I had an interesting talk with a business friend of mine a couple of days ago
I shared with him some statistics that I had discovered

Following an M&A:

• 75% of M&As deliver the results expected
• Productivity drops 50% over the following four to eight months
• 50% of the top talent will leave within twelve months
• The stock price rises only 30% of the time
• Employee engagement falls by 40%

So the question needs to be asked; “Why do businesses do it?”

The answer is generally to expand into new product areas, accelerate growth in new regions, acquire technology, processes or people.
The reason that so few M&As deliver what is expected is, in my experience, because risk analysis isn’t made of the people issues.
It’s people issues that have the capacity to derail an otherwise potentially beneficial M&A.

Those businesses that do consider the people issues at a very early stage tend to be the ones that deliver most, if not all, of their expectations.

If you would like a free paper of this topic please email me at:
stephen@assimilating-talent.com

Readers of this blog will know that  have posted articles on businesses that make it difficult for customers to buy through ill-conceived processes. (See The Sales Assassins At Wickes)

Today my good friend Andy Lopata (The author of the International best selling book on networking “Recommended” posted this screen-save from his attempt to buy Olympoic tickets…Need I say more?

Last night I attended the Opening Ceremony rehearsal. I guess you’ll be expecting a full lowdown on the show and I promise to tell you all about it in this blog when I’ve come down from cloud nine on Saturday morning. Except to say that it is a FANTASTIC show and you won’t want to miss it!

Chaos behind scenes
Half an hour before the rehearsal started my neighbour received a text from someone in the cast of thousands to say that they were all “very nervous and that there was chaos behind the scenes”. When it began, you wouldn’t have known. All the team’s rehearsals over the last few weeks came together and produced an end result that I will never forget for it’s brilliance.

Hundreds of mistakes
Dountless there were some mistakes, probably hundreds, but the end result was stunning and that’s what was important. The message for business teams and managers is that when delivering a complex result there will be mistakes along the way, individual teams may view the thing as being chaotic, lacking in management leadership and full of errors but what matters is that the result looks superb to those watching.

It’s made the start of my Olympics come sooner and if the sport lives up to the opening ceremony then wer’re in for two weeks of real fun.

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Found this feedback on a conference keynote I give and it’s put a spring in my step all day

“I have seen Stephen speaking on more than one occasion and I’m a strong advocate of his material.
The talk is fun and engaging with a deft touch. Mainly though I think the content is vital.
It has a demonstrable ROI and is hugely relevant in this time of constant change.
I would recommend it to anyone serious about the long term success of their business”
Caspar Berry

Over the past two weeks I’ve really enjoyed working with some great professionals and it prompted me to think what it was that did that made contact with them so pleasurable.

The first was John Cassidy who I asked to take some new photos. John specialises in headshots and had photographed David Beckam, most of the English football squad as well as Royalty. Not only did John create some great results but he was a joy to meet, very engaging and took time to find out what I wanted. “It’s what you would expect” I hear you say and I would reply “True, but I have been photographed by people who didn’t light me up and consequently got poor results”.

With John I relaxed, enjoyed working with him and the results were better than I expected. He explained how to get the most from his time with him and how to prepare for the session. What to wear, grooming, and what to do the week, day and evening before the shoot. That was certainly new for me and a three hour photoshoot seemed like twenty minutes!

Then there was a twenty-one year old graduate who once swam for Team GB Youth team called James Hosrfall who’s set up his own fitness suppliment company. I will be talking about him in greater detail in another blog. Then there was the builder, the lawyer and ….

We may, often, complain about the standard of work in the UK and I know I do so regularly, but there’s an awful lot of great and knowledgable professionals about. Thanks guys for lighting me up!

It’s not often that I come accross a business that seems to have a business model guaranteed to upset the customer.
However, I have to give the prize to Wickes. The people who’ve got their name on it! and their branch in St Albans!

Some months ago I decided on a new kitchen. The old one couldn’t hold all the equipment, pots, pans and so on and anyhow it looked old fashioned. So I decided to splash out. After some research I fell in love with a modern look that Wickes had on display. Cream coloured cabinets with no handles, easy to clezan and perfect. The very personable salesperson came to measure up and produced a stunning 360 computer plan (see below) of what the kitchen would look like. I was really impressed and it was a few punds over budget, but when you fall in love…so what

Things started to go wrong
A deposit was paid and a date arranged for a fitter (i guess a subcontractor) to call to take exact measurements. It was then that things started to go wrong!
The fitter arrived and took exact measurement by waving his tape measure around and seemingly rounded up the measurements to give him wiggle room. (No sign of a laser measurer which he told me was less acurate than the old tape measure)
Then cam the add-ons. These are the bits priced up by the fitter and excluded by Wickes designers. Such as light fittings, tiling, electricals and so on.

Price escalated to over 20% more
After the fitter had added up all his extras the project price had risen by an additional 20% (I will admit it included a new fuse box).
I was then told that the work would take two weeks, Wickes had told me it would take one!
I was then left with no paperwork by the fitter except that half the additional payment would be required before starting. Had the fitter demanded more I had no proof that was the agreed amount
I still had to buy the tiles and light fittings!

Second thoughts

• I decided that the budget had been exceeded and so cancelled the contract within the 14 day cooling-off period.
• It was promised that the deposit would be repaid and I’m still waiting
  
• The regional manager phoned me to discuss my concerns and before I could call back (he called on the Saturday of the Jubillee holiday) and has since gone off on holiday without leaving another person’s contact details

Change the poor business model
I would suggest that Wickes consider changing their business model so as to conclude a SINGLE price for all the work and which includes all their sub-contractors work including tiling, light fitting and all other works. It might result in kitchens and possibly bathrooms being a bit more expensive at the quote stage BUT it would prevent the thoughts that sub-contractors were inflating prices and that the process was inefficient and in the end not worth the frustration.
Would I go back, not even for some plywood!

“Is there a world leadership crisis?” was the question posed to me yesterday by someone in the group I was speaking to yesterday.

Lack of political leadership
I had been talking about business team leadership and the question opened up a flood of thoughts that I’d had myself about leadership. In the recent past the world seems to have been led by rather uncharismatic political leaders. A few years ago we had great hopes for President Obamah but due to his problems with Congress his light seems to have faded. The European Community seems to have few politicians who understand or even identify with the people they are leading and their handling of the current debt crisis is leaving many exasperated. Popular revolutions replace dictators with “much the same as before”.

Business leadership not much better
But is business also suffering from a leadership crisis?
Bankers, all over the world, are as popular as a bad smell in a confined space, Journalists, in the UK, are viewed by many people as having little or no moral scruples, business leaders of all shades seen as feathering their own nests with undeserved salary increases and bonuses whilst their workers are laid off and have their salaries cut.
Perhaps it’s not surprising that there seems to be a universal lack of leadership.

Influenced by headlines
In reality, however, it’s always easy to become influenced the “Headlines”. In doing so we can ignore the huge numbers of people beavering away and producing small successes that move a business team forward. In the past few weeks I’ve met dozens of small business leaders that are managing to keep their business teams motivated, enthusiastic for the future and actually growing their business results.

That’s not to say there aren’t difficulties. Youth unemployment is a huge problem, the value of retirement annuities a disaster for many and industries laid bare a tragedy. Yet walk up any street and you notice so many business start-ups. Open up any magazine and you can see new and innovative products. Go into millions of businesses and you can find great team leaders.
I wonder if we can persuade some of these leaders to run for government?

I’ve recently answered a question on what brings a product to life.

I disagreed with some people who thought that the answer was when the “money owing for the product clears in the bank account and exceeds the
liabilities that were created in the process of production”

I thought these answers were too simplistic and actually don’t describe “coming to life”. It could mean that a £1 profit meant the product had come to life and for me that’s not a good description. What I think describes a product coming to life is when it starts to “excite” the producers and purchasers. It’s only through an emotional state can a product actually have an “exciting life”.

Let me give you some examples.

a) In her recent Royal engagements The Duchess of Cambridge has worn coats from last years fashions and the shops have been inundated by people wanting to buy the same coats and shoes and have gone into new production to fulfil demand.

b) Apple creates a loyalty for its products and makes visiting the store exciting, energetic

c) Abercrombie and Fitch have an opposite product to the rest of the high street. The stores are dark, you can’t see the product clearly, it’s unbelievably expensive (in UK if not in USA) and yet kids crowd in, desperate to have a photo taken with half naked models where their muscles are highlighted by clever downward lighting and spray tanning to accentuate the bumps. The products are bought because it’s “Cool fashion”. It’s an exciting product.

The other thing about the examples above is that the product isn’t just what’s bought!
It’s the experience, the emotion of ownership and belonging to a group of other owners.

Products that don’t build this into the product mix may have a “Birth” but they’re likely to have a short life 

Over the past week I’ve been amazed at the response of companies to negative comments on Twitter. In the “getting complaints resolved fast” it seems to scare companies far more than threats to complain through official channels!

It takes 50 days to post a form
At this point I’m not going to mention the companies concerned (look through my previous blogs and tweets if you want to know the who) but to say that one complaint was after I was informed that to post me a form that needed completing could take up to fifty days to post…yes that’s right fifty (50) days to post out a form!

Brand protection
Within an hour of the negative tweets complaining of the poor customer service I was being contacted by teams of people wanting to resolve my complaint to prevent further negative tweets being made. Now, one has to admire the protection of the brand image and how effectively the complaint was handled but my main question is why let the situation where a customer is frustrated or angered occur in the first place?

So, perhaps the advice if you have a complaint about a company should be “Tweet first, blog next, mention it on facebook and if that brings no satisfactory result then complain officially”.

As the Queen’s Diamond Jubilee approaches we are likely to be bombarded with comparisons of the “then and now”. Commentators will be lecturing us saying how much better off we all are than in 1952!

People worked harder
Doubtless they will mention that people worked harder in 1952. Yet in reality communication and technology mean that we work faster and more effectively now than sixty years ago.

There will be statistics showing that more women are employed than ever before and regrets that “company loyalty” has disappeared. Forced redundancies, company closures and so on have meant that people are prepared, often out of necessity, to change jobs and careers more often than sixty years ago.

Is comparison pointless?
Yet comparisons are rather pointless. During the past sixty years the world has changed beyond recognition for most in the UK and the USA and it’s undeniable that the general standard of living of Briton’s has improved.

The real issue
The real issue for discussion with commentators, politicians, business leaders and bankers should be not whether things are better now than in 1952 but instead if things will be better at the end of the reign than they are now?