Archive for September, 2009

Grow Your Own

Last week the Premier League announced that from next season English football clubs are to submit a squad of 25 players, eight of whom must be “home-grown”.

This rule is aimed at encouraging clubs to nurture raw talent and give young players a greater opportunity to shine through a squad of bought in experienced professionals.

The truth is buying talent is an attractive option

It is also true that we don’t all have the resources of Manchester City and most of us are looking for ways to stretch the pound without compromising on quality, whether this is on food, clothing, travel or talent.

In all of these areas, grow your own is back in vogue.

There are of course pro’s and cons…

Buy It

buy-it7

Grow It

grow-it

Ideally, most companies will need to strike a balance between buying and growing their talent. There is no right or wrong way of recruiting, you have to go with what is right for your business. For a modern business like Cheeky Monkey it is difficult to put down on paper the qualifications that we require because so much of the value we bring comes from a softer set of skills and attitude.

Is grow your own an opportunity to be bespoke?

Our recent twitter survey ‘what motivates us to work’ showed that people’s key motivator for working is not money.

We believe that employees want to feel happy in their jobs by doing work that adds value, that challenges them and makes them feel like they are being developed by their employer.

grow-your-own

We can offer all of that.

But…

It’s not for everyone.

If you think it’s for you, get in touch – we are planting.

Surrender to Love

When we christened our change management company ‘Cheeky Monkey’ we were warned it would be a marmite thing – people would either love it or hate it. We were good with that. We are emotional, we want people to be emotional, and we wanted our name to be a catalyst for that process.

We did not want to be wallpaper

How many times a day do you say “I love… something” and mean it? You know, the heart beating faster, adrenalin pumping, couldn’t be happier that you have that thing or are in that place or with that person you love.

How many times a day do you say “I hate… something” and mean it? The feeling of disgust swirling inside, a sickly view that you just don’t want to be part of or a place that you don’t want to be in, something that you would be willing to take a stand against.

How many days go by when you don’t say either you love or hate something?

How many days are you just wallpaper?

When you work on delivering change, everyday something amazing happens, good and bad, it’s a roller-coaster of highs and lows. We struggle to recruit staff because not everyone is comfortable with that, people think they are until they have to surrender themselves to these emotions day in day out, then we realise, many people are more comfortable being wallpaper.

Why?

There are many reasons why people are less emotional than they used to be.

My personal favourites are:

  • Political correctness
  • The “everyone’s a winner” mentality
  • Fear of having the spotlight on you by rocking the boat

You will have your own theories which we hope you will share.

Life is not better for this; we are not better people because of this.

One of our partners said:

“If there are people out there that love Cheeky Monkey, you need to keep the name because there are not many things people openly love any more.”

That has got to be one of the saddest statements I have heard in a long time.

Surrender to love

Today, open yourself up to your emotions, find something you love or a place that you love to be in, or even better a person you love to be with. Face it, feel it, and then tell someone about it because there is no better feeling, it will make a difference to your day.

What Motivates us to Work?

To answer my question I enlisted your help via my twitter, thank you to all who completed the survey.

what motivates us to work

The results of our mini survey show a pretty close 1,2,3 of work life balance, love of the job and money.

We explored the challenge of work life balance in our last blog, so next…

What makes one person love their job and another hate it?

When we are in a position to follow our own values and beliefs we seem more comfortable and confident with our actions and decisions. Believing that what you are working towards will make a difference somewhere somehow is a motivator and gets those happy hormones pumping.

We are not all the same so our values are also going to differ

It is up to us to ensure that there is a good match between our core values and our work environment. This doesn’t have to be a life changing statement (giving up the office job to be an NGO in the Niger Delta) it is just about being aware of why we love or hate what we do. This will change because we change and our environment changes.

Do you love or hate your job?

  • Write an honest statement of what your job is
  • Compare this to your actual job profile (is there a match?)
  • If there is not a match, write down why. Are you being sucked into things because of bad management, process or the incompetence of others?
  • Put a smiley face next to everything you love :-)
  • Put a sad face next to everything you hate :-(

Do the math…

:-) or :-(