Wm Morrison, Britain’s fourth-biggest supermarket chain, promised today to open more small stores as it confirmed that its new chief executive, Dalton Philips, would take up his role on March 29.
Mr Philips, who was poached from the Canadian retailer Loblaw, succeeds Marc Bolland, who quit in November to take over from Sir Stuart Rose at Marks & Spencer.
The news came as Morrisons, which has opened 45 stores during the past year, reported a 30 per cent rise in full year pre-tax profits to £858 million as turnover rose by 6 per cent to £15.4 billion.
On an underlying basis, stripping out the impact of property disposals and a one-off credit of £91 million to the company pension scheme, pre-tax profits rose by 21 per cent to £767 million.
This was better than the consensus forecast of £757 million predicted by a range of City analysts.
Sir Ian Gibson, the non-executive chairman of Morrison, said that the company had raised its market share during the year, with both more customers visiting its stores and existing customers spending more. Read more »
Staff at John Lewis Partnership are to share a bonus payment of £151.3 million, after the retail group reported a 9.7 per cent rise in full year pre-tax profits to £306.6 million.
It means that “partners”, as staff at the retailer are designated, will receive payouts equivalent to 15 per cent of their annual salary, or nearly eight weeks’ pay.
Charlie Mayfield, chairman of the John Lewis Partnership, said that, in all, about 70,000 partners would receive payouts.
He said: “Partners have shown tremendous commitment during changing times. I am therefore delighted that our partners will share fairly in the financial rewards of a successful year.” Read more »
For sales people, ‘To Do Lists’ are not a useful tool in today’s hectic, information-rich, competitive business environments. Here’s an alternative:
- Spend 10 minutes every morning planning the day!
We know it makes sense – but we rarely do it properly. Spending just 10 minutes in the morning reviewing our main business objectives and personal goals, then physically writing out a maximum of 3 or 4 results (not tasks!) we want to absolutely achieve by the end of the day, is essential for keeping us focused. Just as important, is the reason WHY we want to achieve the result i.e. what it will mean to us personally (£) as well as professionally – this keeps motivation high when times get challenging.
- Learn the art of the 80/20 Principle!
According to Pareto’s famous law, most of us spend 80% of our time working on things that will only ever give us 20% of the results we’re looking for. This includes: doing tasks others have passed to us; trying to clear a ‘To Do List’ (because it makes us feel a sense of achievement); and avoiding difficult tasks by distracting ourselve s watching news and/or unimportant emails etc. Instead, try prioritizing during the 10 minute planning sessions, batching up similar or related tasks, and delegating or simply deleting more ‘stuff’ – remember simplicity and clarity is power.
- Spend 10 minutes after work reviewing the day!
It’s easy to get so engrossed in our businesses that we forget to take time out to reflect. By investing just 10 minutes at the end of the day to recap on what we’ve achieved, what we’ve learnt and any great moments we experienced, we stay more motivated. We’re also able to switch off before returning home to connect with family and friends – the basic human need that should be behind why we do what we do in the first place.
Free download: Healthy Habits Guide
For loads of resources check out: http://www.healthysalesexec.com/
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