Informed Decisions
Video Library

Considering working with us? Get a fuller sense of our insights,  experience, and style, with these virtual presentations, hot-seats, and audience Q&As.

Join our upcoming Informed Decisions Podcast

Get the pulse on topical issues and hear practical solutions in our monthly small group webinars for leaders.
Format: 15-20 minute presentation followed by your Q&A (no cost, just bring your questions).

Achieving Work-Life Balance
for Leaders and their Teams

Wednesday, August 7 at 12 noon ET

Is achieving “balance” your New Year's Resolution – every year? Are you tired of Work-Life Balance training that only deals with stress and time management at the personal level, and ignores issues of leadership, or productivity?  And the practical “real-life” pressures that we all encounter? Finally, is there a better way to balance work and life – and succeed in both?

Join Randall Craig as he challenges the conventional wisdom, and provides specific, action-oriented guidance on how you can define a balance that powers your career – yet still gives you a life.

Topics will include:
•  Understanding of the seven dimensions of balance.  
•  Defining your own desired balance  
•  Techniques to help broaden your focus  while performing.
•  Reality check: How do you avoid burn out?  
•  Balance issues when leading a team:
• And Is it really a work vs life question?

Pricing Strategy for
Service Businesses

Tuesday, September 3 at 12 noon ET

Set your price too high, and you will price yourself out of the market, and out of business. Set your price too low, and your margins will suffer, and so will your business. So getting it right is critical.

Setting your fees is supposedly more art than science - but it need not be. In today’s session, we’re going to explore how to getting it right: the strategies, and the tactical parameters.

These are just some of the pricing questions organizations are constantly revisiting.
•  “Are my prices too low… or too high?”
•  “Is it too soon to raise my fees?”
•  “How to I justify my rates?…. And should I have to?”

In this session, we’re going to:  
•  Demystify pricing strategies,
•  Explore the tactical parameters, and  
•  Get clear on the value your organization offers. 

Praise for Informed Decisions

"Really insightful. There are things I  hadn't onsidered. I though it was great and I appreciate it." -Darla Wright

"I was incredibly impressed how you made the whole thing a constant
learning process – so valuable." –Jason Croft

"I want to thank you very much Randall, and Ronja for your facilitating.
A lot of stuff percolating over here so I really appreciate it." –Randall Ettinger

"Brilliant insights, thank you!" –Donald Cooper

"Thank you for the ideas and tips!" –Kayce Halstead

"Great session!" –Nicole Blankenship

"I've enjoyed the discussion, this was good, thank you." –Jerry Cukier

"Great guidance on what's important." –John DiBenedetto

"Thank you, good information." –David Barned

Replay Informed Decisions Presentations and Q&As

Leadership: Building Leadership Capacity

In this session we explore high-performance leadership.As a leader, you motivate and set expectations for everyone within your organization… But what about
•  For yourself?
•  For your partners?
•  And for your leadership team? Let's talk about it.
Continuing our discussion of high-performance leadership:
•  Using accountability to drive leadership performance
•  Better leadership, better relationships, better results,
•  Giving (and receiving) feedback from your partner(s)
•  Board relationships, and much more.
Last part of our discussion on high-performance leadership:
•  The role of outside advisors,
•  What to do when things are not going well,
•  And how to take ego out of the equation…
All of this and more in this episode.
Advisory boards are huge in private companies, but many still don’t have one in place. 
Some leaders are unclear on how to set one up, but recognize there is a need for on-demand advice. What then?
Here is an insightful hour on how to leverage an advisory board to take your company’s growth to new heights. 
This topic is for leaders in their role as mentors and role models.
•  How important is executive presence, and how much should it play into your hiring process?
•  Your succession planning? Or management training, Branding, Marketing, and HR considerations?
•  And for you as a leader, are there things that you can do to improve – or update your executive presence?
In this session, we continue the discussion on how executive presence plays into:
•  Age,
•  Gender,
•  Geography and much more.
It seems that everywhere you turn, everyone is a coach. 
In this session, we aim to demystify the coaching industry: 
•  How do you find the right coach for you? 
•  How do you get the best results? 
•  What is the difference between a consultant and a coach and where does pricing fit in? 
Continue to dig into coaching approaches and how to get value from your business coaching relationships: 
•  The good and bad reasons why people discontinue with their business coaches,
•  Understanding coaching fees,
•  Group coaching, Industry regulations, and more.
This session will address delegation as a lever for business growth, and why it holds the key to being more effective in an age of hybrid work and rapid growth. Concepts discussed:
•  Proper way of delegating,
•  Obstacles and flip side of delegation,
•  Impact of delegating to managers and employees,
•  Setting boundaries and expectations, and much more.

Strategy: Strategic inputs and new concepts

After many years of success, things are not working the way they used to. Or… You’re a start-up looking for product-market fit. Or… an opportunity presents itself, and you need to decide whether to stay the course – or jump on the opportunity. 
These situations all have to do with “The Pivot”. In this Leadership Insight episode, we’ll explore:
 Why, When, and How to make the high-stakes pivot decision, and insights into doing it successfully.
We continue with more topics on pivoting your organization. Topics include...
•  What data do you use to make your decisions (and where does "gut" play it)?
•  Is it time to make significant change during times of challenge, or should you batten down the hatches?
•  When do you change the current business versus starting a new business vs launch a flanker brand?
In this session we’ll share some very different strategies and non-traditional approaches that leaders can use to recession-proof their business. (And to preserve cash.) The question is one of cash:
•  What can you do to preserve it? 
•  How do you cut your burn rate, while still investing in critical areas? 
•  And when things are very tight, what things can you do, right now, to “find” needed cashflow? 
The opportunities offered by generative AI (i.e., ChatGPT) are extraordinary.
We see leaders experimenting with (free) AI tools in order to (mostly) save time on writing or editing.
But as a leader, do you feel you’ve cracked the nut on leveraging it to actually grow your organization?
Sounds reasonable, certainly — but can you use it to fundamentally change your business? And what about protecting your business from the risks?
This session aims to provide new perspectives on how to incorporate greater efficiencies into your operations and processes so that your growth will be smoother – and faster. Topics include:
•  Business management processes,
•  Improving productivity,
•  Getting the right people in the right seats and much more shared by Randall in this episode!

Marketing: Efficiency, engagement, and growth

One of the biggest drivers of business growth is Digital Strategy.
Yes, you may already have a website, email, social media, marketing automation, and a CRM. 
The fundamental question is whether your digital investments are yielding the results that you expect... Is there a better way?
Listen in to hear how we approach our digital strategy and inbound marketing.

People: Getting the most from your team, personal development

Learn practical tools and strategies to turn your corporate culture into one that retains and attracts talent, drives your business, and improves the quality of your deliverables.
•  How “good” is your corporate culture? Is it high-performing? 
•  Is it fully in sync with your external brand? 
•  No matter where your culture is now, is there a way to do better?
For many organizations, hybrid and work-from-home are here to stay, but how can leaders build a strong culture, and ensure that team members are accountable when they're not in the office?
Part of this is developing new standards for communication, collaboration, and engagement. Most of it is sharing with managers new tools and techniques to do their job: management.
Listen in to learn more, and pick up some practical tips that can help.
This session discusses alternative CPD/CE delivery methods.
•  Learn about the pros and cons of various training options, when you should offer training altogether, and new ideas on generating alignment while upskilling your team.
•  Have you considered the impact if everyone had access to all of the training, throughout the year?  
•  And have you considered moving from a “random webinar” approach, to a more integrated offering?
Learn about the pros and cons of various training options, when you should offer training altogether, and new ideas on generating alignment while upskilling your team.
•  Does your training investment really generate results and is it aligned with your strategy?
•  Does the training reinforced throughout the organization, or is it a disconnected “one-and-done” exercise?

Business Development

Topics include:
•  Growing your firm through thought leadership.
•  Navigating the time investment required to create thought leadership vs the pressures of billable hours.
•  The shared responsibilities of Marketing, HR, and IT in the bus dev process, and
•  Business development training opportunities for professional services.
Topics include:
•  Client experience, client touch points, and referrals,
•  New geographies, virtual offices, and cultural fit with clients,
•  The Price/Expertise/Trust Model,
•  Business development goals, accountability, and IP and thought leadership within the bus dev  process.
Topics include:
•  DEI, ESG, and other trends on bus dev.
•  How to measure the success of your business development initiatives, and when change may be needed?
•  How might an emphasis on (or lack thereof on) in-house training investment impact the firm brand?
•  Is the juice worth the squeeze when it comes to your bus dev investments?
Topics include:
•  As you close up Q4, are there specific things that you can do to ramp up business growth for next year?
•  Are you open to new ideas that can make the difference between real success?
•  And are there important market changes that you can capitalize on moving forward?
•  How can you set the tone for a productive December?

Curious? Questions? Interested in exploring the possibilities?

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