Welcome Professionals…

…I just came back from a convention this week. One of the speakers said: “I wouldn’t say that it isn’t wise not to invest these days…” Extremly odd sentence, don’t you think?

Interestingly, I realize that many people – including myself – use denial expressions quite often. We tend to state upfront what we do not mean or what we do not want or what we do not believe is true. I do not know why. Maybe because we feel more strongly about things that we do not want than about the things we really do want.

What I do know is that this way of communication is extremely harmful to our message that we want to bring across. We want to convince people, persuade them, drive them to actions. By stating the opposite, we leave the wrong impression.

The brain is not able not to think of something. “Do not think of a pink elephant!” This is a famous example. Of course, everybody pictures this pink elephant instantly. The same happens to the denial expressions. Statements like “this offer is not expensive”, “this project will not last forever”, “I am not a beginner” etc. leave the listener with the imaginations of “expensive”, “forever”, and “beginner”. This counteracts our real meaning.

So, say what you want! Try this exercise right now. It is not as easy as you may think.

Let me know how it works,

Malte

Thursday Night Flight is brought to you by Malte Müller Professionals. Sharing best practices for top management consultants on topics like communication, client handling, problem solving, appearance, and fitness. Check out www.mm-professionals.com for more material and free resources!

Welcome Professionals…

…we are all focused on solving problems for our clients. This requires a great deal of creativity. But sometimes, we get so goal-oriented that our brain has trouble finding creative solutions. Being busy and focused kills the associative thinking process.

My mother used to annoy me with a simple advice. At times when I was extremely busy, she would call me and say something like “Go outside, enjoy the sunshine and get yourself some ice-cream!” I only realized much later that there was actually a lot of conventional wisdom in that.

Leading neuro-psychologists agree that the real genius happens in default mode. I bet we all know this from experience. The creative idea that sparks after having taken a nap, during the shower or while exercising. When we involve in an activity that does not require our attention, the brain switches to default mode. It is then when the genius occurs.

Despite all the focus and attention you put into your work in this first week of the year, I encourage you to take a break. Right now. Allow your brain to switch to default and unlock the genius inside of you!

You are welcome to share your genius ideas in the forum!

Malte

Thursday Night Flight is brought to you by Malte Müller Professionals. Sharing best practices for top management consultants on topics like communication, client handling, problem solving, appearance, and fitness. Check out www.mm-professionals.com for more material and free resources!

Welcome Professionals…

…this week is one under pressure. I thought about writing the next topic for TNF over the weekend, but I had other priorities. As we approach the end of the year, my days are packed from waking up until falling to bed.

We just had an important client presentation which came in short notice on top of all the other “year-end-project-termination-speed-run”. Now I have 15 minutes to write and publish this week’s edition of TNF.

In order to prepare for today’s presentation, I had to set priorities very strictly. I allocated close to all my working time to this one project and left everything else aside. I told other clients to call me later and I shifted some other scheduled meetings away.

What I am actually proud of: I kept my principals under pressure. These are:

1. My loved ones matter most. My wife was able to take her night out with the other ladies and I cared for my kids.
2. Get enough sleep. Even though it was only 5 hours, I had a decent amount of sleep to get rested to the presentation.
3. Stay positive. I kept a positive attitude to my surrounding instead of getting hectic.
4. And finally: I kept my plan of writing a new edition every Thursday!

What do you think about this? Let me know about your own principles and how you operate under pressure.

Malte

Thursday Night Flight is brought to you by Malte Müller Professionals. Sharing best practices for top management consultants on topics like communication, client handling, problem solving, appearance, and fitness. Check out www.mm-professionals.com for more material and free resources!

Welcome Professionals…

…thank you for your encouraging feedback on issue TNF #006. This seemed to hit an important topic and raised some reactions. My key recommendation is to be fully dedicated to the value creation process rather than getting too focused on perfect end results.

I would like to make this idea more tangible today.

“What gets measured gets done” is a phrase that every top management consultant knows by heart. But what are the appropriate KPIs, if we want to concentrate on the value creation process appropriately?

I believe that in many cases, our clients and also ourselves pick the wrong metrics when it comes to value creation. We choose results-related KPIs that have us focus on end results with strained anticipation instead of dedicating our full energy to the value creation process.

Let me give you an example. Oftentimes, the overall business targets are transferred directly into KPIs for day-to-day operation. A consulting company has an overall revenue and billability target so it is broken down to individual revenue targets by consultant and then into a monthly run-rate, a weekly billability rate and so on. So far so good.

The problem begins, when the individual consultant takes a narrow focus on his/her weekly billable hours and revenue goals. The revenue KPI is to a certain extend a derivative of the value creation work. But it is not directly linked and certainly not directly proportional. When we stare at results-related KPIs that are not fully under our own control, it takes away our attention to what really matters in value creation.

If we want to concentrate on the value creation process, we need to define metrics that are linked to this process. KPIs that we as individuals or as a team have fully under control. We want to measure and control the action that will – most likely – have a positive impact on our final business targets like revenue and profit. Examples for these KPIs could be

• Quality of work
• Number of new target clients contacted
• Research productivity
• Client satisfaction
• etc.

As a consequence, I allow myself to be judged only on KPIs that I have fully under my control and that are linked to my personal value creation process. Only from time to time, I check back if it also fits with my revenue goals. What I discover then most of the time is that I need more patience. And that a lot more hard work is required. 🙂

Let me know what you think,

Malte

Thursday Night Flight is brought to you by Malte Müller Professionals. Sharing best practices for top management consultants on topics like communication, client handling, problem solving, appearance, and fitness. Check out www.mm-professionals.com for more material and free resources!

Welcome Professionals…

…it is fun Thursday again in our Thursday Night Flight series!

A good sense of humour helps a great deal to get along with hard work. We all know that.

I was talking to a friend last week who told me that his boss went on a seminar to a “humour training institute”. That sounded really odd. His boss wanted to learn how to tell jokes the right way. But, whenever he tried, the situation got awkward and people turned away from him. Even after a two-day training session, he did not see any improvement.

So he figured it was due to the fact that he had a different cultural background and people were just not able to understand his special sense of humour. I do not agree. He failed because he made jokes on his direct reports in front of other people.

The best and most elegant way is always to make fun of yourself. Be always ready to laugh about yourself. I think this cuts across all cultural differences and is the most appropriate way for humour in business.

This is why I will tell you my favorite joke about consultants:

A consultant, a priest, and a doctor are trying to enjoying a round of golf. Ahead of them is a group playing so slowly and inexpertly that in frustration the consultant asks the greenkeeper for an explanation. “That’s a group of blind firefighters,” they are told. “They lost their sight saving our clubhouse last year, so we let them play for free.”

The priest says, “I will say a prayer for them tonight.”

The doctor says, “Let me ask my ophthalmologist colleagues if anything can be done for them.”

And the consultant says, “Why can’t they play at night?”

And now another one for all German-speaking consultants: Have a look at this recent content by Harry G. – I think it is hilarious.

Have a fun week

Malte

Thursday Night Flight is brought to you by Malte Müller Professionals. Sharing best practices for top management consultants on topics like communication, client handling, problem solving, appearance, and fitness. Check out www.mm-professionals.com for more material and free resources!