The perfect business model can’t be obtained by standing still. This is an error that has forced many businesses to close their doors over the years. To truly reach a point where a business is efficient, there must be an urge for constant improvement. This can be accomplished through the act of implementing value stream mapping. The following entails some of the ways that this type of strategy can improve the way your business functions today and in the future.
Value Stream Mapping
To understand how value stream mapping can help business, you must first understand what it is. This concept came from the philosophy that doing more with less can improve business over the long-term. Through this strategy, companies can get a better understanding of the state of a business in terms of its current design. Through simple design, you can outline the current value chain of the company with the addition of your ideal ‘future state’. Depending on your industry, your map might look a little different. A company that handles many products could find themselves developing a map based on only a handful of their top products.
How It Helps Your Business
A good value stream map is formatted like a flow chart that helps you see where value needs to be eliminated or modified so everything can function more efficiently. This visual representation of your company allows you to see areas of non-value adding activities or waste. Understanding the areas of your company in which waste is an issue can greatly improve not only the day to day production of the business but the experience your customers get as well.
Improved Business
Although value stream mapping can help a business see a quick overview of their company and help them adjust non-value activities, it is only when you evaluate the process that true improvement is manifested. After all, your changes are an estimation of the improvements needed, not a guaranteed outcome. Therefore, one of the best ways you can improve on your map and the business as a whole is to survey the changes made. This can be accomplished through both employee and customer anonymous based surveys.
Implementing a value stream map into your business is a powerful technique that can really create positive change. Simply adhere to the topics listed above for a more detailed and accurate outcome.
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A well-trained staff is essential to anything you do with your business. Employees who have proper training will have all the right skills and understanding to make your business a success. However, the traditional one-size-fits-all method tends to really diminish the true abilities of those employees. Want some of the best tips to provide your employees with better training tools? Then read on!
Make a Plan and Set Goals
One of the most common mistakes made during the training process is the belief that since you know everything you don’t have to plan ahead. You may know every aspect of your business, but it may not come out as clear to a person just being introduced to your company for the first time. Getting results means you have to implement your training plan successfully. This means preparing ahead of time on what you will need to teach them now so they can get to work and what can be held off till later. In addition, small goals must be in place to not only encourage the trainee but allow you to know where you stand in the training process. This is extremely important during any new employee onboarding process. You may not remember what it was like to be new, what information you needed. Go to the source and ask some of your newer hires what their ideal learning plan would look like.
Ditch the One-Size-Fits-All Approach
One-size-fits-all training was created to save money and make things as simple as possible. What companies forget is that employees are people too, and people are different. You don’t have to customize a program for each and every person, but you do need to understand that your preferred training method must be flexible. Straight verbal explanations might work for some people, while others might prefer a visual demonstration. Online learning may work for many, but certainly not for everyone.
Look at New Technologies
Even the best training programs cannot predict how an employee will react once they are dealing with actual customers or products. Therefore, many companies are now considering implementing various technologies into their programs. One of the ways employers can train their staff to understand various aspects of the business is through VR or virtual reality. Allowing them to see the process with all its challenges and unpredictability can really improve their performance even before they interact with a customer. This will no doubt increase confidence in the employee and provide better results for the company. Bring on the fourth revolution! As you set your goals for your new employees, it is necessary to provide them with the tools to reach those goals. The list above provides you with some of the best options to begin this process the right way.
I’m always yelling about self-care and I stumbled across something the other day that made me want to yell about it even more. It said that modern life overuses the stress response. Back in the day, our body’s stress response system was used for thing like avoiding being eaten by a tiger. As stressful as situations like that they occurred in short bursts. In today’s society, stress can be constant, so the body responds as if it’s always going to be eaten by the tiger. All. The. Time. There is almost no downtime from stress unless you make an effort to reduce it. The effects of stress go far beyond just having tense shoulders or a stress headache. Here’s a look at three of the most significant effects that stress has on the body.
Improving Mental Health
Stress can have a negative impact on your mental health. Chronic stress changes your body chemistry. It affects mood, attention, and memory. Excess stress has also been found to increase the risk of anxiety and depression. Because the brain’s neurotransmitters are being overused, repeated stress changes the way they perform. Eventually, repeated exposure to excess stress causes these bodily systems to malfunction, making it more difficult for a person to control their response. On the flip side, reducing stress can gradually improve mental health.
Improving Physical Health
Chronic stress eventually causes inflammation that affects the body’s immune system. This is why you tend to get sick when you’re under too much stress. It makes the body release large amounts of cortisol. According to ASEA, stress is often an underlying cause of chronic inflammation, which in turn, is linked to most major disease-related causes of death in the United States. For myself, inflammation is a big, painful problem that I have had to learn how to manage without medication. Learning to lower your stress levels through self-care routines like yoga and meditation can have long-term positive effects on your physical condition.
Stress Can Lead to Burnout
Too much stress eventually creates burnout. This is a situation in which a person has been under pressure for so long that they finally cannot function effectively anymore. All physical, mental and emotional resources have been tapped out. This kind of condition leads to a destructive chain reaction in thinking that’s hard to turn away from. Picture in your mind someone smashing their monitor and jumping up and down on their laptop. Yep, that’s severe burnout. If you feel that you’re in danger of burning out, seek the help of supportive friends or a counselor. Lessen the time you spend at work, or if that’s not possible due to the constraints of your job, think about finding a new job altogether.
Stress turns on the body’s fight-or-flight response, a system that was once used only to keep humans safe from the occasional dangers in their environment. Even though most people don’t have to run from tigers anymore, their chronically high-stress levels cause their bodies to react as if they do. Learning how to manage stress keeps the body and the brain healthier, which leads to better cognitive functioning and productivity.
Do you need a little extra boost getting your work-life balance to actually balance? Let us help you!
Natural born leaders fall into a role that has others watching their every move. But even natural born leaders face situations that cause them to stress out a bit. Leaders must be vigilant about how they react in all situations, especially stressful ones. Stress has a significant impact on how leaders respond to everyday activities and impromptu scenarios they were unprepared to handle.
Stress Causes You to Make Poor Decisions
Stress is a natural thing, and everyone chooses how to react to such events in life that cause theirs. Our bodies create what has been dubbed the stress hormone, which is called cortisol. While cortisol can have positive effects on our bodies, ultimately, too much of something leads to adverse outcomes. When a significant conflict arises, our brain creates a flight-or-fight scenario that we must respond to almost immediately. Due to the knee-jerk reaction our minds take under a specifically stressful moment, rational thinking takes a back seat to impulse reaction. The inability to control how you react to stress will inevitably lead to making poor decisions and lashing out at others in close vicinity. Leaders must be one step ahead of the impending impact that stress creates.
You Take Your Stress Out on Others
Snappy comments, quick decisions without a rational reason and lashing out at someone unrelated to the situation are a few ways leaders may be taking their stress out on those around them. Being known as the boss who has brash outbursts will create a negative atmosphere and impact the efficiency required to lead a team successfully. These outbursts do not always stay within the office. Road rage is a common side effect of continued stress in the workplace. Quick decisions and blaming other drivers for their choices is the outlet some people use to relieve the anxiety they had to suppress in the office. This is what happens when you experience road rage, which is responsible for numerous car accidents every year. Try a few of the tips listed below to help relieve stress before road rage becomes a part of your drive home.
Take Steps to Destress and React Professionally
There are a few methods a good leader should adopt to control stress before it controls them. Listen to what is said, and break down what needs addressing right away and what can be discussed later. Situational awareness will help you recognize the need to breathe before speaking. Take a timeout, and walk away to collect your thoughts before making an on-the-spot decision. Take a walk or a break if the stress is too much to remain professional. A quick walk around the building before agreeing to something or the commute home can be helpful for reducing stress.
The best thing you can do as a leader to avoid taking out your stress on other people and continuing to lead your team to success is to take a step back and modulate your reaction to the situation at hand. Try not to make any hasty decisions, and take a break if you need to.
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Use this template to justify your trip and secure your seat at my signature retreat, Sense of Self.
Dear Boss,
I’d like your approval to attend the Sense of Self retreat, attended by the most forward-thinking women leaders, for 7 days of inspired learning, growth and self-discovery from October 12-19 in Phuket, Thailand.
Here’s why I should attend:
· The community of attendees is what sets the Sense of Self Retreat apart from other retreats and conferences – I’ll be among the top women leaders who are actively changing the way companies innovate. Leaders who are ready to make huge leaps both personally and professionally. Leaders that are actively changing organizations. These are the people I want to learn from and grow with, and this retreat will be a great way to do that.
· Attending Sense of Self will allow me to: better communicate with my team, create a plan to achieve my personal and professional goals, fully articulate the value that I bring to the organization, and help me become more self-aware, which we both know if a key predictor of success.
· The retreat is facilitated by an HR Professional with over 15 years of Human Resources experience. Her mission is to create a corporate America that is inclusive, innovative, diverse and authentic. That fully aligns with our company vision, mission, values, and goals.
If I register now, I’ll be able to get an additional bonus of 3 Leadership Coaching sessions. Because of the level of personal and professional growth that I will achieve that week, I think that the return on your investment will be well worth it.
· Airfare: $1000
· Retreat: $3200
· Total Investment in Me: $4200
For more information about the retreat, please visit
Your brand is unique. Its persona is what distinguishes your brand from its competitors. In the age of technology, your website is a part of your brand. with so many competitors online, it can be difficult to distinguish your brand. Having a weak or negative brand image online impacts your brand’s credibility and can lead to missed business opportunities. I am telling you this from experience! I wish I’d known the 5 tips below before I created my first website. And remember, websites aren’t just for big businesses. You can have a resume website, or promote a podcast. If you want to be found, create a website.
Choose Colors Carefully
Color choice is one of the most impactful parts of designing and building your website. You want colors to grab your visitor’s attention, as well as to relay your brand’s message. Understanding color psychology and its impact on the customer’s emotions highlights why knowing your target market is so important. Colors have different meanings in different cultures. Understanding these differences helps improve your brand by ensuring that your website is sending the proper message. Really think about what you want the color to say. How do you want it to make people feel?
Design Your Layout Deliberately
The layout of your website adds to the success of your brand. A key concept of layouts in website design is known as ‘the fold’ — the amount of content that visitors can see without having to scroll. Measuring the amount of useful content versus the amount of “filler” content, like ads and graphics, is important in evaluating the user experience. Even planning white space usage is helpful, as it avoids overloading potential customers with images and information. The layout impacts how long users stay on the website, making it one of the most important branding elements for your brand. The longer visitors are on your website, the more they learn about your brand.
Design Your Site Uniquely
A unique identity is central to developing a successful brand. This is not only true for the products and services, but also the website. Don’t just pick the first free theme that looks good. If you can afford it, hire an experienced web designer whose portfolio showcases the kind of style you want to carry your brand. Custom design means a one-of-a-kind site. Making the investment to craft a unique image for your brand distinguishes you from your competitors and makes you more memorable to visitors. If you don’t have the ability to invest in a web designer, get a template that is highly customizable and user-friendly.
Format Your Site Consistently
Consistency in website design plays a huge part in successfully improving your brand. Repeated colors and fonts help consumers remember your brand, especially when they are unique. A consistent design builds your brand’s image by ensuring that the right emotions are being conveyed throughout the site. Consistent design elements project a uniform and memorable image of your brand.
Use Intriguing Images Smartly
Professional visuals on your website are as much of a part of the design process as color and font selection. Visuals that are reflective of your brand’s color scheme and style can boost brand recognition by maintaining consistency. The details of each image are particularly designed so that they convey your brand’s message. Investing in visual elements is another way to display your brand’s personality throughout the website. High-quality visuals improve the overall look of your website. For businesses selling physical items, images that were taken by a professional photographer enhance the professionalism of your brand. Don’t forget the power of videos and infographics, as they can help convey more complicated messages.
A successful brand cannot exist without a unique identity. Every design decision should be made to display your brand’s message and personality. Is your brand creative or analytical? Traditional or innovative? Every element of your website’s design is focused on the brand and its message. Your website should be simple, consistent, clean and easily recognized. It should also be memorable, as a unique identity is central to building brand recognition. Lastly, personality is key. Consumers love brands that feel real. Think about the emotions that you want to be affiliated with your brand and use your website to evoke an emotional response. Following these tips will help you build a website that truly portrays your brand’s purpose and personality.
