John Manning's Blog, page 3

Communication Clarity: Transforming Workplace Chaos into Collaboration

Are you finding your employees aren’t meeting expectations? Do they bombard you with questions about their duties or roles, asking things you think they should understand because—at least to you—the answers seem obvious? Or are they failing to hit goals and not following through on certain aspects of their jobs?

If you answered “yes” to any of these questions, there’s a real chance your people don’t fully understand what’s expected of them. They may want to get work done and stick to a plan, but...

Workplace Culture: Is Your Personal Development Approach Old-School?

There’s no question that personal development within your workplace culture can give your organization a competitive edge. But what happens if the approach you’ve chosen to evolve and maximize the potential of your people is old-school, ineffective or – no shame here – currently nonexistent?

A lack of or absence of the right personal development strategies can surface serious issues—things like knowledge gaps, low employee morale, productivity slumps/inconsistencies, legal issues, staff hiring a...

Company Culture & Professional Development: Does Your Organization Walk Its Talk?

Many companies list professional development as a benefit in their job postings and as part of their strategy for attracting great hires, building a growth-centric culture, and driving results-oriented performance. But, how often have you heard of an organization marketing this value or benefit, then failing to fulfill promises around it?

In and of itself, professional development—and what it looks and feels like—can vary significantly from organization to organization. For one company, it could...

The Keystone to Leadership: Cultivate Personal Accountability

When it comes to solid leadership, personal accountability stands as the bedrock upon which successful organizations are built. It is the guiding principle that shapes not only individual behavior, but also sets the tone for your organization’s culture and performance. At MAP, we understand that in today’s dynamic and competitive business landscape, leaders who embrace personal accountability propel their teams and organizations toward unprecedented success. They achieve breakthrough results fas...

Are You an Overextended Leader? Up Personal Accountability to Downplay the Angst.

There are a lot of reasons why today’s leaders—even very good ones—find themselves struggling with accountability. In our experience having coached more than 170,000 leaders since 1960, we’ve noticed that one of the biggest reasons relates to leaders overextending themselves.

On the surface, these executives may appear to have things under control. Profits might be strong, and business may be booming. But upon further examination, you’ll often find these leaders working double-time to maintain p...

Money Matters: Key Strategies for Building Fiscal Accountability

As a business owner, part of your job is understanding the organization’s financials. While it may not be your strong suit and you may lean regularly on your CFO for support, a solid understanding is required for driving this key indicator of business health.

That said, your team of direct reports, not to mention all your other staff, may not have a decent grasp of the numbers–what they are, how they’re measured, and what they mean in the context of total business health. You may wonder, does th...

Connecting the Fiscal Puzzle: Achieving Accountability Piece by Piece

There are a lot of factors that go into the fiscal health of an organization. Like some gigantic puzzle, if you’re even missing just a piece—let alone a number of pieces—the picture doesn’t look right. But we’re just talking puzzles and pictures here. No big deal, right?

Wrong. It can be a really big deal because, if your fiscal process and the elements that support it are missing or performing poorly, such shortcomings can wreak havoc on other systems within your organization and put the entire...

Navigating Leadership Accountability: Assessing the Current State of Business

For many organizations and their leaders, a new year and the first quarter almost always provide the opportunity to put a fresh focus on navigating the future and ensuring greater, sustainable success. At the helm, you may already be exploring this topic with your leadership team, direct reports and any key company stakeholders, asking things like “Where do we want to be at the end of this year?” and “What’s our vision of success?”

While fielding those questions is important from a goal...

Three Steps to Effective Strategic Planning That Creates Business Growth

Have you recently refined the vision for your business but aren’t sure of how to turn that vision into a reality? Or, have you maybe got a clear vision but feel your organization is not fully aligned with, activated around, or accountable to it?

You’re not alone. Lots of organizations—despite annual strategic planning—operate in the dark, not knowing or fully understanding what the vision of their organization is or, if they do know it, what goals and strategies are going to make that v...

Productivity Trends & Pointers: Know What’s Happening and How to Respond This Year

Taking a look at various leadership and business trend reports, there’s a lot of hype this year around leadership feeling burned out, particularly managers, who are the vital link between top leaders and all the other team players in the trenches. So the question begs, if managers are feeling squeezed and stressed, how does that affect productivity?

Productivity can’t thrive in a culture that doesn’t feel engaged. It suffers when there’s low morale and when leaders and managers are burn...