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inertia , the lack of competition , and the intense protection of the slot system , means that it is very hard to fail ? And , thus we cannot possibly tell how good , or otherwise , our staff really are .
Most of the time directors are not really tested . Just as we often cannot tell what part of our marketing really works .
How often do our CEOs ask the obvious question : “ Would I hire this person again ?”
It is better to promote people at random Alessandro Pluchino , a professor of theoretical physics , mathematical methods and models , analysed large company performance over a number of years and found that it was generally better for a company to promote people at random than based on how well they appeared to do in their current role . An extension really of the familiar Peter Principle . And why was that ? Generally because there are so many other elements which contribute to apparent success .
‘ Davies ’ can come into an already successful event , one with very little competition . Or he can fortuitously find himself working on a show in a sector which is growing fast – and anyone average would shine as a result .
Or Davies might happen to be in charge when the economy is swinging through an upturn . This was true in the period 2011 to 2016 . That was a good time to run a show , in the UK at least . Then it reversed itself after 2016 and for the next six years we tended to struggle up to the end of the pandemic during which several of our larger companies fired up to 40 % of their staff and did so largely without really assessing who were their best people .
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Being in the right place is the key to success Being in the right place at the right time is the key to most successful careers .
Praising our people is the inevitable cliché . We should try to employ good people , of course . Who would disagree ? But employing good people is really not the key . The key is what you do with your people after you have employed them .
It is more often the company that makes the people , not the other way round .
But , crucially , turn the question on its head .
Success in a company may be down to several people .
But is there one person without whom the company could never have succeeded ? That ’ s the truly defining question . And , to give a very personal answer , CloserStill exists today as one of the ten biggest trade show companies in the world because of Phil Nelson .
So , what is it that makes our people successful ? My own life , and the lives of many of the hundreds of people I have worked with , have led me to believe that a large majority of us want to do something worthwhile , want to do it well , want to enjoy doing it , want to go home thinking it was a day well spent , and want to work with people who make it interesting .
One way that a company can inspire its own staff is to ask them about their own lives , to ask them about what matters to them , and how their current jobs match their own sense of purpose .
Oriana Bandiera of LSE and two Chicago colleagues conducted experiments of this kind with large numbers of staff ( as reported in The Economist ).
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“ One professor of theoretical physics and mathematics said it was generally better for a company to promote people at random than based on how well they appeared to do in their current role .” |
Their conclusions were that by asking people to place their jobs in the context of their own lives ( and remember – we are all the heroes of our own lives ) contributed to them feeling more positive about their roles . And conversely , some people recognised that their jobs did not suit them and left . In other words , good companies can ask their staff why their jobs matter to them , not to the company .
Can we judge how some companies are better than others ? Are there ways of judging how cultures / companies / personalities succeed relative to their peers ? In truth , there appear to be very few and those are mainly anecdotal . One way might be ‘ profitability ’. But this is obviously flawed . Profit can be built organically or by acquisition .
Two of our eight biggest UK companies do not have a single event which they launched and grew organically . Informa has spent £ 7bn on acquiring trade show companies in the last few years . That obviously adds to turnover and profit , but does it add to company culture ?
We might quote margins . Until recently , Emerald had the highest margins in the business – running at up to 44 %. But take a look at the Emerald share price in the past few years .
Can we call this culture ? We reach for the word ‘ culture ’ but what do we mean by that ? It is not a word I like , but I cannot think of a more suitable one .
A company culture develops mysteriously . It can ’ t be forced . It comes from a lot of people in a single time and place . People clearly react to the standards , methods , culture and expectations of the company they join . It is then the company
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