Flibuti Corp.

In addition to increased sales, profits can also be generated by reducing overhead and by using your time more productively. Employee performance appraisal software, despite frequently being neglected, is a great benefit to enterprises aiming to do this. Armed with the knowledge of the specialties of your members of staff are, you can streamline your procedures to optimize their effectiveness, and as a result get the most from the company as a whole. The main issue has always been in finding and collating this knowledge.

Defining and tracking progress through employee appraisal alone can be a huge amount of work. You first put employee appraisal systems in place in order to evaluate the work carried out by each employee. The analysis of this data is next. After all, before you can put it to use determining goals and checking future development you have to know what the data means in practice.

With performance appraisal software, all you need to do is examine the various analyses and factors to determine what these targets should be and then chart the member of staff’s development. Thus you ease a significant demand on your time and probably also find yourself with more accurate information as an added bonus. It’s of course also possible simply to use the software to track raw data like performance reviews and to make your own analysis.

Performance appraisal software doesn’t only help employees. Such software can also be used to scrutinize your suppliers and your clients. Knowing the suppliers that carry the better quality and lowest priced products can cut costs greatly. Clients are measured on their own metric, and just as with suppliers and internal questions it’s possible to benefit your bank balance. You can then adjust your orders and move products around to increase your profits while cutting spending. As well as all this, marketing campaigns become much more effective because you’ll have a clear view of your market and the location of your best target audience.

You can track your sources to minimize costs and watch your target market to make more money employing performance appraisal software. In addition it smoothes out the employee evaluation and aids you in setting precisely outlined goals for your employees. It seems the sky really is the limit with performance management software backing you up…

Nearly everybody faces financial trouble throughout their fiscal life. For that reason, unpaid commitments will likely be encountered. Families can sometimes meet these issues due to loss of work, modified marital relationship, bereavement or just plain bad personal financial management. Small companies characteristically come across misfortune in the 1st couple years of operation. At fault for a business closure can stretch from more competition, accidents, loss of significant accounts to distinguish a couple. Whatever the basis, unpaid obligations can lead to bankruptcy. In spite of this, there are alternatives to bankruptcy that can preserve your personal credit or your business credit.

Financial insolvency can be defined as the inability of a family or a company to satisfy monies owed to credit granters. When filed, the guarantor (your firm or yourself) is required to surrender all exemption free assets and property for cut-rate sale. While individual assets are preserved, you have to likewise subscribe a certain portion of your gained income to the creditors based on a structured repayment agreement. Your FICO scores will become zero for years, which implies that you won’t be capable of acquiring funding for several personal or commercial endeavour for a extended time.

Troubles such as these may cause incredible worry. Insolvency proceedings are highly abrasive and may result in bitter thought processes and deeds. Looking for advantageous paths out of an uncomfortable situation prior to going to bankruptcy courtroom is better. Debt negotiation could perhaps be the option for you.

perhaps you are wondering why a financier will want to work with yourself to resolve the debt consider that settlement is an option for them too. In certain bankruptcy judgments a lending institution carrying non-securitized paper may get nothing. However, after a customer makes out a negotiation they will recover at least a share, if perhaps not every bit, of the debt the creditors hold. Remember too that when added up the interest that has been sent in before along with the late penalties and beyond limit penalties they might have possibly charged, the creditor might be in the black even before the debt resolution.

Debt settlement is a decent choice for individuals attempting to get help with credit card debt. When just a single, solitary is missing, most credit cards incur an extremely significant interest rate increase that will weigh heavily on the present total due. This charge makes it more difficult to pay off the credit card in the coming months which probably will likely send your debt twirling out of reach. Debt negotiation will allow for you to pay back your debt with only a percentage of what you owe without ruining your FICO rating for 10 years.

Succeeding in business depends on the efficient management of employees. You may succeed in improving in these skills. Having a natural affinity for dealing with people is an advantage, but you can do some things to make this procedure simpler.

Relationship Development: Start by remembering a person’s name. Speak to employees; look individuals in the eye when you are talking. Have a respectful attitude, also listen to what the other person says, regardless of whether you are in agreement with them. Listening to what others say is one of the best people management skills in your arsenal. Show interest in what they can give to the business organization. Live up to promises: Do not make promises you won’t fulfill. If you can’t deliver on what you have promised, the fragile bond of trust is broken, and if they can’t trust you people certainly won’t perform at their best. Each time you say something or make a promise about something, do be sure that you can deliver or don’t bother giving your word at all. The truth is, if you can’t be counted upon, your employees can’t be relied on to be committed if you truly need them.

Feedback is essential: Feedback should be a two way process. Having an open mind with regard to other’s opinions is very important in managing people. Being approachable and open shows that your co-worker’s ideas count, your views will be respected in the same fashion. Promoting discourse in addition promotes creative trouble-shooting, innovative methods of achieving the goals of the company, and develops the company dynamic. By giving the staff to express their thoughts, every team member invests in the results of the project. Communication is fundamental: Managing people comes down to one concept — good communication. Be approachable, listen closely to people, keep an open mind, and encourage all your team members to express themselves. Encourage staff not just to communicate with you, but to speak to each other. The sharing of ideas is crucial in the creative process, and by speaking with one another, it becomes easy to discover any issues before they may present as a problem, and corrective measures can be implemented before things get out of hand. Developing these techniques will take some time, even so the rewards are worth it. Through promoting a good team dynamic and demonstrating effective listening skills, you can have a successful business.

Many human resource managers feel that, since all of their employees have the required level of health and safety instruction, they now have everything required to prevent a disaster. The reality is that, irrespective your industry, an education in health and safety regulatory affairs simply isn’t adequate. Equipping employees, choosing a good supervisior and supporting frequent practise are essential to the safety of staff.

Your employees must have an effective supervisor to watch the work area, but this individual must also play another purpose. A supervisor has to be a skilled communicator and additionally believe that training is important. On top of enforcing all of the rules and regulations, a supervisory role also usually includes checking up on staff efficiency. This isn’t a easy job. To achieve this the supervisor is expected to possess an excellent understanding of the industry best practice and the product not to mention a high standard of understanding of up-to-date legislation involving safety, risk appraisal and CPR. It’s just not adequate to offer your staff health and safety education. To successfully discover a hazard they require to put their training into practise. They in addition need to develop insights into the steps necessary to remedy the situation not to mention knowing what to do when something goes wrong. Only when these procedures have developed into habitual are staff properly prepared. Safety equipment is every bit as critical to the well being of your staff as the education itself. If they don’t possess the right supplies or if they see that equipment is broken only after a crisis has occurred, the training they have undergone will have been a waste of time and effort.

Frequent maintanence of your apparatus is a necessity. Should you have a issue with your equipment, ensure it is mended or call out a maintenance engineer as soon as you can. Health and safety instruction is important for the safety of your workforce, but in addition they also require decent apparatus, the chance to practise, and a supervisor who can motivate your staff. If you put this advice into practice you will find the various safety regulations before long be part of the staff’s working habits and no longer an inconvenience for employees to remember constantly.

It’s opinion in a lot of businesses that, by offering each staff member some instruction in health & safety, they now have all the knowledge they might need to prevent a catastrophe. The truth of the matter is that, regardless your industry, basic education in health & safety regulatory affairs simply is not sufficient. You must supply your staff with an enthusiastic supervisor, the right equipment, and the chance to practice.

Every team must have a great supervisor to observe the work area, but this individual must also play an even more important role on the floor. A supervisor must be a good communicator and additionally see health & safety instruction as important.

Be sure to hop over to this fantastic resource for workplace health safety guidelines.

On top of checking compliance with health & safety legislation, a supervisory role also includes checking up on employee efficiency. This is a difficult role. In-depth industry knowledge is needed in a supervisory role in addition to an in depth familiarity with the latest regulations with regard to safety, risk assessment and CPR.

Simply having basic training in health & safety actually is not sufficient for your workers. They must get practical experience of risk assessment and the identification of hazards. They also need insights into the steps necessary to remedy the situation and also how best to manage when the worst happens. Only when these procedures become a habit are workers totally protected.

Adequate safety equipment is every bit as vital to the well being of your staff as any training. When they are without gear they need, or discover that they’re not working properly only after something has occurred, all the training in the world will not help them. It’s a good idea to check on a regular basis to ascertain if you possess all the necessary apparatus and to check it’s functioning correctly as well. If piece of equipment won’t meet the relevant standards, make sure that it is fixed as promptly as possible and put it back in the proper place. The right health & safety training is critical to the health of your workforce, but in addition they require good quality apparatus, the opportunity to practise, and a supervisor who is gifted with contagious enthusiasm. Only then will abiding by all the safety regulations before long be a part of the staff’s working habits rather than something troublesome everyone has to attempt to think about constantly.

The methods in which you set up a conference call vary between the different services you use, and what type of conference calling you are using. There are three main types of conference calls, all with different methods of set up.

The most common conference call is reservationless conference calls. There is not much to set up with this type of call. You simply get a number and access code, as well as a separate access code for the other people that you want to participate in the conference call. All you need to do to during the set up conference call is call the number, enter your access code, and then have the other callers call in and use their own access code.

Operator assisted set up conference calls lets you have an operator on hand for things such as recording the conversation, using moderator commands such as subconferencing and broadcasting, and monitoring the conference overall. This tends to be a bit more expensive, and requires reservations a certain time in advance. The exact amount of time varies from service to service.

Operator dialed set up conference calls allow for more interaction with the individual members of the call. The operator will dial out to each participant at your reserved time, and add them manually into the conference. This is a great service for people who are not used to conference calls. Also, if you need additional services such as translation, recording, or other added features, the operator is on hand to provide those.

There are a few other types of set up conference calls that you can do. Web conferences are much more involved than any type of phone conference call, and requires you to know a great deal about the software it uses, or to have technical support on hand to help. There are also small scale conference calls between two or three people that business lines can handle. Just play around with the different options and you will see what is the most advantageous to your business.

Find out more about conference calls at
http://www.affordable-conference-call.com

They say that management can be a lonely place. A manager has to lead from the front, make challenging demands of their people and if part of an organisation, pass on the dictats of the more senior and remote bosses up at the top.

Yet, a manager has the accountability to deliver - in fact that’s what they get paid for, so ultimately, they must be the one who puts in the most effort to make their workplace deliver, or else.

When a manager tries to delegate, their people don’t always do as they wish for and sometimes that can lead to even more work. So often, managers fall back on that tried and trusted worker who they know will do it just right, at least in their eyes, because that trusted worker is themselves. And that’s hard.

So, to make sure that the work they pass down to their people is delivered, there are some ways to make it happen:-

1. Agree Standards

   Standards of output and performance are vital in any organisation, business or team, yet these need to be communicated very openly to all of the people with whom managers work.

   Yet a step beyond it being a communication exercise is to have their people involved in deciding what standards operate in their team.

2. Have Clear Expectations

   When passing work on, managers need to be clear in how they express and will measure the final result. Without this, those delegated to will not have a clear measure to work towards. These expectations need to be clear on both sides and this checked closely.

3. Test Understanding

   Sometimes though, what seems to be clear is only clear on one side, that of the person passing on the job in hand. So it is very important that what they understand to be expected is also what the job ‘doer’ understands as well.

   Sometimes, just simply, and in a friendly way, asking for the recipient to repeat back what the expected out come measures will be is enough.

4. Show the Way

   When managers manage, except in the minority of cases, they intimidate their people. It may be they are great managers, but the role is the bit that intimidates, so their people may be reluctant to ask for help in a task they are given.

   Managers need to be aware of this and ensure that they help their people succeed by showing them the way. It may be literally showing how a taks needs to be done and the expected outcome. It may be sharing some tactics or skills.

   Not only is this likely to result in success, but it develops the culture of the team in such a way that sharing and supporting become the way things are done.

5. Seek Feedback

   When individuals take on new and often challenging tasks, they need some nurturing. By building in regular progress meetings, especially at the start of a project or delegated task, the feeling of exposure can be lessened.

   Sure people need their hands held a little, but this is not forever. As they succeed more they will learn that they ‘can’ and this will become less of a requirement.

6. Measure Progress

   When new tasks are taken on, it is important for a manager to show that real and vital progress is being achieved, however small or slow this is. The achievement, step-by-step is energising and those developing new skills and expertise will benefit hugely from the recognition that they are getting somewhere, wherever it is!

7. Be Available

   Getting together with your people when they are in a learning phase is important formally, yet there is also a real benefit in a manager’s easy access in an ad hoc way as well.

   In fact the cultural value in their recognising when someone in the team, whilst in the learning phase especially, needs urgent support is very valuable. Clearly this needs some control, but, especially when in the early stages, it will be worth the effort.

8. Accept Failures (and Learn!)

   Sometimes things go wrong. Mistakes happen. A manager who is prepared to appreciate this is likely to get the best support from their people. Especially when asking them to take some of the load on for delivery of the high standards they expect.

   Be generous when people make mistakes in their learning and enable them to appreciate it as just that - part of the learning experience - and gain additional value from it.

9. Praise a Job Well Done

   When managers delegate the work they would usually do themselves, it is a calculated risk. The people they choose to develop in this way, are moving forward with their skills and experience and becoming far more valuable in the workplace - as well as themselves getting much more from their work.

   Yet there is nothing an individual loves more than praise and ‘thank you’ for a job well done. It gives them a warm feeling of success and recognition and they are then ready for more!

10. Encourage Onward Delegation

    Finally, with the experience that they have been able to successfully take on a bigger role in the task they have delivered well, they can pass on this skill of being ‘upgraded’ to others they work with - so not only does the boss get a life, then their people start to as well.

This is not just about delegation. It is about developing a capable bunch of people who are enhancing their skills and releasing their own potential. It works in many ways, so that everyone, as well as the boss, is a winner.

Copyright 2005 Martin Haworth is a Business and Management Coach. He works worldwide, mainly by phone, with small business owners, executives and corporate leaders. He has hundreds of hints, tips and ideas at his website, http://www.coaching-businesses-to-success.com.
(Note to editors. Feel free to use this article, wherever you think it might be of value - it would be good if you could include a live link)

…helping you, to help your people, to help your business grow…

Widespread research suggests that people do not leave organizations; they leave their managers. The implication of this finding is that managers who are respected and seen as supportive of the people who work with them are indispensable to successful organizations. Without them, competent people may leave their current organization in search of better treatment. The resultant costs of recruitment, engagement and subsequent retention can be enormous. Less tangible are the indirect costs associated with the loss of corporate intelligence and the impact on morale.

I ask participants in management workshops to isolate the characteristics of individuals with whom they have worked who they deem to have been exceptional managers. Their answers seldom focus on the educational background or technical capabilities of those people. Instead they emphasize that exceptional managers are passionate, have vision, are caring, treat people supportively, make work fun, challenge people to be their best, provide lots of feedback, listen intently and encourage teamwork. Traditionally, these skills have been labelled, somewhat pejoratively, as the “soft skills”. The insinuation is that they are “touchy feely”, too mushy for the real world of work and, in some instances, even inappropriate in a “professional” environment. My experience contradicts this and supports the thoughts of Roger Enrico, former CEO and Chair of PepsiCo, who says that “the soft stuff is always harder than the hard stuff”.

Successful organizations must invest in developing the skills that are critical for the managers of their people to function effectively. What are they? For many years we have taught managers that they need to provide clear direction, to communicate better, to vary their management style to fit individuals’ level of development and to attempt to engage people in the pursuit of the organization’s raison d’tre. These skills have certainly helped managers to become more productive. But there is more…

In the mid to late 1990s the topic of emotional intelligence gained prominence in management literature. Research at Harvard suggested that emotional intelligence was at least four times as critical as a predictor of success as either IQ or technical skills. Another study at the Centre for Creative Leadership indicated that for successful managers, emotional intelligence is nearly five times as important as their IQ or technical skills.

Emotional intelligence is the ability to effectively perceive, manage and use one’s emotions and to effectively manage emotional connections with other people. While there are eleven components of emotional intelligence, I will only mention a few.

To maximize the contribution of our people and their talents, research into emotional intelligence says that we must support managers as they develop skills in a variety of areas. These include helping managers learn to: assess their strengths and weaknesses; manage their strong impulses; remain optimistic in spite of severe challenges; listen more effectively; become more adaptable to rapidly changing conditions; become more emotionally self-aware; and demonstrate empathy. Managers who refine these skills will be seen as more authentic by those they lead. The outcome will be more people who feel that they are respected and valued by their managers. Under these conditions, people are more likely to be fully engaged in their workplace and to contribute their maximum effort for their manager. They are also less likely to shop the market for other opportunities.

Undoubtedly, effective managers are indispensable to successful organizations

John Eckmire area of expertice is in CMC Training Sales Management Courses Communications, Delegation and Facilitation.

The benefit of running an annual employee survey has for a long time been widely accepted but many organizations have been put off by the amount of effort that is required.

Many organizations who have bit the bullet and conducted their own internal employee satisfaction surveys have often relied on word-processors to allow them to design and compile a survey, then gone through the effort of printing and distributing the survey and spent time chasing and collecting the completed surveys and then even more time transferring the survey response information into a meaningful management report.

Fortunately with the introduction of the Internet and hosted survey websites like www.surveygalaxy.com what was once a time consuming, resource hungry, long winded and cumbersome process is now slick, quick and easy.

This document provides a step by step guide to help implement a survey that will bring considerable benefits to any organization.

Step 1 - Identifying The Need

The reasons an organization would need a survey are as wide and they are long. Listed here are a few of the common reason why employee satisfaction surveys are conducted.

Event Driven

If your organization is about to embark, or is going through, a change management program employee surveys can assist in managing the change, measuring the effectiveness of the change, help to deliver a ‘message’ and gather valuable feedback throughout the change cycle.

For organizations that are experiencing rapid growth employee surveys can monitor internal communications and management structures to ensure that employees are aware of their reporting and management responsibilities.

Where an organization is suffering from poor moral brought on by either internal or external influences an employee survey can be used to identify the specific concerns of employees so those concerns can be properly addressed.

Where there is an increase in turnover of staff employee surveys can help an organization identify the underlying cause of employee unrest and through their findings help find solutions.

Periodically

As part of a periodic assessment, surveys will help an organization review their personnel and monitor on an individual level job satisfaction, training and career development.

Employee surveys also offer senior management the opportunity to look at the soft underbelly of their organization to confirm that their ‘top down’ view of the organization matches the reality and ‘bottom up’ perspective.

With the help of employee surveys an organization can establish good employer/employee communication that will in turn bring both direct and indirect benefits.

Step 2 - Management Buy-In

Management buy-in is always desirable for any initiative and many will argue that it is essential to ensure a successful employee survey, however, in some instances the findings of an employee survey can lead to kick-starting a management that has grown complacent and detached from their employees.

Some organization may be fortunate in that the senior management recognize and drive the need for employee surveys, while in others the management may need to first be convinced of the direct and indirect benefits an employee survey will bring.

The level of management commitment to an employee survey will have some bearing on the nature of the survey and to some extent will help determine what questions are to be asked and the manner they are asked.

A management that is supportive of the initiative may require feedback on specific areas of the business or they may give the go ahead because they feel confident that the results will only confirm that the level of employee satisfaction throughout the organization is high.

In nearly all cases it is good practice to at least try and get management to buy-in to the employee survey from the very start as they have a lot to gain and are in a position to effect any change that is later identified as being required.

Step 3 - Designing The Survey

Designing a good survey will take some time and effort but by following the basics of survey design and concentrating on the ‘need to know’ questions and removing the ‘nice to know’ a survey will rapidly take shape.

Determining the exact questions that should be asked will be entirely dependent on the individual organization, its structure and the previously identified primary need and objectives of the employee survey.

When considering what questions to ask consideration should be given to how the results are to be analyzed. For example there may be a desire to ask for individual comments but these types of answer formats can be very time consuming and cumbersome to analyze and should therefore be avoided or used sparingly.

With online surveys it is generally better to do a few smaller surveys than one very long survey as the longer the survey the higher the drop out rate will be.

Step 4 - Proof Reading And Testing

Grammar, Spelling And Clarity

Before publishing the survey make a careful check for spelling and typing mistakes and incorrect grammar. If available it is always better to have someone who has not been involved in designing the survey to proof read the survey with clean eyes, if no one is available try to take a break before checking through the survey again.

Say What You Mean And Mean What You Say

When checking the survey you need to consider the survey from the viewpoint of the respondent, you may know what you mean by each question but will the questions be clear to the employee?

Allow The Employee To Answer Truthfully

For closed questions where the employee will be required to choose from a number of available responses have you allowed the employee to answer accurately? Make use of responses like ‘Don’t know’, ‘No comment’ or ‘Not Applicable’ where you have made the question mandatory but the employee may not be able to answer.

Consider allowing the employee to include an ‘Other’ answer but also appreciate that ‘Other’ answers will add to the complexity when analyzing the survey results.

Don’t Require A Response To Questions That May Not Have One

Check that for any questions that you have made mandatory you do require an answer, for example open questions such as asking for additional comments should not be mandatory unless you definitely require the respondent to write a comment.

Check You Will Be Able To Analyze The Data

Check through the survey again but this time looking at how the results of the survey will be analyzed. Consider how you are likely to want to analyze the survey data, have you asked the right questions to be able to perform detailed analysis? For example if you wanted to view the detailed response data from the perspective of the different genders, or maybe departments, check you have asked the employee to indicate their own gender and/or department.

Don’t Ask Anymore Questions Than You Need To

Consider all the questions in the survey and look for questions that are not ‘need to know’.

Test The Link And Try Completing The Survey

Publish the survey and then send the survey’s link to a number of people who will be willing to test the survey. By completing the survey yourself you will get a feel for how the respondent will view the survey. From your own and others feedback stop and make adjustments to the survey as required.

Repeat this process until you are happy with the survey.

Check The Data

Take time to view the online summary results of the test data and confirm that the data is being collected in a manner that can be properly analyzed and that will give meaningful results.

Step 5 - Promoting And Deploying The Survey

Where all or the majority of employees have access to the internet or company intranet deploying the online survey is as easy that ABC, either via email or by establishing a link to the survey from your own website or Intranet.

Where there are some or many employees that do not have direct access to the internet there are a number of alternatives that can be used from issuing the survey in printed form, providing a shared terminal or giving them an incentive to complete the survey at home.

Anonymous Responses?

There is a choice to allow all surveys to be completed anonymously. Allowing a survey to be anonymous may encourage employees to speak their minds enabling the survey to provide ‘a warts and all’ report, in turn giving management an opportunity to address underlying problems before they become serious.

However, allowing anonymous comments also allows employees to be more cavalier and flippant with their responses. Some organizations would therefore only want to consider comments where employees are prepared to stand by their convictions and that will also provide an opportunity to follow up the specific concerns of individual employees.

The decision to allow anonymous responses or not will, among other factors, be down to the individual organization, the specific nature of the survey, the surrounding circumstances, the management style and the existing employer/employee relationship.

Step 6 - Monitoring The Survey

While the survey is in progress you will be able to view the summary results online and also monitor in real-time the number of surveys that have been both started and completed.

If after a few days the number of completed surveys falls short of the expected target it is advisable to send periodic reminders to employees asking them to complete the survey.

Step 7 - Analyzing The Results

There are no hard and fast rules for analyzing the data. Much depends on the individual survey, the questions asked and the number of responses.

Most surveys will benefit from many of the results being displayed in graphical as well as tabular form.

When first analyzing survey data often a number of ‘headline’ results will immediately stand out that will provide you with a general overview and, providing the right questions have been asked, give you an instant assessment of the mood throughout the organization as a whole.

Where the results give areas of concern a more detailed analysis may be advisable. For example if employees were asked if they felt the organization provided equal opportunities to both genders and 25% gave a negative response it would be useful to know the gender split of the organization and also to look at what the gender split was of the 25% that answered negatively. Was the negative view shared by employees of both genders, evenly spread throughout the organization, or of a particular gender from a particular department?

There is a method of reporting that presents the result data in tabular and/or graphical form allowing those who are interested in the results to view the raw data.

Often used as a compliment to the first, another method is to interpret the results and provide an analysis of the data and offer a view as to what the meaning is behind the results, what circumstances may have contributed to the results being as they are and, where the results indicate a negative, what initiatives could be taken. Such analysis if done by a single individual is likely to be very personal, if done by a committee it is still likely to be objective and therefore open to interpretation.

Step 8 - Further Action

Probably the most important step is the last. An employee survey will either confirm that the perfect organization exists or it will highlight areas that are less than perfect by identifying individual and common concerns.

It may be that further more detailed surveys are required that target specific areas. For example the survey may reveal that employees working in a particular department are collectively unhappy, but the reasons for their dissatisfaction may not be clear. A smaller, specifically targeted follow-up survey may help reveal the root causes.

When employee surveys are periodically run an organization that has taken steps to address issues will see their efforts reflected in subsequent survey responses. Almost all organizations have some problems and it helps an organization’s moral to see that a channel is available that will allow problems to be highlighted, addressed and resolved.

Summary

These guidelines are intended to help an organization conduct successful employee satisfaction surveys, they are however, only a guide.

Each organization is different in style and structure and the organizations ‘personality’ will go someway to influencing the tone and nature of the survey and organizations will have many different circumstances and primary reasons for conducting a survey.

By utilizing existing technology and conducting surveys online you are now able to monitor the heart beat of an organization, quickly, easily and, by using websites like Survey Galaxy, at minimal cost.

Martin Day is a Director of Survey Galaxy Ltd a web site that allows anyone to create, design and publish online surveys. For more information or for assistance in conducting your own employee satisfaction surveys please visit http://www.surveygalaxy.com

Are you satisfied when your business achieves average results? If you could be the “best” in your industry, but the industry only realizes average results, would you be satisfied with that? If your answer to either of these questions is “yes,” don’t waste your time reading more of this; if the answer is no, at least look at this example.

In 1960 the Soviet Union shocked the world by putting Yuri Gagarin into orbit around the earth. Then they did it again eight months later. The United States’ anemic response was to put Alan Shepard into a sub-orbital flight in 1961 and to put John Glenn into orbit in 1962. We were seriously behind in the space race. Then in 1962 President John Kennedy announced that the United States would “put a man on the moon by the end of this decade and return him safely to the earth.”

But, here’s the most startling thing about that announcement - we had no idea how we were going to do it! We hadn’t built a space capsule that would make the trip. We didn’t have a rocket big enough to get the capsule into earth orbit, let alone send it to the moon. We had never docked two things together in space. No human being had ever walked in space. We had never orbited anything around the moon - we hadn’t even crashed anything into it.

All of these tasks had to be mastered before we could be successful and we hadn’t done any of them. And yet here was the President of the United States proclaiming that we were going to get to the moon in less than eight years. Kennedy has been applauded by history for the vision and the strategic thinking he showed in setting this national objective. But it was also a “stretch” goal, if there ever was one; and that’s not the way most businesses work in the real world.

Before we get into stretch goals, however, let’s put something on the table - they are not for everyone. The real issue for any business is why bother with them at all - why do you need the aggravation of being on the cutting edge? What’s so bad about being “average” - especially if you’re comfortable, making the living that you want to make, and leading the life you want to live? So here’s the second opportunity to stop reading; if being average is where you are, the rest of this is probably not going to impress you much.

Most businesses are very “incremental” about what they do. Businesses managers look back at what they’ve accomplished over the past few years, make a quick assessment of the way the economy looks, and say to themselves “5% seems about right.” It’s hard to break old habits. Going for stretch goals normally involves taking risks and we’ve conditioned ourselves to avoid that, unless we are sitting on a “burning platform” and the risk of following the path we’ve always been on is obviously greater than the risk of doing something different

But, here’s the problem with being incremental - there is always someone else “out there” who sets the curve, who redefines the way your business is being done, and who has an idea that shakes things up. You may not even know it’s happening;”the landscape is littered with businesses and industries that “didn’t see it coming.” So, while you are sending the message to your people that they can perform at the same comfortable, do-able, non-threatening pace that they always have, someone else is doing a better job and setting you up for a broadside that you may not see coming until it’s too late.

Don’t tell yourself this is a “big company” problem - it has nothing to do with size. Smaller businesses fail every day, because they became too comfortable with what was going on around them and didn’t look down the road. Small business owners and managers are no less prone to freezing up in the face of change than large corporate managers. Too many times, when changing the strategic focus, or creating a new product line, or moving to another location, or taking some other bold step was the “right” answer, small businesses ended up failing, because they kept doing the same things instead.

A stretch goal is something that you’ve never done before and that you don’t know how you’re going to accomplish. It’s new, it’s different, it’s radical, it’s hard - maybe it’s always been considered “impossible.” Like going to the moon, you think it can be done, but you don’t know how you’re going to do it. Sometimes you can’t prove to others that it can be done by pointing to someone else who has done it before - because it hasn’t been done before. And, even it has been done by someone else, it hasn’t been done by you!

So, again, why bother with stretch goals; because very few businesses set them, fewer still actually achieve them and they are a way to differentiate your business and create real competitive advantage. It’s human nature to want to take the path of least resistance and challenging your business with a culture of stretch goals is difficult. If you are facing a crisis, it’s easier - you either stretch, or you fail. If the platform is not burning, though, and the crisis is either not staring you in the face, or is far enough over the horizon to not worry about - it’s hard to get people’s attention!

Achieving stretch goals doesn’t happen without someone leading the process; too much change has to take place and change never happens without someone making it happen. But, when you lead by setting and achieving stretch goals, the people you are leading can be happier for two reasons - your company is a lot more of an interesting place to work and they’ll feel as though they made a contribution and are part of something. Those two benefits are a lot more important in the long run than paying your people a few bucks more.

The power of stretch goals is that they force you and everyone in your business to reorient themselves and to think differently. They force you to work backwards from the goals you have set and to think about what you have to do to achieve them. You can’t just do things the same way that you’ve always done them. It’s not a linear progression of just doing the same thing, but doing more of it to succeed. You have to think about every facet of your processes and determine what has to be done differently to achieve your goals.

Take a few minutes and think through a real stretch goal for your own business - 50% sales growth for the next three years, a 25% increase in your margin, a significant geographic, or product expansion, doubling your inventory turnover - anything that is difficult and that some people would say can’t be done. Now work backwards from that goal and think through all the things you would have to change to make it happen.

In the end, what you are really after is a culture for your business that separates it from the pack and that gives you an edge that others can’t find. Having a stretch goal mentality will help you get there. It’s not going to be painless and it’s not going to happen over night; but, when you work toward creating an environment where people think in terms of what could happen, instead of what always does happen, you’ve accomplished something that most companies never even think of, let alone do!

About The Author:
Jim Deyo is the President of Business Advisor Online, an internet based service that provides small businesses with the ideas they need to grow and the resources they require to make the right decisions. As a former Sr. Vice President with a major banking institution, Jim worked extensively with small and medium sized companies and has over 30 years experience in commercial and consumer lending, accounting, finance, marketing, and strategic planning. Visit the website at http://www.businessadvisoronline.com and sign up for a six week free trial of the service, or e-mail Jim at jimdeyo@businessadvisoronline.com.