BCBusiness

May 6 2017

BCBusiness – Thought Leadership with Boyd Liski

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Date: May 4, 2017

Name: BCBusiness – Thought Leadership with Boyd Liski

Presenter: Boyd Liski

As technology enhanced, many entrepreneurs think the end of B2B sales team is near in the current business world; however, it is the rise of new B2B sales reality. BCBusiness invites Boyd Liski, the Founder of Iksil Group Inc, to discuss sales training techniques and systems for B2B. In this presentation, Boyd Liski will share the shift of new B2B era. In addition, Boyd Liski will provide key components of creating high performing sales team. The sales concepts and strategies from Boyd Liski will benefit many entrepreneurs who are looking for a breakthrough in their sales market.

Boyd Liski is the Founder of Iksil Group Inc. He is also the co-Founder of FOCUS$SellingSystems. With over 23 years of experience, Liski has specialized the strategy of B2B investing. He coaches many top performing companies to create record breaking success. Moreover, he helps many entrepreneurs to develop their market growth and leverage technology to gain competitors advantage. His unique sales training techniques inspire many young entrepreneurs and startups. Liski is also a Board Facilitator for The Alternative Board.

Boyd Liski believes the new B2B sales reality adds up to big numbers. In his sales model, it consists of 4 major parts: strategy, build in value, capture value, and win. Strategy requires strategy drivers. Build in value needs system drivers and capture value involves sales drivers. All entrepreneurs need to have the mindset of “win”. The strategy and build in value are task oriented. When entrepreneurs reach the capture value, they will see 10 times return. As they reach to the win, they need market strategy for greater return. Liski mentions many entrepreneurs are stuck in the build in value and could not move up to capture value. In fact, many big companies are managed to move up to capture value, such as intelligence, quickly.

There is a radical shift of B2B sales reality. Many entrepreneurs think B2B is broken; however, Liski disagrees. The new era of B2B has begun. Entrepreneurs will be seeing 3 factors: marketing has a bigger role than before, performance needs structure, and the impact of sales revenue.

In the selling process, many entrepreneurs could no surpass 57% because they only gather limited customer information. The missing piece is customer experience. Liski emphasizes the purchasing experience from customer is number one driver to their loyalty, ahead of brand, product or value. For many companies, widespread support is the number one criteria for decision making. Customer experience creates a huge impact in B2B and it sets apart from other competitors. Many companies are focusing on technology changes, such as new website or software, but smarter marketers start with big picture. To move from 57% to 80% or more, entrepreneurs need to have add sales value experience.

Liski shares the 5 best practices to be a strategic marketer.

Start with strategic approach
Success is gradual
Establish the position of though leader
Combine multiple tactics
All about customer

Liski believes there are 5 common marketing mistakes many entrepreneurs are making.

Undefined value proposition
Weak messaging
Features, not benefits
Project orientation
No sales alignment

In this new B2B sales reality, customers are looking for experts. They are craving for consultant. Liski believes it is time for entrepreneurs to get smart people in the front line. Therefore, Entrepreneurs need to unlock customer value, create predictable result, deploy high performance team, and master simple power system.

Liski provides 5 main criteria to reach high performing sales team

Raise themselves as excellent
Structure sales process
Hold to high level of accountability
Aggressively raise bar year to year
Terminate underperformer

The number one business rule is to have a system to leverage team talents. It requires the approach to build and master the Sales Operating System. There are 4 components of Sales Operating System: hiring, training, coaching, and paying. Moreover, leadership and management play a huge part of all 4 components.

The hiring component focuses on market clarity. Entrepreneurs need to analyze the market priority, align all capability gaps, and place themselves in the attack position. The training component focuses on pipeline creation. Entrepreneurs need to target the right campaign and process. Each part needs to be tested in the field of behavior, motivation, and knowledge. They need to consistently maintain with manuals. The coaching component focuses on continual review. Entrepreneurs need to have customized one on one training with the team. They need to have field strategy and feedback. Moreover, they need regular guidance. Lastly, the paying component focuses on continually do better. Entrepreneurs need to recognize the team in public. Reward must be easy to calculate and analytic. They also need to reinvigorate with skill refresher or new tools.

Liski believes by helping others, it is the quickest way to success. Process leads to profitability. The quicker the feedback, the faster to process. Furthermore, the quicker entrepreneurs pay, the better the result.

“You gotta get it right, and hold it tight, forever and ever”

“System first, then people; that is how you measure the matrix”

Sales Operating System provides full transparency, predictable review, predictable profit, continual improvement, and customer satisfaction. To get performance, entrepreneurs need to be supportive and be cleared with their role. They need to define the right market. They need to integrate SMART principle. They need to have productive meeting and simplified pipeline process.

Liski wants entrepreneurs to remember that there is only one purpose, one system, one language, one playbook, and one focus. The reason for underperformance are poor hiring, no training, inconsistent sales leader, and anti-sales culture. Liski advices entrepreneurs that they can engineer and manufacture sales, they always have control of the process, and they can product revenue and profit.

“There are 3 wins – faster, often, and bigger”

April 8 2017

BCBusiness – Thought Leadership with Bob Lenarduzzi

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Date: April 6, 2017

Name: BCBusiness – Thought Leadership with Bob Lenarduzzi

Presenter: Bob Lenarduzzi

Understanding the view of team leadership can build a stronger organization; moreover, entrepreneurs need to integrate the power of team leadership. BCBusiness invites Bob Lenarduzzi, the President of Vancouver Whitecaps FC, to discuss his business insight on team leadership. From the perspective of sport industry icon, Bob Lenarduzzi shares his valuable lessons that integrate into business. In addition, entrepreneurs will discover the key elements of building a professional team.

Bob Lenarduzzi is the President of Vancouver Whitecaps FC. He was the former star of North American Soccer League, and won the Player of the Year award. As a coach, he led his team to Canadian Soccer League championships, and led Canada’s men’s national team. Lenarduzzi received North American Soccer Hall of Fame, the Canadian Soccer Hall of Fame, the British Columbia sports Hall of fame, and United Soccer Leagues Hall of Fame. Furthermore, he received the Order of British Columbia for his contribution in the sport of soccer.

The Power of Team Leadership

Bob Lenarduzzi is grateful for all the games he played through his career. He will continue to do so and he look forward for many years.

Instead of following the traditional academic education route, Lenarduzzi went to be a professional soccer player in the age of 15. He compromised with his family by continuing the education with correspondence; however, he failed to do so. He still regrets for that decision, and he commented, “Do what I say, not what I did”.

Lenarduzzi mentions he does not profess all the answers, but he resonates the lessons he learned from the locker room. There are five importance factors for leadership in the life of sport player.

Discipline
Hard work
Commitment
Drive
Passion

“Look what I can do today, not tomorrow”

When his youth, passion was his driving force. Lenarduzzi experienced his true motivation when England beat Germany during 1966 World Cup. His brother guided him to discover his strength. His parents supported his decision. Eventually, Lenarduzzi moved to England for his apprenticeship. He learned a valuable lesson of hierarchy and team culture.

He brought over his experience to Vancouver Whitecap and promoted the residency program, where they recruit many talented young players, such as Alphonso Davies and Russell Telbert. Lenarduzzi encourages many old players to take young players aside for the mentorship.

John Giles was Lenarduzzi’s old coach. He had a great coaching style. By taking players aside, he provided feedbacks on what the players need to do better and what they do well. He provided valuable encouragement. It is a powerful acknowledgement for Lenarduzzi. John Cruyff was Lenarduzzi’s idol. Lenarduzzi believes he was equivalent to Wayne Gretzky in hockey. He had the honor to play against him and it was a moment he never forgets.

Lenarduzzi shared during his coaching, he met John Catliff, a Harvard graduate. When he questioned his coaching method, Lenarduzzi provided him harsh criticism with precise facts. That is concise communication. He met Dave Cox, the sport psychologist. Lenarduzzi learned the lesson of “process versus outcome”. People often hear the phrase of “we need to win”; however, they never realize the importance of determining how to get here.

Lenarduzzi had the honor to played in 1984 Olympics. The coach bought beers for them. Coach trusted them. The coach wanted all senior players to invite young players to deliver the message of empowerment. The bonding made them trust coach even more. In the World Cup 1986, the coach established something called “team first philosophy”. Lenarduzzi learned even the other team outperformed his team, the coach wanted the team to stick together with the plan, stick to the process, and stick to the strategy. “No one is bigger than the team” was the message the coach wanted to deliver. In the match against Mexico, the team was in the bull fight and lost miserably. Instead of looking for exercise, the coach took the hit and asked themselves to be better next around.

True leader is graciousness in victory or defeat. They give back to the community. For Vancouver Whitecaps, Lenarduzzi encourages the team to network and be in the appearance. Lenarduzzi believes the guiding principles.

Our all. Our honor
Unity, winning, and honor
T be a champion club on and off the soccer pitch

These guiding principles form the Vancouver Whitecaps today. Every player honors these principles.

Lastly, Lenarduzzi shares a couple of quotes he inspired from Paul Bear Bryant the coach of Alabama.

“If anything goes bad, I did it. If anything goes semi-good, we did it. If an anything goes really good, then you did it”

“That’s all it takes to get people to win football games for you”

“You must learn how to hold a team together”

“You must life some men up, calm others down, until finally they’ve got one heartbeat. Then you’ve got yourself a team”

Questions and Answers

For any entrepreneur who need to manage up, Lenarduzzi suggest entrepreneurs to create good foundation. They need to adapt the top with clear communication and coordinate the low to understand the true “why”. Lenarduzzi is shock that many people who are in the senior position, do not have clear communication with their team.

From a player to coach and coach to leader, the shift of mindset can be difficult. Lenarduzzi believes Vancouver Whitecap still does not have the roots that other sports in Vancouver have. However, it takes strong desire to do well. There is always opportunity. To apply mentorship for youth, Lenarduzzi still believes storytelling is the suggested method. Instead of focusing on the problem, leaders should focus on how they deal with the situation.

May 24 2015

Wealthy & Wise 2015

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Date: May 19, 2015

Name: Wealthy & Wise 2015

Presenters: Arlene Dickinson and David Chilton

The journey of being a successful entrepreneur can be difficult. Moreover, many entrepreneurs are looking for ways to be inspired, informed and poised. BCBusiness invites two dragons from CBC’s Dragon’s Den, Arlene Dickinson and David Chilton, to share their success stories and experiences to help entrepreneurs. The moderator, Peter Legge, the CEO of Canada Wide Media Limited, will discuss with Dickinson and Chilton their ways to invest in the current market environment. This presentation will help entrepreneurs to look deep inside of their life of entrepreneurship.

Wisdom from Peter Legge

Peter Legge is the CEO of Canada Wide Media Limited. As a community leader, he involved many community organizations and elected as the past chair of the Vancouver Board of Trade. Legge is also a professional motivational speaker, and a professional author. Furthermore, his contributions to the community have won many awards and help many people to be more positive.

Legge wants entrepreneurs to think about the question of what they can do with their time and their talent. From the time entrepreneurs are born until now, they are considered to be the history. Since entrepreneurs cannot change the history, entrepreneurs should focus on the time from now to the future.

Legge believes the secret of being successful is to think successful all the time. By adding successful people into their lives can help entrepreneurs to be more productive. Legge mentions day is shorter by a day, and entrepreneurs must change the way they think and their thoughts.

“You become what exactly you think about most of the time”

Journey of Arlene Dickinson

Arlene Dickinson is the CEO of Venture Communications and the CEO of YouInc.com. Dickinson has helped many entrepreneurs to balance their lifestyle. As the author of two bestselling books, her leadership skill and experience have inspired many entrepreneurs. Moreover, Dickinson is recognized as Canada’s Most Powerful Women Top 100.

Arlene Dickinson shares she was born in South Africa and her family sold everything to immigrate to Canada. During her childhood, she moved from Montreal to Edmonton. Nevertheless, her family lived below the poverty line. During the move to Calgary, she learned the meaning of sacrifice when she witnessed her family trade in her mother’s engagement ring for a vehicle to continue their Calgary journey. This impacted her life.

Dickinson witnessed her parents’ arguments and understood the importance of listening. Dickinson believes listening connects with engagement, which can trigger emotional language. Therefore, listening skill leads to become effective leader.

Dickenson was surrounded by family with teachers. However, she did not want to attend university. Her life goal was to become a full time mom. She got married at had 4 children during the age of 27. Since she was struggle with finances, she needed to do everything by herself. When her husband decided to go back to university, Dickenson created a home-based business of helping business to collect bills from their outstanding clients. During that business, she learned there are two kinds of people in the world, the one has the attention to not pay the bill, and the one has the attention not to pay the bill.

Her home business helped her understand the goal of financial freedom. She defined financial freedom to be a way to take care of her family. Her marriage ended with a divorce and forced to find a stable job to get custody of her kids. At age 35, she finally burned out and crumbled. Her dad gave Dickenson the most important life lesson. The lesson was that it was her choice to be in this situation, not anybody else and it was her responsibility to figure out a way out. Luckily, she landed a sale’s job to learn the necessary sale experience. Later she managed to join Venture Communications to maintain her job for her kids’ custody. Dickenson worked hard and had the opportunity to buy off her partner and manage to sustain cash flow. CBC approached her for the role of Dragon’s Den.

“Luck starts when you start something”

Dickenson explained her audition will never happen if it was not for her kids. Her kids motivated her to take the audition opportunity. In fact, during the role, she learned from many entrepreneurs’ stories and experiences.

The show changed Dickenson’s journey. She managed to think different and look different. She is grateful to work with many different entrepreneurs across the country.

Dickenson mentions her experience of speaking in front of the troops at the army base in Canada. She was inspired with the general’s speech. The speech inspired many soldiers and helped soldiers understand that their contribution to Canada matters.

Dickenson is very grateful that her parents decided to move to Canada. Dickenson believes there is no reason that entrepreneurs cannot succeed. Dickenson wants entrepreneurs to love themselves and believe everything is possible.

Journey of David Chilton

David Chilton is a professional author and a professional investor. Chilton’s career begins after he published the book of “The Wealthy Barber”. The book inspired many entrepreneurs about his investment experience. Chilton accepted the cast of Dragon’s Den and begins to let the business world understand his awareness. Moreover, Chilton appears in many television shows, such as The Hour, Royal Canadian Air Farce, Arctic Air, and Murdoch Mysteries.

Chilton shares his career started in the age of 25. Chilton loves to read and continue to read at least 3 books per week. In addition, many people remember him as the character in his book.

Chilton mentions when his kid was in grade 1, he needs to figure what his dad does for living. Chilton defines if people are sick, doctor makes them feel better, and if people’s money is sick, he will cure it.

Chilton believes Dragon’s Den has high engagement with the community. He accepted the role after 6 years of making. CBC recommends him to be one of the casts, and Chilton does not know how big the show becomes until he got involved with the casts.

A funny moment on Dragon’s Den that Chilton mentions is the pitch of the baby seat on the exercise bike. Even though the idea was rejected, Chilton remembers the owner was the world’s best female arm wrestler. Chilton challenged her and dance on his victory. The show aired the dance and made him popular around the world.

Chilton believes the show stars to turn big after 3 years on television. Most of the investments on the show have negative return. Since the show tapes the whole day, sometimes the filming disconnects Chilton with the current business events. Chilton shares CBC will mix up the auditions, which sometimes on the show people will see them wearing the same clothes in some episodes.

Chilton feels lucky to be on Dragon’s Den. One of best pitches Chilton remembers is a couple that sells high end tea and cookies. The business has over 1.1 million dollar in revenue. The couple knows the margin and the detail. The couple has successfully pitched the business and with the help of the dragons, the business revenue has reached over 20 million dollars in revenue.

One of the fun pitches Chilton shares is 3 young engineers from Calgary quit their jobs and decide to become entrepreneurs of series of businesses. They decide to sell ugly Christmas sweater. Chilton believes the idea sounds weird and dumb, but they did their analysis. Chilton decides to invest for royalty and receive return in next 2 weeks.

Vancouver has many goo successful pitches and companies. Chilton mentions their ideas are simple and elegant. The important idea for business is to solve other people’s problems.

Chilton believes the best product requires due diligent. If the market believes in the product, they will request for more. A memorable pitch from Dragon’s Den is Mary’s greeting card business from Victoria. Dragons usually do not invest in greeting cards and board games, but Mary’s pitch is different. Mary has her bird as her assistant to help make the greeting card. Chilton decides to invest, but Mary has no due diligence to show. After working along with the CEO Hallmark for the distribution channel, Chilton receives great return and become close friend with Mary.

Chilton always have positive view. However, he realizes Canada’s national pastime activity is to complaint on everything. Comparing with other countries, Canada is a wonderful place. When everything is getting better in life, people still find things to complaint. Many people are taking things for grant. Chilton wants all entrepreneurs to understand that they should appreciate what they have right now and do not choose to argue the small irrelevant things over the big goal. Life cannot get better than this.

Questions and Answers

Their advice for young entrepreneurs is to not afraid of failure and keep trying until the end. It is important to read books to acquire other people’s experience. Dickinson believes when entrepreneurs are at their lowest, it will be difficult; however, if they keep trying, their minds will find a way out.

One of the biggest mistakes they made is balance. When they are busy on the show, they lost focus on their current business, which result of poor judgement. They suggest entrepreneurs to leave the past where it is and continue to charge forward.

Many people have the misconception of sacrifice happiness for financial freedom. Chilton believes many people are caught up with consumption. It is important not to be materialistic. Instead, find ways to contribute back to society.

“Do not just save 10%, give 10%”

They believe everyone has something to learn from. Their business experience can improve other people’s areas. Mentors can be in different field.

“The best mentors are the one sitting next to you”

They define the definition of success as to become the happiest person in life. Success is never about money and entrepreneurs should always be comfortable of who they really are.

“Liking the person in the mirror; I am who I want to be”