‘Coach Kriengsak, thank you for seeing me at such short notice,” says Tanom. “No problem, Khun Tanom. What’s going on?”
“Yesterday after the board meeting, the chairman had a short private chat with me. He said I needed to adjust my management style to crisis management mode from business as usual. He also told me I needed to come up with a ‘quick win’ for the company. He said he’d been coached by you in the past and recommended that I discus these matters with you.”
“All right, Khun Tanom, what do you want to achieve from today’s session?”
“I want to change the way I manage and also get at least one idea for a quick win.”
“OK. Let’s start with the way you manage. How do you approach things now?”
“I manage my business the way I did in the past. Everything is by the book. I follow the business plan we made last year.”
“What do you want to do differently?”
“The business plan was based on several assumptions that seemed valid at the time but they no longer apply now. I need to be more hands-on and to improvise.”
“What specifically will you do?”
“I think I’ll need to start with strategy first. I have to discuss with my leadership team the strategy we need to use now.”
“That’s good. If your team asked you for some ideas, what would you tell them?”
“I think that where the focus is on strategy, there are a few things we have to do differently such as:
monitoring sales and cash flow more closely;
monitoring credit to risky industries;
ensuring our key customers are served well;
utilising existing resources properly.”
“OK. Once you and your team come up with a good strategy, what’s next?”
“Then, I need to communicate it to all of our employees. I need to start with a town-hall meeting for everyone, and then follow up by using other channels as well.”
“Great, Khun Tanom.”
“Coach, in terms of communicating to our people, do you have any tips?”
I offer a checklist that many successful leaders use for effective communication:
Right target: Who is your target audience?
Right style: What is their preferred style for receiving information?
Right motive: What’s in it for them?
Right media: What will be the appropriate media for them?
Right time: What will be the best time to communicate?
“Thank you, Coach. I think we’ve already covered the first topic,” says Tanom. “Now I want to talk about what our chairman called the quick win, but frankly, I’m not sure what he meant by that.”
“Khun Tanom, a quick win is an initiative or action that’s not part of your regular targets or key performance indicators (KPIs). To qualify as a ‘quick win’, it should be aligned with the corporate vision and strategy, quick to implement, and have a high impact with low resource utilisation. It should also wow your key stakeholders.”
“All right, Coach. Now I’m starting to get some ideas.”
“Khun Tanom, based on those criteria, what options can you think of?”
“Here are some quick ideas:
cross-selling among five business units;
a social media initiative;
stop all advertising;
stop all training.”
“Which ones do you think match the criteria?” I ask.
“Stopping advertising and training would have short-term impact but would create long-term problems,” Tanom replies. “We want to be number one in the market. Saving money on advertising and training are not in line with our vision and long-term strategy. But I can imagine that most of my competitors would do this. So instead, I think the first two items I mentioned would be good quick-win initiatives.”
“Good. Now, what could go wrong?”
“I think doing two things might defeat the whole purpose of being focused. I need to choose only one idea.”
“Which one is the most suitable now?”
“I think cross-selling would be best.”
“Good. What potential problems do you see if you go ahead?”
“First, the team might misunderstand. Second, the team might not have enough knowledge to do cross-selling for other business units.”
“How will you prevent this from happening?”
“I need to communicate the plan to all unit heads first. They have to really understand why we’re doing this. Then, they have to make sure they communicate it effectively with their teams. This will ensure better understanding among all the parties involved.
“In terms of knowledge, we need to do product knowledge training first. This might be a good time for everyone to try a tag-team selling approach. It’s also a good way to build team spirit inside our organisation.”
“Sounds good, Khun Tanom. Let’s follow up on these next week.”
Kriengsak Niratpattanasai provides executive coaching in leadership and diversity management under the brand TheCoach. He can be reached at coachkriengsak@yahoo.com. Daily inspirational quotations can be found on his Facebook fan page: https://www.facebook.com/TheCoachinth. Previous articles are archived at http://thecoach.in.th