Click here to view the video on YouTube.

So following in from my post last week “Leadership, Or that sinking feeling”, this little gem from Peter Irvine is one of my favorites.

Peter Irvine’s insight on how to work with staff and address all those prickly issues is crystal clear, formed undoubtedly from having to deal with over 200 latte drinking prima donna’s at a large advertising agency. (Wow – there’s an opportunity there for a reality TV show if I ever saw one.)

David’s original question was actually about the culture of Gloria Jeans, and Peter’s answer is alone the lines of a family. But of course every family has it’s bad apple – and David rightly asks the question – how do you pluck it from the tree?

Would you be so offended if I asked you to watch the video? I really can’t add anything to his wisdom – it’s top class.

Click here to view the video on YouTube.

This is a short follow on from my ‘Good Vibrations’ post and it’s about coming back to basics. What kind of qualities are you going to need to have in order to have staff stick around and for you to create the kind of culture or ‘vibe’ you want in your business? Peter’s summary is terrific.

If the boss is consistent = he/she is approachable.
If the boss is moody = he/she is unapproachable.
Yelling at staff leads to staff not taking risks & making decisions.
Staff not taking risks/making decisions leads to decisions being left to the boss.
Decisions being left to the boss leads to the boss micromanaging.
This all causes stagnation. And makes for one of those nasty situations where staff turnover is through the roof and the boss is a stressed out nutjob.
Yuk. No thanks. Watch the video – don’t be a tool.

Click here to view the video on YouTube.

When Jess Logan explains marketing it must be something like Einstein explaining the universe. She can boil the art of branding down to a few very fundamental rules that always work. As Jess explains in this video, for branding to be effective it must start and finish by listening to the consumer – by conducting proper research.

You know the remarkable thing? If you work on a campaign for almost any big brand you may think that listening is illegal. As if the customer should be seen and not heard. And after all – research is expensive and doesn’t sell anything. So why waste time on it right?  As a part of my business we produce video for brand campaigns we’re often a part of this very flawed practise. We invent ways to talk to people we have never met and will never talk to. It’s absurd, but heaven forbid I recommend taking some of our budget and spending it on research!

We almost never hear about what the customers think about the campaign … and who cares really? If it didn’t work there are so many pieces of the puzzle that the brand manager will usually be able to find something or somebody else to blame.

So what’s the point of what Jess is saying? Put simply, the customer knows your business best but few take the time and money to listen.

If you can take the initiative, listen to the customer, give them the credit for knowing your business better than you do, there is the potential reward of being able to meet their needs with a refined product. That creates a brand that resonates and gains loyal and devoted customers. Sounds win win to me!

“What are you doing about this in your own business Geoff?” I hear a few of you ask? Good question and please feel free to press me for an answer. It’s a work in progress!

Click here to view the video on YouTube.

Setting the vision mission and values for a business isn’t an easy task. I start to feel like I’m preaching when I start saying how I believe staff should think and feel and what their values should be – so I take my hat off to somebody like Peter Irvine who seems to be able to do just that but in a way that’s diplomatic. What Peter explains in this video I see as crucial for a business. It’s essential knowledge to be able to take control of the kind of ‘vibe’ your business has and to hiring the type of people who will keep that desired ‘vibe’ going and who you will look forward to working with every day of the week. It’s the difference between your business still being the kind of business you want to be involved in after you’ve hired staff member number 20 (or opened your 12th store). It’s the difference between when you, as the boss with the big personality, were the only one in the business, but now your just one of 50 can no longer set the culture for the business.

So what do you do at this point?  Peter’s had plenty of time to work it out – and I love he’s ideas on this topic.

Vision, mission and values. Peter is completely unashamed in presenting these right up front to franchisees, staff and suppliers – with no apologies and with an approach that is anything but ‘softly softly’. For Peter they are not just a series of slogans hung on the wall of the hallway between the boardroom and the toilet, in the hope that the latest recruit will somehow absorb them in while popping out for lunch. The core business principles are put right in your face. Like it? Then join the business with confidence. Don’t agree? Then better to find out now than later.

And that’s half the solution right there!

From there Peter believes you can work as partners to build the business. That’s an art in itself, but most likely a bit easier now that it has already been established that everybody is on the same page. Better to risk offending people right up front than to waist time and effort trying to get along once they’re on board and heading in he wrong direction.

Click here to view the video on YouTube.

We take the cafe culture for granted in Australia. Greek and Italian cafes that served espresso had a presence on the streets of Melbourne and Sydney since the 1930s but it’s not until more recent times that coffee drinking has gone mainstream. Now it seems that we are picking up a coffee on the way to work, meeting clients at a cafe mid-morning and then we’re back again for a long black after lunch. You could argue that Gloria Jean’s was a key player in brining espresso to the masses. I was one of them. Before 1996 I’d never heard of going to a cafe as a social ‘thing to do’. I’m pretty sure that back then all Australian’s just went to the pub – right?

When you look at the success of Gloria Jean’s Coffees in Australia it’s interesting to find out that their evolution from a mediocre coffee merchandise store in America to the now prominent coffee-house franchise, was driven by the search for profitability and a model for expansion. It’s a pretty gutsy move to try and find a way forward when the initial business idea doesn’t actually work, not to mention trying to translate a company to a new country. I can only imagine that for Peter and his business partner it would have been a nail biting experience in those formative years!

The question it poses for you business owners out there is ‘how willing would you be to re-invent your entire business model – in order to make it profitable?’ For any business this is an extreme move. However many will have to contend with this reality in the face of technical overhaul in the way customers socialise, do business, purchase products and go about their daily lives. Just today I read in the newspaper that the DVD-store industry in Australia has been given a life expectancy of three more years. Take that sizeable overdue fees! I’ll soon be a free man. Although after that I’ll likely need a credit card or Paypal to rent movies online – then there will be no hiding.

It’s not just video stores. You only have to listen to Jerry Harvey winging about online stores to start to realise that the retail industry in general is taking a beating. These are two more extreme examples but in most scenarios I’d say business owners have to be ready to take action in the changing environment of technological revolution. You might have a working model today, but you have to be ready to re-invent it tomorrow.

It’s risky, but there is also the potential for great reward. And the comfort we can take from Peter’s story is that it can be done.

Click here to view the video on YouTube.

So here I am having a coffee at the Tropicana up at the cross (Sydney Australia for the international folk out there), watching Domenic’s videos back and thinking that perhaps, just perhaps I’m a bit too GenY for my own good.

The idea of business mentors makes me start yawning!  I imagine a meeting at a cafe with some boring business guy who’s yapping on with business principles, cliches and peppy one-liners. It would be as bland as chewing on the cardboard cup my coffee came in. Domenic Carosa however, the one of of the two of us who’s grown the crazy hundred-million-dollar-business, perhaps has a more valid opinion on this. You see, I managed to learn almost everything I needed to know about running my type of company from running a similar one owned by someone else. Hence when I set up my own show I had a pretty good feel for how it should look, feel and operate. But the business is at a point where we are looking towards becoming a larger company – that’s where my experience ends. This is where my tried and tested business initiative starts to run dry. So then, perhaps it’s time for me to find a mentor or two. It’s either that or learn by making costly and stupid mistakes.

Let’s hope they have some good coffee.

Click here to view the video on YouTube.

Jess Logan is one of the smartest marketers around and she has an incredible track record to back it up. I’m not talking about an incredible showreel of expensive ads, I’m taking about a long list of companies who owe their size and stature to her thinking, branding and balls.

Let me explain.

In this video Jess talks about her two golden rules: #1 measure and #2 don’t lie. She explains that the first is basic. If you don’t measure what effect your marketing efforts are having it’s like talking to somebody whilst having ear muffs on. Worse actually – it’s like having ear muffs on and your eyes shut. Take yourself for example. I’m assuming you’re a normal human and you adjust your tone and what you’re saying according to how your listener is reacting. If they’re smiling and nodding – that’s good. You’d continue confidently. If they’re frowning and clenching their fists you’d probably stop and perhaps ask if you’ve offended them. You would almost certainly change your approach for fear that you were on track to get a fist in the face.

Now to rule #2 – don’t lie. I know that most marketing embellishes the truth at best and at worst is a complete fabrication. Just watch most Coca-Cola ads and you’ll get a rough idea of what I mean. A company should back up their marketing claims with solid product and service. This is what gives branding efforts longevity.

And this leads to my assertion that good marketing requires balls. Why?

Put bluntly when Jess loses a client it’s unlikely due to a lack of results. It’s most probably because she’s offended them or kicked them to the kerb. She’s more comfortable with annoying senior management, than to put advertising into market that doesn’t work. You need courage to say to senior management that you’re more interested in what the customer has to say than what they have to say.  And to follow that up with telling them that their service and product isn’t up to standard. Insisting that the message being broadcast must be backed up by the product and service is a great way to have a fight with the boss. To say ‘get it right or fire me’ – that takes balls.

Click here to view the video on YouTube.

And speaking of balls (if you missed my last post check it out above) I love this video. When the entire company is in full agreement – you get amazing results that are worth talking about

(and excuse David’s brain fail: bull = balls? Awkward!).

I’m going to see if I can get some sort of video that shows the Boost Juice story – great stuff.

Click here to view the video on YouTube.

Several years ago I had the, er … pleasure … of pitching in a business idea to Domenic Carosa . It was the kind of pleasure you get watching a building demolished with explosives but then realise it’s your building that is imploding. He systematically dismantled my business idea in 15 minutes flat (in less time then I could drink my coffee – and not just because he talks incredibly fast.) Now, don’t get me wrong this wasn’t a fleeting idea I’d just come up with. My well thought-though concept had been developed over 4 or 5 months with the input from some very clever (and successful) contributors and had some rocking technology at its cornerstone.

It was in this frame of mind in which I approached Domenic. You’ll be pleased to know that what Domenic talks about in this video he practises himself – thoroughly. It wasn’t’ so much that he was shooting holes in my proposition but he was just effortlessly pointing them out. He made the flaws so clear that it surprised me that others had failed to point them out before. That’s where it became obvious that was the the biggest believer of my own hype. I’d successfully sold myself on an idea, and forgotten to go and ask a bunch of my potential customers what they thought.

Click here to view the video on YouTube.

The most important part of the entire process is what Domenic says in his last three words of the video. If you miss doing this – don’t’ even pretend you’ve been through the process. So what became of my business proposition I was pitching to Domenic? We ended up shelving it without having lost any money.  For that I owe Domenic a lot more than the cost of his coffee that’s for sure!

Click here to view the video on YouTube.

Domenic Carosa’s story of his life in business is incredible by any standards. Surely he was born with an entrepreneurial spirit. I doubt it was his mum’s idea that he should start a business to fund his fondness for lollies – especially at the tender age of five years old. Fast forward 20 years and he was running a company with revenues of an astounding nine figures. Yes folks, over $100 million. That’s a crap-load of candy. He became Australia’s youngest ever CEO of a public company and it’s reasonable to suggest that the man has a gift and that he’s probably uncovered a few tricks to the trade along the way. (Lucky for you I’ve asked him to share them with us but we’ll get that another day.)

I’ve watched Domenic deliver talks, sit on panels, I’ve watched his television interviews and even interviewed him myself. As far as I can tell, we’ve all missed the catalyst of his success – how superhumanly hard Domenic works. A former flatmate of his said that Domenic was hardly ever home, never slept, was constantly thinking, working and engaged. Everybody who knows him seems to echo a simliar report – the guy works like a man possessed.

From where I sit it has become pretty clear that for Domenic it’s a potent mixture of all the smart stuff he’s learnt over the years mixed with his incredible work ethic that has yielded the results. Thomas Jefferson said “I’m a great believer in luck, and I find the harder I work the more I have of it.” Domenic Carosa seems to abide by this principle – simply sets himself an incredible goal and then works his arse off to achieve it.