Media Spotlight: Loose
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by Martin Thomas
The mortgage market has not had the luxury of being able to flex its wings and experiment with loose management styles much lately. It has been more a case of fighting to survive.
The credit crunch has made many companies streamline their processes and if anything adopt a more strict and organised work structure.
But in his new book, Loose: The Future Of Business Is Letting Go, author Martin Thomas argues that businesses’ reluctance to break from the norm holds them back and sometimes harms them.
He is not completely radical in his views though and stresses that for a loose culture to flourish there still needs to be some form of management structure to allow loose thinking to thrive.
He quotes Shona Brown, a director at Google, who says that “the way to succeed in fast-paced, ambiguous situations is to avoid creating too much structure, but not to add too little either”.
Thomas gives some principles of loose companies, which include operating in a and transparent way with all stakeholders and having a flexible approach to the development and management of prized brand assets.
He uses the example of a Belgian traffic planner who removed most of the traffic lights in his town because he felt they absolved drivers of the need to think for themselves. As a result the town has fewer accidents as people grew more conscious of their driving.
He attacks the regimented and formulated view of the stereotypical Daily Mail reader and says that what often holds businesses back from adopting this type of less structured approach is the criticism they would suffer from society.
He uses the recent example of a couple who allowed their young children to cycle to school alone and were strongly criticised by the media and public for it as not being generally acceptable.
The book focusses on examples from everyday life and although it is a business book, Thomas draws heavily on everyday scenarios to demonstrate his points.
What he is suggesting is nothing new and is more a case of thinking outside the box and being prepared to take risks - something that has been suggested by many marketing gurus before.
A lot of his examples on how to make businesses looser would be hard to adapt to brokering or a mortgage business because they are designed for larger operations.
But having said that, he does offer firms some useful guidelines on how they could embrace negative pubic opinion or address stereotypes in a honest way.
He uses supermarket giant Asda as an example and says that by allowing customers to compare its prices online it opened itself up to criticism but in a constructive way. It might admit to not being the cheapest on some products but accepts this and encourages customers to suggest ways in which it can improve.
This tool could prove useful for brokers struggling against the direct deals on offer from banks.
Thomas writes in an entertaining way and even though it can get a bit choppy as he shifts from one example to another, he keeps it light and condensed.
The book is easy to dip in and out of with an index at the back and concise chapters that you can read on a standalone basis if you are looking for some inspiring words.
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