I’m in Europe at the moment for some client conferences, so I thought I’d do a Tip on one of my favourite European characters — the Jester. I’ve always had an unusual fascination with Jesters. It’s not their musical or acrobatic skills that interests me. It’s more their role in speaking the truth, and naming the political shenanigans that people in power often use to  
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We all love an interesting customer service story, so I’m going to share two contrasting experiences from similar businesses. The lessons are compelling. But first a big thank you. Last week, FRI was awarded “Supplier of the Year” at the Australian Excellence in Franchising Awards. These Healthy Franchise Relationship Tips are a small, but important, part of what we do to f 
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Recently at Natadola Beach in Fiji, I ticked an item off my bucket list. I wobbled all the way to shore on one of those 1960's longboards. That night as I walked along the beach, reflecting on my surfing prowess, I had a phone call from a colleague who was having a very different board experience. The Board of an organisation he was involved with had been disbande 
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I recently sat in a workshop on Mindfulness led by a psychology colleague. Later, while chatting about her work, she said how stressed she felt and that her head was overloaded with the stuff she had to do. I couldn't help myself and quipped, “Sounds like you are more mind-full than mindful”. We both laughed. You've probably noticed an upsurge of interest in the benefits of 
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I was meeting with a senior executive who said he wanted to learn about franchising best practice. Although he was polite and asked some good questions, I soon realised we were both wasting our time. Despite several very specific suggestions targeted to his company’s situation, this guy had not written anything down. Taking notes is a pet topic of mine. This is because  
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We just bought a puppy. I have named him Leo because he is courageous and looks like a lion cub. While Leo may be new to the planet, he did arrive with a significant amount of instinctual knowledge. We commonly refer to instincts in slightly derogatory terms (“they are just animal instincts”). But there is a lot we can learn from these behaviours, honed over millions of yea 
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What are you like at receiving feedback? The truth is, when it comes to feedback most of us prefer to be givers than takers. I once stepped onto an escalator behind a work colleague. We had both just put in three long days at a conference and were tired. He was complaining about all the things he still had to do, so I thought I’d give him some encouragement. As the esca 
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Zhanna Kremez is a PhD student at Griffith University who has been investigating eCommerce in the franchising sector. I first met her at a workshop for social scientists in 2012 and was impressed with her enthusiasm for understanding how people work together. We subsequently conducted a joint research project on how franchisors are approaching the digital world, particularl 
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I was recently conducting a debriefing session with a team of senior franchisor executives on the results from their latest franchisee satisfaction survey. One interesting finding was a significant increase in franchisee expectations around the services provided by the franchisor. I asked the CEO how he felt about this, expecting a defensive response. Instead he said he wel 
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Over the past two weeks I’ve had the privilege of spending time with two remarkable people, both newly appointed Chairmen of their respective franchise associations. The first of these was International Franchise Association (IFA) Chairman, Aziz Hashim, who blew everyone away with his incisive insights and advice in a series of meetings with multi-unit franchisees and franc 
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