Bill Hogg

Without trust in your organization, what do you have?

Trust is perhaps the most important element that needs to be present within the culture of your organization. Knowing that you can trust and rely on others on your team significantly changes how a person operates either as the leader of the team or as a team member.

Knowing that you can trust your team to get the job done, and on the other side of the coin, knowing that the leaders in your organization will go to bat for you and follow through on what they promise plays a large role in shaping an organizational culture that will thrive.

Organizational trust starts with leadership and cascades down

Trust starts with the leadership in your organization. This is why it is so important for leaders to establish an organization culture that is based on trust and collaboration both on paper — and in practice.

Real trust exists when your team believes you are going to do what you say...

A critical element of initiating a successful change initiative is communicating that change is a normal and positive function of doing business — it is a key factor in a company’s ability to remain relevant and differentiate from competitors and grow year over year.

People are intuitively resistant to change — even helpful change — so it is a leader’s ability to frame organizational change in a positive way that will lead to its successful adaption internally. Yet, one of the major issues that organizations face regularly is how they approach implementing new processes and managing change — and not communicating consistently and effectively.

Change is a Process

Change is a process — and a leader’s ability to manage this process effectively makes change possible.

There are three main phases when implementing change in an organization:

Leaders create the vision, set company goals, and develop strategies — but it is front line employees that execute the plan. They are the ones that carry out the daily tasks and initiatives that help make a leaders vision become a reality. They are the ones that interact daily with the customers who are the life blood of any successful organization.

Poor employee behaviour and performance will severely limit an organizations ability to grow and will have a negative impact on your organizational culture. One rotten employee can spoil a whole team or department. This is why incentive programs have become a popular tool. They provide a set of goals and performance standards for employees to strive for, and reward them accordingly.

Reward Based Incentives

One of the most popular and widely used ways to encourage desirable employee behaviour and get results is by offering some form of monetary or financial reward. Some of the most common types of...

Most of us already know that customer service is not good enough — it is no longer a differentiating factor. The brutal business reality is that three quarters of your customers would gladly do business with your competition — even if they were satisfied with the service experience.

We all know the difference between good and bad service, but in order to compete, you have to move beyond this and focus on the overall experience you create for your customers. Successful companies must shift their focus from providing satisfactory customer service to creating a memorable customer experience that builds loyalty.

Your customer relationships are your only sustainable competitive advantage for growth and profitability. So rather than focusing on a specific customer interaction, a true customer experience is focused on your relationship with a customer from the moment you engage them and over the duration of your relationship with that customer.

Build...