Twice a year we invite our clients to share their thoughts on how we’re doing and where we can improve as a company via a Net Promoter Score Survey. In our most recent survey, clients rated us 186% (or 41 points) higher than industry average. There’s no better feeling than seeing feedback like this: As consultants, trust is […]
Trust
Theo Epstein and the Trust Factor in Leadership
Does trust really matter when it comes to leadership? After all, leaders pay people to do their jobs. Trust is somewhat beside the point, right? Actually, not by a long shot. Research both formal and anecdotal proves that organizations run as such suffer in big ways, including the bottom line. On the other hand, leaders who treat […]
Are You Building High-Level Business Relationships?
In the world of entrepreneurs and startups, high level relationships are everything. You can’t start a business alone. You need partners, team members, investors, vendors, and customers. But people don’t realize that all relationships are not the same. There are people you only recognize on the street, business friends, and then close friends whom you […]
How to Create a Core Team You Can Trust
How many times have you heard this line in a movie: “I don’t know if I can trust you…”? The line always comes at a pivotal moment. If there isn’t any trust, then the love affair, caper, or escape won’t happen. It teaches a good lesson: For important plans to be successful, there must be […]
4 Ways to Build Trust with Customers That Can Transform Your Business
“Make hundreds of dollars a week just by stuffing envelopes.” Remember that tiny ad that used to run regularly in virtually every newspaper’s classified ad section? I suppose a fair number of people answered the ad, otherwise they would have gone extinct quite quickly. However, most of us didn’t take the bait. Why? Because we […]
Transparency: The More Things Change…or Do They?
“…{You} must recognize that we are living in a different generation than the one in which {your} father had lived, and that it was possible, in building up an industry such as {his}, to maintain a comparative secrecy as to methods of work, etc. and to keep business pretty much to those who were engaged in […]
5 Expectations Your Team Has for You as a Leader
Leaders help create powerful, cohesive teams that enable organizations to achieve their targets. Part of being a great leader is understanding what the members of your team expect from you. By understanding their expectations you become a better leader and help them become an even stronger team that can achieve anything. Here are 5 important expectations […]
Advice for Future Leaders
Recently, for a magazine article on leadership, I was asked for my top three pieces of advice to future leaders: The first was to understand that Dale Carnegie totally had it right 80 years ago when he wrote in his classic, How to Win Friends and Influence People, that, “Ultimately, people do things for their reasons, not our reasons.” […]
How Becoming an Influencer Helped My Company Succeed
My company, Focus Lab, has made $3,330,727.15 in revenue as a result of showing our work. How have CMSs, Dribbble and niche communities made this possible? Let me share my story. Becoming the “ExpressionEngine Guy” I was sitting in my cubicle reading a blog post about how to do something in ExpressionEngine (“EE”), a content […]
How is Your Corporate and Personal Credibility?
A friend of mine recently told me his story of how his very career rests on his credibility with his major supplier–partners. He stated that everything rides upon his credibility when he declares that he can produce a quality product on time, especially when his competition has faltered attempting to do so. There’s little news […]
