 Happy New Year everybody, and I hope that 2018 has got off to a spectacular start for you all. Wherever you're tuning in from, I hope that you're having a lovely day, a lovely week, and certainly as I say, starting a wonderful year. Now, today I am going to share with you a book review of this book called Star. You can see it there with my microphone. And I invite you to have a cup of coffee with me while we have a chat about this. Two of my favorite things, books and coffee, really are. Now, the reason I picked this book is because did you ever see an SME owner and they look just completely composed. They're on top of everything. They know their strategic objectives. They know their value proposition. Their sales books are full. And you look at them wondering, what are you doing? Or more importantly, what am I doing wrong? Because I know how that feels. Or did you ever, you know, one day walk into your office of a theoretical sort? And whether that office could be an actual four walls of an office like where I am. Actually, sorry, I meant to tell you I'm joining you today from the boardroom in our own office here at Invent ECU. And your office could be your mobile. It could be a coffee shop. It could be wherever it might be. And did you ever, you know, look at your inbox and you think, that is blowing smoke. I probably have loads to do there. And you look at your phone and then you think, OK, well, I could be tweeting and I could be putting things on Facebook. And then you get an invite to go to an event. You think I could go into that. And then you think, well, I didn't actually follow up from everything that I did last month. And then you watch a YouTube video and you see somebody who is really inspirational and they say that you should take a day off and just journal. And you think, you know what, no one ever trained me for this. I actually don't know exactly what I'm supposed to be doing. And I'm not quite sure how to get to the point of where I get to that completely composed SME owner. Or, right, and this is another one. I've often experienced this and spoken to people who've experienced this. And this is where you get to where you want to go. So you might say, OK, I would actually love if everybody just took care of customers and where I had the time to think and strategize and actually put real business, new plans in place and implemented them and thought big dreams. And then from there I could pursue them and that everybody else could look absolutely urgent. Well, I take care of the important. And then you get to that point. And then it's awfully scary because, of course, at that point, other people are taking care of the other things and the other areas. And then you're supposed to come up with these visionary ideas and pursue them and make them a success and everything else like that. And then it's kind of a little bit scary when you're there and you just wish you could go back to the safety zone of having, you know, a blowing smoke email inbox because you can get a sense of achievement out of that. Well, each and all of those I've been through, OK, each and every single one of those. And this is why I'm telling you about this book is because Star, sorry, I know it's just, you know, when a video works backwards, Star, leadership behaviors for stellar SME growth. This book codifies what those things that you need to do actually are. That is what this book does. It was written by Will and John McKee. Now, I have never met them, but I have reached out to John and LinkedIn. They set up a company called Linkubator. It's based in Belfast and it's a consultancy for dealing with SMEs. And I have also found out that Will actually was John's dad and he sadly passed on. So it's now Will and sorry, John and a number of colleagues who actually run the business. So I, I've reached out to them and I've told them exactly what I thought of the book. And for me, this book is a really worthwhile read. Now, I came across it actually at an event. It was at an event that was being run by Small Business Can, which is a CSR project of Ulsterbank. And actually I see that Ulsterbank is on the back of the book supporting it. And anyway, they were giving away free copies of this book one day at an event. And I thought, hmm, must take that home. Now, I must say it was at home in the press for, I don't know how long. And then when it came to my leadership assignment for my masters, that was the time that I said, you know what? Actually, I should take this out and I should have a look at it because I needed a leadership model. But the thing about a lot of leadership models is that they pertain specifically to companies that are really, really big or that have lots of staff or we can take the, you know, a week out just to stop and think and reflect and everything is fine. Now, I did that for the first time ever actually last year on foot of something else that I read to great effect. But you can't do that all the time. And even I have to say I was seven years of business by the time I could actually get to that point. Anyway, you don't need to know any of that. What you do need to know is why I read it and why I'm talking about it today. The reason that I particularly looked at this book for that assignment was that I would like to read something that isn't nebulous. The thing about leadership, a lot of leadership reading is that it's fantastic and it's very interesting and it's insightful. And there's very little you can do about it because it is insightfully academic or it pertains to again taking lots of months off with lots of staff off site and casting the fortune to think about how to do things better. This book was written by people who are a cold face and be deal with people all the time who are at the cold face. It is packed full of stories, tiny, short, sharp anecdotes that underscore a point. So it and also the other thing I should mention, many of the stories are about companies, SMEs in Northern Ireland and Ireland. So it's very local and the stories are like you basically could step into the shoes of any one of them. And that's what makes this book really, really, really, but it's very, very practical. So three things I want to tell you about this book. And before I do, I want to tell you who you might be if you would find this useful. If you are going to be or are an SME and you want to grow. And what I mean by grow is you want to get, let's say to a point. Now, I'm, these are my numbers. Okay. This isn't what necessarily the guys say this. But in my opinion, if you want to grow to, let's say 10 staff plus and a couple of million in turnover, that is where this book is super useful. Now, if you are a one man or a woman band, certainly it will be very useful, but just not as useful as if in the case, let's say you might be taking on staff or really putting together budgets of a quite a significant size or where you can develop your own value chain and so on. Okay. So from that point of view, I would say if you're in that space, I know that's a cliche these days, isn't it? I hear space all the time. But if you are in that space, if you are in that kind of 10 staff plus and couple of million, that couple, whatever that number, I know it's typically two, but around that area plus this book I have to say is well worth your while. I also would say if you're ambitious to get to that point, you can read this early enough. I mean, if you can't read this early enough, it's very, very important to live and build your company as you want it to be, not as it is, so therefore reading about how your role models, if that's what you want to call them, are running their company that can be very, very useful. Now, my favorite thing out of this book is at the end, of course. And that is, now I hope you can see this now in the camera, but here at the very, very end, right? And the whole book is dedicated to it. I'm just trying to get this for you here. Can we get this positioned right? There is a diagnostic, okay? And the diagnostic looks at five different pieces, five different types of leadership style. So you have the visionary leader, you have the team leader, you have the seller leader, you have the manager leader, and you have the innovator leader. And basically what this book is dedicated to is the 20 behaviors, and that's key. It's not skills, it's not characteristics, and it's not anything else that you can put your finger on. It is 20 behaviors that each type of those leaders excel at in order to be the leader of that type, okay? Now, initially, right, when you start reading this, it's great. And you say, you know, yes, I'm that, and I can work on that, and certainly I can pursue that. So one of the behaviors, right, I'm just randomly open to page here, right? And one of the behaviors in the visionary leadership style is that you set ambitious goals. Check, yep, that you spot opportunities. Yep, done that too. And plans methodically. I do, and after reading this book, I do a lot more of it, but when I read it first, I thought, okay, research is meticulously, and I looked at that and said, I don't have time for that. I have to go on, execute it, implement it. Who's going to pay the staff's bill next week, you know, and then build new concepts. And I'd say, yeah, I've done that, and that's a work in progress. But the thing is right, that's the first five. But then anyway, you start getting on and moving on from there. And then what you realize actually is that there is 100 behaviors in here, and by the time you get to about 23, you think, oh my God, oh my God, I actually now see how I have been feeling this way, because I'm supposed to be doing all these things, and this book is telling me that I should be doing them all in order to be a stellar SME. How am I going to manage that? But then you see, and this is the point that I wanted to pick out with you, is that that diagnostic is there. And I have used that diagnostic many times, right? I look at the back of the book, and I look at the diagnostic, and I see how I'm doing. And then what I do is I go to the, particularly I look at the gaps, and I see what I'm not excelling it. Now for me, a gap isn't where I am not practicing that behavior. It's where I'm not practicing that behavior, optimally. Of which I can't. Not a hundred of them. All the time. I could possibly. And then what I did right was then I rang out to my husband and business partner. You might say, why did I ring him? If he's my husband, surely he should be there. Anyway, he wasn't that particular day, right? So I rang him and I went to the same diagnostic with him and I said, don't think just answer me. I said, just don't be thinking too much about this. So what I did was that when I put the two of us together, I actually realized we'd an awful lot of these behaviors together. Now that was that time. As those of you who've looked at my book reviews before will know, I don't just read a book, put it down and then turn on the camera. I have, I read this book for the first time. Properly anyway, at the end of 2015. Okay. So like that's when I have been practicing this since then all, sorry, not 2015, 2016. Sorry. So I've been practicing this all of, all of last year. And so as I say, ran the diagnostic and ran it with the tools. And then I realized, okay, a lot of the gaps that I have of a, of like an excellent four or five out of five type of level he has. And that was fine at that stage. Right. So, but then as time has gone on, the company has changed and it's deepened and it's widened and it's, you know, some of the boundaries have become a little bit more blurry because we've partnered with other people or because we've taken people on in the liquid workforce and so on like that. So the thing is what this book has enabled me to do is actually run the diagnostic per team. So when I look at our team based on whatever project that we're working on, that is actually how I use this diagnostic. So it's no longer just about me or just about me and Ardell or Ardell and I to be precise. It's actually about how, how can I make sure that my leadership team for my SME projects are complete or at least as optimal as they can be or at the very, very least. What can I look for in the team so that I can spot what isn't there and then subsequently fill it. Okay. So that's the first thing I want to find out to you is that this diagnostic is very, very useful for you. But actually if you do it with your team, particularly the team involved in leading the team or leading aspects of the team. Now the other thing that I wanted to tell you as well is that it's actually interesting how as an SME leader, I mean we don't have an awful lot of people in the company who can just be one particular leader or one specific this or one specific that. So what I find actually is that I need to be a different type of leader at different times of the day, different times of the week, different stages of a project, different stages of various different projects, etc. So I'll just give you an example, right? This morning I was leading a meeting of a group of people, the core team of one particular project that is quite innovative, okay? So I had to lead that project this morning. Now my leadership style this morning needed to be visionary because we've just met our first milestone. So I need now to be visionary and see what the second and subsequent milestones are and work backwards. That was this morning, okay? Now on Friday I'm going on a trade mission to Hong Kong and from there that is solely about being a research gatherer and seller type of leader where I'm building relationships with potential collaborators, suppliers, customers, influencers, etc. So I'd be doing that, right? So that's the seller leader to type in me. And at the same time I need to be research gathering at the same time. So it's a different style of leadership. Now for about the last quarter of last year we took on a number of people in differing roles. So therefore I needed to be the people, the team leader, manager. All the time I need to be a manager. I need to be a manager in terms of resources and outputs and wages and budgets and targets and getting things done and implementation. I need to do that a lot. Now specifically though the VAT return is due in two weeks time and the 23rd of January to be specific and the tax deadlines and accounting deadlines that I have, I have actually used those as my hard goals around my accounting cycles as well. And my accounting cycles lead me to look at my management KPIs and my financial KPIs, etc. And that's when I need to be the manager. Now throughout in between the start of this project that I'm currently working on, which had a big lead in time before that and appropriation phase to the board meeting today, in that case what I needed to be was I needed to be an innovator leader, an innovator leader. So there I needed to look at novel concepts. I needed to challenge the assumptions. I needed to look at ways in which we could do things better, cheaper, faster, more efficient, leveraging technology and so on. So the thing is as an SME leader it's not that I have a head of innovation, right? I'd love one. I'd love to have a head of innovation and in time all going well we will. But the point is that you do need to be a different type of leader in different days, in different scenarios and in leading different teams and of course all of that assumes things go to plan which doesn't quite ever, no I won't say ever happen, that's exaggerating, but it doesn't happen all the time, okay? So in that context you also need to be the leader. One of the characteristics in here is that the SME leader needs to be able to handle ambiguity. Yeah, I agree with that one. Now the other thing I want to tell you though and this is what has happened to me as I've examined this book over time is that the words mean different things at different stages. So for example one of the characteristics, right, the behaviors of the seller leader is that you need to be a busy networker. Now many of you on this page will know, right, it's here in the seller leader diagnostic, okay? So many of you will know now that over the years I have been to far more than my share of networking events and I really do enjoy it and you'll also know many of you that I speak at a lot of events and therefore I get to de facto network with people as well. But I wouldn't say that my networking has changed over the years. It changes if you're trying to explore a new market. It changes if you are like I did, make a decision to change the strategy of your networking. I've told the story countless times, countless, countless times. That in 2014 my New Year's resolution that year was to network within my network, okay? So not to try and expand it, but to deepen it. And that year marked a very, very notable change in my network. About two years later I decided to change my networking from going to many events and meeting many people to and specifically when I was saying meeting many people and deepening my network almost concurrently. I'm not making a lot of sense there, but that's for another Facebook Live. But about two years later what I decided to was actually focus my networking and not on one to many, but one to one or one to two. And now my networking has changed again. So the thing is that particular one, even since I started reading the book, being a busy networker, which is what you need to be as a seller leader, has changed and changed quite considerably. Now another one over here for example is ruthless, cost-cut and that's in the manager leader. Yes, I can see how I would need to do that for some of our businesses, but for other businesses it's not the way I think it would be short-sighted to do that, particularly in this new project that we're working on. If our focus was to cost-cut as opposed to build an optimal product at this stage, it wouldn't be the right thing to do. So you also need to be able to make calls like that. And throughout this book, right throughout reading this book and reading it again and thoroughly enjoying the stories again and looking through a different lens, but particularly using that diagnostic, that diagnostic is super, super useful. What I have seen is that the nature of it changes. It changes quite a lot. The nature of what you need to do changes quite a lot, even as I say the words of different connotations and meaning to you as you go on. So on that note, what I'm going to do is that I'm going to say to John, Miki thank you very much indeed for writing this book. It's an excellent resource for practical businesses. If you are, as I say, if you are, I have that feeling where you're just not quite sure, what exactly am I supposed to be doing? Because nobody really trained me to do this. Or you're thinking, how can I get a handle on this? How can I get to a stage where I move away from the urgent and I focus on the important and really build behaviors like proper behaviors to do that. I have to say this book has been very helpful for me, but also and I really do want to, I know I've said it already, but I just want to make the point again, that when we're talking about leadership in an SME even though you may not have a leadership team per se, you might not have a CFO and see this and see that. It's not the point, it's about who actually takes care of those particular activities, who takes care of sales and the innovation and the management and so on, and they may not have nice titles. And in fact, they may not be very senior and there may not be very many of them, but that's not the point. It's about do you are the people pursuing these behaviors regularly, consistently and optimally in your company and if they're not, how do you bring them in in such a way that's affordable, consistent sustainable and so on. So as I say, I recommend this book I really do recommend if you are an SME leader that you want to grow I really do recommend this book, it's called as I say Star Leadership Behaviors for Stellar SME growth. It's hugely useful practical read and if you are that type of SME leader, that's the place to go. So on that note from what is now becoming rather dark at this stage in Dusky Dublin from our offices here at Invent ECU thank you very much for joining me there will be another book review next month I know exactly what it's going to be and again, like every other one that I've done for you I've read it months ago and the weeds have been turning throughout. So as I say from the Hayes Colletin Group to you from me, Susan Hayes the positive economist, I wish you and yours the very best for 2018 and I'll see you again soon. Thank you, bye.