Posted on June 24, 2009 by Nick
Regular readers (yes, you, Mum) will know that I spend a fair amount of time here banging on about customer service. Today, I doff my cap in honour, because I’ve got a guest writer in to tell his story. Eamonn O’Rourke is a great friend of mine – and mighty funny too. So pop the [...]
Filed under: people skills, sales, service | Tagged: service, customer service, business, CRM, entrepreneurship, start a business, run a business, entrepreneur, customer satisfaction, ebay, eBay business, shed, gardening, inventor, inventions, industrial revolution | Leave a Comment »
Posted on May 12, 2009 by Nick
I’m not usually a fan of Human Resources departments. It’s not particularly the people who become HR consultants (there’s nothing congenitally wrong with ‘em); no – it’s the fact that I think it’s rather hard to bat for both sides at the same time. When times are good, there’s nothing to worry about. But when [...]
Filed under: current affairs, mobile, people skills, retail | Tagged: business, business blog, entrepreneur, entrepreneurship, flexible working, HR, HR management, human resources, kellogg, kelloggs, people management, people skills, run a business, work at home, work from home | Leave a Comment »
Posted on April 14, 2009 by Nick
Hello! I hope you had a fine and restful Easter!
I’ve been trying to resist writing about BBC1’s bizfest, The Apprentice, but I can’t help it. It’s getting me quite annoyed.
Let me be fair, here. We’re into Series 5 (yup, 5!) and rather like Big Brother, that means that the game has changed a little. The [...]
Filed under: current affairs, finance, people skills, sales, service | Tagged: Amstrad, apprentice, BBC, Big Brother, business, entrepreneur, entrepreneurship, run a business, Ryanair, start a business, The Apprentice | Leave a Comment »
Posted on March 23, 2009 by Nick
In these troubled economic times, much has been rightly written about customer service. If you want customers to stick with you, it seems a pretty good idea to put a bit of effort into looking after them.
A good magnifying glass for this sort of thing is the banking industry. You can’t have failed to notice [...]
Filed under: PR, marketing, people skills, retail, sales, service | Tagged: business, call centre, CRM, customer management, customer service, entrepreneur, entrepreneurship, run a business, service, start a business | 1 Comment »
Posted on March 20, 2009 by Nick
It’s not been the best of weeks. Once again, I met up with a friend who told me, mournfully, that she’d had the “Big Meeting” where her company announced a raft of redundancies. She’s got 4 weeks of work, 4 more weeks pay, and that’s it.
Now, I know this blog is meant to be about [...]
Filed under: current affairs, people skills | Tagged: business, coping with redundancy, entrepreneur, entrepreneurship, redundancy, redundancy advice, run a business, start a business | Leave a Comment »
Posted on March 9, 2009 by Nick
Hi there!
I’m trying to make this blog as much about my personal business experiences as about the advice I both give and receive as I navigate the world of business. And sometimes that means being critical. I’m not going to name any names, but the following is absolutely true, and if the person responsible should [...]
Filed under: marketing, people skills, sales, service | Tagged: business, customer service, employees, entrepreneur, entrepreneurship, freelance, freelancing, outsourcing, run a business, sales, service, staff, start a business | 4 Comments »
Posted on February 26, 2009 by Nick
Sometimes, the strangest things happen.
On Wednesday, I had a meeting in Victoria, London, at a client’s office.
I rolled up to their reception desk, and just as I was signing in, got a call from one of the guys I was going to meet. He apologised profusely, but the meeting was going to have to be [...]
Filed under: people skills | Tagged: business, business scene, entrepreneur, entrepreneurship, good luck, meetings, positivity, run a business, start a business | 1 Comment »
Posted on November 24, 2008 by Nick
Last week, I attended an event where the speakers were from a company called Empathy Styles (www.empathystyles.com). The company offers courses which help people become more productive or sell more effectively, by better understanding the people they’re dealing with. They have simple tests which will allow you to assess your own personality type, and that [...]
Filed under: people skills, sales, technology | Tagged: business, empathy styles, entrepreneur, entrepreneurship, motivation, personality, productivity, psychometric testing, psychometrics, sales, start a business | 3 Comments »
Posted on November 4, 2008 by Nick
There’s quite an argument going on at the moment about social networking websites (like Facebook and Bebo) and their role in the workplace.
In the red corner are the HR departments of several large companies. They’re convinced that employees are wasting time surfing these websites for spurious purposes, like arranging waterfights or watching videos of their [...]
Filed under: marketing, people skills, sales, technology, tips | Tagged: business, business network, business networking, business scene, communication, Demos, ecademy, entrepreneur, entrepreneurship, Facebook, linkedin, networking, networks, ning, run a business, social network, start a business, TUC | 1 Comment »
Posted on October 30, 2008 by Nick
I, dear reader, am male. That means that when I need a pair of shoes, this is what I do:
Decide what sort of shoe I require, functionally (e.g. shoe, trainer, boot, etc.)
Go to the nearest shoe shop
Find shoes that broadly meet the requirement above, at what looks like a halfway decent price.
Pay. Run away. Fast.
I [...]
Filed under: current affairs, marketing, people skills, retail, sales, service, tips | Tagged: Add new tag, business, competition, customer service, experience, management today, matt gwyther, public transport, retail, run a business, shopping, start a business, westfield | Leave a Comment »
