There was a time when people bought products and did not care from whom they bought them. But our attention has shifted from the package in o ur hands to the identity of the company that put it there. We care now, for example, if the company is a good corporate citizen, how it treats workers, and what impact it has on our environment.

This sea of change is leading us to a potentially radically different world. Our corporate battle has transformed from contentions about resources and price into wars of identity. Are you an Apple or Microsoft person? Are you a Starbucks or Dunkin’ Donuts person? Are you a Whole Foods or Pathmark person?

Corporations face the same struggles that the military has faced for years the “war of identity.” For about a decade, military thinkers have been exploring the role of identity in determining the outcome of conflicts. Why are our conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan persisting? How does a band of unorganized individuals, without matching uniforms or even a place to meet, challenge our large, well-orchestrated military machine?

Maybe it’s because our military is having an identity crisis. A combination of Abu Ghraib Prison photos, Blackwater mercenaries, and a serious language and cultural gap has distorted the reality of these missions. But in a world where perception is everything, no one is immune to falling ill from a damaged identity.

Stories Build Identities

There are numerous books about the use of storytelling in business, but most address the way stories are used in marketing goods and services. This topic is different. It is about competition and the tangible role that a story plays in creating a competitive advantage.

Last month I spoke with Michael Vlahos, author of “Fighting Identity: Sacred War and World Change” and one of the world’s leading gurus of this emerging focus on identities. What he shared, in simplified terms, was that:

1.     Identity drives conflict: Was the U.S. Civil War really about principles of governance or was it about northern vs. southern? Is the Microsoft-Apple competition really about software or about their respective identities?

2.     Narratives drive identity: The story you tell about yourself and your company shows how you got here, why you are right, and where you are going. Stories are the vessels of our identities.

3.     Competition is often won or lost by the narratives’ leaders’ spin.

By Kaihan Krippendorff

Want to know more? email Leigh

Attitude is Everything!

You hold the power to change your reality… The source of your attitude is your philosophy or rather how you view life and yourself.  If you want to change certain parts of your life, take a look at yourself first!

What we think of ourselves has a tremendous effect on our lives.  Fill your head with negative thoughts, and you will probably be a negative person.  Keep a positive attitude, and you will most probably have positive things happen to you.  It’s your choice, and while it may seem like a simple one to make, it can have powerful results.  Give it a go – get rid of that negative self talk and see what happens.

Passion & Drive

Passion and drive are learned behaviour traits.  Children can be taught passion and drive that will cause them to excel.  However, it is extremely difficult to put passion and drive into an adult’s life once they are past about thirty five years of age, but you can still change your attitude…

Passion is a tiny flame that can be quenched early on or fanned by someone with vision – someone who looks past what is to what could be…   Passion comes through in all your dealing at work, at home and in the community.  Buyers are keen to work with people who are authentically passionate about their product and service – it is infectious.

Are you a visionary for your staff , community or family  – can you fan that flame??

Sometimes it’s easy to complicate things.

And sometimes it’s also easy to look for a silver bullet – to think that someone else has a solution to your problems or a secret formula for success. To put your business in the hands of an expert, to leave it to them and your business magically leaps forward.

That is so tempting to believe that will make everything all work out.

It’s so easy to forget that no one knows your business like you, that business solutions are right under your nose, that you have insights and skills that leave the “professionals” in your dust. You might even have experienced this yourself, by hiring a consultant, bristling with solutions, case studies and great business credentials, who actually doesn’t add any value to your business at all.

I’ve just seen a couple of cases where clients didn’t have enough faith  in themselves to implement some solutions.  They sourced a well recommended consultant and then left them to it.  The result?  The unsupervised consultant produced a result that threw the baby out with the bath water – creating a solution that had nothing to do with the company vision or values.  The business owners had to unravel his work and do it all by themselves, losing time and money in the process.

You know, sometimes it’s great to remember that business is really more about art than science. That business is done by the people who just go and do the business, not by the people who anal-yse how they did it. That the so-called expert may be great at talking theory, but lousy at execution.

Maybe it’s time to take some credit for knowing about your business and start looking for some of your answers from within. Not just within yourself, but within your staff, within your customers and within your suppliers. There are answers everywhere.

It’s more art than science.

Let us know about some of your artful business thinking or some of your experiences with consultants!

Innovation is not a task or project you do offsite.  It is a constant mindset and perspective.  It’s a way of looking at the world. Instead of seeing what is, it is looking for what could be.  Being an innovator is seeking the greater potential in every person, in every situation, process, experience or outcome.  The fundamental desire of an innovator is to help, serve and solve.

You know you should be doing it, but are you? Some companies reinvent their products and services, just to stay ahead of their competitors. You might be despairing and think it’s complicated and that only a certain talented group of people called: “Innovators” can do it, but the good news is that everyone can innovate.

Innovation comes from a study of people, how they live, what they want & what they need.  Innovation is constantly finding more ways to add value to the lives of others.  Innovation is not coming up with the ideas (that is creative), you have to be the one who implements ideas.

You can be a better innovator in your business by using your vision, your values and your passion as a focus to improve your products  or services. Regularly looking at your business through these lens not only aligns your product and service to your marketing, but also helps you create products and services of unique advantages.

What was the last innovation you implemented?  Are you willing to dust off any remaining complacency you might have and start looking to improve and innovate your products and services?

MAY 2010 • Christopher Davie, Tom Stephenson, and Maria Valdivieso de Uster

Source: Marketing & Sales Practice

The way businesses buy from and sell to each other is changing. While some trends were emerging before the recession, the downturn has accelerated their adoption to create a very different business-to-business (B2B) sales environment. To find out how the B2B sales world has changed, we went directly to our clients, interviewing senior sales executives who are collectively responsible for more than $150 billion in sales, as well as buyers, at leading global companies across a range of industries.

Our clients identified three primary trends that will demand a place on the agendas of B2B sales organizations over the next three to five years. These trends are rapidly dominating the B2B landscape as both customers and vendors seek to maximize returns and minimize costs.

First, customers have become more demanding, insisting on both off-the-shelf products and more complex, customized solutions—with different levels of sales support. Companies accustomed to selling products and walking away are being forced to prove how they add real value.

Second, companies servicing larger managed accounts are exploring lower-cost ways to make clients happier and to generate sales growth.

Finally, organizations large and small are following the lead of business-to-consumer (B2C) retailers such as Amazon.com by making smarter use of customer data to predict behavior, drive sales, and deepen relationships.

Which one are you going to do something about today?

Modern day Machiavelli  Dr. William Horton, author of Mind Control, keynoted the “Taipan: Making of Asian Giants” program this week in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. After showing various debate clips featuring Presidents Reagan, Bush, Clinton, and Obama, he outlined five techniques for winning over (manipulating!) the masses:

1. Encourage their dreams
2. Justify their failures
3. Allay their fears
4. Confirm their suspicions
5. Create a common enemy

So this is how it’s done — cold and calculating. We’re so predictable. Keep this list handy.

Be alert.

Sharks and other predators rely on surprise when they attack.

They capitalize on the 15 second shock that people go into when attacked out of nowhere.

People (Prey) in shock are much easier to manage than an alert person ready to defend themselves.

If they see you are alert and aware of their presence in their vicinity, they are less likely to attack.

So, raise your level of alertness. Continually scan for predators. Don’t take your safety and security for granted.

Above the door of every Returned Serviceman League (the Australian RSA equivalent) is the saying:

“The price of freedom is eternal vigilance!”

Where in your life, can you be more alert?

I know it’s risky, but there are times you have to swim with sharks.

The first lesson about swimming with sharks is that a shark won’t attack you if you are both working toward common objectives.

If you are helping them achieve what they want, you have relative safety for the period of that project.

Before you attempt to swim with them, think carefully about your purpose and objective in the project as well as their purpose and objectives.  In particular, find out what’s really important to them about the project….and help them achieve that.

Keep clear in your mind about all of these purposes and objectives while swimming with them.

Have several exit strategies worked out so you can move quickly if you have to.

At the end of the project, take the lead from the male black widow spider:

Get out of their reach as quick as you can!

The Polish national and international community has united in grief to mourn the tragic death of Poland’s president Lech Kaczynski.

Mr Kaczynski and his wife, Maria, were killed in a plane crash along with dozens of senior figures from the Polish government and military.

Among the dead were Poland’s army chief of staff, the navy chief commander and heads of the air and land forces, central bank governor, MPs and leading historians.

Many are questioning why the government allowed so many important, valuable and senior figures to all travel on the one plane. This is a significant loss of Polish brains trust.

If you are an investor, it’s foolish for you to put all your eggs in one basket…
If you are a business owner, it’s unwise to have all your income come from one source….
If you are married and in love, it’s crazy to cut off all your friends and family and focus on the one….
If you are single, putting all your efforts in one club puts you at a disadvantage….
If you are learning at a school, you limit yourself if you only read the recommended texts….
If you have a family and only relate to one or two of your relatives, you are missing out on part of who you are….

But we all do it – put all our winnings and bet it on one horse. How can we take responsibility for the risks of life and protect our valuable assets?

What can you learn from this tragedy?

What areas of your life are you having all your eggs in one basket?

What can you do to spread the risk?

Your Network is your Net Worth

Harvey MacKay’s Moral:

I had to name a single characteristic shared by all the successful people I’ve met over a lifetime, I’d say it is the ability to create and nurture a network of contacts.

Being part of a business community gives you the opportunity to contribute, build meaningful and valuable relationships and friendships.  This week we have lost a friend like this to cancer – they passed away in a hospital and the amazing thing was that we and a bunch of our business networking club have been with her through her battle over the last 12 months and were there when she passed away.  What does that say about the quality of relationships you can have through creating and nurturing a network of contacts?

What are you doing in your network of contacts that builds friendships like that – quality over quantity?

What are you doing to nurture and grow your network?

Are you fishing in the right pond?

Where can you learn the skills of networking?