The wonderful RedBalloon product team never cease to amaze me with how they source such innovative, memory-making experiences. Today’s additions to our experience line-up are so exciting, especially the beer belly casting kit that I’ve already earmarked for some of my friends with a little too much taste for the amber nectar! For watersports lovers, if regular water skiing isn’t enough, why not try being towed behind an F-16 Fighter Jet for the ultimate water skiing experience? Or for the…
The NSW Opposition Leader – Barry O’Farrell visited RedBalloon this morning to make an announcement on his ‘Economic Growth Plan’. They were very deliberate in chosing a fast growth business with a strong employee engagement record as a venue for the announcement. It was an interesting experience having eight or so party people and three politicians visit, however it was the 20 media people with all their equipment which took over RedBalloon. Barry chatted with the team, I got to…
Last week was very busy celebrating Australian women. With the 100th anniversary of International Women’s ay on Tuesday – I attended many events including a speaking engagement for NSW Clubs and the launch of the Westpac ‘Power of 100’ celebrating 100 women. Attended the fabulous Business Chicks event in Melbourne – with the guest speaker Professor Fiona Wood… (will write a blog on that). And then celebrated my mothers birthday with a very special experience. This week: Monday: Looking forward…
I heard Liz Wiseman speak recently (co-author of Multipliers)… on leadership styles. She asked the participants to think of a boss who had made them feel great and as a result how did we ‘perform’ for that boss. Then to think about a boss who made us feel smaller. Liz outlined that leaders who make people feel smarter (multiply) as opposed to leaders who make people feel smaller (diminish) – will get more than double the capability from those people….
I just had lunch with a colleague – Kate, a casual celebration of her third year with RedBalloon. A bit of a reminisce and comparing notes on what we think has changed the most since 2008 both within and outside the business. She posed the question as we walked back… ‘Do you still think you are learning a lot?’ Interesting; that is what I am most excited about – learning. By nature I am curious (one of my strengths in…
Often I get asked ‘what is your employee engagement secret?’. Megan (RedBalloon Employee Experience Manager) argues that we don’t have an engagement secret (maybe because we will tell anyone who is interested what we’ve learned – so by definition it’s not a secret). It does take focused commitment from every leader in a business – consistently. Employee engagement is a journey not an activity. Some organizations are further along their journey than others – but how do you know where…
1. What effort is involved to transition non-attached employees back to attached, if it is at all possible. Re-establishing trust takes time – often years but is the essential ingredient to engagement. This must be achieved consistently. Leadership needs earn trust and a great way to do that is simply notice what people contribute. Often the hardest question to answer is: Is the effort it will take to re-establish, trust worth the reward for the organisation? Sometimes there are very…
I’m often asked what is the greatest concern that I have – ‘what keeps me awake at night?’ The only thing that concerns me is did I do everything I could to support, assist and grow the team around me. It is kind of an upside down world here at RedBalloon. I see my role as serving the team – who of course then serve our customers. It is not external things like interest rates, or retail trade figures that…
The launch of this Trimesters theme was last Monday morning. It is all about growth. – We will celebrate when we achieve 54 by 24 –that is every RedBallooner will celebrate with an extra day of summer holidays with 250 points to have a fabulous experience on the day. Fun! I had three speaking engagements last week – which meant lots of travel, from the Yarra Valley to Lorne in Victoria. (Lorne was looking spectacular – I have not been…
I just heard from a friend of mine who lives in NYC – that he has resigned from his GM role because the owner of the business said, “I don’t want happy people I want factory workers”. My friend was completely disheartened – he thought business owners were enlightened – and understood that happy people = happy profits I guess I question if this entrepreneur is reading or learning anything. One thing that Verne Harnish is noted as saying ‘the…
Imagine running a business based on fun - that's what I decided to try when I left a very serious corporate career in marketing to set up RedBalloon...
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