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Need to build your business but not the outgoing type? Don’t have time for all those networking events? Just hate the idea of promoting your ideas or business in front of groups of people? You are not alone!

In fact, we know that over half of the population shares those thoughts and concerns. Most of the personal assessments used today identify that portion of the population that prefers or gains energy through solitude. Those assessments all tell us that slightly over half of the people have some degree of introversion.

Yet, go to a business seminar or a school to learn business growth ideas and they all tell us to market the same way. The experts (and remember that these people love to be the center of attention) tell us:

1. Go to networking events
2. Attend social gatherings
3. Speak in front of groups
4. Make cold calls
5. Build your professional network
6. Make appointments with prospective clients
7. Get out of your comfort zone – get over it and do it!

For over half of us the response is a resounding, “You’ve got to be joking! Be realistic.”

Jungian type assessments (Myers-Briggs) and behavioral assessments (DISC) speak to a preference for extroversion or introversion so I’ll use those terms for this discussion. Understand that the terms mean much more than outgoing or shy, although we may observe those behaviors.

Knowing where your personality falls in relationship to those two terms can be easily determined by your reaction to the seven statements listed above. I’m assuming that you agreed with the “You’ve got to be joking” statement and find yourself in the introverted group.

Introverts prefer structure to spontaneity, small groups to large ones, and close relationships to many relationships. Introverts also tend to prefer a slower and quieter pace. You just need to adjust your marketing effort to align with your personal preferences.

Networking events can be replaced with a quiet lunch with someone in the business community. Social gatherings can be limited to those with a more intimate crowd. Speaking can be replaced with publishing and your network can be virtual rather than live.

People like yourself will find the written word more powerful than the spoken word so focus your marketing to a nonverbal approach. Perhaps a marketing plan may look like this:

1. Publish – Write articles, blogs, and e-books to enhance credibility and recognition in your profession.
2. Network on line – Social networking is gaining favor and is being used by many large companies. Sites like Facebook, Linkedin, Twitter, and YouTube are the largest and most visited websites on the internet. Learning to use them effectively could dramatically impact your business success.
3. Market 1-on-1 – Build your business using a referral model. A direct introduction from a client or friend will always produce better results than any method used by our outgoing brethren.
4. Team with a friend – Attending some of the traditional events with a close colleague or friend may make the whole adventure more tolerable. If it works for you, go for it.
5. Be prepared – Introverts tend to prefer structure and security. Plan your marketing pitch, outline your discussions, and write out your entire realistic marketing plan.

We also know that you will be great at leveraging the contacts that you have made. Introverts excel at building strong relationships with people they meet. Use that to your advantage. You may not have as many candidates entering your marketing pipeline but you will tend to have more clients emerge from the other end!

I know this doesn’t sound like what the experts told you to do; but they would respond to this approach just like you responded to theirs. You can have a highly effective marketing program that fits your style. Recognize the strengths that you have and leverage them into a “realistic” marketing program that works for you.

Nigel Hartley is the President of Commonwealth Advisors and is an Accredited Associate of the Institute for Independent Business, a CMT Senior Mentor and a certified behaviors coach. Combining coaching and business advice for business owners to achieve their goals.  Nigel can be reached on 707 573 7154 or you can email him at nigelhartley@cmtmentors.com.

Startup incubator in RP fosters growth

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By STEVE HART
THE PRESS DEMOCRAT

As the volcanic eruptions in Iceland seem to be calming down, the long-term economic implications and costs are still to be determined. In a world that is becoming increasingly interdependent we often see how a disaster, natural or manmade, can impact the rest of the world.

I decided to write this article after talking to my brother in the U.K.  and thinking about the effects on his business and lessons we should have learned from the terrorist attacks of 9/11.

How many businesses know what the Maximum Acceptable Outage period is for supply of key inputs that are coming from outside suppliers? The attacks triggered many companies to look closely at their supply chain. How many have kept their risk management and business continuity management plans for their supply chain up to date since?

With that in mind, let’s go back to my brother in the U.K., who is a fresh produce wholesaler and, as you can imagine, has been hard hit by the grounding of the airlines. He can’t get produce, and as we talked it over, it dawned on me how widespread the effects will be. He had been expecting a very large delivery of Mexican onions that because of the delay was now going to be sold to the U.S. market at a greatly discounted rate to move the product, which in turn will put pressure on the prices domestic producers can command, which given the fragile economy, is the last thing we need. 

One can also only imagine the effect this is having on our fresh produce companies that export to Europe. In the short term there may not much he can do about it, but in capital intensive industries you may want to look at your minimum inventory levels, especially spare parts that have probably been run down given the economy.

However, I did suggest to my brother that he is really in the distribution business, and perhaps he should look into dehydrated foods as a complementary line. In a business it is commonly accepted that having more than 20 percent of your business with one client is not a good idea. This should also theoretically apply to geographic markets, modes of transportation and product mixes. How dependent are you on one supplier or one market?

Stories such as this are not limited just to fresh produce or supply chains in general. There may be opportunities out there for you to capitalize on if you keep your eye on the ball. I have seen a couple of comments that the grounding of the airlines is affecting the Greece Euro bailout as key meetings had to be canceled, and the resulting delay could lead to a downgrade of the Greek debt, which in turn could raise the cost of the bailout.

Now, if this is true then there has to be an opportunity for Web-based communication companies to offer the Greek government their services and probably industry in general much as they did after 9/11.

Let’s look locally, too, where we are very fortunate that only 6.6 percent of our visitors come from overseas, and so this major cog in our economy will not be impacted. However, should we be front-loading and gearing our advertising to address those Americans who were going to vacation in Europe this year and might now consider a domestic vacation instead?

It is very difficult to give answers to every scenario as each industry is different. However, I would like to leave you with two thoughts. One, if there was a disaster, how would your company fair? Do you have enough inventory on hand to withstand a reasonable delay? Secondly, are you constantly thinking outside the box so that when an opportunity presents itself you are able to take advantage of it? No one wants disasters to occur, but they do unfortunately, and you need to be prepared for their occurrence.

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Nigel Hartley is the president of Commonwealth Advisors and is an accredited associate of the Institute for Independent Business, a CMT senior mentor and a certified behaviors coach working primarily with small and mid-size business owners. He can be reached at 707-573-7154, or you can e-mail him at nigelhartley@cmtmentors.com, www.nigelhartley.co

(March 24, 2010)

One of the key signs of trouble for the current labor market can be summed up by two words that are rarely spoken today: I quit.

With employers still trimming rather than adding jobs and a record number of unemployed looking for work, job holders are hanging onto their current positions, even if it means being unhappy.

The “quits rate,” or frequency of people leaving jobs, is close to the lowest point since 2000, when the Labor Department began tracking the data. And workers’ willingness to quit without having another job lined up is well below the historic norms going back to the 1960s, according to a separate government reading.

Recent surveys show many workers would like to find a new job once the labor market improves, but most are just too scared to make the jump yet.

An American Express survey found 54% of the general population willing to make significant concessions in the name of job security, including accepting pay cuts or even demotion.

Employment consultant Towers Watson found 86% of workers value job security and stability, topping the number of people who listed improved pay or career advancement as important to them. And while 43% of workers believe they have to leave their current employer in order to advance their career, only 12% of workers say they are looking to leave their current jobs.

“They’re saying they’re staying put,” said Laury Sejen, a global practice leader at Towers Watson. She said she was surprised by how dug in workers have become in their current jobs.

“When you look at it from a lot of different angles, it’s a mindset shift.”

Stuck in a dead-end job
One worker who feels trapped in the job is a product manager for a consortium of travel agencies, who would only talk if her name was not used in this story. She said her stomach churns every day because she dislikes her job and her boss so much. But the state of the job market and worries about job security have kept her from even looking for a new job, especially since her husband was laid off last year.

“I hear so many people are out of work, I feel lucky that I have a job with insurance,” she said. “I don’t want to update my résumé and send it out and have it get back to my boss.”

Another unhappy worker in the accounting department with a Midwest manufacturer says he’s limited by the fact that his wife also works, making it difficult to relocate in the current job market.

“The job I’m in is a lot of number crunching that I’m not interested in doing anymore, but my wife likes what she’s doing,” said the worker who also asked that his name not be used. “If we were to move and she stopped working, it would require us to downsize a great deal.”

Both workers quoted said that in a better job market they might be more willing to try to start their own business, but they’re nervous about doing so in the current environment.

Economic headwinds
The lack of mobility from job to job is a problem for more than just those unhappy workers. Economists say it can keep wages down and hinder economic recovery.

Changing jobs is an important method workers use to improve their income, giving them more dollars that they can then pump into the economy. Even the threat of leaving a job is often enough to increase pay.

“When you have low unemployment, people are much more free to leave their jobs and search for jobs with higher wages, and employers will have to pay a premium to find or retain the best workers,” said Heidi Shierholz, labor economist with the Economic Policy Institute, a liberal think tank.

It makes sense that people are nervous about changing jobs in the current labor market, said Robert Brusca of FAO Economics.

“Even if you’re unhappy in a job, it’s the devil you know. You don’t know for sure how they’ll treat you in a new job, if they’ll give you a fair shake,” he said.

Brusca said the latest jobs bill passed by Congress won’t help get job mobility moving again because it gives a tax credit only for hiring the long-term unemployed.

But the economy would benefit as much from an employer offering a job to someone already working as it does from the hiring of someone without a job, because such a hire is likely to open up another position in the economy. He said the law is an example of the difficulty that Congress has reviving the moribund labor market.

Experts say the bad housing market is another factor keeping people from switching jobs, since people won’t be willing to relocate for a better position if they have to take a large loss on the sale of their home.

And the unwillingness of workers to leave an established job to try to start a new business also slows economic growth.

The Labor Department estimates that more than a million fewer jobs were created than normal during the recession because of the low rate of new business start ups. While much of that could be due to the credit crunch and the overall economic downturn, some new businesses were undoubtedly lost because current employees are unwilling to take a chance to start something new.

“Until the economy gets better, many people won’t be willing to take chances. And we need them taking chances,” Brusca said.

What is rapport? It is building unconscious human interaction. How many times have you gone into a meeting with good intent only to exit it the other end feeling that the vibes weren’t good or you found the other party too dominating or too timid? It happens to all of us because it is our human antenna going up and giving us warning signals. Now I would argue that all of us with a little thought could turn 90% of those situations around to a positive outcome. The key to any successful communication is being able to build rapport and more importantly to hold it. As a certified coach there are a number of tools I have at my disposal, such as assessment tools and mirroring skills, but anyone can be better at building rapport by just observing and listening more intently to the person you are trying to build that rapport with. This is because of VAK. VAK is an anachronism and stands for Visual, Auditory and Kinesthetic which is the way we like to receive information. A visual person sees words first and will say things like “I see where you are going with this”, an auditory person hears words and so they would say “I hear what you are saying about this”, and the kinesthetic person attaches feeling to words so they would say” I feel I have a good grasp on where this is going”. A quick search on Google will provide a whole directory of key words but once you get your head around the concept it is all very logical. So if you listen, you can get an idea of how you need to impart information to a boss, employee, colleague or anyone you are trying to coach and you will be streets ahead if you can determine how they would like to receive information.  That is the listening element, but we also talked about observing peoples body language. This is because most visual people also tend to be faster talking people with a lot of upward and outward movement of the arms. An Auditory person tends tends to speak in a more measured tone and make movements  from side to side and a kinesthetic person  tends to move slower and have downward motions. President Obama is an excellent communicator and next time you see him make a speech watch his body movements and his voice and he will mix it up combining primarily visual and auditory tools. It helps him build rapport with a wider range of potential voters.

Now how is this going to help you in the workplace? Whether you are being a coach or a mentor or just someone who wants to communicate better in the workplace or home environment, the person you are trying to communicate with is not going to listen unless you can build that rapport. I happen to be a very animated visual person so when I am working with an auditory or kinesthetic person I make an extreme effort to minimize my body movements and slow down the pace of my voice. It is not that I am more special than other people but that I have learnt to understand what makes the other party tick and therefore it helps me be a better communicator.

I hope this helps all of you be a better communicator. Lastly I would like to leave you with a communication tip that I have found works really well for me. When I am coaching or trying to overcome objections on the phone I always stand up and have a smile on my face. Trust me, the smile always comes through, and standing up increases the energy you project to the other party.

Nigel Hartley is the President of Commonwealth Advisors and is an Accredited Associate of the Institute for Independent Business, a CMT Senior Mentor a certified coach ( behaviors and careers).  To unlock your potential call  Nigel  on 707 573 7154 or you can email him at nigelhartley@cmtmentors.com.