CGM blog: Little and often

06 Oct CGM blog: Little and often

We’ve all heard the story about the man who ate an aeroplane.

Frenchman Michael Lotito (Mr Monsieur Mangetout – Mr Eats Anything) filed miniscule pieces onto his food each day and washed it down with copious quantities of water. It took him two years to munch a Cessno 150.

Remarkable feats can be achieved when you take a little and often approach. It is a lesson for life – and for business.

Some business coaches talk of training the supposed ‘corporate athlete’ (dreadful phrase) then urge their clients to sprint a marathon, which (a) can’t be done, (b) results in near-immediate burnout, and (c) inevitably fails.

Last week we celebrated the first anniversary of our very own CGM Business Media Club.

The Business Media Club consists of three elements – media training, professional development and quality networking in a sharing setting. The significance of little-and-often to these ingredients cannot be stressed enough.

The club meets for three hours each month. Learning, developing and sharing in bite-sized chunks enables people to focus on developing new skills, allows room for progression and to build quality relationships.

Our anniversary was a special meeting with guest speakers and tales of inspiration from our members of things they had learned at the club, tried out in their business and worked.

It was marvellous to reflect on what had been achieved. Some stories showed a fairly swift response to changed practices with our member’s businesses, but others were more patient – such as one member who, as advised, carefully built relationships via LinkedIn and had landed a major client.

When I devised the club little and often was a key phrase I wrote onto my blank piece of paper.

Little and often, regular, continuous, focus on specific best practice – these aren’t quick fix facets of communications – they require time, space and thought.

Life – business – is a marathon not a sprint. Doing the right things in the right way is achievable and can produce remarkable results – especially if you do them little and often.

For further details and to book your visit to the CGM Business Media Club see  CGM Business Media Club or contact us on info@chrisgreenmedia.co.uk or call 01905 453908.

Chris Green is CGM’s managing director and is an award-winning author and broadcaster.

CGM provides a range of media and communications training courses. For more details, see CGM media training courses.