I was very fortunate to spend five days in this wonderful resort last week. Nestled in between an Omani mountain peninsular, it’s a beautiful hotel retreat (well worth a visit if you are able to). Whilst staying in the resort, I e-mailed their CEO – Sonu Shivdasani – (that’s what you get if you put your e-mail address in your hotel information) asI had observed a near perfect alignment of his companies vision, purpose and values, relative to the service experience I had received. If there’s one thing, many founders are passionate about it’s alignment!
It’s also one of the hardest things to get right. Leaders devote bucketloads of time within their businesses, explaining the vision, living the values and encouraging others to live them too. It’s a difficult thing to get right. Managing people can be as complicated as rocket science at times, a customer experience can go wrong so quickly, it only takes a moments lapse. Asking further questions of some of the staff within the resort, it became clear to me that the reason that felt passionate about the business, is that they were being treated very fairly and honestly by the business and the local leadership team. “Open door” policy was mentioned more than once and the overall living conditions were of a high level compared to many hotels, quite the opposite of many a hotel chains business model!
There is a lesson to be learned here. In this business, the guest experience is everything. If it’s not, they don’t come back. By ensuring that the staff within the resort felt valued by providing them with a high quality working and living environment, the overall company values were aligned, there is no inconsistency. As a result, the staff working there felt motivated to go that extra mile and the guest experience is delivered.
As a business highly focussed on sustainabilty too, it is attracting lot’s of “eco-tourists” aswell as international staff who want to work for a chain with a shared vision to their personal values, a clear and defined business model. You can find out more about Six Senses here, I for one, was not only impressed by the place (you’d be hard not too) but also by the alignment of the vision, purpose and values by the local leadership, it was great to see and experience.
I guess it was just a matter of time before someone at Microsoft had the brilliant idea, that to catch up with Google, they need to be offering more cloud based applications. With 500 million global users, the licensing business is a big business, however you can’t fight big trends and the business model is coming under pressure, particularly in the home and small business environment with free products from Google apps and the world seemingly being a mobile office nowadays.
This month sees the launch of their business based MS Office cloud application and next month it rolls out to consumers. Not before time I hasten to add. We can’t ignore the role that Microsoft still plays in our lives, they still dominate the spreadsheeting and presenting spaces with MS Excel and MS Powerpoint, less so, the document side. Big enterprise relies on Microsoft for its integration with e-mail servers, connecting businesses globally in multiple languages using the same protocols. You have to admire what they ‘ve achieved in their product development, however they are still way behind the eight ball with their social media integration. Google is still an irritant, grabbing the headlines, making new innovation, stealing a march, launching cool stuff that everyone wants to talk about. You can’t ignore some of the recent Microsoft security hacks and patches either, things haven’t been too great of late.
It’s turning into a “David vs. Googleiath” battle of epic proportions. This latest launch is designed to try and catch up, Google dominate the cloud at the moment, their timing is/and was impeccable. With $58bn a year of revenue at stake, Microsoft need to find an answer to them. Let’s see if this latest step, will be welcomed by users and give Google a run for their money.
Here’s a dilemma for you. Imagine you are the Corporate relations manager for a major airline. You have hundreds of delayed passengers, you’ve found a seat back to the UK on a full flight. Two people are at your check-in desk causing a rumpus. One is at the highest level of your loyalty programme, a platinum member, been flying with you for years, desperate to get home. The other, a surgeon, needing to get home to perform surgery. Who do you give the seat to? The inevitable “meat in the sandwich” moment for somone, I know what I’d do.
There was a really interesting item on Radio 4 earlier today, a psychologist was explaining why some people just stay put and wait for things to get better, others take up arms and put their situation back in their own hands. Some do it for the adventure others because their impulse to get home is so strong. Whatever your circumstances, the volcano has created individual stories of adversity.
If you are one of those people affected, would you take a moment to share your story with everyone? Did you set off under your own steam and get back? Were you let down by an airline? Did you go on one of the warships? What do you think about Ryanair’s declaration that they didn’t want to refund passeners their incidental expenses? It would be great if you could leave your story in the comment box for others to read and share.
It’s funny how a cloud of volcanic ash is bringing the world to a stop of a sudden. Here in Europe, we don’t even give Volcano’s a second thought, so when news initially broke about the Icelandic volcano Eyjafjallajökull erupting, I’m sure you turned to the next page of the newspaper or listened for the next news story on the radio. However, just a few days later and here we are into a full scale global crisis. Planes can’t fly, 150,000 UK folk are stranded abroad, goods aren’t moving, supply chains are stretched, plan B’s are being tested.
It’s funny how quickly the world comes to an abrupt halt isn’t it. The world runs on a tight timescale. Supply chains are everything. An event such as this is a great reminder about the need for Plan B’s and contingency measures, just as with any business. For the people stranded on business, work carries on. Access to wireless networks now is widespread, latest news can be updated via the web, the office is only a mouse-click away. Distance becomes irrelevant at times like this. With so much being available in the cloud (data that is), life can just carry on (providing you’re not overseas). You can still buy from e-Bay, download music from i-Tunes, watch videos on YouTube or BBC i-player. If you are overseas and being faced with a delayed trip home, having to buy new clothes, find new accomodation and deal with the hassle of trying to get back, I’m sure that now will be a time when demand for video-conferencing will increase. Sometimes it takes a major event to trigger a change in behaviour, we’ll be examining this further in the upcoming Death of Distance discussion, why not participate and let us know your views?
Had a really interesting day yesterday. Went down to the historic battlefield site of Naseby with this company to learn about the English Civil War and lessons that can be applied to modern day business. It really was fascinating to be actually stood in the fields where pitched battles raged, re-counting the military strategies, the big mistakes, and how the battle was eventually won by the Parliamentarians.
What strikes you is that essentially, nothing has changed in 350 years. Business battles rely on effective communication, having a clear strategy, delegating decision making and getting the tactics right. Experential learning events embed themselves deeply with people and have a long lasting impact on behaviour. At one point, we made a battle formation with those really long pikes that they used to use to kill incoming cavalry horses. The point of the formation was all about trusting the captain and the formation implicitly. The formation would have to bunch tightly, look at the floor and then move forward only on the direction of the captain who would have his back to the enemy. Any breach in the formation weakened it, anyone who looked up, could be stabbed in the eyes. It was a powerful way of demonstrating to the team about trust and the power of a unit when it works together.
Another highlight of our time were the talks and speech from Lt. Gen Sir Philip Trousdsell KBE CBE. A long serving Army officer who has commanded the multi-national NATO force in Bosnia, the Army’s officer leadership training academy at Sandhurst and the Army in Northern Ireland. Authoritative and knowledgable, he had our sales teams hanging off of his every word whilst telling stories of some of the challenges he faced in operational theatre and his leadership lessons from Sandhurst. A really inspiring character, with bags of humility, he was a big hit and an inspiring guy to listen to.
Taking people out of their normal places of work is an excellent way to encourage new thinking. Looking at problems not directly related to your business or industry, but with wider lessons to be learned is an excellent way of motivating your troops (workforce). We all came away knowing more about the English Civil War, how the Army uses communication to deliver objectives and how we as a team can deliver knockout blows to our competition. Time well invested.
Does your briefcase resemble this nowadays? Let’s face it, if you’re in any middle or senior management post nowadays, you’re expected to be mobile. I call it “roam working.” That is, you can work practically anywhere nowadays.
It does have it’s disadvantages. Is your case getting heavier? Are you carrying more chargers than ever? Is your case bulging at the seams? Have you had to check your case into the hold rather be allowed to carry it on the plane in the cabin? If the answer is “yes” to all of the above, you qualify for our new “elite roam worker” status.
Benefits of this new club? Back strains, neck strains, bulging arm muscles and always being shaken down at airport security! Only joking of course. I have to say, my case nowadays is one of those with wheels on. When you do miles in airport terminals, you have to give in to the machismo and just be a trolley dolly. Inside it, I have another micro-case which comes out when I have to check the main case into the hold, or just need to dash to a meet, without all the clutter.
One things for sure. It’s all about fitting more in nowadays. I’ve purchased a smaller laptop. I try and buy things that are light and easy to haul and carry all my papers and reading in A5 booklet format (a rather nifty feature of the printers we use in the office). I’ll happily pay a premium for products which fit this bill because I don’t want to be hauling a suitcase around with me, however, when I’m on the move, I need a lot of things at hand to run my mobile office.
More and more people will work remotely from their office in the future. To save carbon, to save costs and manage their work/life blend more effectively, watch for the wheels!
Another one bites the dust. $850M later, AOL are preparing to either offload or close the social networking site Bebo. Another casualty of the Facebook domination of social media, less than two years ago, Bebo boasted around 5.8m users in the UK and Ireland. However, it failed to keep up with the latest features, stay relevant, monetise its offering and differentiate itself from Facebook. Around four million users deserted Bebo subsequently, Facebook, by contrast grew its UK user base from 15M to 23M in the same period.
There’s a limit to how many social media sites you can maintain. Thinking of my own life, I use Twitter, Flickr, Linkedin and Blogs. They keep me busy. What’s notable however, is how much integration is going on between social media networks, perhaps that’s where Bebo started to struggle. For example, Twitter can interface with Facebook, Blogs and Linkedin if you use the right interface, like Tweetdeck.
Social media platforms that fail to do this, in time, will fail. The growing dominance of Facebook, which now has over 50M users worldwide is there to be seen, YouTube is still uploading terabytes of video every day, Linkedin supports millions of connections every day. Launching a new social media networking site is going to be pretty tough for a new market entrant and survival becomes the key word for everyone else.
So, it’s bye bye to Bebo. An expensive lesson for AOL but an important lesson for anyone else thinking about a social media platform. Users are fickle. They will desert you as soon as join you. You have to stay relevant, do something really new and make sure you integrate!
Today, the biggest non-secret became official. The General Election has been called for May 6th and the politicians are all in a high state of battle readiness as the party lines get drawn in the forthcoming build up.
There have been so many appearances of late by politicians at business events, only a fool wouldn’t have recognised that the run in had already began. I’ve seen three Mandelson vs. Ken Clarke debates already, same old stuff, different venues.
What interests me most will be the electoral turnout. Are the economic problems now so large, so insurmountable, that people may feel apathetic to the future government? That is, regardless of who get’s in, it’s going to be tough. Will the public sector employees get behind labour to protect their pensions and their jobs? Will the electorate want change, a fresh approach, a new set of eyes on the problem? Who will business back?
One thing’s for sure. A general election is mostly bad for business. Uncertainty means people delay decisions, put things off. With a fragile economic recovery underway, it’s the last thing business really needs. No one knows who will gain power and therefore what the economic policies are going to be post-May. So, button down the hatches for the next month or so, picture lot’s of politicians kissing babies and turning up for events, that they previously always pulled out of at the last minute.
Personally, I’ll look forward to the tussles on Newsnight. The trip to work will be full of debates on Radio 4. The papers full of leader exclusives. At least we’ll start to get some transparency on what the policies of all the parties actually are, although that means little in the world of “pledges”. So, let’s get it over with as soon as possible so we can start comparing/revising/re-writing our Corporate business plans for the coming years.
Shadow Secretary of State for Transport- Theresa Villiers MP – visited Manchester today to talk about Convservative plans for the High Speed rain link from London (called HS2). I chaired the discussion between her and about twenty other representatives from various businesses and sectors with a vested interest in understanding what the Conservative party are prepared to commit to, relative to this important project. She confirmed that The Conservatives would build the link via Manchester.
Opening the debate, there were three central points I made: -
- That the Northern Hub investment be linked to the HS2 project. This will basically link Victoria and Piccadily stations, meaning trains can travel from Liverpool from Manchester to Leeds. Without it, all the benefits of a 1hr 25min journey could be lost. Local connectedness is as important as national.
- That the entire economy needs to grow, not just the South. Regional GVA is one of the key economic drivers for UK growth, Manchester is one of the regions driving the numbers.
- That a link such as this has Social, Economic and Environmental benefits.
The point of the HS2 – P1 – is to connect the key regional centres of London, Manchester, Leeds and Liverpool. P2 will mean connections up to Scotland. Journey times have been improved significantly from Manchester to London, with the overall travel time now taking just over 2hrs. So what difference will the extra 40 or so minutes saved travelling between Manchester and London make? In a world which is speeding up so dramatically, every second counts. If you talk to the BBC, who are re-locating to Manchester, a commute time of an hour and a bit makes a big difference to employees who are re-locating but still need to bounce up and down to London. If you are using Manchester as a hub to travel to other places, it will compound to reduce overall travelling time to other destinations. People see time as precious.
The West Coast line, despite £8bn of investment, is expected to be at capacity by 2015. The HS2 is expected to be around 4-5 years in planning and up to 12 years in construction, so it’s a 20 year project (which means that we are in for a pretty miserable time between 2015 and 2027). This isn’t good for business who rely on this route for business in London. It’s going to take some serious investment, this has to come from somewhere, so brace yourselves. When you look at public sector spending as a percentage of regional GVA, it’s about 50%, this has to change, particularly when Government want more work, for less money, to re-pay the economic debt. Private sector businesses need to contribute more to the regional economies. They can only do that by having sound transport infrastructure as one of the hygiene factors.
If you’ve ever travelled to Japan, you’ll understand what the future could look like for the UK if this project gets the full go ahead. Lord Adonis, Secretary of State for Transport, is making an announcement tomorrow, let’s hope there’s good news for Manchester within it. Hat’s off to The Conservatives who called this briefing at the last minute, clearly to grab some headlines before tomorrow’s announcement, that’s politics for you!
On balance, Theresa Villiers was impressive. A former barrister, lecturer in law, Euro-MP and now Shadow Cabinet member, she’s clearly been round the political block. Whether she remains Transport Secretary if The Conservatives win the election, jurys out.
Not satisfied with giving Microsoft a good hose down, those folks at the EU are now turning their spotlight to Google. Seems that their total dominance of search is making life difficult for others who’ve decided that the EU needs to step in and sort it out. Microsoft had to pay £1.5bn in fines after their investigation, when you consider the legal expenses and executive time involved in fighting such a case, it’s a distracting intervention, innocent or not.
However this case feels slightly different to me. Microsoft were under the cosh as they dominated the operating system marketplace with Windows when there really wasn’t much else to choose from in operating systems. Internet Explorer was almost the de-facto web browser, they used their dominance at a time, when choice was at a minimum, Linux wasn’t really as commonplace as it is now.
Google however have a different proposition. They have an “open source” model in the software they generate, they want developers to further extend their products, make them better. Search is still a dark art, granted. Keeping up with the algorithm is the job of the techies who live and breathe it. But stop for a minute and think about all the other things that Google have done for free, cross-funded by their search income. Gmail, Google Earth, Goole Wave, Google Analytics Google Buzz. All these items have been launched in the market for free and arguably had a big impact on tens of millions of people, that will make for a much more interesting debate in the EU chambers.
They have dominated search because they made a simple interface. It works really well, gives you the results you want, when you want it, and quickly. They’ve grown massively because the product has always retained its simplicity, yet continued to develop and evolve. They haven’t given users much excuse to move away from them. It’s an open market place, we can use a host of other search engines available to us, however many folk just stick with it Google as it does what it says on the tin. The other engines haven’t given us reason to switch, I’m sure we would if they did, in the same way that Firefox challenged the Internet Explorer browser marketplace.
Of course, when any business scales and starts to call the shots it makes life uncomfortable for us as consumers/users of products/services. We don’t want to be spoon fed, we want to retain choice. Quite how much of the search results are under manipulation, I can’t answer. However, if I was failing to get the results I needed, I wouldn’t use Google, simple as that. Relevancy counts.
The innovation train will continue at Google, of that I’m sure. Investigations won’t be a distraction for them. They have the money and they certainly won’t let it impact on their creatives. Will be a fascinating story to track and follow in the weeks, months and years (remember it’s an EU investigation) ahead.
