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Put People Before Profits and make more money!

Guest post by: Ian Berry

Article Overview: My solid conclusion after thirty five years in business, twenty of which have been as a advisor, educator, mentor and speaker, is that leader/managers and business owners who genuinely put their people before profits make more money and are therefore able to make a greater contribution to the world, locally, nationally and internationally, in a myriad of ways. Putting people first is a key strategy and is one of nine essential ingredients in my view for success in business in the modern world.

Put People Before Profits and make more money!

© Ian Berry. All rights reserved. My solid conclusion after thirty five years in business, twenty of which have been as a advisor, educator, mentor and speaker, is that leader/managers and business owners who genuinely put their people before profits make more money and are therefore able to make a greater contribution to the world, locally, nationally and internationally, in a myriad of ways.

Putting people first is a key strategy and is one of nine essential ingredients in my view for success in business in the modern world. The others are

• Having a cause greater than simply providing a product/service in order to fund a lifestyle
• Having a product / service consumers perceive is of high value to them
• Having a product / service consumers will buy more than once
• Hiring and retaining people who believe in your cause and live your values
• Continually improving systems that make it easy for people to deliver your product/service effectively and efficiently while still providing a wow experience for consumers
• A structure based on service lines rather than the traditional hierarchy
• A pursuit of a five-fold bottom line: Economic Prosperity, Social Responsibility, Environmental Sustainability, Universal Harmony and Spiritual Validity
• A focus on benefiting all stakeholders not just shareholders

Training, or as I prefer to call it, learning and development, is an integral part of putting people first. Many people have an attitude to training that is not positive. While I believe the statement ‘people are an organizations greatest asset’ is true, most people see it today as demeaning. Most people also have a dim and cynical view of the words ‘human capital’ and reference to them as ‘human resources’. Training has sadly also become a dirty word in the minds of many.

There are numerous ways to provide your people with inspiring learning and development, in person, on line, in print, over the telephone. For the purposes of this article I am referring to learning and development in person particularly via seminars and workshops.

Before I begin assignments with clients one of the questions I ask employees is about their views of previous training programs. Here are the typical responses

“We’re just herded into a room and force fed the same thing.” “Nothing ever changes after training courses. So it is a waste of time having them!” “Presenters are usually boring so I find training hard work.” “We have been involved in some great training courses here but management never let us implement any of the ideas.” “We are forever doing courses but management never does the same ones so it’s a waste of time really.” “I am all for doing my job better but I have never been able to see the relevance of most of the training we have done.” “I have been able to apply a lot of what I have learned from training courses in my life but not at work. The culture here means we never adopt anything.”

There are a number of initiatives we can take that over time replace perceptions such as those above with positive ones.

Putting people first involves:

1. Forever reminding ourselves that all people are unique, special beings and need to be treated accordingly
2. Continually clarifying people’s roles and how their performance contributes to overall results
3. Forever recognizing and celebrating people’s contribution
4. Creating and building a culture of continuous learning and improvement
5. Exchanging feedback informally and formally about performance in ways that are uplifting for the human spirit
6. Having systems and processes in place that are forever discovering the gap between current performance and possible performance
7. Providing meaningful learning and development opportunities that inspire, provide insight, and help people remain positive, passionate, productive, innovative and creative

Here are some ways to ensure success with Number 7

1. Hire Presenters (consultants, trainers, advisors, coaches, mentors, and speakers etc.) capable of discovering the real learning and development expectations, needs and desires of your people
2. When hiring presenters pay for value and outcomes not time and processes
3. Get a guarantee in writing from presenters regarding return on investment
4. Hire only those presenters who have genuine expertise and can present in eloquent ways? (Their professional membership of National Speakers Association of Australia Ltd (NSAA) or The Australian Institute of Training and Development (AITD) is a good guide to this)
5. Ensure there will be strategies in place following all learning and development that means application of learning at the workplace
6. If your people do participate in courses of a generic nature ensure content and the presenter / s have been well researched resulting in confidence that all will be of genuine value
7. Pay particular attention to the interconnectedness between learning and development and all other strategies for personal and business growth
8. The Fun Factor: it is a proven fact that people learn when they laugh. All learning and development therefore must contain humour and opportunity for people to have fun
9. Ensure there is a fit between the likely positive and productive outcomes of participating in the seminar or workshop and your overall learning and development programs for your people

This last point is critical. Do all of your people have a learning and development program specific to individual needs, expectations and desires? Is their program relevant to individual and team goal achievement and the fulfillment of your business cause and goals? Do all learning and development programs play a pivotal role in ensuring the creation of value for customers and clients?

A simple way to answer yes to these questions is to have all your employees write down their goals and their strategies (including learning and development programs and process) to achieve them. This can be done on one sheet of paper. I call this performance possibility plans. If you would like a template for one please give me a call.

Be the difference you want to see in the world

Ian

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Article Tags: change, educator, essential ingredients, money, profits



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