Online & Offline profiles

When creating or working with an online profile its best that its rooted and reflective of the person or brand's offline profile. Authenticity generates trust which is a key component of sustainable conversation ultimately driving positive engagements and interactions.

Over time out of sync online & offline profiles will converge either smoothly or catastrophically.

marlin.africa-sylvester: Keep it Simple, Stupid!

marlin.africa-sylvester: Keep it Simple, Stupid!: When stripping all the BS that has been built into the numerous management and strategy models that are taught the key success factors can...

Keep it Simple, Stupid!

When stripping all the BS that has been built into the numerous management and strategy models that are taught the key success factors can be distilled into the following 4 components.

Planning:

What are your objectives as these must be become the criteria for measuring success? It’s also not the time to solve all of humanities problems. Focus on 2 or 3 non-negotiables and source the right resources for the right reasons.

Organising:

Capacity, resources and budget constraints are a given when working in a knowledge driven company, use this as a lever to focus only on the key path of success.

Leading:

Co-creation has been a focus area for many management sages and does deliver meaningful results.  Co-leadership is an extension of the underlying principles of co-creation but needs well defined parameters to be really successful. Do remember that sometimes being a dictator is what is required.

Control:

Realising control has a finite limit is the first step to being successful and being honest about those limits does not make you a failure. Embrace them. They do however provide opportunities of growth if not neglected. Too much control is also a huge stumbling block for knowledge companies who thrive on innovation and streamlining as mundane micro-managing managers (M⁴) are innovation inhibitors. Bright ideas and process efficiencies never see the light of day when a M⁴ is involved in a decision or project so continue to try and mitigate the negative impact M⁴s have. 

Emotionally Intelligent Leaders

After reading the article 9 Attitudes of Emotionally Intelligent Leaders & Managers (http://goo.gl/jBRsm). I could not help but think about how many of the 9 attitudes I live everyday. It takes a special person to be fully immersed in it and live that way. I’ve been fortunate enough to have worked with a few people like that and it is an amazing experience. Also within my family my granddad has those traits which he has nurtured over many years and engaged people from all walks of life with.

It takes time and practice to be operating at a sustained level of excellence but the key is to nurture it over time and have the willingness to want to be an Emotionally Intelligent Leader.

The 9 attitudes are:

•  Accepting people completely for who they are
•  Always looking for the good in people, there is always some
• Dealing with negatives in an impersonal but practical way and getting over it!
• Not judging – we all make mistakes.
• Giving people the benefit of the doubt
• Listening to what people need and wherever possible – obliging
• Responding neutrally to anger or other attacking behaviour and helping the person to reframe it in a positive way.
• Pivoting negative situations to achieve a positive outcome.
• Caring about people, even when they were difficult.

These attitudes are essentially a way of living not just a suit worn at work.

Brands and Twitter accounts

Recently I had the unfortunate experience of using Twitter to complain to two well-known South African brands. It was an unfortunate experience as neither brands Woolworths (@WOOLWORTHS_SA) and Canal Walk Mall (@canal_walk) responded to my complaints. Given the public viewership of the Twitter timeline it is incredible that large brands that have an online and public presence choose not to respond.

FNB via @Rbjacobs has created an online powerhouse not only through clever marketing but by being authentic and responding to complaints and compliments. In our increasingly connected world it has become imperative for brands to remain cognisant of authenticity and engagement at any time of the day as this drives relevance and loyalty.

Brands should never forget the following: Brand = ∑(of all experiences)

Springboks

SA rugby fans are deeply divided by provincial lines and will at every opportunity promote their team as the best in SA. Provincialism runs deep in SA rugby and even Jake White admitted that non-Bulls Bokke disliked playing at Loftus after being repeatedly hammered by rampant Bulls teams. It is however concerning that Coach Heyneke loaded his first Springbok team with 13 Bulls players. By their own admission the Bulls have had a mediocre Super Rugby season. They have been inconsistent and rarely set the field on fire. They trail the SA conference leaders and are fighting to get into the playoffs.

Given all of this the Boks will win; they will bash the opposition into submission predominately playing 8 man rugby and occasionally pass the ball to the flyhalf to release the potent wings. It’s not going to pretty but it will restore consistent winning ways to the Boks. 

The Coach has a preference for a particular type of player for each position and due to the success achieved at the Bulls franchise winning 3 Super Rugby titles who can really argue. It is a pity that some of the most talented backs the Boks have access too probably will only receive game time if injuries to first choice players persist. 

Being a Bok supporter isn’t easy but it does provide endless debate and conversation. Boks4Life

Blackberry vs Nokia

Time will tell if the latest attempts by Nokia & Windows to resurrect their failed mobile businesses will pass the volume test. Nokia’s latest internet inclusive data bundle package of R59.99 is 1c lower than the BlackBerry (BB) data bundle cost. Both packages exclude large data file downloads and are essentially perfect for live streaming or browsing if the 3G network connection is working optimally. Thus the decision if excluding the sublime iPhone or multitude of Android offerings is a combination of hardware, software and apps. Nokia & Windows have done everything to become relevant again while it appears RIM has done everything to become irrelevant!

Both OSs are propriety with Windows 8 (W8) rolling out exclusively on touch devices already while RIM recently announced OS 10 will be touch screen only. W8 has progressed leaps & bounds in the right direction from a user ability perspective and should give the established players a hard time. The jury is still undecided if OS 10 will be RIM’s knight in shining armour but “leaked” news reports and dev reports point to an OS with enough tricks to keep RIM in the game. 

On the hardware front Nokia has essentially redesigned its complete offering after the disastrous partnership with Symbian. The new devices are sleek as expected but remain a step behind the leading touchscreen devices. The BB 10 devices if common sense prevails should resemble the Samsung Galaxy devices. But we’ll have to wait and see.

On the app front both Nokia & BB are lagging the competition by a long stretch. Some commentators are suggesting BB OS 10 appears to be better than W8 for Apps but again proof will be in the pudding when OS 10 hits the streets.

With competition heating up, consumers will bet with their wallets and given SA’s relatively high broadband costs Nokia & BB could still be the primary consideration set for upgrades or new mobile device purchases.