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16.03.2017 // New products of the Company "Ranok-Creative"

13.03.2017 // 20 Sales Contest Ideas Guaranteed to Motivate Your Team

In order to make more sales, you need to find a way to really motivate your team. If you don’t have a huge budget to work with, that might seem difficult or even impossible to do. But there are some low budget ways you can motivate your team and incentivize great work.

Contests and other fun incentives can be a great way to bring your team together and get more done. Here are 20 different sales contest ideas you can use to do just that.

Sales Contest Ideas

Salesperson of the Month

Having an employee or salesperson of the month is a pretty straightforward way of rewarding great work on an ongoing basis. You simply present a designated award to the top salesperson or another employee who meets a certain set of objectives throughout each month.

To get started, you’ll simply need to choose a starting month, outline a specific prize and then alert your employees. Prizes can range from time off to money or even something more creative.

Raffle Prizes

If you want to make sure that all of your employees have a chance to receive awards while still getting recognized for their work throughout the month, you can set up a raffle type system.

Each salesperson or employee can obtain raffle tickets for every sale or specific objective that they reach throughout the month. Then at the end of the month or quarter, you can have a drawing to award a large prize or a few smaller prizes. This ensures that the people who do the best work have a great chance of receiving awards, while still ensuring that every small achievement receives recognition.

Winner’s Choice

Coming up with prizes can be one of the most difficult parts of running a sales contest. But there is a way to make it a bit easier. Just let the winners decide.

To do this, just pledge to give an award to the person who makes the most sales each month or quarter, then outline a selection of potential awards. The winner can then decide what they want to win, or even choose a potential prize for the next month’s winner if you want to make it more interesting.

Win a Favor From the Boss

Or you can even offer a more personalized prize for the person who makes the most sales. Let them win a favor from you!

Set up a specific timeline for the contest. Then at the end, the winner or winners can choose a favor from you as their prize. Maybe they want you to wash their car. Maybe they want to pick your brain over lunch one day. Leave it up to them — within reason, of course.

Boss for a Day

Or you could set up a sales contest where the winner actually gets to take your place for a day.

At the end of each month or quarter, the person with the most sales or points will get to run things their way for a day. Let them run a meeting, choose where to take the team for lunch and even set up shop in your corner office.

Team-Wide Goals

If you want to start a sales contest that doesn’t pit each of your team members against one another, you can instead ask them to work together to reach certain objectives.

To do this, set a team goal like a dollar amount for total sales or a number of products sold. Then keep track of your progress throughout the month and have your team members encourage each other to work toward that goal.

Daily Prizes

Not every contest has to go on for a long period of time to be effective. Instead, you can have smaller daily contests that give more people a chance to win.

For this, you’ll need some ideas for smaller prizes to offer your team, like gift cards or free snack items in the break room. Then give those prizes to the people who make the most sales each day.

Sales Madness

A la March Madness, you can set up a bracket style contest that creates friendly competitions between your salespeople throughout the month.

This one can take a bit more planning. You’ll need to create a bracket that includes all of your sales staff. Then at the end of each day or week, whoever has the most sales in each individual competition will move onto the next round. At the end of the month or quarter, depending on the size of your team, you should have a final round and an eventual winner.

Conversion Contest

When you get a list of new leads, you can start a new contest where each salesperson has the same opportunity to win no matter what their sales history looks like.

For this type of contest, you’ll need to distribute the leads evenly throughout your team so everyone has an equal opportunity. Then the person who converts the most sales within that group wins a prize.

Top This

You can also set up a sales contest where your team is awarded for making the largest individual sale, rather than the most sales overall.

This would be fairly similar logistically to other contests, but would just encourage your team to try and upsell or sell multiple items to individual customers. At the end of each month or quarter, award a prize to the person who has made the largest individual sale. You can even keep track of who’s in the lead throughout the month so that the rest of the team knows the number to beat.

Floating Prizes

You can also offer prizes or awards that go from person to person as the winner changes. This type of contest can award the largest sale throughout the month or even go from person to person at the end of each month.

To do this, you just need to identify a prize that your team members can enjoy even if they don’t get to keep it permanently. It could be a simple desk decoration or even a privilege — like the ability to choose meeting snacks. Then ensure that the prize goes from person to person when someone breaks the monthly sales record.

Team Scavenger Hunt

Each member of your sales staff likely has his or her own specialty. So you can set up a scavenger hunt style contest where your staff works in teams — pooling  their various skill sets –to complete various tasks.

For instance, you can set up a set of objectives like a sale that’s over a certain dollar amount, a sale to a brand new customer or a sale of a certain amount of different products. Then split your staff into teams and challenge them to complete every objective on the list.

Fantasy Sales Team

Think fantasy sports leagues here. This type of contest is intended to create an environment where all of your staff supports and encourages one another.

In a draft-style format, your sales people form teams. Then each “player” is awarded points for sales or other objectives reached. And the person whose team gets the most points at the end of the month or quarter wins.

Slump Buster Contest

Contests can be a great way to spur more activity from your sales team when times are slow. What you can do during those slow times is challenge your team to contact old or existing customers to try to sell repeat or upgraded products.

To do this, you’ll need a start and end date and an objective for your team to reach. This can be the most sales, the highest volume or even the largest single transaction. Then challenge your team to reach out to their existing contacts and see who comes out on top.

“Most Wanted” Clients

Within your industry, there are probably a few big players who you’d love to have as clients. And you can even make this goal into a contest.

Outline a few “most wanted” clients and divide them up among your team so each member knows who should reach out to whom. Then reward whoever is able to make the biggest sale.

Visualizing Progress Contests

Sometimes, contests are most effective when your team is able to actually see the progress they’re making right in front of them. So you can create a visual to put up in your office to keep track of how close your team or individual salespeople are getting to their goals.

You can make it a team competition, where you set a numerical goal for your whole sales team for the month. Then all of your reps can encourage each other and update the chart or graph visualization every time they make a new sale. Or you can have a chart that depicts how many sales each individual has made throughout the month so you can keep a friendly competition going.

Trade Show Objectives

If your business does any selling at trade shows or events, that can be a great opportunity for you to foster some healthy competition amongst members of your team. So you can start a day or weeklong competition where you award the person who makes the most sales just during the event.

All you need to do is alert your event staff of the competition and then create a way for them to easily track their sales during the event. At the end, offer a simple prize to the winner.

Customer’s Choice

Not every sales competition has to be just about the volume of sales made. Instead, you can create a contest where you encourage better customer service by offering an award to the person with the best customer reviews.

For this type of contest, you need to make sure that you have a way to survey your customers after they’ve completed purchases, or just periodically. Then you can present awards to the sales reps who get the highest marks from their clients or customers.

Surprise Prizes

Sometimes, sales contests are less about the actual prize and more about simply recognizing your employees. And you can also add a little bit of fun into the mix by making each prize a surprise.

To do this, you’ll need to collect some small prizes like gift cards or tiny trinkets. Then place them in small gift boxes or bags. And outline some objectives that your staff must reach in order to get a prize. Then when someone achieves one of those objectives, they can choose a box or bag without knowing what’s inside, and it’s a fun surprise for them and your whole staff.

Sales Bingo

You can also reward those little everyday tasks your team completes by creating a bingo-like game. This type of game can help you encourage your team to do all of the little things, since every box they can check off gives them a better chance of winning a prize.

For this type of game, you’ll need to create bingo cards that include different types of sales or tasks in each of the squares. One could be a sale of a certain amount. One could be getting a brand new account, and so on. Then have each of your reps keep track of their accomplishments, and then award them when they fill in a whole row or card.

06.03.2017 // Spielwarenmesse 2017

27.02.2017 // How to Start a Mastermind Group

If you’re interested in sharing your knowledge or networking with other entrepreneurs or professionals in your industry, you might consider starting a mastermind group.

Gail Gardner of Growmap.com is the co-creator of the Blogger Mastermind Group on Skype. Over the years, she’s seen the positive impact that mastermind groups like this can have for businesses and entrepreneurs. And she shared some tips for others looking to start their own groups.

How to Start a Mastermind Group

Find Potential Members

The most important part of any group is the members. And that’s the case with mastermind groups as well.

For Gardner, the group started as a forum site that added members over time. When the site got hacked, she decided to switch over to Skype. And then she invited all the members who were still interested in being a part of this type of group.

She told Small Business Trends, “I invited all the original forum members and we’ve been adding people as we come across them ever since. Most of the members are full-time freelancers or serious bloggers. Some are web developers and most own their own sites.”

Welcome New Members

It’s also important that you actually engage with those new members when you find them. There are different methods of doing this. But you should at least send a quick welcome message and tell them a bit about the group.

Gardner says, “When onboarding new members, it is important to make them feel welcome and give them some idea what is acceptable and what isn’t. We have a Blogger Mastermind blog post that explains how the group operates and how to access our collective resources on Skype. When adding a new member, I invite them to share what they do and their website and most used social accounts.”

Be Clear About Expectations

Since most groups are going to have a specific purpose, that also means that there are certain activities that won’t fit into that purpose. That means you need to have some kind of rules or a code of conduct to ensure that the group remains valuable for all members.

Gardner says, “Be clear on the purpose of the group and what is expected. In our case, we make it very clear that there are no requirements and it is not necessary to try to keep up with all the messages. I tell members to think about it like a water cooler. Chat when you can, but don’t worry about reading every message.”

Stick to the Rules

From there, you need to actually come up with a way to deal with any difficult situations when they do arise.

Gardner says, “If someone does things that other members find annoying, Eren [Mckay of Mckay Social] or I will talk to them privately. Most understand that they should not spam or advertise, while sharing a special post or recommending something they find truly useful is encouraged. We have only removed people a couple of times in all the years our group has existed because they persisted in doing something they had been repeatedly asked to stop doing.”

Keep Information Organized

To make the group as valuable as possible, it’s also a good idea to have a system for organizing the information you’ve discussed. This can make it easier for people to provide quick answers or information when people bring up topics that have been discussed at some point in the past.

Gardner says, “We pool our knowledge and resources and save that information onto Trello boards for easy access anytime. As discussions happen, I capture the highlights and organize them by topic. This makes it easy to share any conclusions and tips that come out of our discussions whenever the question comes up again.”

24.02.2017 // Why tech toys are here to stay

The most exciting premise of these new technological toys is that they encourage kids to be active creators of their play experiences. By inspiring kids to embrace an active creator playstyle, instead of a passive consumer mindset, we are evolving kids into being vested in the process of building, making, creating and customizing their toys. This has developed a whole generation of kids that take more risks and are becoming more confident “Do-It-Yourself” kids. When kids start to ask “What if?”, then we have got them thinking. Encouraging experimentation and curiosity are important, active life skills.

Here is a review of the top new segments that are emerging, and some of the players that are leading the charge. Get excited, and get in on the fun.  The best way to learn new technology is to place it into the hands of kids you know, and play right alongside them.

Electronic Pets

Spin Master: Zoomer Chimp

Wowwee: CHiP

As kids become more sophisticated and adept at technology, their toy electronic pets have also become more interactive. The CogniToy Dino, is a cloud-based WiFi Connected Toy that allows kids to engage in intelligent conversations. C.H.I.P is an electronic puppy who is trained by their owner to follow a child, to learn tricks and even to play with an object that uses beacon sense smart technology (Wow-Wee).

Spin Master has created a variety of smart technology pets in multiple play iterations.  Their Meccano Meccasaur uses sensors and touch-points that are built into the creature, so that kids just need to activate the touchpoints to get reactions such as roars, speech, attack mode and other playful sounds.  Hatchimals, (Spin Master) offer a new form of nurturing play, to evolve new characters that actually hatch from their inner eggshell over time, to become unique, functioning, interactive pets. Zoomer Chimp is a playful chimpanzee that uses smart technology to sense its owner and to respond to tricks and commands.

Robot Toys

Sphero: BB-8 Star Wars Droid

So many new iterations here engage kids to teach and control their robots. Coji Emoticon Robot by Wow-Wee uses emoticons as the social and emotional intelligence programming language. Dash and Dot (Wonder Workshop) teach coding to preschoolers and older kids can create more sophisticated programs, such as devising obstacle courses, or building with accessories, to create more complicated stunts and actions. OzoBot mini one-inch robots and the Sphero BB-8 robot have both encouraged character-based play with coding sequences that surprise and delight kids as users.

RC Drones

DJI: Phantom 4

From the smallest portable Pocket Drone, by Odyssey Toys that folds as flat as a credit card to the most sophisticated DJI Phantom 4K camera flying drones, there is a wide spectrum of flying RC drones to choose from. Horizon Hobby has launched their First-Person-View (FPV) drones to experience the thrill of racing, as seen through the pilot’s eyeglasses. Other key stand-out manufacturers in this segment include SilverLit, SkyRocket Toys, Revell, Carrera, and AuldeyToys.

Virtual Play

3D Printing

3D ImagiPen

These products bring concepts to life in a very tangible way, using 3D and 4D modeling. Whether kids use a 3D printer to create their toys, or a 3D doodling pen, to build products with filaments in the air, the excitement is in building something unique in the colors and combinations of the kids choosing.

Some examples include: Mattel ThingMaker 3D printer, XYZ Printing Robot Building Systems, 3D Magic ImagiPen (Tech 4 Kids), The original 3D Doodler Pen, and their newer 3D doodler Starter Kit, SkyRocket Toys 3D Chocolate Pen, and Redwood Ventures 3D Drawing Pen.

22.02.2017 // 11 Best Executive Recruitment Lessons

When it comes to hiring, advice for recruiting recent college grads just doesn’t apply to positions like CTO and CFO. That’s why we asked 11 entrepreneurs from Young Entrepreneur Council (YEC) the following question:

“What is the best recruiting lesson you’ve learned about hiring for a senior position within your company?”

Executive Recruitment Tips

Here’s what YEC community members had to say:

1. Look for Hunger 

“I run a relatively small business that year after year recruits top performers from our much larger competitors. We do this by getting people who are frustrated with the slow pace and general bureaucracy that exists in large businesses. I want people hungry to drive growth and be responsible for results; happily, our key hires are looking for exactly this in their next job, with me.” ~ John Rood, Next Step Test Preparation

2. Sit Down for a Meal With Them 

“You spend a LOT of time with a senior hire. One of the key reasons a good hire typically works is you interact well and get along. When you have a meal with someone you can easily read if they are formal/informal, what their interests are outside of work, how they approach the business problem they need to solve, and if they share a similar worldview to your own.” ~ JT Allen, myFootpath LLC

3. Make Sure They Have Healthy Side Projects 

“My best people have always been the ones who couldn’t sit still even when they weren’t working a traditional job. Most of them were burned out by office life, and they were smart enough to get by on their own but could be convinced to join my company. These people are endlessly creative and driven, and I look for independent online projects when hiring now.” ~ Adam Steele, The Magistrate

4. Hire for Culture 

“Culture trumps strategy. If you hire a senior person who is a cultural mismatch, you will likely do some real damage to your organization. Ask for examples of when they lived some of your cultural values and norms and what the outcomes were. At the same time, determine whether they have exemplified cultural values that are NOT closely held by your company to find red flags.” ~ Eric Mathews, Start Co.

5. Trust Your Gut 

“One key lesson I’ve learned is to trust my gut when something doesn’t feel right. As a first-time entrepreneur, it’s hard to determine who the best hire is going to be. Here’s when you should lean on others to help you interview and hire. However, when your gut says “no,” regardless of what others tell you, listen to it. I’ve often regretted the times when I didn’t.” ~ Roberto Angulo, AfterCollege

6. Focus on HR From Day One 

“One of the best tips I can give novice entrepreneurs about hiring is to put a major portion of your focus on your first team members. Those who follow can be easily replaced, but the first ones will surely determine the product, the marketing and the chances of success. ” ~ Yoav Vilner, Ranky

7. Follow the Rule of Three 

“There is no shortcut to hiring someone for a senior position. We use the rule of three — interview at least three candidates, in at least three different settings and with at least three different employees or company partners whom they might be working closely with if hired. This might seem intensive, but it’s better to be thorough at the start of a crucial, potentially life-changing engagement.” ~ Peggy Shell, Creative Alignments

8. Think in Terms of Numbers 

“When I hired my first employee, I thought of this person as 50 percent of the business. The second hire was a third of our company. The fourth represented 25 percent, and so on. Evaluate a candidate’s skills, experience, drive and potential with your company through a numbers lens. You’ll know how heavily to weigh his or her value to the company, especially a senior-level hire, and avoid damage control later.” ~ Brett Farmiloe, Markitors

9. Make Sure They Can Teach You Something 

“My best hires have been people who know more than I do about their area. If they can challenge my perceptions, improve my understanding, or show me a new and better way to do something, I’ll be impressed — far more so than if they’re afraid to challenge me, spout industry-standard clichés, or haven’t engaged in any original thinking.” ~ Justin Blanchard, ServerMania Inc.

10. Spend More Time Looking for Culture Fit Than Anything Else 

“For a senior leadership position, skills are a given. There are many individuals who will be qualified. The key thing an organization must look for is cultural fit. We spend more time interviewing for culture at the leadership level than we do anything else. If you hire a leader who does not belong, no one will follow him or her and you demonstrate that your culture is not valued.” ~ Aviva Leebow Wolmer, Pacesetter

11. Spend Time Outside the Office 

“Go to dinner or breakfast and make sure you like the person outside the office. If you end up hiring them, most likely you will be spending a lot of time together. When someone comes in for interviews you may not get to know the person well enough and they may have their guard up. If you are doing something casual, they will feel more comfortable and you can get to know them on a different level.” ~ Jayna Cooke, EVENTup

15.02.2017 // 7 Qualities of Leaders Who Inspire Loyalty

10.02.2017 // Amazon Sellers, Your Packages Are Shipping More and More by Air

Amazon (NASDAQ:AMZN) sellers are set to benefit from faster and more efficient services after the global eCommerce giant announced plans to construct a major new air hub in Kentucky.

The centralized facility has been designed to support more than 2,000 new jobs, and will be based sat the Cincinnati/Northern Kentucky Airport (CVG) in Hebron, Kentucky. It will play an integral part in Amazon’s rapidly growing fleet of Prime Air cargo planes.

In 2016, Amazon hammered out deals with two carriers to lease 40 dedicated cargo planes to support its Prime members with fast and free shipping. Sixteen of those planes are currently in service, and Amazon’s Prime Air cargo hub at CVG is expected to help the company bring additional planes into service to bolster and improve Prime services.

“Amazon’s Prime Air hub promises to revolutionize the fulfillment industry worldwide, and Kentucky is excited to partner with them as they embark on this disruptive, transformative and exciting venture,” Kentucky Governor Matt Bevin said following the announcement.

The planned Amazon Air cargo hub at CVG isn’t the first major development the company has rolled out in recent years to expand the company’s logistics chain.

In 2015, Amazon launched Amazon Flex, a unique mobile app that allows individuals to register to start delivering packages on behalf of the site. The company has also increased its global network to 149 fulfillment centers and 20 sorting centers — helping Amazon to achieve its plans to create more than 100,000 jobs across the U.S. over the next 18 months.

In December, Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos also announced the company’s first trial run of drone deliveries in the United Kingdom, claiming it a resounding success.

Not only do these developments bode well for Prime consumers, but they are also expected to improve logistics and subsequent sales for the ever-increasing network of global businesses that are choosing to sell products with the help of Fulfillment by Amazon.

26.01.2017 // Forget Complexity: The Key to Profitability is to Simplify

Simplify: How the Best Businesses in the World Succeed is not your average book on simplicity. You won’t find tips on how to organize your desk space for greater efficiency or which new productivity app you should install. The concept of this book goes much deeper than that. Simplify makes the claim that simplicity is directly tied to profitability. Simply put, the book makes the claim that the best businesses (no matter how complex they may seem on the outside) are really good at competing on just two things, price or offering.

What is Simplify About?

Despite all of the complex technical innovations that businesses like Apple, Pixar or Google do, their core business function is very simple. Apple’s products help people communicate and work. Pixar tells stories digitally. Google helps people turn data into information. Yet, how many times do business owners feel pressure to do the opposite? Many businesses feel the pressure to add more features to their products or services in order to stay competitive.

Simplify argues that you shouldn’t.

Instead, Simplify breaks down competition into two main categories. In this highly competitive global environment, your business can win customers in one of two basic ways: your price (price simplifier) or value (proposition simplifier). In order to successfully compete, the authors invite readers to simplify their business operations before doing anything else. Businesses need to determine if they will beat their competitors and woo customers by offering lower prices or by doing something unique that customers are willing to pay more to get. Using the case studies in the book, you have to ask if the chief focus of your customers is price (like a $1 hamburger) or emotional value (like a $600+ iPhone).

Deciding on the chief focus (aka “pain point”) is important because it determines the entire thought process behind everything your business does. It determines the strategy that keeps a company like Apple or McDonald’s in business despite increased competition and a constantly shifting consumer base. These businesses know what they are good at and what the customers want. When companies forget this simple message, they get overly complicated and sabotage their progress in the process.

Simplify is the product of industry experts Richard Koch and Greg Lockwood.

Koch is a former management consultant and private investor turned author and founder of his own business, L.E.K. Partnership. Koch credits the power of Pareto’s 80/20 Principle to help improve his personal and professional life as well as those of his clients.

Lockwood is also the co-author “Superconnect: Harnessing the Power of Networks and the Strength of Weak Links” with Richard Kock and is founder ad partner at Piton Capital, LLP, which he set up after helping UBS get established in the European market.

What Was Best About Simplify?

Simplify is unique because it doesn’t address productivity for a “feel-good” reason. It promotes productivity because it has been a time-tested model that has worked for companies like McDonald’s, Uber, Apple and others. For businesses that are tired of dealing with complexity, this book offers a business philosophy that intuitively makes sense to both consumers and business owners.

What Could Have Been Done Differently?

While Simplify provides a bare-bones approach to profitability, it doesn’t provide enough detail on adapting the strategy. To provide an example, the book praises McDonald’s as an efficient price simplifier yet it fails to highlight companies that failed like Blockbuster, Kodak, etc.) due to innovation. Continuing with the case study of McDonald’s, further study about how McDonald’s can continue to evolve while maintaining its core low price strategy would be great for companies stuck in the same situation. And those unsure about what move to make next.

Why Read Simplify?

Simplify is best suited for those businesses with an established track record of success. Though they may be over-complicating that success with the wrong staff, policies or strategy. Many businesses in the “it’s complicated” situation might feel overwhelmed about where to start in the simplification process. Simplifyprovides a specific strategy focused around your businesses’ specific value to customers. The authors recognize that not all purchases or consumers are alike. The context of a purchase matters. Readers of Simplify are taught how to focus in on their key contribution in that context and focus on what customers value most.

24.01.2017 // Is Strengths-Based Employee Development Right for Your Business?

The traditional approach to employee development is to focus on employees’ weaknesses and how they can improve them. For example, if an employee works better alone than on a team, you’d probably tell him he needs to focus on getting better at teamwork. Recently, however, a new approach to employee development is making waves: strengths-based employee development.

As the name implies, strengths-based employee development focuses on what employees’ strengths are and builds on them, rather than trying to correct weaknesses. There are several ways a small business owner can benefit from using strengths-based employee development.

• While a weakness-focused approach seeks to bring everyone up to a basic uniform level, a strengths-based approach will develop a diverse team with a wide range of specialized strengths. This can give your business a real competitive edge.
• Because it focuses on what employees are good at, rather than what they aren’t, it motivates and energizes employees.
• It makes employees feel important and valued as individuals. That’s especially effective with Millennial employees, who make up an increasing percentage of the workforce. Millennials like to feel they are making their mark from the minute they join your business. By focusing on their strengths, you enable them to contribute right away.

How to Use Strengths-Based Employee Development

Here are five steps to using strengths-based employee development in your business.

Step 1. Identify your company’s strengths. Are you innovative, dependable or fun? Just like a person, if your business is trying to be something it’s not, you’ll work harder but achieve poor results and feel dissatisfied along the way. By knowing your business’ strengths, you can use your employees’ strengths to build on them.

Step 2. Identify your employees’ strengths. There are several ways to do this. Start by sitting down with employees one-on-one to discuss their strengths. Just asking, “what do you think your strengths are?” may not produce anything very useful. If that’s the case, try asking these questions:

• What do you look forward to doing most at work every morning?
• Is there something you do at work where the time seems to fly by?
• What do you most enjoy doing in your time off?
• What did you enjoy doing most at previous jobs?

You can also ask employees to identify each other’s strengths — kind of like a 360-degree performance review, but focused only on the positive. There are also online assessments to help you pinpoint your own and your employees’ strengths. The Clifton StrengthFinder is popular; it was developed by the Gallup Organization as part of a 30-year study of the strength-based approach to management.

Step 3. Match employees’ strengths to their tasks. You can assign employees to specific tasks based on the strengths you’ve uncovered, or you can also just explain something that needs to be done and ask who would like to do it. When employees volunteer for jobs, they’re more likely to choose tasks that play to their strengths.

This part of implementing strengths-based employee development may involve some trial and error. Chances are you’re going to have to move employees around to different positions or assign different types of tasks to see what their true strengths are.

Once you have a clear understanding of each person’s strengths, you’ll be able to better group employees in teams for projects or tasks. The ideal team involves people with a diverse range of strengths. For example, if everyone on a team is good at strategizing and planning, but no one is good at executing, you’re going to be in trouble. Diverse strength will also lead to more creative thinking and new approaches to problems.

Step 4. Provide ongoing feedback. Whether you’re praising an employee in front of the team or in a performance review, it typically goes something like this: “Steve, you did a great job planning and overseeing our customer recognition luncheon.” This type of feedback focuses on how well a task was completed. Strengths-based employee development goes a step further: “Steve, you did a great job planning and overseeing our customer recognition luncheon. It really showcased your strengths at organizing, coordinating and relationship-building.”

Step 5. Make public recognition of strengths part of your day-to-day business. For strengths-based development to really work, employees need to be aware of each other’s’ strengths as well as their own. That’s why it’s important to publicly recognize employees not only for their achievements, but also for their strengths.

You should also encourage employees to give each other feedback and recognition for strengths: “Thank you for helping with the new marketing campaign. Your creative strengths really helped us think outside the box.”

How does strengths-based employee development sound to you? Do you already use this approach?