Dive into the riveting story of Neil Lloyd, how a career banker became the Managing Director of a full-service law firm – without even being a lawyer!
Listen as Neil recounts the significance of mentors in his formative years and discover the leadership principles that have guided him seamlessly across starkly different sectors. From sharpening his prowess in banking to architecting growth strategies at FBC Manby Bowdler, Neil’s ascent to Managing Director is nothing short of inspiring.
Neil was recently recognised with an Honorary Fellowship by the University of Wolverhampton, and The Lawyer magazine included him in their Hot 100.
But there’s much more to Neil; off the clock, he’s an avid marathon enthusiast, conquering some of the world’s most iconic races from London to New York.
Join us for a narrative of ambition, adaptability, and passion, and uncover how Neil Lloyd is redefining the boundaries of career trajectories.
With an alarming statistic revealing that a staggering 70% of errors in the workplace can be traced back to miscommunication, it’s no wonder that businesses are feeling the pinch. Dive deeper, and you’ll find that poor communication ranks as the number one concern for a majority of businesses, overshadowing even financial concerns or market competition.
But what really happens when communication goes awry? Trust erodes. The very foundation upon which business relationships are built begins to wobble. Employees start second-guessing, leading to serious doubts about the motives, integrity, and capabilities of their employers. The domino effect of this breakdown? A jaw-dropping cost of £50 – £70 Bn in lost productivity annually.
But there’s more. As a result of these communicative missteps, 33% of employees report having low morale, feeling disengaged, and disheartened.
In this episode, Ricky and Rob not only highlight the challenges but also explore solutions and best practices to cultivate an environment of open, transparent, and effective communication.
Are you looking to boost your team’s productivity and cohesion?
Ricky dives into the groundbreaking study by Google that sheds light on what truly sets high-performing teams apart. Whether you’re a manager, team leader, or team member or have a curious mind, this video holds transformative insights for you!
Inside this video, you will discover:
Google’s extensive research spanned over two years.
Powerful takeaways from 200+ interviews & analysis of 250 attributes across 180+ active Google teams.
The surprising truth about what really matters in teamwork.
A comprehensive breakdown of Google’s five key dynamics for high-performing teams:
Impact of Work
Meaning of Work
Structure and clarity
Dependability
Psychological Safety
Exclusive Resource: Want to implement psychological safety in your team? Don’t miss the exclusive worksheet that will guide you through the process! Click here for the worksheet
Join Ricky on this enlightening journey and equip yourself with the tools and knowledge to craft a team that doesn’t just work but excels!
Did you know that only about a third of companies believe they communicate effectively?
Forbes (March 2023)
In this episode, Rob and Ricky dive into the complex realm of communication, a skill so integral yet so frequently misinterpreted.
They explore why most companies fail to communicate effectively and share some of the stumbling blocks hindering effective communication. Consider this, when one individual errs, does everyone else receive a blanket message? We know this is not the best approach, so why does this keep happening?
Ricky and Rob also delve into the human side of miscommunication. Our emotions, ever a double-edged sword, often weave themselves seamlessly into our dialogues, clouding judgment and disrupting clear exchanges. Then there are assumptions – we all make them, but at what cost? Plus, we discuss the dangerous ‘dance of ambiguity’, where leaving things open to interpretation can spell disaster.
Mastering Teamwork: 7 Essential Tips to Be a Stellar Team Player
In this video, we delve deep into the art of teamwork. Whether you’re aiming to enhance your professional collaborations or uplift your personal interactions, being a top-notch team player is the game-changer.
What’s Inside?
Communication Foundations
Valuing Diverse Perspectives
Harnessing Individual Strengths
The Power of Reliability
The Need for Adaptability
Staying Positive in Team Dynamics
Resolving Conflicts the Right Way
Mastering teamwork isn’t just about getting the job done; it’s about fostering relationships, growing personally, and contributing meaningfully to collective efforts. Dive in to explore how you can elevate your team interactions and personal growth journey.
Join us as we talk to Michael Smith, a humble lad from the North East of England who rose to become Chief Commercial Officer of a Silicon Valley medical technology company focused on saving teeth from tooth decay. Listen as he shares why he wrote to the Home Secretary!
Michael leads the commercial side of Sonendo®, which develops and manufactures the GentleWave® System, an innovative technology platform designed to treat tooth decay by cleaning and disinfecting the microscopic spaces within teeth without the need to remove tooth structure. Michael walks us through his journey and how his dream to join the police soon shifted to the corporate world of healthcare.
In this episode, Michael shares with us the crucial roles his role models and mentors played in his personal development, preparing him for leadership. Michael shares insight and lessons behind his journey and offers many great takeaways for everyone.
If you like this type of content, please like, share and subscribe, be sure to follow us on your chosen platform to ensure you know when the next episode is out!
Coming up next time is Neil Lloyd, who is featured in The Lawyer Magazine’s Hot 100 for 2023 and he’s not even a lawyer!
We have two primal fears: shame and death! Evolutionary strong feelings that were designed to keep us alive, but not really designed for the modern workplace, yet these fears play out strongly in our day-to-day lives.
In this episode of our mini-series on getting out of your own way, Richard and Ricky discuss how fear of failure might drive our behaviour, and not always in ways that make us more productive or easy to get on with!
This article, the final instalment of the “Areas Every Leader Must Master For Success” miniseries, emphasises the pivotal role of productivity in achieving business success. Following discussions on purpose and people in the previous parts, this piece delves into the essential elements leaders must focus on to drive productivity: process, accountability, and expertise.
In today’s fast-paced and ever-changing business environment, leaders play a crucial role in balancing speed and precision, ensuring that processes are efficient and adaptable. Their efforts in effective process management can prevent inefficiencies and errors that often arise from hastily implemented workarounds. Leaders can enhance operational efficiency and drive sustainable progress by actively fostering a culture of continuous improvement and standardisation.
Accountability is another cornerstone of productivity. Clear roles and responsibilities within teams ensure that projects are completed on time and without costly oversights. The article highlights the importance of defined accountability in preventing project delays and missed opportunities, emphasising that shared accountability can lead to confusion and risk.
Lastly, the article underscores the critical role of expertise in leadership. Leaders must possess subject matter knowledge and know how to effectively empower their teams. By setting clear standards and fostering a culture of collaboration, leaders can harness their teams’ collective expertise to achieve shared goals.
The article concludes with critical questions to help leaders evaluate and enhance their approach to process management, accountability, and expertise. This practical checklist guides leaders committed to driving productivity and achieving excellence in their organisations. Leaders can position their teams for success in a competitive and dynamic business landscape through a focused approach to these areas.
This final part of the three-part miniseries “Areas Every Leader Must Master For Success” focuses on productivity, following on from purpose in part one and people in part two.
In business, productivity is crucial for success and hinges on three key factors: process, accountability and expertise. As leaders, we ensure efficient processes, clear ownership of tasks and the right expertise within our teams. We create a winning combination that drives our company’s triumph in the competitive landscape by fostering collaboration and effective governance. Prioritising these elements empowers our workforce to excel and secures our position at the forefront of the industry.
Let’s unpack each key area in more detail.
Process
Businesses operate at such a fast pace, determined to win in their chosen field. The volatile, uncertain, complex and ambiguous (VUCA) landscape means leaders have to seize opportunities. The leader’s challenge, however, is they may travel too quickly for their people, so project implementations and integrations are partially completed, leaving their teams to cope with workarounds. Workarounds are inefficient, prone to error and often create key-person dependencies in high-change environments. I worked on three mergers in quick succession. The next one started before the previous one was complete. It felt like we didn’t get the time to do any of them justice: good enough and compliant, but with apparent gaps.
Complex mergers rarely deliver against the original brief; yes, things change, and what you thought was under the hood is often very different when you open it up. All companies have foibles, quirks and workarounds of their own. Understanding this means the assumptions change the game’s rules, and you must adapt. We all face fast-moving change, so it’s crucial to reprioritise what you feel constantly is essential. It’s no wonder that McKinsey reports that 70% of change projects fail to achieve their intended outcome.
Leaders must strike a delicate balance between conformity and change, fostering a culture of efficiency and continuous improvement. They should champion standardisation to streamline operations while encouraging innovative approaches to drive ongoing progress.
Accountability
Imagine you’ve worked on a project for 18 months; it’s all coming together, and you’re almost ready to go live. You are at the project go/no-go meeting when someone asks, “Have we got local government permission to access the site?” The room is deathly silent; the murmurs signify that someone has screwed up.
What happens when accountabilities aren’t clear can be catastrophic.
What if this was a new product going to market at a specific time to steal a march on the competition?
Google’s research into what makes teams highly effective highlights (among others) three areas: dependability, structure, and clarity, which involves clear roles and responsibilities. When no single person has accountability, you leave your outcome to chance. It’s the same with shared accountability: “We’ll pick that up.” There’s wriggle room, which means massive risk with “I thought they had got it” comments.
The 18-month project I just mentioned was actual. It led to a three-month delay. New people who were trained and ready to go were temporarily relocated. There were costs not budgeted for, lost revenues and missed opportunities. However, this experience also presented a significant learning opportunity in accountability, demonstrating the positive outcomes that can arise from a culture of shared responsibility.
Leaders must find the delicate balance between effectively organising the group and not micromanaging. They should facilitate consensus on decision-making processes and hold team members accountable for their commitments. This culture of collective responsibility ensures efficient progress toward the higher purpose.
Expertise
The challenge for many leaders is that their leadership journey involves them ascending the ranks and being promoted for their technical prowess and subject matter expertise. As a leader, there are different expectations; you now have subject matter experts reporting to you. The tendency for new leaders especially is to overplay their knowledge to the detriment of their team.
I remember my early career as a new leader in a contact centre. My expertise was in people and processes, not technology. I had a steep learning curve. It was humbling to defer to subject matter experts, yet I still had to fight my tendency to dive in and “fix” stuff that was in my comfort zone.
Leadership is about combining subject matter expertise and leadership skills. Leaders should set standards and ensure proper governance, leveraging their expertise to bring diverse talents and viewpoints together and driving progress toward the shared objective.
Questions to Ask
This next section lays out a set of questions to help leaders ensure they have considered the key areas under productivity. They provide a checklist for leaders to define, check, and balance: how to strive for the right people doing the right things at the right time and in the right way.
Process
How do we decide on the what and the how?
How do process and structure work in this setting?
How do we know our communication flow is fit for purpose?
How do we iterate and continually improve?
What is our process for challenge and testing?
How do we track and adjust our key performance indicators (KPIs) and progress?
Accountability
How could we optimise the way we organise?
How do we provide clarity on who does what?
How do we ensure decisions are consistent with our standards and align with our purpose?
How do we hold each other to account?
How should we govern the expertise in each function?
What are our leadership standards?
What is our tolerance for performance?
How do we standardise expectations?
How do we measure results?
How could we drive continuous professional development?
Effective leadership goes beyond theories and styles; it focuses on action and practice in critical areas of purpose, people and productivity.
Within this entire series, leaders will find a comprehensive checklist that will enable them to steer their teams toward success and make a lasting impact. A strong sense of purpose, a thriving team culture and a commitment to productivity set the stage for outstanding leadership in today’s dynamic business landscape.
This article first appeared on Forbes.com on 26th September 2023
Ricky has been a regular contributor to the Forbes Councils since 2023, where he shares his perspectives on all things leadership, change, culture and productivity, all with Thinking Focus’ unique perspective on metacognition, or as we prefer to say, thinking about thinking.
Boosting productivity doesn’t always demand expensive tools or cutting-edge technology; often, the most impactful changes come from simple, intentional shifts in mindset and daily habits.
This article provides actionable strategies to help individuals maximize their efficiency and effectiveness, focusing on time-tested principles and easy-to-implement behaviours. By addressing common productivity pitfalls—such as poor prioritization, distractions, and burnout—these steps empower readers to take control of their time and energy. Whether you’re a professional juggling competing demands or an entrepreneur looking to optimize performance, this guide offers practical advice for achieving more with less effort, unlocking sustained success in both work and life.
In my article “Productivity: It All Comes Down To The Pilot In The Box!” I unpacked the trinity of mindset, habits and behaviours versus the plethora of productivity tools and apps available on the market. I am not saying that tools can’t be helpful, but without the right mindset, habits and behaviour, any app or tool is just another tool.
In this follow-up article, I share practical advice for boosting your productivity, and unlike newfangled apps and tools, they won’t cost you a penny. Better still, you can implement them immediately.
Set clear objectives and priorities.
Why: Clarity is the bedrock of productivity, be it personal development or business management. Ambiguity is the enemy of productivity. Busyness does not achieve your objectives; it’s a meaningless waste of time.
How: A clear goal or vision of success helps focus your energies on what truly matters and prevents wasting time on less important tasks.
The SMART goal technique (specific, measurable, achievable, relevant and time-bound) is powerful. Focus first on the “SMT”; resolving the SMT gives you a specific goal, precise measures and a timeline by which you will deliver. This is clarity.
The “A” tests confidence. Confidence is a two-sided coin. On the one side, it tests your belief that you can achieve your goal. The other side tests whether you believe what you’re aiming to achieve is possible. You do not need supreme confidence; you just need more belief than doubt.
The “R” tests importance. I call it your “bothered-o-meter.” A goal you’re bothered about will register highly and sustain you when things become challenging. However, choose something you’re less bothered about; if it doesn’t inspire you or becomes challenging, you will likely switch to something more interesting.
Clarity is essential for prioritisation. Critical thinking tools help you remove bias and preference from decisions. We all prefer to do things we enjoy or are easy, but often, it’s the complex tasks or the things we least enjoy that will move us forward toward our goal.
Knowing what you want, why you want it and when you need it enables you to prioritise. The Eisenhower Matrix, which separates tasks based on urgency and importance, can be invaluable. Another method is the ABCD prioritisation technique, where tasks are categorised from most to least critical.
Establish routine and structure.
Why: Our brains respond well to habits and patterns; it’s how we’re wired. Routines reduce the number of decisions you make every day, which conserves mental energy for more critical tasks. Without this cognitive energy saving, we suffer “decision fatigue,” where the quality of decisions deteriorates after lengthy decision-making sessions.
How: Building a routine involves setting specific times for various activities, such as work, exercise, meals, and relaxation. Time-blocking is a practical method where you allocate blocks of time for different tasks, creating a visual structure for your day. This approach can help maintain focus on the task at hand and reduce the tendency to multitask, which is often less effective. Don’t forget to include breaks and leisure activities in your schedule to prevent burnout.
Eliminate distractions.
Why: In a world where information is constantly at our fingertips, distractions are a significant barrier to productivity. Take social media; these platforms are notorious distractors engineered to keep us on the channel by triggering our biochemistry.
Receive a like, comment or any form of positive interaction, and it stimulates dopamine release. This release promotes pleasure and satisfaction, like the gratification you might get from eating food you enjoy or winning a prize. The intermittent and unpredictable nature of these social rewards creates a pattern like gambling, where the anticipation of a reward keeps users coming back.
Email, Teams, Slack and other systems can also release dopamine, but they can also trigger cortisol. Cortisol is released when we feel stressed. High volumes of email and system notifications can cause anxiety, which can, ironically, drive us to check more.
Distractors’ fracture concentration significantly decreases the quality and quantity of work produced. Switching between tasks inevitably means some of our attention remains with the previous task, reducing our ability to entirely focus on the new task.
How: Identifying and mitigating distractions is critical. Tools like Focus@Will, which offers music designed to aid concentration, or apps like Freedom and Forest, which block distracting websites, can be helpful.
Setting specific times for checking emails and social media, rather than constantly responding to notifications, can help maintain focus. Creating a dedicated workspace free from clutter and potential interruptions can also enhance concentration.
Cultivate a growth mindset.
Why: A growth mindset, a concept popularised by psychologist Carol Dweck in her book Mindset, centres on the belief that we can all develop our abilities and intelligence.
This perspective encourages resilience, a passion for learning and a willingness to confront challenges, all essential for personal and professional growth. Viewing failures not as insurmountable setbacks but as opportunities for learning and development fosters a positive attitude toward challenges.
How: Cultivating a growth mindset involves several practices. Keeping a journal can be a powerful tool for self-reflection and tracking progress. Embrace criticism, and choose to see it as valuable feedback that will help you grow.
Adopting a mindset that sees challenges as the vehicle to stretch and grow will boost resilience. Celebrate small wins to help maintain motivation. View setbacks as steps on the journey; ask what can be learned from the experience rather than viewing it as a failure.
Conclusion
The secret is harnessing proven tools to help our “pilot” make better choices, from what we focus on and deciding what tasks are important to creating the space to get stuff done. Our mindset will determine whether we challenge ourselves, repeat the same mistakes, learn, and grow on our journey to becoming highly productive.
Productivity is more than choosing the right tools. With clear objectives and priorities, productive routines and structures, eliminating distractions and cultivating a growth mindset, you can unlock the pilot in the box.
This article first appeared on Forbes.com on 13th December 2023
Ricky has been a regular contributor to the Forbes Councils since 2023, where he shares his perspectives on all things leadership, change, culture and productivity, all with Thinking Focus’ unique perspective on metacognition, or as we prefer to say, thinking about thinking.
Rob and Paul continue this mini-series within The Question Is podcast about some of the different ways that people ‘get in their own way’. This time we consider perfectionism.
Could perfectionism be an advantage, or are we confusing high standards, with nothing ever being quite good enough?
Like most traits that get in our way, these habits were once useful, which is why they have become a habit. Then, out of the blue, the very thing that was helping becomes the thing getting in the way.
Paul and Rob explore the fine line between driving to excel and perfectionism and discuss strategies for perfectionists to stay on the right side of the line.
