workshop Archives - Cortex Leadership Consulting

11 Things Every Business Traveler Should Know Before Going to England
By: Lynda McNutt Foster, CEO, Cortex Leadership Consulting

Allen and I took a holiday (that’s what the Brits call vacation) for a week in London, then York, England. This week we’ll be facilitating some leadership training in a town called Andover which is about an hour from London.

If you plan on traveling to England one day or have plans to do business there, this list of word swaps might be helpful.

Fries are Chips
In England, chips are fries. That’s where the term “fish and chips” comes from. What we call chips, they call crisps. No problem, when you say something incorrectly, they will quickly correct you.

Cents are pence.
It cost to pee. No really. Twice we had to pee and we were out of luck because we had pounds not pence. When we did have pence we did not have the right amount of pence to get in. Ended up eating somewhere for 20 pounds because we didn’t have 40 pence to pee.

Dollars are pounds.
Important to note that there is a significant exchange rate. 1.37 dollars equal a pound. That meal we signed for 20 on our credit card for was actually almost 28 bucks. Not looking forward to getting the full statement next month. Ouch!

Restrooms are toilets.
Yes, the restrooms have toilets, but they call the restrooms toilets so don’t look for signs to point you to a restroom, the signs say TOILETS. And remember, bring your pence if you are in a train station or public area like a park.

You’ll need a converter or two.
You’ll be quite surprised after your overnight flight and train ride to London when you plop down in your hotel room and want to charge up your phone, iPad and Computer. Oh, yeah, there are ample outlets none of which will work unless you have a converter for each one.

Your blow dryer can kill you.
Really. Plug that puppy into a converter and it immediately gets hot as hell. It is like a Camero engine at 150 miles an hour. The end of it gets red as fire. Turns out your blow dryer in the states is designed for 110 watts and they run on 220. Clearly a big difference that other appliances like your phone is okay with. Your blow dryer is not. Leave that at home.

Pants are Trousers.
This one is important because pants mean underwear. You could see how that could lead to some embarrassment or confusion at a closing store or in a casual conversation after work.

Your check is a bill.

Ask for your bill at the end of your meal, not your check and stay as long as you like without tipping.

They call your check a bill and don’t rush you if there are only 4 others in the stamp size restaurant you are in. They think it’s rude to bring you your bill. Same thing in Puerto Rico. Relax, enjoy your meal and your company. They are not in any hurry to turn your table.

Their taxis are cute.

Uber is cheaper but the taxis are just so convenient and cute! The little black rides are adorable which makes it seem like a treat to ride in one of them. The British accents are charming and they zip you through London in no time flat.

Breaks are Tea Times.

They really do break for tea at about 10:30am and 3:00pm. The first time we taught here the nice lady from the hotel came in to our training and announced “tea time”. I said thank you and kept going as we were right in the middle of something. I quickly came to the understanding that tea time is not optional, so plan around it.

Your phone might be useless. Try WhatsApp.

I’ve had US Cellular for about 20 years now. I love them when we’re traveling in the US. They suck overseas. When I called them to find out what I needed to do the very nice man on the other end suggested that I get a track phone once I got to my destination. We chose instead to try a free service that you can download known as WhatsApp. It’s an app. You can use it for free when you are connected to the internet. That’s the trick, right. “Hooked to the internet” are the key words. It’s fantastic if the other person you want to talk to uses WhatsApp, too (like FB, it’s impossible to talk to someone on FB who doesn’t have an account). Free text, you can send all the pictures and videos you want, and you can even make a call on video on WhatsApp. If, you have a WiFi connection. Imagine splitting up to go to different stores for a period of time. Nope, can’t just expect to send a text because the other person may not have signed on to the internet where they are at or the place may not have WiFi at all, like in the small shops, or in the museums, etc.

I will apologize now for anyone who was traveling overseas, got a Monti text and was dying to answer it, except they couldn’t or it would cost them 40-80 cents to do so. I got one and told Monti to go fly a kite while I am away.

We have another week here so I am sure that I will be able to add to this list at some point down the road. It’s been an amazing, wonderful, romantic, magical week that we won’t soon forget. Now… back to work tomorrow to make work fun again for a group of talent leaders.

I love my J.O.B.

When you lead others you’re taught that you need to tap into your team member’s passion and find methods that will motivate them to accomplish a stated goal. Sometimes you’re taught that you need to dangle a proverbial “carrot” in front of them so they will chase after a stated reward. That should motivate someone towards a goal, right? It works. Sometimes. Short term, maybe.

So you might be asking yourself, how do I motivate others at work?

There are lots of methods that sound great in theory. You read them and they make total sense, and yet, many of the people you need to get things done still aren’t doing them. If it sounds so easy on paper and in class, why is it so hard in real life when you try it?

Because it’s not easy. Easy is the one thing we really want to be true about motivating others and it simply is not.

People are complicated. They have different behavioral styles, different motivators, varying degrees of strengths in the phases and approaches to their work. They come from different backgrounds and have had completely different experiences than you have. They possess different skill sets and levels of IQ and emotional intelligence.

What sounds easy when you are in a meeting talking about what tasks need to get done may be extremely difficult to execute once you leave there. It’s much easier to look at a sheet of music and mark down which notes and rhythms you need to play on the flute. It’s completely different for someone to have the skill, which they build through countless hours of practice, to actually play that music as the composer intended it to sound.

We use three foundational assessments to determine someone’s strengths and abilities to contribute at work. They don’t measure emotional intelligence or IQ or their skill sets, all of which are also important factors in understanding the person. The three base assessments we utilize simply tell a leader the team members’ behavioral styles, the motivations or driving forces behind the team members’ actions, and how they prefer to work on a team. There are 20 markers (scores) that are derived from those assessments that we look at to determine the person’s preferences, where their “genius zone” lies, and how to predict how they will contribute, or not, in the future in the situation at work they will be placed into.

The methods we use help take the risk out of hiring the wrong person for a job and contribute greatly to coaching a team member or new hire to operate at their potential. Being able to predict how someone, based on their behavioral DNA, so to speak, along with their experience and skill set, reduces the risk of making decisions at work when it comes to the true driver of business success, the people that power it.

Here are a few references for the assessments referred to in this article:

What are the DiSC and Motivators assessments?

How DiSC is used as part of a hiring process.

The Science behind the DiSC, Motivators & Team Work Cycle assessments

How to quickly identify a DiSC style at work