The Hunger Project is setting a whole new pace for charities.  They are one of the most financially efficient ‘Not-For-Profit’ organisations on the planet. They are committed to spending less than twenty percent on overheads, which includes fundraising and administration, while they go about the business of changing both the lives of the donor-investors and their recipients as equal partners in the process.

For example in 2012, thirteen percent of their income went toward fundraising and administration, while eighty seven percent went directly to programs.

They are setting new standards for the Not-For-Profit sector globally, in particular for women in the workplace, not just in the countries they are working in to end world hunger (more on that later) but also in companies of the developed world with whom they partner.  For example, one of Australia’s ‘Big Four’, the Commonwealth Bank, sends their top executives overseas on tour with The Hunger Project every year to learn more about leadership, diversity and entrepreneurship with deeper learning gained from every visit.

The Hunger Project does things differently.  They believe that hungry people themselves are the key to ending hunger. By changing mindsets of their village partners in India, Bangladesh and Africa, they empower women and men to bring about change in their own communities. Top-down, aid-driven charity models often fail to reach the people who need the most help. To be sustainable, The Hunger Project discovered three critical elements that, when combined, empower people to make rapid progress in overcoming hunger and poverty:-

1. Mobilisation for self-reliance
2. Empowering women as key change-agents for development
3. Making local government work

Here are some of the companies which are standing up, taking notice and getting on board with this this very small but influential global organisation:-

•    McKinsey and Co
•    Commonwealth Bank
•    Business Chicks

What is The Hunger Project doing that is getting people so excited and enthusiastic?  They are getting their investors deeply involved with the experience and process of working to end world hunger in the developing world and they are giving those of us who decide to help them in this quest a deeper sense of meaning and purpose in our own lives, through their process of investor engagement.

As world renowned psychologist and author Dr Martin Seligman PhD, states, “There are five key parts to leading a great authentic and purposeful life”:-

•    Positive emotions
•    Engagement (losing oneself in the moment and losing all sense of time)
•    Relationships (positive relationships)
•    Meaning and purpose
•    Accomplishment

The Hunger Project manages to not only help their village partners tap into all five categories, they also help their investors to tap deeply into every one of these aspects.  This is an example of an organisation that doesn’t try to take the credit – they are constantly giving credit to others at every possible turn.

This is how THP makes such a huge difference in the lives of both the givers and receivers…

Firstly, they ask people like you and me to agree to fundraise $10,000 to give to a community in the developing world.  Then they take us and other likeminded contributors along with them into that community to immerse ourselves in the project and witness first-hand the difference we are making.

They educate us as investors to look out for the incredible leadership skills we observe while in that village partner community. By asking the people of those communities to share their own stories with us, they ensure that we, the audience, receive genuine value from hearing those stories.

They educate the women in those communities who are being helped and encourage those of them who want to, to step into positions of local power. This takes a lot of courage for the women involved. Not every woman wants to and that’s okay.  The Hunger Project does this because statistically the women are far more likely to give back… to make a difference…  and to seek ways to empower their entire community.

They encourage participating investors who have been on the tours to run leadership programs for others.  They give them a stage to share the leadership stories that they have witnessed which in turn recruits others who may want to join the process as well as inspire people to give more and be part of making a much bigger contribution to the world.

The Hunger Project leaders think differently. They involve people at every level. They are forging new paths and opening minds in the process.  They are not just a charity, they are revolutionising the way people think when they give and are setting new standards of personal involvement.

Bruce Poon Tip, CEO and founder of Global award winning tour company G Adventures, made the comment that happiness has three components:-

1.    People need to feel connected (to each other/to a cause/to the planet – they just need to feel connected)
2.    They need to feel that they have control over their own life
3.    They need to be part of something bigger than themselves

G Adventures and The Hunger Project are examples of two organisations that allow their clients to do just that and the positive impact of their efforts are beginning to be felt around the globe.

Drop me an email at brian@precisionprofiling.com.au if you would like to discuss further how to join our September study tour and create the environment that attracts and retains the young leaders of the future for your organisation.

Until then… Let’s seek to understand more and judge less. Have a great week – Brian

Precision Profiling – What Makes You Tick? Through ‘Motivational Fingerprinting’ we uncover what you do, how you do it and why you do it, and most importantly, the hidden patterns that lead to your success, and that of your team.

After returning from a backpacking tour of Asia, in 1990, Canadian Bruce Poon Tip founded Gap Adventures (renamed G Adventures in 2012) with nothing more than two personal credit cards and a burning desire to create an authentic, sustainable travel experience like nothing the world had ever seen before. By offering adventure-craving travelers an alternative to the resorts, cruises and motor-coach tours they were accustomed to, he not only changed the way people looked at their holiday time, but changed the face of travel forever. What started off as a one-man show has since grown to become the world’s largest adventure travel company with over 1350 employees.

But it doesn’t just begin and end with unique travel experiences. G Adventures is itself a social enterprise, creating positive social change. They sell tours to countries all over the world that utilize local services, contribute to local economies, and provide employment opportunities and training in under-served regions of the globe that rely heavily on tourism as their only economic import. They even give grants for seed funding along with training to get new travel initiatives up and running in some cases.

The entire G Adventures enterprise was founded on the concept of sustainability and established travel practices that show due consideration for natural surroundings and local cultures. By limiting the average travel group size to around twelve people, and by using local transportation and staying in small, locally owned hotels and guesthouses, G Adventure travelers are able to minimize their footprint in foreign communities and gain maximum exposure to the local culture.

Poon Tip’s organisation supplies these locally operated businesses with ongoing tourism and the people at G Adventures are very passionate about the difference they and their clients make to the communities they serve. In return, their globetrotting tourists get engaged and motivated CEOs (the company calls all their Tour Guides, CEOs or ‘Chief Experience Officers’) and can witness first-hand the real difference that their presence and their tourism makes to these local communities. The families and the communities within G Adventures’ travel network benefit in so many ways from the extra income. It creates a ripple effect within the local economy connecting small businesses, cooperatives and even rural families directly to its supply chain, thus enabling more tourism dollars to stay in the local community.

G Adventures’ business model varies greatly to that of all-inclusive resorts or other tour operators. In a staggering statistic from the UNEP (United National Environmental Program), on average out of every $100 spent by a traveler in a developing community in an all-inclusive resort, only $5 actually benefits the local community. Bruce believes that travel can be the greatest form of wealth distribution on the planet if it’s done correctly. and it doesn’t rely on donations or handouts – it just relies on travelers making smart choices about how and who they travel with.

This is a business that cares, with a founder who is a revolutionary thinker and a great leader.

Planeterra Foundation

Established in 2003 by G Adventures as a way to give back through travel, The Planeterra Foundation is a legally constituted non‐profit organization that supports social and environmental solutions in destinations around the world via its global network of travelers. Planeterra works to ensure that communities are benefiting from the opportunity that tourism has to bring. Working directly with G Adventures to minimize the impact on the world’s great destinations and to promote sustainable solutions and economic growth for communities worldwide, Planeterra manages over 50 current and funded projects in threatened and developing regions all over the world. 

Together, G Adventures and Planeterra have partnered with the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB) in a multi-million dollar initiative that will promote sustainable, community-based tourism in Costa Rica, Guatemala, Nicaragua and Peru. This is the first time that IDB have partnered with a private organisation, and this highlights the great work that together G Adventures and Planeterra can achieve. The on-the-ground component of this joint venture (hiring, training etc.) is managed by Planeterra, who develop tourism projects, services and small businesses in these communities that have not historically benefited from the travel industry. Planeterra brings the knowledge and expertise in developing sustainable projects, while G Adventures provides a ready-made market for the product.

“Tourism is one of the largest industries on the planet. Vital to the livelihood of eighty-five per cent of developing nations, it creates employment opportunities, battles poverty and strengthens economies,” says the Executive Director of Planeterra. “Hundreds of millions of dollars have been spent on developing community-based tourism worldwide with little benefit to the hosting communities. The tourism industry has not traditionally been involved in international development activities. Where it has, it was only engaged at the very end, yielding high failure rates and unsuccessful projects. In order for community-based tourism development to be sustainable and effective, the private sector, specifically tour operators that possess the market power, must be engaged at the beginning and throughout the entire process.”

Some of the Planeterra projects include…

• A Women’s Weaving co-op in Peru. This is an incredible project that taught local women ancient weaving techniques as well as natural fabric dye processes. As a result of this project, local women now have employment where there was previously zero employment of women and it has reconnected a community with the importance of their own history. Today all G Adventures travel groups visiting the Sacred Valley in Peru have a chance to see and purchase high quality textiles produced by these weavers, all sold at fair trade prices.
• New Hope Cambodia – a Vocational Training Restaurant in Cambodia, which provides marginalized people in that community with hospitality skills to help them obtain new dignified job opportunities.
• Hope Africa – a day school for HIV/AIDS orphaned children in South Africa.
• A foundation in Honduras to help women start their own businesses.
• A community school in Ecuador.
• A drop-in centre for street children in Cuczo, Peru.
• An NGO in Costa Rica for environmental and wildlife conservation projects.

Once Planeterra has made its positive impact, G Adventures then provides consistent market access through its travelers as a sustainable source of income for these local communities. Its travelers bring long term success to these projects long after Planeterra’s initial investment has gone, so it is a business model that measures the social return on investment as a priority rather than just the company’s profits, but in the same breadth ensures that it remains financially viable over the longer term. A perfect example of ‘making a difference’ without sacrificing financial sustainability.

G Adventures funds Planeterra by covering all administrative costs, so one hundred per cent of donor funds go directly towards supporting each project. G Adventures also contributes $30,000 per year in matching funds made through individual donations online. Whether a traveler takes a trip with G Adventures, volunteers at one of Planeterra’s projects, or invests in their projects worldwide – he or she is helping to make Planeterra’s work possible.

Planeterra’s mission is to support sustainable solutions in the places travelers love to visit and it does this through G Adventures – building projects into tours.

Global Recognition

The work of G Adventures and Bruce Poon Tip has not gone unnoticed. G Adventures and Bruce Poon Tip have been consistently recognized for leadership and outstanding business practices. G Adventures is among the Top 100 Employers and 50 Best Managed Companies in its country. Bruce has won Canada’s Entrepreneur of the Year and has been honoured as one of Canada’s 100 Leaders of Tomorrow.

In recognition of G Adventures’ dedication to ethical business practices’ and responsible travel, Bruce received the Ethics In Action Award. He has also received the Global Traders Award for his groundbreaking ideas in exporting services. In January of 2002 Bruce was invited to speak at the United Nations launch of the Year Of Eco Tourism in New York and in 2006 he spoke about the commitment to responsible tourism at the World Trade Organization’s ‘Ethics in Tourism’ Conference and at the World Tourism Conference.

Just recently Bruce was asked by the World Bank and UNESCO to represent a team to visit the Peoples Republic of China to speak on sustainable development.

Here are just some of Bruce’s tips for business leaders…
• Look beyond the triple bottom line and understand how to make a real difference.
• Sometimes big business can be alienated by the difference the smaller brands can make – allow them to understand the difference they also make by bringing a deeper sense of purpose and passion into their corporations. Bruce calls this ‘The Quintuple Bottom Line’ – People; Planet; Profit; Passion and Purpose.
•Bruce runs G Adventures using a happiness business model, where happiness drives performance, allowing G Adventures to maintain a global company culture that delivers on a very aggressive brand promise that differentiates itself based on a purpose-driven business model.
• Engage your customers beyond the product with every sale. Make them aware of the difference they make and help them to feel that difference every time they engage with your business.
• Engage with all people who touch your brand beyond the product.
• A company’s core values are more than just a sign on the office wall. Your employees need to live and breathe the company’s core values each and every day, and those core values must guide all decision making in the company.

The guiding principle behind everything that G Adventures does is quite simple… They’re about running their business in a way that respects people and the planet. A perfect example of ROI+I – Return on Investment and Integrity.

For more information contact me at brian@precisionprofiling.com.au.

Until then… Let’s seek to understand more and judge less. Have a great week – Brian

Precision Profiling – What Makes You Tick? Through ‘Motivational Fingerprinting’ we uncover what you do, how you do it and why you do it, and most importantly, the hidden patterns that lead to your success, and that of your team.

I sometimes wonder if we as parents and our schools have gone too far in over-protecting our children, pandering to their whims, and being hell-bent on saving them from accidents or disappointment in their young lives. Remember that old saying from the fairground… “Every Player Wins a Prize!” But should they? We all know that’s not the reality in the real world and we may be risking future emotional harm by trying too hard to smooth out the bumps in the road for our children during their formative years.

Political correctness gone mad and ‘safety first’ may be responsible for breeding a generation lacking in resilience who throw in the towel at the very first falter or knockback. I remember days of falling on the hard ground and skinning my knee; cutting my arm on a nail sticking out of the billycart I and my brother had built; breaking a collar bone in a football tackle; and discovering that what I thought was a ‘best in class’ composition only gaining me a B-.  Yet eventually the knee and the arm healed; the collarbone knitted together and I knuckled down and tried harder on my next classroom assignment.

And yes there was the occasional schoolyard falling out between friends when lunchtime games went awry, but ultimately we sorted things out and made up again the next day without the need for adults to come in and impose their ‘play fair’ rules upon us.

So if you like me, feel that protection pendulum has swung too far in the opposite direction here is a wonderful story about a radical new move to back away from over protection in the schoolyard. It originates from my old home town in Auckland, New Zealand.

I read this story on Australia Day and it is sourced from ONE News in NZ. The headline reads “School Ditches Rules and Loses Bullies.” Now that piqued my interest. Here’s the gist of it…
(Source: Television New Zealand Limited. www.Tvnz.co.nz )

…. “Ripping up the playground rulebook is having incredible effects on children at an Auckland school. Chaos may reign at Swanson Primary School with children climbing trees, riding skateboards and playing bullrush during playtime, but surprisingly the students don’t cause bedlam, the principal says.

The school is actually seeing a drop in bullying, serious injuries and vandalism, while concentration levels in class are increasing. Principal Bruce McLachlan rid the school of playtime rules as part of a successful university experiment.

‘We want kids to be safe and to look after them, but we end up wrapping them in cotton wool when in fact they should be able to fall over. When you look at our playground it looks chaotic. From an adult’s perspective, it looks like kids might get hurt, but they don’t.’

Swanson School signed up to the study by AUT and Otago University just over two years ago, with the aim of encouraging active play. However, the school took the experiment a step further by abandoning the rules completely, much to the horror of some teachers at the time, he said.

When the university study wrapped up at the end of last year the school and researchers were amazed by the results. Mudslides, skateboarding, bullrush and tree climbing kept the children so occupied the school no longer needed a timeout area or as many teachers on patrol.

Instead of a playground, children used their imagination to play in a ‘loose parts pit’ which contained junk such as wood, tyres and an old fire hose. ‘The kids were motivated, busy and engaged. In my experience, the time children get into trouble is when they are not busy, motivated and engaged. It’s during that time they bully other kids, graffiti or wreck things around the school. Parents were happy too because their children were happy,’ Principal McLachlan said.

But this wasn’t a playtime revolution, it was just a return to the days before health and safety policies came to rule.

AUT professor of public health Grant Schofield, who worked on the research project, said there are too many rules in modern playgrounds. ‘The great paradox of cotton-wooling children is it’s more dangerous in the long-run. Society’s obsession with protecting children ignores the benefits of risk-taking,’ he said.

Children develop the frontal lobe of their brain when taking risks, meaning they work out consequences. ‘You can’t teach them that. They have to learn risk on their own terms. It doesn’t develop by watching TV, they have to get out there.’

The research project developed into something bigger when plans to upgrade playgrounds were stopped due to over-zealous safety regulations and costly play equipment. ‘There was so many ridiculous health and safety regulations and the kids thought the static structures of playgrounds were boring.’

When researchers – inspired by their own risk-taking childhoods – decided to give children the freedom to create their own play, principals shook their heads but eventually four Dunedin schools and four West Auckland schools agreed to take on the challenge, including Swanson Primary School.

It was expected the children would be more active, but researchers were amazed by all the behavioural pay-offs. The final results of the study will be collated this year.

In the meantime Professor Schofield is urging other schools to embrace risk-taking….’

Isn’t it about time we took stock of what we are creating in our homes and schoolyards? I am interested in your comments.

Until next time… Let’s seek to understand more and judge less. Have a wonderful week and a prosperous New Year. – Brian

Precision Profiling – What Makes You Tick? Through ‘Motivational Fingerprinting’ we uncover what you do, how you do it and why you do it, and most importantly, the hidden patterns that lead to your success, and that of your staff.

Brittany Mathis was diagnosed with the small ping-pong ball sized tumour in December but can’t afford surgery to remove it because she doesn’t have health insurance to cover the cost of the operation. Already since her tumour was diagnosed, her medical bills have been piling up. The kind-hearted boss is selling his business to help his teenage waitress receive potentially life-saving brain tumour surgery.

Other members of the Mathis family work at the restaurant and De Beyer said he felt a moral obligation to help them out. “Here’s a family, they really work hard they have had a lot of stuff go against them in the past and they are not holding their hand out. They didn’t even ask anybody for help,” he said.

Brittany Mathis works as a hostess, server, and helps out in other ways at the restaurant. She has brain cancer in the form of a ping-pong ball sized tumour in her brain. Mathis learned that she had the tumour after a neurosurgeon examined her and conducted an MRI and CAT Scan.

Brittany had entered the hospital after complaining of headaches, poor vision, and dizziness. Brittany’s tumour is on the left side of her skull, which has led to a rash on the side of her face.

Her father John, reportedly died from a brain aneurysm caused by a tumour in 2000.

Brittany’s mum Barbara Mathis, who also works at the Kaiserhof restaurant with her older sister Kay, is desperate for any help she can get to save her daughter.

The teenager described the offer as an “amazing blessing” adding she “never thought anybody would do that”.

This story is a timely reminder of the true value of wealth creation in business and the difference we can make to the lives we touch through financial success. I am sure that the owner of the Kaiserhof, Michael De Beyer, will reap the reward of his act of kindness in many different ways, not the least of which is the worldwide attention that has been focused on his decision to sell and the potential buyers it may bring as a result. Both he and his young employee and her family who also work for Michael, will all hopefully share in the positive outcomes as a result.

Here’s the story in full.

Until next time… Let’s seek to understand more and judge less. Have a wonderful week and a prosperous New Year. – Brian

Precision Profiling – What Makes You Tick? Through ‘Motivational Fingerprinting’ we uncover what you do, how you do it and why you do it, and most importantly, the hidden patterns that lead to your success, and that of your staff.

Nelson Mandela.

“No one is born hating…. People must learn to hate and if they can learn to hate then they can be taught to love, for love comes more naturally to the human heart than its opposite.”

Nelson Mandela achieved much, most of which will be praised and some of which may be challenged, but the enduring legacy for me will be his total commitment to compassion and forgiveness in his later years, through his ‘Truth and Reconciliation’ movement. It reminds me that we all have it within us to forgive and to look forward to a more compassionate future, and not backward to regret and recrimination.

Mandela endured so much over the decades of is adult years to right the wrongs of an oppressive system, but his indomitable spirit and his unwavering belief in the innate goodness of humanity shone through it all.

Vale Nelson Mandela

Contact me:- brian@precisionprofiling.com.au for anything at all you may need help with, especially if it involves your culture of engagement or your people and their performance.

Until then… Let’s seek to understand more and judge less. Have a great week – Brian

Precision Profiling – What Makes You Tick? Through ‘Motivational Fingerprinting’ we uncover what you do, how you do it and why you do it, and most importantly, the hidden patterns that lead to your success, and that of your team.

Society is heading towards a more sustainable, tolerant, progressive future. There are sweeping social and environmental changes that have been taking place this last decade that is being forced upon us by governments and consumers alike. And now it is taking shape as a business led movement driven by socially and globally aware employees; savvy investors for the future and inspired leaders of today. Just recently it was officially described as one of those deep-seated societal trends that we only see come our way every fifty or so years by the global trend tracking organisation Trendwatching in their September article “Demanding Brands.” So what is a demanding brand?

According to Trendwatching ‘Demanding Brands’ are ‘switched-on brands that are embarking on a journey towards a more sustainable and socially-responsible future that will demand that consumers also contribute.’ Even though that may cause some pain or inconvenience in the short term for the consumers when they are asked to respond to a meaningful demand on their time, energy or wallet, ultimately they will come to have a deep respect for those brands that push them towards taking action that they know to be right, as a condition of doing business with those brands.

Here are the four major demands that Trendwatching feels are beginning to have traction more and more in the hearts and minds of socially responsible businesses and consumers alike:-

The Planet: Demand action that is good for the environment, now or in the long term. (Think ‘reduce, re-use, recycle’ as an initiative of most local and national governments being promoted widely, taught in our schools today, and now promoted by more and more environmentally-conscious companies.)

Society: Demand action that is good for other people, whether that be close friends and family, local communities, or the larger sphere of society inhabiting our whole world. (For example, ThankYou Water and Zambrero here in Australia)

Lifestyles: Create products or services that demand consumers live healthy or behave well. (For example WholeFoods Markets in North America)

Nonprofits: Make demands on behalf of an established nonprofit, and insist that customers do something to support them. (For instance, our own Australian major charitable organisations of many years standing like World Vision Australia, Red Cross and their ilk are now increasingly looking at ways to partner with large corporations in a joint approach to the hearts and minds of consumers.)

Of course, consumers will not take action of this kind unless the brands that ask it of them are totally sincere, fully committed and completely transparent in their own efforts to make the world a better place. Meaningful action means just that, and those brands which don’t follow that golden rule of social consciousness will be caught out and discarded by the tidal wave of new consumers coming on to the scene in very quick time. So media stunts, one-off programs of the month, and consumer response promotions linked to customer loyalty programs fall into the ‘you’re not really serious’ consumer basket, and will be vilified and ostracised accordingly.

Authentic and concerted action by socially conscious brands in partnership with their equally concerned consumers is a trend that is growing bigger and bigger every day.

This demand on the consumer is a two-way street, because consumers everywhere are increasingly demanding it of their favourite brands. If you have any doubt about that, just consider how the ‘fair trade’ movement is rapidly gaining influence in the world today and the impact it is having on the coffee and chocolate industries of the developed nations as well as the current media and consumer focus on the Bangladeshi fashion clothing sweatshops and the impact that news is having on the ethical sourcing of products by fashion brands here in Australia.

Here are a couple of comments that describe the effect of this trend quite succinctly from the consumer-driven perspective… “91% of global consumers believe that companies must go beyond the minimum standards required by law to operate responsibly,”   (Cone Communications/ Echo, May 2013)….

and…..  “87% of global consumers believe business should place at least equal emphasis on social interests as business interests, and ‘purpose’ has increased as a purchase trigger by 26% since 2008.”  (Global Consulting firm, Edelman, 2012).

There are some excellent examples of brands that are making demands of their consumers as partners in this push to make a difference to our planet and all the people that inhabit it, in the feature article from Trendwatching titled ‘Demanding Brands.’ I think you’ll enjoy the examples they share with their global readership. I particularly like the one about the Brazilian soccer club, Vitoria, that promoted its charitable blood donation campaign through the progressive changing of the colour of the hoops on its players’ uniform strips each game from white to red to match the amount of blood being donated by their huge fan base each week.

From 17th-21st February next year, we will be leading interested executives from socially aware companies on a journey of discovery through the corridors of some of Australia’s most forward thinking organisations working in this sphere of social responsibility in harmony with commercial success. I would love you to join us on this study tour with a difference.

For more information contact me at brian@precisionprofiling.com.au and I will rush the details to you.

Until then… Let’s seek to understand more and judge less. Have a great week – Brian

Precision Profiling – What Makes You Tick? Through ‘Motivational Fingerprinting’ we uncover what you do, how you do it and why you do it, and most importantly, the hidden patterns that lead to your success, and that of your team.

While creating happy customers is one aspect of Naomi Simson’s business (and an important one), creating happy staff and stakeholders are equally critical components.

RedBalloon’s founder, Simson draws heavily on her experience as a senior marketer, having worked her way up over a 15-year period from marketing officer to product manager, marketing manager and director with well-known companies such as Ansett, IBM, KPMG and Apple. After leaving corporate life to become a mother, other priorities took hold and she decided to build her own workplace that people genuinely looked forward to attending every day.  Simson believes this is vital for long-term success and it’s something she is well versed in.  RedBalloon has secured a place in the list of Australia’s Best Places to Work produced by BRW four years in a row now.

RedBalloon are considered the pioneers of experiential gifting in Australia and New Zealand.

Although a recent arrival on the scene, here are some of the awards that they have won over the past few years:-

2013 –     #8 in the Top 50 BRW Best Places to Work in Australia (an award they are well and truly used to receiving) and one of only 9 companies to make this award 5 years in a row

2012 –     Secured a place in BRW Top 50 Best Places to Work in Australia.
BRW Fast 100 list from 2004 to 2009.  Red Balloon have also been a regular on the Deloitte Fast 50 for Australia, beginning in 2006.

2011 –     Australian Human Resources Institute HR Practitioner Of The Year – Awarded to RedBalloon Employee Experience Manager Megan Bromley.
-    Ernst & Young Entrepreneur Award – Awarded to company founder Naomi Simson (2011 Eastern Region winner for the Industry category).

2010 –    Hewitt Best Employers – One of only six companies to receive recognition.

2008 –    Nokia Business Award for Innovation – Presented to Naomi Simson at the Telstra Business Women’s Awards.

There are numerous other awards too many to mention here, and they are all centred around training, culture, team building and innovation.

In her book ‘Five Thanks a Day,’ Naomi Simson has compiled a collection of stories on the ‘how-to’ and science of saying thank you, the concept of which she also attributes as part of her success.

The name behind Simson’s endeavour was inspired by the 1956 Oscar-winning French short film Le Ballon Rouge (“The Red Balloon”), which takes viewers on a series of journeys with a young boy named Pascal and a whimsical red balloon that begins to follow him through Paris. That red balloon, a vibrant symbol of fun and happiness throughout the film, laid the foundation for Simson’s dream venture.

“I wanted to test if a business could be successful by simply listening to its people and its customers, and focusing on what would get people talking: the giving and receiving of experiential gifts that create memories,” Simson says.

Now, twelve years later, the company Simson founded in her family home has flourished into a six-time BRW Fast Company that has garnered many more accolades for its work environment, gift offerings, and employee engagement.

In an effort to bring RedBalloon into the business sphere, a corporate incentive service was created that offers employees reward points that may be redeemed for cash credit on the RedBalloon website. There are approximately 3,000 clients involved in this innovative program including such corporate heavy hitters as Qantas, Virgin Mobile, ANZ, Commonwealth Bank, Telstra and Origin Energy.

The work in this sector is not only rewarding for participating companies, but also for the RedBalloon employees coordinating the programs. “I have found my home in a business where they practice what they preach and ‘mix business with pleasure’,” says Matt Geraghty, General Manager of Corporate.

People Management

The work atmosphere at RedBalloon is just as upbeat and invigorating as the experiences they offer, and this is largely due to the high spirits of the employees.

“We believe that our people are our biggest competitive strength and, as a result, have shaped an award winning culture of fun, appreciation and recognition designed to attract and retain top talent,” says RedBalloon’s current CEO Kristie Buchanan.

A great deal of emphasis is placed on structuring the employees’ daily experiences to ensure that every work day is engaging and fulfilling.

“The framework – ‘Welcome. Tools. Grow. Flow. Appreciate’ – covers our approach to recruitment and on-boarding; what productivity tools we provide; how employees are kept connected to the flow of information; and finally, how they are recognised and challenged,” says Buchanan. “Our growth plans involve continuing to find more innovative ways to deliver meaningful experiences to our customers, our corporate clients and our employees. This could be in the form of products, in service delivery, in our marketing or technology.”

Check out for yourself why RedBalloon is one of Australia’s most sought after companies to work for and why it is also one of the fastest growing start-up brands in business today. I am sure it will give you food for thought. RedBalloon is another of the amazing companies we will be showcasing on our week long study tour in February of organisations that are changing the shape of the way we do business.

Drop me an email to brian@precisionprofiling.com.au if you would like to discuss further how to join our February study tour and create the environment that attracts and retains the young leaders of the future for your organisation.

Until then… Let’s seek to understand more and judge less. Have a great week – Brian

I must admit I got caught out recently when I thought I was doing the right thing by this young tradesman. I needed some landscaping to be completed at the front of my property and it just so happened that at the same time I was considering my options, a young man (around 25 years) happened to drop by with a business card offering to quote me on the job. He had been doing some work in the area and noticed that I had been preparing my front yard for a major facelift. He seemed knowledgeable about his craft (landscaping and concreting) and was personable enough in a rough ‘tradie’ kind of way. Once I had seen his handiwork on some previous jobs, I felt comfortable he could complete the work to an acceptable level, so I decided to give him the opportunity. So far so good…

Given I did not know him personally, I wanted to make sure that I would receive fair value for money so we came to an arrangement that I would pay directly for any of the material needed (machinery hire; sand and soil supply; concrete delivery etc.), and he would charge me at a daily ‘labour-only’ rate for him and his mate which would allow me to keep within the budget I had set aside for the project. He told me in advance what the daily rate for the two of them would be and it seemed reasonable enough so the project commenced with me confident that I had covered all the bases and that we were both on the same page with our mutual expectations.

The first couple of days I needed to be off site in meetings so I didn’t get much opportunity to observe what my contractor and his mate were doing. Each day there was evidence of progress in the right direction albeit slower than I expected, so I assumed that things were on track and I paid him as I had agreed to do at the end of the first two days of work. By day four I was beginning to get concerned that the project did not seem to be progressing as fast as I had hoped but I put that concern down to me not being knowledgeable in the ways of landscaping. Whenever I raised my concerns with my young friend, he assured me that things were progressing well and his super confidence seemed to allay my fears enough for me to question myself and my expectations rather than him and his abilities. By now I felt we were two days behind where we needed to be if I was to keep within my budget, so I decided to remain around for the next day to observe first-hand the work that was being done for me by our landscaper and his helper.

At the end of day five, the penny had dropped for me.

Here’s what I witnessed. The general theme of ‘a days work’ by my young landscaper….

Arrive around 8.30-8.45 am. Take the next half hour preparing site works (i.e. unpack the ‘ute’ while chatting about the night before with his mate). Set tasks for the mate to complete while answering mobile phone calls for another half an hour. Do some work for about an hour before taking a break. Complete the morning break and work for another hour before leaving the site together at around 11.30 am to have lunch. Come back an hour later, and work until around 2.30 pm when it was time to clean up. Leave at around 3.00 pm (sometimes earlier I later discovered) to go and quote on other jobs.

As you (and I) will discover from this scenario, a day of work for two tradesmen consisted of probably only five to five and a half hours of actual work. The rest was made up of late arrival, long meal breaks and early finishes interrupted constantly by mobile phone calls and a lot of watching by the tradie’s mate while the tradie did the skilled work.

That evening I quizzed my young contractor what a ‘fair days work for a fair days pay’ meant to him, and much to my surprise he answered that if he is on site for four hours or less it is charged out at a half day rate, but anything over four hours was a full day regardless of how much time was spent on site working. When I mentioned that it seemed like I was actually paying for a full day for two of them for only 1.5 hours more that his half day rate he shrugged his shoulders and said ‘this was what we agreed on.’

And he was right!

In my eagerness to engage him and cover what I assumed was all the bases, I left out one very important aspect of our communication. At a daily ‘labour-only’ rate – what constituted a days work? I wonder if you have you ever been caught out like this as I was.

And here is the valuable lesson I learned from this recent episode. When giving freedom to people without framework built around that freedom, what you are actually doing is giving them licence not freedom. This is because freedom and autonomy without proper framework takes away accountability, and without accountability freedom for the individual is a fairly hollow experience for all concerned.

This recent experience of mine translates directly across to the workplace, especially with our fast changing workforce where we are attempting to create cultures filled with the young Gen Y whizz-kids of the future whom we want to attract and retain. In our rush to engage with them and their self belief that anything is possible for them (instilled into them via parents; schools and the media), we need to be very careful that we do not give them licence without framework in the name of self determination and autonomy. It is a fine line between the two but it can be a slippery slope if we are not more careful as their employers.

I guess you may be wondering what was the final outcome for my landscaping project? Instead of it being an enjoyable win-win experience for both of us, once my trust had been broken I believe it developed into a lose-lose experience instead. My project took double the expected amount of time to be completed and henceforth my budget blew out significantly, and the extra work that I had agreed my eager landscaper could do once the main project was completed was given to someone else to complete under tighter and more specific guidelines as a result. So my young landscaping friend got less work in the end and I paid more than expected.

Here is an excellent link to a blog written by a young and eager Gen Y achiever Kejia Zhu, an employee of Facebook. He’s a 29 year old guy who was born in China, grew up in the UK and now lives in America. Kejia wrote a blog this week which received a lot of attention worldwide because it speaks to the heart of the overblown expectations of the Gen Y generation and their search for instant success before they reach thirty. In his blog Kejia talks with a fair degree of insight about the value of patience and the wisdom that comes with age and years of experience in a world bludgeoned by stories of overnight fame and success.

When I read what Keija says about his 92 yo grandfather’s achievements and his own new-found insight into the meaning of success, it gives me heart that there is a place in this world for every generation if we are prepared to step back and honour the unique perspective that people of each each decade of learning and discovery brings to the table.

http://kzhu.net/does-life-end-at-35.html

Drop me an email to brian@precisionprofiling.com.au if you would like to discuss further how to create the environment that attracts and retains the young leaders of the future for your organisation.

Until then… Let’s seek to understand more and judge less. Have a great week – Brian

Precision Profiling – What Makes You Tick? Through ‘Motivational Fingerprinting’ we uncover what you do, how you do it and why you do it, and most importantly, the hidden patterns that lead to your success, and that of your team.

Photo Credit – ‘Grandpa stealing wifi for his beloved iPad’  – Keija (@Kzhu)

“It seems today that everything we have known and understood is being challenged on the basis of globalisation.” Such were the words of the then managing director of Bendigo Bank, Mr Rob Hunt, when he wrote about communities of the future back in 2004. He went on to say, that the best way to build sustainable communities of the future was from within, by involving, uniting and engaging local people in regional and rural Australia in community building programs.

In making these comments, Mr Hunt shared the fact that his organisation had identified some years earlier that one of the difficulties for many regional and rural communities was that they controlled very little of the capital they produced locally, in part due to the ever-increasing centralised banking and financial systems that were impacting on their lives.

With the rapid onset of technology and bank rationalisations in the 1990s, local communities throughout regional and rural Australia were dying out as their local bank branches closed their doors, and local commerce dried up as a result. If people were forced to travel hundreds of kilometres to do their banking in larger neighbouring commercial hubs invariably they spent their money in those hubs as well, ultimately draining their local community of its financial lifeblood.

Out of the ashes of these rural disasters in the making, rose the community bank model. June 1998 saw the inaugural opening of the first ever Bendigo Community Bank®, in the form of the joint Minyip and Rupanyap branches, two tiny towns in north  western Victoria with a combined population of 1100. Since that first foray into rewriting the concept of community and banking, the retail arm of the Bendigo and Adelaide Bank Group (the result of a recent merger in 2007) now boasts 296 locally-owned community bank branches to add to its 190 company-owned branches, 90 agencies and 1900 ATMs represented across all states and territories throughout Australia serving more than 1.4 million customers via its national retail network.

The Bendigo Bank as it was known back in the late 90s put its money and considerable resources where its mouth was and as a result created a model of banking that is arguably unique in the world and earned it the enviable reputation over the past decade as one of Australia’s most consistently recognised top ten brands in terms of community engagement, financial service provision and corporate social responsibility.

Bendigo Community Bank® branches provide communities with more than just quality banking services. They deliver employment opportunities for local people, keep local capital in the community, are a local investment option for shareholders and provide a source of revenue for important community projects determined by the local community.

Each community bank branch is a locally owned and operated company, which functions as a franchise of Bendigo and Adelaide Bank. Bendigo and Adelaide Bank provides the coverage of its banking licence, a full range of banking products, training of staff and ongoing support.

Part of the bank’s philosophy stems from its belief that it is the role of the bank to ‘feed into prosperity, not off it.’ Bendigo and Adelaide Bank is often lauded for its social responsibility because of its work with communities – almost as if it has tacked a social conscience on to its business strategy. But working for the benefit of its customers and their communities is central to its business strategy. To the bank it makes sense – ‘You cannot run a successful business in an unsuccessful community.’ Therefore, if it can help communities to prosper, then it will have strengthened its markets. And if Bendigo and Adelaide Bank is an essential part of the community fabric, then it is more likely to be supported and to build a sustainable business.

As the bank says on its web site, ‘In the late 1990s, few people thought local communities could influence banks. Now they are running successful branches that are contributing many hundreds of thousands of dollars into building better communities.’ 

Central also to its core business is the Bendigo and Adelaide Bank’s aim to be Australia’s leading customer-connected banking group. The bank’s driving motivation is to help its customers and partners succeed and its communities and districts to flourish, thereby ensuring its business and its sustainability. Social responsibility is therefore not an after-thought that comes after business success, it is part of the DNA that drives its success, because as the bank knows successful communities are great places in which to run a successful business.

Increasingly the Bendigo and Adelaide Bank is finding other ways to help, too. It feels that if community based enterprise can be set up for banking, then it can be accomplished in other areas as well, and as such it is developing ways to encourage local people to commit to buying their services through a company committed to retaining at least some of its earnings in their community, to the mutual benefit of both the bank and the communities it supports.

Some examples of these joint bank and community initiatives are the locally owned Community Telcos for telephony services; the Lead On Australia youth project underwritten by the Bendigo and Adelaide Bank which is helping communities to engage better with their local youth; the Bendigo and Adelaide Bank’s charitable arm, Community Enterprise Foundation which creates a pool of money that is put towards working to build stronger Australian communities through funding programs for families, youth, health, education, the environment, the arts and more; and projects to address environmental sustainability.

For example, since Lead On Australia was established in 1999, more than 8,500 young people have participated in more than 1250 business and community based projects. These projects have been supported by partners from the business, community and government sectors.

Not only is the bank the instigator and driver of these community-based initiatives, it actively supports and encourages the engagement of its staff at both the head office and local level community levels to make a difference and contribute to the communities in which it and they operate.

Environmental sustainability is another area that is strongly promoted by the bank, primarily through its Generation Green™ partnerships. The bank links sustainability to customers through its Green home and personal loans encouraging energy efficient homes; its Carbon Offset program; its business packages for sustainable water; and its community initiatives supporting the development of bio-diesel projects.

Once again, the bank not only promotes environmental sustainability through its many Green related programs, it has led the way by being the first organisation in Australia to build a five-star Green energy-rated office building in a regional city, one of the first office buildings of its kind in Australia, and the only Australian bank with headquarters located outside a capital city.

The Bendigo Centre, was officially opened in Bendigo, Victoria by then Prime Minister Kevin Rudd in December 2008.

Key features of the $100 million, six-storey complex include:

•    Half the energy usage of a typical office building of its size.
•    A fifty per cent reduction in the use of potable water.
•    A water treatment plant that recycles 20,000 litres of waste water per day.
•    Recycled water to service all toilets throughout the building, saving almost 4.5 million litres of drinking water each year.
•    One of the first large-scale applications of under-floor displacement air conditioning in Australia. Using considerably less energy, this system provides fresh, clean air at a low pressure with individually controlled vents at work stations.
•    Solar panels to reduce the amount of black power used. Automated lights that dim or turn off with natural light levels.
•    A range of family-friendly facilities which include a mothers and babies room and an after-school room for children where they can use computers to complete homework or watch television.

Needless to say, the work environment is a joy for staff to be a part of with its vast expanse of natural light filled open spaces and chill-out areas built around the soaring central atrium. The interior is a revelation of modern design, comfortable and user friendly with working spaces bathed in natural light.

Currently the branch network is also undergoing remodeling focused on providing enhanced staff-customer engagement in an open and friendly service environment supported by the alternative choice of technology-driven service and automated customer coin counting facilities.

The Bendigo and Adelaide Bank’s drive to make community banking a viable alternative in the financial services landscape has restored faith in 296 regional, rural and local communities across Australia as a whole. As the recently retired CEO Rob Hunt says, “Community is important, and we all want to belong, contribute and see improved prospects for ourselves and our children. We have the necessary ingredients and ability to build strong, modern and creative communities of the future – a future only limited by our imaginations.”

What are your thoughts on this wonderful community banking story? I’d love to hear them.

Drop me an email to brian@precisionprofiling.com.au if you would like to discuss further how to create the environment that attracts and retains the socially conscious leaders of the future for your organisation.

Until then… Let’s seek to understand more and judge less. Have a great week – Brian

Welcome to a smarter, more socially and environmentally sustainable model for doing business today. It’s such a wonderful surprise to find a large, publicly listed company with more than 74,000 staff, in the highly competitive grocery industry boldly stand and say ‘noble cause before profits’.  This company even made the statement, ‘It’s not about share of wallet anymore, it’s about share of heart’ and the leaders of this company are happy to put both on the table, placing their trust in others by offering them a share in the profits as well as recognition for the difference they make in the world.

John Mackey, founder and CEO of Wholefoods Market is a force to be reckoned with.  He is fighting an American business war with loving kindness and generosity of spirit by putting people above profits and starting a global movement called ‘Conscious Capitalism’ and he is encouraging others to follow his example.

There are some out there who are hard-core believers that profit above all else is the only way to survive and that  Conscious Capitalism is a ‘Pollyanna’ point of view and not even possible for publicly listed companies to behave in such a way. But when companies like Walmart start looking over the fence at what is happening (and changing some of their own strategies to follow suit) there must be something in it beyond just being a nice thing to do.

There must be some pretty sound business principles and structures in place. So let’s look at why this is not just a great, ethically and socially responsible idea but why John Mackey, Wholefoods Market and Conscious Capitalism (which includes globally recognised brands such as South West Airlines, Google, IDEO and Timberland to name just a handful) are living proof that this is not just a rose coloured view of the world but a smart way to get ahead in business. It also supports Peter Drucker’s theory that culture eats strategy for breakfast. Strategy is still important but no matter how brilliant a company’s strategy might be, the strategy’s execution depends on great performance by the people inside the organization.

Let’s first compare the financials of businesses who operate under the banner of Conscious Capitalism to those who operate on more traditional models (a lot of these same companies were also studied and featured in the book, ‘Firms of Endearment’).

Investment Performance of Businesses Operating under the Conscious Capitalism model vs the S&P500

Ave S&P 500 Co.      – 3 Years   – Annualised  3.3%;    Cumulative  10.3%
Conscious Cap. Co. – 3 Years   – Annualised  21.1%;   Cumulative  77.4%

Ave S&P 500 Co.      – 10 Years  – Annualised  2.7%;     Cumulative  30.7%
Conscious Cap. Co. - 10 Years – Annualised  13.5%;  Cumulative  254.4%

Ave S&P 500 Co.      -  15 Years – Annualised   6.5%;    Cumulative  157.0%
Conscious Cap. Co. -  15 Years – Annualised  21.0%;  Cumulative 1,646.1%

There are four specific tenets of the Conscious Capitalism Model. 

Tenet Number One:  A Higher Purpose and Core Values.

A ‘noble cause’ is at the core of everything they do and the way they operate.  For Wholefoods Market it is to educate people and provide easy access to healthy eating to improve the world’s health. The people at Wholefoods Market live and breathe this noble cause – from conducting free nutritional seminars within their stores for their customers; educating their staff and giving them additional discounts on healthier foods; providing their own staff healthcare program; to a huge fund to help developing nations feed themselves by providing the materials for farming and sending their staff over each year to assist, plus many more projects of equal merit.

Tenet Number Two:  Stakeholder Integration.

They actively align the interests of all stakeholder groups, not just balance them against one another. They have carefully devised a business model where the objectives of each stakeholder can be met simultaneously and are strengthened by other stakeholders.

The key is that the activities within the business are executed within a system that allow for the active alignment not competition of stakeholder interests. Wholefoods Market captures this idea in its formal “Declaration of Interdependence,” which acknowledges the idea that all stakeholder groups constitute a family whose members depend on one another.

Tenet Number Three:  Conscious Leadership.

Leaders operating within this framework are required to display the characteristics we admire most in exemplary human beings such as emotional intelligence; spiritual intelligence (ability to access our deepest meanings, values and purposes); servant leadership; capacity for love and care; and systems intelligence. Such leaders are required to continually evolve, learn and grow in these areas.  John Mackey himself said that his own personal growth in these areas was necessary in order for his company to evolve and be of benefit to the lives it touched.

Tenet Number Four:  Conscious Culture and Management.

This revolves around the decentralisation of information to gain more widely dispersed collective intelligence and collaboration. People within a business operating inside of this model have a high degree of accountability and a shared fate… the better the company does… the better the customers do… the better the team members do… the better the shareholder investors do.

At a lot of companies, team members develop an entitlement mentality. They want to benefit from the boom times but want to be shielded from the tough times.  This is not the case at conscious companies.  All of the people within the company are required to put forward their ideas on getting through the tougher times and looking at all angles of what’s possible. This not only brings with it a lot of innovative thinking but brings solutions that can defy normal thinking. Structures and strategies to help innovation are seen everywhere within a conscious business.

Innovation, collaboration and self-management are important factors and tend to go hand-in-hand with the decentralisation of information and the empowerment of all.

According to Mackey, there are seven characteristics of a conscious business which can be summed up with the acronym… T.A.C.T.I.L.E.

Trust:  Conscious businesses have a high level of internal and external trust, both vertically (between leadership and frontline team members) and horizontally (within the leadership team as well as across teams at all levels).  Externally there’s a high degree of trust between the company and its customers; suppliers; other business partners; and the communities within which they operate.

Accountability:  Combined with those high levels of trust and caring is a strong emphasis on accountability. Team members are accountable to each other and to their customers.  People stick to their commitments and hold each other responsible for performance, efficiency and deliverables.  Suppliers are accountable to the company and vice versa.

Caring:  The human need to care and be cared for is extremely powerful, often equal to and exceeding the need to pursue self interest.  Conscious cultures are marked by their genuine heartfelt love and care for all stakeholders.  Caring begets caring and the company’s stakeholders in turn exhibit genuine caring towards the company.  People in conscious cultures behave in ways that are thoughtful, authentic, considerate and compassionate.

Transparency:  There are few secrets in a conscious culture because there is little to hide.  Financial books are usually open; salary information is more readily available and strategic plans are widely disseminated and discussed.  The reality is that we live in an increasingly transparent world in which most information of genuine significance becomes known anyway.  Conscious firms embrace this reality and benefit from it.

Integrity:  A conscious culture is marked by strict adherence to truth telling and fair dealing.  Conscious firms readily forgive lapses in judgement, but do not tolerate lapses in integrity.  Conscious firms are guided by what they believe is ethically right, not merely by what is legally required or socially acceptable.

Loyalty:  Conscious businesses exist in a system of high loyalty. All stakeholders are loyal to each other and to the company.  This is a natural consequence of the relationship mindset that permeates such businesses. It means that these businesses don’t have a ‘what have you done for me lately?’ attitude.  Stakeholders are more patient and understanding of each other when short term blips occur.

Egalitarianism:  Conscious businesses do not have a class system that separates their leaders from the team members at large.  Everyone is treated with the same respect and dignity. The salary differential between the top echelon and the front lines is smaller than typically found at traditional companies.  Senior executives generally do not enjoy special privileges and perks not available to others.  To a large extent all team members have input into how the company is managed and led.

Precision Profiling in collaboration with Leaders of Distinction, has created a one week ‘hands on’ study tour at the coalface of some of Australia’s leading exponents of these philosophies where Return on Investment and the total belief and support of a noble cause are jointly enshrined as integral to the  long term success of the  business.

The tour’s theme is “R.O.I + I.” (Return On Investment and Integrity), and it will include on-site case studies where we engage with and learn directly from those leading the way in this new paradigm of business and corporate responsibility, where making money and making a difference hold equal sway.

As Sir Richard Branson, arguably the most successful and internationally recognised entrepreneurs of our time and founder of the global Virgin mega-brand, puts it in his most recent book,  ‘Screw Business as Usual,’….  “There’s a massive generational shift occurring that will blur the distinction between doing good and doing business…  In our newly interconnected world, no one can any longer ignore the issues we are facing… I believe that business can be a force for good… because never has there been a more exciting time for all of us to explore this next great frontier where the boundaries between work and higher purpose are merging into one and where doing good really is good for business.”

For expressions of interest and background information on the make-up of the tour, its leaders, and the organisations we will be showcasing and visiting, send your requests for further information directly to brian@precisionprofiling.com.au

Until then… Let’s seek to understand more and judge less. Have a great week – Brian

Precision Profiling – What Makes You Tick? Through ‘Motivational Fingerprinting’ we uncover what you do, how you do it and why you do it, and most importantly, the hidden patterns that lead to your success, and that of your team.