Archive for the ‘Strategy’ Category

Time to talk to the unvaccinated?

November 23, 2021

We are reading about the need for taking more care, not going back to the workplace, socialising less and the need for possible regular antigen tests to keep us safe. Fancy a stick up your nose three times a week?

We are reading about Covid sweeping through our schools with students and teachers alike falling with the disease.

We are reading about how the hospitals are under severe pressure with over half of the serious Covid cases being unvaccinated people who have fallen seriously ill and the other half being vaccinated people with underlying conditions. (92% of the adult population are vaccinated – the numbers are clear).

We know 100% that the hospitals are rammed with Covid patients and as a result normal procedures are being postponed and god love anyone who goes there with an emergency case.

We are also reading that the unvaccinated are a big part of the problem, allowing the disease to spread more and possibly mutate.

A restaurant or venue owner is obliged to ask customers for their Vaccine passport and proof of ID but they are not permitted to ask their own team members if they are vaccinated ..”invasion of privacy“.

Do we not have a duty of care towards our employees?

We are reading about huge protests in Rotterdam and Vienna as people are freaking out about the necessary restrictions that have been introduced – angry with the wrong people?

If more severe restrictions are introduced here, no doubt people and businesses will be freaking out and all of this will be aimed at NPHET and the government, who will only be doing this to keep people safe and our hospitals functioning.

Maybe it is time to stop pussyfooting around, enough of the “PC” stuff and if we want to get out of this Covid mess and keep our loved ones safe and our businesses open it is time to focus our messaging on those who have so far been unwilling to vaccinate.

Maybe not quite “boot in” but it is time to apply some real peer pressure because it is needed.

Instead of the various lobby groups pressurising the government, maybe it is time to start focusing on those members of the general public who are not playing ball and putting everyone at risk and our lives on hold and livelihoods at risk.

Instead of being angry at the government, maybe it is time for us to start talking to family, friends and colleagues and encourage them to keep us safe. (instead we are all dancing around them gently- it’s their right)

If the unvaccinated are the biggest part of the problem, let’s tackle this head on and stop trying to solve it by tinkering with other measures that won’t deliver a solution.

We’ve all seen the advert about wearing a seatbelt..

Greg

Greg Canty is a Partner of Fuzion Communications who offer Marketing, PR, Graphic Design Podcast Production and Digital Marketing services from our offices in Dublin and Cork, Ireland

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Dangerous People!

December 14, 2020
Dangerous People !

Don’t you just hate those “dangerous people” who come to meetings because

– they ask the question you hope no one asks

– they don’t just go with the flow and nod their head politely at what is being said

– they are there to fulfil a role and not to be popular with the group

– through their actions they encourage others to speak their mind

– they provide another point of view and quite possibly an inconvenient one

– they can make you feel uncomfortable

– they might take the meeting in an unplanned direction

– they could cause the meeting to run over

– they might just result in making more work for everyone

Next time you have a meeting where you really want to trash out an issue, hold people accountable, get alternative views and maybe even arrive at a much better conclusion, make sure you have a dangerous person in the room..

Of course if you want an easy life..

Greg

Greg Canty is a Partner of Fuzion Communications, a full service Marketing, PR, Graphic Design and Digital Marketing agency with offices in Dublin and Cork, Ireland

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Posted in Censorship, Communications, Creativity, Innovation, Management, Motivation, Personal development, Positivity, Reputation, Strategy, Teamwork | Leave a Comment »

When ‘How About’ and ‘Why Not’ come together

December 21, 2019

Emerald Ivory at The White Horse

A really talented musician said “How about” to a bunch of talented musicians who answered “Why not” to an idea about performing classic Irish songs together

Someone said “How about” doing a gig before Christmas at the venue Upstairs at the The White Horse Bar and Restaurant in Ballincollig, Cork and someone said “Why not“.

I saw the gig listing when trying to figure out something special to do belatedly for our wedding anniversary (too busy with client events!) and asked Dee “How about” and she said “Why not“.

Needless to say the debut gig of Emerald Ivory was really special and we had a great night.

To do anything new and discover magic in life we need two essential ingredients:

Someone to ask “How about”

and someone to say “Why not“.

Are you one of those people?

Greg

Greg Canty is a Partner of Fuzion Communications, a full service Marketing, PR, Graphic Design and Digital Marketing agency with offices in Dublin and Cork, Ireland

 

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Posted in Creativity, Entertainment, Innovation, Inspiration, Motivation, Music, Personal development, Positivity, Strategy | Leave a Comment »

Peter Drucker, Management Guru and a Powerful Perspective on age

March 6, 2019

Peter Drucker

I was listening recently to a podcast hosted by Tim Ferriss who was interviewing the author of what I consider to be my bible of business books, Good to Great, Jim Collins.

One of topics discussed was age and Jim put this into huge perspective by chatting about his inspiration, Peter Drucker.

Jim was lucky enough to meet this giant of the management world and when he met him first Peter was 86 and still at full throttle.

Peter was a prolific writer and one of the most respected of his time and in many ways his writings about management are still held out as being ground breaking and as relevant today as they were when they were written.

Jim was sent an image of a bookshelf that was full of all of Drucker’s books and there was a line drawn across the image that marked the volume of books written when he was 65, the typical retirement age.

Incredibly, at 65 years of age Peter Drucker had written just one third of his books!!

Peter Drucker passed away in 2005 at the age of 92 – he wrote another 10 books since Jim had met him at the age of 86!

As I am nudging closer to another birthday (those numbers keep getting bigger!!) I keep telling myself that I am only at the beginning..

Thank you Peter Drucker…

Greg 

Greg Canty is a Partner of Fuzion Communications, a full service Marketing, PR and Graphic Design agency with offices in Dublin and Cork, Ireland

 

 

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The Mother, the Mother-in-Law and the Queen

July 28, 2018

Pat O'Connell and The Queen, English Market

I just had to grab the man, with the heartiest and biggest laugh in Cork, Pat O’Connell for the latest episode of the Fuzion Win Happy podcast.

Pat, for those few who don’t know him is the famous fishmonger who is in that iconic photograph with a smiling  Queen, during her visit to Cork.

Pat runs the very successful Fishmerchants, K.O’Connell, in The English Market, which is now one of the popular attractions in Cork city for locals and visitors.

In the podcast I explored his early career and what it was like to grow up in a hard working, entrepreneurial family where his clever mum, Kathleen understood what was needed to differentiate your business.

While we all take the fantastic English Market for granted, Pat explains how this wasn’t always the case. Just like markets all over the world, it was a very functional, drab, market for locals, which opened a few times during the week and it required the clear vision of a few forward thinking people to change direction and evolve into the special place that we experience today.

Pat’s story is one of a family business and succession. His mum, an early female entrepreneur with a gift for people started this business, which Pat joined full-time after a brief stint working for the City Council. His brother Paul works with him in the business and the next generation of O’Connell’s are also involved..

Like so many stories, there have been bumps along the way, including the passing of his mum, work partner and great friend, Kathleen, which has left Pat and Paul to take the special business into the future.

Pat is a very proud Corkonian, a recent President of the Cork Business Association and anyone who has spent even five minutes chatting to him will understand why he believes Cork is the best place in the world to live and work.

In our chat I learnt a lot about his business philosophy and he also shared some exciting news about a new development with Dunnes Stores, which will be opening very soon in the Bishopstown store.

I hope you enjoy listening to Pat share his story as much as I did!

Click here and enjoy the show..

Fuzion Win Happy Podcast

Greg 

Greg Canty is a Partner of Fuzion Communications who offer Marketing, PR and Graphic Design services from our offices in Dublin and Cork, Ireland

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Posted in Bereavement, Cork, Customer Care, Strategy, Tourism | Leave a Comment »

Strategy – A good strong “why” will stop the arguments!

June 12, 2018

Strategy

I found myself in the middle of a big argument with a colleague about a decision that had been made around an initiative.

To cut a long story short, it was cancelled and I wasn’t at all happy about it as I believed this was a really poor decision according to all of the well thought criteria and rationale that I had in my head!

He thought it was the right thing to do to cancel it and I thought it was totally wrong and we both argued tooth and nail for our point of view. In the end we had to agree to disagree as it would soon be dark as there was no shifting of our respective opinions.

I reflected after on this argument and the potentially damaging heated disagreement and realised that the absence of a clear strategy that would have given the argument a clear focus was the main reason that had us in a battle of words that was going nowhere fast.

Why?

If the why (or the strategy) was clearly established, understood and agreed in advance of our “argument” then there would have been a good chance that we may have had no need for any conversation!

Armed with a good ‘Why’ a logical decision could have been made by answering a few basic questions:

– Who is our agreed target audience?

– Why are they important to us?

– What is our agreed objective for that audience?

– What are the best tactics for reaching that audience?

– How did this initiative work as a tactic that delivered the objective for this audience?

– What were the KPIs that were agreed to assess the success of the initiatives?

– What was the cost of the initiative?

– How did the initiative work in the past and how did it perform against the agreed KPIs?

– Could anything have been done to improve the performance of the initiative?

– Are there other alternative tactics that would deliver the same or better results?

With a strong and transparent assessment framework that is rooted in a clear strategy our conversation would have been very straightforward.

Have a strong why that everyone agrees with and your life will be much easier all round !

p.s. I know I was right!

Greg 

Greg Canty is a Partner of Fuzion Communications who offer Marketing, PR and Graphic Design services from our offices in Dublin and Cork, Ireland

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