And that the world will benefit from these fantastic advances in communications.

Well actually, it’s not!

This is an article about how smartphones are now killing the art of conversation, and also basic connectedness on a very personal level.

We have all seen people in bars and restaurants, where there is a table of 4 people all with their smartphones texting, tweeting, and Facebooking and not one of them is talking to a person sitting at that table.

Not only have I seen it, I have been one of those people, tweeting or checking in on work email.

I have been so busy staying connected that I have lost the personal connection with the person sitting 2 feet away from me, sometimes this is my children and more often than not it’s my wife.

This is almost getting to an epidemic state, and I know I am not the only one.

The next time you’re in a public place just put your phone away for a moment and take time to look at all the others and what they are doing, and how little connection they have with the people around them.

We need to redress this balance, we need to find time for the people who are right there in front of us, and relearn the art of conversation before we lose it permanently.

I can’t promise to be perfect, but as of now, I am going to make a concerted effort to give the people I am with 100% of my attention.

If you want to learn more about creating highly engaged teams or being a better leader click the link to view our course.

The post Saving the Art of Conversation in a Smartphone Age appeared first on Gordontredgold.

Happy to announce that I will be speaking at Business Transformational and Operational Excellence World Summit in Orlando March 21-24 in 2017.

BTOES17 is one of the leading conference and will have some outstanding speakers, over 100) who will be sharing their knowledge and over the three days

If you would like to attend then register here and get and 35% off the standard ticket price using the Promo code  TREDGOLD35

Having worked my entire career in Business Transformation and Operational Excellence I am excited to attend this conference, getting the chance to learn from the experts, sharing tips and advice and networking with other experts in this field.

Some of the key themes of the conference are:

• Customer Experience Excellence
• Strategy Execution
• Innovation Execution
• Business Transformation
• Operational Excellence
• Culture Transformation
• Leadership
• Agility
• Process Optimization

Of all the conferences that I get to speak at this is the one that I am looking forward to the most.

If you want to take you’re business to the next level then come and join the experts, industry giants and c-suite execs from many of the Fortune 100 companies and learn about the strategies and initiatives that they have used to successfully transform their businesses.

The post Business Transformational and Operational Excellence appeared first on Gordontredgold.

When he said that I was stunned because as a leader he was usually a very empowering leader, always looking to build up his team, giving them confidence in their abilities and telling them that impossible was a word that did not exist in his vocabulary.

When I challenged him on this, he said ‘look, it’s a massively competitive area with a well-established core of experts already, it’s not that I don’t think you’re good enough it’s more to do with the sheer level of competition and where you’re starting from’.

Now, many people might have seen this as disheartening but for me, it actually empowered me, because now I had nothing to lose, there was no expectation, anything I could achieve would be a bonus and would be seen as a victory. I always relished the underdog role, and when someone told me, I couldn’t it made me all the more determined to succeed.

It also told me that just writing once a week that just writing the odd article here and there was not going to cut it; I was going to have to do something above and beyond.

So I followed my own FAST process to achieve the results I was looking for, that meant being Focused, Accountable, Simple, and Transparent.

I focused on three things, trying to produce quality content on a regular basis, almost daily; building real a following who were interested in my niche, and then engaging with them.

Accountability was simple; it was down to me and only me to do this, having someone else write for me was not going to work, and it would have flown in the face of authenticity which is crucial for leadership.

Simplicity, I looked to keep the process as simple as possible so that I would be able to share it and teach it to others so that they could benefit if it worked.

Transparency was the easiest part as there were plenty of analytic tools and ranking websites which would show me how I was progressing.

Today I achieved a new milestone, I was ranked as the Number 3 Social Media Expert to Follow on Twitter, this now also goes alongside the rankings I have received for Leadership and Business Consulting.

This has taken me just three years achieve, writing nearly every day, producing over 900 plus articles in that time, building a following of almost 1/2 million on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and LinkedIn, and tweeting and posting around 150-200 times a day to engage with them.

Initially, I was empowered by the words of my friend who told me I couldn’t, but my confidence really grew when I started to see things come together, the number of articles and the following increase and my climb the rankings.   This then allowed me to go and empower others showing them the techniques that I had used, which then helped them to build followings, increase their influence and ranking online.

This is one of the great things about empowerment, as we become empowered and see the benefits in our results it allows us to empower others to achieve great things, but they also can then go on to empower even more people to be successful.

To celebrate this recognition, I am offering discounts up to a whopping 65% on most of my services. Click here to checkout the amazing offers right now. Hurry, because the discounts are for limited number of bookings and they are fast running out!

The post How Recognition Empowered Me… appeared first on Gordontredgold.

– I was selected #8 on the 50 Top Leadership and Management Blogs.

– And I also achieved the milestone of writing half a million words.

I want to thank everyone who has read, commented or shared my words, I truly appreciate it and it motivates me to keep going. These words are my journey of inspiring others in achieving results and driving success, by avoiding failures and complication of things that can be done simpler anf smarter. Also thanks to my family and friends for their support on this journey, I couldn’t have done this without them.

I have learnt from my failure, and applying FAST Principles that I created with my experience in the industry and personal life. It’s amazing what we can achieve if we start slowly and are persistent and consistent.

Thanks again and here’s to the next goal of One Million words!

If you’d like to learn how to Achieve Results and Drive Success, checkout my Online Training and Coaching Packages right here and avail a massive discount for a limited period.

This blog has been verified by Rise: R97bf02f11dbaf79fc51d96972401d377

The post Half A Millionth Mark – Persistent, Consistent & Humbling appeared first on Gordontredgold.

This has led to my blog being recognised as One of the Top 50 Leadership Blogs to watch in 2013, and as one of the Top 30 Hidden Gems of Leadership blogs.

As one of the recurring themes of my blog is recognition, and the impact that recognition can have on our teams, I wanted to share how I feel about this recognition and it’s impact on me.

I truly appreciate every like, share, comment and recognition award that I receive, it gives me the positive feedback that people appreciate what I am doing, that I am on the right track, and that I should continue with my efforts and even think about redoubling them.

This is the power of recognition: it rewards us; it boosts our self esteem; it increases morale, it motivates us; it inspires us; and the best thing of all it costs nothing, absolutely nothing.

In terms of return on investment, the impact of a simple ‘thank you’,  ‘well done’ or ‘good job’ is immeasurable.

Given all that, what surprises me is how often recognition is withheld, or how reluctant some people are to give even such small pieces recognition.

I often hear the comment, you praise people too much, especially from people who are reluctant themselves to give recognition, but I never ever hear from the people recognised.

Sure sometimes they say “oh it’s nothing” or “no need to thank me”, but in reality they themselves are saying thank you for the recognition, they appreciated it and felt really good about receiving it.

So as a recent recipient of recognition,  I would really like to say thank you to everyone who contributed and to encourage everyone to increase the amount of recognition that they give to others.

Thank you

The post Recognition appeared first on Gordontredgold.