All Things Purple 2024

It has been an absolute age since I put out the last edition of "All things purple" as life has been busy! The last few weeks has seen me working hard to ensure that Purple Story is in the best possible state to deliver another year of exceptional growth! The team has grown with the addition of a Non Exec Chairman Brian Bagnall and Non Exec Director Jody Bennett and the long awaited appointment of our head of ops Matt Howcroft . There are some exciting projects and prospects being nurtured as we speak not least:-

• Two clients who have now taken Purple Story (The Home of Operational Excellence) as their outsourced Learning and Development function. With costs tight on the central overhead and in the face of the fast approaching national minimum wage increase (more on this shortly) this is a really good option. You buy in the specialism at a set price and it is then much easier to control win win! We love being a plug and play solution as a purple partner!
• Our Purple Content is now ready and we have an absolutely brilliant range of content for organisations to purchase to host on their own learning management systems to really support that intra personal learning (more on that later)!
• I am kicking off my new venture with ?? Simon Parsons and we have now settled on a name - watch out for the first pieces of comms coming out soon!

As always the Purple wheels keep turning and as CEO my job is to keep innovating and moving us forward! So, in this edition I am going to drop some thought leadership in here! The intention is not to tell you what to do BUT to give you some information and allow you to process it - you take a view and then you can action it! One of our favourite concepts is the Iceberg model! If you cannot see it, you cannot fix it!

If you see more you can fix more!

So what are we covering?

• Are you really Gen Z friendly?
• Intra versus Interpersonal learning
• The National Minimum Wage - thought leadership
• Girls Out Loud - developing your female leaders in a purposeful way
• Being a working Mum!

Are you really Gen Z friendly?

Generation Z is the demographic cohort following the millennials born after 1995. Early benchmarks show Gen Z are on track to be the most diverse, best-educated generation yet (Pew Research Center, 2018). Gen Z are present in your entry level roles and starting to progress into first line management positions and by 2030, almost every entry-level role will be ?lled by a member of Generation Z (Al-Asfour & Lettau, 2014).

While Gen Z shares many traits with Millennials, they also bring in new patterns of behaviour. To drive performance, managers today not only have to understand how to get the best out of these inexperienced employees but also their unique characteristics shaped by their experiences, upbringing and the dreaded Covid, that changed their world forever!

This generation is ?rst and foremost looking for the best cultural ?t for them at their future workplace. They are looking for a company where they are not just a number, but are in a position and place to make a signi?cant contribution. At Purple Story we talk about

See me as a person rather than for the job I do!

The top aspect Generation Z looks for is a fun place to work, with a ?exible schedule and paid time off also ranking high. They are not looking at climbing the ranks quickly. Like millennials, they are interested in getting value quickly.

If I am learning I am not leaving!

But make no mistake they will need to be trained on skills that we have taken for granted in previous generations like customer interactions, handling calls and writing emails. That is because Generation Z has been less about face-to-face communications. They more commonly communicate via text, emoji, and video. They want to be socially connected with everyone, even with their boss.

So if you are technophobe and don't use digital channels - then STOP it - they need you on demand!

They also need feedback regularly. The days of a one to one being scheduled are long gone - they want it on the spot - if I am not doing it properly then show me and correct me!

According to research by McGaha (2018), Gen Z prefers a leader who

1. is a strong and effective communicator;
2. drives a positive and inclusive culture;
3. demonstrates high levels of emotional intelligence;
4. provides ongoing mentorship;
5. has an involved and engaged personality;
6. is highly competent, and
7. promotes equality.
8. We would add a high level of self-awareness to this list!

At Purple Story (The Home of Operational Excellence) we call this the #purplefactor and our programmes are designed to support manager to be this type of leader! Just ask Claire Byles (Cox) from Parkdean Resorts who went on a Purple journey on one of our programmes and absolutely embraced the factors above!

Generation Z strongly prefers the transformational leadership style (more so than transactional leadership) or as we talk about it

Gen Z wants to work for a person centric leader NOT an organisational centric one!

If you want help supporting your team with a multi-generational workforce then reach out. I am studying for a Doctorate in Professional Studies in this area so you can be assured we will hold your hand in evidenced backed way to get more performance from your people!

Intra versus Interpersonal learning

One of the key things about Gen Z is their desire for ongoing professional development through continuous learning, advancement, and using one’s abilities. Generation Z is fortunate to have websites (definitely not available when I entered the workforce) where they can teach themselves new skills.

The top learning method for 59% of Gen Z is YouTube (Pearson Higher Education, 2018). This is because Gen Z has a propensity for Intrapersonal learning - which means they would rather learn on their own. This is a shift away from how Millennials liked to learn which was an interpersonal way, collaboratively in groups. This has so many important aspects for organisations that need consideration.....

• Is your e-learning as sexy as it needs to be? Your Gen Z team will actively engage with learning content if it is GOOD and helps them learn something.
• This openness to digital learning means your training budget should go further if you are taking a hybrid approach and blending e-learning, with virtual workshops and some classroom! Classroom can actually be the smallest part for this generation! I am still hearing lots of we need to get back to the classroom! This statement is filled with the bias of an older leader and perhaps needs to be challenged! Big shout out to Tom McManus at McManus pubs who has built his entire people plan around this notion of being #futurefit!
• John Mason has been banging the content drum with SIDEWAYS for a LONG time - he has always been bang on the money for Gen Z and their preference for intrapersonal learning.

When it comes to on-the-job development, Generation Zers want their managers to become personal mentors and help their team with personal advancement.

So the BIG question is.....

Is your digital learning content as sexy as it needs to be?

If you want to know how you can get a library of content like this RIGHT NOW just message - you will not believe how cost effective it can be!!!!!

The National Minimum Wage - thought leadership

Over the last couple of weeks I have been busy running workshops all around commerciality! Big shout out to Bella Italia who has focused heavily on this with their management teams and participated in a 3 part Cracking the Sales Code programme - the results have been tangible!!!!

What has struck me however is the #pastperfect approach we are taking to the upcoming headwind of the National Minimum Wage increase! I have been asking delegates on programmes...

Who has worked out the ￡ note impact of the NMW increase on your business?

The answer has been a resounding no! Seriously, our GMs who will either help or hinder performance with this large cost impact are not being empowered, challenged or even directed to get "cracking" on what they can do now!

This increase is not going to be mitigated by the traditional methods such as labour optimisation, price or reduced hours! In fact, data from Hospitality Data Insights (HDI) has shown that price has increased over 20% on food and drink in the last 2 years, so definitely no room there!

The ONLY way to mitigate a negative impact is for venue managers to be putting a considered and robust sales strategy in place, purposefully aimed at delivering operational excellence and sales to mitigate the head winds.

Think about it...

In a very crude way

Let's say a venue has a typical 400 hours per week and each hour is going to see a ￡1 cost increase (I told you crude). Let's say we have worked out that to stand still I need to find an additional ￡4,000 per month!

• ￡1000 per week
• ￡142 per day
• ￡71 per trading shift (2 in a day)
• ￡35 per trading hour (assuming 2 peak hours per trading shift)
• ￡17 per hour (assuming 2 people on the floor for each trading hour
• ￡4.25 per 15 minutes

Seriously, this is one bottle of water or side PER 15 mins of trading!

The reality is that we are NOT having the right conversations with team and my workshops have proven it! The only way to mitigate the NMW increase is to set the GMs up for success with a targeted plan.

It will come as no surprise that we have a 5 point plan to set a GM up for success to drive performance through the headwind! Watch out for the Propel webinar coming up and if you want some cost effective content - we have just recorded a series of it Junkyard Golf Club in Manchester! Thanks Ruth Derry and team for helping us make this possible!

Don't wait and see what happens get our content NOW (you will not believe the price)!!!!! Or book a Cracking the Code sales workshop now!

Girls Out Loud - developing your female leaders in a purposeful way

As we head toward the end of this newsletter I just wanted to remind everyone of the power of Girls Out Loud as a development programme for your female leaders!

I have already explained that Gen Z want personal mentoring and this is not always a skills we teach in organisations! The Big Sister Programme at Girls Out Loud with Jane Kenyon takes a female leader on a 12 month journey where not only will they receive in industry leading development they will also be paired with a teen girl to mentor!

This programme is only ￡1500 per female for a 12 month journey! The ROI is significant as your female leaders will learn how to take a person centric approach to the Gen Z's but feel valued and appreciated in the process! Please book a call with me to discuss this! As an ambassador I am a key supporter and Verity Milns in my team is currently on the programme!

Being a working Parent!

Finally, this is a sign off message for all of the working parents who ever experience that parent guilt for not being there! I was plagued by it! Missing meetings or sports days or being the Mum on her laptop in the corner at kids parties!

My kids are now grown up and both are working within hospitality in one guise or another and I could not be more proud of the young men they have grown into! I did ok!

This weekend we celebrated my youngest son's birthday in Manchester at the The Crystal Maze LIVE Experience , Flight Club Darts and Honest Burgers Ltd ! Friends, shots, burgers, beer and spicy margs (who knew). The hospitality was amazing across all of the venues we visited and we made some memories! So if you are beating yourself up just stop it - your kids will be as kick ass as mine and you too one day will go on the lash with your grown up kids and be considered one of the gang!!!!!

Thanks for reading and as always please do share this newsletter with your friends and colleagues! Help me become an disruptive influencer for good!