Managers and Entrepreneurs Need Training Too

In today's economy more and more people are turning to entrepreneurship as job replacement. This is true for two instances:

• People who can not get jobs and need to start their own business to earn money.
• People who are under-employed and need to start part-time businesses to supplement their income.

In both cases, these individuals, who are not necessarily entrepreneurship-inclined and trained; need to take steps to enure their businesses succeed and that they do not take a bad situation and make it worse; and that they do achieve what they set out to do – earn enough money to pay the bills and live a comfortable (at worst) life.

Before starting a business keep in mind that:

• 50% fail in the first year
• 10% to 33% are left standing after five years (depends upon the study you read)

And that the main reasons business fail are:

• No business plan
• Poor management

Interestingly, research I have done shows:

• 80% of all entrepreneurs indicate a business plan is important
• 20% of all entrepreneurs have a business plan

Looking at the last stat, along with many people starting businesses with no management training; it is no wonder the vast majority of new businesses fail.

This is why I implore people starting businesses to generate a business plan (worst case in bullet point format) and, at minimum, know what management tools are needed to run a business successfully.

A business plan is needed for many reasons, not just to obtain financing. A business plan is a feasibility study to ensure your business can earn enough money to cover your personal and business expenses. A business plan helps set strategies so you can measure if you are on the path to success or need to re-look what you are doing (and to do so quickly before you get swallowed up by debt). Researching and writing a business plan also helps define your management strengths and weaknesses. If you cannot develop a good marketing promotion while generating your plan, you better improve your skills or leave room in the budget to hire someone to develop one for you.

As far as management tools go; you need to implement a strategic plan, with specific objectives, strategies, tactics and goals from day one and monitor your progress quarterly. You also need to understand marketing. This includes advertising and promotion, pricing strategies, your competition, perfecting your sales skills and elevator pitch, and understanding branding. Other areas you will need to perfect include: customer service, cash flow management, project management, market research, and more.

I teach a course, “How to Start, Grow and Manage a Business.” The course covers business plans and management tools. I wrote a book to support the course. It contains much of the lecture content (in bullet form so you do not have to read four paragraphs to get the key piece of information) and has lots and lots of worksheets that entrepreneurs can use in their business and to outline a business plan.

You can check out the book's table of contents on Amazon (http://www.amazon.com/Building-Successful-Business-entrepreneurs-instruction/dp/1470000636/ref=sr_1_29?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1328713612&sr=1-29). If you cannot find a better deal on line, go to my book's web site, https://www.createspace.com/3785695 and use coupon code ADF28U4Q for $5 off.

The book is perfect for entrepreneurs, whether new or seasoned, and for managers employed by a business who want to learn new to implement improvements to their departments.

Review: A Straight-forward, Affordable Approach to Work Readiness Training

There has been a lot of activity on my blog recently from search terms indicating a need for a work readiness training program. While different programs and recommendations can be found in past entries, I thought I would write a quick summary of an easy to implement, but very effective work readiness training program that can used by any business. Of course, since this is my blog, I will be recommending my tools. However, if you feel comfortable implementing all the steps below, all you need to do is buy a copy of my book. This is not a program where I am recommending using my consulting services where my I have made significantly more money from very satisfied clients. That of course is an option for you as well.

KEY COMPONENTS:

Training approach: demonstrated competencies

It is not enough to teach employees and have them pass assessment and/or certification tests. They need to demonstrate what they learn in the workplace.

Training manual: “How to Get, Keep and Be Well Paid on the Job” (http://www.outskirtspress.com/Goldberg)

This book should be purchased by supervisors (or the training department). The first chapter does not pertain to training existing employees, however, all the other chapters do. The supervisor (or training department) should read each chapter to help him/her teach the information in that chapter to his/her employees. Each training session should be for one chapter in the book. The book uses examples outside the workplace to help illustrate key points. It also explains why specific behavior and skills are valued in the workplace, which is the key in getting employees to actually buy into modifying their behavior.

Employee accountability: After training is completed, hold employees accountable for demonstrating what they learned every day at work.

First, have all employees initial that they attended a training session and understood the material that was covered. Next, write competency statements on the behaviors and skills covered in each chapter. The competency statements need to be in the format of: demonstrate a behavior or skill in a specific and measureable way as evidenced by a specific person/report/etc . For example:

The employee will have zero unexcused tardiness as evidenced by never being late to work, never extending breaks, always taking only the allotted time for lunch, and never leaving early, as evidenced by supervisor observation (could be as evidenced by time clock reports, etc.).

You could also add: unless prior arrangements were made with the employee's supervisor and/or unless there is an emergency situation out of the employee's control.

Another example is:

The employee will demonstrate that he/she is a positive influence in the workplace by being pleasant, courteous, and respectful to all of his/her co-workers at all times, and never starting or engaging in gossip about a co-worker as evidenced by supervisor observation.

Note – supervisors need to document all incidences where he/she observes that an employee is not meeting this competency statement.

A third example is:

The Customer Service Phone Representative will demonstrate that he/she is ready and available to receive calls by having a "plugged into the system" percent of 90% or higher during non-scheduled-break and non-lunch times as demonstrated by a score of 90% or higher for percent of time plugged into the system during non-lunch and non-scheduled-break times on the Daily Representative Summary Report generated by the ACD System.

If you need help developing meaningful competency statements, contact me at JayGoldberg@DTRConsulting.BIZ. Please be aware that I am a business consultant and there will be a fee for writing competency statements.

Employee performance review: Make meeting the competency statements a part of every employees formal performance review process.

Tie all employees’ annual raises to meeting their demonstrated competencies, which should be part of all employees formal annual review process. This formal process (from training to review) can also be used to help support fired employees who legally challenge their terminations.

Good luck with your work readiness training.

ETHICS IN THE WORKPLACE

I recently published a series of three blog entries for Jobing.com. The entries went over very well and were featured in the Jobing.com newsletters for both employers and job seekers so I’m going to share the “meat” of those blogs here.

Before summarizing the information below I want to point out that the ethics example used comes from my book, How to Get, Keep and Be Well Paid in a Job, a work readiness rulebook that received a five-star review from the Midwest Book Review, an entity libraries rely on when ordering books for their collections. In addition, I am now offering a new service for businesses that I will run through my account at wisdompan.com. Every month I will present a fictional workplace case study. Companies will sign up for an account where they will get a private company message board where their employees will comment anonymously on the fictional case study. Towards the end of the month I will comment on their comments (on the board), present the answer, and provide key learning points. At the conclusion of the month a competency statement will be provided to the company based on the lesson learned for the month. From that point forward the employees will be held accountable for demonstrating that competency at work, and their performance of that competency becomes part of their job appraisal process.

The new service is not up yet on wisdompan.com, however, I will only be accepting 15 businesses for this service. Please contact me (jaygoldberg@dtrconsulting.biz or leave a message on 561-842-9942; in email or or phone message indicate "your employer work readiness program" to ensure your message gets the attention it deserves) if you might be interested and I will place you on my list of potential clients. I will contact businesses in the order I receive their potential interest to explain the service/process in more detail and to fill up the 15 slots.

PART I – Ethics fictional case study

Situation: A bank has a strict policy that all tellers must have at minimum a high school diploma or a GED. There are no exceptions. In fact, a good friend of yours who was an excellent teller for another bank, just lost his job because of the downturn in the economy, and was turned down by the bank you work for because he did not have his GED or high school diploma. Your friend was told that every teller in the bank has at minimum a GED or high school diploma, and that the bank even uses that fact when soliciting new accounts. Today the teller who sits next to you, someone who is not your friend, not even someone you go to lunch with, turns to you and says, "I can't wait. Next month I am finally getting my GED."

Question: What would you do, if anything, after finding out that the teller sitting next to you did not have either a GED or high school diploma?

PART II –Commenting on the Comments

First, in addition to being the author of the book, How to Get, Keep and Be Well Paid in a Job, which is a work readiness guide; I also developed a work readiness certification training program that was called the best in the Country by a member of the National Skills Standard Board in January of 2003. I mention that fact because during the initial rollout of that program I trained the teachers. While instructing them on how to teach ethics, I used a scenario similar to the one presented here. I did so because I knew the situation would result in a diversity of answers regarding the correct action for the employee to take, with people digging in deeply to their point of views. However, during all that discussion no one came up with the answer presented by Roosevelt Williams, and I found his response very well thought out. It is both intelligent and cautious. Bringing up the specific situation to his supervisor to help clarify a company policy was brilliant. Management is now aware of a potentially damaging fact, and Mr. Williams was able to bring it to the attention of his supervisor in way where he was finding out about company policies, not directly "talking about" a co-worker.

Both Monica Diaz Veliz and Jan Teegardin made statements that were true. Businesses often do hire employees below the stated requirements for a job and give the new employees time to accumulate the credentials they lack. While that could be true in other scenarios, I tried to close that door here when I wrote "that there are no exceptions". But more important is that I mention that the bank uses the fact that all tellers have at least a high school diploma or GED to solicit new accounts. If customers found that statement to be untrue, they could become uneasy with the bank. Even if they do not care whether the tellers have a high school diploma or GED, they may question the truth when the bank informs them that its checking account has no fees. After all if all tellers really means almost all tellers, does no fees really mean almost no fees? Losing the trust of customers can lead to customers leaving and to negative word of mouth on the street about that business.

Adrienne Ishmael's answer shows she is an honest, compassionate person. In my experience, I have found that the majority of people respond to this situation in a similar fashion to Ms. Ishmail. Ms. Ismail indicated that she would be reluctant to do anything because she wouldn't want to be responsible for setting the wheels in motion that could eventually get her co-worker fired. However, she was also very insightful in her answer pointing out that it is possible her co-worker lied to get the job. In addition to Ms. Ishmael's reason for not taking any action, I have heard responses from people who would not do anything ranging from, "It's not my job to correct a mistake made by Human Resources", to "I'm not a rat, I'm no squealer", to "If I keep my mouth shut no one will ever know that I'm aware of that fact" to more. I hope after reading my next blog everyone will realize that deciding not to do anything in a given situation is something that has to be thought through. Not acting on a something does not ensure that there are no consequences for that inaction.

Finally, Mirna Musharbash took a point of view I respect and have valued in my employees, but may have gone as the band Madness would say, "One Step Beyond". I like when employees look at situations through the eyes of a supervisor. It means that they care about the business, take their jobs seriously and want the business to succeed. So I applaud Mirna Musharbash for taking that approach. However, there is a fine line between looking through the eyes of your supervisor and taking it upon yourself to make decisions that should really be made by your supervisor. In this case Mirna was basing the decision to bring this fact to the attention of management on how well that person performed in his/her job. First, Mirna is not in the position to evaluate a co-workers' job performance, because I know Mirna is busy working and therefore, not in a position to observe all work completed by any co-worker. Second is that reviewing the overall job performance of Mirna's co-workers is the responsibility of Mirna's supervisor, not Mirna. Furthermore, even if Mirna was correct in the assessment of the co-worker's job performance that may not be the key factor in management's view of the situation. As mentioned previously, the fact that the employee lied on his/her job application and the fact that the bank is marketing that all tellers have high school diplomas or GEDs to its customers and could lose business if customers found out that that was untrue, could be the chief concerns of management in this situation, not job performance.

PART III- My Final Remarks

In my prior two blog entries on this topic I first presented a workplace scenario, requesting comments from readers; and then wrote a blog commenting on my readers’ insightful comments. In this wrap-up blog I will give my view on ethics and my answer to the workplace scenario. To not re-invent (or in this case, re-write) the wheel, I will use some quotes from my copyrighted book, How to Get, Keep and Be Well Paid in Job.

“A behavior is either ethical (right) or unethical (wrong). There is absolutely no gray area. Being ethical means doing the right thing. What determines if something is ethical or unethical is the behavior itself, not the circumstances surrounding the action taken, not the relationship between the people involved, not an individual’s culture, not a person’s value system, not life’s experiences, etc., etc., etc.”

That said, acting unethically does not mean you are a bad person. For example, speeding is against the law, thus unethical. However, driving 10 miles an hour over the speed limit doesn’t make you a bad person.

“The key to understanding ethics is to be able to define if an act is ethical or unethical. Once you have identified the ethical behavior, then you decide what to do. In other words, to either do the ethical behavior or do the unethical behavior. This is where circumstances, relationships, culture, values, life’s experiences, etc., etc., etc. come into play. You decide in each situation if you are going to act ethically or unethically.

There will be times in life that you feel strongly that choosing the unethical behavior is the right choice for you. However, you must be aware that if you choose to do the unethical behavior there can be severe consequences. Therefore, if you choose to act unethically, know what those consequences could be (obvious and hidden), and be prepared to accept those consequences for making the decision to act unethically.”

In the case of the unethical act of driving 10 miles over the speed limit, for example, you have to be prepared to possibly: get a speeding ticket and see your insurance rates increase; to be at minimum partially liable for any car accident; and may have given cause for a police office to search your vehicle.

Now on to the scenario from this blog:

The ethics of the situation is clear. The bank teller obviously lied during the job interview process and on his/her application which is unethical. So, what would I do?

I would first inform the bank teller that I am very annoyed that he/she told me that they are breaking bank rules and that by telling me of that fact he/she has placed me in a difficult spot; a spot I would rather not have been in, and a spot I am only in because of his/her action. I would next remind the bank teller of the fact that we promote to all potential new customers (and existing customers) that all our tellers have at least a GED or high school diploma. Next, I would tell the bank teller that I will give him/her two days to inform our supervisor of this fact, or that I will have no choice but to tell our supervisor myself.

I know what many of you are thinking. What a rat, especially since by just keeping your mouth shut nothing would happen to you, Jay. Well, let me play this scenario out.

Let’s say that my supervisor finds out that the bank teller did not have his/her high school diploma or GED when he/she was hired. Maybe the bank teller celebrates when he/she finally gets his/her GED, or maybe someone sends him/her congratulatory flowers. When the bank teller is called onto the carpet by his/her supervisor, the bank teller comments that he/she didn’t think it was a big deal and that he/she mentioned it to Jay and Jay did not think it was a big deal either. That statement by the bank teller just brought me into this mess.

As a result of the lie on the application the bank teller gets fired (this is usually a policy; companies can’t start looking into the degree of each lie on a job application). Nothing happens to me. I keep my job and, in fact, have no idea that my name was brought up in the meeting between my now fired ex-coworker and my supervisor. However, my supervisor now feels that my priorities are wrong. I do not have the best interests of the bank in mind. I knew the bank was informing potential customers that every teller had a least a GED or high school diploma, knew that was untrue, and keep my mouth shut. If I thought I would be admired for not “tattling” on a coworker who was untruthful on his/her application, I might be by some misguided coworkers; but I won’t be by people of influence in the company.

A year later there is a promotion opportunity in the bank. I believe I am perfect for the job. I don’t get it. The same thing happens nine months later, then fifteen months after that. Unfair I think. However, it all goes back to me deciding to act unethically. It is the fact that management in the bank does not believe they can count on me to do the right thing for the bank that is preventing me from advancing in the company. And by this time I have totally forgotten that offhand comment by my ex-coworker; and never got a chance to explain my side of things, although I doubt that that would have made a difference anyway.

There are often hidden consequences to unethical acts. People who say “Why doesn’t anything ever work out for me?” or “I constantly have bad luck” may just be living the hidden consequences of prior unethical acts. Here, I would not be willing to risk my advancement in the bank, possibly being stuck in the same relatively low-paying job for a long time, because a co-worker acted unethically (lying on a job application) and brought me into the mess; most likely on purpose to have an ally in case the situation went bad.

See you in my next post.

A Practical Gift for the Recent Grad

Unfortunately today, graduating from high school or college does not provide adequate insight, knowledge, or tools for a young adult to fit into and thrive in the workplace. Students learn reading. Students learn writing. Students learn arithmetic. Students may even take subjects specifically to help them in the workplace such as accounting or computer programming. However, students do not learn how and why workplaces operate as they do. This leads to employers all over the U.S. complaining about the lack of work readiness skills in their workers, especially workers new to the workforce.

I know what some of you are thinking. My school has a work readiness program. Well, to parrot a very smart man I knew who worked for the National Skills Standard Board and was knowledgeable of work readiness programs all over the U.S.; “many of the programs do more harm than good.” How am I aware of this quote? Because he said it right after stating that the work readiness program I developed was the best in the Country. The quote came during a presentation of my Program in Jacksonville, Florida on January, 14, 2003.

This leads to the practical gift for the recent grad. In April of 2008, my book, “How to Get, Keep and Be Well Paid in a Job”, was published by Outskirts Press. This book is a guide to succeeding in the workplace. Unlike the other work readiness books, this book is not written like a text book that simply “preaches” what workers should do at work. This book is written to both inform and entertain, and takes the time to explain why specific behaviors and skills are valued by employers, and uses real life examples to help illustrate key points. For example, the first chapter is titled, “The First Date” and compares dating to the interview process. There is also a chapter called, “What Are the Special Codes for This Game Called Work” that correlates advanced workplace skills to video games. In addition, the chapter on ethics analyzes music downloading before moving onto workplace issues. To find out more about the book, including the book’s table of contents, go to http://outskirtspress.com/webpage.php?ISBN=9781432725297.

I know writing a blog recommending a book I wrote is self-serving, however, I have spent a long time in the work readiness arena and strongly believe that my book will help both the reader/worker and the business community. And I’m not the only one. In July of 2008, the book received an excellent review from John Taylor of the Midwest Book Review, an entity that reviews books for libraries. The review concluded that my book is “is highly recommended to community library jobs and career collections.” To read the complete review, go to http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m0SFB/is_2008_July/ai_n27967713.

My last note: the book is currently being used in Programs that are teaching work readiness (ESOL, trade schools, youth at risk, etc.). If you would like to use the book in a Program, go to this web site for more information: http://www.dtrconsulting.biz/dtrbook2.htm.

THE FUTURE OF TRAINING: LIVE WEBINARS

One of the results of the bad economy is the negative impact on training. The more people I speak to in large companies, the more I hear about training staffs being cut.

While there will always be a place for “hard skills” training, even if it takes the form of on the job training, the days of “soft skills” training in large and small companies alike, are growing short.

Based on my experience, training from videos and pre-recorded material on-line doesn’t work very well. When individuals know they can watch again, when there is nothing live going on that requires immediate attention, when there is no interaction between instructor and participant, there is a tremendous amount of inattentiveness on the part of the individuals watching the training.

I know what some of you are saying, “That’s why we have the participants take a test after they watch the training, to ensure that they pay attention.”

Well, if you read my previous blog, “THERE IS A RIGHT WAY AND A WRONG WAY TO TEACH WORK READINESS”, you already know that basing the success of “soft skills” training on the results of assessments tests is a mistake. The goal of “soft skill” training is not to provide knowledge; it is to have the participants practice good work readiness behaviors and improve their job performance after they complete the training. The key to getting someone to improve/change is for them to understand why a behavior is important to their employer. Often that fact is driven home by using real life analogies. That is the approach I took in my work readiness book, “How to Get, Keep and Be Well Paid in a Job”. Click here to find out more about my book which received a five-star review from the Midwest Book Review.

Therefore, I will go so far as to say, err write, requiring that the viewers of a video training session take an assessment test often results in the most important parts of the video training being ignored by the viewers. Having an assessment test after the video for “soft skills” training only ensures that viewers concentrate on the facts and take good notes so they can pass the test. Instead you want them to be paying attention to the entire lecture so that they come away understanding not only the facts, but why those skills/behaviors are important, so that the training can result in positive changes in your workplace.

So if taped/pre-recorded training sessions do not work, and training staff and budgets are shrinking what is the answer?

Live webinars are an excellent solution. In live webinars, viewers must pay attention the whole time or they will miss information. There is no fallback to rewind or replay the taped session. In addition, with a real-time chat room, and live polling questions with instantaneous results, the audience can be kept involved. In fact, when used right, the polling questions serve as feedback for the instructor to know when to stay with a topic that the group is not grasping a little longer. A good instructor does this all the time in live, in-person, classrooms. This can not be done, obviously, in taped and pre-recorded training media.

Finally, another trend that could arise, especially out of a poor economy, is that “soft skill” training falls on the shoulders of individuals, to improve their value, rather than on businesses, that are struggling to keep costs low. In these cases, live webinar training is very assessable, and affordable to individuals. Taking live workplace, self-improvement webinars, will not only improve a worker’s performance, but the initiative will impress the boss; whether yours, or someone with whom you are interviewing to get a job.

Towards that end, I am in the process of changing how I deliver my training programs. I have invested in a webinar product, and will be rolling out a series of affordable webinar training sessions in late November, or early December. Check back here for more information in a couple of weeks.