The 4 Functions of Management

Too many managers today place a disproportionate amount of emphasis on execution. While effectively executing is a critical aspect of business success, getting back to the foundational elements that make managers successful is key to sustained success.

This brings us to the 4 Functions of Management - Planning, Organizing, Leading, and Controlling. Each function requires significant time and attention, including:

• Setting clear goals and objectives
• Assembling the right people and allocating resources
• Influencing and inspiring action
• Making necessary course corrections.

Contact Dr. Ed Slover to learn more about how to integrate the 4 functions to accelerate your business results.

Managing By Wandering Around

It is remarkable that, with all the evidence that proves how to create a high-performing organizational culture, managers still get it wrong.

Why is it so challenging? The answer lies in the lack of faith and confidence managers have in their employees. Ironically, managers wonder why their business results suffer or stagnate.

What is required to change? Each manager must make an honest appraisal of what they are doing and recognize that they are the problem before they can become the solution.

It would seem that until that happens, nothing will change.

Contact Dr. Ed Slover to have him provide customized strategies and tactics that will help you build a high-performing business culture.

Compelling Visions

What if you created a vision for your company that was so compelling that people found purpose and passion working for you?

Far too many business owners go into business because of personal interests or need to support their families. Both are noble pursuits, but it doesn't "blow the hair back" of the people working for them.

Creating a compelling vision statement about why you do what you do and painting a picture of where you want to go influences and inspires people to want to be a part of it.

When there are no downside to doing something, do it.

Contact Dr. Ed Slover to help you craft a compelling vision that inspires people to want to be a part of your business.

Leveraging Social Media

Business owners and manager appreciate the importance of marketing their products and services on social media.

Unfortunately, many don't do enough research to learn who there specific target audience is or where their target audience lives, which disallows them from systematizing their strategy.

While there are numerous strategies and tactics that can be employed, there are a few that can make or break the success of any social media marketing initiative (see image at left).

If there is one that is more important than all the rest:  Consistency.

Contact Dr. Ed Slover to learn more about how you can customize your social media marketing to maximal effectiveness.

Leader as Coach

As people mature in their leadership effectiveness, they successfully make the transition from a directive style to that of a leader-coach.

This transition is never easy, as it requires the leader to "flex" their preferred style to meet the follower where they are depending on the maturity-level in their role.

A starting point is to hone your emotional intelligence to not only understand "how" you and your follower are showing up but also "why" you and your follower are showing up that way.

From there, you can help your follower continue to develop their skills, which will, with time, lead to amazing results!

Contact Dr. Ed Slover to learn more about making the transition to an effective leader-coach.

Customer Retention

Small businesses constantly look to gain competitive advantage, but owners tend to overlook the importance of customer retention in lieu of new customer acquisition.

By shifting the focus toward retaining customers through delivering exceptional quality, "best in class" service, listening to the voice of their customers, offering promotional discounts, and implementing loyalty programs, small businesses build a solid financial foundation from its existing customers.

When done well, newly acquired customers become incremental to business success and not the primary source of revenue and profit.

Contact Dr. Ed Slover to learn how he can help you implement customer retention strategies that will make your business sustainable.

The Power Paradox

Far too many people believe that leadership is a rank and with authority comes power. Unfortunately, these people are misinformed.

The nature of power in leadership is paradoxical. In order to become more influential in the lives of our followers, we need to give our power away.

By empowering others, we show them that we trust them. We show them that we have their best interests in mind as they develop new skills and grow as leaders.

And once they believe we have their best interests in mind, they begin to trust US thereby giving us more influence in their lives.

Contact Dr. Ed Slover to learn more about how he can help develop the current and next generation of leaders in your business.

Lifelong Learning

There is an old adage that a business is either growing or it's dying. No truer words have been written or spoken.

It isn't enough to remain stagnant because that is not progress. In fact, staying in one place means you're regressing, going backwards.

With how quickly the competitive landscape in business changes, it is incumbent upon us as business owners and leaders to scratch, claw, and find those things every day that will lead to better results.

Commit today to learn (at least) one new thing that will improve your business. Then, make the same commitment tomorrow.

Contact Dr. Ed Slover to learn how integrate a growth mindset into your daily habits. 

The ULTIMATE Superpower

Many people believe that leading with love is weak and ineffective. This perspective could not be more short-sighted and wrong.

What people want more than anything in life is to be loved and accepted, especially at the place they spend the majority of their time...at work.

If you care to live by the foundational principles of: 1) Love your people first; 2) Be clear on your vision; 3) Be uncompromising with your values; 4) Treat others with dignity and respect; and 5) Hold yourself and others accountable...your business results will show up better, faster, and stronger.

Contact Dr. Ed Slover to learn how to integrate a leadership development program into your business practices. It is well worth it!

Enhance the Customer Experience

What would it mean for your business if you doubled your efforts on delivering an exemplary customer experience every time?

What would it mean if your customers said, "WOW!" every time they engaged with your business?

The answers to these questions can bring about transformative business results. Research supports the idea that delivering personalized, responsive, and consistent service that customers find satisfying contributes 14x more revenue than dissatisfied customers. The cool thing is that you get to choose.

Contact Dr. Ed Slover for a complimentary assessment and learn more about how he can help your business build toward the "Pursuit of WOW!"

Self-Leadership

What type of leader do you want yourself to be? One that defers to your positional authority and, ultimately, allows you to become the impediment in development of those that report to you?

Or, do you want to be disciplined in the development of your strengths and self-influencing behaviors that allow you to be (more) influential in the lives of those that willingly choose to follow you?

The answer to these questions appears self-evident, but choosing between the pain of discipline and the pain of regret is, surprisingly, not easy.

Contact Dr. Ed Slover to learn more about how to develop self-leadership in addition to how it brings about better in your life.

Inspect What You Expect

There is little doubt that learning to delegate effectively is a skill all leaders and managers must cultivate. And while delegation is important, there is a better way to hold ourselves and others accountable.

Learning to transfer ownership allows for increased commitment to task performance and goal attainment. It allows for people to feel part of the process rather than having things imposed on them.

It also allows for people to feel like they have more "skin in the game," which is positively correlated with improved performance.

Contact Dr. Ed Slover for a complimentary assessment and to learn more about how transferring ownership can improve business results.

The "Recipe" for Leading

Leadership cannot exist without a willing follower.

The "recipe" is simple, but not easy, as it requires that we, as leaders, invest time, energy, and resources in other people. This takes time and has little to do with whether we have positional authority or not.

It is through a commitment to helping others get better at their jobs that we begin to grow our influence. It is only when people believe we have their best interests in mind, they will start trusting us. Thus, THEY allow US to be more influential in their lives.

Contact Dr. Slover to learn more about how to take your leadership to the next level.

Emphasize Execution

Very often, people debate the merits of a results-orientation and a process-orientation. While the former allows for seeing the "big picture," the latter emphasizes the details.

Both orientations can be effective on their own, but finding the appropriate balance serves business leaders more favorably than either approach alone.

Business success is never guaranteed, but envisioning "where" you want to go allows you to place emphasize on "how" you intend to get there. After that, it's all about...EXECUTION!

Contact Dr. Slover to learn more about how he can help your business find the appropriate balance.

Leadership Development Programming

It is alarming that so few businesses and organizations have a formal leadership development program, especially knowing that  everyone recognizes how important leadership is.

Leadership is the foundation for building and sustaining a high-performing organization. It provides direction, allow for overcoming all types of adversity, and, creates value for all stakeholders.

When done well, leadership is extremely difficult. It must cultivated, nurtured, and present at all levels within an organization if it hopes to survive and to thrive.

Schedule your complimentary consultation to learn more about how Dr. Slover can customize a leadership development program for your organization.

Evidence-Based Decision Making

There are times when "going with your gut" is an appropriate way to make decisions, but rarely is this the case when making business decisions.

The most effective business people gather, interpret, and analyze the relevant facts and apply what they learned to solve problems swiftly and appropriately.

The key to evidence based decision-making is looking at the "right" information and interpreting and analyzing it accurately and effectively.

Schedule your complimentary consultation with Dr. Slover to learn more.

Above the Line Leadership

As leaders there are times when we feel like we're drowning in what isn't working and we create negative feedback loops with the mindset that we hold.

We externalize why things are happening the way they are and fail to take personal responsibility and accountability for the fact that the problem may be...well...us.

Conscious leaders, however, adopt a mindset of radical self-awareness, commit to life-long learning, and take ownership when results are less than ideal. They welcome criticism in the pursuit of improving themselves and others. #mindsetmatters

Contact Dr. Ed Slover to learn more about how to improve your leadership in life and business.

Interview Smartly

Far too many managers hire for “need” rather than taking the time to select the best person for the job. This makes sense because managers assume the extra burden, workload, and time commitment when a position isn’t filled. 

While moving “quickly” in the hiring process is a must, managers shouldn’t “hurry.” One way to do that is to ask enough of the “right” type of questions to candidates. 

Behaviorally-based and situationally-based interview questions are an efficient way to learn a lot about prospective employees thereby giving managers the best chance for success during the selection process. 
 
Contact Dr. Ed Slover to learn more about how to improve your business. 

Make People Feel Important

The famous poet, Maya Angelou, was once quotes as saying that, "people will forget what you said, people will forget what you did, but people will never forget how you made them feel."

From a leadership perspective, when we take time to make others feel important - through basic behaviors, such as providing feedback, celebrating success, and extending thanks - we create goodwill and trust, which is the foundation for success in any organization or team.

The next time you catch yourself overthinking this thing called "leadership," start with these basic tenets. Doing so will only make things better.

For more information, contact Dr. Ed Slover to see how he can help improve the leadership at all levels within your organization.

Evaluating Performance

The typical performance evaluation serves as a recitation of what happened during the last performance management cycle rather than a formal opportunity to make their employees better. 

The typical manager says: “If I develop my team members, they might take my job or leave the company and I can’t afford either.”

The enlightened manager says: “If I don’t develop my team members, they might stay and I can’t afford that.”

Interestingly, making people better creates an environment where they WANT to stay and perform at a high level. 

Contact Dr. Slover to learn ways to effectively integrate this approach in your business.

Lead from the Heart

Every day, people in “leadership” positions have the opportunity to transform the experiences of their “followers” and, yet, it is Groundhog Day for most businesses constantly wondering how to get more commitment and engagement from their employees.

Try each of the following for 30 days and see what happens (doing so isn’t going to make things worse):

-Start with nice. 
-Start with caring. 
-Start by leading from the heart for the people in your charge.

Contact Dr. Slover to learn more about how he can help create a high-performing business culture.