Tom Nixon

There are no such things as competitors

It’s time we consigned the notion of competition to history. Sure, we will sometimes find ourselves in competitive situations when we pitch for new work, but in-between times we should look at companies who offer similar services as ourselves as peers and friends... not the enemy.

Here’s how things have moved on:

Old way: Protect your know-how ferociously from your competitors because if you don’t they’ll steal it and get ahead of you.

New way: Give away everything you know. Publish your ideas and insights online. The gains from sharing far outweigh the risks of being copied (is it so bad being the one who leads?) And besides, nobody can take your experience and ability to apply your knowledge away from you, and that’s what the customer is really buying.

Old way: Make use of tough contracts to prevent others from poaching your people, and your people from leaving, becoming competitors and poaching your customers.

New way: Create an amazing environment that the best people will want to join and then stay for while. But accept that people will move on eventually. Create a culture where knowledge is shared and everyone is empowered so you won’t be crippled when a key person leaves. And when people do leave, make sure it’s on good terms so you con continue your great relationship with them in their next role.

Old way: Study your competitors from afar. Anticipate their next moves and plan your own strategy to outfox them.

New way: Go for a beer with other companies in your market. Make friends. Discuss how you can make the whole industry work better, and figure out ways to collaborate for mutual benefit.

I dare you to pick up the phone to a competitor and invite them out for a beer next week.

A (subtle) change of tack for this blog

As well as the subtle change in colour scheme (thanks Will for pointing out that the old colours felt like being hit in the face with a wet cardboard box!) I've decided to focus my efforts on this blog to writing purely about business, and how I think it should be done.

I'll still be posting my thoughts about web-related stuff on the Nixon McInnes blog, but I want to make this site relevant to anyone in business, and in particular, anyone who thinks that how most companies do business is tired, dated and capable of so much more.

So what is "Business for enjoyment's sake"? Well, at a philosophical level I believe that the purpose of life is to be happy. Simple. And what makes us happy? Doing things we enjoy! For me, this means building a business based around core principles of integrity; freedom; respect and trust. So that's what I'll be writing about.

Abolishing employee holiday entitlements

Today I've been thinking about holidays (and who isn't, during a wet and windy January?)

At Nixon McInnes, we don't have any fixed working hours for employees, so there's no rule about being here 9-5. Instead we just trust everyone to work the hours they need to work to fit in with the rest of their life and to do their job. There's no expectation to make it add up to a certain number of hours per week - after all, we employ people for their brains, not for the time they spend sitting at their desks... and we all know that it's perfectly possible to sit at a desk all day long and get absolutely nothing done.

It amazes me that in 2007 this kind of flexibility is still the exception in business and not the norm. It will be laughed about in 10 or 20 years time and I look forward to that. Your staff are adults who are perfectly capable of deciding what time they go to bed, so why do they need to be told what time to get up in the morning?

So this got me wondering if we could extend the same level of freedom and trust to holiday allowance. It just seems so old school to have to complete a holiday application form for a manager to approve or reject and carefully tally up the number of days holiday taken to make sure nobody is off work and enjoying themselves a day longer than they are entitled to.

Surely we can trust our people to communicate with the co-workers and customers who depend on them and decide for themselves whether or not to take a holiday. And balance their own need for time away from the office with the organisation's need for their time to ensure that the company can remain healthy and keep them in work.

An interesting subject to discuss with the team I think.....

How to run a company without managers

If you haven’t stumbled upon this blog yet, then you should check out Alexander Kjerulf. This guy is soooo on my wavelength I love it. I just discovered that his all time business hero is the same as mine - Ricardo Semler. Yay!

In this post Alex explains how you can run a company without managers - democratically AND profitably. It’s a nice bite-sized chunk of Semler-thinking to remind us how all successful businesses are going to be run in the future (I’m certain of it.)

Think of a continuum with at one end the industrial age model of a business with managers cracking the whip and keeping ‘lazy’ workers in line. Then a bit further along you’ve got your average business today with managers who ‘listen’; ‘care’; and encourage ‘participation’ (Well at least they say they do anyway). Then further along still you’ve got companies that are far more democratic where people self-organise and naturally evolve roles and responsibilities based on their skills; the company’s needs and perhaps most importantly, what they ENJOY. This is where business is heading.

Will and I have been tinkering with putting these ideas into practice at Nixon McInnes. We’ve had some interesting debates and votes about moving offices and hiring key people at critical points in the company’s development. Hot on my agenda now is setting up a really staff-friendly company-wide share ownership scheme and profit share. I’m happy to give away a hell of a lot if it helps me to attract, motivate and retain the best people.