Recharge on Air with Alan Hargreaves

Common sense and scientific research make it clear people are more productive when they feel good. What can leaders do to make people feel better?

Managers often encounter challenging times when it all seems too complicated. Try taking an imaginary helicopter ride. Climb out of the crowded view inside your head and take in the entire landscape. It can be calming and insightful.

The hybrid business model can appear confronting, yet it opens the door to a more agile operating style. Rather than a hindrance, see it as an opportunity to build flexibility, boost productivity and cope with a rapidly changing landscape.

Difficult as it has been, the pandemic introduced a level of urgency that accelerated change. It has reminded us of the importance of taking action. Try keeping your foot on the gas. There is still plenty to do.

Strategies which embrace stakeholder interests have often been seen as an enemy of shareholders value. That might be changing as the pandemic forces faster innovation in work practices and business tactics.

The share prices of stocks like FB, Apple, Amazon, Netflix or Google trade at prices way above traditional values. Even if this is not a sustainable phenomenon, their performance dramatically emphasises the power of focusing on long term value versus short term profitability.

The surge in online connection and virtual workspaces will not go away when Covid does. What's good about that? What are the problems? What can we do about them?

The Covid crisis has supercharged changes that were already underway. The pandemic may end, but things will be different on the other side. What are you going to do about it?

Recessions present challenges and opportunities. Use the urgency to create change; take advantage of the uneven impact; return financial management to front and centre.

Few leaders have stepped up as ideal role models in the coronavirus crisis. What can we learn from their failures?

Terminating an employee can be confronting. How to do it properly.

Commercial principles don’t change with time, place or technology. Business is still about supply, demand and customer connection.

When dealing with difficult individuals, stick to the commercial facts. If you want to find a solution, focus less on the person and more on your management responsibilities.

Worried about maintaining business momentum? To keep moving, start by asking yourself three simple questions.

For real progress, building on a strength beats fixing a weakness. Find out what you are good at and do more of it.

No recession does not mean no tough times. Regardless of the economic outlook, carry out a regular health check if you want to maintain resilience and growth.

The life cycle of any business means means different strategies for incumbents and start-ups. Although there's an array of tactical options, there is no guarantee that any will be successful.

Outsourcing is often the best way to manage parts of your business. Sometimes it's the best way to manage most of it.

Confidence is a great strength but it works best when it embraces uncertainty. Rather than deny risk, the most effective advice — to colleagues or customers — accommodates the chance of error and manages it.

Simple rules underwrite a successful business. Drill down into basic commercial principles to find solutions.

Want to lift your performance, boost teamwork, lower stress and get better business results? Try using ‘We’ instead of ‘I’.

In times of rapid change, don’t rely on established beliefs. You may think your strategy will work, but look for reasons why it won’t.

Accountability mobilises the constructive use of some positive anxiety. People are more likely to meet deadlines when they know someone is watching.

Business expansion into new markets means doing what you do well somewhere other than where you are doing it now. Success depends on unique advantages. The specific strengths of your own business model will guide you to where the best opportunities lie.

Diversity is not a simple matter of politics. We need it to survive and grow.

Basking in success can come at a cost. Top performers think less about how good they are and more about how much better than can be.

To keep your strategy agile, unload a range of alternative futures. You may not need them, but you'll be ready if you do.

Developing a loyal customer base means helping your customers use your product or service. Make them easy to access and easy to use.

Two questions can help you cope with disruption. If you wanted to disrupt yourself, how would you do it? If you wanted to do something different with what you've got, what could you do?

Just about everything in business is cyclical. Get used to it. Work with it.

Uncertain times may well favour the brave, but the keys to survival and growth are agile and pragmatic responses to changing circumstances. To maintain momentum, you need to constantly review all aspects of your business or career.

Responses to disruption vary from fearful avoidance to an unhealthy over-indulgence. To convert our anxieties about invasive innovation, we need to work with it rather than be driven by it.

We often make big plans about things to do over the next year. Maybe we should try to do less.

Big financial words often describe business concepts you already intuitively apply. You can become more literate by applying some simple arithmetic to your thinking.

Intense focus can yield great returns, but to move forward in business or life we need to take our attention beyond our immediate tasks. You can't expect much inspiration to enter your brain if you don't make any room for it to enter.

Sometimes some of our best thinking comes about when we are not thinking at all. Alan suggests a few effortless ways to help new ideas arrive over the holidays.

Your business or your career can tick along quiet nicely, but are you optimising them? Exploiting untapped business opportunities and building fulfilling careers often means taking a risk. Your challenge is to take some and not take too many.

Leadership is crucial in critical situations. It doesn’t mean you should charge head on into troubled waters. Real leaders don’t shy away from the situation. But they assess it rationally, clarify it for their team and get everyone working on the best possible solution. It may not work, but it will give you the best chance of survival.

In this age of entrepreneurial mania, it seems everyone wants to start their own business. There are plenty of arguments why you should. Here's six reasons why you shouldn't.

The test of any new idea is not how clever it is. It's whether it makes something easier to do.

Great leaders don't do everything. They get the best people they can find to do all the things that they aren't good at.

We can waste a lot of time stressing about things we can't control. What if we focus that energy on the things we can control.

We know that feedback loops can generate a lot of momentum, both good and bad. The good ones for your business are often just simple adjustments to the way you already do things

We have this idea that somewhere out there is a place where everything is balanced. There isn't. Managing life and coping with change requires us to be fluid, not static.

Many statements about leadership are just cliches that often lead to management dysfunction. Effective leaders have humility. They look at how they can serve their people. They know that great leaders don’t just solve problems. They grow great people and they do so by focusing on how they themselves can serve others.

Research shows that most forecasts or predictions are wrong. That makes it hard to get your strategy exactly right. What can you do to hedge against uncertainty?

A start up needs money to get traction, but is your great idea 'investment ready'? You will be a shareholder too. Before your commit a couple of years of your life and most of your cash, check that this makes business sense. Are you ready to invest in yourself?

A successful business can often end up with too much cash on the balance sheet. What should you do with it?

We often get stuck thinking the best product has to be the most sophisticated one. Instead, look to the ordinary strengths of you and your business. Great successes often come from simply optimising what you've already got.

Is there an issue you have been avoiding? Try addressing it. Your leadership style will always be a work in progress. Don't miss the chance to work on it.

There are simple ways to make your 'to do' list more manageable. One of the best is working through it with a friend.