Happy New Year

Happy New Year!

I know it is the time of year where promises and resolutions have been made. In fact, it's probably around that these resolutions start to break for most of us. Traditionally, the resolutions that people make are things like eating more healthily, to exercise more, cut down on alcohol consumption and to quit smoking.

However, we need to also consider our own personal development. The first step is to reflect back on 2010. Take a moment to ask yourself the following questions, what went well in 2010? What could be improved?

I am a big football fan and this is also the time of year that many managers get the sack (Roy Keane of Ipswich is the latest to get the chop at the time of writing). This is nothing new or surprising. What surprises me is the lack of flexibility in a large number of the managers that work in the sport, even at the very highest echelons. To give you one example, Carlo Ancelotti
of Chelsea won the double last year and they started this season as they finished the last. However, over the last two months Chelsea have managed just a solitary win in the league and now find themselves nine points adrift of Manchester United.

In this troubled spell Carlo has stuck to the same formation, tactics and has refrained from making changes in the team. A wise man once said that the definition of insanity is doing the same things over and over again and expecting different results. This unwillingness to change may end up costing him his job.

But I digress..........

Now is the time for you to identify key areas of development that will improve your performance at work. It makes no difference whether you own your own business, work part time or anything in between.

Dale Carnegie Training supports individuals, teams and organisations to perform better. If you would like a complimentary needs analysis assessment to help you establish these key areas then get in touch with one of our performance consultants on 0207 379 4323. You can also come along (for free) to our Effective Communications and Human Relations preview on 11th January. This is our flagship program based on the books How to Win Friends and Influence People, How to Stop Worrying and Start Living and The Quick and Easy Guide to Effective Speaking, written by our founder.

You have many options; don't just do the same thing over and over. do everything you can to make sure 2011 is better than 2010.

Amar Garcha

Performance Consultant
Dale Carnegie Training

www.london.dalecarnegie.com

Merry Christmas

Hello everybody,

I just thought we'd take the opportunity to wish you and all your colleagues and family members a very merry Christmas and a fantastic new year.

It is the perfect time to reflect back on year that went by and remember all those people, who made it special. Our world revolves around our friends and family, who have a special importance during the festive season. However, often we forget our co-workers, with whom we spend a large amount of our time. This Christmas, let your co-workers and friends know how special they are to you.

Christmas wishes are the best way to make your co-workers and friends realise how important their support is to you.

May the holiday season open the gate of new opportunity and success for you! Merry Christmas!

All the very best and safe journeys where ever you might find yourself travelling to and we look forward to continuing the success of 2010!

Best Wishes

Dale Carnegie London Team !

You're Fired!

At least one contestant on The Apprentice hears these words each week as over 7 million of us view in to watch the challenges and triumphs they endure.

Last week the teams were split into boys verses girls and were given a list of ten items, a budget and a day to hunt them all down for the best price.

Those of us who love watching human behaviour will have noticed that the boys more or less hit the streets straight away with their Project Managers words of ‘offer them at least 70% less than what they want’ ringing in their ears, whilst the girls sat down with the telephone directories and located the majority of the items before hitting the streets some two hours later.

The outcome was that the boys managed to buy 7/10 items and the girls located and bought all 10. However, even with the hefty fines the boys were given for not getting everything on the list, they still won! Why? Because they negotiated better and some may say harder than the girls!

Negotiation is the most important part of the sales role and can be the hardest, and here are four tips to help you with that process:

There should be three stages of every negotiation.
Learning the other person’s goals and establishing what you want will direct the flow of the discussion. Gather information on the other person and his or her needs by doing your homework. The goal should be to reach a compromise. And both parties should leave the negotiation satisfied.

Work with, not against, others in determining neutrally beneficial solutions.
Try to create a win-win situation. Your customer should feel good about the transaction and you should walk away happy about your sale. Never attempt an offer too quickly; you don’t want to think you could have done better twenty minutes later, nor would you want to leave anything out.

Finalize all agreements.
Don’t depend on working out all the details later. Time pressures cause us to be vulnerable to compromise and human errors as well as the customer backing out later claiming certain points were not discussed. Offer to write up the agreement, if possible. There are always small points that are unclear. When you write the agreement, you define those points.

Follow through.
Do what you said you would do and do it when you said you would do it. Make sure the customer follows through on their end of the agreement.

If you would like further tips then why not come along to our free Sales Advantage session on 6th January. A perfect time to kick start your New Year.

Helen Mills
Financial Controller
http://www.london.dalecarnegie.com/

Attitude

As I sit here in my study the light snow is steadily adding to the 350 cm we have had in the last 48 hours. With daytime temperatures no where near approaching zero I wonder when we will return to some normality.

I could be sitting here raging about the 5 hours delay I had Tuesday evening on a 45 minutes train journey, the postponement of training that is my responsibility with some people travelling the length of the country to attend. Getting frustrated about the new business winning meetings that are scheduled for today and missing my mother's 89th birthday tomorrow will only make me feel worse. Cooperating with the inevitable is essential, not a cop out, its common sense.

Dr Charles R. Swindoll, pastor, writer of over 70 books and regarded as the 25th most influential preacher in the world today, decided that:

“The longer I live, the more I realise the impact of attitude on life. Attitude, to me, is more important than the past, than education, than money, than circumstances, than failures, than successes, than what other people think, or say or do. It is more important than appearance, than giftedness, or skill. It will make or break a company.......... a church......... a home. The remarkable thing is we have a choice everyday regarding the attitude we will embrace for that day. We cannot change the past. We cannot change the fact that people will act in a certain way. We cannot change the inevitable. The only thing we can do is play on the one string we have, and that is our attitude. I am convinced that life is 10 per cent what happens to me and 90% how I react to it. And so it is with you. We are in charge of our attitudes.”

A vital aspect of Dale Carnegie’s training programmes is that we actively work on shifting attitude to the positive, a can do outlook. Next time you are considering development for yourself or your team make sure you choose the one that has a positive approach to life and not just remedies for taking away the pain.

David Pickering
Sales Consultant and Trainer

www.London.dalecarnegie.com

Team Spirit

‘Wickets, runs, bowlers, overs, stumps, the Gabba, the Barmy Army...’

This week saw the start of the Ashes and a month of cricket played between England and Australia. The anticipation has been building for weeks and the rivalry between the teams and the fans is strong. Both teams really want to win, England want to hold on to the Ashes crown and the Australians want to take it back. Both teams have been training hard for the test matches ahead and their fans are depending on them to perform at the best.

In order to have any chance of winning each side needs to work together as an effective team, this is the same for any group of people in any business, unless they work collectively to produce their desired outcome they will not achieve the best results possible.

Here are some tips to help your team to be effective and keep on track –

Have frequent and open communication - Most teams dysfuntion is rooted in coommunication breakdowns, such as poor listening, interrupting, rambling, an inibility to get to the point and simply not communicating enough to create team cohesions.

Build Cooperation – In a strong team, individuals rely on each other to make processes and interactions function as planned.

Recognize strengths – Take time to give honest and sincere appreciation to team members.

Manage results, not tasks – Ultimately, what matters is each team member’s contribution to the team’s goals and mission. Strong teams, with diverse peronalities, learn to focus on the results each team member achieves, rather than trying to make indivduals achieve results in a certain way.

Leverage competitive spirit to create communication – Friendly competition generates results. Keep the competition between the team and it’s own past results, not between individual team members.

For more tips and articles on how you and your team can achieve your maximum potential click here to visit the Dale Carnegie Knowledge Centre .

Sophie Whittall
Marketing Co-ordinator

www.London.dalecarnegie.com

Unleash Your Full Potential

What would be the impact on your organisation if the employees were able to increase their level of performance?

Dale Carnegie helps improve the performance of organisations by improving the performances of their people.

At the recent graduation ceremony of our flagship programme “Effective Communications and Human Relations” participants presented one of the results they have achieved over the twelve weeks. Regardless of their position or industry everyone got one step closer to their goals.

Here are some of their achievements:

Senior Technician (Architecture Design) - improved relationships with clients by being more approachable and turned cynicism into a consistent positive mindset

Service Manager (Insurance) - raised profile within the organisation by getting the confidence to speak in meetings, engaging with his team as well as the senior management

PHD student - increased confidence to deliver presentations and sell an idea to the audience, managed high levels of pressures and stress

Project Manager (Banking) - learnt the art of listening which helped increase efficiencies by getting the correct information to the customer within deadlines

Lead Researcher (Digital Agency) - learnt to coach the team to improve results, empowered others to take initiative, delegated responsibilities which enabled the department to take on more projects

Assistant Manager (Hotel) - became more positive and approachable, inspired the team to do better, and received an award for collecting the most 'Thank You' notes from the team

Is there anything you can do differently/ more of/ better to increase your level of performance?

To find out more about how Dale Carnegie supports individuals, teams and organisations or to arrange a free skills assessment call us on 0207 379 4323.

Corina

Performance Consultant

Be Exponential

There is something to be said about being on a roll. Just look at sporting teams, winning two or three games in a row and all of a sudden the confidence and belief is up within the group and they begin to get better and better. Reality is this isn’t just sports teams, it works with business as companies getting better and better, just look at Apple who have grown year on year and zoomed through the recession. Interestingly both teams and companies like Apple have one thing in common – they are driven by people and people are driven by confidence and self belief.

Over the past 11 weeks our Effective Communications and Human Relations Course has been running for one night per week. The class comes every Wednesday and shares their ‘business good news’ at the start of the evening, before cracking into the course content. If there was a graph which measured the results shared by the group over the period it truly would be an exponential curve, much like getting on a roll!












Beginning week 1 session 1 we cant expect all our goals to be achieved straight away, its much more like the age old saying:

How do you eat an elephant?

One bite at a time.



Angus Firth