out the way. Linking to the same person twice in two days is not a bad thing. In fact I think it's a good thing. It shows consistency. Not a lack of imagination/slight obsession with that person's blog.

So bearing that in mind, Sonia Simone inspired the following post today. That's not fair on Naomi from IttyBiz though, because it was her original post that inspired Sonia's post, that inspired me.

Too complicated. Let's start again...

A couple of days ago I read a post by Naomi (click here for it). It was an idea for a game where you answer 5 questions about yourself and what you do, both for your own satisfaction and to inform any potential customers. I totally intended to do it and write something the other day, but got completely distracted and kind of forgot.

Then I read Sonia's answers on her blog (click here for them) and liked them so much that I decided to get my ass in gear and do it myself. Here (in convoluted fashion) is my part of the conversation:

What’s your game? What do you do?
I’m a freelance marketing guy (the non-evil type). I help small businesses get the best return from their marketing efforts as possible. The people I work with generally don’t have a marketing team and their budgets are on the small side so it’s about kicking ass by being innovative, rather than just splashing the cash on useless adverts.

Why do you do it? Do you love it, or do you just have one of those creepy knacks?
Little bit from column A and a little bit from column B. I used to do marketing for a recruitment company, which was cool if a little unfulfilling. I’ve got the knack for writing good copy etc and coming up with cool (and effective) marketing strategies, but often my stuff is pretty counter-intuitive. I wanted to get more hands-on, with more people, so I could teach them about my non-evil ways.

I’m oddly (for a marketer) passionate about people doing the ‘right thing’; not screwing customers, marketing ethically, engaging in conversations, working with competitors and so on.

Who are your customers? What kind of people would need or want what you offer?
All the boys and girls who want their small business to succeed but don’t know where to start with the marketing stuff.

What’s your marketing USP? Why should I buy from you instead of the other losers?
I’m really cool, so even just hanging around with me will make your business cool. Plus, although it might be scary at first, I guarantee what I come up with for you will be remarkable.

What’s next for you? What’s the big plan?
I want to fix marketing because it’s an industry that is undoubtedly broken. I’ve started with Manchester but I’ll be disappointed if my stuff hasn’t spread throughout the UK by the end of the year, even if it’s not me doing it. In fact I’d love the marketing that I bang on about all the time to be really prevalent in the not too distant.

I think my main goal is basically to change the world. Which after all is why everybody is in business really, isn’t it?

P.S. This isn't a meme, it's a conversation (according to Naomi, which is cool because I don't really like memes, which is a deeply un-blogger thing to say, but there we go). So whilst I don't want to 'tag' anybody to spread the virus etc, I would be really interested to hear other people's answers. Louise for example, Pete Gold, Matt Alder, Dan McGuire (Broadbean Dan) and so on. So if any of you fancy it, answer the questions on your blog and let me know!

I think advertising sucks (and I work in marketing)

2008-04-23T16:50:00.002+01:00

Sonia Simone wrote a cracking guest post over at Copyblogger. Click here to read about the 'new media' way to find customers.

I'm going to blog about this in the next few days in the context of marketing for small businesses (which after all, is my business).

5 things you need to go freelance (plus the website is live)

2008-04-17T08:34:00.006+01:00

It's been a while coming but finally my website is live! Click here for www.jamesparronline.com

Despite the stresses involved in getting it sorted (anyone who reads my Twitter feed has heard all about it! BTW, if you're not a Twitterer yet, click here to follow me), I'm really pleased with how it's turned out. I spent a lot of time worrying that it wouldn't look right but the guys have done a good job I reckon. Any comments or thoughts, as ever, much appreciated!

So now that's up and running (and the business cards are ordered) I figure I can officially call myself a freelance consultant (I have been doing a little work in this vein up until now, but the website going up was always going to be my proper start date).

This post therefore is for anyone interested in going freelance themselves, or just curious about what goes into the process. I'm talking from my own experience obviously, so other people's mileage could vary, but from what I've read and heard anecdotally I think my experience was pretty standard.

Here are the top 5 things you need to become a freelancer:

1. Patience

It’s number one for a lot of reasons but mainly because it's been two and a half months since I left my previous company and although that may not seem like a long time, I naively thought I’d be motoring along by now. I've been waiting and waiting and waiting for all manner of things to drop into place.

The website has been the main delay (and those guys worked quickly, believe me) but there's other stuff too. I had problems with my emails, my computer, the blog and my bank, all of which tested my ability not to completely lose my rag and run off to join the circus.

2. Belief

Nearly as important as patience, it’s belief in both yourself and what you're looking to achieve. Despite having thoroughly thought this decision through over and over, there have been days where I decided it was completely crazy. In a job you get a pay check every month, someone else worries about the little details and if it all goes wrong then the worst that can happen is you have to find something else. None of that’s true as a freelancer. Worst that can happen? It doesn't even bear thinking about.

I'm very fortunate though, in that I have an exceptionally supportive girlfriend and some very successful friends and associates, who've been in similar positions and believe in me even when I don't. It’s that sort of thing that keeps you going.

3. Cash.

It’s another biggy. You don't need to be Monty Burns, but you do need enough cash to get by for a while. I haven't made any proper money since I left my last job but I’ve spent plenty (a new laptop, the website, business cards, even new clothes so I look the part). I've been fairly frugal where possible but the bank balance has still been steadily decreasing. Without the redundancy package I simply couldn't have done this.

4. Inspiration.

It's massively important to keep a perspective on things and realise that there are a lot of people going through exactly what you're going through. This means sometimes looking for inspiration in the form of successful peers and approachable experts. I get my daily dose of inspiration from the blogosphere mainly but I also read books and magazine articles about my field.

Luckily there’s so much good free stuff out there you need never go short of inspiration. Click any of the following for sage advice, funny stories, tips on how (and how not) to do pretty much anything and all round inspiration: Naomi @ IttyBiz, Seth, Hugh, Penelope @ Brazen Careerist, Pam @ Escape from Cubicle Nation, Alex the Chief Happiness Officer, Sonia @ Remarkable Communication, Maki @ doshdosh and Rowan @ Fortify Your Oasis.

(Top Tip: Read those guys, then read the people they tell you to and you'll never be short of inspiration again)

5. An idea

Finally (or at least finally in this list, there's a lot more you need other than this to become a freelancer but I'm going for brevity over comprehensiveness) – it’s the strength of your idea. Whether you’e going to become a freelance IT guy or a self-employed plumber there's a very good chance that whatever you're offering is already out there in one form or another. In fact it's pretty likely that people right now are setting up in exactly the same space as you (this is definitiely true for me; the word 'marketing' in a Google Blog Search returns 98 million items!) Your idea therefore needs to be well thought out, easy enough to explain and something that you genuinely believe in (a good idea helps with point 2 in this list).

That's what I've tried to achieve with the concept of RED marketing™ (click here to find out what the heck that is). I knew what I wanted to achieve with my business, but it wasn't until I sat down and fleshed out an actual concept (a workable, defined one) that I felt I had an idea I could go to people with. People need that idea if they're going to buy from you, so make the best of it that you can.

Whether what you do is consultative or practical, service or product, you should be able to define your business in terms of your idea. Work on that and it’ll pay you back big time.

That in a nutshell is what it’s taken to get me to this point. I’ve purposefully not mentioned the various practicalities of setting up as a freelancer (taxes, legal status etc) because there are so many good books and articles out there that do a much better job of explaining that side than I could. If you’re considering it and want some more information then feel free to get in touch (either in the comments, or email me directly – james at jamesparronline dot com) and I’ll happily have a chat with you about the ins and outs. I can say that I highly recommend it and that’s even before my business has really taken off. Just the different perspective it gives you can be invaluable in my opinion. Even if I end up eventually going back to work for someone else, I think I’ll be a better employee for my time doing this.

P.S. Just one thing though, if you were thinking about becoming a freelance marketing consultant, maybe have a bit of a rethink; I hear there’s really not much room in that area anymore…

A review of Recruitment Juice - training for recruiters

2008-04-10T11:41:00.005+01:00

About 3 weeks ago Louise introduced me to a chap called Matt Trott. Matt is Director of a very interesting outfit called Recruitment Juice, whose goal in the world seems to be making recruitment training more fun. I had a brief chat with Matt about the product he and business partner Roy Ripper offer and was intrigued. Matt described it as part ‘The Office’, part training DVD, which sounded to me like a bloody horrendous combination to be honest; fist-in-mouth, cringe-worthiness delivered by money-driven, robotic, recruitment-sales folk right?

Matt very kindly offered to send me a review copy with the proviso that if I had something interesting to say about the product (good or bad) I blog about it here for all to see. Never one to turn down a freebie, I agreed!

First up – here’s the website. Perhaps go check it out before you read my review of the DVD. I’m not going to go into tonnes of detail about what actually happens in the videos so it may help for you to be a little familiar with the material (plus the website is actually really good fun).

OK, back? Seen the site? Good.

First impressions

The DVDs come in a snazzy box along with some instructions, a workbook and a survey (conducted by the guys at Recruitment Juice) on ‘perceptions of the recruitment industry’. The survey is great; really detailed and well-thought out. It confirms pretty much all self-aware recruitment folk’s worst fears – 70% on average have a PSL in place, only 1% response rate to unsolicited mails, a laundry list of ‘annoying’ recruiter attributes and so on.

The workbook looks good too, although I didn’t go through it myself when watching the DVDs (the idea is to watch 1 DVD a week with a group of people and all complete a variety of complementary thought exercises after each session to aid learning)

The DVDs

There are 6 of them and they probably last slightly over 2 hours in total. I watched a couple of episodes each week and found the pace and volume of information to be more than manageable. Matt’s mention of ‘The Office’ was pretty spot on actually as the series is filmed in a very similar style.

The ‘action’ takes place in a fictional recruitment company, Sunshine Recruitment, and centres around 2 of the staff. Wayne is a useless, self-indulgent, arrogant pillock of a recruitment consultant (an exaggeration one would hope, although I fear Matt, Roy and the rest at Recruitment Juice probably based the character on a few individuals they know pretty well). Charlotte meanwhile is the lovely new girl; all innocence, honesty and enthusiasm.

As with ‘The Office’ a camera crew is following the fortunes of the business. The voiceover chap interacts with the staff (particularly the aforementioned Wayne and Charlotte) to discuss recruitment issues.

The experts

The learning element comes from a number of ‘talking heads’; industry experts whose advice is sought to help Charlotte on her journey from newbie to super-recruiter. The experts are all pretty good and their input is generally both interesting and succinct (rare for recruitment!) A couple of them particularly are great, Angela Ashwell and Helen Curry (Ashwell Forbes and The Spencer Group respectively) standing out. Occasionally some of them slip into full-on ‘recruitment consultant’ mode and remind you of the sorts you get stuck talking to at a networking do with no escape route in sight bar the nearest window, but overall they err on the side of charming, if a little money-obsessed.

The content

So, with a good format, good cast, good experts and good execution the onus is really on the content not to let the side down. Fortunately it does no such thing and delivers in spades. The focus is winning new business this time but I really hope the guys plan on developing this into a series for different areas of recruitment because it could really work. The level of detail is spot on; it would benefit both new starters and seasoned recruitment pros alike.

The pacing of the content is good too, meaning each point can be delivered and absorbed comfortably, even if you’re slightly distracted (I watched one whilst trying to wrap my girlfriend’s birthday presents and despite the intense concentration required to scrunch the paper into a ball, sellotape it to the floor by accident, then my leg, then finally stick it down only to realise I hadn’t cut enough paper off, I still managed to get the main points from the DVD).

The topics covered take you through your attitude to winning new business, the preparation required, how to open calls, questions and communication tips, objections and closing and strategies outside of cold calling. This is pretty much all you’ll need to know if you want to become proficient at winning new business. Delivering that level of information in just over 2 hours is no mean feat.

So is it worth it?

Cold calling has never been my idea of fun but it is a vital part of the successful recruiters armoury. Winning new business can be a nightmare, but it’s not rocket science and this training solution shows that nicely and adds some fun to the mix too. It borders on being cheesy at times but manages mostly to avoid the clichés and empty sales rhetoric that I’ve seen in other offerings.

At £700 it may sound expensive but to be honest it's not really. A half-day training course covering similar material would cost at least £500 per person whilst other DVD based offerings generally cost between £300 and £1500 depending on the calibre of the trainer associated with the product. This offering is totally different to any other production you'll see and the training seems to be easy enough to implement. I'd seriously consider it if I ran my own firm.

I’m pleased I spoke to Matt as I think he and Roy are people to pay attention to in the future. I’d love to see what they come up with next; my suggestion – the candidate side of the procedure could always do with a spruce up and the characters you could create would be a hoot!

Matt also very kindly put me on their affiliate programme, so if you’re interested in buying the DVDs you can do so at a reduced cost by entering the code PARR when you order. (To be clear – as that’s affiliated as well as the discount for you, I get a fee if you sign up using my code.)

Anyway, I’m off to practice handling objections from potential clients, so I’ll leave you to have a proper snoop round the Recruitment Juice site. Any thoughts or feedback, as ever, welcome via email or in the comments.

Hugh MacLeod's gapingvoid lands a book deal

2008-04-07T17:16:00.003+01:00

Pic credit: Probably my favourite gapingvoid cartoon

Worthy of note because Hugh's gapingvoid was the first blog I ever read. I've said before how I owe Seth Godin for the 'be remarkable' stuff; well I owe Hugh MacLeod for igniting the blogging spark in me at all.

Now I get to read him in a book. All good. Congrats Hugh.

10 Top Tips to get on the PSL - a post for recruiters

2008-04-02T14:29:00.009+01:00

Pic credit: flickr CC from rachelvoorhees. Follow the link for more of her wonderful photos

A little while back Louise from uk:recruiter posted an introduction to Emma, an in-house recruiter for Sky. Mentioned in the post was a forum discussion about the merits and demerits of PSLs (Preferred Supplier Lists to the uninitiated). You can see the details here. Emma was surprised that so many people suggested PSLs were a waste of time and that HR were a hindrance to the recruitment process.

Although not surprised myself (I’ve encountered a fair amount of vitriol from recruiters about in-house teams, outsourcing companies, HR etc) it stuck with me and for a while I’ve been thinking about how best to address the subject on the blog. I’ve decided (wisely I think) not to open the can of worms again by presenting an opinion piece on the subject, but rather to answer the original question in the forum discussion – what should you do if you call a company and they tell you there’s a PSL in place and they’re not reviewing?

Here are my 10 top tips:

Don’t argue with them. The plan is to develop a relationship, so even if you’re frustrated and this is the 5^th time this has happened to you today, don’t piss them off.
Try and get a few details about the PSL. Ask how it works, how many agencies are on it, how they got there and what the likelihood of a review is. Again, remember point 1; don’t be stroppy, just ask polite, interested questions. Most HR or outsource folk won’t mind answering them.
Ask for their email address. Ensure them that you absolutely, positively will not spam them and that you won’t send over endless, unsolicited CVs. Explain that you’d like to put them on your mailing list for salary surveys, industry info, fun Friday contests etc (yes, you now have a mailing list to whom you send those types of things – trust me, it will pay back the minimal effort it takes to set up).
Leave the conversation on a positive note. Ideally get their permission to send them the above and possibly some standard, corporate company info (although bear in mind, that stuff always goes straight in the bin/deleted folder).
Do your homework. If you’ve got their details you need to start thinking about how best to use them. Think about what relevant, useful information you can send them to ingratiate yourself.
Be cool. It’s tempting to call them/email them the very next day (then every day after that until you get bored). This is what stalkers do. Nobody thinks they’re cool.
Send them the relevant, useful, informative things you thought of in point 5. Salary surveys are great for example (they’re easy to create for you, but exceptionally useful for potential clients). If that’s beyond you how about a newsletter covering recruiting topics for their industry? Still too much? Send interesting highlights from your blog, or something more informal (competitions and games on a Friday are popular).
Send content regularly, but not excessively. If it’s really juicy, relevant stuff then once a week is fine. Otherwise fortnightly. (Never daily; I guarantee you’re not that interesting.)
Gain their trust and ongoing permission. By agreeing for you to send them stuff they give you a level of permission. That will only go so far so don’t abuse it. After a while though, it’s ok to ask for more permission. Ask them about their business, their preferences, the people they hire and so on, maybe in a short survey. Make sure you have their explicit permission to do so though.
Finally, ask in one of your emails if there’s a good time to call and discuss the PSL. If they trust you, they won’t mind your asking. They may still say no, but it’s as good a chance as you’ll have. Also, if they agree, you’ll now have much more information about them so you’ll be in a better position to make your pitch.

I know the above sounds like hard work compared to just spamming as many people as you can with ‘fake’ CVs. I also know that some recruiters will think it’s all BS. The sales ‘experts’ particularly may see this as wishy-washy marketing crap that doesn’t fit with their mantra of ‘ABC’ (Always Be Closing). You know what that means though? All the more room for you enlightened folk to start doing this and reaping the rewards!

Working for a recruitment process outsourcing (RPO) company I’ve been on both sides of the recruitment-sales fence, both pitching for business and taking pitches from potential suppliers. I’ve taken thousands of sales calls and rarely given away business on the strength of one. I’ve managed PSLs for a variety of organisations, from Blue Chip to small biz, and every agency on those PSLs got there because of performance, not because they managed to ‘get round’ HR and speak to the recruiting manager directly.

(Quick note to those who think that’s a good tactic – you think you can get onside with line managers by taking them to lunch etc? So does the rest of the industry! They’re not loyal to you, they just like going to restaurants! The number of managers I’ve heard say “I don’t like agency X, in fact they’re assholes, but they do know some good places to eat in North London!”...)

The best bet in this saturated market is to differentiate yourself from the dozen other agencies who are busy picking up the phone to your prospect that morning. (Be remarkable, remember?) People buy people, and the right types of relationships matter. PSLs are exceptionally easy to get on, if you do a few simple (honest, decent) things.

I’ll post on another occasion about how best to approach the pitch stage, particularly presentations to potential clients (I’ve seen tonnes of presentations by agencies but never a good one I’m sad to say). For now though, why not give this a try and see how you do?

Anyone with any experience of this subject, anecdotal or otherwise, in favour of or against my suggestions, please feel free to share with the group in the comments.

[Bonus link: I mentioned setting up a mailing list in point 3. Microsoft Outlook can essentially do this for you, or you web host might offer a service so ask IT. If you need something else though, I've just started using a service called YourMailingListProvider. It's cheap and user friendly, with plenty of features. I've no affiliation to the company, just one chaps opinion etc]

Like this post? Why not subscribe to get more like it? Hate this post? Why not subscribe so you can see what other crap I come up with? Subscribing is free and it'll make you cool, like the Fonze. Now sit on it, Potsy!

Why praise is the most important skill a manager or leader can develop

2008-03-28T12:35:00.004Z

Just a link post today, but it's a damn good one from Wally Bock:

In praise of praise

Devour it if there's even a possibility you'll manage people.

What's really in a name?

2008-03-26T17:26:00.002Z

Here's a bit of frivolous fun from the BBC that might help you find out:

Apparently, I'm Mr Successful...

My site

2008-03-26T14:30:00.002Z

Things are moving at pace with my planned consulting website. The domain is all signed and sealed and the new site will definitely be living at jamesparronline.com (my preferred location, jamesparr.com, was already taken unfortunately - if you don't own 'yourname'.com then go buy it immediately before someone else does). Hosting is sorted too, I'm using LaughingSquid.

So things should be up and running within the next week and I'll post about it here when I launch officially. When it's all sorted it will also free up my time to blog a bit more hopefully.

If you're interested in blogging, read this...

2008-03-19T13:47:00.002Z

There's a blog that I haven't flagged up before and that's bad form, because I devour every word written there. It's called Dosh Dosh and it's written by Maki (that link is to his Twitter profile).

His blog is so good because he really puts the hours in (seriously; hours and hours) to write damn good stuff. Thousands of subscribers, mucho respect in the blogosphere, tonnes of link love and general worship are the prizes that land at his feet pretty much daily. If that's what you aspire to, you should have a read. If not, it's still worth a look...

Click here for the wonderful Dosh Dosh

Delete everything and reboot your brain

2008-03-12T21:13:00.005Z

Too much information can be really bad for you so delete it all and start again. A blank canvas to work on is worth the pain of giving up your precious information streams. In short, freedom rocks.

I’ve just got back online at home. As mentioned previously, having moved flats I had problems with a new ISP and the phone company. I went to my girlfriend’s to steal her wifi regularly. I went to the library and wifi enabled coffee shops too, but I couldn’t keep up. My email was overflowing, my feed reader was jammed and the blog went quiet. It was getting pretty stressful and I was relieved to get everything sorted today.

First thing I did? I opened 2 tabs for my email accounts and another for my blog feeds. 36 emails in one account. 42 emails in the other. 1500+ new items from the 100 or so feeds I follow. Gulp!

Had I read everything it would have taken me days to get through. All the time new items would have piled up too. I was even more stressed than when I didn’t have the internet! So I deleted it all. I declared email and feed bankruptcy and now I’m starting again with a blank canvas.

[Note: The emails were mostly subscriptions I have, not personal emails. Anyone who emailed me personally knew I was having web trouble and so spoke to me about important stuff directly]

It was a scary thing to do I’ll admit. I love information and feel down if I go a couple of days without learning something new or reading something interesting. I’m addicted to blogs for that reason; tonnes of content delivered to me fresh everyday. But it’s debilitating too. Sometimes I can’t get a new idea of my own going for all the good stuff out there. And I often give up on a half-formed idea because I read someone else’s work on a similar topic.

Now though, I’m free. I’m now thinking about ideas for my marketing consultancy business rather than reading the (doubtless interesting and entertaining) thoughts of Seth Godin. I’ve even got time to write this post.

I’m not worried about what I missed, because the blogosphere is such a damn wonderful place I reckon any interesting stuff will crop up again anyway. And I’m not worried about the conversations I missed either because I’m planning to be around for a while, so I’ll get the chance to join in another time.

If anyone reading this is in the same position I was, delete, reboot and start again. I know you won’t regret it.

How to keep quiet

2008-03-11T11:10:00.002Z

I'm not usually good at being quiet. In fact some people (my girlfriend, friends, family etc) might go as far as to say I'm actually totally crap at keeping quiet. I'm one of those people who talks a lot, about a lot of things. I've got opinions on most topics and can fake an opinion on any topics I'm not familiar with. Verbosity is my friend.

And yet here I am, keeping quiet with no effort at all on the blog!

I feel like all I do at the moment is apologise for not posting regularly enough and you guys must be getting bored of it by now because I sure am. I still don't have the internet at home, although I do now have a fully operational phone line. I've been promised the internet should be up and running next weekend. I live in hope.

If that doesn't happen I'll have to think of a new excuse or just admit to myself that I'm incapable of doing many things at once (i.e. setting up the new business, visiting the library to use the internet, consuming blogs, writing posts, maintaining my sanity etc). It's kind of ok to admit that though, because of the common notion that men can't multi-task (how on earth did we convince women of that one guys? What a 'get out of jail free' card, eh?)

I hope to get noisy again as soon as possible everybody. You'll be thankful of this quiet period if I manage it...

Some thoughts about estate agents

2008-02-28T11:39:00.006Z

(I found and saved this image a while back, but lost the credit info. If it's yours and you'd like credit, or want me to remove it, then just let me know. Thanks)

I've just moved house so got to thinking about estate agents and the housing market in general. I rent a flat in South Manchester (Didsbury) and have done for the last 3 years nearly. Prior to that I rented in the city centre. In that time I've encountered a heck of a lot of estate agents. I've viewed dozens of places, been to a variety of agencies and rented from several of them. This experience has led me to the following conclusion...

Estate agencies are broken.

This seems counter-intuitive because they've been doing really well in recent years obviously, but I think it's fair to put 90+% of this success down to the unrelenting growth of the housing market, not their ability. Harsh I know, but I can genuinely say that I have never encountered what I'd regard as a 'good' estate agent. In fact it's rare to find even a competent one. Anecdotal evidence seems to suggest I'm not alone in my thinking.

This poor showing by agencies is surprising given their long history and traditions. What baffles me more though, is that not one agency (that I’ve heard of) takes advantage of the situation by acting differently, thereby building a stronghold in the market.

Maybe all that's needed is a spark to light the creative fires though, so should an estate agent be reading this and be ready to make some changes, here’s my 7 tips for future success.

1. Now that the housing boom seems to be tapering off you need to get back to focusing on people, predominantly your clients (and to some degree your employees – see point 4). From tomorrow morning, 9am, every person that walks through the door or phones you up is seriously important, because as things get worse, it’s going to start happening less and less. Consider everything from first impressions (hint – tidy up), to how you answer the phone to the comfort level of the chairs.

2. You used to create a lot of stress (convincing people to move house, one of the most stressful life events alongside divorce and bereavement). Now you should seek to minimise it, by ensuring their sale or move is painless. People are worried about the market and worried about the deal they’re making/getting. Be useful, be reassuring and most of all be honest and you'll have calm clients, ready to work with you.

3. Smarten up your act. It’s not okay to have a property list or pictures in your window that are weeks out of date. It’s not okay to promise a certain number of viewings and fail to deliver. You need to show your business in the most professional light possible because the gold rush is over and the people that still want to move house want to do so with someone they trust, not just the first agency they come to on the high street.

4. Get your people to smarten up their act too and give them the incentives to do so. I‘ve never been shown round by an agent who knew what council tax band a property was in. I’ve met some agents who didn’t even know what the rent was or when the place was likely to be available. From now on, this is unacceptable.

Make it worth their while to change their attitudes and habits. Bonuses could be paid on good feedback (see point six), or other benefits given (e.g. days off) if cash isn’t an option. Houses have sold themselves for the last few years, now your people need to learn to sell houses. Make up a ‘cheat sheet’ for each property on your books, with obvious information like rent and council tax and not so obvious stuff like good local bars, restaurants, schools etc. Encourage your people to learn this stuff but if they have to take the sheets everywhere and read them verbatim it’s still better than the standard blank stare they usually deliver when someone asks a question.

5. Change your tone of voice. Take a look at your sales and marketing copy. If it’s aggressive, outdated, or contains any jargon, then change it (or pay someone to change it). From now on you’re all about trust, transparency and expertise. Your copy should say “We know times are tough but we’re all in this together”. Reassuring clients is a priority.

6. If you don't know what it is that will reassure your clients, because you don't know what they want, then start asking them! Get permission to survey your clients before, during and after their move (particularly after; it baffles me that estate agents don’t contact people a couple of weeks after the move to see how things are going). Importantly, if you decide to ask for information from people and the feedback says changes are needed, then you’ve got to make those changes, even if they seem scary.

7. Be remarkable. This one is a winner no matter what business you’re in, but I think estate agents particularly could benefit from some good word of mouth. If you’re the only agency in town that focuses on people (because the rest of them are focused on what people carry in their wallets) then trust me, people will talk about you. Those people, the talkative ones, will be your salvation. Watch as they drive their friends, family and colleagues (all potential buyers and sellers) to your agency and then start the whole process again, recruiting these new folks to your word of mouth army with more fantastic performance.

If the market folds then it will be a scary time for estate agents, no doubt. I picture bands of them, roaming the streets, desperate for a house to sell, going feral due to lack of business. But remember, it’s an even scarier time for buyers and sellers too, which means it’s an exciting time for estate agents.

People still need estate agents (everyone I know who doesn’t own a place still wants to buy, despite the predicted problems), they’re just going to be far more picky about who they do business with. The opportunities are there for agents going forward, but only those agents who embrace the changes in the market. If you're one those agents with a worried eye on the future and the above helps get your thinking on the right track, then I’m a happy ~~camper~~ renter.

[UPDATE: A few hours after posting this I was going through my feed reader (not done that for way too long, 1400+ new items, ouch!) and found this from Seth, with his advice for the US real estate market. Good advice and well worth a read.]

What am I doing?

2008-02-27T16:40:00.003Z

What am I doing? is a question I ask myself with some frequency (virtually every day in fact). Usually that's because I've got a terrible attention span and find it's a good idea to remind myself exactly what should be getting my limited attention-allowance.

I'm finding recently though, that other people have started to ask me what I'm doing too. And they don't mean specifically at that moment in time. No, they mean what am I doing with my life.

This is a perfectly reasonable question really, given recent developments and although I've promised repeatedly to give everyone I know a heads up, I still haven't got round to it. So I decided to answer the question on the blog, ergo saving myself some time. Now when someone asks, I'll just send them here (although when my mum asks for the umpteenth time I'll have to first explain to her what a blog is, meaning time savings for that particular interaction will be negligible at best).

As I've hinted previously, I intend to pursue a new direction now that my time at Omni has come to a close. To be more specific, I'm currently setting up as a freelance consultant and will soon (as of next week, when my period of gardening leave finishes) be able to offer my services to interested parties.

The work won't be a complete departure from what I did previously as I'll be operating essentially as a marketing consultant. My focus will be on new marketing, branding and communications (fortuitously things that are both my passions and my areas of expertise).

I won't go into too much more detail than that on the blog, save to say that if you read some of my previous posts you'll get the gist of the direction I'll be taking with my consultative advice (communities, transparency, honesty, happiness etc all watchwords).

I intend to have a website dedicated to my new venture up shortly (details of which I'll post here). The blog, although obviously inextricably linked to my adventures, will hopefully remain somewhat separate. In essence, I'd like to talk about all the things that interest me here, have conversations with people and generally rant and vent as appropriate, whilst saving the more business-type stuff for the website.

I'm sure there will be some crossover, but basically what I'm saying is that I don't intend to start pimping myself out on the blog! I'll still be talking about things that are completely unrelated to my new business (or at least may seem it to people) and I'll still be looking to poke my nose into various conversations with my usual limited grasp of the facts and unlimited enthusiasm for a good ding dong. I think it's important therefore to have some demarcation of territory, if only so I don't get confused and start calling out my clients for a ruck and fawning obsequiously over my blog readers. (This is a joke, I will ruck and fawn in equal measure with my clients and my readers).

Right now, things are moving along, albeit a little slower than I would like. Pace should pick up soon I hope though. I need an accountant, a finished website and some other bits and bobs (including a bloody internet connection, which is proving problematic in the new place). Once I have those things the rest should fall into place fairly easily (or at the least I'll feel better about things so the other stuff won't matter as much).

I'm excited about this new venture because it's allowing me the freedom to focus on the things that are most important to me. I'm under no illusions about the amount of hard work that will be involved, but I'm sure someone famous once said something about the work you love being no work at all.

Thanks again for all your patience with things guys. I'll be back with another post as soon as I can get online again. Although if the internet people don't sort it out in the next couple of days you may see me on the 24 hour news channel before you see me back here, accompanied by the scrolling announcement 'Manchester man reeks bloody revenge on ISP'...

I'm still here...

2008-02-22T10:28:00.003Z

...honestly!

I've been incommunicado for a while because I went on holiday (my wonderful girlfriend organised a surprise trip to Prague) and now I'm moving house. I'm currently without a landline in the new place therefore I'm sans internet. Plus my PC is in bits in a box.

So apologies for the continued slow running at the blog and for anyone who follows me on Twitter. I'm not going to speculate when normal service will be resumed, because I don't know really. I'll try my best to get things up and running quickly though.

What's in a name? (Or why 'Be Remarkable James')?

2008-02-13T15:03:00.005Z

Pic credit: gapingvoid.com

Well things are moving at pace in my post-Omni career. At the moment I'm still doing the nitty gritty, detail-heavy stuff. Plus I'm still on gardening leave until March. When things are sorted though my plan is to be in business for myself, offering my services (which I'll tell you all about soon) to individuals and small companies. Exciting times ahead!

In the meantime though, I'd promised to highlight where the new name for the blog came from. So here goes...

First off I must state what is an ongoing debt I have to Seth Godin. It was his his work on Purple Cows, Permission Marketing and Free Prizes that led me to address my genuine interest in marketing (new marketing, branding and communications in particular). If I had never found Seth's work my current direction would likely be very different now. Sometimes you just need to read something wonderful to push you in the right direction.

'Be Remarkable' is essentially my way of turning the material that I began to learn about (via Seth and others) into as simple a premise as possible. These ideas about remarkability (the qualities that some people, companies and products have that simply 'make people remark upon them') led me to my own thoughts on the vary nature of business. 'Be Remarkable' became my mantra essentially (and something I would preach it to all who would listen). I first mentioned it on the blog a good while back and I will doubtless mention it again many times over!

So 'Be Remarkable James' was really my only choice as a title. This blog is somewhere for me to share my thoughts and make connections with people. It is somewhere discussions will start and grow. It allows me to externalise my thought processes, my beliefs and my passions, and even better it allows other people to pass comment on them. Therefore it's also the ideal place to remind myself everyday to practice what I preach and to 'Be Remarkable'.

As well as thanks to Seth and the countless others who have inspired me (and who will deserve even more credit if the endeavours I have planned lead me to any kind of success) I'd also like to ask people a favour...

Whether you read this blog regularly or are reading it for the first time, whether you love it or hate it or just plain don't care, if I'm not being remarkable I want you to call me on it! If I write a 'me-too' post, if I'm slcaking off excessivley, if I talk rubbish or get things wrong - tell me! And if you think what I'm writing, doing or saying is remarkable, then hopefully you'll be inclined to remark upon it!

Ongoing changes...

2008-02-08T17:40:00.000Z

As the more keen eyed amongst you will have noticed there's been a few little changes around here recently. Ok, ok, there's been some damn big changes!

I'm in the process of updating things, learning a little HTML, pulling together ideas and generally getting myself organised. Some things will stay, other stuff I'll doubtless change over and over! Patience with my progress would be much appreciated as I tend to like to tweak and chop until I get things how I like them.

You'll notice that I've renamed already though. I thought that was important to do straight away. I'll let you all into the thought process that went into choosing the new name very soon.

I'll post updates about the state of play here in the coming days. I also hope to have an exciting announcement about my plans for the future, so don't change that dial folks!

Changes

2008-02-06T12:22:00.000Z

Okay, here's an important post - sorry it's been nearly a week in coming...

The reason I've been quiet the past few days is because I've been trying to get myself sorted to some degree following some fairly major changes, or at least one in particular.

I'm leaving Omni.

This is something that has been a potential for some time. I (and the people I worked with) wasn't sure exactly how things would pan out but I have known for a while that some of the stuff I do (and want to do going forwards) doesn't fit in the Omni set up. No hard feelings, nothing bad. Just doesn't fit at the moment. So the question became how to manage the change.

Rob (the MD) and I sat down on Friday. Between us we came up with a plan that sees me take redundancy with the potential to continue to do some work for Omni (freelance etc) in the future. I'll then sort my stuff out and see where I go from there. I've got some ideas but nothing concrete. It needs some serious thinking.

I hope therefore that people will bear with me for the time being. There's going to be some changes coming. The layout and look of the blog will change for starters (I'll be taking off the Omni-related) stuff. Depending on how easy it is I may change the address (although I do worry about losing the subscribers etc I have. My readership isn't enormous but there's a few loyal fans out there. I don't want to blow what I've put up here the last few months, so I'll see what I can do).

I'll also rename the blog. I've got some ideas, but more on that later.

I'm genuinely excited about this opportunity that's now sitting in front of me. Pretty shit scared too. But more excited than terrified.

I'm trying to think of all the people I need to email about this stuff too, I've made some great contacts/friends the last 3 and a half years and really don't want to lose touch. If you think I might have missed you though then drop me an email. I've 2 addresses I check regularly jparr81 at gmail dot com and jparr81 at hotmail dot com.

Like I say, exciting times! I'll have my head more sorted in the next few days and will be back up to full speed here (with all kinds of crazy plans no doubt) by next week at the latest I reckon. Before that I'll try and update and stuff, but apologies in advance if I'm a bit sporadic or rambling.

Thanks to anyone who's been with me through my time at Omni, I've loved all of it (the ups and the downs equally) and hope I can go on and meet many more cool and interesting people here and in my career going forwards.

Take it easy all you good, good people.

It's a medal place for Omniblog!

2008-01-31T09:08:00.000Z

At the tail end of last year I posted this, about the UK Recruiting Blog awards organised by the lovely and wonderful Louise Triance of uk:recruiter. Louise emailed me yesterday to let me know that the votes were in and counted and that the winner had been named.

Much to my great surprise I didn't receive nil points. In fact to my even greater surprise I came second! It's even on her blog, so I've got proof I'm not fibbing!

Therefore I just wanted to say thanks so much to all those who voted for little old me, it really is appreciated. One of the difficulties with blogging (or one of the difficulties I find at any rate, maybe it doesn't bother anyone else) is that quite often you can feel like you're just jabbering away to yourself. This, even with my massive ego and general love of the sound of my own voice, can be a bit disconcerting. It's why I appreciate the emails I receive and the comments on the blog and it's why I'm probably more pleased than I should be with the result. It's good enough just to know that a few people read my ramblings, it's spectacularly fantastic to think that some people actually enjoy what I write!

So thanks to all who voted, to all who've ever commented, to all who email me and to all who've read one post or read 'em all - you guys rock! I love blogging because it's let me start lots of new, cool and interesting conversations with new, cool and interesting (and seriously smart) people who I'd have likely never had the pleasure of engaging with any other way.

Things might be changing a little round here in the not-too-distant, so I'll keep you updated about all of that (it's a bit of a secret at the mo, sorry). I just really hope though that I can keep doing this for a good long while.

Cheers everybody!

P.S. If you're interested in recruitment particularly, the blog that beat Omniblog into the silver medal spot was most deserving: Pete Gold writes consistently relevant stuff for the savvy recruitment professional, so if you get chance have a read.

Optimum nutrition and Omni

2008-01-29T16:10:00.001Z

Chances are if you made New Years resolutions about your diet you've lapsed a couple of times by now at least. I never make NY resolutions to be honest (food related or otherwise) because I'm so spectacularly bad at keeping them (although this year I like the idea of having a NY theme, which you try and incorporate into your regular habits).

However the diet one is probably one of the most frustrating for people. Good nutrition is a minefield of information (and misinformation) that would be nigh on impossible to follow to the letter at any rate. Here at Omni people felt exactly the same before Christmas.

So, last year we arranged for a nutritionist to come into the office and give a talk on good nutrition to the entire office. The nutritionist, Alison Irving, also offered one-on-one follow up sessions to those with particular worries or questions.

The whole thing was a resounding success. I'll admit that I went in sceptical (after all, it seems pretty much everyday something new turns out to be 'bad' for you). I was very pleasantly surprised though. Alison was realistic about the whole thing and didn't preach any ultra diet nonsense. Rather she focused on a few practical, simple things that people could do (particularly people who work in an office most of the time), like drinking more water and snacking on the right type of things.

None of it was rocket science and that's the beauty really. Nobody needs to be blinded by science with these things, they just want some honest advice about what they can do to improve their diet and nutrition.

We liked it so much in fact, that we've started working with Alison, offering her service to current and prospective clients of ours. Alison will go into organisations and deliver her talk to groups of employees, followed, if required, by one-on-ones with people. The idea is that by providing good advice to their staff about optimum nutrition, companies can improve performance and productivity (for example by eliminating that lethargic, post lunch period that everybody seems to suffer from).

I'd also say that if this is something that you'd be interested at all, Alison has said to me that she'd be happy to extend her client list a bit further. If you'd like the chance to talk to or meet Alison, then just let me know in the comments or via email and I'll happily arrange that. She's based in the North West, but if you're not and would still like to have her talk to your team that's something we could arrange.

Post 101

2008-01-24T16:01:00.000Z

I can't believe I missed my hundredth post, which was the last one I posted! Oops.

Well this is post 101 and I'm still happy I've reached triple figures, even though I missed the milestone!

I'll pay more attention when I'm getting towards the next big milestone... (I wonder, should that be 200, 250, 500? Maybe the next milestone is quadruple figures, that's when I'll really know I'm addicted to this blogging stuff!)

New UK job board

2008-01-22T10:43:00.000Z

Louise announced the exciting news a couple of days ago that uk:recruiter have entered the job board market for the first time. You can find the details here.

I think this is a really good idea and the right direction for them to be going. Previously the site had only listed other job boards (it still does that by the way) but never tapped into the potential pool of loyal visitors directly. The site gets a lot of eyeballs and Louise's blog is popular and well-ranked on Google, so I'd thought for sometime that a job board of some kind was the logical next step.

They've gone the whole hog with it too. Rather than make a small niche board they've created what looks to be a broad and useful resource. Time will tell obviously, as a job board is only as strong as the recruiters and candidates who use it. I think it should have a good shot though.

I've not tried it out myself, just had a look around briefly, so if anyone has any practical experience with the site, or just first impressions, then do shout up.

Omni Finalists for onrec.com

2008-01-21T11:30:00.000Z

Some good news for me to come back to from my couple of days off: Omni have been named finalists in the OnRec awards for 2008, for the category Best Use of Online Recruitment. Here's the details.

Well done everybody, you all rock! Fingers crossed for us in the finals in March!

Man flu takes hold

2008-01-17T14:32:00.000Z

Well having avoided all the germs and nasties going round over Christmas I finally succumbed to something unpleasant today. I feel rotten, I'm bunged up and my head's in bits, but I'm sure despite all this it's probably only man flu.

Sunnier climes required I think, I wonder if Rob would consider moving the business to the Cayman Islands?

Wrap up warm everybody, and you'll hear from me again after my convalescence.

('Cough, cough' - in the style of Tiny Tim)

Social Objects or How to embrace the future of business

2008-01-15T10:45:00.000Z

Pic credit: gapingvoid

I mentioned briefly in a post a couple of weeks ago about the concept of Social Objects, that Hugh turned me on to. He picked the term up from this chap, (who’s an anthropologist and founder of the online service Jaiku), but in true Hugh-style he took the ball and ran with it (all the way off the field, out through the car park and into the building across the street).

He’s posted about it repeatedly – see here, here and here for a taste.

He’s also got a lot of other people excited about the idea, not least Mark Earls (here and here for example), John Dodds (who turns sprouts into the social object here), Seth Godin (who references it in this interview here and Dennis Howlett (who points us to Sonia’s Biker Jim story to illustrate the social object-ness here).

Others have mentioned it too, the idea is simple, effective and interesting, so it’s plenty sticky enough to get some real ‘ink’ in the blogosphere. It’s of real interest to me too.

From a marketing perspective creating a product that’s a social object could be the Grail. What’s easier to ‘sell’ than something that people naturally want to interact around and talk about? Even the least savvy of marketers would have to go some to kill this golden goose if it fell in their lap.

The problem is how do you cotton on to the social object idea in your organisation and what if the product you’re making isn’t a social object (or you can’t see it’s utility as such)?

Hugh gives a few examples in his social objects for beginners post, and goes on to say that there could be literally thousands (perhaps hundreds of thousands) more examples. He’s right too.

Humans interact around all kinds of weird and wonderful things, from broad churches to the cranniest little nook or niche. Hugh suggests Star Wars and sexy phones, he could just as easily posit 17^th Century soil samples or single cell organisms. In one post on the subject he answers my question above too – anything can be a social object, even if you only produce ‘Brand X’.

Yes, wine is perhaps a more logical social object than the boxes that your factory produces. But that’s not to say your box can’t be one too. Here’s a quick story about something that may have passed me by, had I not been at the time thinking about the whole social object thing...

Just before Christmas one of the major sweet manufacturers in the UK produced a new plastic package to run alongside the traditional Christmas tins of chocolates that everyone seems to buy only predominantly at that time of year. The new, plastic tubs were lighter than the metal tins and funky looking. They could also be used to store food and leftovers in the freezer, once all the chocolates were gone. (This isn't something you could do with the metal tins and this neat, new trick was advertised on the package itself.)

When someone brought one of the new tubs into work and left it in the kitchen for people to help themselves, I was a little surprised to see that the new packaging was what got people talking most, not the chocolatey contents. This plastic box became (you guessed it) a social object, in our office at least.

Now I don’t suppose that the company intended it as such. I would imagine there were a variety of reasons they chose to experiment with a new type of packaging, some of which were likely primarily economic. The tins weren’t withdrawn or replaced and the plastic tubs may not have even sold that well (I tried looking on the groups site for information, but the new packaging doesn’t even get a mention, suggesting it’s not part of a coordinated strategy or anything).

In reality therefore, it wasn’t the best social object in the world, or at least not a particularly long lasting one. However, I believe it could have been; they might have missed a trick.

If I was responsible for designing packaging somewhere, turning it into a social object would be one of the first things I’d try to do. Packaging is utilitarian, generally plain, fairly standard. There’s plenty of reasons for this I bet, functionality being a primary one. You don’t want your packaging to look wonderfully interesting but fail to keep your free range chicken fresh for example. A cool new tub for sweets is great, but only if it does the same (or a better) job as the old one of keeping the sweets in. Cost likely comes into it too. However I’d say that cost should be less of a consideration – a little extra money on packaging could create the social object that everyone loves to interact around. This in turn leads to greater sales of your packaging as everyone wants a piece of you!

Innocent Drinks provide a great example of this in my opinion. Having recently managed to become the first company to offer their drinks in 100% recyclable bottles, they have created a social object. (Even better, their drinks themselves are definitely social objects – social objects within social objects; how cool!)

OK, with that point sufficiently highlighted (/laboured) I want to address the area of business that ostensibly this blog is about – recruitment.

Recruitment is a service, not a product as such. ‘Brand X’ in Hugh’s example may well be boring and fairly unremarkable, but at least it’s something that people take home from the supermarket with them. How does recruitment become a social object when there’s nothing for people to ‘take home’, plonk on the surface and then incidentally talk about over coffee at the kitchen table?

For me the point here is the (Seth inspired) remarkability factor. If your service is remarkable (i.e. people will remark on it) then it will get a heck of a lot of traction. Amongst some people (HR or recruitment managers for example) recruitment is definitely a social object that they’d talk about.

So HR Manager Jo, from company A, goes out for lunch with HR Director Peter, from company B, at a moderately priced restaurant in town. The lunch is a catch-up; they’ve been pals since a CIPD conference they both attended some years back and get together fairly regularly to chew the fat over HR legislation, incentive schemes and funny hiring and firing stories. Their companies are in a similar market, but not what you’d call natural competitors.

Over a couple of glasses of sparkling water (/house white, depending on the industry) they get to talking about recent hires:

Jo tells a story about a recent nightmare vacancy “I couldn’t find a good project manager for love nor money. Everyone I saw from the agency just didn’t know the industry well enough, I need someone who can hit the ground running and at the minute they’re like hens teeth”

“Funny” Peter says, “I was just hiring for a project manager a couple of weeks back. I needed someone with a little experience so it wasn’t too hard to find – we offered on Monday. We saw plenty of people with more experience than we needed though…”

“Oh really” says Jo, intrigued/desperate

“Yeah, they were great. I got them all through (insert recruitment agency name here). We had to explain what we wanted in a bit of detail, but once we got them a good job spec it was smooth sailing”.

“Really?” says Jo, “I had a cold call from them last week, but didn’t follow it up as I wasn’t sure about the sales person”

“Me too, but once you get past the sales stuff, they’re actually pretty decent. They might still have some of the guys they sent me too, there were some real crackers in there”

In my experience, if an agency cold calls me I’ll almost never give them business based on that alone. Why would I? I have a tonne of agencies that I know plenty about to work with, why risk working with someone else? Even if they call and tell me they’ve just registered three great project managers and I’m recruiting for project managers, it’s unlikely they’ll get a positive response.

Maybe I’m missing a trick by not working with them, but if so I’d bet I’m not the only one. A cold call is a terrible way to try and win business (although the many reasons I hate them are for a different blog post entirely) and even if someone promises me a solution to my 'big problem' it’s unlikely to make me work with them. A conversation about your agency over lunch with a friend or trusted colleague though, will change all of that in an instant. As in Hugh’s example, once your agency becomes a social object it gains credibility and traction, the 2 things that will make me take a second look.

There’s no tricks or shortcuts unfortunately though, it’s just good old fashioned hard work. I respect my colleagues and peers because they’re good at what they do, so I know they won’t recommend me a dud agency.

You can’t ‘trick’ my colleagues or game the system with free schwag, meals out, trips to the football and the like. Plenty of agencies give that stuff out, but no one I know says “That agencies great! Sure they send me lousy CVs, no one ever turns up for interview and the lead consultant won’t stop looking at my chest…but they sent me this cool calendar with funny pictures and a box of Krispy Kremes!”

Talent and skill and expertise will take you a long way. Professionalism, dependability and generosity will never stop being good business. Free stuff is fun and I’m not saying it should be dropped (if you’re clever you can make your schwag a social object…) but results and attitude are what matter. Turn the performance of your recruitment company into a social object and you’ll turn a lot more people on to your service.

Hugh calls social objects the future of marketing. I think he’s right and I think he could even go further too. I think social objects are the future of business in a sense.

If you’re in business then you’re trying to sell something. If you’re trying to sell something you’re trying to change people’s behaviour. Any programme trying change people’s behaviour is a marketing programme (I’ve been saying this for a while and was delighted to see Paul Hebert agreeing with me on this today). The future of marketing is social objects, ergo the future of business is social objects.

OK, these are my thoughts on what is clearly a complex topic, and to be honest I could write a heck of a lot more on it (I may do in the future but won’t in this post you’ll be pleased to hear).

I think though, that anybody in the recruitment field who reads the social objects spiel from Hugh, but passes it off as something they couldn’t/shouldn’t get involved in is missing a trick. In fact I think in the future if you don’t try and turn your service (i.e. your performance) into a social object it’s tantamount to nothing more than sheer laziness. The rewards for joining in here are real and abundant.

Why wouldn’t you want to get onboard ahead of the curve?

(Like this post and want to read more? All the cool kids are subscribing to my feed, so they don't have to keep coming back and checking the site like a total square! Plus, if you subscribe, then you'll automatically become more attractive to the opposite sex, more decisive, have success in your career and win the lottery. In fact even better, you'll actually become a social object yourself*. So what are you waiting for?)

*All benefits are not guaranteed. Nor are they typical, likely or even, in actual fact, possible. But subscribe anyways, because you never know...

Big Post ahead...

2008-01-14T17:34:00.000Z

Quick announcement - there's a post coming tomorrow, and it's a big one! It's going to be about social objects...

(Intrigued? Why not subscribe and then you won't have to check back tomorrow and you definitely won't miss it!)

How to write effective online ad copy

2008-01-11T10:49:00.002Z

So if you're a regular reader of this blog you'll know that my posts are a real mix of things. Most common are shorter posts either about something that's just popped into my head, or linking to something great that I've read somewhere (like this one, or this one). Other times I'll go on a bit more about something that really interests me (like this). And finally the other type of post is the completely unrelated rant (the best example of which is this one, which I'm secretly quite proud of in rant terms). I'm going to start doing something new though, and what better time to start than the present? In a nutshell all I'm going to be doing is putting up a few (hopefully) 'useful' posts, particularly related to recruitment. These posts will be a bit longer than my normal sort, and will generally be formatted as 'How to...' They won't be up all the time and I'll make sure to keep my shorter, pithier posts coming too. I know some people who read the blog probably won't be interested in them at all so if that's you I'd appreciate your indulgence, just skip the long ones and stick to the links and quips. If you hate it though and it really annoys you then do let me know! To those who've expressed an interest in posts like this, I hope this is what you were after. Any questions, comments, rants, praise etc all equally welcome, here on the blog or emailed to me - james dot parr at omnirms dot com (of course replace 'dot' with '.' and 'at' with '@', minus parentheses). So, without further ado, here is the first of my 'How to...' posts:

How to…

…Write effective online ad copy

Although there is no exact science to writing online ad copy there are some things you can do to get your ad noticed and read. This document hopefully outlines some of the basics and should give your ad a bit of a head start.

The basics

Simple, concise ads work best online. With so many jobs advertised in such a short space it is easy for candidates to skim over a whole page full and completely miss yours. There is also a suggestion that people make up their mind on whether they want to continue reading what they are looking at on a webpage within seven seconds, so getting them to read on immediately is vital. There are therefore a few things that you can do to give your job the best chance of being considered.

Always include the salary, work location and a suitable job title at the top of the ad. Where possible put an actual figure for salary rather than ‘£Excellent’. If they get a car too or a guaranteed bonus, mention that. Candidates will read the ads with all that information before they do one that excludes some of it.

With the job title, avoid being too creative. Remember that titles are searchable on boards so they need to be clear, intuitive and understandable. If you want a sales manager don’t ask for a ‘Business Development Co-ordinator’.

The first paragraph is the most vital. Most people put company information in the first paragraph. However you can make better use of this paragraph. The first few lines should outline exactly what you want from your ideal applicant. So if you want a Japanese speaker with Project Management experience, put it in the first paragraph. That way candidates will waste less of your time applying for something they’re not suitable for.

After that initial paragraph you can then go on to talk about the company (obviously using the company name directly is better where possible), the role and duties and anymore information about what attributes are required.

In terms of layout it is about targeting the right audience. If your ad is full of technical attributes and jargon and aimed at IT people then a bulleted list might be best. If however you’re writing an ad for a marketing professional they’ll respond better to a well-written couple of paragraphs.

Length-wise, although you may have lots of information to get across (particularly in IT ads) something concise that the reader doesn’t have to plough through is always better. A good indicator is Jobserve’s character limit. 1500 characters should be enough to get everything you want into an ad. Longer ads would again be best targeted at the more creative markets where they are more likely to read than skim.

A good sign-off is a nice touch. However there is no need to outline how to apply or include contact details. This will be covered by the job board in the final ad and would also increase the likelihood of inappropriate candidates (and agencies) just firing over an email or picking up the phone without thinking about the job and their suitability.

Advert management is also crucial. If you’re getting plenty of appropriate candidates in and need more, then refresh the ad. If nothing or nothing suitable is coming through, then don’t. Instead think about how you could change the ad to generate a better response or better outline what it is that you’re looking for.

The tone of your ad

It is important to get your delivery right with online advertising. Although it is not worth agonising over which prose style you adopt or the usage of ‘who’ and ‘whom’ it is worth bearing in mind that people respond to how you say something more than to what you actually say. Therefore making sure your style is appropriate for your audience should be a consideration.

IT ads are naturally going to be different to marketing ads. Similarly something suitable for a banker is probably not appropriate for a HR manager. Therefore make sure you know who you’re writing for and what kind of audience your client would like to target. Most people are conservative in their nature when it comes to advertising. However recruitment advertising is necessarily different to advertising a ‘brand’. Therefore try not to adopt as traditional a tone in your ads as you see on corporate websites, for example.

Additionally it is important to be aware of any parameters set by your marketing department (if you have one). Marketing people are generally good at selling to potential customers not potential employees. Therefore they will want to see something far more in line with the ‘brand’ they are used to selling. Don’t be afraid to challenge decisions to a degree or to see how many of your ideas you can keep in an ad that has to be reviewed by marketing.

The content of your ad

You should use questions in your ad where possible to make the reader think about the details of the role and their suitability for it. So rather than saying “My client needs a candidate who is a strong negotiator with a good work ethic” a more effective ad would say “Are you a skilled negotiator? Do you strive to be the best in everything that you do?” By asking questions you are engaging the reader and making your ad stand out. This is a simple but underused technique and can be applied to virtually any requirement you can think of (“Do you work well in teams?”, “Are you a talented Java developer?”, “Friendly bright and personable?”)

Also try to make use of strong adjectives (much as you would in a CV) when describing the job and the ideal candidate. Even with the recent guidance regarding age discrimination it is still possible to put together a good ad using phrases like talented, gifted, determined, motivated, professional and so on. Words to avoid are those with age connotations like enthusiastic, vibrant, mature, experienced and so on.

Getting your ad read

There are some things that you can do to make your ad more attractive. Although it’s not always necessary to spend a lot of time on an ad (a helpdesk role doesn’t require masses of thought to get the relevant info in and encourage people to apply) for some ads it is worth putting in that little bit of extra effort in a couple of areas to make your copy stand out from the 20 or 30 others in the search results.

Opening and closing lines are important. The temptation is to lay on some of the more clichéd (/cheesy!) lines and it’s not always the end of the world to give in to temptation! Again, remember your audience. High level managers (particularly in sales, advertising and so on) expect the kind of line that would make others cringe. “If you’re the best then come work for the best” is a line that would put a few people off, but it’s typical big business fare and therefore not out of place in certain online ads. If that sort of delivery seems inappropriate (or just out of character) you can say the same sort of thing but stick to something more straightforward – “This is a great opportunity for the ideal candidate to work for one of the top organisations in the industry”.

If you’re recruiting grads or juniors then something more fun, friendly and light-hearted could be appropriate. A good tag-line also goes down well in ads that need a more exciting tone. Something simple like “Grads wanted!” is effective enough although if you can think of something more creative so much the better. (For the recent graduate campaign Omni ran for Allied Irish Bank we came up with “Want a career in Business you can Bank on?” AIB liked it so much they now use it as the tagline for all of their recruitment advertising across the board.)

Again, bear in mind your client’s tastes. A manager we work with looking for a senior buyer recently turned down the taglines “Buy Buy, Baby” and “Buy low, rise high” but was more comfortable with “Are you buying what we’re selling?”. His comment that they couldn’t get away with ‘something that someone like Coca-Cola would use’ is telling; it is still probably good advice to suggest that you try and push the boundaries as far as is reasonable but watch out for offending the more traditional thinkers out there.

Ask for help

Perhaps the most important point is that there is no ‘perfect’ ad. Different ads work for different reasons and some people just won’t even read your copy no matter what you do. Therefore it’s crucial to make use of as much knowledge as you can when writing your ad. If you know someone (colleague, friend etc) has had a similar role and recruited with some success for it, ask for tips. Re-use ads that work well for you to, changing just the most specific details. Ask for advice on phraseology, steal good ideas for taglines, openers and so on and use your synonym generator on Word to avoid repetition. Cheat, blag, steal and mimic; in the best advertising tradition you don’t need to be an expert to write effective copy, you just need to convince enough people you are.

If you enjoyed this post and want to read more like it, why not subscribe to my feed? It's easy to do and will keep you regularly updated, meaning you don't have to keep checking back to see if I've updated the site.
Didn't like it? Well there'll be lots of other things coming up I promise, and some of them are bound to be good! So why not subscribe and save yourself the effort of having to come back everyday to check for the next good thing? Great idea eh? Don't thank me though. Making your life easier is thanks enough.

Helicopter Parents and a new blog

2008-01-09T17:13:00.000Z

Photo credit: Michael Elins, Newsweek May 22, 2006

(Whole lotta linking going on today...)

OK, I just read a really funny article which I found through a fantastic blog that I'd checked a couple of times but never got round to reading properly and adding to my Google Reader. Links to both:

The article, which has given me a whole new insight into just how pushy parents can get. The term 'Helicopter Parents' has it's own Wikipedia entry even. Scary.

The blog, Fortify Your Oasis by Rowan Manahan, which looks like a real cracker and well worth a subscription and some regular attention.

Hope you enjoy both!

Interview with Seth

2008-01-09T16:53:00.000Z

Really quick one - if you've got a few minutes go and have a read of an interview with Seth Godin. It's a really good interview (the interviewer gets a lot out of him) and covers blogging, entrepreneurship, books, marketing, the iPhone and more.

Well worth a read.

Twitter, Twitter, Twittering on

2008-01-09T10:11:00.000Z

I’ve posted about it before and discussed the topic with Louise over at uk:recruiter so apologies if you were bored of it back then and definitely don’t want to read another post on it! If that’s the case just skip to the next post and we’ll say no more about it (although in the words of Hilary Clinton this week, that hurts my feelings).

If however you’re interested at all I’d just like to ask you to have a glance (a longish glance maybe) at Twitter. I won’t try and sell any benefits or anything else here, it’d be better just to have a look and see what you think. Once you’ve done that come straight back because I’ve got someone to point you to…

OK, back? Right, the chap I want to point you to is Dennis Howlett, who I’ve blogged about a couple of times before. He’s written an article for zdnet.com about Twitter (and other related services) and gives a really solid round up of the situation and offerings currently. Have a read of the article here.

BTW, I even get a mention having twittered (should that be tweeted?) something to him in response to his query – just something to bear in mind if you ever want link-love from me! ;)

Happiness in the UK

2008-01-08T11:56:00.000Z

Alex Kjerulf has announced what is a real coup for his 'happiness at work' agenda today, having released details of his latest partnership. Alex has joined forces with HP in an effort to increase the happiness of UK businesses. As Alex says:

The idea is that HP’s mobile products (laptops and mobile phones) allow us to work more flexibly - and flexibility, ie. having more choice over when and where to work, makes us happier at work.

The main elements of the campaign are:

A campaign website with tips on how to make yourself and your workplace happy
Appearances in UK media by yours truly
A staff satisfaction survey
A contest for small UK-based companies

I think this is absolutely fantastic news. As any regular readers will know I'm a huge fan of Alex and he's even mentioned me on his blog before, which is one way to guarantee me as a friend for life! This partnership shows that he is going from strength to strength. He's done a fantastic job of building his brand and deserves all the accolades and business opportunities that can come his way because he's working bloody hard for them.

If you were at all interested in happiness at work, but not sure where to start, you've now got no excuses! Enter the competition, get yourself a customised happiness survey and generally get with the Chief Happiness Officer's programme!

Social Networking making people money

2008-01-07T14:25:00.000Z

Upon reading this article your reaction may well be something along the lines of "Well duuurrrr!" And yes, the very fact that you're reading a blog like this probably indicates that you are no Luddite and are in fact well aware of the potential of social networking for more than just flirting and trading insults.

But I'm pointing this article out anyway for 2 reasons.

First, it's really easy to get into all this social networking stuff and start to believe that everybody loves blogging and twitter and Facebook and so on, but in reality most people don't. Of those who are on Facebook or MySpace, the majority don't care about Scoble getting banned or how Twitter will eventually monetise it's offering. So when an article about social networking helping younger people make money hits the front page of msn.co.uk it's a big deal.

Second, the article should make you think about something damn important. Here's the most pertinent quote for you:

"This networked generation are using these sites to explore new levels of creativity and develop new ways of doing business online," the report says.

This is why it matters. Not everyone gets social networking yet. Many people will never 'get it' in fact. But their numbers (and power and influence) are dwindling. 18-24 year olds are where it's at (and I say this as a practically decrepit 26 year old). We're back to the old GenY conversation obviously. Creativity is their bread and butter and creativity is the new currency of business. Get creative or get out of the way.

Why not talk to the 18-24 year olds you know and ask them how they interact with social networks? You could learn a heck of a lot. At worst they may just inspire you. At best maybe they can teach you how to make money out of them?

Catch up and links

2008-01-04T11:43:00.000Z

So because this blog is primarily a 'corporate' blog (kinda, sorta, in that I do it on work time, I try and talk about work related stuff and if I were to leave I'd likely have to leave it behind) I made a conscious decision to keep reasonably quiet over the holiday period. I figured if I chattered on over Christmas and New Year when the office wouldn't open, it would be more like this blog being all about me, which isn't the plan.

What I didn't count on was 2 things. First, how much I'd miss posting. And second how much great stuff I'd miss sharing with everyone over the holiday period. Now that I'm back at work and all caught up with things (only took me a couple of days!) I'm going to start blogging regularly again. However it would be a crying shame if I didn't share some of the great stuff that was out there over the last couple of weeks. So below are links to some of the best and brightest posts that dropped into my Google Reader since December 24th.

Jeff Jarvis moots flying as a social experience. If I worked for an airline, or knew someone who did, I'd be doing all I could to convince the people who control the purse strings to do whatever it takes to hire Jeff as a consultant. He could revolutionise that business, no exaggerations.

Hugh breaks down the Social Object concept in his inimitable style. So well written and such a good post it makes me want to find him and eat his brain. (N.B. I'll be endeavouring to write a bit on social objects myself in the coming days/weeks, but I'll never explain it as well as this, so it's worth reading now or you won't know what I'm going on about.)

Tim Ferris explains how he managed to escape the crappy weather and holiday-time misery to live it up in Argentina over Christmas. If only he'd written this post before Christmas, I'd have happily followed suit!

Seth tells you how to problem solve. Simple, short and sweet as only Seth can make it.

Robert Scoble gets his Facebook account disabled! If you don't know Scoble then that probably doesn't mean much to you but trust me on this, it's a big deal!

Church of the Customer Blog always find interesting stories for me. This one is no exception. It describes what must be up there as possibly the most ridiculous corporate rule ever. Ever, ever in fact.

Alex tells us how to deal with anger at work. It's vitally important to keep anger under control at work, Alex spells out exactly why.

Penelope Trunk has picked up on the Gen Y issue again and very cleverly links it in with yesterdays voting for the next Prez of the United States in Iowa. I've talked about Gen Y a couple of times now and doubtless will do again. It's a sea change in the workforce I tell y'all, and it matters to everyone.

That's it for now people, I'm sure you'll enjoy a few of those at the least. I'll be back with some original content after the weekend, so see you then!

If you fancy hearing what I've got to say when I say it, but get sick of coming back and checking the site regularly (often to find I haven't put anything new up because I'm such an unreliable sod) then I recommend you subscribe to my feed. It's easy enough to do. If you don't get what feeds are though, then the good old BBC does possibly the best job of explaining.

Understand the whole subscription deal?

Subscribe here!

Vote for Best UK Recruitment Blog of 2007

2007-12-28T09:41:00.000Z

My friend and yours, Louise over at uk:recruiter, has had a jolly good idea and set up a vote for the Best UK Recruitment Blog of 2007. The voting list can be found here.

Yours truly is on the list, but I can say I won't be voting for myself. In fact it'd be remiss of me not to suggest that you vote for Louise herself, as her blog has been one of the highlights of the blogging scene for me in 2007.

There's lots of good blogs on there, and doubtless a great many more who just aren't on the list yet. When I started reading blogs (over 2 years ago now) there were very few I could find with any sort of recruitment bent. The growth in numbers represents both the staggering speed with which blogging and 'Web 2.0' is changing the way we do business and the ability of recruitment professionals to buck the outdated trends of their fore bearers and embrace the times.

I've had a great 2007 and hope everyone reading this has too. Here's to an even better 2008!

Apologies! (And Merry Christmas!)

2007-12-28T09:39:00.000Z

I'm really sorry everybody, I meant to write a post after the Christmas party but before the Christmas break but never got round to it; how rubbish of me!

So apologies for the unexpected and overly long break and (better late than never):

Merry Christmas!!

I hope everybody had a good one, I'll be back with more content in the New Year!

Party time!

2007-12-13T14:03:00.000Z

So we've got our Christmas party on Saturday. I know there's a variety of stories in the papers at this time of year about offices banning parties for fear of causing offence to non-Christians, others ranting about political correctness gone mad and so on but to be honest I'm of the opinion that the party we have every year doesn't do any harm (except to people's livers). I am aware of the offence such a tradition could cause though, and the inequities and inequalities in most workplaces regarding religious holidays and the like. I still think it would be a shame to lose our December-time shindig though, as it's so good for morale, getting to know colleagues, relaxing after a hard year etc. It's not that we don't socialise any other time (we do with regularity) but I'd say that the Christmas party is the one social event that everyone comes to.

I'd love to hear people's thoughts on this though, all comments welcome or email me on james at omnirms dot com if that suits better (just trying to avoid the spam bots harvesting my email there; if you do email just remember to change 'at' to '@' and 'dot' to the traditional full stop mark, like this '.')

Anyway, our party is going to be in Manchester city centre. The place is called Manchester235 and we've got a traditional turkey dinner in one of the restaurants, followed by drinks, dancing and gambling in the casino and bars. Should be great, thoroughly looking forward to it (although, less looking forward to having to buy a new suit, as I tore the one I was going to wear so have to brave the Saturday shopping traffic!)

About Omni (Squidoo)

2007-12-13T13:35:00.001Z

I get quite a few people asking me to tell them more about Omni and what we do, particularly the Recruitment Process Outsourcing (RPO) part, pretty regularly. Rather than bleat on about it repeatedly therefore, I decided it would be a good idea to have a place (other than the website) that I could direct people to. With that in mind I created a Squidoo Lens for Omni.

Squidoo is a great site set up by (amongst others) Seth Godin. It allows people to create a 'lens' (essentially a micro website) on any topic they fancy. There are lenses about pretty much everything, including (but definitely not limited to) art, religion, Humphrey Bogart and Manga.

Building a lens is easy (although creating the content is obviously as tough as creating content for anything is - for help with that see this lens). The 'technical' side of things takes less than half an hour though.

Here's the Omni lens. It answers as many questions as I could think of about Omni and hopefully should prove useful for people. If there's anything that you think should be in there but isn't, then just let me know!

New Omni client: May Gurney!

2007-12-12T17:11:00.000Z

Well things have been wrapped up even more promptly than I expected them to be, so as hinted at yesterday, I'm pleased to announce the signing of a brand new Omni client!

The lucky people at May Gurney, one of the UKs most successful construction services companies, will soon get to talk to our wonderful account management team everyday! This is a fantastic client win for us and will in fact likely be the biggest on our books, in terms of numbers of hires etc.

This was also a really quick one in terms of sales life cycle, thanks to a combination of hard work from the sales team (Luci and Howard especially) and real organisation and diligence from the guys over at May Gurney (Sarah particularly helped things run as smoothly as possible). We're pleased that we managed to convince them we were the right organisation to partner with (there were a couple of others in the running) and really excited about starting working with them.

This is hopefully just one of many new clients I'll have the pleasure of announcing here over the coming months; 2008 looks like being easily our busiest year yet. Every new one we sign up is special too, as it goes some way to helping us achieve our ambition of improving recruitment for the whole world! (No harm in thinking big!)

So hi again to May Gurney, and here's to a fruitful and fun relationship for all concerned!

Exciting client news...

2007-12-11T15:43:00.000Z

I'm pleased to say that I should have a great, client-related announcement to make soon. As I've mentioned before, we've been busy on the new client side recently and although I won't count any chickens etc right now, we're confident that we'll be saying hello to someone officially very soon.

Watch this space!

Creativity, Copyright and Presentations

2007-12-07T10:05:00.000Z

I want to point you to something today that aptly illustrates 2 things that I can frequently be found ranting about: the woeful state of our arcane copyright laws and the prevalence of terrible presentations. Whilst both are worthy of a standalone post of their own, that will be for another day. Here, I'm relying on Larry Lessig to effectively combine the 2.

This video is of a recent TED talk by Lessig on the effect that copyright laws are having on creativity. Lessig asserts that creativity is being stifled and that we are moving from a 'read-write' culture (i.e. creative) to a 'read-only' culture (where people simply 'consume'). I think he's spot on with this and the law is falling way behind the times. If it fails to catch up soon we are essentially criminalising the majority of people born after 1980 (Gen Y) who are IT and web savvy and keen to express themselves via social media, blogs, user generated content (UGC) and the like. Lessig's comparison with the common-sense approach taken to repeal outdated property laws in relation to land is effective and apt.

That brings me nicely to the second part of my rant; that you just don't see a lot of good presentations. I must have seen 40+ presentations from potential suppliers and many more at conferences, university etc. Yet I could count the number of good presentations I've seen on one hand (in fact only 2 stand out of real note - Noam Chomsky when I was at university and a talk by Jeff Pfeffer on Evidence Based Management at a Chicago based HR and IT conference). Even my colleagues are inclined to give bad presentations (despite my frequent desperate pleas to change things) because it's just the way things are done. My argument that your typical PowerPoint, death by bullets presentation is boring and ineffective is met by the counter-argument that everybody does it that way, so it must work.

Yet in this world of terrible presentations, poor presenters and horrific slideware, there is hope. Not many people embody that hope as well as Larry Lessig. Watch his talk; I promise it'll be time well spent. He is passionate, articulate and funny. He has great slides (his style of slideware is in fact famous, and there's a presentation method named after him, The "Lessig Method"). He commands the room and steers the audience to his way of thinking, whilst as a viewer you take a tonne of information away with you, surely the ultimate goal of any presentation.

I promise I'll put up some separate posts on presentation and copyright more generally, when I get round to writing them! Also, here is probably a good time to point out that despite the lack of widget on the subject, anything you read here is under this Creative Commons License. That means you can copy it, print it out, link to it etc with appropriate attribution. Basically you can't take it and charge for it, or alter it. For more information about Creative Commons check out the site.

Quote of the Day

2007-12-05T10:33:00.000Z

The most important thing a leader does is set the example. In many ways that's the only thing a leader does.

Wally - on it, as ever.

Motivating Generation Y...

2007-12-04T15:01:00.000Z

(Pic credit: gapingvoid.com)

Generation Y, or Gen Y, are the youngsters in the workforce. It’s a bit of an Americanism (often the worst kind of business-speak anachronism) but it’s becoming common parlance, and therefore worthy of some attention.

So to break it down, here are some definitions to start with if you're not familiar with the term. First up we have the Baby Boomers, then Generation X and now Generation Y.

Born in 1981 myself (I’m 26 in a couple of weeks, 17th December if you want to send a present…) I’m in Gen Y, just! I should therefore be fully up to speed with my own generation and emotionally intelligent enough to understand my elders too, if the definitions are to be believed. There’s been a lot written on the subject and whilst some of it is accurate (common sense you might even say) some is as out of kilter as you can get, not totally surprising given that all 3 terms are seriously sweeping generalisations. I read an article today though that came to me from Reuters, via Wally Bock. It lit a bit of a creative fire in me, so I decided I’d tackle the subject myself briefly.

First up, the Reuters article.

From that we glean some useful tips. Younger workers want positive engagement. They need praise, recognition and “patting on the head”. Older workers couldn’t care less about that apparently; the boomers want “clear direction” instead. Apparently they’re “past” looking for praise.

Anecdotally this may well have some backing too. Ask around your office and see what people think (particularly any emotionally intelligent managers responsible for boomers, X-ers and Y-ers).

Yet it is clearly a simplification. Rather than just requiring ‘praise’ per se, I would argue that Gen Y are the group most likely to want to do meaningful work that adds value (sweeping generalisation and simplification in itself I know, but bear with me!) This need for ‘meaning’ can’t be fulfilled in all roles; not everyone can have a job that gives them that warm fuzzy feeling that an assuaged social conscience can. So the praise and recognition can act as a replacement for this.

Additionally, Gen Y is the teamwork generation. Y-ers are more likely than boomers or X-ers to embrace collaborative working and the possibilities that the hive mind offers. This team ethos is predicated on praise and recognition, a team can’t survive and succeed if everyone is busy working away for their own benefit and never stopping to say well done to others in the group.

So whilst the article may broadly be reporting an accurate picture of the generations, I can't help but feel it's missing a trick by not looking at why Y-ers want praise (the article seems simply to point out the trend and suggest that boomer or X-er managers should be exploiting it). My biggest problem with the article though, is the following line:

Generation Y are portrayed as self-centered and demanding in the workplace -- and it's all true

This isn’t the case to my mind. In reality Gen Y believe in endless possibilities and are inherently optimistic. This optimism could be perceived as selfish (trying to change the status quo, seemingly for their own benefit) but in actual fact it’s massively egalitarian. Gen Y wants to change the status quo for sure, but they have a bigger picture in their sights; Gen Y truly wants to change the world! There’s a guest post on Penelope’s blog that expresses this confusion a lot better than I can, so have a read of that.

As a Gen Y-er I’m naturally inclined to defend my peers, so apologies for the natural bias there. But I truly believe that the new trends in business for collaboration, transparency, trust, happiness at work, creativity, innovation, social responsibility and so on are going to define the coming years. These trends are most associated with Gen Y, but there’s plenty of X-ers and boomers who buy into them too. So in true Gen Y style, I’m keen to work with these people to make these modern methods the norm.

The Reuters article raises an interesting point, but misses the crux of things for me. Rather than pointing out differences for the sake of it why doesn't it instead highlight how the gaps in each generations skill set could be negated by co-operation. Surely the ideal team is driven by relentless Y-ers, grounded by realistic X-ers and guided by experienced (open-minded) boomers?

As the cartoon above (by the imperious X-er Hugh) attests, change isn't what you should be afraid of.

3 Recruitment Tips

2007-12-03T16:50:00.000Z

Today I want to put my 3 best recruitment tips out there for people. These are the simple ones; there's a tonne of other stuff you could do. However if you start with these 3 you'll be on the right track.

1. Focus on 'direct' recruitment. That is, rather than relying on recruitment agencies and search and selection companies (headhunters) to provide you with potential candidates, find them yourself. You can do this by giving the job to someone in HR (make it their main role though), or by engaging an RPO like Omni, AMS, RPO Solutions etc. There should be adverts on the major job boards (like Monster, Jobserve etc) that you put out there, branded with your logo and driving candidates to your site and your info, not an agency.

2. Improve your recruitment selection process. Even if it's good, it can be great. Make sure that screening is done properly (again, either by an appropriate HR or recruiting partner, or by an RPO) and that CVs are reviewed efficiently. Then make sure you have a clearly defined process including telephone screening, any testing and face-to-face interviews. You should not have more than a 3 stage process, maximum. That would be 1- telephone screen 2- testing 3- face-to-face interview. If you can get your testing process online you can add a second face-to-face stage. Otherwise you just annoy candidates.

[Note: it should go without saying that your selection process should fall into line with all relevant employment legislation and HR mandates on things like discrimination etc]

3. Build your Employer Brand. This is very different from your corporate brand. Your corporate brand (i.e. the one you sell to customers) might be of tradition and authority. But your offices might be fun, creative and vibrant places. If you sell to potential employees that you're traditional, authoritarian, grey, when in actual fact you're cool, innovative and bright red, then you're missing a trick (and probably a heck of a lot of potential superstars).

This is a really brief post of something that is a much bigger story. If you're interested in improving your recruitment process across the board (and no it won't require you spending hundreds of thousands on 'consultancy' and revamps and the like) then I'd love to hear from you. I'll either be able to help myself, which will brighten up my day no end, or I'll be able to point you towards someone who can. This may be a colleague here at Omni, but it may just as likely be a 'competitor' or other brand; I get a kick out of helping however I do it.

New Omni Employee

2007-11-30T14:28:00.001Z

I don't usually announce it on the blog when new employees start at Omni (although I should do, so hello to Jenny, Jo, Clair, Nicola, Emma and Howard, all of whom are reasonably new round these parts). However I had to make an exception for the newest member of the team.

Alfie joined us this week for the first time. He only came in for one morning but made himself at home straight away. He proved exceptionally popular with the ladies in the office, but is the sort who'd get on with the gents too. He's a tenacious and lively character and should be a big success with clients too. Some nepotism could be suspected, as Alfie does live with Rob, the MD. I think in reality though, it's safe to say he's here on merit.

You can see a picture of Alfie here...

All the best to him in his Omni career!

The 'War for Talent' in the Accounting Profession

2007-11-29T17:14:00.000Z

Hi all, I'm back after a couple of days off work. I caught a Kanye West gig and went to the best all-you-can-eat Chinese buffet I've ever been to, so a good few days overall for me!

Today I thought I'd point out a piece by the MD of Omni, Robert Leggett, that went in Accountancy Age magazine recently. It's an opinion piece and worth a read for those in the profession specifically or more generally interested in recruitment.

You can read the article here and any comments or questions about Rob's point of view, direct my way and I'll get him to answer them if that's of interest to anyone.

Great post for you to read...

2007-11-21T08:47:00.000Z

...but it's someone elses, not mine! Just had to draw people's attention to a great post (and a very open and engaging ongoing discussion in the comments) on Penelope Trunk's Brazen Careerist blog. From the post:

Today, educators take a child’s lack of social skills seriously. Parents should also. For educators, any nonverbal learning disability (like not being able to tell if someone cares about what you are talking about) is treated as significantly as a verbal learning disability (like not being able to speak.) Yet I am stunned by how many parents brush aside recommendations from educators to get help for their children by saying to themselves, “My child is so smart.”
Smart is not an endgame. Even in a toddler.

Penelope is highly adept at bringing her own experiences to bear on what are always relevant and sometimes undiscussed subjects and this is another fine example. She also does it with an honesty and openess that I admire greatly (and strive to emulate myself here).

Hope you find the post interesting; if so pop the blog in your Google Reader and you won't be disappointed.

UK:recruiter

2007-11-19T17:32:00.000Z

As I haven't for a while, I thought today was a good day to plug Louise's uk:recruiter blog list. It's an invaluable source of information for me and if you have any interest in the recruitment scene you should definitely check it out. There's even a blog by a certain somebody you all know on there...

Happiness at work - 5 tips to try today!

2007-11-15T11:17:00.000Z

Everybody, it would seem, is getting into happiness at work. This is really great! I’ve been preaching the happiness at work schtick for a while now, ably assisted by Ollie, and inspired by the likes of Alex Kjerulf, Ricardo Semler, Penelope Trunk and others. I truly believe that I can go and sit down with my boss and say to him categorically – "if the people who work here are happy people they’ll be more productive". I believe fundamentally in the cause and effect of increased happiness leading to increased motivation and productivity.

So it’s really good to see others taking up the happiness at work message too. Via Louise Triance comes a service from Jobsite that assesses people’s level of happiness and recommends changing jobs to increase overall happiness if there is a shortfall. Whilst the sell is obvious (I’d expect that Jobsite have more to gain if their surveys suggest unhappiness in most participants) it’s nice to see an organisation in the recruitment marketplace embracing the idea that work is not just somewhere you turn up for 8+ hours a day, but that instead it’s somewhere you actually can go to be happy.

Happiness at work is a vital element of the organic growth of an organisation. If a company wants to retain talented staff in this new business environment, then employee satisfaction levels need to be high. Sure, this means paying the right salary and providing the right financial incentives, because pretty much everyone has to pay the bills. But it’s inherently more than that too. As I’ve said before (and will keep saying over and over) it’s about engagement above and beyond the normal “I need a job to keep a roof over my head and feed my kids” concept. It’s about creating an environment where people are so happy that they’d do anything to keep the company going. Those people who really ‘love’ the company, i.e. are completely emotionally engaged with it, will work their behinds off to see it succeed. They’ll also pull out all the stops in times of strife just to get through the bad patch (these are the crazies who’d do the work even if no one paid them to!)

Now you might sit here reading this and thinking “yeah, that’s all very well in another company, but in ours where we’re just making widgets day in day out, who’s going to be that passionate about working for us?” Fair point, in essence. It’s a common notion that we can’t all be Google, with a raft of cool people, eager to sign up. Like many common notions though, it’s complete and utter BS.

You’re worried because you’re not making uber-sexy products, or you’re worried that it’s just too tough to get your warehouse staff excited about stacking boxes right? Well worry no more. Happiness at work can apply to everyone. Call centres (notoriously high attrition rates) can be happy places. Production lines can be happy places. Banks and leisure centres and council buildings and hospitals and schools and compliance units and McDonalds and everywhere else can be happy workplaces! It’s about doing some basic things right. Here’s 5 to try straight away:

1) Take a look at the working environment first. It should be as bright, fun, pleasant and conducive to work as possible. If it’s drab, dirty and dull then change it. A couple of K spent doing this will be recouped in productivity easily.

2) Train your managers to be happy people and to encourage happy people. Every manager that thinks that screaming, shouting and generally acting like a delinquent 13 year old is good ‘people management’ either needs to get a lobotomy or get a new job. No exceptions here. If you’re in any doubt go read Wally Bock’s blog. The number one impediment to happiness at work isn’t people's boring jobs, it’s crappy management.

3) With a nice place to work and happy managers who are encouraged to make their teams happy, you should start to see an improvement straight away. When this happens, capitalise on it! Address any issues with salary, bonuses and the like here to avoid any potential lingering problems. Then hit the next big one, holidays…

4) Some places get holiday allowances spot on. In the US this is rare (holiday entitlement really sucks over there). Here in the UK we’re a lot better at it. Better, but not always good. Here’s the thing though – giving people more holiday truly costs you nothing. You can harp on to me about lost man hours with people off on their jollies and so on but this is the place where I get a little tetchy and tell you to shut up I’m afraid. If you give people plenty of holiday you allow them the time to chill and relax, get their heads straight and come back to you an even better employee than they went away as. You should really embrace the idea of ‘work-life balance’. By doing that you'll make your money back in increased productivity. If you work your people into the ground though, then you can expect crap morale, poor standards of work and high attrition.
If you’re struggling with this concept at all, here’s a base level that you should be working to. Copy it verbatim if necessary. Minimum – 25 holiday days for everybody in the company as standard. This excludes public holidays, Bank Holidays etc. On top of that, everyone will earn 1 extra day per year of service. If you need to put a maximum figure in, make it 35 days (although if you’re brave enough my preference is to have no maximum because if someone stays with you in this day and age for 20+ years they deserve all the holiday they can take and they'll be one of your best people no matter how much time they have off).

5) OK, holiday rant over, here’s the final tip. When you’ve done all of the above it’s time to start listening to your people. Where you can, democratise your workplace. People’s inability to affect their surroundings and environment is one of the biggest causes of unhappiness at work. So listen to your people. Give them freedom and autonomy where you can. Basically treat them like adults. They will repay you with productivity, loyalty, evangelism, initiative, innovation and more. The best example is the customer service person who is empowered by the company to do the right thing by the customer even if it goes against what might be seen as ‘policy’. Giving your frontline people the discretion to use their knowledge, judgement and integrity to solve a problem means problems will actually get solved. Say to your frontline people – “if you see a problem that can be fixed and will cost the company up to (insert figure here dependant on circumstances, £10, £50, £250...whatever fits), then fix it yourself. Tell your manager about it after.”

This empowerment is a wonderful thing. Your people are aching to challenge themselves and do the best work they can; you must truly believe that. The reason they don’t demonstrate it now is because they’re probably unhappy. I know it sounds harsh but if you’re the boss that’s your fault, not theirs. Treat them right and they will treat you right. Make them happy and I guarantee they’ll make you very happy (and rich, if that’s your bag).

These are very basic starting points. If any of them speak to you at all though then I’m a very happy camper. I’d recommend getting copies of Alex’s book immediately and giving them to everyone you work with (particularly your managers). On top of that read Semler’s book about how he democratised his company. It’s inspiring reading, but filled with takeaways for the average business to implement themselves.

I’m passionate about happiness at work and believe in time it’ll be the norm. Whilst it’s not though (as I said above, we’re getting there slowly), why not try climbing on the cutting edge of the movement and seeing how it feels. You’ll be in very good company and the place will be packed soon enough. In fact your business might just depend on it...

(Note- this post was written mainly in the direction of managers, business leaders, MDs, owners, HR and the like. If you’re not one of those people but are still interested in happiness at work and perhaps how you can make yourself happy, Alex is definitely the expert. Read his blog and buy his book. I’ll be posting about it myself too in the future, so rock on back regularly and you won’t be disappointed.)

Secret Apple sauce

2007-11-15T10:59:00.000Z

What is in that secret sauce of their's hey? Whatever it is, it's mighty tasty and mighty popular. Whether you're a techno-freak or techno-phobe it's been pretty hard to miss the launch of Apple's super cool new product, the iPhone. Stephen Fry has one and loves it.

Have you got one yet? Are you planning to? It's the ultimate 'I want it' product from what's seen as the ultimate style-over-substance company (although to be fair their products are not just cool as a cucumber, they also kick ass).

If you're not convinced because of the price, or the few bad reviews though (like me) then maybe it's worth waiting for the next big thing - the Google Phone...

Quick one

2007-11-13T17:11:00.000Z

Back from holiday but still not put up a proper blog post - how lazy!

So this quicky is intended not as linkbait (I promise!) but because I'm short of time and want to share the following wonderful posts rather than quickly knock together something not anywhere near as useful to you. Enjoy them while I get my brain back in the right gear...

I found this chap via Euan of The Obvious and the post is about the new workforce gap. Loved it and he's now stuffed into my Google Reader
Another excellent post from Sonia Simone. It doesn't matter what she's writing about, you should read it immediately (and then read all her archives too)
A typically hilarious post from Scott Adams (he of Dilbert fame) about why he'd like to win the Nobel Prize
Finally, a science one from Mark 'Herd' Earls. If you're not usually into sciency posts, just try this one, you might like it...

I'm off!

2007-11-02T17:23:00.001Z

...but only for the next week, you'll be pleased/disappointed (delete as appropriate) to hear.

Sorry for the lack of posts the last few days too, it's been a busy old week as far as these things go. I'd meant to write a couple of posts today actually then my MD told me yesterday evening that he needed an application writing for an award we always enter. Before next Tuesday. And I'm off Monday/Tuesday.

So today was spent doing that. Never really any fun writing awards entries. It's pretty repetitive and making it sound like you're not a narcissistic ass is always difficult. It's done and submitted though, so fingers crossed. (If you're really bored it's the Recruiter Awards 2008; we've entered the Best Managed Service Provider category).

Anyway, I'll be back posting again from Monday 12th, so enjoy the peace and quiet in the meantime! Bye!

You're not the best you'll ever be...

2007-10-30T17:10:00.000Z

...so don't worry! Make mistakes, fail at things, learn. Whether you've been in business (which I guess translates to alive) for 2 months or 2 decades you're still not the finished article. This could seem scary I guess (when's the peak coming??) but I find it liberating. Fear of failure on the other hand is a horrible, debilitating thing. So don't worry. You're not done yet. Keep on trucking.

About me

2007-10-30T12:10:00.001Z

I was in the process of writing a post for the blog today and was referencing some psychological profiling that I had done last year. The company paid for all of us to be psychometrically tested using the PeopleMapper test, provided by ASE, in an effort to better understand how we like to work, what gets us out of bed in the morning and who had tendencies towards work-related homicide. (That last bit is a joke).

Going over my results today I thought it would be quite fun to publish them here for all to see. That way everyone will get to know me better and be able to pass judgement more thouroughly about what a pain in the neck I am, with reliable evidence to back it up. Personally I think the results pretty much have me pegged.

I'm still a little agnostic about these sorts of tests (there's a lot of them out there that seem to be dubious pseudo-science) but overall I think that well structured, established psychometric tests can really help paint a good picture of someone.

Anyway, having uploaded the results to Google Docs (meaning it's accessible to everyone rather than being stuck as a Word document just on my PC) here is the link. Have a nosey and I'd love to hear if people who know me think it seems accurate. (To those that don't know me, is this more or less likely to make you want to change that situation??)

Wear it Pink

2007-10-26T15:09:00.000+01:00

October is National Breast Cancer Awareness Month and today (Oct 26th) is the Breast Cancer Campaign's annual 'wear it pink' day. So I'm currently sat here in a 'wear it pink' t-shirt, drinking some pink sugary stuff, eating pink sweets and looking at a sea of pink colleagues all around me. We try and raise some money for this good cause every year by doing raffles, a quiz and selling pink cakes, sweets etc. All great fun and the charity bit gives everyone a nice warm, fuzzy feeling.

My mum was diagnosed with breast cancer last year, so it's one of those charities I'm inclined to be a bit selfish about. It's funny how when it hits you directly you're far more likely to see the benefit of raising the money. My mum is fine fortunately; she had some great doctors and nurses and a good surgeon that helped her through it all. It could come back though so it makes you eager that plenty of money still goes into finding the cure for this horrible illness. Plus, depending on the genetics involved (my mum is having some genetic tests in a few weeks, science never ceases to amaze me) my sister, aunties and female cousins could all be in the high risk category. So I have a vested interest in organisations like the Breast Cancer Campaign doing well.

Charity is probably the most rewarding thing anyone can do though. The feeling of knowing you've helped someone (even someone totally remote from you who you'll never likely meet) is completely unique. If you haven't put your social hat on for a while I recommend giving it a go today. It's not too late to join in with 'wear it pink'. Or maybe there's a cause close to your heart. Whatever it is, invest a bit of time and a bit of money in it and I guarantee it'll be the most satisfying thing you do this weekend/week/month etc.

CRM

2007-10-26T14:51:00.000+01:00

I'm looking for a good CRM solution for Omni at the minute. Nothing too fancy, just need to better track prospective clients, manage marketing that we do and maybe sync up contacts, meetings in the diary etc. Doesn't need the bells and whistles. Amazing how many different offerings there are. Even with a good idea of what you want it's easy to get 'sold' by the shiny toys out there.

Anyone reads this and has experience with or knowledge of the market, then do let me know.

When bad employees go bad...

2007-10-24T11:28:00.000+01:00

The following landed in my feed reader today from Kris Dunn's HR Capitalist blog. In this post he details an occasion when an employee at a previous company took it to the absolute extremes to land a couple of extra days off. From the post:

Human nature exists, and HR pros get to the see the downside in employee relations issues that involve anger, ambition, lust, lies, etc. But faking funeral programs to get a couple of extra days off? That's taking your game to the next level.

This is a pretty remarkable story and it makes you wonder about the very nature of people. It also reads like a pretty damning indictment of employees generally. When you get those real ball-breaking bosses (or HR people) who claim that every aspect of an employees work life must be monitored (think banning websites, monitoring email usage, micro-managing to targets etc) this is what they base their defences on. They believe that if you give an employee a proverbial inch they'll take a mile. If you let them on Facebook then they'll do nothing but that all day and productivity will plummet. If you don't require a doctor's note for illness then all of a sudden people will be off to the quacks every week like clockwork. If you let them decide their own schedule then they'll slack off, only work when they absolutely can't avoid it and will happily see your profits drop for their own self interest.

My issue with this take on 'management' and 'employee relations' is that in every way shape and form it's complete crap. The employee skiving off to go to a 'funeral' every couple of month is clearly not the right person to employ. Firing him was the right way to go. But does no one ask why it got to that position? How on earth did it get to a point where he was so unhappy in his job that he needed to fake family deaths to avoid another 8 hours of it once a month? Why did no-one notice that this guy was seriously miserable and demotivated before? How was his regular absenteeism the first warning sign?

Now I'm probably getting a bit too much into the specifics of this one case. For all I know the organisation had been trying for ages to get him engaged and in reality he was just a total jerk. So let's talk in more general terms.

As I've said numerous times, employee engagement should be the number one priority issue for HR and management. If your staff hate you, your company and their jobs, you should be fired immediately. It's no use blaming the employees, or the economic environment, or the bad weather. The buck stops with you. It is your job to get those guys engaged and get them flying. If you can't do it because they're a miserable and belligerent so-and-so then the best plan is to get rid of them (I'll not mention that perhaps you should be fired for hiring the wrong person in the first place, that is a rant for another day). Fire them quickly and fairly and move on. If however they could, would and should be engaged, happy and productive but for your dumb policies/poor working environment/lack of training/dearth of management capabilities/general ignorance/crappy attitude/unrealistic targets/badly planned business (delete as appropriate) then it's your ass on the line, to quote my American friends from the telly.

If you think this is massively unfair and miss the days when you could just shout at people and they'd do exactly what you said for the length of time you specified, then tough. Think this is all wishy-washy liberal nonsense and that these people who abuse your good nature (i.e. the fact you gave them a job in the first place) are just unreasonable swine? Read this.

When it comes down to it, the future of business is predicated on employees not consumers. I will rant on and on about customer experience, making sure you're telling the right story, being remarkable and so on. But if you do all of that yet still treat your employees like children then you are in for a rough ride. Be as remarkable to your employees as you are to your customers though (in fact even more remarkable) and you will see your successes grow exponentially. Happy people are productive people. Productive people who keep getting happier are your superstars.

So next time someone seems to be disengaged address the root cause, not the individual. If you're hiring the right people in the first place there is nothing to stop every single one of them becoming a superstar employee for you. Nothing that is, except you.

Rewards Revisited

2007-10-22T10:10:00.000+01:00

Read this post today from the always interesting Incentive Intelligence blog. Just thought I'd flag it up as it ties in quite nicely with a post of mine from a couple of weeks ago about intrinsic and extrinsic motivation.

I agree with Paul on this one; as I've said previously the non-cash incentives are important but it is vital that you don't forget about the other side of things. Paul surmises it best:

The real answer is - cash and non-cash are both critical in creating an engaged audience. Neither is better. Neither is worse.

Traditionally organisations have been better at the cash part, making sure that salaries are in line with the market and so on, paying bonuses in times of plenty. So I see why the focus is (rightly) on the non-cash, intrinsic side of things. As with everything in life though it is about getting a good balance. Anyone with an interest in hiring and keeping superstars needs to have both sides of their brain working these days, otherwise they just won't be able to keep up.

What makes you go 'Ewww!'?

2007-10-16T15:42:00.000+01:00

10 minutes to kill? Take this test from the BBC Science and Nature department on their site: What disgusts you?

Some other interesting tests to do there too. Apparently my brain is about 50-50 male to female in ratio...

Pucker up

2007-10-12T16:49:00.000+01:00

Call it coincidence, call it serendipity, but there I was trying to think of a quick post to put together on a Friday before going home from work and I only went and stumbled across an article about something that Ollie, Luci, Craig and I were talking about only yesterday! The issue is the always embarrassing, potential social faux pas that is the new greeting methods for the more continental faction of the UK business community...

Here's the story, courtesy of the ever entertaining and informative BBC site. One cheek or two?

Manchester blog awards

2007-10-11T16:34:00.000+01:00

Went to the Manchester blog awards last night at Matt & Phreds as a guest of Jane and Nathan at Smith & Smith; thanks for the invite guys, I had a blast!

I didn’t really know what to expect beforehand, having been to plenty of awards events but never a blogging function before. All the surprises were pleasant ones though, which is always good. If you get chance to go to a blogging event in the future I can give the idea a thumbs up.

The people speaking were, for the most part, great. There was a slightly downbeat 20 minutes or so where an author (who also blogs) read from her new book (can't remember her name sorry, it might have been Elizabeth somebody). The reading was fine but the choice of material could have been better; she read the first chapter which introduces a child character whose mother has just died. It was fairly depressing stuff (and not at all my type of literature) but fortunately it didn’t take the shine off the evening overall. I have to say though (because it feels dishonest not to give full disclosure) that without wanting to be churlish, her writing perhaps proves that there’s a book (or 3) living in everyone.

The best performance of the night for me came from this chap. His name is Chris Killen and he read excerpts from a novel he wrote in the form of a blog post a day for 100 days. If you’ve got some spare time I highly recommend reading it; what I’ve read so far is funny and delightful. He won the category he was in, best writing on a blog and deservedly so I’d say. (Details of other winners can be found here.)

The event was in association with the Manchester Literature Festival, so there was a real literary bent to the evening. That was one of the pleasant surprises actually. The crowd was a real mix and everyone seemed to have a good time.

It made me think about blogging more generally overall. Many of the blogs on show were all very much ‘traditional’, in the sense that they represent online journals. People were pouring their life into their blogs and letting others feel their joy, pain etc (like this blog and this one). All very Belle du Jour. Given that the majority of blogs I enjoy regularly are more like comment or opinion blogs, written by experts in a certain field, it was a refreshing change. In fact when I first heard about blogging that was how I heard it described – an online journal, a sort of public ‘dear diary’. This seemed like a novel idea to me at the time, although didn’t really hold any appeal (I didn’t fancy the idea of detailing my sex life or job dilemmas online in all honesty but to those that do, whatever floats your boat). It was only when I found Hugh and gapingvoid, which led me to Seth and Guy and so on, that I began to see the potential of this medium for me personally. Nice to look at the other side of things too though.

The night was a great one and all credit to the organisers, bloggers, judges etc. I'd happily go back next year, or indeed to similar events. It's great to see that there's real talent knocking around in the Manchester blog scene. Long may it prosper.

Happy workplaces - rated by Revyr

2007-10-10T12:40:00.000+01:00

The Chief Happiness Officer today links to a new service called Revyr which has a nice little premise at the core of it’s offering. Essentially it allows employees to rate their workplaces based on 10 key factors. Then potential employees can go to the site and find out what a place is really like to work at before they even commit to applying for a job, never mind attending an interview.

Alex has a nice interview with Jake Taylor of Revyr that’s definitely worth a read. I’ve signed up to the site to try and get on the beta testing list too so I’ll post more as I get more detail for you.

As an initial comment though, I think it’s a fantastic idea. Ollie and I were just talking about it and were absolutely gutted that we hadn’t thought of it first in all honesty! The simplicity factor is really appealing; who wouldn’t want to know what a company is really like before applying for a job there? Without knowing loads about the different factors though I’d say additionally they seem to have gone to a lot of trouble to define what a ‘good’ workplace looks like, and that’s to be applauded. Had it just been based around pay, perks and parking spaces then it would have been a lot poorer for it. Including things like Corporate Social Responsibility and Autonomy really makes this work for me.

Commenting on this service, Paul over at Incentive Intelligence moots that a service like this could really impact on HR people. As he suggests:

All you HR folks out there now have to worry about your "product" (read company) just like all those marketing and product development folks do when they launch a new product/service. Marketing is now an HR function (or has been but not to the degree it will become.)

I agree entirely on this one. With some proper metrics in place it is totally feasible to imagine people ranking and scoring potential employers and focussing on landing a job only at those who have ‘4 star’ or above rating, for example. With citizen-created content growing in popularity and reliability these days it was only a matter of time before that extended to the working world. All of a sudden you need your employees to be evangelists for the organisation. So if someone wants a job in software development in Birmingham, they go to the site, they check out all the different companies with those types of positions then read the reviews, as if they were picking a seafood restaurant in Birmingham. If your employees aren’t evangelists and perhaps rate things a little on the low side then that software developer is going to look elsewhere for her next move. Scary stuff if you’re not big on employee engagement and happiness at the moment…

This is really positive to my mind. The more that companies are pushed to improve their employees’ experiences the better. Plus, this isn’t just a stick-to-beat-the-big-companies-with situation; the carrot for employers is that as they improve their working practices and environment they’ll improve their ability to hire top talent. All of a sudden the competitor down the street who pays the big bucks but burns people out doesn’t have the advantage.

It’s early days for Revyr obviously, but I really hope it works out well for them. I’ll be keeping a close eye and my fingers crossed.

ChangeThis.com

2007-10-08T14:36:00.000+01:00

Rather than spend any of your time today reading something that I've written I instead insist that you go read the collective works of many a smarter person than me. ChangeThis is the brainchild of, among others, Seth Godin and the numerous talented manifesto authors that submit their material have done a great job in covering virtually any topic you can think of from Guerilla Marketing to web design to talent management. Contributors include Hugh MacLeod of gapingvoid, Guy Kawasaki and even Seth himself.

Brilliant idea, wonderfully executed. If you have the time, lose yourself in a few of these and you will be a far smarter person for it. Feeling particularly smart? Submit your own manifesto for public appraisal and consumption!

If you like Change This then spread the word, it's how the good ideas stick around.

Intrinsic versus Extrinsic

2007-10-05T12:33:00.000+01:00

I’ve been thinking a lot lately about the topic of intrinsic motivation vs extrinsic motivation at work. I’ve found some particularly interesting blogs recently about the topic, particularly Incentive Intelligence and The HR Capitalist, both of which I’d recommend highly to go into your feed reader (more on that below).

My take on it (briefly though as it is a subject I can talk about at length) is that it seems obvious to say that intrinsic motivation, (i.e. your staff naturally want to work for the organisation because they like it, feel it aligns with their values etc) is the best type of motivation. Extrinsic, (i.e. salaries, bonuses, perks etc) is clearly the more fleeting option. It goes without saying that anybody who is only motivated to work for you by monetary rewards can quite easily, one would imagine, be poached by your competitors and their higher basic salary.

Yet in some ways this, I feel, is used as an excuse not to reward people well for the work they do. Just because you have managed to engender a culture where people work for you loyally and diligently because they agree with the companies mission for example and indeed they would even work for you for less than they could make elsewhere because of this intrinsic motivation, doesn’t mean you should pay them less! Indeed perhaps even you should pay them more! Intrinsic motivation is a rare thing indeed and at all costs you should aim to keep those individuals who have it. A bit of extrinsic motivation on top therefore may well do no harm at all.

Rewarding your star performers and creating an environment where people feel valued and well-compensated for the work they do seems, in the popular American parlance, a ‘no-brainer’. Yet I see countless organisations (particularly in recruitment but in no way limited to that sector) who feel that their employees are trying to 'screw them' for more and more money. I know managers who hate the idea of regular appraisals and performance reviews because they think it gives people the chance to ask for a pay rise!

When it comes to it I try and encourage people to apply this methodology: if a star performer at your company feels that she deserves a pay rise, she does. People inherently (particularly those star performers that are loyal to the organisation) aren’t in work to rip their employers off; if they value the job they do, their colleagues and the organisation as a whole they will act decently, honestly and fairly in all matters, monetary or otherwise. So strive to engender that intrinsic motivation. Make people proud to work for you and keen to see the organisation prosper. But don’t forget about the money too.

[Note: if you’re not reading the blogs you like through a feed reader I’d highly recommend it. I use Google Reader and wouldn’t change now, just to avoid the hassle of moving all my feeds really. I understand that Bloglines have recently added some nice new features though, so might be worth checking out too if you’re shopping around.]

One per child

2007-10-04T15:09:00.000+01:00

I was going to write a different post to this today. But then I saw a link on Seth's blog about this project to get a laptop to every child in the developing world. It's inspiring and simple (as the best ideas often are). Individuals should definitely get involved. Businesses even more so. What's $200 (about £100) to your organisation? In fact what's $2000?

Talk to your boss today. Give children the gift of knowledge and the chances they'd be missing otherwise.

Here we go again...

2007-10-02T14:37:00.000+01:00

Well that was some hiatus! I’m going to call it a blogging sabbatical because that sounds better I reckon. Whatever the case we’re back up and running so I’m going to try get back to posting here a few times a week at least.

As a brief update on what’s happened in the last 3 months: we’ve moved offices, I’ve changed jobs, we’ve hired 4 new people, re-hired 1 and 2 people have left. So you’ve not missed much.

I’ll start filling in some of the blanks over the coming days and weeks, as well as telling you all about the exciting new things that we’re doing at the moment. There’ll be some big announcements, some (hopefully) informative content, some (undoubtedly) controversial content and plenty for everyone to chew the fat over.

All in all, good to be back.

Training for Economic Growth

2007-06-25T11:26:00.000+01:00

Due to the fact that Omni have 3 of our recent new starters beginning their NVQ training this week, I thought it would be worth mentioning how much benefit both the employee and employer can gain from providing training such as this.

So what is an NVQ exactly? – they are work related and competence based qualifications demonstrating that the person has the knowledge and skills required to do a job effectively, and that they are competent in the area of work which the NVQ represents.

They are important for both employer and individual as they not only help improve productivity and competitiveness, they also have the added benefit of improving employee performance and motivation, lowering staff turnover, providing better relations with staff and management (always helpful!) AND can also help the employer to benchmark standards and provide training which is specifically targeted to meet both individual and business needs.

Topics such as this were recently brought into the public arena following the Leitch Report which assessed the UK’s long term skill requirements. Scarily, it was identified that we are falling behind countries such as Germany and France in skills within the workplace – in other words the people within your organisation are a major untapped resource!

A series of recommendations were made including increasing adult skills across all levels and increasing employer’s investment in qualifications in the workplace. This will help us to become a world leader in skills as opposed to continuing as we are and observing diminishing economic growth (quite a frightening prospect).

As a result of this Omni currently have a quarter of their workforce involved in a variety of further qualifications to improve their skills and to help develop individuals to meet the company’s business needs, these include Management NVQ Level 3 and NVQ in Business Administration Level 3, Association of Accounting Technicians (AAT) and CIPD courses.

So jump on the bandwagon and ensure your company and its employees are helping to contribute, not only to YOUR growth and development but also helping the UK to become a world leader in skills, ensuring our long term prosperity.

Omni Acheive the Disability Symbol

2007-06-01T11:09:00.001+01:00

Many thanks must go to Nicola (Office Manager!), who has helped Omni achieve the disability symbol, awarded by the Jobcentre, by agreeing to take action to meet the 5 Commitments regarding the employment of disabled people.

What are the Five Commitments?

First Commitment - A guaranteed job interview
• To interview all disabled applicants who meet the minimum criteria for a job vacancy and consider them on their abilities

Second Commitment - Consulting disabled employees regularly
• To ensure there is a mechanism in place to discuss at any time, but at least once a year, with disabled employees what can be done to make sure they can develop and use their abilities

Third Commitment - Keeping employees if they become disabled
• To make every effort when employees become disabled to make sure they stay in employment

Fourth Commitment - Improving knowledge
• To take action to ensure that all employees develop the appropriate level of disability awareness needed to make the commitments work

Fifth Commitment - Checking progress and planning ahead
• Each year to review the five commitments and what else has been achieved, to plan ways to improve on them and to let employees and the Jobcentre Plus know about the progress and future plans

This is a big achievement and Omni join many organisations across Britain who currently use the symbol to promote disability awareness, for further information please contact your local Jobcentre or disability employment advisor.

The age/old question

2007-05-31T15:39:00.000+01:00

With age discrimination being a major consideration round here (and in the majority of organisations in the recruitment sphere thanks to recent changes in UK legislation) I found this from Louise very interesting.

Not entirely surprisingly "assumptions about personality and age are exaggerated or incorrect".

T-Shirts and office furniture

2007-05-25T16:29:00.000+01:00

Putting together a couple of stories I've talked about recently, here is a post from Guy about his recent visit to everyone's favourite t-shirt company, Threadless. This combines nicely with my recent posts about the office move and potential decor - I don't think we'll be going for the grafitti look but something chilled out and relaxed would perhaps be the right feel given the type of people that make up Omni. Basically I'm of the opinion we don't need to conform to any kind of corporate stereotype; the way things are moving in business now we can embrace the individuality that people have been wanting to see in the new place.

How to fast track your career

2007-05-16T14:00:00.000+01:00

Quick link to an interview with Penelope Trunk that Guy has on his site. Penelope is a blogger and author of the book 'Brazen Careerist: The New Rules for Success'. The interview is really interesting and makes me think the book might be well worth a read.

We're moving house!

2007-05-14T16:08:00.000+01:00

As I flagged up a little while ago, Omni are moving! We’re not going far, just down the road actually. It’s an important move though because in terms of current growth levels if we stay where we are we’ll have to sit on each others knees by September! The new office will have enough space for us to double in size, meaning plenty of room to grow into as we expand. Plus there’ll be more space for some fancy meeting rooms, some cool ‘break-out’ areas and all the other fun things that we’ve been talking about for a while now.

Part of the process is going to be getting ideas from people about what they want to see in the new place. What kind of furniture, what colour walls, what sort of ‘feel’ should it all have; it’s massively important that this is an environment where people can do their best work and be productive. Whilst the current office is great the limitations here needn’t apply somewhere new. We have a blank canvas to work on and that’s a really exciting prospect.

So, to all my colleagues out there that are reading this please let me know what you want to see in the new office. You can post it in comments here, or email me or just pop over with any thoughts.

To anyone not an Omni employee but with an opinion, I’d love to hear from you too! How do you use your work space? What gets the best out of people in the environment you work in?

[If you need some inspiration just follow the link from the Chief Happiness Officer’s blog in this post where there’s some food for thought]

Management methods for success

2007-05-14T12:43:00.000+01:00

First off apologies for the lack of updates from the HR Forum. 'Technical issues' are to blame initially, but I'll be trying to get some info on it up soon, as promised.

In the meantime, there is someone that I haven't linked to yet but really should have done as his blog is very good. Joel on Software is funny, entertaining, informative and very easy to read. It's a regular of mine and despite my lack of software knowledge I still feel that I get a lot from it. A good example is a series of posts from his archives on management styles. Joel is talking in the sense of how to manage a technical team but in reality it's good advice for any managers. Read all 3 and in order if you can. Highly recommended.

Joel on Command and Control Management
Joel on Econ 101 Management
Joel on Identity Management

Get your boss to buy you a house

2007-05-04T12:39:00.000+01:00

Although it sounds crazy an article I read online today seems to be suggesting that in the not-too-distant it could be fairly commonplace for employers to help staff get a foot on the property ladder. And this got me thinking...

The first rungs of the property ladder in the UK have been greased somewhat by rapidly increasing house prices in the past few years. The average price for a house in the UK went past the £150,000 mark for the first time last year. Combined with a staggering 2006 average student debt of £13,252 per person (according to Natwest) it's really no fun at all for a number of those trying to land their first house. Add to this recent interest rate rises and even if a first time buyer manages to squirrel away enough money for a deposit and mortgages themselves to the hilt for a 1 bed flat in the dodgy part of town, they'll still have to be super-frugal to avoid becoming one of the 17,000 people who had their home reposessed in 2006!

All in all it's a pretty glum picture and it makes the response from HSA all the more welcome. By allowing people to save up specfically for a house it takes a lot of the burden off the individual and gives them a suitable target to aim for without being unrealistic. So good work to the HSA!

What else can be done though? What more could (/should?) employers be doing to look after their staff? How about the following:

Consultations with professional financial advisers provided for all employees, completely free of charge. Absorbing what would be a relatively small cost to ensure that your people don't end up in financial difficulties. Staff with comfortable home lives are happy staff. And happy staff are productive staff, as we know.
Free or subsidised transport for employees. If the office is out of town maybe set up a minibus service. Reward car sharing, provide travel allowances, generally make it easy and cheap for people to turn up (because let's face it, on a rainy Monday morning turning up may be the last thing they want to do).
Help and advice on where to live, what the locality is like and any other pertinent information (schools, shopping, cinemas - all that non-work stuff that work gets in the way of). You can find a lot of the info here, so there's no excuse for not providing the basics at least.
Flexible working hours and locations where possible, particularly to take into consideration family commitments. As can be seen with this handy calculator (the link came from Guy, I think it's Mother's Day in America shortly), a stay-at-home parent is worth serious money. Making their life as easy as possible should be one of an employer's top priorities.
For larger organisations how about company-owned property that can be rented out to staff at a cheap rate. Not Robert Owen-esque or anything, just some apartments that people can stay in whilst they save up and find their feet. This would be particularly helpful for new graduates or those looking to relocate. It could also help out when hiring specialist contractors who are looking to commute to work for short periods of time.

Obviously all of the above take time, money and effort. Plus, they're ideas off the top of my head rather than fully developed strategies. If employers are to truly offer a unique proposition to potential employees though, there's a lot worse starting points they could go from. Thoughts?

Guest blogger next week - Craig Sweeney

2007-05-03T13:29:00.000+01:00

I'm pleased to announce that next week in addition to the regular postings that I'll be making, we'll also have the pleasure of some content from Omni's Ops Director, Craig. Craig is going (along with Robert, the MD) to the HR Forum's annual meet-and-greet onboard a crusie ship called the Oriana. For those who aren't familiar with the concept basically it's a huge networking event where a group of 'clients' and a group of 'suppliers' are trapped on a boat for 3 days and forced to endlessly eat, drink, be merry and (most importantly) network!

Craig will therefore be blogging from the frontline, providing fascinating insights into potential new clients, interesting business opportunities and how to stay on your feet when drinking cocktails on a boat.

Best of luck Craig!

[Correction - the boat is actually the Aurora this year, it was the Oriana last year. Thanks for the heads up Bev!]

'Nice' is the new 'You're fired!'

2007-05-01T11:34:00.000+01:00

Although ‘Sir’ Alan can still reel ‘em in with the best of them by snarling curmudgeonly advice at bewildered ‘management’ types his days as the archetypal businessman may be numbered. In workplaces the world over, being nice is fast becoming the new black…

Don’t believe me? Check out this link from Penelope Trunk (which I found via Louise’s blog) that extols the virtues of a spot of home baking for your beloved colleagues and this post (link via Alex the CHO) describing a novel approach to falling profits by a McDonalds franchisee (in fact check out the blog that link comes from generally for 'nice examples, it's called The Nice Blog for a reason!).

Don't mess with nature...

2007-04-25T16:10:00.000+01:00

A harsh lesson but one that others would do well to learn perhaps: don't mess with crocodiles...

Meeting hell

2007-04-20T14:41:00.000+01:00

A post over at Seth's Blog for all those stuck in that perpetual-meeting kind of hell. You know the type I mean. If you don't, you're lucky!

I like his idea for removing chairs from the meeting rooms personally, I've had a couple of stand up meetings and they went really well. Something else that we're going to try in our meetings is the Six Thinking Hats technique. If it works out I'll let you know!

The best clients

2007-04-16T12:59:00.000+01:00

Good post from Dennis Howlett (an accountancy blog that is a riveting read and interesting even if you have no interest in accounting).

It got me thinking about clients in the recruitment sector. Dennis' list should apply to clients in this market too but I'd wager it doesn't for most people. I went to a talk in Chicago last year where the speaker was from the HRO Buyers Advisory Board. The board is an independent HRO buyers group and the membership is a veritable 'who's who' of organisations that outsource some or all of their HR function.

Most of the audience were potential buyers, looking at the possibility of outsourcing. I went to get the 'other-side' info and pick up any tips I could. What I remember best from it though is the following assertion:

All of the groups membership expect and want their outsource companies to make money.

Now this isn't really a surprise when you think about it logically. Yet still, it made me stop at the time and at the end I went over that particular note a couple of times to really make it stand out. Buyers should be thinking of long term relationships and they expect providers to make money over the period of the contract. Something as radical as outsourcing your HR function (or just your recruitment function) is not to be undertaken lightly. So why plan to scrap it in 6 months? Exactly, no one does. Yet that's what happens time and again. The blame for this is often attributed to poor service (and I don't doubt for one second that there is a heck of a lot of poor service out there, I hear about it all the time). Yet maybe more of the responsibility (because I don't like the word blame) needs to be on the buyers, the clients.

At Omni we've got (and lost) clients that are indeed gold standard. And I think we're getting a lot better at saying no to those who just won't be up to scratch. Yet does anyone tick all the boxes from the list? Do any of your clients? If not, what can you do to help them get there?

The "world's local bank" do themselves proud...

2007-04-13T09:51:00.000+01:00

Although I think I'm probably incapable of being surprised by the appetite to make money demonstrated by the worlds leading banks, HSBC have this week outdone themselves. You may have seen this story in the news recently but I thought it worthy of flagging up nonetheless as I think with all the advertising money and the massive charm offensive by banks like HSBC it is easy to forget that in reality they aren't the good guys they'd like you to think they are. Customers come second, money comes first. That is and always will be the way of it.

The stand-out quote of the story:

"...not everybody in the world is equal. Some people have higher incomes and need greater services through the bank. These customers demand a better service."

If I was a HSBC customer, that quote alone would be enough to make me switch banks.

Free ice cream!

2007-04-11T11:56:00.000+01:00

This post is as simple as the title! Via Martin, the MoneySavingExpert, and thanks to Messrs Ben and Jerry - free ice cream!

Enjoy!

Quick mind/link dump

2007-04-10T10:12:00.000+01:00

Hi all! Hope everyone had a great Easter break and got some nice weather. Four days off and I feel fairly refreshed so whilst my brain is working reasonably well I'm going to put together a few links that I've come across over the past days/weeks. Bit of a brain dump to be honest so a real mix of links in there, both work related and not. Hopefully some will take your fancy.

- Seth's most important rule (which my thinking is very much in line with) ties in quite nicely with the secret I divulged last week

- Follow up from Guy on Carol Dweck and the different types of mindsets people have (for background see this previous post)

- An interesting post about stress and burnout at work from a new section of the always interesting PsyBlog.
N.B. Jeremy has decided to start up a Careers section on PsyBlog after good feedback on this post, that I've linked previously. Looks interesting so I'll doubtless be paying it a few visits as he starts to get some more content on there

- An interesting green post here. More on the whole green issue to come...Omni have some very interesting things in the (recyclable) pipeline

- The best t-shirt website known to man: Threadless is very cool and a shining example of a working user community. As the t-shirt says, I ♥ Threadless

- Another non-work link so for your lunch hour obviously ;-) This is something that I've always thought would be a good idea - design your own trainers. Good work Puma! (Not ridiculously pricey either, a good personalised birthday present for someone or just a nice treat for your feet)

That's it for now folks. Hope something tickles your fancy in there. Any comments etc

The secret

2007-04-04T16:50:00.000+01:00

I can't believe we're already in April. Where's the year gone? I've had my head buried in graduate CVs and telephone interviews recently as it's backs against the wall time for my clients' grad scheme this year; the assessment days start next week with nearly 120 people being seen in total. Gulp!

Here's a quick post therefore, before I get back to the slog. But it's an important one. I want to tell you the secret. The one thing that matters. I've said it before but I wasn't as blatant about saying it. It's the one thing that impresses me. It's how to get on the PSL I run. It's how to buy some time on the phone with me. It's how to sell me a product and how to get me to evangelise for you. It's how to get noticed by me in virtually any context. It's how to convince me you're worth more money when it's salary review time and it's how you get my job.

Here it is. The secret.

Be Remarkable

(...in that literal sense I've talked about before, meaning what you do, I'll remark upon)

Now you have the secret I'm looking forward to seeing what you'll do with it.

The Effort Effect

2007-03-30T15:34:00.000+01:00

I found this link via Guy Kawasaki's exceptionally good blog. The article is right up Ollie's street but should be of particular interest to anyone who manages people or has kids. And if you don't fall into either category it's just pretty darn interesting and well worth being information that you store in your brain to pull out and wow (/bore) people with at parties (or is it just me that does that?)

The article is about Carol Dweck and you can see it here. Carol is a psychologist with an exceptional pedigree so what she says goes pretty much. My favourite bit:

Dweck’s students from over the years describe her as a generous, nurturing mentor. She’d surely attribute these traits not to an innate gift, but to a highly developed mind-set. “Just being aware of the growth mind-set, and studying it and writing about it, I feel compelled to live it and to benefit from it,” says Dweck, who took up piano as an adult and learned to speak Italian in her 50s. “These are things that adults are not supposed to be good at learning.”

Maybe I should pick up that guitar that I put down quite a few years ago now...

Where would you like to work?

2007-03-30T13:30:00.000+01:00

Omni are looking at a potential office move soon. The place we're in now is great but just not big enough for the rapid expansion that's happening. If we leave it unchecked it'll be 3 people to each desk, sitting on each others knees and chaos in the kitchen.

When we move we'll have a blank space that will need decorating and furnishing. We could do a lot worse than follow some of the ideas suggested by the always innovative Chief Happiness Officer. (I want a few Sumo Omni bean bags at least! The name fits and everything!)

Really disappointing

2007-03-30T13:11:00.000+01:00

There is a story floating round on the blogosphere at the minute that is really quite upsetting. It's essentially a story about bullying and how some people feel the need to make other people miserable. It's a pretty sad indictment of human behaviour in all honesty and it's not my place to get into it in too big a way, not knowing the main protagonists involved. Worth noting I thought though, as the person this has affected most is one of my favourite bloggers and she now may be retiring from the whole scene.

The link to the story is below. You'll also find plenty of comment if you pay Scoble, Hugh or Seth a visit. Important though - the following link leads to what is a quite disturbing post, with very strong language. If you're not comfortable with that please don't click the link.

Here is the link to the possibly the last post Kathy Sierra will ever write (although fingers crossed this is a break rather than a retirement).

Q&A with JP

2007-03-23T12:19:00.000Z

I've been interviewed for a post that Louise (from UK Recruiter) has just put up on her blog. You can read the interview here.

Almost like being famous this, maybe they'll call me up about the next series of Celebrity Big Brother...

Utterly remarkable recruitment strategy

2007-03-21T14:14:00.000Z

I like to think that some of the strategies we put in place to find people for our clients are pretty innovative. We're focussed on finding the very best people anyway we can. Yet this blows it out of the water really...

Via Seth, this link describes in detail a recruitment strategy that is truly remarkable. You may think that this doesn't apply to you I suppose because of the effort involved/cost/market sector you work in/type of person you hire etc. For me though it's not about copying what Red5 do, it's about the state of mind involved. It's about your attitude to recruitment. It's about the focus on people. It's about being truly committed to hiring the best and proving your committment. It's about doing things that people will remark on over and over.

Read the post, click the links, absorb the info and then hope you can do something as good as this. Think you can? Ideas on a postcard please!

Do you blog?

2007-03-19T17:08:00.000Z

Any fellow bloggers out there? Then this link from Kathy Sierra is an absolute must-read. It's from a presentation she gave (man I'd love to have gone to that talk) based around Hugh MacLeod's Global Microbrand idea, which is a theory I subscribe to wholeheartedly.

To my mind it's no coincidence that the likes of Jason Calacanis, Robert Scoble, Seth Godin, Tara Hunt et al follow all of the above without even thinking. The debate about A-listers, access to readers etc keeps popping up in one form or another. Yet when all is said and done the guys 'at the top' all write well, have interesting content and respect their readership. Not to say others don't (narrowly avoided opening that can of worms there!) but it seems to me like a very good place to start for a newbie like me.

Who likes George Clooney?

2007-03-19T15:53:00.000Z

First off apologies for the lack of posts recently, I've been in and out of the office so much recently. I really need to get into this whole mobile blogging thing!

Now apologies for the shameless 'exciting title - tenuously related post' situation here! This post from Seth is a good one though. What do you choose to do? Do you make good choices? My favourite quote:

Not choosing is still making a choice.