Best Example of Authentic Entrepreneurship & Customer Focus? Chris Zane´s!

Chris Zane has learned from his own experience what it means to win the trust of a lifetime customer. He thinks a lot how the game is played and tries to change the rules so that everyone (except for competitors) wins.
Chris Zane, Founder and President of a very successful leading American bicycle Company Zane´s Cycles based in the Branford, U.S., always positively surprises. His customers, his business partners, employees or just his followers on Twitter. I am myself the real life example. My blog on Starbucks´ was a door opener for our twitter conversation on customer service , that ended up by a pleasant surprise of receiving Chris Zane´s new book with his inscription. Another sign that Chris Zane lives the values which he shares during Keynote speeches, at Universities, in professional magazines (e.g.Fortune, The Harvard Business Review) and also in his new book "Reinventing the Wheel".





What puts Chris Zane apart from others?

Vision, Passion, Authenticity and Drive
Chris is always hungry for a challenge, wanting to do something big. Already at the age of 16 he bought his first bike shop. Twenty years later he was running 15 million USD business.

"I was scared to death of going out of business which is always a great motivator to try new things. I was small potatoes, but that didn´t mean I had to stay that way."


Perseverance
The success story was not as rosy at the beginning. Chris nearly went bankrupt. Fortunately he got an impulse for trying again, but differently.

"I thought I would let my customers lead me instead of trying to guess what they wanted."

Customer Service Obsession
If you may not yet have heard about a CEO, who believes he should be "at somebody´s service", please meet Chris Zane. His customer service obsession became famous, not just in the U.S.
"Every company, particularly large national ones, needs to start thinking of customer service as a profit creator, not just a cost sink. ...In this viral age, where so many transactions happen with no human being involved, finding a way to make emotional connections with your customers is key."

As Chris passionately claims in his book: "We are better than our competitors because we differentiate ourselves by offering more service than most customers consider reasonable. ...Our goal is to blow them away with our attention to detail as soon as we meet them. ...By doing more, by creating a positive and unexpected experience, along with a gentle reminder of what you did, you are changing the relationship you have with your customer."

No wonder that Chris believes that most important is to look at the value of a customer over the lifetime of your relationship with him or her, as part of a lasting sequence of events, avoiding thinking in terms of single transactions.

Zane´s employees pro-actively use customer database to start a conversation with a returned customer. The profile of the customer reveals among other information purchase frequency, bought items history and also tracking of every repair job. Rather than wasting time by offering to a customer something he/she has already bought, they are talking about what type of other products he/ she might be looking for this time. Database information is also used to send tailor-made flyers to customers, informing about special event or for approaching parents of growing kid e.g. if Zane´s sells a 16inch bike to the parents of a five-year-old, the same family will be ready to upgrade to the 20inch bike in another two years.

Zane has also put high attention to designing the retail store layout. The objective was to encourage his customers to browse through the latest and greatest products. For the customers who subscribe to the unlimited flat tire fix program, there is a staff "show" in the retail store. The entire staff sprint into action and the customer receives the red carpet treatment. In front of the eyes of the other customers, who have afterwards the temptation to enroll as well.

"If I stopped thinking I was in the "selling stuff" business and instead that I was in the "selling experiences" business, I could attract those customers who weren´t 100 percent price driven."

Innovative Marketing
Chris is always looking into a new niche, trying to change the game. He believes that if Zane´s ensures continuous improvement, than the employees are never on autopilot. He is obsessed with developing additional offerings, with providing more service than seems reasonable, knowing that customers self-regulate.

Among the most popular and surprising services that Zane´s started to offer were e.g. a lifetime service guarantee (all parts and labor are covered for the life of your bike, meaning tune-ups for free), flat tire insurance (for small one-time fee bike´s flat tires will be fixed for free for ever), a free trade-in program for kids bikes (even ten years later kids can get full credit for their bikes to purchase new ones) or also ninety-day price protection guarantee (to take out the question of price right out of the customer´s buying decision).

Spreading positive Word Of Mouth and helping the community he lives in is also a key priority for Chris. Zane´s donates dozens of slightly used but quality bikes to underprivileged kids every six months or so. As he continuously thrives to support those in need, being it sports clubs or children at schools, the attention from the local media to Zane´s Company is inevitable then.

Down the Earth Approach
"Rather than obsessing over textbook concepts like inventory turns or the cost of goods sold, all I had to do was think about how to make our customers think good things about us."

"It took me several years of operating the business before I built up enough confidence to leap to a lifetime guarantee." When Zane´s started with this program, some supposed experts were convinced it was going to lead Zane to bankruptcy. He however understood clearly the cost and profit implications of each service innovation he has undertaken. So he assured, the costs of this service will be minimized: "I paid my mechanics a salary rather than a commission, they had all the incentive in the world not to work on the same bike more than once." He has also made his pre-calculation of probable cost he will have to take on. The reality overachieved his expectations. The business started to grow rapidly at the expense of competition and the profit has not sunk while most people did not take full advantage of every deal they come across.

Training of Positive Serving Employees Mindset
Chris has an ambition to make Zane´s a fabulous place to work. "My goal is to build a team of people who have both the aptitude to learn the nuances of riding and the ability to translate those details to our customers. ... I can´t teach someone to have empathy and kindness for our customers and toward his or her co-workers. My main criteria in adding new members to our team is, "Is this person intrinsically nice"?

"Any organization that fails to coach its employees not to say things like "Can I help you" also fails to recognize that it has encouraged its employees to turn on autopilot, responding in the way a robot would."

Final Word
Chris Zane definitely belongs to the top class retailers, not just in the American scale. I wish his vision of creating lifetime customers will be adopted by more businesses, especially in the Czech Republic.

Chris Zane has been awarded many times for his Customer Service / Outstanding Business Practices, proudly belonging among the most influential people in the US bicycle industry, his marketing and sales practices are used as college case studies worldwide. His book Reinventing the Wheel is available at Amazon. 

Link To Amazon - Chris Zane: Reinventing the Wheel

The Other Vaclav Klaus (Or The Other You) On Twitter

Identity Theft Easy With Twitter

The Other Vaclav Klaus became popular on Twitter once publishing joking tweets about stolen pen. Followers started to grow by geometric line. The issue is that this Other Vaclav Klaus pretends he is Mr. President himself, adding the President picture and a link to official Vaclav Klaus web pages.

A typical case happening to famous people that the Twitter Co. struggles to prevent or deal with. There is a boarder line between allowed parody vs. not allowed non-parody impersonation. Twitter's impersonation policy states the following: "Impersonation is pretending to be another person or business as entertainment or in order to deceive. Non-parody impersonation is a violation of the Twitter Rules." Too much vague definition enabling harm to victims.

For increased clarity twitter just offers a service for selected celebrities and politicians to verify the data and give the person an identity authorization stamp. No wonder that some of the influential guys like Robert Kiyosaki or Donald Trump had no other options except for naming themselves on Twitter "@theRealKiyosaki" or "@realDonaldTrump" and adding a authorized stamp from Twitter, once they rightly did not start to negotiate the lump sum for name buy-out from the fake users.

Not all the fake owners do it from financial reasons being inspired by huge packages coming from web domains sales. Some of them just enjoy the fact that they can for a period of time enjoy the popularity or just to feel "cool" and "funny" to contribute to spreading out the local jokes. But what about if they attract huge number of their followers and then distribute a false alarm message?

It is not anymore about identity protection of celebrities.Twitter currently claims something between 175mil. & 200 mil. registered users worldwide. So if you imagine that this social network continues with its fast development, your registered true name on twitter may become a prized possession. Once you book it ahead of time, it cannot be taken away from you. YOU own it.

But do not go overboard and don not try to register now all name possibilities. Anything to which you do not own the rights is likely to be removed when Twitter is made aware.

If you do not want to be left out with some desperate user name, because yours is already taken, act immediately.You prevent yourself from identity theft and you make it easier for friends to find you.

And do not stop just there.

Track your name on-line presence via search engines or profi tools. Act immediately to avoid spreading misinformation or reputation damage. If you are a celebrity, media person or politician, assure that you act immediately once you are a target of being "twitterjacked", as Ashton Kutcher or Oprah Winfrey, Bill Gates or Condoleezza Rice experienced themselves, some hackers tweeted under their names.

Engage and build your brand on Twitter, post and share interesting tweets. This will attract many followers to you. Sooner or later your active twitter presence will eliminate the fake other ones, as readers intuitively go for quality and essence, they can only obtain from the authentic true individuals they adore.

Note: Identity theft, parodies, and copyright infringement on Twitterverse bring legal implications. Officially Twitter advises impersonation victims to contact its Terms of Service group. But depending on how quickly the profile in question is caught, it may be too late, experts say. Impersonation, parodies, and copyright infringement are likely to continue as Twitter grows. While the medium is relatively new, these issues are not. We can definitely expect interesting legal cases in this area.

(Not) Aging By Learning And Playing

Recently I have re-connected on Facebook with a business friend. He has sent me as a teaser a picture from our “olden – but golden” days, suggesting it was just few years ago. I had a temptation to correct him, the photo was taken already at least 17 years ago… Did I feel old realizing it was so long? And what about my authenticity? How much have I lost it because of my age or due to the top management expectations during my professional career?

Aging is a topic most of us hesitate to talk about. But the curve of aging is linked with learning. We cannot grow old, if we succeed to learn something new and stretch our minds enough every single day. We cannot grow old if we constantly try to improve the way we think and behave, if we actively and positively fight the obstacles we face. Challenges are good for us, because they help us to expand our horizons, to make a difference and to keep our soul young. The bigger we aim the more barriers we can expect and the more creative fresh approach we have to take. 

Feeling “for-ever-young” means we can tackle the professional and private life-hurdles with ease. Feeling young means we are able to nurture our inner child. We are able to build on the skills we have had as youngsters - being naturally curious, enjoying to engage with spontaneity and laughter, without fear.

Most of the time once we adults assume the responsibilities of life, we stop playing. We close our minds to new insights and powerful thoughts. We live reactive, passive, “comfortable” lives. We are afraid to take a chance, to live through new experiences, to search for greatness.

But does it have to be that way? What would our life look like if there was more authenticity? Where would our work experience bring us, if we started to bring more fun, imagination and greatness back to our jobs?  How would we feel if we started to fully enjoy every second of this journey called living?

“Aging only happens to people who lose their lust for getting better and disconnect from their natural base of curiosity.” Robin Sharma.

How Howard Schultz Managed To Enhance Starbucks´ Soul

Howard Schultz is visible everywhere now. At least from three reasons. Starbucks celebrated its 40th birthday on March 30th. Howard recently released his second book "Onward. - How Starbucks Fought For Its Life Without Losing its Soul" and thirdly because he is a true leader who is able to lead by example and generate a buzz around the Company he restarted for success after he returned to the CEO role in 2008.

Starbucks became under his leadership the World´s largest coffee store company. But back in 2007 successes covered up mistakes. Starbucks - as many other growing Companies - lost its focus on the customer. Instead it put all the efforts on the compliance with Wall Street. The pressure to deliver the growth expectations led to over expansion and loosing the Company soul.

Hard work had to be done, tough decisions had to be taken. Starbucks had to downsize and to reclaim its original customer centric values, vision and mission, while aggressively innovating and building on the opportunities arousing from social media landscape. Priority was to maintain the loyalty of Starbucks´s core customers at all costs. "Maintaining a focus on core customers during crisis is what helped weather a downturn," said once Howard, "While winning them back later would be too hard."

Howard understood well, that the Starbucks brand has to be unique and authentic. It has to resonate with the customer. People want to support only those brands and companies, whose values are comparable with their own. These values have to be inspirational, the staff and shop ambient have to breathe them. But a true brand has to go beyond its own distribution outlets.

This was the reason why Starbucks intensively started to emotionally engage with customers outside the coffee stores. Starbucks found the recepie to become one of most relevant brands to customers on Facebook, Twitter or Foursquare. It has developed itself into an iconic modern brand, often used as a benchmark, not just in the coffee business.

Howard underwood well that "Employees want to work for a Company they are proud of." But as well that "We are not in the coffee business serving people, we are in the people business serving coffee." For him the most important people at Starbucks are those wearing the green aprons. That is why one of the first steps Howard had done as returning CEO was unprecedented closing of all the North American stores for three hours to retrain employees (at costs of 6mil. USD) and then hosting a comprehensive off-site with 10,000 retail store managers (at costs of 30mil.USD). He apologized himself to all the staff for the decisions Starbucks leadership had made that had put the Company into the negative position. "The most important characteristic of a successful CEO is building trust with everyone in the organization. We can´t exceed the expectations of our customers if we can´t exceed the expectations of our own employees."

"Success is not an entitlement. It has to be earned.".Once you have the loyalty and trust of customers, you have to continue to earn it," as Howard once said. Starbucks is now on the rebound with its stock up more than 350% from its 2008 low. Though the challenge will be to keep the momentum and avoid the mistake of sleeping on the laurels again.

Howard Schultz personal mission:
"Dream more than others think practical. Expect more than others think possible."

Howard Schultz on vulnerability of a CEO - more in my other blog post:
http://janabudikova.blogspot.com/2010/11/is-vulnerability-in-ceo-leadership.html

Why I Am Hooked Up. Reasons You Shouldn't Ignore Twitter.

LinkedIn, Facebook or Twitter are not a passsing fad suitable for media, marketing, IT or recruitment professionals, as many sceptics judged at the begining. On contrary, more and more people and businesses realized the need to join and participate.  So why should YOU use twitter on top of your LinkedIn and Facebook profiles?

Beeing on twitter enables you to join a community of your choice, getting up to speed with news, and latest developments in the World, either from respected official channels –professional magazines, newspapers, business and political authorities, progressive Companies or from the tweeting community itself. Never before you could get so close to the gurus in their field, who’s  tweetstreams ideally consist of 80% professional and 20% private news, comments, evaluations, blogs.

You either create the content yourselves or you distribute (re-tweet) interesting news. Twitter is a great partnering and influencing tool. You can even steer an upheaval by tweeting, as Wael Ghonim did in Egypt (more in the blog post http://bit.ly/gU66z0) . The news travel fast and quick, the support can grow rapidly. 

One of the biggest hurdles at the beginning is to choose the relevant people and publishing houses, you want to follow. Your followers will recruit from those who are attracted to the similar topics. The easiest is to study the list of contacts somebody you admire follows and start to follow them as well. Only then you fully get hooked up with tweeting world, when you actively join in. Give this experience a week and you may be surprised about the value twitter brings you instantly.

The challenge of contributing is to learn to engage with your audience. Many celebrities are tweeting random quotes but never interact with the audience (is it really them who is tweeting?). The authenticity is lost and credibility as well. The line what ‘s hot in the world or in your chosen area gives you idea what similar minded people think about. Tweet words limit (140 letters) enables to focus your thoughts, also in direct e-mails, no time lost for the reader.

Twitter despite its growing registered accounts base of more than 200mil. worldwide, is still waiting for more widespread usage especially outside the United States (LinkedIn with 100mil. users WW, Facebook 643mil.WW). Language choice could be a challenge especially in countries with small English speaking base as they are limited to get to the WW twitter trending topics – except if they do not live in Egypt (voices in Egypt have special section).  Specific solutions were found for Germany, France and Italy, via @twitter_de (287t followers), @twitter_fr (388t followers), @twitter_it (312t followers).

If twitter is about speed and snapshot view, inviting you to get deeper in topics that interest you, and about learning and sharing with people you may not know personally, Facebook is mainly about updates exchange with your close family, friends and colleagues, as you have to (unlike in twitter) accept them in your network if you do not decide to go for the Company / Brand FB pages.

Professionally you cannot stay up to date without your LinkedIn account - for reputation building while nurturing your professional network and being connected with key people throughout your career evolvement.  

The more you interact with people on all three social media sites, the more thoughtful you are about your content, timing and target group relevance, the wider your reach will be and the stronger your personal/professional brand will become.


For inspiration about the power of Twitter check following sites:
@Zappos (1.8 mil. followers), @SouthwestAir (1.1 mil. followers), @CocaCola (0.236 mil. followers), @jack_welch (1.3 mil. followers), @tonyrobins (1.9 mil. followers), @mashable (2.2 mil. followers), @wired (0.8 mil. follwers), @tedtalks (0.37 mil. followers), @ThisIsSethsBlog (0.07 mil. followers).




Note: Twitter celebrated last Monday, March 21st its fifth birthday. From official Twitter Blog that day: "Twitter users now send more than 140 million Tweets a day which adds up to a billion Tweets every 8 days—by comparison, it took 3 years, 2 months, and 1 day to reach the first billion Tweets. While it took about 18 months to sign up the first 500,000 accounts, we now see close to 500,000 accounts created every day. All of this momentum and growth often pales in comparison to a single compassionate Tweet by a caring person who wants to help someone in need."

What the King George V. In 1934 Understood Better Than Today´s Managers

It is not enough to be just on the wall in the framed picture.  Each leader, the King or the CEO, has to get closer to the crowds. He has to be like an actor, talking to the people, having „own voice“. Be that the nation or the Company, both need a leader they all could stand behind. They need a voice that unites them.

Seeing the Oskars´ winning film King´s Speech this week I was awakened to observe an interesting parallel. Early 30th the radio started to be widespread and the King understood its impact on the masses. Nowadays the social media play that role. But how many progressive managers use meaningful conversations around their brands and companies to link themselves to the hearts of people?

In the movie "King´s Speech" Prince Albert, The Duke of York (later the King George VI) heartbreakingly got beyond his weakness of being a stutterer and thanks to his perseverance learned how to talk to the crowds with passion and intensity, fluently.

What will it take for the leaders nowadays to break the „ceiling“ to the future, to increase the understanding about social media conversations around their brands? What will it take for the leaders to „FLUENTLY“ start to speak with „ordinary“ predominantly young people on Twitter, Facebook or LinkedIn?

Interesting facts regarding social media development worldwide:
Trends In Social Media Europe / Worldwide

Statistics on Low Social Media Understanding

Lesson From Japan: Seize Each Moment, There May Be No Tomorrow

Japan Earthquake followed by disastrous tsunami proved the old true – we have to live our lives fully at present, there may be no tomorrow.

We would never expect this to happen, even in our biggest nightmares. Japan is highly civilized country, with all the emergency plans, with all the sophisticated technical and electronics equipments in place. Still the Mother Nature shows us how vulnerable we – the human beings – are.

 It is not a punishment for some wrongdoing for Japanese people, but they have to take on their shoulders its burden now. Those who survived have to find the strength to cope with loosing family members and friends, their homes, jobs and places they felt connected to. They may be left out homeless, starving from lack of electricity and basic food supplies at present. Regardless how much fortune they have gathered in the past, regardless how much valuables they have collected. They are like “naked”, just with their memories from the past and the hope for better days to come.  

 It is never too late to say your family and friends how much you love and care about them. It is never too late to say thank you to those who deserve it. It is never too late to start to seize each moment of your life to find YOUR way to happiness.

You have to act now. Because nobody can be sure what the future brings.

“Dream as if you’ll live forever. Live as if you’ll die today.” James Dean

“CARPE DIEM (Seize the Day)! “Horace

How To help Japan from the Czech Republic (according to server: Novinky.cz) ?

Salvation Army: SMS - DMS ARMADASPASY sent to Tel. No. 87 777 or bank transfer 475 335 533/0300, variable symbol 222.

Czech Red Cross - bank account 222826/5500, variable symbol 999.

Czech Doctors without borders  : bank account 2101050700 / 2700, variabilní symbol: 99

Steve Jobs’ Most Relevant Quotes, You Never Dare To Forget

I have been impressed with Steve Jobs’ last week’s speech on the launch of iPad 2. He came, though seriously ill. He put his passion into the show, despite his energy being exhausted by fighting illness and media speculating about his near death. He shined as always. The lasting standing ovations belonged to his well deserved reward.


I admire Steve Jobs for his leadership qualities. I am not so hard on his people skills gaps as some others may be (people at Apple are said to be at constant fear of losing their job). But Steve still attracts the best employees and he enthuses them to do great work for him. Apple stands for something for them. Apple has a reason for being that isn’t just about making money. Steve is a type of genius, artist, who has made his mark in the history and he could never be so successful without some of his unique personality traits.


What the great leaders do and Steve Jobs masters better than others?

VISION AND PURPOSE

      “Our customers want to know who is Apple and what do we stand for, where do we fit in this world. What we are about is not making boxes for people to get their jobs done, although we do that well, we do that better than anybody in some cases. But Apple is something more than that. Apple at the core, it’s core value is, that we believe that people with passion can change the world for the better.” 1997, Jobs’s speech to employees

“The goal was never to beat the competitors, or to make a lot of money, it was to do the greatest thing possible, or even a little greater.”

PASSION  

“I am willing  to tear down walls, build bridges, and light fires. I have great experience, lots of energy, a bit of that “vision thing” and I am not afraid to start from the beginning. “ Steve Jobs’ resume

“Unless you have a lot of passion about this, you are not going to survive. You are going to give up. So you’ve got to have an idea or a problem or a wrong that you want to right that you’re passionate about, otherwise you’re not going to have the perseverance to stick in through. I think that’s half the battle right there.”

COURAGE

“I have always been attracted to the more revolutionary changes. I don’t know why. Because they are harder. They’re more stressful emotionally. And you usually go through a period where everybody tells you that you’ve completely failed.”

 “I looked to my hero Bob Dylan for inspiration. One of the things I admired about Dylan was his refusal to stand still. Many successful artists at some point in their careers atrophy: they keep doing what made them successful in the first place, but they don’t evolve. If they keep risking failure, they are still artists. Dylan and Picasso were always risking failure.”1998 for Fortune magazine

INVENTIVE SPIRIT

“Innovations has nothing to do with how many R&D dollars you have. When Apple came up with the Mac, IBM was spending at least 100times more on R&D. It’s not about money. It’s about the people you have, how you’re led, and how much you get it.” 1998 for Fortune

“Process makes you more efficient. But innovation comes from people meeting up in the hallways or calling each other at 10:30 at night with a new idea, or because they realized something that shoots holes in how we’ve been thinking about problem. It’s ad hoc meetings of six people called by someone who thinks he has figured out the coolest new thing ever and who wants to know what other people think of his idea.” 2004 for Business Week

PERSEVERANCE & PERFECTIONISM

“Be a yardstick of quality. Some people aren’t used to an environment where excellence is expected.”     

“When you start looking at a problem and think it’s really simple, you don’t understand how complex the problem really is. Once you get into the problem… you see that it’s complicated and you come up with all these convoluted solutions. That’s where most people stop, and the solutions tend to work for a while. But the really great person will keep going, find the underlying problem, and come up with an elegant solution that works well on every level.”

DISCIPLINE AND DECISIVENESS

“Everything just got simpler. That’s been one of my mantras – focus and simplicity. We’ve got to focus and do things we can be good at”.” 1998 for Business Week

“We look at a lot of things, but I’m as proud of the products that we have not done as I am of the ones we have done.” 1998 for Wall Street Journal

INTEGRITY AND CHARACTER

„You can't connect the dots looking forward. You can only connect them looking backwards, so you have to trust that the dots will somehow connect in your future. You have to trust in something--your gut, destiny, life, karma, whatever--because believing that the dots will connect down the road will give you the confidence to follow your heart, even when it leads you off the well-worn path, and that will make all the difference.“ Jobs Stanford Speech 2005

„Your time is limited, so don't waste it living someone else's life. Don't be trapped by dogma, which is living with the results of other people's thinking. Don't let the noise of others' opinions drown out your own inner voice, heart and intuition. They somehow already know what you truly want to become. Everything else is secondary.“ Jobs Stanford Speech 2005

„Remembering that you are going to die is the best way I know to avoid the trap of thinking you have something to lose. You are already naked. There is no reason not to follow your heart.“ Jobs Stanford Speech 2005

Once Steve Jobs said: “I want to put a ding in the Universe.” He certainly did.

Do not miss the video on his appearance in March 2011:
Steve Jobs Standing Ovations March 2011


The Beginning of Steve Jobs' Greatness / Video from 1984

Note: When the quote source not mentioned, than appeared in the book "Inside Steve's Brain" by Leander Kahney.

My other blog devoted to Steve Jobs and his mission: 
Steve Jobs Journey Toward Success - Another View 

The Art of Forgiving in Highly Competitive Business World

I have heard it many times before: „You have to forgive people for what they have done to you, even if they were driven by evil, non-ethics behaviours, damaging you or the work you have done.“ Easily said, but I have never understood: "How come I can be so generous to somebody who is mean to me?" Studying many clever books I have got the idea.

The more I was thinking about that “nasty” person, the more I have accumulated my anger inside myself. The more I tried to escape, the more I was trapped. The fact that I refused to forgive meant that the burden lied on my shoulders not on his ones. The wounds on my feelings, when not dealt with, became inflamed. Only when I started to pay attention to my negative emotions and deal with them in positive way, I could free myself up.

I started to define the new meaning of forgiveness for myself – by forgiving I am actually not agreeing with that person behavior, I am not supporting his or her wrong-doing, I am not forgetting what he or she has done. I am just not enabling them to control my life. I am just not going to live their own nightmare. Because I am sure that those who are causing harm to others were themselves hurt in the past.  They are neither happy nor they live a fulfilled life. Their wrongdoing will reach them sooner or later anyhow.

Forgiving is opening a way for own rich positive life.

Forgiving is one of the most difficult things, especially in the very competitive and tough business world, but when mastered well, it can bring us up to the new heights.

„ Forgiveness is primarily for our own sake, so that we no longer carry the burden of resentment. But to forgive does not mean we will allow injustice again." Jack Kornfield

 „The weak can never forgive. Forgiveness is the atribute of the strong.“ Mahatma Gandhi

„The stupid neither forgive nor forget, the naive forgive and forget, the wise forgive but do not forget.“ Thomas S. Szasz (Hungarian Professor of Psychiatry)

„People With Passion Make You Feel Better“

You will always remember them. You will adore them. You will try to follow their professional path for your own inspiration. They care. They trust. They breathe their passion. They share themselves with this world. They bring you up when you feel down, even if they may not know you.

That‘s why they are successful. Role models. Immortal.

„Really great people make you feel that you, too, can become great.“ Mark Twain

Passion and inspiration are linked together. Are you following your dreams and desires instead of your rational plans? Have you identified your inspirational gurus who make you feel good and multiply your passion to the new hight?

Don‘t waste your time. 
This is YOUR turn now to change the world for the better!
For your own fulfillment.

„Twenty years from now you will be more disappointed by the things that you didn't do than by the ones you did do. So throw off the bowlines. Sail away from the safe harbor. Catch the trade winds in your sails. Explore. Dream. Discover.“ Mark Twain

“Our Youth Makes FEAR History,”

We do not want to be just the Mubarak’s „Those noisy kids on facebook’. We believe that “Freedom is a bless that deserves fighting for it,” the speeches and tweets from Wael Ghonim, the Egyptian activist, Google marketing executive,  after his 12-day disappearance, blindfolding and interrogation, re-energized the Egyptians in their final quest for „the dignity that comes with being actors in a nation’s destiny rather than its pawns“. His extremely human leadership attracted many ordinary Egyptian men and women , who saw in him their own son, ally or companion, crying publicly during a TV interview for the death of people that died during this upheaval. Wael Ghonim inspired many people to remove their fear of personal persecution or even death.  

Ghonim showed his nation that they should not anymore fear the Regime, represented by its dictator Hosni Mubarak: „Because the only barrier to people uprising and revolution is the psychological barrier of fear. All these regimes rely on fear. They want everyone to be scared. If you manage to break the psychological barrier, you're gonna definitely be able to do the revolution.“

Fear has become too much frequent experience for many people nowadays. Not just on the political level. I have observed many people experiencing fear in their ordinary lifes – much more simple than life or death, freedom of speech or prison.

They are in fear for their circumstances and future. They are in fear of failure on personal or professional level. They become paralyzed. Fear can be an internal message giving alert to an actual or probable threat. But most of the time it is simply an anxiety about things or situations that haven't happened yet and may be unlikely to happen at all.

Mastering fear requires bearing thinks as if it is impossible to fail. Imagining that behind every failure there is the potential for success, and if we give up too soon, we may never know what wonderful thing we could have accomplished. Only when we remove the fear from our thoughts, we put our energy full speed into doing meaningful things and we may actually start to change the world.

Fortunately Wael Ghonim understood this.

View: Wael Ghonim CNN Interview from Feb 11: Facebook To Thank For Freedom!

P.S. Snapshop on Wael Whonim usage of social media for organizing an upheaval:

Wael Ghonim, 30 years old Google's regional marketing manager for the Middle East, changed the way revolutions are made. Ghonim among others credits Social Media sites – Facebook and Twitter for enabling the revolution that resulted in the resignation of Hosni Mubarak.

Wael Ghonim had been running since June 2010 a popular Facebook page, speaking against police brutality, with 400,000 Egyptian followers. He has named it after Khaled Said, a businessman who died in police custody in Alexandria last year. This page played a crucial role in organizing the protests. Hundreds of thousands of Egyptians started collaborating content. Up to 60,000 people within hours shared on their walls particular video. Internet and namely facebook helped to fight the restricted media world.

In one of his last tweets on Jan. 27, Ghonim expressed his strong passion against the current regime. "Pray for #Egypt. Very worried as it seems that government is planning a war crime tomorrow against people. We are all ready to die," he wrote

After he was released from prison on February 7th, shortly after his TV interview,  at least 130,000 people have joined a Facebook page titled "I delegate Wael Ghonim to speak in the name of Egypt's revolutionaries"

On February 11th, when Mubarak disappeared from the country and all Egyptians celebrated end of his dictatorship regime, Wael Ghonim expressed the credit not to himself, but to the Egyptian nation: „I’m not a hero, you are the heroes, you are the ones who stand on this square.“

****

Sustainability of Management Job At Present

Hot topic today - partially due to economical crisis. Too many of my LinkedIn contacts have within last few months changed their job titles. Becoming consultants, experts or investors instead of CEOs/Board members. The leadership market is changing. One can observe the cheaper and younger replace the more expensive and the experienced. Another can view fixed costs cutting at any price as a short-term gain for the Company winning over long-term benefits, overemphasized financials to non measurable values the experienced top leaders bring to the Company.

Each situation is different. The outcome however is the same. I see many talented leaders, who have successful track record of delivering great financial results and developing people, currently looking for new opportunities, not fully utilizing their potential, despite being in their "best age" (40-50).

For the talented leaders this may just be a nice long-time dreamed break from high-speed life and from lasting frustration that has built up over years due to their low influence on local results thanks to increased International HQ decisions. The Universe may be giving them time to rethink life values and career objectives, to re-launch their personal brand. These people understand the principles that brought them to the top and thus they either excel in similar top job again or they start their own business ventures. Their "star" will shine again soon, even stronger. The time in between is for them just a test of their patience to search for the next opportunity and a test of perseverance to find one.

On the other hand the leaders who got their top jobs by co-incidence and luck, who did not build their success themselves,who always played it safe or "win what I want at all costs", feel totally lost. They have never known what are the key pillars of the Company growth they may have inherited. They have hardly at all added significant value to the Company, to their teams or to the society they live in. They have not learn the ability to excel. They victimize themselves. They feel born for the job, that is why they demand it back. They know well how to take, use and manipulate, their big life lesson is to learn how to give, contribute and build. Most of them try to avoid this painful excercise. Their arrogant behavior destroys even the last few opportunities that have opened in front of them.

For progressive leaders the year 2011 should be bright again! The leadership jobs will be again in demand (see more in the attached research from BlueSteps Company). It is a high time for everybody now to do the homework and prepare for the promising future!

Blue Steps Research

Tony Robbins: "What stops us all from moving forward? Fear. Fear can destroy our psychology and immobilize us from taking action. The secret is learning how to use fear instead of letting fear use you!?"

On-Line Fast Track for Success

Speed and timing are critical. Competition never sleeps. Competitive advantages are stolen quickly. The civilization itself is nowadays put on the fast track. Like it or do not. What worked several decades ago, is considered the “Age of Dinosaurs” today.  To reach 50 million people, it took radio 38 years,  13 years for TV, 4 years for internet and 3 years for iPod. Only 9 months were sufficient for Facebook to engage with 100 million people. The technological advancements, since Facebook started in February 2004, accelerated everything even more. From over 610 million Facebook active users nowadays, about 200 million access through their mobile devices and about 75% live outside the United States. We can continue with statistics for Twitter or LinkedIn. However they are not as important. The key for leaders is to understand how they can use these existing trends for their profit. For the benefit of their Company as well as for the benefit of self.  

Many Companies in the Eastern Europe have not yet adjusted themselves. A lot of them have forgotten they have to evolve with the ever changing environment. What worked for engaging with consumers and for networking in the business world several years ago, does not work today.

The truth is that a lot of Eastern Europe’s CEOs and management team members themselves have not still established an account on the social media networks for their Company or for themselves. Or they do not actively exploit it. They prefer to live comfortable life based on their historical routines. They start to loose their edge, but they do not worry. They can still live comfortably. At present at least. But what about in future?

If CEOs want to drive their Companies forward and enjoy their highly paid jobs, they have to stop worrying about being publicly exposed due to bigger transparency. They have to put their audience - being it consumers, customers or business partners - in the first place. They have to dissolve their fear to make the first step. They have to inspire the Company and its employees to change. Nothing more, nothing less.

Leaders of the future have to build their new vision for on-line presence and start to feel the urge to do something about it. NOW!

P.S. There are of course positive examples as well :-). Check them out:  http://www.socialbakers.com/facebook-pages/brands/czech-republic/

And fresh new opportunity to use LinkedIn for Companies:
http://www.linkedin.com/share?viewLink=&sid=s248861528&url=http%3A%2F%2Fon%2Emash%2Eto%2Fh97Nii&urlhash=uwUv&pk=nhome-chron-split-feed-items&pp=18&poster=24694257&uid=5438189677066584064&trk=NUS_UNIU_SHARE-title

How to Avoid "Killing" Yourself During the Process of Change

Changes can change the status for the better or worse. How do we make sure we drive change that delivers our progress?

The other day I was running a workshop with a team of people who were going through a tough time, while their company was taken over by a new owner and their personal future was unknown.  People were asking themselves “Why does it happen to me? ” Some of them were not happy, blaming everybody for the outcome, tired of not having what they thought they deserve, being frozen to do anything and waiting for a miracle to happen. The consensus of this group was clear. They needed a new vision – not just for the new Company, but for themselves as well. They needed a reason to wake up in the morning to go to fight for their Company, for their brand, for their market share and for their own future. They wanted open communication, consistency and honesty from the management team. The “do-ers” wanted to hear from somebody concrete steps to move forward, the “visionaries” were hungry for official go ahead for freedom to define the new rules of the game themselves.  They all wanted to be included, listened and managed with respect regardless of the fact if they were on the list to be fired.

People naturally reject changes that are forced on them. As the takeover situations become more and more frequent , the need to adopt to new conditions instantly arises. The key is to know that there is always a new opportunity awaiting us, regardless if we know about it or not. It may be in the acquiring company or outside. We have to believe in it first. We have to realize, that we will be rewarded with this new job only at a time when we overcome our fear, when we take the whole situation as a new exiting adventure – when we finally start to do something about it.  The sooner we will mentally give up the old circumstances, the sooner we will find the new opportunity. The visualized happiness from the new opportunity will bring us even faster towards fulfilling it.

The question, if we will be in the end personally successful or not, depends who we are as a person and how much desire we have to succeed despite tough times. We have to realize, that the success comes from us, from within. We have to stop relying on others to lead us throughout uncertainty, as well as to stop being dependent on the luck maybe coming to us. We have to take charge of ourselves, of our destiny.

Everybody had at least once woke up and realized the world around him has - without recognizing it - slowly but surely changed. The old opportunities no longer existed.

Changes are natural regardless if we expect them or not.  The way we drive change shows our maturity and readiness to accept even bigger challenges in future. We cannot wait until the effects of change reach us. We have to be in the driver seat ourselves. Finding new ways is not always risky.  Be creative!

ü  “Going into the dark of unknown is better than waiting where nothing is left.”                           Spencer Johnson, M.D.

ü  “The gate to change is unlocked from the inside.”  Dr. Morris Massey

CEOs Need Inspiring Vision in Company's Turnaround

Big or small companies regardless need clear inspiring vision when finding themselves in performance trouble. Each economy and each enterprise has its periods of ups and downs. Only those survive long-term, which master the art of learning from mistakes.

Companies can never think they can stand still at one place, even though it feels very comfortable at the beginning. The down times provide Companies opportunities for studying what worked in the past and what could work better. The closer companies are to the reality, the faster the growth path can be found. Mistakes Companies have made during good times come back to them during bad times: Living large and consuming reserves, being overly focused on internal processes, on approvals, personal interests and on mistakes covering, being obsessed with own successes and thus loosing the track of consumer, not enough benchmarking with competition and with ever changing environment or simply just responding to coming ad-hoc demands vs. creating the opportunities upfront themselves by constant innovation.

The better the leaders master the downtimes, the longer companies can stay next time up. In times of performance trouble leaders have to visualize the success they want to achieve. First for themselves, then painting it to everybody. They have to think back at times when they have felt victorious, and remind themselves what principles they have used on their way up and then put exactly the same passion to their new goals. They have to be inspirational and motivational in their new mission to restart the Company for growth.

If the leaders have clear meaningful vision, if they are able to listen to external hints and to involve the team into the process of defining how to fulfill their new vision by concrete steps and actions and if they stimulate the excellence of execution, the path to follow this vision will appear itself. It will appear exactly at a time when they decide to see things differently. It will appear exactly at a time when they will be able to color the vision persuasively for self and others. It will appear exactly when they will help everybody to overcome their fear of change.

Only those thrive who value the good times as well as the bad times. Only those thrive who see the down times as opportunities for restarting the growth. Only those thrive who are not scared to act and to manage the change. They fulfill their vision. They attract new opportunities. They win better quality people. And last but not least they obtain a gift of personal satisfaction of doing the right things right.

P.S. I am happy to help your company to manage the turnaround, as well as to advise on painting the new isnpirational vision and on change management (More at: http://www.janabudikova.com/)

How to Inspire to GIVE MORE in Retail

Someone once said: „Retail is detail.“ But what detail should we have in mind when we talk Retail? Retail experts have clear answers: You can only be successful, if you manage several factors in the same time, if you multi-task, if you pay attention to smallest practical solutions. You have to be operational as well as strategic. You have to balance external and internal priorities. You have to create new opportunities and wisely manage risks…. I have one decisive addition to all of that:  You have to engage the whole team to tackle the priorities together with you.

Successful retail companies understand that they need to put service mindset as the top priority. They unite their employees around their Company’s distinctive vision, mission, strategy and plan. They understand that employees’ engagement brings rewarding way forward. Personal leadership with passion and its ability to be contagious to people motivation drives their success. It can never be just the leading role of the CEO. It is about his/her ability to create an atmosphere of sharing and learning environment. It’s about believing that employees are able to enrich the Company’s purpose in this world.

Easily written, difficult to implement especially in bigger corporations. Few years ago I have thought about how to pass to the whole organization our new consumer oriented mission, we have created with my management team to restart the growth: “At Tchibo We Give You the Best, Because We Give YOU More“. Having in mind the audience (180 shop assistants out of 340 total employees), with desire that this should be lived by everybody without me daily supervising it, I have painted a picture everybody could understand. I have summarized the desired behavioral result in a detailed mission statement that was empowering each department, each employee or each shop assistant, encouraging them to bring new ideas, motivating them to take responsibility for their (shop) operations as well as for the impact they make on consumers. Everything was supported by a visual - internally used symbol  – kind of stamp of smiling coffee, symbolizing we are not just about coffee, we thrive to provide our consumers more than anybody else. Not just coffee and consumer goods. Smile and greetings, consumer first mindset were to become the corporate standard in our shops. This idea itself would not be enough.

I have asked the department heads to summarize with their teams how they want to contribute in concrete steps to the new mission statement, how they want to GIVE MORE to the consumers, to the customers externally as well as to the other departments internally. Then department leaders presented how their teams want to support the shop assistants in their task to DELIVER MORE quality experiences to consumers.

The critical factor was the way I have chosen for spreading this new mission statement out among shop assistants. I have taken the knowledge of the Chinese Philosopher Confucius (551BC – 479 BC, China): “What will you tell me, I forget. What will you show me, this is what I will remember. What you will let me do, this is what I will understand.”

I have asked the shop assistants themselves to define and document on film, how they want to change themselves to start to GIVE MORE to consumers, based on everything they have heard. They felt enlightened by the fact that somebody was treating them with respect and trust. They started to “play” with us and presented back advertising films demonstrating top class consumer experiences they want to start to provide, with concrete examples.

I was astonished twice. First, I have seen everybody got the message and we all are united and want to go for it, secondly I have realized even big groups of people with different educational backgrounds can start to breathe for the same purpose, if they strongly believe in it themselves.

The financial results were visible shortly after we have launched this internal program. We have over-delivered our KPIs, while especially the shop performance improved significantly, despite starting economical crisis.

If YOU put all your belief in your people and in the success you want to create together, if you visualize together with them the desired outcome and “what is in it for me” i.e.for them, your employees will start to DELIVER MORE not just because they are asked to do it, but because they will have a passion to GIVE MORE. This passion will stimulate uniqueness. This uniqueness will differentiate your company from your competition.


P.S. I am happy to run workshops with your teams to stimulate the passion to GIVE MORE, so that you can DELIVER MORE ! (more at: http://www.janabudikova.com/)