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Lets see how‚ Nick has helped people actualy find out what they really really want in life.

Transcription

Valerie Prentice: Everyone welcome to Humber.TV. Today I have I don’t know if it is a pleasure or not but it is so I have Nick Danby from Face To Face Corporate and Personal Development.

Nick Danby: Yeah, good afternoon.

Valerie Prentice: Good afternoon, welcome. Nick we are going to get straight into it.

Nick Danby: Okay.

Valerie Prentice: So tell me what actually why would somebody bother seeing you in relation to Corporate And Personal Development?

Nick Danby: Good question Valerie, I think it relates to my experience over the last sort of 30 odd years of working. My background is engineering I was with GEC a large corporate. I went from engineering into sales from there into the Royal Mail with customer services and retail management. And on top of all of that I also started I was a director of a PLC company. So when I actually talk about leadership and I talk about management I’m actually talking from a position of authority. I’ve been there I’ve been at the sharp end.

Valerie Prentice: So you’ve been sort of round the block so you take advantage of that.

Nick Danby: I’ve been yeah round the block, I’ve had sort of hard knocks, I’ve learnt some hard lessons and all of those experiences I bring into the classroom. I’m quite happy to talk about my success, I’m also very comfortable to talk about my failures and some of them have been horrendous. So when people look for management development, when they look for executive development they just don’t want somebody who’s swallowed a text book and is just regurgitating it. I think in all honesty they want somebody who has earned their strikes and had the hard knocks along the way and can bring back experiences into the classroom and develop their people in real time.

Valerie Prentice: I always find one of the interesting things about you is that you actually help people actually find what they really want in life. And some people must find that really difficult like you know… I guess this is like a corporate person they take their career path and this is their path you know only a large company but then they said after they do a couple of sessions with you or course with you tha’s it, their whole life completely transformed into a different route and they get rid of you know wives, children and…. maybe not like that.

Nick Danby: I think basically a lot of people are living a lie in all honesty…

Valerie Prentice: But why do you think that? Why you… tha’s a pretty harsh thing to say.

Nick Danby: Because I think a lot of people get corrupted with the position, with the power, with the money they get on the treadmill of life and when I really sort of boil it down and I ask some really pertinent questions to people i’s they want a different life but they just haven’t got the courage to actually step out of that life they’ve become corrupted.

Valerie Prentice: You mean like they’ve been seduced because of what the money can provide, the status…

Nick Danby: Its grand total that.

Valerie Prentice: Not having to write their thing.

Nick Danby: Yeah its grant all day, I think a lot of people look upon the status, a lot of people are status driven. They want the nice BMW’s, they want the 5 bedrooms detached houses, but you know sometimes they just want to run away to a little island and just literally have a simple life.

Valerie Prentice: Oh but everybody goes on about that…

Nick Danby: Okay.

Valerie Prentice: Isn’t it just this idyllic thing that we pretend we really like, but really we love we have to buy that label suit, we love having that flash car, we love…

Nick Danby: There are some people that are corrupted by that, some people are comfortable with that and some people are quite happy to help them to get the better suits and the bigger cars. I ask that question and you know some people say i’s a bit cheesy. You know tell me what you want, what you really want out of life and that is soul searching, that is actually looking beyond the trappings and trimmings of executive life or you know millionaires life. We have had some startling results, some people have turned their lives around and actually walked away from all of that, but also helped people to find the balance. I think some people you know home and work life balance is absolutely paramount.

Valerie Prentice: You really think you can get home and work balance?

Nick Danby: Yeah, you can. It takes a discipline, it takes a lot of letting go, a lot of managing directors and business owners, they start the business with all the good intent that they are going to retire early, they are going to make a lot of money and what actually happens is the job then takes them over and all of a sudden what they started off as an idyllic dream of where they wanted to go is all of a sudden become a night mare and the business is now driving them. So a good lot of actually where you want and where you want to be is about letting go what you’ve actually got. And a lot of guys at the top have a difficulty letting go i’s a trust issue. I’s delegating, i’s letting go of the baby that they have been developing and nurturing all these years to actually find that home and work balance, because there is without a shadow of a doubt what happens at home affects work, what goes on at work affects home, there’s no two ways about it, i’s a vicious circle. And how many times do you find people at the top their hoe life is in tatters. And then you’ve got to ask the question so you’ve got your money, you’ve got your big car are you happy? And 9 times out of 10 they’ll tell you no. They’d give all of that up for a more idyllic home life, because in the end and hey people have found this out over this last 18 months. Possessions can be taken away at the drop of a hat, businesses have gone burst, people have lost fortunes and what do they fall back on, the family. And at the end of the day i’s the family and the friends that you are going to find that will nature you, that will support you, that will put you back on your feet. Not the type of car you drive.

Valerie Prentice: Okay just back to the whole want thing that people what people really want. I’m sure that you have people sort of say that I really don’t know what I want this is the you know this is the path that I have been lead and at the end of the day I don’t know what I want you know I just think…

Nick Danby: Okay.

Valerie Prentice: This is what I have been forced with this is what the media is telling me…

Nick Danby: Okay.

Valerie Prentice: So how do you help these people?

Nick Danby: I would say okay well in fact I’ve got a case in hand young ladies coming to a crossroad’s in her life and in her career very successful where she is. No two ways about it she has a career path to a certain degree but she will hit hetro I mean she is going to hit the ceiling shortly.

Valerie Prentice: What does that mean by the ceiling?

Nick Danby: The ceiling she can’t promote, she can’t move on because there’s people above her who are holding her back. Her next promotion is that person’s job and that person aren’t going nowhere so they’ve hot the ceiling they can’t go any further. Now she can settle for the corporate life and she’s well paid and she’s well within her comfort zone, but she was only talking to me yesterday saying I don’t feel comfortable with this. I feel trapped, I feel sort of penned in. Now when I first started the conversation with her she was saying well actually I’m quite happy where I am, I’m okay you know the nice income, comfortable lifestyle, just got married. By the time I’d actually finished talking to her I got her now looking beyond the business, starting to look at other opportunities. What else is out there for you right now? And look beyond these 4 walls.

Valerie Prentice: So you got her to move from… I gather you got her to move from the point that everything is ready everything is great to a point that she is sort of actually questioning things.

Nick Danby: Yeah, only for the simple fact that I listen to what people are telling me.

Valerie Prentice: And you feel she opened up because she felt more comfortable with you…

Nick Danby: Yeah.

Valerie Prentice: Or you asked the right questions for her to re evaluate things?

Nick Danby: I think there’s got to be a trust, whether I’ve got sort of a 6th sense I can build people’s trust very quickly and people open up to me I’m not all together certain it works for me. There was a lot of contradictions I’d listen communication is about listening, you know God gave us two years one mouth we should use them in those proportions. And she started off tell me that everything was rosy, but halfway through she was telling me that she was bored and that she was and i’s almost like a contradiction in turn so I’m starting to think hang on, you are telling me on one hand that you are happy and on the other hand you are telling me that actually you are bored and you feel as though you are trapped, so what is the truth. And basically just turning that back on somebody and saying okay have you looked have you considered wha’s your option, where do you want to be? And by the time we’d actually left she was comfier about her position within the corporate world, but she’s now understanding that she can actually look for other opportunities and you can always say no. You know if she doesn’t want to move on, she is comfortable where she is but there may be that moment that opportunity that she will see and think okay, lets go for it. I’m a firm believer that if people are not happy where they really want to be, they are never going to give you 100% of effort, they’ll give you 80%, they’ll be compliant rather than committed. You put somebody where they really want to be and they will give you 100% plus.

Valerie Prentice: But then the trick is actually finding what people really what they really want to be and they might not really want to be in that your organization so then you could lose key people so that must be I gather like people when top people and employee to look at their employees that must be tha’s a risk they take is that¢â‚¬¦

Nick Danby: Absolutely and that from the people, I’ll always say that there is potential of casualties you know when I do work with senior teams and I have worked with a number of big corporates’ literally the length and breadth of this country and at times and have been lucky enough to go abroad with my work, I always say upfront be prepared for some casualties, there may well be some people that will not embrace the change that they are living in their comfort zone and tha’s exactly where they want to be. Unfortunate the organization and the girls have moved, now are they prepared to move with it. Yeah there has been some casualties along the way I’ve never damaged an organization not by any means, if anything I have actually strengthened the organization by sometimes letting people go because they are just compliant, they have been taken over 80% and the trouble is you get to a point you accept 80%, you pay 100% wages or 80% effort. I don’t know whether any organization especially today can accept that.

Valerie Prentice: I guess on the flip side of the coin is that the person is giving 80% they are not feeling they’re just going through the motions of it all so they are actually not pushing themselves, not going out of their own personal comfort zone, so they are becoming stagnant in themselves.

Nick Danby: A lot of people that you know I haven’t had that many people that fallen out of organizations, I don’t want you to get the impression that I go in there and strip people apart, not by any means, but people that have moved on a few months down the line have actually come back and thanked me for it, because now they have actually found something that really fires them up.

Valerie Prentice: Can you give us an example on that one?

Nick Danby: Yeah, there was a guy who was a financial director of a PLC and his burning ambition was outside activities, he wanted to run own like mountain biking and canoeing centre and that was his passion and yeah he sort of travelled the world for this organization, had for many years, very well paid, very comfortably off but every time he got on his mountain bike at the weekend, tha’s what really fired him up and he came across a business that was sort of struggling but it was an outdoor pursuit business, he looked at the potential of it and he went for it and yeah he stood out, he gave up a six figure salary to move away for nothing to invest in a business that was struggling and lo and behold he has turned it around and i’s a success and yeah that six months down the line he did ring out of the blue, he’s invited me up there to see what he’s done with it and just looking at his face tells me that he made the right move. You know his whole demeanour has changed and it is a different lifestyle and one thing that he has gained back is home, him and his family are a lot stronger, he’s got a lot more time for the children and his life and I would say he’s found utopia, but where he was sort of 2, 3 years ago he is certainly now where he feels he always wanted to be foe many years.

Valerie Prentice: I find you are sort of painting this picture this idyllic life like working for this massive corporation really wanting to do something that you know you like this mountain biking thing you go out there but really when you are looking at the world like they are becoming this monopoly of this organizations taking over the small businesses, people that work in them don’t want to be part of that then they are wanting to set up their own small business, it just doesn’t seem to be at a fit because these monopolies are just consuming the small businesses, so how can people like they want to do like all like mum and dad shop back to basics, but how do they complete it just doesn’t seem like this idyllic bullshit.

Nick Danby: Okay, what was it that Napoleon said of the French that we are a nation of shop keepers and I think i’s in all of us to want to have our own business, look at me I’ve worked for GEC, I was swallowed up in the corporate word for 15 years then I went into the royal mail, another big corporate, I spent 2 or 3 years in there back into the family business, then I broke away about 13, 14 years ago and started my own business. Would I ever work for anybody ever again? No I could never envisage it. I’m a master of my own destiny and though I may not be earning the potential I was back in GEC days, the fact that I’m actually master of my own destiny makes me a richer man. Inwardly I feel a lot more contentment that I actually feel I’m actually achieving something every day that I get the recognition for and I get the payback for.

Valerie Prentice: So I guess you are happy to take on the responsibility and the blame and how successful you are and how not successful you are.

Nick Danby: Absolutely and when I see people starting up their own businesses whether i’s a one man band or whether i’s in a partnership or they are going to employ 30, 40 people, I admire anybody tha’s takes that sort of risk because I think a good lot of the actual achievement that people get in Woodley is not the monetary I think i’s the actual standing back and thinking, I’ve actually built that, I’ve actually done that and i’s the sort of the pat on the back that you give yourself is probably the bigger buzz than the big bank balance.

Valerie Prentice: So then you are like the person that niggles people until so you go look is this what you want and you find the little hooks and use to pull it out.

Nick Danby: I hold people accountable, if people say they want to change, I’ll say to them, “you really want to change? Are you prepared to go through the pain?¢â‚¬ because it isn’t all rose tinted glasses not by any means, i’s tough, i’s hard. Even developing people within organization to go up the corporate ladder is exactly the same there’s pain, sometimes its tough and sometimes yeah there are tears and there are tantrums but I’m prepared to stick around long enough if this is what you say you really want, I will help you to achieve what it is you really want.

Valerie Prentice: So you sort of hold their hand?

Nick Danby: Not necessarily hold their hands, I’ll stand alongside them

Valerie Prentice: You’ll give them a shove over the cliff or something?

Nick Danby: Sometimes they need a bit of a nudge, sometimes they need a bit of a talk, sometimes they need a bit of praise and recognition and some positive grooming and developing along that way. I’m not sort of the thug in a suit; I’m not the guy that takes you around the back of the bike shed with a lump of two by two. But I will give you the tough talk, once you actually sign up to me and you are saying that this is what you want to achieve, you’ll certainly find that I keep my side of the contract, I expect you to keep your side of the contract and if I feel as though you are sort of slipping back, we’ll have those sort of conversations.

Valerie Prentice: So you’ve had tough talks with people?

Nick Danby: Yeah.

Valerie Prentice: So you are not all this fluff sugar and spice.

Nick Danby: No, people say that the soft stuff is the hard stuff. I’s amazing how many people actually find motivating people making people feel needed, wanted, and appreciated is tough. Its easy to hide behind charts and bottom line profitability and products and procedures, we can all hide behind that but if your people aren’t truly engaged in what needs to be done, then tha’s the tough bit, actually sitting down and understanding the motivations, the emotions, behind people, how do I encourage them, how do I hold them accountable, because what you do for one person can switch another person off and it is an art. Some people are born leaders; some people take to this naturally. Well I’m going back to my days in GEC I was an exceptionally good engineer and they thought I’d make a good manager, poof.

Valerie Prentice: That is a common mistake.

Nick Danby: Absolutely, a lot of organizations and I embrace it, promote within and I think its good that they promote within provided they give them the skill set because it is a totally different skill set. When I became a manager within GEC, where was my headache? It wasn’t in the products or the procedures, it was actually dealing with people and I soon found out that I thought I had a team of people that were all as dedicated as me, as enthusiastic as me. I soon found out that some were just there for the beer and that was the tough bit and getting them on board its hard its not easy, not by any¢â‚¬¦

Valerie Prentice: So would that be like the start of you realizing the importance of personal and corporate development through your failures in that experience?

Nick Danby: Absolutely, I learnt again the School of Hard Knocks; GEC invested tremendously in me in product knowledge and trust me I could bore the pants off your back, gear ratios and cam designs

Valerie Prentice: I’m bored already

Nick Danby: But what they did not invest in me is management skills and yeah I had to learn the hard way. it was only my sister who actually sent me on the Dale Carnegie course in leadership because my management style when I came into the family business was sometimes a bit direct and a bit hard and I rubbed a few people up the wrong way and look at a lot of them are part time ladies that had been with the organization along time and they didn’t like my managerial approach. I went on the Dale Carnegie course and it was like a breath of fresh air, I just wish I had that back in GEC, chances are I’d still be within GEC, if I’d had that sort of management training so much so that a couple of years after doing the Dale Carnegie course that was my break into corporate and personal development, I actually joined the organization, I joined Dale Carnegie because what they teach isn’t rocket science, its common sense sort of stuff but it works.

Valerie Prentice: So you think Dale Carnegie has been around like 1930′s isn’t it?

Nick Danby: 1936 he wrote the book How to Win Friends and Influence People.

Valerie Prentice: Like tha’s really when you people like say quite a grotesque title i’s really i’s a better book really of just being nice to people and actually listening to people.

Nick Danby: Listening to people, respecting them , understanding their opinion, being genuinely interested in people, making them feel needed, wanted and appreciated and when people feel that genuinely Valerie, they will go the extra mile for you for no extra cost. Is it rocket science? No. Do we all know it? Yes we do, we’ve just forgotten it.

Valerie Prentice: But when the thing is since like Dale Carnegie tha’s been the big difficult for you to break from Dale Carnegie on to your own then.

Nick Danby: It took a quantum leap. I was with Dale Carnegie 6 years. I became a multi skilled instructor in array from executive development, presentation skills, sales training. Yeah, why did I break away from Dale Carnegie? Again it was that crossroads, it was that wanting to do it for yourself, it was that stop hiding behind the big corporate. No disrespect to Dale Carnegie, the material has been refreshed for a while, it is a fantastic course and¢â‚¬¦

Valerie Prentice: I’s been dead for a long time.

Nick Danby: I’s been dead for a long time. Every five years they actually look globally at the material and they ask the instructors for their feedback and one thing that the Europeans kept saying to the Americans was that we wanted some of the material re writing to be more palatable to the Europeans. They wouldn’t have it so a good lot of Americanisms came in which didn’t sit comfortably with some organizations in Europe. Also the material did need a little bit of refreshing and I actually brought other material into the classroom and I got caught out and I got my knuckles rapped.

Valerie Prentice: Oh you got sprung.

Nick Danby: I got sprung and I got my knuckles rapped and it was then that I realized that maybe I needed to break off and I should start doing something for myself. Bringing in other facets of executive development and hence tha’s how I started.

Valerie Prentice: Okay, it all starts from there. Nick we’ll finish up there. Thank you very much. Everyone we’ve just been talking to Nick Danby of Face to Face Corporate and Personal Development, this is the man tha’s been around the world, been around the block and if you need to make that big change or know what you really want in life, this is the bloke. Thank you very much.

Nick Danby: Thank you Valerie.

Valerie Prentice: Tha’s a pleasure.