team | The Barefoot Spirit

Build Trust with Timely Status Reports

Michael Houlihan & Bonnie Harvey — Thu, 08 Jun 2017 17:00:54 +0000

There’s a new phenomenon happening that we never saw ten years ago. It is a best practice that somehow got dropped from the up-bringing, educational and training processes.

In today’s workplace, we see employees keeping vital information to themselves and not reporting it to others who have asked them for it …and need it to do or complete their job. This “sitting-on-it” style hurts everyone on the team.

In business, keeping your boss, your colleagues, and your customers up to date is essential. It builds trust in your relationships. It’s easy to say, “Don’t worry, I’ll take care of it,” but actions speak louder than words.

You must actually tell the person who asked for the information what you found out. Just because you know, doesn’t mean you can sit on the information. When you are asked to check into something, it is assumed that you will share what you have found.

You can get back to others with a comfort call, a timely update, or a status report. Or you can wait in silence until they call you and ask, “Hey, what’s going on?”

Nothing is more irritating than having to check up to see if someone really did what they said they would do, are still working on it, or dropped it entirely! Not knowing causes anxiety.

So why do so many people go dark after they say they’ve “got it covered”? The fact is, it leaves the requestors, guessing. It makes them wonder what’s going on, not just with the request, but what’s going on with you.

Are you deliberately going dark, hoping they will forget the request? Are you depending on them to remind you? Are you dropping it until they mention it again? Are you so late in your response that you are embarrassed to admit to your tardy status because you think you will get in trouble? Do you think they don’t need to know until the task is completed, even if weeks go by?

Do you realize that this makes the requesting party anxious? Their mind reels with the possibilities and it keeps them awake at night.

Whatever your excuse, it’s damaging to your company, your team, and your reputation as a professional businessperson! No news is worse that bad news.

If you get a request that is a long-term, ongoing project, give the requesting party a comfort call or shoot them a memo every few days.

Timely status reporting has so many benefits. For one, even if you’ve had no progress, it puts the requesting party’s mind at ease. They don’t have to wonder about you or question your motives. It just plain shows respect. Suspense is stressful.

For another, it says, “I am keeping you up to date, so you can trust me to not drop it.” When you demonstrate that you care about relieving their anxieties, they will see you as professional, reliable, and indispensable. When you show you care about the requesting party, they will care more about you.

In any case, do not let so much time go by that they feel compelled to ask you about it. If you keep them in the dark on a regular basis and they find themselves frequently asking you what’s up, don’t think they don’t notice. This kind of sloppiness can result in lost relationships with your vendors, customers, associates, and employers. You are jeopardizing the effectiveness of your team mates. You could even lose your job.

Show others the common courtesies you expect. Put their minds at ease. Show them you are on top of it. Earn their trust …and your own security. Get back to them on a timely basis!

Who We Are

Michael Houlihan and Bonnie Harvey co-authored the New York Times bestselling business book, The Barefoot Spirit: How Hardship, Hustle, and Heart Built America’s #1 Wine Brand. The book has been selected as recommended reading in the CEO Library for CEO Forum, the C-Suite Book Club, and numerous university classes on business and entrepreneurship. It chronicles their humble beginnings from the laundry room of a rented Sonoma County farmhouse to the board room of E&J Gallo, who ultimately acquired their brand and engaged them as brand consultants. Barefoot is now the world’s largest wine brand.

Beginning with virtually no money and no wine industry experience, they employed innovative ideas to overcome obstacles, create new markets and forge strategic alliances. They pioneered Worthy Cause Marketing and performance-based compensation. They built an internationally bestselling brand and received their industry’s “Hot Brand” award for several consecutive years.

They offer their Guiding Principles for Success (GPS) to help entrepreneurs become successful. Their book, The Entrepreneurial Culture: 23 Ways To Engage and Empower Your People, helps corporations maximize the value of their human resources.

Currently they travel the world leading workshops, trainings, & keynoting at business schools, corporations, conferences. They are regular media guests and contributors to international publications and professional journals. They are C-Suite Network Advisors & Contributing Editors. Visit their popular brand building site at www.consumerbrandbuilders.com.

To make inquiries for keynote speaking, trainings or consulting, please contact sales@thebarefootspirit.com.

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Best Source of Good Ideas Are Your Employees

Michael Houlihan & Bonnie Harvey — Thu, 06 Oct 2016 17:00:18 +0000

Most companies, in their attempt to present the image of stability and security to their employees, will deliberately prevent them from knowing about the challenges the company faces. They fear their people will jump ship if they know that the company is facing difficulties. They put their people on a strictly need-to-know basis. This may keep them from jumping ship when times get tough because ignorance is bliss – till they get the pink slip.

We think there’s another way that may solve those challenges and even prevent the pink slip. We call it the “know-the-need” basis. The concept is simple. Your people can’t help solve the problem if they don’t know what the problem is.

With know-the-need you don’t have to go into every detail of the daily operation. It should never be a distraction. But it can be a very healthy team building and problem solving exercise when done with the right attitude. Think of your people as your most valuable asset, view them as such and never as “labor” or worse, as a “cost center”. They know your business, your policies, your procedures. They have an interest in seeing your business succeed, not just for their own security, but for their reputation. They want to work for a business that has its best days in front of it, not behind it. Changing jobs is traumatic and unsettling. They want stability. And they will participate to make that happen.

At Barefoot, we would have regular meetings between the non-sales staff and the sales staff. During those meetings the sales people would outline their challenges with the market, the competition, or with our own support. Folks who were apparently far removed from sales like accountants and receptionists would step up to the plate with suggestions. Many were completely off the wall, impractical, or down right crazy, but they all knew they had permission to say anything. Often, it got others thinking and innovative, disruptive, and practical solutions would bubble up. Everyone was thrilled when we hit upon something that worked. The folks who came up with the solutions were publicly praised. Others were thus encouraged to participate. It was actually great fun. We solved many of our biggest challenges as a result of some of these know-the-need brainstorming sessions.

In one of these sessions, our top sales person announced, “Well, we’ve got good news and we’ve got bad news. The good news is that we just got Barefoot into 400 stores in Florida. The bad news is that they put us on the bottom shelf.” This was the worse place to be in a retail set. Nobody looks down. To the bottom shelf, especially for an unknown brand. And if we didn’t make a certain number of sales in a certain number of days, we would be discontinued … forever! What were we going to do?

One person piped up in jest, “Well, I guess we’ll just have to go after the “foot traffic” then. Everybody laughed because our name was Barefoot. But then, someone else said, “Wait a minute! That’s not so crazy. Why don’t we have wine stained footprints decaled to the floor and lead the shoppers step by step down the aisle and turn them into our products on the bottom shelf!” it worked so well we used it all over the county. And that idea? It came from the receptionist.

Showing your people that you respect their intelligence, team spirit, and ability to handle challenges apparently outside of their area of expertise, gains you solutions, teamwork, and an element of trust. Let your people help you solve the problems that ultimately affect their jobs. You may be surprised at what they come up with … when they know the need!

Who We Are

To make inquiries for keynote speaking, trainings or consulting, please contact sales@thebarefootspirit.com.

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Address the Assumption Behind the Question, Don’t Just Answer the Question

Michael Houlihan & Bonnie Harvey — Thu, 25 Aug 2016 17:00:32 +0000

The purpose of a question is to solicit an answer. But an answer to what? Just the question on its face? Or the deeper misunderstanding posed by the question? In business, when you are building a team, you must pay very close attention and read between the lines to ascertain not just what your new team member is asking, but more importantly, why he or she is asking that particular question.

Often the question posed shows a giant incorrect assumption about how your business works, how the customer receives your product or service, or what the various relationships are between the critical parties in your supply and distribution channels. What happens if you give them the short answer that just addresses their immediate query? They remain off track, but now they feel validated in their erroneous assumptions, and start to take actions based on wrong judgements that can hurt your business.

That’s why we recommend that you take the time to look through a new hire’s questions to discover those wrong assumptions and correct them. This may seem tedious and you run the risk of being accused of giving a speech where a simple answer would do, but as we say, “When the cement is wet, you can move it with a trowel, but when it’s dry, you’ll need a jack hammer!”

Questions that indicate deep misunderstandings show that there’s room for improvement to your orientation and training documents. You’ve got to teach the basics. You can’t assume new team members have a good foundation in business because they worked for a big company or have a big degree. We found incredible basic misunderstandings about business from some of the apparently most qualified for the job. Many times schools and their former bosses failed to lay the proper foundations.

We had a supply manager who asked repeatedly, “Why does the vendor always get the order wrong?” when the correct question was, “What do we have to do differently to reduce the likelihood of wrong orders?” This person had “a good college education” and had several jobs where it was OK to blame the other party when something went wrong – and that there was nothing he could do about it on his end.

We had a top administrator ask, “Why haven’t I had a raise in two years?” when the correct question was, “Why hasn’t our bottom line improved in two years?” This person assumed the money came from the owners, not the customers.

And we had a sales manager who asked, “Why won’t my distributer’s sales rep get the reorder?” when the correct question was, “How do we create an incentive plan that reduces out-of-stocks?” This person thought the distributer’s rep was going to perform on a new, unknown product like ours, without an additional financial consideration beyond their salary and commission.

Questions can tell you more than they ask – if you listen closely. If the question fits into the “this-doesn’t-make -any-sense-to-me” category, you’ve got the clue that you have work to do. There may not be any stupid questions, but there are some stupid answers and most of them are short. Short answers are saying, “Go away, don’t bother me!” but they are also asking for trouble down the line. Sure, workers can continue with their immediate jobs without a detailed explanation, but later they will surprise you with their deep-routed misconceptions.

Oh, and “Why do they call it duck tape? Because if it dries out, it can quack!”

Who We Are

To make inquiries for keynote speaking, trainings or consulting, please contact sales@thebarefootspirit.com.

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Successful Entrepreneurs Must Constantly Sell to Each Business Relationship

Michael Houlihan & Bonnie Harvey — Thu, 14 Apr 2016 17:00:44 +0000

Most agree that selling products and services are at the core of any successful business. Without sales there is simply no money to pay the bills and the business fails. But there are other, less obvious types of “sales” that are just as essential to the success of your business. Without these sales, made regularly, your costs will increase dramatically. These are the “sales” you must make, not with your prospects, but with your support team.

Your support team includes your employees, your outsourced services, and your suppliers. Each one of these “sales” requires a different approach to fully engage them to do their best work for you, take on additional responsibilities, provide quality products and services, and extend your credit and terms. But they all have one thing in common. They must believe you have their best interests at heart before they will commit their time, energy, loyalty, products and services to you. But when they do, they can significantly reduce your costs, turnover, and need for capital, thereby dramatically increasing your chances of success.

Employees. Your employees are key to your success – if they really understand that you are offering them a career opportunity, security, a piece of the action, appreciation, guidance, respect, and time off. They must be clear on how their job, however removed, eventually affects sales, why it’s important, and how it fits into their careers. Show them that you have their best interests at heart so they will be more appreciative of performance based-compensation plans, bonuses, and increased decision-making power.

Outsourced Services. Show appreciation for your outsourced services by providing them with a clear message about your expectations. You can achieve this by having policies in place to constantly improve communication, being clear on requirements and deadlines, and sharing with them the reasons for your requirements. It also means that you give more praise than criticism, and your criticism is constructive. Show them that you are easy to work with. “What can we do on our end to help you be more effective” is a great “sales” pitch for these folks.

Suppliers. Show empathy for the risk they are taking with your new or growing company. Share with them your goals, challenges, and opportunities on a regular basis. This will alleviate some of their fears when they take a chance on you by extending credit and terms that enable you to grow. They worry that you may pay your bill late, or be a “beg pay.” Work out a long-term commitment so they know you won’t dump them for another supplier. They have to believe they can grow with you. It takes considerable seasoning over time to prove you have their best interests at heart.

Negotiating every business relationship is a sales process. You have to gain their trust and prove to them that you fit into their business and growth plan. You have to be aware of their fears and allay them. You do this by demonstrating over time that you will live up to their expectations, and that you are a true strategic partner, helping them achieve their goals.

The alternative to making these “sales” is to spend tons of money on turnover, lost corporate knowledge, high interest rates, short payment terms, and higher service and supply costs. This is money that startups can’t afford, and money that is better spent growing your business.

These types of sales to your support team are rarely taught in school and receive little focus in the entrepreneurial media. But when you demonstrate that you have your team’s best interests at heart, you spend less and monetize faster!

Who We Are

To make inquiries for keynote speaking, trainings or consulting, please contact sales@thebarefootspirit.com.

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3 Essentials of Effective Leadership

Michael Houlihan & Bonnie Harvey — Thu, 31 Mar 2016 17:00:31 +0000

Running a company, division or a team is a responsibility that goes way beyond being the executive. In many ways you are in a parental role. It’s not enough to lay out the path and make the big decisions. You must also nurture your people if you want them to perform at their best. After all, they are spending more time with you, in many cases, than they spend with their own families. They not only take direction from you, but they look to you as an authority figure. A word from you can make a big difference in their personal development as well as their skill set.

And isn’t that what you want – team members who are better this year than they were last year? So what exactly are those words from you that can make all the difference to them and your team’s productivity and your company culture? Just like the gas you put in your tank that gets you to your destination, here is the “G.A.S.” that keeps your team running:

Guidance. Make sure your team has clear and achievable weekly goals. Review them again on Wednesday to make mid-course corrections. Clearly describe to every member of the team what they have to do, and by when, to achieve those goals. Be sure to explain why what they are being asked to do is important to the big picture, the health of the company, the security of their jobs, and ultimately their compensation, bonuses, commissions and benefits. In other words, tie it to sales! Get the deadlines on the calendar. Get involved in helping to remove roadblocks and barriers to communication. Make suggestions and offer help when needed. And then get out of their way!

Acknowledgement. This often overlooked essential is the building block of validation. And validation is what your people want when they are creative, take responsibility, and complete a job well done. We feel that acknowledgment is right up there with compensation when it comes to why they even work for you at all. A heartfelt “Thank You” is always appreciated, but don’t stop there. Do it in writing, be specific about what they did and how it moved the project forward, saved money or made money, and copy the entire team. Public acknowledgement creates more appreciation among team members for their team mates, encourages more of the productive behavior you want, and creates loyalty and tenure.

Support. This is not hand holding. This is not micromanaging. This is being there to answer questions, and to provide the right tools, applications, and services. This is conducting yourself in a reasonable and understanding manner during frustrating times. This is taking it down a notch when things get crazy. And this is standing up for your people when they need it. It’s also interceding on their behalf when they run into the type of contracted or other ‘outside’ folks who won’t work with a delegated person and want you personally on the line. Take those types aside in advance and spend the time to convince them to work with your delegate. Then help your own people develop the confidence and people skills to get the respect they need to get things done on their own.

So when it comes to Leadership, don’t run out of G.A.S.!

Who We Are

To make inquiries for keynote speaking, trainings or consulting, please contact sales@thebarefootspirit.com.

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