MBM Featured in Forbes
Regular readers of the MBM blog will know that we are passionate about self-development. Sometimes, however, it is nice to share our insight with others. Our founder, Darren A. Smith is a regular guest author for Forbes. He shares his unique blend of humour, industry experience and a dogged passion for self-improvement to help their readers maximise their potential and become the very best version of themselves.
About Forbes
Forbes uses their various platforms to help the world build back with equity at its core. As the world’s leading business media brand, they serve a higher purpose and are true partners to their clients, coaching them on their message and most importantly connecting them to their audience. It’s through these partnerships that they spark the innovation that leads the world forward and creates a more equitable pathway for all.
You can explore each article below:
15 Things Leaders Can Do To Help Women Remain In The Workforce
The pandemic has taken a toll on many businesses, but it’s also had a significant impact on professional women. While there is still a lot of debate surrounding women’s role in business, one would think that moving to a less centralized working situation would benefit them. However, the opposite seems to be happening as women are juggling both familial and work responsibilities.
Business leaders, therefore, should be looking at ways to reinforce their dedication retaining qualified women. To help, 15 members of Forbes Business Council look at the ways that business leaders can stand up for women and avoid them being pushed out of the workforce.
This article was published by Forbes on the 22nd of March 2021. You can access the full article.
Do You Leave Everything To The Last Minute? Three Steps To Stop
You work late most days. Always burning the “midnight oil,” as my dad used to say. Stressed and always up against a deadline. Yet, you manage to pull a masterstroke each time. A rabbit out of the hat. A last-minute rabbit, but nailed all the same. And when people ask you about it, you say, “I do my best work under pressure.”
Sorry to say, you don’t.
Deadlines are a part of work life. A big customer presentation on Thursday, a report to be filed by Monday or a meeting to prepare for. Deadlines. We wouldn’t be without them. Companies could not function without them. Yet there we are again and again and again, working right up to the wire, supposedly doing our best work.
This article was published by Forbes on the 24th of March 2021. You can access the full article.
13 Methods To Reach Customers Beyond Your Community
Businesses usually start within their local community. Small and medium enterprises draw a lot of their customers from their local region, and many even hire within the area as well. However, as a business expands, it quickly realizes that the local region may be holding back its growth. There is only a finite amount of consumers within the local catchment area, and the company needs to reach out to more people if it wants to realize its full potential.
Small businesses now have many tools at their disposal to help them reach out to areas outside of their home region. Technological advances and networking have helped small businesses expand their boundaries and get in touch with consumers outside of their communities. Below, 14 members of Forbes Business Council discuss several crucial methods of reaching consumers outside of a business’s local space.
This article was published by Forbes on the 7th of April 2021. You can access the full article.
12 Ways To Grab Attention With Content
Social media advertising isn’t a new phenomenon. It’s been over 10 years since Facebook took social media mainstream. Today, most businesses involve one or more social media platforms in their marketing campaigns because of the powerful targeting algorithms they provide. However, while a company can pinpoint its core audience, the advertising needs to be good enough to draw their attention. If you want to engage an audience, you need content that makes them sit up and take notice.
Going viral can be the best thing for a business since it gets them traction and exposure like nothing else can. However, a video or post needs to grab the consumer’s attention for it to go viral and preferably generate positive sentiment associated with the brand. Here, 12 experts from Forbes Business Council discuss how businesses can make their content grab audience attention to send their engagement rates through the roof.
This article was published by Forbes on the 27th April 2021. You can access the full article.
15 Critical Ways To Manage Work And Home Life Boundaries
Workplace boundaries can be a critical part of a business owner’s lifestyle. In many situations, business owners have been taking their work home with them for years, usually resulting in overwork and higher stress levels. Managing the boundary between work and home will help an entrepreneur juggle the demands of their enterprise and family life more efficiently. Additionally, a better work-life balance means lower stress and fewer health problems over the long term.
Balance only happens when a professional puts in the effort to make it happen. When individuals set up healthy workplace boundaries, their stress drops, while their productivity and motivation skyrocket. Here, 15 members of Forbes Business Council delve into how a business owner can better manage their work and home boundaries.
This article was published by Forbes on the 30th April 2021. You can access the full article.
Seven Steps Teams Can Take To Reduce The Number Of Emails They Send
During stay-at-home orders, running outdoors became a popular activity for many. And as more people started to run, they likely wanted to know how well they were doing and what was possible: “How far did I run? Could I run farther next week? How could I improve?”
In the business world, I believe we could learn a few things from these runners, particularly when it comes to email. We have been using emails since the first one was sent in 1971 — 50 years ago — and ever since, many of us have failed to ask how we’re doing, what is possible or how we could improve. Emails are one of office workers’ main moans.
This article was published by Forbes on the 25th May 2021. You can access the full article.
Five Soft Skill Models That Are Easy To Learn And Implement
Back in 2018, Jack Ma said, “We have to teach our kids something unique, so that a machine can never catch up with us: values, believing, independent thinking, teamwork, care for others — the soft skills — sports, music, painting, arts, to make sure humans are different from the machine.”
He is absolutely right. Most soft skills aren’t taught at school, though maybe you took a few one-day training courses that taught you a nugget or two, and what you and I know about soft skills we learned as we went. But in the age of the machines (yes, Terminator and Skynet come to mind), soft skills are the key to being human and achieving success, and we need to overtly improve these soft skills.
This article was published by Forbes on the 9th July 2021. You can access the full article.
14 Critical Career Skills To Cultivate In The Digital Era
Since the start of the information age—and especially in the last decade—technology has permeated every aspect of our lives, including the business sector. As organizations embrace tech and more digital options, employees will need certain skills to keep up.
Prioritizing the right competencies can help employees stand out from the crowd, advance in their careers and grow with business technology. Below, the members of Forbes Business Council shared 14 critical skills to cultivate in the digital era.
This article was published by Forbes on the 8th December 2021. You can access the full article.
15 Out-Of-The-Box Ways To Communicate Your Company Culture
Company culture is critical to the success and health of a business and its employees. Conveying this culture at onboarding will ensure that new employees thoroughly understand what the organization is all about.
Though traditional methods like orientation meetings and informational packets will do the trick, sometimes it pays to think outside of the box. Below, a panel of Forbes Business Council members shared 15 unconventional—yet effective— ways they communicate culture to their new hires during onboarding.
This article was published by Forbes on the 5th January 2022. You can access the full article.
14 Ways To Foster Connection Between Employees
Genuine relationships within a company can help to create a more engaged and productive workforce. Though sometimes these relationships develop naturally over the course of the regular work, other times they require a bit of a push. But how exactly can leaders work to foster more connections between their employees?
To help answer this question, the members of Forbes Business Council shared 14 tried-and-true strategies to naturally build employee relationships, thus developing a stronger team overall.
This article was published by Forbes on the 7th January 2022. You can access the full article.
Doomed To Fail: Approaching Situations Where Failure is Inevitable
When I was 15, my girlfriend told me that I needed to be more romantic. She’d just watched Dirty Dancing and not so secretly had a crush on Patrick Swayze. This was my first introduction to what I have named “the treacherous tightrope.” She had sown that seed, and I had agreed.
Over the coming weeks, I tried to be more romantic without really knowing what that meant beyond something to do with dancing, watermelons and wearing a tight black vest. I’d watched the film for clues. She kept giving me what I thought were pointers: “You need to bring me flowers.” “No, not those ones.” I just kept getting it wrong, and she seemed to be helping me to get it right. Six weeks later she called me to tell me that it just wasn’t working. I was gutted.
This article was published by Forbes on the 14th February 2022. You can access the full article.
Digitize Your Business With These 14 Smart Strategies
Though the digital space has opened up new opportunities for entrepreneurs, there are still some businesses that have yet to “get online.” Some stores, restaurants and service businesses have relied on their community’s foot traffic and word-of-mouth alone to keep them afloat, but as the business world continues to move toward a digital-first environment, those who don’t develop their online presence and sales channels are likely missing out.
If your business has never had a digital strategy before, it can be intimidating and daunting to figure out where to begin. For entrepreneurs interested in setting up an online presence for the first time, these 14 members of Forbes Business Council shared their best recommendations for digitizing a business.
This article was published by Forbes on the 22nd February 2022. You can access the full article.
