Friday, Dec. 23 2011 8:58AM
Local business owner writes the book on people skills
By Rob Roberts, rroberts@lsjournal.com
Rob Roberts/The Journal
Kay Saunders, CEO of Bellewether, a Lee’s Summit-based management consulting firm, is pictured with her new book, “Interpersonal Secrets for Professional Success.”
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closeDeveloping good people skills isn’t rocket science, said Kay Saunders, CEO of Bellewether, a Lee’s Summit-based management consulting firm.
But Saunders has found a profitable market – including NASA as a client – for her company’s thorough approach to the topic.
And now, the company has moved into the publishing realm with Saunders’ newly published book, “Interpersonal Secrets for Professional Success.”
According to Saunders, the book includes information collected through years of research by Bellewether, founded in 1994, and the Human Asset Imaging Institute, a subsidiary founded two years ago to develop and market services that increase interpersonal effectiveness.
In the past, the information was shared largely through management consulting, workshops and other types of training, Saunders said. But after detailing her firms’ services for Johnson County Community College officials a couple of years ago, she was told, “We’re getting more and more requests for students to be familiar with interpersonal competencies.”
And then came the question: “Do you have this in the form of a textbook?”
Saunders said “not yet.” Then, over the next year and a half, she completed “Interpersonal Secrets for Professional Success.”
The book, which was edited by Bellewether co-owner Jami Henry and published by the company, has been adopted for a JCCC business class to be offered in January and is being marketed to other colleges and universities for classes starting next fall.
But according to Saunders, the book is also a valuable resource for the business world.
When she founded Bellewether, Saunders said, much of the initial focus was on business processes and procedures. But she soon realized that, regardless of how sound those assets were, businesses sustained losses when their people bickered, didn’t show up on time and didn’t know what to do when they did show up.
Therefore, she developed a workshop series focusing on interpersonal skills such as communication, decision making and problem solving, ethical behavior, interpersonal behavior, self-management, and professionalism.
Kansas City-based J.E. Dunn Construction has hired Bellewether to provide the workshops for its minority- and women-owned subcontractors and suppliers in 11 U.S. markets. And other clients have included Veterans Administration hospitals and federal agencies such as the Federal Emergency Management Agency, the U.S. Department of Agriculture and the Federal Aviation Administration.
Bellewether also was contracted by the U.S. Department of Labor to develop an electronic version of the company’s skills assessment system for use at Job Corps vocational training offices across the country, Saunders said.
“We have a statistically reliable and valid assessment system,” she said.
But before skills can be assessed, they often have to be taught. Saunders’ new book does that, she said, serving as “a guide for anybody who wants to understand how to form positive relationships and get ahead, particularly when they have no direct control or authority.”
When a person doesn’t have direct control, she added, they have to rely on their ability to influence.
“And how do you influence? By the ethical behavior people see in you, by the way you interact with other people, by your communication,” Saunders said.
The guidance provided by her book also is useful among the leadership ranks, Saunders said.
Ask company leaders what they love about their jobs, and most will say it’s providing whatever products or services their companies specialize in, she said. Then ask what they hate, and most will say, “It’s the people.”
Conversely, Saunders said, you can ask a winning coach what he loves, and he or she will undoubtedly tell you, “It’s the people.”
Winning coaches consistently drill home the importance of teamwork, Saunders added, and they see their players as individuals, who respond to different motivations, ranging from positive reinforcement to challenges to threats.
Saunders, who earned an MBA from Rockhurst University and worked in corporate sales before launching her firm, said now is a crucial time for business managers to retool their “players” and for employees to retool themselves so they can more effectively adjust to social and economic changes.
“Certainly, the need for interpersonal skillfulness has never been such an obvious success factor,” she said.
