When you first take on a management or leadership role, you will probably have to learn a number of new skills. What is often overlooked, however, is that you also have to avoid a number of common management pitfalls. These pitfalls often catch out new managers, but with a little careful thinking and organisation, many can be avoided. This page ...

Selecting and recruiting the right person to fill a vacancy is not an easy task. It is, however, very important, because making the wrong decision can have serious consequences for your team and your organisation. Recruitment is also a time consuming and expensive business, so it pays to get it right first time. There are a number of activities that ...

Most organisations have a leadership development programme, whether it is a comprehensive system of training or an informal process. However, only a fraction of these companies will consider their programmes truly effective at developing their employees to the desired levels. Despite the willingness of individuals to progress and build skills to enhance their capacity and performance within a company, unless ...

At some point in your life you will be criticised, perhaps in a professional way. Sometimes it will be difficult to accept – but that all depends on your reaction. You can either use criticism in a positive way to improve, or in a negative way that can lower your self-esteem and cause stress, anger or even aggression. To deal ...

How often have you needed to persuade others to do something? It’s a situation that arises almost every day, whether it’s getting your teenager to tidy their room, or your preschooler to get dressed, or a colleague to attend a meeting on your behalf. Some people seem to be able to do it effortlessly, and almost without anyone noticing, whereas ...

In the course of your career, as well as in other times of your life, you may well be asked to take the minutes of a meeting. You may even be asked to take on a formal role as secretary to a group or organisation, whether voluntary or as a paid position. In this capacity it is essential that you ...

To lead effectively, you must have followers. A key part of gaining followers is creating and communicating a compelling vision, which means that others want to follow your lead. This is particularly important in driving change. Vision is an important part of leadership, whether as part of a major change plan or simply explaining where the organization needs to go ...

Since Michael Porter published his ‘five forces’ framework in 1979, it has gone on to become one of the most widely-used frameworks for strategic decision-making in business. In particular, it helps organisations to explore the competitiveness of their industry or environment, and identify where they can best make a profit. Porter’s Five Forces was designed to help organisations to assess ...