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Just recently, I had the extreme pleasure of working with a leading edge financial services company.

Is their market tough? YES!

Has it pushed them into a corner? NO!

First, let’s see what they’ve got going for them:

• Young, creative, aggressive leadership
• A clear and compelling vision for the future
• A powerful business model
• Edgy products pushing the market boundary
• A commitment to deliver “value-added” knowledge and consultation AND positive, measurable financial impact
• A solid energetic team of field professionals who care about the business and its success
• Those professionals are totally committed to the value of consistent processes across their company and with clients across the nation

In the months since the CEO launched our project, we have been coaching selected of their producing leaders and sales professionals. We have also been adapting our tools to their marketplace and co-developing approaches to leverage the value of the company, the people and the products.

A few of the key things we have focused on:

1. Professionals who are hungry to perform well and achieve lots are an essential part of the recipe for success that:

• Builds on their strengths and individuality
• Builds on the identity and potential of the business
• Promotes them to “be your best”
• Helps them make “value-added” concrete and practical

2. To succeed, you need to give ambitious and motivated professionals a framework. These guys and gals want a consistent process because they know that puts the company tone and identity front and center.

3. It’s not either~or: being “strategic” and “value-added” is not enough - they also need to be “transactional” and “gets deals done”.

4. Confirming and demonstrating that tools and processes do not have to be “ceilings for compliance” - that they should be firm to act as foundations for innovation and for enhancing the clients’ appreciation of individual and company strengths and style.

5. The power of repeatable patterns of dialogue and coverage will drive more meaningful conversations about client business priorities, heighten client expectations of us and create unassailable defenses against more transactional competitors.

It was one of the most gratifying and exciting workshops I have facilitated in years. I’m excited to observe how they make it their own and drive new results through the next few phases of coaching and integrating.

Now watch ‘em go!

I wrote last week- a favorite rant - about the importance of practice in building repeatable excellence.

A short form way of referring to “repeatable excellence” - let’s say “Tiger” as in Tiger Woods. Tiger could be your power animal. I love those Accenture www.accenture.com magazine ads… I want to save every one… “90% straight line > 10% go with the flow”. Go to the website and you can check them out… they are on a rotating pattern.

The Fewest Things To Make The Most Difference

What surgical insight did the Business Week from last week’s post give us?

• Practice is a critical differentiator. Yeah, yeah.
• Work hard is critical. Yeah, yeah.
• Different practice is the key. Okay, now I’m listening.

One of the keys to practice is that you become capable enough in the behavior that you can “play” and “observe” and still be present.

Follow the flow…

Practice creates solid foundations.

Solid foundations creates repeatability.

Consistency creates trust - in your organization, with your clients, with future clients.

Consistency creates the opportunity to observe and adjust to situational differences. Instantaneously.

Adaptation - innovation - creativity - that’s what powerfully ”spices” your consistency.

Observation creates quality feedback so the baseline is adjusted and the innovation can become part of the repertoire.

Be Your Best… you tiger!