“An inspiring and practical guide to really effective people-communication in a modern business climate crying out for it”

Mike Harris – Founding CEO of first direct and Egg Banking plc, founding Executive Chairman at Garlick and ex CEO of Mercury Communications

“This book puts the heart and soul back into business. Miti Ampoma combines her deep experience with fresh insight and inspirational thinking in a communications masterclass that focuses us all on our most valuable asset, at the heart of everything we do - our people.”

Mike Symes – Chief Executive, Financial Marketing Limited

“Miti Ampoma, with pincer-sharp clarity, explains brilliantly the relationship between becoming an innovative communicator and having a successful business. She whets our appetite to go do!”

Anne Newton – Chief Executive, Richmond Chamber of Commerce

“Articulate and incisively written with compelling stories and practical ways for us to achieve better communication skills so our businesses excel.”

Daniel Priestley – Author, Become A Key Person Of Influence

Every business needs an Innovative Communicator

• Are you craving relief from pin numbers, passwords and soulless voice-activated messages?

• Is communication with people in your workplace an uphill struggle in spite of all you have tried?

• Do you fear that the heart and soul of your business is evaporating?

• Is all this impacting staff morale and bottom line profits?

Good human communication is more important than ever in a business world where technology and process have come to dominate at the expense of bringing out the best in people. Work colleagues respect and respond well to clear, honest communication they can trust. At the heart of that communication there needs to be a genuine focus on integrity and humanity.

You may think good communication is best left to the experts, but nothing could be further from the truth.

This book introduces the Innovative Communicator, who puts the soul and heart back into business communication to deliver happy staff, happy customers and more profits. The Innovative Communicator is able to build deep relationships, get their team on board, plan powerful communication strategies, whilst courageously pushing their own boundaries, having the capacity for great empathy and the skills to get tough with heart when necessary.

Start becoming an Innovative Communicator today.

See and feel the difference!

 

THE INNOVATIVE COMMUNICATOR

Putting the soul back into business communicationBy Miti Ampoma

Balboa Press

Copyright © 2012 Miti Ampoma
All right reserved.
ISBN: 978-1-4525-5684-0

Contents

Introduction.....................................................ixChapter 1 Meet the Innovative Communicator......................1Chapter 2 Build deep relationships..............................16Chapter 3 Get your team on board................................46Chapter 4 Build your strategy...................................67Chapter 5 Push your own boundaries..............................100Chapter 6 Step forward with courage.............................111Chapter 7 Get tough with heart..................................125Chapter 8 Have a life to bring to the table.....................153Chapter 9 Keep sparkling........................................162

Chapter One

Meet the Innovative Communicator

"There has never been a better time for people in business to reconnect through meaningful communication, to what matters most to them and to each other, for the greater good." Miti Ampoma

Miranda – Flower-stall business owner

Miranda is a real person – I buy my flowers from her – and this is her story. She is a business owner, a business manager and a team leader, as she employs staff. She may not be a Chief Executive Officer (CEO) in a FTSE 100 company, but the way she runs her business beautifully illustrates what I see as the Innovative Communicator and here's why:

Miranda runs a flower stall in the middle of a busy local high street. Her stall is surrounded by three large national supermarkets that also sell flowers, some the same as Miranda's, at a cheaper price.

Since the economic down-turn, the other three independent flower-stall business owners in this high street have gone bust.

In fact, Miranda is the only independent flower-stall owner left in the high street. With four years of the toughest economic conditions known in recent times, Miranda's flower stall has not only survived, but thrives amid the business chaos and intense competition around her. Why?

For almost four years, I've watched with curiosity and fascination at the way Miranda operates her business. I have talked to her customers to find out and understand what they like about Miranda and their feedback has been consistent.

Firstly, Miranda is extremely personable. People warm to her. She makes every customer feel important and gives them her full attention, no matter how busy she is. She has trained her assistants to do the same.

Customers genuinely feel Miranda cares about them and wants to ensure that they leave her and her flower stall with the best flowers for them.

Secondly, Miranda knows her flowers inside out. She is an expert at her trade. She gets up at the crack of dawn and goes to the flower market herself. She is instrumental in making choices about which flowers end up on her stalls for sale to her customers. When she or her team are asked for advice on what flowers are best for an occasion, or to suggest a winning combination for a loved one, Miranda and her team's advice is professional, caring, personal, bespoke and spot on, delighting her customers. This is the huge emotional benefit for the buyer of Miranda's flowers.

Thirdly, Miranda's flowers are beautiful and fresh and according to her customers, last a lot longer than the cheaper supermarket flowers. Above all, Miranda makes her customers feel they are part of a local community.

Miranda has built deep long-lasting relationships with her customers. In return she has banked their unreserved trust and loyalty.

Miranda's customers adore her for who she is, for the emotional benefits and experience she gives them through her business, for her supreme customer service and for her superb style, range and quality of flowers. For these reasons, customers in this high street are very happy to spend that extra money on Miranda's flowers. A typical Miranda customer will first do their shopping, often in the supermarket next door, buy everything they need except for flowers, and then go and buy the same flowers (they could have bought more cheaply in the supermarket, but chose not to) at Miranda's. On any typical busy Saturday morning in the high street Miranda's flowers will be sold out by early afternoon. Due to popularity, customers will often pop round and say "Save those tulips for me will you? I'll pop by and get them after shopping." Miranda will put those flowers aside and the customer will turn up and that is when they pay for it. The trust between Miranda and her customers to do the right thing for each other is notable.

The single common feature in all the attributes consistently described to me about Miranda, by both her customers as well her team, is the way in which she treats them through her daily interaction and communication. She is smart, highly gifted, admired and gracious in her strengths. She is also genuine, open-hearted and radiates integrity. People want to be around her and to actively support her business to flourish. Her flower business continues to go from strength to strength, regardless of the turbulent business environment.

David – CEO of a multi-million pound company

David is also an Innovative Communicator, and here is his story:

David is the CEO of a multi-million pound business, which includes a brokerage firm and a hugely successful IT division. He has hundreds of employees. He is an extremely busy man. He is known and respected in his industry as a tough, astute businessman. At a time, when the economic climate is producing continuous headlines of plunging profits, business closures of once iconic institutions and the bankruptcy of competitors, David's large business, amid the gloomy pandemonium, is reporting rising profits. He is employing more staff, and his existing employees stay put not out of dissatisfaction, but out of a fierce loyalty and genuine affection for him.

Many of David's staff have worked under his leadership for several years. David's business is bucking the economic trend. I was given permission to talk to David's employees, because like Miranda's flower business, I was curious and fascinated to understand why David's business is doing well in a dire economic climate, while many of his competitors are not. In my research when talking to the company's employees, there was one particular story which stood out and summed up the source of the organisation's sustainable success.

An employee called Mike was, unbeknown to David, having financial problems. In fact all told, it was a difficult time for Mike who had been with the company for barely a year. He felt very fortunate to have his job and enjoyed it.

However like many people, with rising costs, a wife, a four-year-old son and another child on the way, money was tight and Mike was struggling to make ends meet. His financial woes came to a head when, with less than a month before the birth of his second child, it became clear that the family could not all share the one room they called home since moving back to Britain, having lived abroad for some years. They had found a small suitable flat to rent but soon discovered that they needed references and a £1400 deposit. Mike confided his situation to a work colleague who immediately mentioned that the company, under David's leadership, had set up a special benevolent fund under a charitable trust, which was there to deal with existing and past employees in the industry who had fallen on hard times. The friend advised and encouraged Mike to talk to his line manager. Mike did. Within a few days Mike's circumstances were assessed. He was given a reference for the estate agent and the £1400 needed to secure the flat which was to be his new home.

He felt strongly he wanted to show his gratitude to the man who had made this possible. As a result of the open-door policy David operated in the business, Mike genuinely felt he was able to make an appointment to meet the CEO. David is a CEO who connects personally with his people because he makes it his business to do so on a regular and consistent basis.

Mike went with his wife to meet David to thank him. He told me that in his private half-hour meeting with David, he was at one point overcome with emotion because without that £1400 he and his wife and children would have been homeless. David had been gracious and kind to them in that private meeting. He talked with them at length and with depth and meaning, Mike added.

Mike's manager went on to tell me that while Mike had always been hard working he had "completely upped his game" since becoming a beneficiary of the company's benevolent fund in his hour of need. The manager added that since the incident two years previously, Mike had continued to be "a worker on steroids". His loyalty and dedication to the company was highly evident and the CEO had played a major part in that.

In describing why they stayed with the company and enjoyed working there, the employees would consistently mention the CEO, David. They were fired up in a positive way by the way he treated them, by how they felt genuinely valued by him for their efforts on behalf of the business he leads, for his tough but fair ways, for his genuine generosity of spirit and for the way in which he actively engages with them through good, meaningful, effective communication. Significantly, they said they believe him when he speaks to them. They frequently said "he doesn't spin us a corporate line".

They all said what they valued most about him was his ability to communicate with them regardless of how busy he is.

Miranda and David work in completely different businesses which operate on completely different scales. Yet both have got things right and achieved sustainable success. Their achievements have been very largely down to clear, honest, meaningful communication which puts their employees and customers at the heart of their business.

What Miranda and David have in common is that they do not pay lip-service to the idea of good communication, they deliver it.

What has been going wrong?

In the Introduction to this book I outlined what's going wrong in large businesses today, and why good people-communication is so important for lasting success. Here's a summary of these crucial main points:

• Globalisation means demand for lower costs and faster delivery.

• Globalisation means frenetic change is the norm.

• Frenetic change includes mergers, acquisitions, takeovers, downsizing and redundancies.

• Fast-track profit at all cost is endemic.

• Priority has moved from people, process, technology to technology, process, people. This often results in bad communication between people.

• Bad communication leaves employees and customers disgruntled, cynical, suspicious, misunderstood and distrustful.

• Unhappy employees impact negatively on production and profits.

• Bad communication is bad business.

The Edelman Survey

In January 2012, the world's largest independent Public Relations Agency, Edelman, produced its prestigious Edelman Trust Barometer Annual Global Study.

The survey revealed that "only 30% of UK respondents found CEO's to be believable spokespeople for their organisation."

"This plunge, 9% down from the previous survey, compares with a 25% rise in the credibility of `people like yourself', taking this category up to 60%."

As Danny Rogers, Editor in Chief of the respected communications industry magazine PR Week put it "This is pretty incredible. The very people running the companies are not regarded as credible."

Edelman's twelfth annual survey showed that only 38% of people trusted business to do the right thing, while 72% believed companies should be involved in solving social and environmental problems. Credit Source: Edelman 2012 Trust Barometer/PR Week

There is clearly an apparent crisis of trust and confidence facing business leaders. The brutal fact is: trust in business remains "wrecked". Ed Williams, Chief Executive Officer of Edelman UK says "Trust in CEOs has slipped further with people trusting almost every other type of spokesperson higher than the boss. The CEO is now one of the most distrusted authority figures. The challenge for business is that to become more trusted – to move from simply protecting its "licence to operate to establishing a licence to lead – it needs to move beyond operational excellence to address society's priorities."

Ed Williams adds "One of the key findings in the survey was that large numbers of the public expect business to do much more than just make money and create jobs.

They expect business to improve the world it operates in for the better, act ethically, treat employees well and help local communities."

In the tough political and economic climate where chaos is rife, business leaders can no longer expect an automatic `licence to lead', simply because of who they are.

They have to work for it and earn it and are expected to do so by their people and the public. They will be judged by the substance of their actions and their meaningful communication of them.

What the UK public thinks

Just 30% of UK respondents found CEOs to be believable spokespeople for their organisation

Just 18% of those polled believed business placed customers ahead of profits

Just 11% said the Government communicated frequently and honestly

While 68% believed the UK was heading on the wrong track

While 58% of respondents trusted TV and radio news

Credit source: Edelman Trust Barometer 2012

So what does it take to be that "believable spokesperson"? What does it take to bring in profits, and have happy staff and customers? What does it take to feel you are "on the right track"?

Enter the Innovative Communicator

This book is about being a communication leader of choice. You too can become an Innovative Communicator if you wish. If you choose to, it will transform your business.

Innovative – because they think outside the box as the norm, they do things differently, they are bold, and they are inspirational. They combine this with a deep grounding in common sense but are not afraid to push their own boundaries.

They are adept at building great relationships, collaboration and getting people involved and are not afraid or averse to looking for opportunities to bring a humanity into their dealings. They manage to get others excited about buying into positive new ideas and methods, and in doing so often transform the way people think. Their skills generate belief and enthusiasm about goals and the actions needed to achieve those goals. Practical action backs their vision. They are clear thinkers and strong decision makers.

Communicator – because through their style of language (both verbal and body language) which is honest, warm and approachable, they engage the receiver. They strongly believe in a people-centred strategy to deliver clear bold, effective communication with eyeball-to-eyeball contact between people as the cornerstone for communicating key messages and major news (sometimes grim news). This done with integrity, respect and heart is the corner-stone and success to their business. They inspire. They are role models.

Does this person actually exist? What my studies showed

In 2009, I put myself though rigorous professional training (one must do this regularly as a communication professional) and during the six-month course, I had to come up with a communication project to research and write.

January 2009 was just months after the global banking crises of November 2008, and out of the ashes of the debacle, I could see that the delivery of effective communication in business – now more important than ever – would need to be delivered differently. That difference needed to be specifically suited to a climate of on-going business chaos in order to successfully assist and deliver business success.

I came to realise that business as usual (BAU) will almost inevitably become "history". The context in which people-communication now operates is frenetic, fast, moving, changing and chaotic. Businesses need to come to terms with this fact quickly.

I was fascinated to explore what would make the difference in organisations in this new acerbic and difficult era. So, the project I came up with was: "How organisations re-invent themselves to become leaders of the new way".

It was during my research for this work that I came across specific individuals who stood head-and-shoulders above their peers in making a difference through the power of their unique and offbeat communication skills within their organisation.

I noted the huge priority they placed on communication, innovating, introducing new ideas or refreshing and reinventing past ideas, using their intuition and re-adapting communication in their business appropriately to enable real achievement of goals. Above all, they didn't just talk about the importance they placed on communication and then pay lip service to it, thereby producing a chasm between rhetoric and actuality (the biggest problem for most organisations). Instead, these individuals believed the actions of effective communication every day, was the way forward. The results of their daily behaviour had dynamic results on their businesses.

I researched completely different but equally successful organisations in terms of how their collective workforce were genuinely made to feel inclusive, and therefore in turn made a real contribution to business goals.

I noticed that the individuals who ignited this collective feeling of inclusiveness in the workforce through their communication skills, had a range of very similar characteristics and attributes.

(Continues...)

Excerpted from THE INNOVATIVE COMMUNICATORby Miti Ampoma Copyright © 2012 by Miti Ampoma. Excerpted by permission of Balboa Press. All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.
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