Spring 2018
PROVOKING THOUGHT GENERATING DISCUSSION ENGAGING EMPLOYEES DELIVERING RESULTS
London (via Edinburgh) 399 miles
Edinburgh 202 miles London 197 mile s Welcome to York
Taking stock and looking ahead
Study the past if you would define the future. Confucius
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Ian Barrow, Client Services Director
Paul Jones, Senior Engagement Consultant
S
pring brings with it a fresh start: new ideas, new events and new destinations.
Richmond Events will start 2018 as it means to go on, with bigger and better ideas than ever before.
Richmond Events’ business cruises are starting their new year ashore, after weighing anchor on the conferences aboard the Arcadia and Aurora. The innovation and quality of thinking that has accompanied Richmond Events symposia for decades will continue with the sense of purpose, fresh motivation and gusto that comes with a new year.
Karian and Box will also be present and will provide the Thinktank sessions at these conferences, covering critical issues and high-level case studies in our ThinkBites series.
Richmond Events will be hosting a number of forums throughout 2018, as you will see later in this issue, with keynote speakers giving delegates the intellectual stimulus and opportunity they need to plan their next steps and help their business grow in 2018.
So, we too, will start as we mean to go on – by wrapping up 2017 with a bumper issue of all the best articles and ideas from ThinkBites 2017, we will help to pave the way for 2018 and all that it brings in the world of business.
Karian and Box in association with Richmond Events
David Clark, Project Manager Contributors: Ian Barrow, Paul Jones, Lavinia Taylor, Heather Corbett, Ed Clews, Liam Quinn
David Clark, Project Manager dclark@richmondevents.com 020 8487 2203 Liam Quinn, Project Director lquinn@richmondevents.com 020 8487 2250
Karian and Box 1st Floor, 22 Lendal, York, YO1 8AA 01904 654454 info@karianandbox.com www.karianandbox.com
www.richmondevents.com
Liam Quinn, Project Director
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Power to the people How to meet ever-increasing expectations of empowerment
I
How to overcome the obstacles When to empower – and when not to For many roles in certain sectors, radical employee empowerment just isn’t practical. Where safety is king – on trains and planes, oil rigs and the production line – empowerment will always face necessary limits. Likewise, there will be clear restrictions on the extent to which, say, frontline retail customer advisors can be empowered to make on-the-spot decisions about pricing and refunds in an industry with tight margins. Boundaries of empowerment must be clear, so expectations are realistic. When employees can’t be fully empowered, employee voice must be a credible alternative, with an effective and wellcommunicated loop between listening and action.
Empowerment and engagement across the sectors Headless chickens
Make-it-happen intrapreneurs Pharma
Retail
Empowerment
n an age of democratic expression and social power, people (especially millennials and Gen Z) believe more than ever before in their right to a voice and to customise every aspect of their life. Work is no different. Organisations that succeed in attracting and retaining the best talent in the future will be able to meet these expectations to improve and extend core business activity through employee activism.
Food and Beverage
Insurance Financial Services
Telecomms Manufacturing Chemicals
Impotent disengaged
Frustrated advocates
Engagement Unsurprisingly, compliance and safety–dominated sectors like chemicals, manufacturing and financial services are the least empowered.
C ritically, these sectors also have lower levels of engagement, underscoring the positive correlation between (perceived) empowerment and engagement.
P erhaps surprising is the dominance of pharma businesses – indicating that engaged empowerment is possible even in an industry with staunch rules.
Source: Karian and Box research with 500,000 employees benchmarked across multiple leading UK and global brands.
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From the Build issue
Build trust first You can’t start with empowerment, you have to start with trust. Leaders must trust employees to make the right calls and treat the business’s money as if it’s their own before they can empower them. Equally, employees must trust they won’t face recriminations for making mistakes. That means you need to estimate your tolerance for risk before the empowerment rules can be established. It’s a tricky proposition in compliancedriven sectors like financial services, but we’ve seen major players like HSBC use empowerment to keep pace with the innovation of fintech challengers.
Engage and educate managers One of the biggest blockers to redistributing power in an organisation is the people who already hold that power. For managers and leaders who use power to achieve performance and thrive on the personal status of authority, empowerment can feel like a threat. Education is key for this population. Education that highlights the changing expectations of a workforce whose majority will be made up of millennials. Education that shows the real benefits of empowerment in driving innovation. Above all, education that underlines how empowerment will actually make the job of leading easier by improving employee motivation and performance.
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Avoiding a shipwreck: top tips on change comms Conversations at The Communication Directors’ Forum saw leading professionals share their hard-won experience of implementing change programmes successfully in the real world. These top tips are the success factors that make a real difference in engaging employees on change – especially now change is business-as-usual for so many of us. Involve people meaningfully in the process
Have a Y-fronts comms policy: put the ‘Why’ up front he ‘why’ is so much more important T than the ‘what’ and is key to winning over employees – both through underlining the business benefit and painting a picture of what a better future will look like for the business. ake sure all comms focus on this M rationale first – and pre-empt the sceptical arguments that might undermine your argument in the business by considering carefully where people are right now.
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Get involvement right and you can deliver so much more. Use network analysis insight and anecdotal feedback to identify influencers and key opinion leaders in your business – and involve this unofficial leadership hierarchy as champions of the change programme. Pilot your materials and genuinely listen to the feedback – that means being open to changing direction if people don’t buy in to your engagement programme. Make sure you give people enough time to have their say if they want to – especially among your line management populations. Use the power of positive reinforcement to showcase involvement, telling stories to the business about individuals who have influenced change from the bottom up. Use peer-to-peer recognition in team meetings to involve employees in telling the success story of the organisation.
Make sure your leadership is on board
Say it like it is It can be tempting to hide bad news, but it is completely the wrong thing to do; in the inside-out leaky world we live in, news is on the grapevine before you’ve announced it. Instead, treat people with respect and call bad news what it is – don’t dress it up to conceal negativity, because people will find it. It is more of a temptation to try to hide bad news in the private sector than the public; public sector organisations have higher expectations of external disclosure and scrutiny. But, if private sector businesses are to foster genuine trust with employees, it makes sense to be as transparent as possible – saying what you can share and when, even if there isn’t any ‘new’ news. Equally, be proportionate when talking about change. If something isn’t that big a deal, then treat it appropriately. The words ‘change’ – and, today, the word ‘transformation’ – triggers certain reactions that aren’t always necessary in communicating your core message.
It sounds obvious, but change comms will be counter-productive and grow the say-do gap if visible leadership behaviour does not reinforce the key messages employees are hearing. Furthermore, communications campaigns often fail to penetrate the ‘permafrost’ layer of middle management, leaving line managers feeling isolated and uninformed and providing oxygen to the rumour mill and the grapevine. Use the change programme as an opportunity to build a deeper relationship with all levels of leaders, and to clarify engagement responsibilities. Take time to sit down with middle management so they feel they own the programme.
From the Aurora issue
Answer the ‘what’s in it for me?’ question for employees Change is all about people – not the message itself or the channel you’re using. Focus on your employees. What are their fears and insecurities? What opportunities will come out of the change? What’s in it for them? Develop a clear, simple narrative that transparently explains the ‘why’, the ‘what’ and shows employees what they have to look forward to in their day-to-day working lives. Use simple, honest colleague-tocolleague language that speaks to them – not corporate waffle or unbalanced propaganda.
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Changing up change M
ajor transformation used to happen once in a decade. Now change has become the new normal.
Some thrive on change: others feel threatened. Change rarely impacts all populations equally – and it rarely impacts all people in the same way. While the change curve has become a standard tool for plotting the emotional journey of change, it assumes that ‘one-size-fits-all’. And that’s not our experience of employees in an age of diverse identities and personalised content. Segmentation is the key.
thinkBites
When segmenting your populations, think about these indicative types we’ve encountered across many organisations – and how you can equip your managers to spot and respond to their different needs and develop a personalised approach for their teams.
The Slow Adopter
The Quitter
Remains open-minded but takes their time to get off the fence.
Panics and looks to the exit instead of engaging with change.
Tends to be: Moderately engaged, but have the potential to be highly engaged and high performing with the right encouragement. Give employees like this a little more time to make their own adjustments as, when ready, they will be an asset to your team.
Tends to be: Longer serving employees who weigh up the benefits of a redundancy package against the tribulations of adapting to a changing workplace. Watch out for losing experienced high performers – but embrace the opportunity to exit lower performers who can’t cope.
The Advocate
The Gossiper
Looks at the bigger picture and visualises the possibilities. Agrees whole-heartedly with the company’s decisions, has absolute trust in its leadership and wants to work with the company to achieve its goals, and their own.
Responds to uncertainty and sense of disempowerment with the emotional satisfaction of rumour – often negative or unfounded.
Tends to be: A very high performing individual who is also very highly engaged. They are often very ambitious and see their company as a way of achieving their own vision.
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Tribes of change
Tends to be: A ‘terrorist’ or ‘wrecker’ with low levels of engagement and empowerment but high levels of influence over other colleagues. Seeing the world from their point of view will help you to stress-test your messages.
The Anarchist
The Agnostic
Questions leadership and struggles to trust and commit to new leaders.
Watches and waits to see whether change works or not before committing.
Tends to be: An experienced and above-average performer who thinks they are indispensable to the team – and can therefore speak their mind with impunity.
Tends to be: A long-serving middle-of-the-road performer with high levels of understanding but lower levels of engagement. Watch out for their influence on other colleagues as a seen-it-all-before ‘old hand’.
The Eager Beaver
The Optimist
Embraces change enthusiastically and sees it as necessary to an organisation’s evolution. Their attitude can help make the implementation of change more palatable for everyone.
Views change as a challenge, but takes a ‘can-do’ attitude. They are receptive to new ideas and asks questions.
Tends to be: Well-liked within the company, a high achiever and well-engaged.
Tends to be: A middle performer but one who has the potential to excel. Nurture and develop this kind of employee.
The Hothead
Supporting managers to take their teams through change at ASDA Karian and Box created a change-management toolkit for Asda people managers whilst they were going through a period of significant organisational transformation. This toolkit enabled people managers to engage with thought-leading content on change in a way tailored to their level and needs. Managers could complete personal
reflection exercises on their practice, and were guided to analyse and plan for the different personality and communication types in their team. Managers were enabled to be the best version of themselves they could be – and to provide personalised support to the many different types of employee they managed.
Feels a loss of control and worries about job security. Introverted hotheads stress while extroverts explode. Tends to be: Highly engaged (perhaps a little too invested) in their role with lower levels of trust in leadership and confidence in the future of the business.
From the Change issue
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Employees as advocates S
ocial media has transformed the power of the employee voice. Whether it is a review of your business on GlassDoor by a happy or disgruntled employee, or a tweet comparing your external brand promise to the reality of working life in your organisation, people have the power to go public whenever they like.
“Employee advocacy is held up as this glittering jewel that everyone would like to be involved with and see happen, but many fear unleashing that power.” Conference participant
Many organisations respond to this with fear and loathing, discipline and punishment. Your social media code of conduct has probably been used to dismiss someone for compromising your brand’s image in the big bad digital world out there. But there is an alternative. Why not embrace the power of the employee voice? Imagine thousands of your employees promoting your external-facing content through their own personal networks. Sound unlikely? Read our case study on how a police force made it happen. The benefit is two-fold: engaging your employees and turning them into trusted external advocates for your brand. Everyone is a storyteller these days: why not motivate employees to help you tell your story?
Social externals have become a great way to reach your own people 10
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Case study A police force created a platform where employees were able to post ideas and comments – if their post got over a certain amount of likes or re-posts, then it went to the Exec for discussion. Just like a petition to Parliament, the top team were obliged to discuss it. That’s not to say that the idea was committed to, but it was at least considered. Senior leaders then came back to officers and explained why they could or couldn’t do it. One idea was dropped on to the platform asking if employees were happy to share campaigns on specific
issues – like child sexual exploitation – through their personal social network. All those who responded were briefed and given content to share. The employees then uploaded this campaign material (videos, pictures etc.) to their own social media channels like Facebook. As the broader public received these posts from friends or family, instead of from the police, they were more likely to share the content. It created amazing cut-through and engagement that traditional external channels couldn’t compete with.
Richmond Events: 2018 forums R
ichmond Events are hosting numerous forums throughout 2018. The programmes at their conferences are pitched at a high level and present new case studies and fresh thinking at each event. There are a variety of session formats that encourage participants to get stuck into critical issues in each industry.
The Richmond L&D Forum 21st March 2018, Savoy Place, London Speakers: Matthew Syed, author of Bounce, Black Box Thinking and The Greatest, and Will Gompertz, Arts Editor at the BBC. Matthew Syed is a journalist, writer, broadcaster, former international table tennis champion and finally the co-founder and trustee of Greenhouse Sports, a charity that empowers young people from disadvantaged communities through sport. He is also the author of two critically acclaimed books – Bounce and Black Box Thinking. Syed has recently written another book called The Greatest: The Quest for Sporting Perfection, which focuses on how we become the best that we can be, as individuals, as teams and as organisations, using sport as a foundation.
Here are a selection of events over the course of 2018 and some examples of their keynote speakers. A list of further conferences can be found later in this issue, but you can also visit the Richmond Events website at www.richmondevents.com.
We are thrilled to announce that Will Gompertz, voted one of the World’s Top 50 Creative Thinkers by New York’s Creativity Magazine, will give our closing keynote address. Will Gompertz is a world expert on modern art. Will’s new book, Think Like an Artist: Imaginative Ways to a More Creative and Productive Life was released by Penguin in July 2015. A witty and inspiring read, it identifies ten lessons to be learned from the greatest artists across history, to give us tools to unlock creativity and thrive at work and in our personal lives. As a writer, he has penned numerous articles for, among others, The Times and The Guardian. His book, What are you Looking At? 50 Years of Modern Art in the Blink of an Eye, was published by Penguin in Autumn 2012. Will was previously a Director of The Tate Gallery, and in 2009 he wrote and performed a sell-out one-man comedy show about modern art at the Edinburgh Festival. He is currently BBC Arts Editor.
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The Richmond Human Resources Forum 22 - 23 May 2018, The Grove, Hertfordshire
The former Managing Director of Waitrose, Minister of State for Trade and the author of ‘Workplace Fables’, Mark Price will draw on his real-life business experiences to provide a heart-warming, entertaining and instructive look at what you should and shouldn’t do in business and the workplace today.
Speakers: Dame Helena Morrissey DBE, Head of Personal Investing, Legal and General Investment Management; Lord Mark Price, former Managing Director of Waitrose, Minister of State for Trade and the author of Workplace Fables; Simon Fanshawe OBE, co-founder of Stonewall, Partner, diversitybydesign. In her keynote speech, Dame Helena will share her own story, what she’s learned through both her successes and failures and will outline new ways of approaching the well-worn subject of HR. In 2010, Dame Helena Morrissey founded the 30% Club aiming at improving gender balance in the boardroom. Helena was named one of Fortune magazine’s ‘World’s 50 Greatest Leaders’ and the Financial Times’ 2017 ‘Person of the Year.’ Her first book A Good Time to be a Girl, Don’t Lean In, Change the System was published by Harper Collins in February 2018.
From the good to the bad, from the inventive to the hilariously silly, Mark will combine wisdom and gentle humour when sharing his HR lessons of a lifetime after thirty years in the John Lewis Partnership. Mark Price joined the UK government as the Minister of State for Trade and Investment in 2016 and was reappointed by Theresa May to her postBrexit Government, with specific responsibility for negotiating the UKs future trade deals. He will share anecdotes and lifetime learning from the shop floor.
Simon Fanshawe OBE was a co-founder of Stonewall and has experience as a chair of Boards (most recently of the University of Sussex, a £350m top 20 institution). He is a consistent and careful challenger in business and social change who works, as part of his consultancy diversitybydesign, with organisations and people to hold them to their core purpose. He currently works with Costa, Virgin Media, First Group, the Universities of Sheffield and Cardiff, GCHQ inter alia to develop meaningful programmes of change in diversity, to enhance their performance and the achievement of core goals.
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The Communication Directors’ Forum 22 - 23 November 2018, The Grove, Hertfordshire Speakers: Professor Steve Peters, Author of The Chimp Paradox, Consultant Psychiatrist and Performance Coach for Elite Sport, and Kate Adie OBE, former chief news correspondent for BBC News In this keynote address, Steve Peters will explain how to use your mental muscle to greatest effect. Peters will be exploring topics such as, optimising performance, getting the best out of yourself and others, the principles of managing thoughts, behaviours and emotions and finally functioning individually and in a team. Peters is a Consultant Psychiatrist working in Elite Sport, the Corporate world, Education and Health and an acclaimed specialist in the functioning of the human mind. Steve is the author of the bestselling personal development book The Chimp Paradox and the CEO of his own charitysupporting company, Chimp Management Ltd. Steve has worked in elite sport for over fifteen years and some of his clients, past and present, include: British Cycling, GB Taekwondo, England Rugby and England Football.
Kate Adie is one of the best-known television news correspondents of recent times and has won awards for her coverage of Northern Ireland, the American bombing of Tripoli and the student uprising in China in 1989. In 1993 she was awarded an OBE. In this keynote address, Kate will share her considerable experience of world events and insights into how to communicate in times of crisis and change. She will discuss the developments in modern communications and how best to tackle the message – internally and externally. Kate will share her experiences honed from her assignments in the first Gulf war, conflicts in former Yugoslavia and events in Armenia, Albania, Rwanda, Kosovo, China and Sierra Leone. Most recently as one of the group of ten journalists at the BBC, her experience of getting the message of equal pay heard. Kate currently presents From Our Own Correspondent on BBC Radio 4.
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Forum dates
2018
April
Energy Business Forum Italia
12 - 13 April 2018, Grand Hotel Di Rimini, Rimini www.richmonditalia.it/energy
The Learning, Development and Talent Executive Forum 19 April 2018, Harvard Club, New York, NY www.thecloforum.com
The Retail & eCommerce Directors’ Forum
March
24 April 2018, The Belfry Hotel, Sutton Coldfield www.theretailforum.com
8 March 2018, The Grove, Hertfordshire www.digital.marketingforum.co.uk
24 - 25 April 2018, BĂźrgenstock Resort, Lake Lucerne www.richmonditforum.com
The Digital Marketing Forum
Richmond HSE Forum 8 - 9 March 2018, Grand Hotel, Rimini, www.richmonditalia.it/hse
Richmond HR Forum 14 - 15 March 2018, Victoria-Jungfrau Grand Hotel, Interlaken www.richmond-hr-forum.com
The Richmond L&D Forum 21 March 2018, Savoy Place, London www.ldtmforum.com
The Richmond Supply Chain Forum at the Belfry Hotel 22 March 2018, The Belfry Hotel, Sutton Coldfield www.logisticsforum.co.uk
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Richmond IT Forum
June
The Marketing Forum USA
May
The CFO Forum
3 May 2018, Harvard Club, New York, NY www.thecfo-forum.com
Marketing Forum Italia 17 - 18 May 2018, Villa Medicea, Artimino www.richmonditalia.it/marketing
Richmond Financial Industry Forum 17 - 19 May 2018, Victoria-Jungfrau Grand Hotel, Interlaken www.richmondstrategyforum.com
The Human Resources Forum 20 - 22 May 2018, Turnberry Isle Miami, Aventura www.hrforum.com
The CIO & IT Security Forums 20 - 22 May 2018, Turnberry Isle Miami, Aventura www.cioforum.com
The IT Directors’ Forum - Spring 21 - 22 May 2018, The Grove, Hertfordshire www.itdf.com
The Richmond Human Resources Forum 22 - 23 May 2018, The Grove, Hertfordshire www.hrforum.co.uk
PIMS 24 - 25 May 2018, The Grove, Hertfordshire www.pimsforum.com
Retail Business Forum Italia 29 - 30 May 2018, Park Hotel ai Cappuccini, Gubbio Province of Perugia www.richmonditalia.it/retail/
3 - 5 June 2018, Sawgrass Marriott Resort and Spa, Ponte Vedra Beach, FL www.marketingforum.com
The Logistics & Supply Chain Forum USA 3 - 5 June 2018, Sawgrass Marriott Resort and Spa, Ponte Vedra Beach, FL www.logisticsforum.com
The Market Insight Forum UK 6 June 2018, Savoy Place, London www.marketinsightforum.com
The CIO Forum at the Ritz Carlton 14 June 2018, The Ritz-Carlton, San Francisco, CA www.cioforum.com
The CFO Forum at the Ritz Carlton 14 June 2018, The Ritz-Carlton, San Francisco, CA www.thecfo-forum.com
The Finance Directors’ Forum at the Four Seasons 14 June 2018, Four Seasons Park Lane, London www.fdforum.com
Security Director forum 18 - 19 Giugno 2018, Park Hotel ai Cappuccini, Gubbio Province of Perugia www.richmonditalia.it
Cyber Resilience Forum 21 - 22 June 2018, Park Hotel ai Cappuccini, Gubbio Province of Perugia www.richmondevents.com
Richmond Marketing Forum 28 - 29 June 2018, Bürgenstock Resort, Lake Lucerne www.richmondmarketingforum.com
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September
Richmond Finance Directors’ Forum
6 - 8 September 2018, Victoria-Jungfrau Grand Hotel, Interlaken www.fdstrategyforum.com
The CIO Forum West at Park Hyatt Aviara 9 - 11 September 2018, Park Hyatt Aviara Resort, Carlsbad www.cioforum.com
The Marketing Forum at Park Hyatt Aviara 9 - 11 September 2018, Park Hyatt Aviara Resort, Carlsbad www.marketingforum.com
The CLO & Talent Management Forum
July
Digital Communication Forum Italia
5 - 6 Luglio 2018, Villa Medicea, Artimino www.richmonditalia.it
16 - 18 September 2018, The Phoenician, Scottsdale, AZ www.thecloforum.com
Richmond E-Commerce Forum 20 - 21 September 2018, Grand Hotel, Rimini, www.richmonditalia.it/ecommerce
The Market Insight Forum USA 27 September 2018, Harvard Club, New York, NY www.us.marketinsightforum.com
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November
The CIO Forum at The Harvard Club
1 November 2018, Harvard Club, New York, NY www.cioforum.com
October
Finance Director Forum Italia
1 - 2 Ottobre 2018, Grand Hotel Di Rimini, Rimini www.richmonditalia.it
Richmond Finance Summit 4 - 5 October 2018, Beau-Rivage Palace, Lausanne www.finance-summit.com
The IT Directors’ Forum - Autumn 8 - 9 October 2018, The Grove, Hertfordshire www.itdf.com
The Finance Directors’ Forum 9 - 10 October 2018, The Grove, Hertfordshire www.fdforum.com
Richmond Energy Business Forum 9 - 10 October 2018, Grand Hotel, Rimini www.richmonditalia.it/energy
The Richmond Supply Chain Forum 16 October 2018, Sopwell House, St Albans www.logisticsforum.co.uk
Human Resources Forum Italia 22 - 23 Ottobre 2018, Park Hotel ai Cappuccini, Gubbio Province of Perugia richmonditalia.it/human/
The Logistics & Supply Chain Forum at the Ritz Carlton 4 - 6 November 2018, The Ritz-Carlton Dove Mountain, Marana, AZ www.logisticsforum.com
Richmond PIMS Forum 6 - 7 November 2018, Bürgenstock Resort, Lake Lucerne www.richmondpimsforum.com
IT Director Forum Italia 12 - 13 Novembre 2018, Grand Hotel Di Rimini, Rimini richmonditalia.it/it-director/
Procurement Forum Italia 15 - 16 Novembre 2018, Grand Hotel Di Rimini, Rimini richmonditalia.it/procurement/
The Marketing Forum UK 21 - 22 November 2018, The Grove, Hertfordshire www.marketingforum.co.uk
The Richmond Human Resources Forum at Savoy Place 22 November 2018, Savoy Place, London www.hrforum.co.uk
The Communication Directors’ Forum 22 - 23 November 2018, The Grove, Hertfordshire www.cdforum.com
Logistics Forum Italia 25 - 26 Ottobre 2018, Park Hotel ai Cappuccini, Gubbio Province of Perugia richmonditalia.it/logistics-ok/
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The sense of an ending T
he business world loves a launch. Every freshly appointed CEO wants to get started by starting something. And many leaders have a sophisticated understanding of how to begin their reign with a crafted, credible, down-to-earth organisational narrative that draws employees into their business strategy and empowers them to be part of the living story of the organisation. But too many businesses give people a ‘living’ story without thinking about what comes next. As humans, we love closure – the sense of an ending is often the cue for the beginning of something new. Yet we always seem to find ourselves in the middle of a story, looking for milestones that help us to think about who we are, what we are doing and what the next thing is.
“Zeigarnik studied a Berlin waiter with a perfect memory for orders before he had distributed the beer and bratwurst, but who couldn’t recall a single detail the moment he had served his customers.”
Behavioural economics underlines this need for finality – it’s called the Zeigarnik effect (after the Lithuanian psychologist Bluma Zeigarnik). It means our attention is strongly channelled towards unfinished tasks we’re committed to, leading to improved recall compared to completed tasks.
How to handle change when it becomes the new normal
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tales of terror
Metamorphosis
Changing up change
What does all this mean for organisational storytelling? We find that while businesses are often strong at launching a strategy story (the beginning), and maintaining the drumbeat through progress updates and milestones (the middle), it is the ending that is neglected. This is for a variety of sensible reasons: strategies come to an end because of failure, or a change in leadership, or a change in market conditions – all of which usually necessitate a new strategy. But, when launching that new strategy, it is vital you bring the old one to a close, in order to help shift attention and emotional focus away from the old and on to the new. We’ve all experienced surprise that an employee is still clinging onto a strategy slogan months or years after it has become obsolete. However, there is a good and totally human reason for that – the story hasn’t finished for them yet. They are waiting for the next chapter, for the sense of an ending, so they can begin anew.
Taken from the Change issue
From the end spring new beginnings. Pliny the Elder
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special editi
ERATING THOUGHT GEN PROVOKING
DISCUSSION
ULTS
IVERING RES
LOYEES DEL
ENGAGING EMP
on
Autumn 2017
Jonathan Change -&Mr Norrell
PROVOKING THOUG
HT GENERATING DISCU
Charles Dickens
RESULTS
gs
Harry Potter and the Changer of Secrets GREAT ADAPTATIONS
the people. It’s still about
Metamorphosis
SSION ENGAGING EMPLOYEES DELIVE RING
Happy endings, new beginnin Change and the Giant Peach
Changing up
Rethinking internal v. external
change
How to handle change when it becomes the new normal
The sense of an ending
The power of employee advocacy
Providing closure and signalling continuity
To receive an invite to attend one of our forums as a delegate, please contact:
an um H r d The Human Resources Forum s fo hmon orum u F Sophie Katon, Delegate Manager n e, 17 c Joi he Ri urces ber 20 rk Lan Tel: 020 8487 2261, T so ovem ns, Pa Email: skaton@richmondevents.com Re N so
July 2017
PROVOKIN G THOUGHT GENERAT
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SSION EN GAGING
a d 23r our Seon W1 F nd Lo
The Richmond L&D Forum Jack Richards, Delegate Manager m .co ion nts itat rum m Tel: 020 8487 2224, eve inv .co nd an ces Fo nts o e r m eve , ceiv sou m ich Email: jrichards@richmondevents.com ond .co ger n@r o re an Re t a m e n o h nts k t li Hum a ric , Ma eve uld te ail: sk ger s@ wo d The act: ond ga na ard n ou hm ele Em Ma ich If y atte e cont er, @ric , D 2261, te ail: jr g n a a k to leas o g t n ic Ka 487 p ele 4, Em Ma nw ,D hie 0 8 nce : hfe rds 7 222 Sop l: 02 ere ail ha Te onf 4, Em Ric 0 848 C k , c ick 224 Ja l: 02 Te enw 87 ry F 0 84 Hila l: 02 Te
The Communication Directors’ Forum Vicki Barford, Delegate Manager, Tel: 020 8487 2202, Email: vbarford@richmondevents.com
For speaker enquiries, please contact Hilary Fenwick (all events): Tel: 020 8487 2244, Email: hfenwick@richmondevents.com
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