What then transpires due to these and other challenges? Cliques are formed, feuds happen and morale is down. This then results in lower performance levels, a lack of productivity, and general negativity which, ultimately, causes the teams to fall apart.

How to keep teams intact? Trust. Trust is the backbone to teamwork.

..the most critical, foundational building block of a team is trust. Without trust most teams are really disparate collections of individuals called groups. The element that creates or erodes trust is your individual behaviour. Charles H. Green, Trusted Advisor Associates

Business team leaders therefore need to build trust, by behaving in a trustworthy manner. The team members won’t trust them for the sake of trusting. It is too risky. Therefore, the team leaders need to lead and exhibit the traits and characteristics that create trustworthiness. It is up to the leaders to drive two of the following Trust Principles:*

Collaboration: To work jointly with others or together especially in an intellectual endeavour. (Merriam-Webster)

A few examples:

Team leaders need to demonstrate trustworthiness by constantly involving the team member. Don’t speculate about what your team is thinking – ask them.

Value meetings over phone calls and phone calls over emails. Make it personal.

Practice putting all issues on the table for joint discussion.

Transparency: The art of being transparent. Transparent: 1) free from pretense or deceit: frank 2) easily detected or seen through: obvious 3) readily understood 4) characterized by visibility or accessibility of information especially concerning business practices. (Merriam-Webster)

Nothing destroys trust faster than the team leader who appears to be withholding information or trying to control the team member. Be willing to be open about your practices.

Most organizations recognize that trust is an important consideration in their company’s success, but many employees don’t feel it is being nurtured internally. The main culprit? Top management… Charles H. Green, Trusted Advisor Associates

Trust drives relationships which drives teamwork, therefore team leaders need to set the example and drive trusted relationships… to keep the teams together.

Trip Allen, Team Egyii, Singapore

*The Four Trust Principles, Charlies H. Green, Trusted Advisor Associates

The leaders who work most effectively have trained themselves not to think “I.” They think “we;” and they think “team.” They understand that their job is to make the team function. They accept responsibility and don’t sidestep it. But “we” get the credit. This is what creates trust, what enables you to get the task done. Peter Drucker.

Many reasons for low employee engagement and high employee turnover are given by companies, from unhappiness about having to accept lower pay during the downturn, to high career expectations. These may play a part, but often the perception of employees by management as being less important in creating a competitive advantage than product or service innovation and marketing strategy, is bound to send the wrong signals.

When management and senior leaders recognise that in today’s tough business environment, it is their people who have the potential to create that critical competitive edge that will see companies through this crisis, only then will they change their practices.  Changing practices means honouring the untapped potential in all your people, maintaining training and development initiatives, and creatively coming up with ideas on how to place employees at the centre of your strategic plan.

Only then will businesses find that the tough times can be managed and overcome.

James Irvine, Team Egyii, Singapore

To support the business in changing and turbulent times, HR leaders are looking for ways to support their stakeholders and offer new ideas/programmes above and beyond the norm.

Why? Due to the pressure of the business. The pressure for profitability and the pressure to contribute more to the business.

How are the HR leaders looking to do this? The HR leaders are looking to supply the right tools, and some of the old tools may not work anymore. They also feel that they need to add more value to the business.

So what might work today?

We all know that HR needs to understand the business and needs to link learning and development to the business goals and strategies. That is a no brainer.

To date, HR leaders have exausted their efforts with the sales and sales management teams by providing sales training programmes that offer a scripted, burdensome process. These programmes have brought in results, but the HR Leaders should take it one step further- even as  the executives continue to look  for quick answers-and quick results.

Wait a minute. Quick answers and quick results? You have tried programmes that offer the quick answers and results already. Some work and some don’t. What to do next?

As an HR leader, shouldn’t you be in the position to advise the business? Shouldn’t that be your key role?

To provide value you should look to be a proactive advisor. And as an advisor, you can position business differentiators.

How to differentiate?

Soft skills.

Soft skills are truly in need today. And I don’t recommend that becuse Egyii’s business evolves around that. I (and others) believe  it.

Soft skills need to complement the current sales process and the product training.

Soft skills are the “glue” to keep it all together.

So why is it difficult to pitch to management? Is it because soft skills are difficult to measure? They don’t show “direct” results? If that is on the mind of your executive team, they need advice. Your advice.

Soft skills, such as relationship skills, are important as they complement the drive for immediate results.

They also build the pipeline.

…and they turn a prospect into a client and keep the client a client.

If you are focusing on programmes that bring immediate results, chances are you are losing the client, because they know when the sales pressure is on. Relationship building soft skills help relieve this pressure and give you the ability to sell immediately and medium/ long term…without losing the client.

Isn’t that what the business REALLY wants?

HR Leaders have the opportunity to be more active as advisors. Contribute more of your ideas to the business. Add more value by advising the business and offering new tools such as more targeted soft skills.

It may difficult to convince the stakeholders- give it a try.

For more, see:

Building and fostering client relationships.

Building and rebuilding trust.

Trip Allen, Team Egyii, Singapore

Press Release! Hot off the wires..

Singapore, May 25th, 2009

Egyii, the Singapore based learning and development consultancy, has announced its launch into the Consumer and Retail Banking space, leading with a new perspective on “customer experience.”

Egyii will continue to focus on its current agenda of Priority and Private Banking but will expand into Consumer and Retail Banking with more thought leadership, web based material and customized, in-house curriculums.

Trip Allen, Egyii’s Director of Sales and Marketing, says “The Consumer and Retail space is a logical choice for us. In fact, the banks have requested that we move into this space. And with customer experience initiatives in banking being a top priority, it makes sense that we link all the different banking programmes together.“

James Irvine, Egyii Director of Programme Development, says “Financial organizations are struggling and it is the customer who is suffering, causing a break of loyalty and trust and a loss of business.”

“Bankers can continue to focus on re-engineering products, systems and policies. Alternatively, they can break the mold and focus on the customer and the customer experience.”

For the “Improving the Customer Experience in Banking” white paper: White Paper

For our updated overview, please see:

Egyii Overview May 2009 

Thank you.

Trip & James, Team Egyii, Singapore

HR-in-Action Nite- 2 April 2009
for the HR Community @ SHRI Singapore Human Resources Institute

The secret to getting good results at work is by getting control of our thinking, rather than just diving into new behaviours.

Most learning programmes try to help us change our behaviours by giving us new knowledge and skills. However, much of the time nothing actually happens because we have not addressed the things that drive those behaviours i.e. our thinking patterns. It’s like a plane trying to change course while all the time having the auto pilot set on another direction.

Yes, it’s important to learn new behaviours. But since so many of them are habitual, we need to change the beliefs, values and emotions that control those behaviours if we are to experience change that lasts more than a few days. And the funny thing is, when we do control our thinking patterns, the behaviours tend to take care of themselves.

Based on Neuro-Linguistic Programming (NLP), this talk will introduce you to some of the key drivers of our behaviour as well as methods for getting control of these. You will find that you can apply this knowledge in any situation both at work and at home, and you will gain a new sense of control over the results you get.

Please feel free to click on the downloadable Slideshare version of the presentation here.

For more information, please email us at stuff@egyii.com.

Bon vivant!

Trip Allen, Team Egyii, Singapore

Can you imagine a business without overstuffed egos? How much more do you think could be accomplished?

Most of the time the word ego has negative connotations but having an ego can be both positive and negative to business.

Steven Smith, author of  “What Makes Ego our Greatest Asset (or Most Expensive Liability)” writes “Ego is the invisible line on everybody’s profit and loss statement.”

Guy Kawaski of Garage Technology Ventures recently interviewed Steven and asked him “Why is it invisible?” Steven’s response was “Because it hasn’t been measured, and yet the people know the costs are there. Over half of all business people estimate ego costs their company six to fifteen percent annual revenue; many believe that estimate is too conservative. But even if ego were costing six percent of revenue, the annual cost of ego would be $1.1 billion USD to the Fortune 500 Company. ” (For more read the interview)

Ego? Affecting six to fifteen percent of revenue….WOW!

If the egos were recognised, and put under control, how much money would that save banks (and other institutions) today? Not only that, how many more of the staff would feel in control, and therefore more productive? And client relationships? They would be better for sure.

Take a peek at the tools and techniques in self management - this will be a good start to help unstuff egos.

Another 6-15% in the bucket is not so bad. Agree?

Trip Allen, Team Egyii, Singapore

That is a mouthful. And it should be.

In one of Obama’s recent public announcement, he proclaimed the following:

“…in order to restore our financial system, we’ve got to restore trust.”

Obama and his team get it. Does everyone else? Probably. What is everyone else doing about it? Thinking about it? Yes. Taking action? Maybe.

There are a lot discussions on trust going around in multiple circles today and most of it is focusing on the financial institutions. Why is that? Are people fed up with the “old world” of the banking business?

Wouldn’t it make sense to make trust an integral part of the bank agenda? Certainly life and business would be easier for the relationship managers and the executives. And isn’t this what most clients want? A trusted relationship?

For more reads on trust in all the circles, read Trust, Trust, Trust by Charlie Green of Trusted Advisors. He and his team thoroughly cover trust from all perspectives.

Please also see James’ prior post Private Banks’ new journey back to credibility

Trip Allen, Team Egyii, Singapore

In his new book Aligning Training for Results, Ron Drew Stone says, “It is vital that training professionals understand performance in order to identify needs and design, develop and deliver training solutions. …Training professionals should adopt a different thought pattern and a different performance framework that will allow us to see and communicate training and performance in a more results-centered way.”

As a training professional, what are you doing to ensure that your training leads directly to performance improvement on the job and that this improvement leads to tangible business results? In today’s budget-conscious, turbulent business environment it is vital that every dollar spent on training leads to some form of improvement in the following:

• The cost of doing business
• The profitability of the business
• The quality (effectiveness) of the organisation’s business products, processes and services
• The output (quantity) of products and services
• The time (efficiency) it takes to complete tasks and business processes, address and correct problem areas, and service the customer

It’s time for change.

Time to move on from a focus on learning requirements and participant evaluations, to a focus on execution. Do you have plans in place to identify the specific business results you want to achieve, the performance gap between where you are and where you want to be, and the execution needed to close that gap?

Have you identified all the various internal factors that need to be addressed to ensure that you are doing whatever it takes to achieve execution after the training is over?

It’s no good gaining knowledge, understanding, skills and a positive attitude if there is no execution, because this is the only thing that will lead to performance improvement and business results. If you can achieve all this, then you deserve to be sitting at the top table.

James Irvine, Team Egyii, Singapore