Whistle while you work.

Snow White wasn't the best CEO in the forest. In fact she slept most of the time and when she was awake her workers were in constant mortal danger from hostile mergers. Her employees worked hard but only one in 7 could be called Happy while the others were the usual collection of workers known for being Dopey, Sleepy and of course Grumpy. As a group they were disengaged, unproductive and constantly getting into trouble, until Snow White merged with the right party to provide a better place to work and they lived happily ever after.

For many workers the dream of happiness at the "coal face" is a fairy tale, with specialists at the Conference Board and Gallup calculating over half the U.S. population hate their career, noting fewer than 3 in 10 had their hearts are in their job, resulting in productivity loss upwards of $350 billion. The things that could have kept the dwarves happy, ability to move within their group, praise for a job well done, having a direct impact on the direction of the group and recognising individuality along with a work life balance, would have seen the evil witch vanquished by the middle of chapter 4.

Each year research mounts showing the positive affects happiness has on the company bottom line. Something recognised by the leading lights as pointed out by CareerBliss, who asked "what exactly makes staff whistle while they work?". The innovative technology companies with their bean bags and ping pong tables long ruled the roost when it came to staff happiness and engagement but they knew it was more than just the perks. Today chemical giants like Pfizer, government bodies like the US department of defence and NASA have all learned an amalgam of recognition, constant movement, clarity of company and career direction, life balance and having the ability to contribute and influence beyond the work place shoots them up the list of best places to work. The companies climbing the list have worked out "it's always personal" and people above everything adds up to the places people seek out, providing these companies with the choice of the best people in a tight employment market.

SAS, head quartered in Cary North Carolina, was named by several global bodies as the world's best multinational work place and they point at their 37 year streak of record earnings as a testament to their employee engagement and satisfaction. Valuing people above all, especially during the GFC when owner Jim Goodnight guaranteed no one of the 13,000 employees would lose their job and asked only they remained vigilant in their spending habits, SAS stayed true to the four pillars of happiness. Four pillars, that along with "people above all", include "trust above all things", "to give is to get" and "employees understanding the significance of their work".

It's easy to pin up such mission statements but if it was that easy, the question remains why don't other corporations lead like this? It requires leaders willing to open up and learn from people like Goodnight. Google, amongst the current crop of global technology giants has constantly looked to such models giving them a perennial spot at the top of the best places to work but other industries are embarking on the challenge to provide happiness, accepting it's not just about bean bags and ping pong tables.

Something the handsome Prince knew all along, giving the dwarves new direction, a new start, a new work place and saving Snow White from a career as CEO to a bunch of miners, constantly reliant on the coal index for future company profits.

"Trust men and they will be true to you; treat them greatly and they will show themselves great". —Emerson

Is it just me?

Is it just me, or is Michael O'Leary of Ryan Air a mad genius? While legacy carriers acquiesce and stumble over each other to passenger requests for better service, high quality engagement and seats Neil Armstrong would have loved in space, Ryan Air continue to gouge passengers for every conceivable service fee and get away with it. From discussions on fat tax, toilet tax, in flight porn, charging exorbitant fees, calling his clients "idiots and consideration for standing room only air carriage, Ryan Air has managed to stay in the news, in the social media and in people's minds, for all the wrong reasons. So you would think senior management concerns would look to rectify the above, but 20 million online searches per month ( compare 1.5 million for Virgin Atlantic ), have Ryan Air laughing all the way to the marketing department. Which in a million years could not replicate such a profile by mere campaigns for on board entertainment or food services.

Is it just me, or do brand experts not always know what they are talking about when they discuss Ryan Air's reputation suicide? The negativity encountered in blogs, chat rooms, reviews and website scrutiny, has people in a search frenzy and though experts would say this is all blood in the water, attracting nothing but sharks, the telling indicator for Ryan Air has always been about top of mind advertising. Top of mind advertising done for free by passengers and pundits with opinions that would turn your Grandma's hair white. Yet this brand awareness, free of charge, certainly qualifies Michael O'Leary as a marketing genius who has engaged and enraged the flying public in a deliberate campaign of hostility, looking to the airline you love to hate to be the first one you think of when you want to fly.

Is it just me, or is the head of PR for Ryan Air the worst job in the airline industry? Ten people are now on the short list for the vacant position of Stephen McNamarra, who for four years, took a beating and was bludgeoned about the head for the deliberate negativity used by the airline to increase profile along with sales. Mr McNamarra will be heading up the PR for the Irish Rugby Football Union, where no doubt sticking your head into a scrum is an eminent advance to sticking your head out for Ryan Air. The successful candidate will no doubt have the personality of traits of Gengis Khan, the Grand Wizard of the KKK, along with the guillotine mentality of the people who didn't want to eat cake, while always keying an eye out for the next best negative campaign to keep Ryan Air in the media.

Is it just me, or is Ryan Air the most interesting airline in the world to talk about? Seems no matter what the experts say, cheap shots and bad publicity combined with O'Leary's cynical approach to paying customers seems to be paying off at the bank. Instead of trying to emulate Richard Branson, maybe the local boys should take a more feisty approach to running an airline, as O'Leary points out, "the customer is not always right".

Marathon.

I should have run one by now. I've had the time. I like to run. What have I been doing? It's one of those iconic list items that has surely been overlooked. How come it hasn't been ticked off yet? Am I under achieving by letting this one slip? Better get my skates on or the pressure to accomplish the run will be too much to bear.

Lists, the defining element of our workaday world, encroach on every day life creating pressure where we had none before and occasionally throwing an albatross around our neck. To do lists, email lists, things to do before the boss fires me lists, lists for groceries on the way home, bucket lists of holiday destinations, work projects stuck on the drawing board lists and all manner of lists put pressure on us to perform. Is that what's holding you back? Are the lists too long? Are they unachievable? Do you want a new page and another go at it? The New Year is always a good starting point to re prioritise, re align, and re everything to do with the lists that drive you crazy, hold you back, put you under pressure and get in the way of you accomplishing what's important, the list.

Yes life gets in the way, it distracts, it bewilders, confuses and worst of all gives us reasons not to do things and before you know it, list items have passed their use by dates and pressure is applied appropriately. Pressure we don't want, pressure that accumulates and pressure that eventually causes us to blame list items for our deficiency to achieve. Commitment and responsibility come with lists and too often the list gets long by virtue of the lack of both.

Take back the initiative, become the list master once again. No more someday, maybe if all the planets align and I wake up a super hero I can accomplish that lists. No more lists filled with celebrity master chef ideas for the next time the boss visits, no more self help guru inspired career change lists and no more goal setting lists requiring a masters degree along with a Phd in aeronautical design. Do yourself a favour and don't listen to anyone else when making those lists or else you will end up with undue pressure provided by external input.

There is enough technology out there with APPs and time management programs to manage even the most unruly list but the final arbitration on what to include and when to do it remains with you. Instead of adding another New Years's resolution to last years's list, consider two options, prune the list or just go all Nike on that list and "just do it". Don't let that list keep you treading water, don't let that list keep you from moving forward, find the one sweet spot, the doable item right now and accomplish an absolute decision.

I have cut the marathon from my life list and replaced it with an ultra marathon for sometime in the future. Nothing like putting a little pressure on yourself!

Socially Kind.

Nine year old Dalton Dingus, received over 700,000 Christmas cards this year, not on Facebook, not via email but real honest to goodness cards the post office had to deliver. Dalton living in Kentucky with stage-4 cystic fibrosis wanted to break the Guinness world record for the number of Christmas cards received and show the Christmas spirit was still alive. In the same state, Lane Goodwin, who had been battling a rare form of cancer called Alveolar Rhabdomyosarcoma since 2010, wanted to receive more than 100,000 likes on his Facebook page, to show there was more kindness in the world than we think. Lane was known for his thumbs up pictures and before long he had thumbs up from Johnny Depp, the US Marine Corp, assorted state police, the 49ers NFL team and a host of celebrities globally. When Lane passed away a month after starting the campaign, 369,000 likes had hit his favourite online site. Both of these campaigns were accomplished by small acts of mobilisation that could only have happened with a worldwide web connected socially by people wanting to show acts of kindness.

Our capacity to do good has expanded exponentially via the web, to such an extent social responsibility means more than just sorting your recyclables and not being mean in business. Today it means much more because we have all become social hubs, with followers, connections and influence over many more people than we could ever have envisaged. We belong to tribes, we belong to communities and we belong to associations that ten years ago you would have had to travel the world to meet. Those relationships can be strong, regardless of whether we have met face to face and with each relationship comes a responsibility, accountability for our actions, a duty of trust and what the Dalai Lama calls his religion, "kindness".

Globally we have seen the formation of "caring groups" who's initiatives are based around kindness and changing the way we look at the world with big Internet eyes. They all use the community model favoured by the Facebook generation enabling small hubs to connect globally as long as the ambition to further the message is altruistically worthy. Groups such as UK based "The Kindness Offensive", known for its large scale random acts of kindness, "Random Hacks of Kindness" a joint initiative between Microsoft, Google,Yahoo!, NASA, and the World Bank working on disaster management and crisis response with volunteer software, the "Singapore Kindness Movement" using public education programs aimed at cultivating kindness and graciousness, "Conscious Acts of Kindness" aiming to empower and inspire people and their communities to kindness and "The One Million Random Acts of Kindness" encouraging people to carrying out a Random Act of Kindness and pass on a RAK Card to the recipient who is then instructed to pass forward their own act of kindness to someone else, are examples of what is achievable on a global platform.

On a singular amplitude, individuals are capable, as noted by Dalton and Lane, to capture the attention of many and make them cognisant of rudimentary movements and bring out the best in people. Celebrities have long been the target for responsibility when it comes to giving and many use the social networks to do their best work via their social media presence. Yet it is the conviction of unknown individuals, such as Jono Fisher, building an online community looking to make Sydney the "Kindness Capital of the World" via the "Wake Up Sydney" site that shows what is possible in the new connection generation. This ability behoves all to give more, become more and grow more.

So from the safety of your PC, "Don't just be yourself - be someone a little nicer".

Back to work.

"Every day I get up and look through the Forbes list of the richest people. If I'm not there, I go to work".

Sometime this month, if not already, you have to go back to work. The festivities are a hazy memory, the egg nog has added inches to your waist, the sunburn is but flaking skin and worst of all, you didn't spend those couple of hours cleaning out your email. You've returned the ab exerciser from Aunt May, you've exchanged those skinny jeans for one size up and you've already broken two of your New Year's resolutions.

So why not go back to work? Things are more black and white at work, it's results driven and not emotional warfare over who gets the last piece of Gran's fruit cake and most importantly you need to pay off the credit card.

There are advantages to going back to the salt mines, you are no longer the boss having to make all the household decisions, you get back to having adult conversations, your keyboard won't be filled with Christmas cake by angry bird playing juveniles, no one will ask for lunch money and your best friend wont be a bottle of Chardonnay at 10pm when you finally get time to yourself.

With so many reasons to go back to work, it will quickly dawn on you, holidays are the firm's way of showing you how much you miss it, the meetings, the late night conference calls, the guy in procurement always on about the toilet rolls, wrestling with the printer and the Sunday night stress attack when you realise how little you achieved over the weekend.

Still it occurs to you, some of the household rules would make for a more gratifying work environment. Surely sending an unruly, uncooperative co-worker to his room, brings with it a satisfaction not normally encountered in the office. The afternoon nap, chips and trifle for lunch, beers on the balcony, working in your tracky pants, not to mention having the last say while not wearing underpants all day, are ways to make the lines blur to create a homely feel at work.

What better way to engender staff satisfaction than making everyone sit together at the lunch table, laugh over the most inappropriate Christmas present, help clean up and spend time with people who may not be your family but who are part of your work family. Both families deserve your best.

So instead of heading out with anxieties about the email avalanche awaiting, worrying whether the boss had a good break or if the printer guy finally fixed that monster, bring some left over fruit cake, show the Christmas pictures to all and sundry, tell the funniest Uncle Kevin story and generally delight those around you.

The decision between fighting with the printer guy or bringing your best from home is yours, not your boss or your manager. So bring your smile and all those lessons learnt at the beach, at the dinner table, at the mall.

You could be surprised how much fun work can be?

Resolutions and Predictions.

After the resolutions, another couple of kilos, no more salt, call Mum more often, be kind to small children, come the predictions, what we want to see, what we don't want to see and maybe a few things that will disappear in 2013. I don't think we have the capacity to slow down now that we have turned the web tap on full bore, with all the pundits and boffins pointing out technology will rule the rest of our lives. I thought it already did, still it's predicted the cloud, broadband, in-line shopping, big data, everywhere commerce, data leakage, tablet market share increase, boundary and privacy elimination, along with gesture control will help leap us into Star Trek territory and beyond. I thought we had already passed James T Kirk in so many departments that only the second coming of Spock would surprise us now?

We'll continue to be inundated by vast amounts of information, especially from the world of entertainment, where we'll see Meryl Streep win another Oscar, regardless of whether she is in a movie, where chefs will continue to touch food too much while participating in innocuous TV cook offs, Mark Zuckerberg will fake his own death to increase the number of "likes" on Facebook and Apple will become the villain in the next Bond movie. Sports will continue to be the only reality show not conquered by the Kardashians, although Kim has indicated the "Lingerie Football League" has shown interest in her talent for avoiding contact and getting to the end zone unscathed.

2013 will be a year of no boundaries, with imagination and any and all ideas having suitors who will look to make our lives easier, more convenient, while building their personal brand for personal wealth. The possibilities at this time of year seem exaggerated, and it's as good a time as any to try and reinvent ourselves but the danger in following the trends and predictions leaves us open to the same pitfalls encountered by the obsolete, keeping up is hard, staying ahead is harder and keeping true to yourself is hardest.

After all, if we look back a few years, the obviously antiquated, the abandoned, the forgotten and the bygone could fill up warehouses filled with obsolescence. Whatever happened to palm pilots, video arcades, Kodak film, email you paid for, Blockbuster, paper maps, land lines, fax machines, running out of hard drive, book stores, losing touch, privacy, wires, blind dates and believing what you see on film?

So for 2013 to be your year, for 2013 to become a watershed year, for the resolutions to turn from predictions to absolute certainty, without concern for keeping to the trend cycle, you will be all about authenticity, trustworthiness, credibility and unimpeachable guarantee.

These are the only things that will separate you from the masses and give you a chance to show your point of difference, share your insights, make a difference and give back. Granted you'll need to embrace the new technologies and that will make for an exciting 2013.

Happy New Year.

22/12/12

Okay, I've emptied the bath, thrown out the half eaten tins of beans and spam and eventually I'll take the mattress money back to the bank. Seems I've survived another apocalypse, although there is something about a cliff coming up that could derail my good fortune. For those of us who hung off buying the Christmas presents, it's crunch time to hit the mall and fight the crowds, serves us right. All is right with the world and its time to count our blessings and look to the future, a future filled with more online retail, social becoming business as usual, big clouds of information and a second chance to make a difference. With the future in mind, I looked for a couple of personal favourite, post apocalyptic reasons to rejoice in 2013.

My first rejoice comes from the arena that has captivated everyone from eight to eighty, I'm talking about the food fascination era brought on by the celebrity and master chef phenomenon. With that in mind I give you Pizza Hut, who have decided to celebrate the future, by breaking through the final pizza barrier not believed possible by lovers of the thin crust sandwich, first encountered in the Italian town of Gaeta in 997 AD. For those of us enamoured with this dish of infinite toppings, Pizza Hut has taken the greatest minds in the culinary world, stuffed them into a cramped kitchen and come up with the "Pizza within a Pizza". For so long just a theory, a hypothetical, existing in the minds of starving University students, this break through has seen the long unanswered question of what's my favourite pizza topping? Of course my favourite pizza topping is another pizza, so easy and yet so genius. With pizza one of the four main food groups required for a balanced diet, I see a resurgence in the once flagging empire of "The Hut".

The second reason we should rejoice is reality will finally take a back seat to fiction. We will no longer see the disengaged, the loud and obnoxious, the over bearing, the egotistical and the just plain abominably abhorrent take up space on TV and the net. We will be rid of the stupidity of the lowest common denominator becoming the bench mark for behaviour, for shopping trends and attention. The Kardashians, along with the housewives of all the cities we never visit, people from the Jersey Shore and anyone who has survived on an island by eating grubs will finally be vanquished to the outer limits of reception on web channels for the criminally insane.

So I say, what's not to rejoice post apocalypse? After all, if we believe all the hype, we were nearly destroyed, nearly erased from the planet and yet here we are ready to finish the Christmas shopping, wondering if Aunt Maude will finally shave off her moustache for your New Year's kiss and generally oblivious to what might have been. Lighten up I say, we were nearly destroyed, how bad can it be? Seems the only blight on the future is the resigning of the 75th season of the Kardashians.

Seems we can't have it all but second chances should be fun, Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year to you all.

21/12/12

I'm not even sure John Cusack (2012 Columbia Pictures) could help me. It's a couple of days till the end of the world and I'm not ready, I'm not organised nor do I have my legacy in place. The Mayan calendar has predicted the end before but Friday seems a pretty definite date to many who have organised bucket lists, bought all the baked beans at the supermarket and are filling the bath with water. I know it has to be true because tour companies have organised groups to Mexico, visiting Mayan temples in the hope of getting one more payday. Just in case Friday is the last day, it behoves all of us to take a breath and think about what we might leave behind. Surely someone, maybe John Cusack, will make it through and he'll have the responsibility to read all about us and the legacies left behind.

Howard Stevenson, a noted professor at Harvard, is the subject of a book called "Howard's Gift", uncommon wisdom to inspire a life's work, dealing with the end of life to affirm a life well lived. Stevenson is all about the end and thinking about what you want on your tombstone, what you want people to say at your funeral and how you want to be remembered. From this view point, Stevenson wants people to think further ahead than the next iPhone release, think deep about how they want their life summarised and then make decisions that will make that happen.

Stevenson wants people to "consider how you’d want those you care about to describe you, on the most personal levels, separate from the structures and roles that define you to the rest of the world. Envision what you’d want your children to say when they describe you to their children. Or think about it this way: if a camera could take a “legacy” snapshot of you in the moment before you departed the earth, what do you want that picture to show? Starting at the end’ means investing time up front to develop an aspirational picture of your future as a guide for the decisions you make throughout your career and your life,”

According to Stevenson, defining that legacy and having a belief in yourself to achieve the end result will have strong influences on life and career decisions. Bringing all of life's possible endings together helps that decision making process become focused, giving you a clearer picture on why you should decide on a particular fork in the road. If you can't decide on your direction then maybe, Stevenson suggests, you haven't had a good look at the end. The book's author, Eric Sinoway construed that "identifying your legacy is the essential precursor to creating the road map of how you want to live your life and is the foundation for the decisions you make in your career". He suggests even the little day to day decisions are easier if you have your road and final destination mapped out.

In the book corporations are used as analogies for life, where the most successful have a definite end game in mind and do everything along the way to achieve that goal. That corporate strategy can be used for individual life choices, or as Stevenson describes it "business planning for your life's work". Developing an image of where you want to end up gives you the ability to make decisions based on a long term strategy, effective for the most successful companies.

Realising you have a choice to decide your end, is the start point for what Stevenson calls "defining your legacy" and the most successful people use this thinking as a tool to guide the major choices they make in their careers and their lives. If that is the case, I have a few hours left to polish up my end game but remember, “Everything will be okay in the end, if it is not okay, it is not the end.”—author unknown.

KISS.

"Keep it simple stupid", has long been a catch phrase among business leaders and corporate presenters wanting to show it's easier for people to understand the message you are trying to convey with immediacy and imperativeness. With a world getting more complicated by the byte, with more messages being transmitted via more channels, with more interference and distractions everyday, we instinctively look for simple alternatives and clarity of message. That clarity of message is important for brands and products as we sift through a mountain of product detritus, trying to choose our next purchase or service.

The difficulty encountered in creating awareness and profile, trying to stand out from the crowd and surviving the fickleness of the buying public is dependent on conveying your message as simply as possible. Keeping it simple translates to understanding and that can translate to the bottom line. Siegel+Gale conducted a global brand survey trying to define simplicity by polling more than 6,000 consumers, asking them about clarity of promotions, messages, simplicity of experience online and offline. They were looking for brands that resonate with people's need to declutter their thinking and decision making process, thus providing an obvious line of decision.

What the simplest brands index pointed out, was if they concentrated on what they do best without muddying the decision process of why you have walked or clicked onto their premises, they become successful and are are able to charge a premium for the obviousness of your decision. This rational has seen Subway, Google, Amazon, Apple, McDonalds, Starbucks and Zappos lead the way for consumers who have grasped the messages of that simplicity, a single search bar on Google, unrivalled customer service on Zappos, the $5 footlong at Subways and the appropriateness of cleans lines at Apple. All of these messages are patently clear, making it easy for consumers to decide from a raft of competitors, whose messages are clouded by not being able to articulate their true worth or willing to test their resolve and move away from the pricing death spiral.

Consumer sectors that suffer from over complication and confusion from the public, are insurance, banking and financial, where they become mired in multiple messages around price, service, relevancy, credibility, integrity and usability. Simpler products and experiences are the panacea for this sector but no one jumps out as a leader. This complexity of thinking, leading to confusion was also indicative of brands expected to be higher up the index. Twitter at 93 and Facebook at 125 are instantly recognisable brands on the index that have slipped as they become more intricate and complex in their workings. The bewildering privacy policies, interface changes and constant tinkering on Facebook have frustrated users to where numbers leaving are now significant enough to be of concern.

Simplicity of design and message are not the only things to make great brands successful but the ones that have distilled their essence to communicate and resonate with consumers will always have a blue water advantage.

Christmas conscience.

Two weeks before Christmas and many people are feeling the anxiety building up, building up because they haven't bought that perfect gift. What is the craze this year, Apple continues its trend of being the digital du jour, book readers are always in, cheap flights to everywhere except where you want to go are available and a variety of toys that will barely outlast their batteries continue the sell cycle. At Christmas the sell cycle is on steroids and everywhere you look you are accosted by the next poster entreating to buy before it's too late or before stocks run out. For many this is an unconscionable approach to a season of cheer and good tidings.

So imagine my surprise to see the folks at Patagonia continuing their 2011 campaign, when they implored me not to buy their jacket, to this year asking me to buy less. What would David Jones think, how could Apple continue and what would Nike do if they couldn't make the shoes you bought yesterday, obsolete today? Consumerism today is about replacing, not the old and worn out with the new but replacing yesterday with today as quickly as possible, before the midday rush. Aside from my Mother it is difficult to find anyone who has held onto anything longer than necessary, meaning until the next new range or new model is released.

Patagonia have worked hard at their passion for making the best outdoor gear in the world and making it last for more than one sale cycle. Everything they make is built to last and they have a full appreciation of what it takes to make their garments and outdoor equipment and who they are selling to. They were forthcoming in telling consumers how much last year's jacket cost the environment when they released their sales campaign information, “to make it required 135 litres of water, enough to meet the daily needs (three glasses a day) of 45 people. Its journey from its origin as 60% recycled polyester to our Reno warehouse generated nearly 20 pounds of carbon dioxide, 24 times the weight of the finished product. This jacket left behind, on its way to Reno, two-thirds its weight in waste.” Think twice before you buy it and if you do, use it for a very long time.

To stay true to their mission, “build the best product, cause no unnecessary harm, use business to inspire and implement solutions to the environmental crisis", Patagonia have embarked on a brand campaign to build more than loyalty and social awareness. They are creating brand evangelists whose values align with the company's and who become their greatest sales team, albeit one with a conscience. The power of information and the limited amount of money for the Christmas budget sees people looking to buy from companies with values aligned to their own and values they are happy to pass onto their children. Marrying the environmentally responsible with great products gives Patagonia the chance to connect with these consumers, work at the premium end of the market, sustain profits and continue to save the planet.

So when looking for that next great Christmas present, consider the socially and environmentally conscious companies who want to give you more than just a great product, they want to save the planet for more Christmas' to come. Now you know why I haven't bought you that new jacket, I'm just saving the planet.