Business Skills


The Dark Side of Leadership - 10 Leadership traits that will destroy your organisation 1
Reading Time: 12 minutes 10 Leadership traits that will destroy your organisation Having spent 20 years of my life in the corporate world and 10 of them in leadership roles, I’ve been privileged to have worked with some fantastic leaders from across 3 continents. I’ve written many posts on positive leadership for Think Oak! [...]

The Dark Side of Leadership


Moments of Truth, Customer Journey, Manage, CRM, Customer, Insight, Need and Desires 9
Reading Time: 19 minutes Customer Experience = How customers or prospects perceive their interactions with your organisation Click To Tweet Customer experience encompasses every aspect of an organisation’s offering – the quality of customer care, of course, but also advertising, packaging, product and service features, ease of use, and reliability. How can you drive [...]

A to Z of Customer Experience


Strategy, Objectives, Goals, Marketing, Sales, People, Finance
Reading Time: 19 minutes Strategy creates context for operating decisions. It establishes the playing field and provides guidance for decision-making, the experience and skills needed by employees, positioning of marketing and advertising, the priority of initiatives, how to structure the company, and a many other issues. A plan is necessary to guide decision-making, channel resources, [...]

A to Z of Business Strategy



Mushroom Culture 18
Reading Time: 5 minutes I’m sure many of you have heard people say: They treat us like mushrooms! They keep us in the dark and feed us manure or nothing at all! Click To Tweet Nothing stifles an organisation’s possibilities more than poor communication. Actually that’s not strictly true. Three things do – telling [...]

Avoid the Mushroom Culture – The Seven Deadly Sins


007, Change Management, Organisational Change, Oak Consult, Mark Conway, Management Consultancy 13
Reading Time: 4 minutes The original version of this post was a partial celebration of the 50th Think Oak! post together with the 50th Anniversary of the James Bond Movies. What better way to celebrate than to talk about very special agents, Change Agents! Firstly what is a Change Agent? A Change Agent is a [...]

007 ~ An Agent For Change


A to Z, Leadership Qualities, Oak Consult, Mark Conway 5
Reading Time: 9 minutes Great leaders come in all shapes and sizes, genders and cultures, but they all possess many of the qualities I’ve highlighted below in the Think Oak A to Z of Leadership Qualities: A – Agile In today’s economic climate, it is more important than ever for leaders to be agile. Agile [...]

A to Z of Leadership Qualities



Teams, Success, Customers, Oak Consult, Knowledge, Energy, Focus 6
Reading Time: 9 minutes Being part of a winning team is a great feeling! Building a winning team is hard work, but can be great fun with some amazing results! Below I’ve detailed Think Oak’s A-Z of Building a Winning Team: A – Audit Abilities The very first thing to do when you take [...]

A to Z of Building a Winning Team


business, iso 22301, iso 27001, iso 31001, iso 9001, risk assessment, risk management, threat management
Reading Time: 26 minutes All organisations, whatever their size or market, face a range of risks affecting the achievement of their objectives. While “risk” is commonly regarded as negative, risk management is as much about exploiting potential opportunities as preventing potential problems. Risk management comprises a framework and process that enable organisations to manage [...]

A to Z of Risk Management


ISO27001, Information Security Management
Reading Time: 19 minutes The purpose of information security is to protect an organisation’s valuable assets, such as information, Intellectual property, hardware, and software. Through the selection and application of appropriate safeguards or controls, information security helps an organisation to meet its business objectives by protecting its physical and financial resources, reputation, legal position, [...]

A to Z of Information Security