Colin Gautrey | Gautrey Unleashed

Trying to Impress the Boss? Don’t Try Too Hard

January 7, 2015 by Colin Gautrey

The trouble with bosses is that they can have such a massive effect on your life. They can decide to promote you or fire you. To a great extent, your future is in their hands. Making a good impression becomes vital. Shine in their eyes and you will rise. They will favour you with the best development opportunities, your performance reviews will be a foregone conclusion and as for pay? Well, they will do what they can. A bad impression with the boss, well, where are you going Read More

The Practice of Stakeholder Management

January 5, 2015 by Colin Gautrey

If you need to get things done, you need to get your stakeholders on your side. In my recent book, Influential Leadership: A Leader's Guide to Getting Things Done I shared a process I have been evolving over the last ten years. Here is a short video, taken during a recent workshop, that considers the more practical aspects of using this process to engage with your stakeholders. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8EXz7Xj9NNk There is a great deal more Read More

Seven Ways to Build Extraordinary Trust

January 3, 2015 by Colin Gautrey

If you want to become more successful at selling, make sure that your customer trusts you. It doesn't matter what you are selling (product, service or idea), or who you are selling to (client, colleague or spouse). The more trust you engender, the more likely they will buy. There is no need to waste your time here with lengthy rationale. Just consider the last time you bought something from someone you distrusted. My bet is that you'll find it quite hard to think of an example. Much easier is to think of a time when you bought something from someone you did trust. How did you feel about the transaction? What difference does it make to you that you trusted the individual (or company)? Rather than debate how you might be able to Read More

How to Manage a Crisis

December 22, 2014 by Colin Gautrey

Once upon a time, I suggested to my MD that if he didn’t give me a crisis, I would make one. Never afraid of a crisis and confident in my ability to manage, effectively what I was saying was that I was bored and wanted some excitement. He duly obliged and I didn’t have to create any problem. Fortunately, at that time I had the benefit of lots of experience in managing difficult situations, so I was pretty confident I could handle what he threw at me ― and I did. We all have to start somewhere, so here are a few thoughts about what I have learned about managing people during times of crisis. BEFORE you do any of this, make sure Read More

Building Purpose by Creating Visions

December 22, 2014 by Colin Gautrey

Having an inspired vision of the future, perhaps surprisingly, is not essential, but it really does help. Being a leader, a true leader, is all about helping people to reach towards the future, which is why it helps so much if you can create a vision. If you cannot do that, it's still okay, provided you can set and guide the team strategically. Assuming you are here to stretch yourself beyond your current limits, here's a simple process to use to create your leadership vision.

Problems

Being realistic, most good visions Read More

The Stakeholder Management Collection

December 4, 2014 by Colin Gautrey

Stakeholders are everywhere and your ability to engage, manage and influence them is usually mission critical. If you are unable to succeed in this respect, you are unlikely to succeed, period. The Influence Blog is focused on helping ambitious and talented professionals to take positive, high-integrity to become more influential, so naturally there is a great deal of content here relevant to your work with stakeholders. Read More

Escalation Woes: Alleviating the Grief

November 30, 2014 by Colin Gautrey

In all big relationships, be they supplier, outsourcing or strategic alliances, escalation processes are inevitable and necessary. They are formal procedures to resolve intractable problems between the parties. While accepting that these processes need to be used, and should be used, I do feel that they are often overused, and over relied upon to solve problems. Why? Well, to provoke a little debate:

Escalation presents an easy excuse at lower levels to pass responsibility up the chain of command.
The pervasive myth that senior people are better placed to solve these problems.
Failure to build trust and credibility at the appropriate levels.
Absence of a positive, proactive, and collaborative problem-solving mentality.
"It's the way we do things round here."
It makes senior people feel important and useful.

There are many reasons why escalation should be Read More

How to Realise Big Goals

November 30, 2014 by Colin Gautrey

This article was first published on Sales Initiative on 23rd October 2014.

My bet is that if you have been a reader of Sales Initiative for a while, you are the sort of person who is ambitious, driven and motivated by great achievement.

No doubt you've done all the goal setting routines and got pumped up visualising your dreams. You might have tried affirmations and put up motivational pictures by your desk. I sincerely hope these things are working for you. I've read countless books on the topic of success, but I don't recall one that Read More

Taking Responsibility for Leading a New Team

November 12, 2014 by Colin Gautrey

When you are taking over responsibility for a new team can be an exciting time. The opportunity to innovate, refresh and transform the performance, while also adding to your credibility as a leader, and preparing you for greater things to come.

It is also a time fraught with risks and dangers that could overwhelm you and actually damage your career prospects.

It will pay dividends if you invest some time now to maximise the opportunity ad minimise the risks. Read More

Looking at Your Boots: Influencing Mistake No. 2

November 10, 2014 by Colin Gautrey

Can you imagine going for a hike on the fells or moors and spending the day just looking at the ground in front of you? Not only would you get lost pretty quickly, but it would also be very tiring and boring at the same time. Yet this is exactly what many people are doing when it comes to influence. In fact, it ranks number one in my catalogue of common mistakes. This is easy to explain when you consider that:

Most people arrive at their job as an influencer from a background in task execution rather than strategy. They are more accustomed to following processes, completing actions and delivering outcomes.
Influence usually happens in the grey zone between black and white. It is difficult to understand what really needs to happen and hence, many people shy away from it and stick with the tangible.
Not only is the influence zone difficult to understand, it is forever changing. What was true (or likely) today may be completely false tomorrow; and the change is even harder to notice.
Many people don't know the difference between strategies and tactics, let alone the benefits of strategizing.

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