Bob Schultek

Bob has more than 30 years of service as a senior sales and business development executive, CEO and business owner. His expertise includes customer-partnered business development, strategic planning, sales management, customer service, operational alignment, lean process analysis and improvement, quality assurance, and performance management. He has worked in the energy, medical device, bioscience & pharmaceutical, discrete and process manufacturing, packaging and distribution, communications and information technology, and business-to-business service industries.

Finding Talent

by

Businesses are struggling to find and hire talented people. Job postings cite requirements and experience levels, which translates to expertise. Companies hire for expertise.  But not all expertise is equal. Attracting and retaining the most talented people, those with the highest level of expertise, is expensive and time-consuming; and it can be risky if the person hired ultimately isn’t the right fit for the business. So, most companies design jobs that can be done reasonably well by a person …

Read more

Cultivating Dialogue

by

It’s understood that communication is an essential ingredient of effective leadership. What is less often realized is that two-way interaction, dialogue, is the most impactful method of communication for influencing those you seek to lead. The word ‘dialogue’ is actually a contraction from the Greek words for “through” and “words” which suggests a focus on discovering meaning. The ancient Greeks learned that people reasoning together, rather than as individuals, are more likely to uncover the …

Read more

Navigating Disruption

by

Today’s tech driven world appeals to our search for predictability. We have instant access to an abundance of information, perhaps too much of it. We’ve come to expect consistency from the brands on which we rely; Starbuck’s coffee is the same worldwide, and Amazon will deliver your package as close as possible to tomorrow.  But working against this predictability, and undermining its expected outcomes, is the persistent disruption of routine, perpetual change that challenges us to repeatedly …

Read more

Customer Experience Value

by

Relentless disruption during the past couple of years has elevated the value of excellent customer service. Those who thrive in delivering exceptional customer experiences have increased satisfaction by ensuring that the benefits of their offerings go beyond resolving the customer’s immediate need, to creating value that accelerates that customer’s progress.  Such experiences build enduring relationships which subsequently provide insights about trends, changing customer demands, feedback on strategy, and innovation opportunities – all valuable inputs for …

Read more

What Comes First

by

What comes first? Is it a company’s culture that enables its leaders, or leaders who strengthen the culture? Culture and leadership are mutually dependent. When they are aligned, and supporting each other, progress accelerates and performance improves.  When a business is new, the prime directive is to grow it by earning and keeping customers. Leadership shapes the early culture to accomplish this, and with a small staff, not much effort is required to sustain it.  As the business grows …

Read more

Improvements Accelerate Progress

by

Building enduring customer relationships mandates that your business consistently creates value for customers. This involves more than introducing new products or delivering exceptional serviceexperiences. Increasingly, this value emerges from your efforts to improve the efficiency, responsiveness and agility of your business.  Continuous improvement accelerates your progress and strengthens the sustainability of your business. In addition to the expected benefits of greater customer loyalty, increased profitability and more revenue, pursuing improvement expands your capacity and enables your people to gain …

Read more

Commitment is More than Consensus

by

Achieving strategic goals requires a team commitment. Commitment is more than consensus. Pursuing consensus, or shared agreement, can be alluring because it’s more expedient than the hard work of securing commitment on a goal or critical business issue. It avoids confrontation to preserveharmony, enabling team members to surrender to the majority opinion rather than exposing themselves to the risk of expressing their views. Without the whole team engaging in the healthy, essential discussions about conflicting …

Read more

Customers Value Options

by

When your customer comes to believe that you understand their business, and care about its success, then you’re on your way to building an enduring relationship.  Their belief is grounded in your proven delivery of solutions that create value for them, solutions that resolve a short-term need while contributing to the achievement of their longer-term goals. Thisenables your solutions to become investments in their future rather than one-time transactions.  Ensuring that your solutions create value rests on your ability to …

Read more

Agile Leadership

by

As technology continues its rapid, incessant evolution, complexity and unpredictability grow in the marketplace, causing your customers to constantly assess and react to shifting market trends. Your ability to remain a valuable partner to them depends on how accurately and consistently you anticipate their changing needs, and then, how quickly, efficiently and profitably you adapt to them.Anticipating change, challenge or opportunity, and then responding with urgency and certainty when they appear, is what defines agility. …

Read more

Rebuilding Culture

by

Leaders own culture. As organizations continue to emerge from a disorienting, multi-year disruption, many leaders are discovering that their company culture has eroded, and they need to rebuild it.   Pre-covid work communities are fractured, challenging you to define new working norms and expectations that enable team trust and collaboration to grow in accordance with core values. Teams need some in-person time together, and with you, to share stories and ideas, exchange perspectives and rekindle relationships. A distinctive energy …

Read more