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A Weekly Letter With Tips and Ideas to Improve How Your Life and Business Work - and Other Interesting Things that Catch my Eye!
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August 26, 2017 - Issue 17-35
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Good Afternoon.
As this letter goes out, it's the close of the first week of the AWAI program I've talked about recently. Phew! This is like a real job! 5-8 hours a day, six days a week, and lots of mental effort learning new and unfamiliar things - many concepts in marketing are new to me. My work throughout my career has been about doing things and helping people learn how to do those things more efficiently. Marketing and selling of those things has mostly been others' responsibility. Having worked with people in various leadership roles, I understand personality types from the point of view of how to interact with them, encourage them, help them work with others, etc. However, except for a few years in the real estate world, it's usually been someone else's job to take what they produce and get people to buy it. Learning about sophisticated marketing techniques is changing my whole perspective. It's going to be an interesting twelve weeks! I'm sure it will make me a better writer, and of course much more effective at marketing my improved services.
As a logical follow-on to last week's discussion of the value of civility where you work and the negative effects of disrespectful behavior, this week we'll hear from
Rohini Venkatraman about specifically
how to make the workplace friendlier. Rohini is a business designer at IDEO and writes a blog on the "psychology of the everyday".
It's fine to say we need a friendlier environment where we work - here we find some specific ways to accomplish that.
Rohini explores Tony Hsieh's obsession with building a friendly culture at Zappos, of which he is CEO.
Check out Rohini's article!
John Stevens at Unity Copywriting
Marketing Support for the Business Coaching Industry
Office and cell phone: 814-590-3854 or 603-835-3215
In Argentina: +54(country code) 9 3868 459586
Skype: johnbstevens1943
P. S. If you want to dig deeper into the subject of building cooperation where you work, I have a book recommendation. I'll discuss that further at the end of my comments below.
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Please Help me Spread my Message Where It's Welcome
Please remember to pass this letter along to anyone you think will enjoy and benefit from it, and/or might like to receive my messages every week - just click the "SHARE THIS EMAIL" button at the bottom of this one. If this message was forwarded to you, and you'd like to join us regularly, please click on the "SIGN UP FOR EMAILS" button below. You'll be automatically added to my mailing list, and I guarantee that will not generate other promotions. Your privacy is of the utmost importance to me. If you'd rather not receive these messages any more, you're welcome to click the "UNSUBSCRIBE" link at the foot of this message. I'll miss you, but I'd rather send these ideas to those who find benefit in them.
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How Could You Make Your Office, or Shop,
a
Friendlier Place?
While some business leaders might think workplace friendships distract people from performance of their duties, studies have shown that working in a friendlier environment actually contributes to productivity. Last week we discussed the negative effects of unpleasantness and disrespect among workers, and it would seem logical that no one would want that in their shop. Certainly some tasks require "head-down" concentration. Even that though need not be humorless, and a friendly surrounding can make even hard serious work more enjoyable, which virtually always equates to more productive. People simply do what they enjoy better than what they don't enjoy. Tony Hsieh, founder and CEO of Zappos, the online retailer of shoes and clothing, is determined that the Zappos workplaces have friendly cultures. Rohini Venkatraman writes here about some of the ways the Zappos people build friendliness into their daily, weekly and monthly routines.
Lots of what builds friendliness is doing things together outside of work, and in social activities during times set aside within work hours - an excellent investment. You may remember my mention of my daughter's experience with her workplace. We examined how effective her employer's efforts to make work enjoyable are in developing positive attitudes among the employees. If you want your employees to produce more, treat your customers better, and stick around your place of business - and who doesn't? - making their work lives more enjoyable is a very good thing to do. Promoting friendly relationships among them is a great way to help them enjoy their time at work.
Want More? Check out This Amazing Transformation!
The reading list for the AWAI program I mentioned in my opening comments includes a book published by the Arbinger Institute titled Leadership and Self-Deception, I found this to be a wonderful look at how we - yes, every one of us - often delude ourselves into the belief that our position in a conflict is totally justified and the other person is completely unjustified. Seldom is a situation that one-sided, and this book goes on to examine ways to change our attitude to where we see things from an unbiased perspective. The company described in this book had struggled for years under a heavy-handed autocratic leader. When the leader discovered this new approach (during a desperate attempt to "fix" his teenage son) and mended fences with the managers he'd been beating down, the company quickly rose to the pinnacle of its industry by teaching its people this new way of being. They became that much more efficient by reducing conflict, and turning energies from arguing with each other to more productive pursuits!
Any leader who wants his or her team to be friendlier, have fewer conflicts, and therefore be more productive, owes this book a serious look.
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Do More of What You Love Doing -
and What
You Get PAID For!
Do you coach business leaders on ways to improve their businesses? When you're face to face, or on the phone, with your clients, that's the work you signed up for, that you love...AND that you get paid for.
Writing effective promotional material to attract new business takes hard, focused work. If you're doing that writing yourself, it diverts time and attention from your work with the clients you're already helping. Your coaching work, also very demanding, distracts you from your promotional writing, likely making it less effective. I can focus on your promotional pieces while you put your time and effort toward your most important work.
Call Unity Copywriting today and learn how I can eliminate this distraction for you. Let me help you with a regular newsletter, a white paper for distribution at a trade show, a case study describing the benefits a client has enjoyed, or other pieces to describe how you serve your clients, and how prospective clients can benefit from working with you.
Put My Experience to Work for You...
As a business coach for several recent years, and before that having worked in various operations management roles during a long and varied career, I've been practicing and studying leadership and teamwork for over 45 years. With that background, I'm uniquely qualified to explain the benefits you offer to your clients and prospects. I love writing about this work and I'd love to talk with you about how we can work together to promote your business most effectively. Please let me hear from you!
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I'd Love to Hear Your Thoughts -
Let's be Friends, Even if You Disagree!
Do you have friends among the people you work with? If you're the leader, have you considered doing some of the things
Tony Hsieh is doing to lighten up the culture at Zappos? If you're working in a place without that kind of culture, might you suggest some things to help promote it? The company leaders will be pleasantly surprised at the return on such an investment.
Do the ideas in any of my messages contribute to making your life and business more enjoyable and effective...or, do you have some reservations about them? I can hardly wait to hear your thoughts and experiences and learn from them.
If you email me whatever's on your mind, please give me a phone number or a Skype address, or send me a Skype contact request (see my Skype address below), and mention that you read my newsletter. It's really important to mention this - with all the spammers, phishermen, etc. out there, I'm very selective about my connections on networking services. If your name is unfamiliar to me, I'll consider your contact request when you tell me the reason you want to connect with me...
Conversations are often necessary to discuss complex ideas, and conversations occur only in real-time, two(or more)-way exchanges; hence my request for your call or the information I need to call you. Email and other forms of one-way communication are data transfers, and very useful for many types of communication. However, they are extremely limited in their ability to convey the ideas, emotions, and inflections that characterize conversations (it's estimated that words, which are the total content of an email, convey only about seven percent of the total import of a message - sure, you can add emoticons, which help marginally, so maybe the percentage becomes 10 or 12 - still very limited). So please call me or tell me how to call you.
Just dial 603-835-3215 or 814-590-3854 if you're in the United States or Canada. Of course, if you call from outside North America, you'll need the +1 prefix. If you're calling from Argentina, you're welcome to call my Argentine number, +54 9 3868 459586.
Help me Spread my Message Where It's Welcome...
If you know someone you think will find value in the ideas I discuss each week, I encourage you to forward this to them, using the "
SHARE THIS EMAIL
" button at the end of this message. If this was forwarded to you, and you'd like to hear more, please click the "
SIGN UP FOR EMAILS
" button below. You'll be automatically added to my mailing list, which I
never
sell, rent, or even add a name to without permission.
Your privacy is enormously important to me.
On the other hand, if you'd rather stop receiving these messages, simply click the "
UNSUBSCRIBE" link at the bottom of this message. I'll promptly remove you from the list...and I promise you won't hurt my feelings. It's my desire to send these ideas only to people who find them valuable.
Join me here again next week for more unique ideas on life and business...and
thanks for reading this week's letter.
Have a wonderful week
, and contact me
to discuss how we can join forces to add value to what
you
do. Our investigation as to how we can mutually benefit from working together is totally on me - no obligation or cost will arise from that conversation. You won't pay me a dime until you hire me to write something for you.
Be well, my friends.
John Stevens
Marketing Support for the Business Coaching Industry
Office and cell phone: 814-590-3854 or 603-835-3215
In Argentina: +54(country code) 9 3868 459586
Skype: johnbstevens1943
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About John
Throughout a career spanning over 45 years my management style has been one of building teams to bring several competent people together to focus on a common objective.
As I transition to life in the Argentine outback, my focus will shift to helping other business coaches and advisers get their message out to their prospective clients. With my first-hand knowledge of the benefits of effective business coaching, I am uniquely qualified to work with business advisers of all stripes convey their message.
Read More >
Contact Info
John B. Stevens, Freelance Copywriter
Phone: 814-590-3854
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