Do you have fun with your Teams?

Business Fun – MID Comms Summer Ball 2017

Last night we held our MID annual Summer Ball. We do this every year and get all the Store teams, Call Centre, and the Head Office Team together and have a social drink and tons of business fun. This year we hosted at Hotel Football at Old Trafford, a great venue.

The team loved it. Especially as we let them plan it. I give the team a budget and they put the night together. Empowerment of your people is really important. They grow as people and as a team when given responsibility, which is always a must for me.

This year we played loads of different games like Family Fortunes, Krypton Factor, Play Your Cards Right and much more. We had a bucking bronco and a great indoor penalty shootout on the roofless top floor.

A great highlight of the night was our singing waiters. The theatrics they displayed and made the entire room think it was a real argument, and then burst into a superb Italian Opera Performance which was brilliant and comes well recommended for me, for any event.

The Team Really Love The Evening, They All Come Together As One!

As a business, we have 17 sites across the northwest, so this is one of four times a year we get together as a team of teams. Yes, it can be seen as quite a big gesture for any business to organize and fund, to why my response to many other business owners is:

“It’s all relevant based on the scale of economy and business size.”

It doesn’t matter about the scale or the investment into the event as there is always someone doing a bigger event. The point I am wanting to make is about the importance of getting your people together, to make sure they feel valued, have fun, let their hair down and you can keep a real community feel.

The Teams Share Ideas & Collaborate About Different Topics

They share ideas, challenges, goal progress, and support each other with lots of other social topics. They love to see who the rising stars and upcoming talent, they love to tell each other how well they are doing, all of these conversations give the entire business, exciting energy as we go into H2.

I can not tell you how important it is to get together and have some fun. So ask your self these questions, when did you last get your business together?

When will you next get your team together? Ask any of our team they will tell you they like the night.

So if the answer to the first question is a long time, Christmas or even never, then make sure you answer the next question with soon…

Best regards
Danny Simpson
CEO

Pride, Passion & Persistence – Are you nurturing your talent?

Pride, Passion & Persistence creates Talent

Over the last couple of months, I have been planning how we explore the talent in our business and who is ready for the next steps in their career, to become ready to help MID Communications move and grow to the next level.

After a great meeting with my leadership team, we decided that some of the current Senior leaders could play both a bigger and different role in our business. We started with a replacement of John Harvey, who is currently regional sales manager.
John applied to move to take ownership of the Operations channel, which is a very exciting opportunity that I could not say no to. This move created a new opportunity for an Area Sales Manager role.

We advertised the role, and in the applications came! This was amazing to see the confidence of our current store leaders.

We interviewed 3 amazing leaders, and what I can say from this experience is how amazing they all were. I know all 3 MID Comm’ers very well as they have all worked for the business for at least 3 years, moving into bigger stores and doing a great job in every store they have been involved in.

They have always shown great leadership skills, driving our key store leader’s, People Profit, and Proposition.

The interviews blew us away!

Each candidate was amazing. They were very creative, inspirational, well thought out, and had captured amazing new ideas, that encapsulated our core values, our culture, our direction, and our attitude.

We were expecting great but what we got was pure excellence. They were so good that we agreed to make 2 role’s for 2 of them, Jamie Houghton and Daniel Toft.

The 3rd candidate Lee Todman, I have agreed to put together a development plan, and some separate mentor sessions with myself over the next 12 months, that will help us both and the business.

I was so proud of them, to see how they have grown and developed within our business. It’s so exciting to think of the new opportunities, for our business over the next few months and for our 4 new rolled team members.

They have all been supporting and mentoring other managers and leaders over the past couple of months, this has really helped them realize how great they are, how much they actually know and how much they have grown/learnt.

My Lessons & Takeaways

How often do you temperature check your leaders in an interview format to really see how much they have grown?
How often do you get managers/leaders coaching other managers and leaders at the same level? Get them doing SWOTs on each other and creating action plans for each other – collaboration is amazing when done right!
Not all promotions have to be upwards in your business people can move sideways, and add more value in another part of your business.
Keep your business fresh and exciting to keep people engaged. My personal view that I learned a long time ago is, people in a role for 3-5 years can become frustrated, maybe even bored, uninspired, unmotivated, and some could even get complacent. I have adapted this theory over the last 18 months due to our amazing millennial generation, to 2-3 years.
Finally, always be looking at your business and ask have you got the right people, in the right roles, reaching their full potential. If not make sure you address this FAST, as this can have a damaging effect on your business. As a leader, it is vital you always ask and challenge your team on this, at any level. This has really helped me make some tougher decisions over the last 12 months as we have freshened our business up.

A great week and I cannot wait to see the team this Sunday as we celebrate as a business community at our Summer Ball, at hotel Football.

I hope this helps you and adds some value for you or your business.

Captain Your Fear

Small Steps To Overcoming Fear.

So here we are relaxing in our family holidays, and the time comes when we want to start some family activities. A boat trip was my idea and the type of trip where we decide where and when to go. Yes, I wanted to captain my own boat and, no, I had never done it before so this had interesting written all over it!!

I went to see a great guy called Spiros at the boat rental place. He showed me a good range of boats available for the family and our trip. I definitely did not want something too big and I didn’t want something too small so we made the decision for an 80hp boat, with some great family comforts for us to relax.

At this point I have to say our son, was not keen on the idea, he was not looking forward to this boat trip. He has always been wary of the ocean and its depth, because of the unknown. The thought of taking a boat out into the deep sea was a huge NO NO and the fear was setting in.

Sensing the Danger

Fear is a barrier that your brain creates because it can sense danger, and wants you to keep the feeling of comfort. This was the first time on a boat my son’s brain was sensing some form of danger, wanting him to stay on the shore as this was his comfort.

Start where you are and use what you know to help, over come the fear. He had me and his mum who wanted to move out of the comfort zone. Even I was feeling a little fear as I knew I had never captained a boat before, so I used this to help comfort my son, that I too was feeling fear, and it was just a feeling and a feeling that would go away…

Myself and my lovely wife convinced him to trust us, to try it and see how he felt. This was the first step for my son overcoming one of his fears. He had support and trust in me and his mum. These are two vital ingredients needed for the first step of dealing with fear in my opinion.

Setting Sail, Raise The Fear Anchor!

As we set sail for our first destination I knew the entire family was nervous about the trip. My son and his fear of the deep ocean. My fear of knowing I had never driven a boat, and only had a small crash course ten mins ago. My wife knowing we were both nervous, made her nervous. Yet here we go… off into the ocean all for the first time on our boat, all being captains and navigators. We all made sure we kept reassuring each other and taking each small wave as they came one wave at a time. I made sure we didn’t go too far out and used the shore line to guide us.

With every wave and with every positive word our confidence grew and grew.

As the journey carried on my son had surpassed all his uncertainties, and was now a different person. My wife was calmer now knowing our son felt better, and I was more confident at driving the boat. I had become a captain of our family boat. I was now able to show our son, how to drive the boat, his confidence was amazing. He would help drop the anchor, when we stopped off, and bring the boat to shore.

I couldn’t help but look and reflect on his journey and my own journey with the day, to take any lessons from. Some of these lessons, I know, will stay with me and Brad for life, knowing I can apply in many other situations, both personal and business.

Reflection – Lessons Learnt

You need to have great people around you that you trust if you are to deal with overcoming fear, or anxieties.
Take control and don’t let fear take over. Acknowledge it’s there but don’t let it take over, you’re the driver!!! Remember fear is a thought of potential danger in some cases when you are doing something for the first time.
Be positive with each other and take small steps towards the goal
Praise the success no matter how small or big the win is, a win is a win….
Keep pushing yourself to push up your limits, and learn from things that didn’t go well or made you not feel good – losses are not losses they in fact Lessons, valuable lessons to help extend your minds comfort zone, and get you closer to your goal, with confidence.

These are some of my lessons to overcoming fear, helping you to become the captain of your boat, your life, take control.

Holiday Time – Are your prepared for your holiday?

Jet… set… and we’re off!

Today me and the family set off for our family break to get away and relax for a couple of weeks. I always love family time, as life is so busy, work, school, out of school activities, and all the other things we have going on.

When we arrived at the airport and we were relaxing, waiting for the plane in the lounge it was amazing to see was how many mobile devices are now going on holiday with people, as we all take our tech away with us. Phones, tablets, watches, and other wearables.

It’s amazing that we don’t want to be disconnected from our digital world. Not only do we want to stay connected but as I now sit on the aeroplane I see people using their devices for so many reasons. Gaming, reading, listening to music, watching films, and so many other amazing things.

How prepared are we when going on holiday?

Our devices are brilliant, and what a big part of our lives they are. All this to help make the journey go faster and keep you occupied, to help make the journey seem shorter, as we are excited to get to our destination. It got me thinking how prepared are we when we go travelling abroad. I thought this little blog may help some of you prepare for your hols, and not get caught out.

CEO Dan’s Top 5 Holiday Tips

Make sure you download all the music / digital books you need before you depart. With music set your music app to play in ‘Offline Mode’ to make sure you have the music on your device when you get on the plane. We use Spotify, you flick the switch for offline mode, and it stores the music on the device… clever ?
Make sure you download the games you want for the journey. Make sure they don’t need an internet connection to play as you won’t have any signal up in the sky!!
Make sure you check with your airtime provider about using your device abroad. If you are going to an EU country (which we are) you should be able to take your tariff with you. You will possibly want to push your tariff up for just this one month, to make sure you have enough data for all that extra social media use. Snap-chatting by the pool or showing all your friends back at home your holiday pics of the weather, the cocktails or what you’re getting up to on Facebook, Twitter and other social media channels.

You can increase your tariff by calling or visiting your local airtime provider store. It’s always better, I think, to pop into the store to see your local team, you never know what special offers they might have for you to travel with. This should not be a permanent thing as you can always reduce your tariff back down to your original plan when you return. You should always be able to go up in tariff range and reduce back to your starting plan. Also make sure you add the correct bolt on if you are travelling outside the EU and make sure you are aware of all charges you at risk of.
Make sure you are aware of your data over usage charges as some network providers will bill you, for out of bundle usage, just like the UK. I am biased to O2, however, on this occasion, I believe this is the right network to be with as they text to inform you when you have used the allowance and then stop your usage. This only happens on refresh and other consumer plans, business plans are a little different. This is great especially if you have a teenager like me. You can let them get on with it, and use their phone as they need to. Trust me, £5-10 extra to increase your tariff is cheaper than bill shock when you get back home.
Make sure you have the correct app or the best way to check your bill while away. Stay in control, of any charges, or check to make sure you are not being incorrectly charged. Most network providers should have this facility on their app, or you can send a text to find out. Again, O2 have the MYO2 app, it’s great for this exact need.

So there you go, some top tips for your holiday to make sure you don’t have to change what you do with your device or have to potentially change your behaviour. The best bit is, we should now not need to hunt for a WIFI hotspot. We all know this can dictate your plans on holiday…

Have a great time where ever you go, relax, and make sure you Plan Like Dan!
Don’t you just love a bit of cheese! ??

Silkmen Denied Victory From Club Sponsors

Silkmen Denied Victory In Controversial Style

Macclesfield Town was denied victory in controversial style this afternoon at the annual cricket match against the club sponsors, due to a strong performance from MID Communications key man Martyn Barrow

The Silkmen took to the field during the first innings and took the initiative as early as the first over when the first wicket fell.

After three overs, the sponsors were struggling to deal with the strong bowling attack and were 1-1 in a baking hot afternoon at Victoria Road.

After some “unique” bowling from Scott Wilson, Martyn Barrow from O2 Franchise MID Communications salvaged some pride for the sponsors by smashing countless balls over the boundary for six.

Keith Lowe made some fine catches in the deep to dispose of two batsmen in the same over as the total crept over the 100 marks.

Macclesfield Town FC Cricket Team 2017

Barrow finally was forced to retire since he had scored too many runs as the sponsors posted a respectable total of 142.

Sir John put in a solid performance with some great shots before Don McCarthy dismissed him with a slower ball which had the Gaffer caught up in knots. The very next ball Mitch Hancox was dismissed leaving McCarthy on a hat-trick at 32-3.

Danny Simpson CEO of MID Communications Commented on Martyn Barrow’s Performance by saying ” I am not surprised by Martyns recognotion showing his Efforts, he loves sport, and always puts 150% into anything he does. He loves to win and has a desire to be the best both in and out of work, so it’s no surprise to see him stand out, for performance here.”

” Well done Martyn and I am devastated I missed what sounded like a great game, but I got a great picture of how it played out thanks to the Macclesfield Town Unofficial news page, which always puts out great content, so thanks to them for sharing great content for all to read “

A truly great game with lots more exciting moments. To get the full coverage and detail of this story please follow the link to Macc Town Unofficial Website.

Special thanks to them and columnist Rob Trafford who wrote and provided most of our content from the full story above.

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