News and articles

Always delighted to hear news from career programme participants.

This person was recently made redundant and decided to go ‘free-lancing’:

“I just had to email you with my job news! As you know the plan was to start looking for a job at the end of the school holidays. But …

“Last week, I received an email from [my old organisation] asking me if I wanted some bank work on a temporary basis. Literally an hour later I received a call from an old colleague who now works for an interim recruitment agency.  She asked me if I would be interested in working on a short-term project at the local hospital three days a week for the next six months.

” You were right making and keeping contacts is a fantastic strategy! Amazing ‘head hunted’ twice in one day without leaving the comfort of my own home!  They liked my CV and I started the following week – I love it, just up my street and hassle free.

“Thanks Nicky for all of your support and help with my CV – it worked!”

(some detail changed to preserve anonymity)

Finding my way around tenancy legal and payments systems is one of the biggest challenges as a newcomer to the ‘Landlord-Agent role’ I took on.   Most of all where the tenants are in receipt of housing benefit, a third (public sector) party is also involved, potentially complicating the relationship and the maths.

Whilst the standard letters take a little while to fathom out, Gedling Borough Council’s  ’One Stop Team’ service get my customer service vote for their telephone support lines.  Every call I’ve made, I’ve found them efficient, informed, polite, respectful of confidentiality of all parties.  And, for the newcomer to DSS and the like, they go the extra mile initiating explanations about the next step you might take.

Well done to their manager, who I understand is a Mrs Storer, and Team for a great service.

At last – I have finished designing the programme and web page for the business start up!

Views – and improvement ideas – always welcome.

Inquiries about becoming an independent consultant have been coming in over the past few months – as people consider their options post-redundancy.

Worth a quick scan through the article on ‘Going Solo‘ – it may have been written in 2001 but much remains relevant.  The main change being the higher number of consultants out on the market, the current and forecast tougher economic and financial climate.

Should you be considering working with the NHS, best also factor in (at least in the short term) the pro’s and con’s of limited management cuts and high levels of organisational change.

Knowing and marketing the unique offering you bring to the market place will be a must.

Need support thinking through your options?  Book into either the Career or Marketing Advancement Programmes.

Lovely to get a commission that gives me something new to fathom out, mull on or crack.

Today, it’s designing a new process to enable me to facilitate effective conversations between managers and one or more members of their staff where working relationships are in danger of breaking down.

Early intervention and resolution allows each each to maintain their workshop relationship and reputation and, still more, become more productive.  It prevents the time/resource consuming and emotionally draining state in which differences remain unresolved or the more formal disciplinary processes have to be embarked upon.

Back from a London break and already distracted by this  question on a linked in group:  ”What techniques do you use to encourage strategic thinking in a group?”

My best tips included

1.  Recognise ‘strategic thinking’ can be learnt and improves over time, with knowledge and experience

2.  To accelerate the process,

• find what people already know and build from there
• avoiding jargon, develop or adapt existing tools and techniques (SWOT, PESTE & Co) into the appropriate language
• design checklists to illustrate areas the individual or group may not have thought to cover (labour market, green issues, lifestyle changes, pensions)
• use everything from art to flip chart to release and collect the group (or individual)’s visualisation of the world around them and how it has, is and will be developing: health visitors design the front cover of a local paper in 2020 to show what the service has accomplished, a team compare notes on the ‘ good, bad and what we can’t change’ about the world around them

3.  Be sure to summarise the emergent themes and trends – and, for example by conjuring up ‘what if … best and worst case’ scenarios;  show how these may impact upon their service, business or ambitions;  extract the key messages for things that may stay the same, need to be changed now or reviewed in a little while and, of course, test ideas, put them into practice, learn and review.

4.  If practical, move people into multifarious and challenging projects, environments, sectors or even countries – where value systems and tasks can be so very different. Seeing the different ways others function triggers curiosity and an appetite to explore things from every angle.

How would you would do it? Do let me know.

Arrived on Google Maps … well bar the photo which is of a local residents’ homes! Hope Google respond update the photo soon.

Being good (for today) doing my blog … easier now I have learnt and bookmarked the short cut to editing it on the website!

Completed the final draft of a marketing plan now that the Marketing Advancement Programme has concluded. Put the programme evaluation onto SNAP surveys to minimise energy and expense in collation and analysis.  Am even trying a maiden voyage with a ‘tweet’ button to see what happens  … software wizard, an’ all, me.

Favourite session to deliver in marketing? Definitely ask me about the ‘market positioning’ tools and I will go on and on forever.  They also make great discussion and debating tools if you allow time and invite your service people in on devising your plan.

Tweet

Mid Spring crept up on me unnoticed and I’m quickly putting together our quarterly ‘enews’ letter … and realising my blog has been neglected.

Announcing the Winners of the Coventry and Warwickshire Quality and Governance Awards.

• Best Chairperson – Representing Leadership:  Paul Nash,  Bulkington Village Centre
• Trustee Board Showing the Most Improvement: Warwick District Ryder-Cheshire Volunteers
• Best Presented Annual Report: Crossroads Coventry & Warwickshire
• Best Newcomer – Group: Art Alert

Further information on the awards and winners