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Alan O'Neill

Speaker on change management, corporate culture and customer experience

About

Gender: Male
Nationality:
Languages: English
Travels from: Ireland
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Biography Highlights

  • The secret to growing profit? A thriving company culture with customer experience at its heart. Alan’s expertise and 30 years’ experience can steer your company through the change to make it happen. Enthusiastic and down-to-earth, Alan can share his hard-won insight from helping global giants to grow profit, from Selfridge’s to Suzuki and from Emirates Insurance to Swedbank.

Biography

Meet Alan O’Neill

Learn the secret of Selfridges’ success from the man whose 7-Steps to Profit programme stimulated growth for the department store from £45 million profit to £200 million in a few short years. Now Selfridges has received multiple awards as the ‘Best Department Store in the World’. Alan’s 7-Steps to Profit has also transformed the fortunes of other iconic brands such as Toyota, Getty Images, Harrods, aafaq Islamic Finance, Primark, Intel and Moet Chandon.

Alan can guide your team through his structured path to profit increase, tailoring his insight to the needs of your business. Wherever you are on your journey, Alan’s no-nonsense expertise, infectious enthusiasm and sheer depth of experience can reignite your company’s passion for growth.

Known for his relentless focus on putting people first, Alan truly understands the direct link between a thriving company culture and improved commercial results. Alan can help your team to identify your unique culture as a company and use this to give you maximum competitive advantage.

A seasoned expert in facilitating organisational change in culture and strategy, Alan can help your team to navigate any stormy waters and overcome resistance. His tried-and-tested formula will help you transform your business to deliver the meaningful experiences your customers crave.

Practical, empathic and very commercial, Alan’s refreshing and passionate style will inspire and challenge your organisation to embrace change and grow, using real-life business models and memorable success stories.

Alan brings 30 years of wide industry experience, from retail to manufacturing and distribution, FMCG to financial services, hospitality to professional services, motor to travel and tourism and more. His work history spans blue-chips and PLCs, SMEs, family businesses and the Public Sector across Europe, the Middle East and Asia.

Navigating a post-Covid economy

In our post-Covid world, Alan supports organisations in person and online, to get a clear head and develop recovery plans to ensure a speedy return to our new normal. He can offer physical, virtual or hybrid meetings – tailoring his approach to suit your business challenges.

Alan’s accomplishments

  • Three-times published author with Premium is the New Black, Culture Matters, and Show Me the Lid on the Box.
  • Business columnist with leading newspapers and several business and trade magazines in the Gulf
  • The 7-Steps to Profit process has been used by iconic global brands such as Toyota, Getty Images, Primark, Intel and more.

Videos

Topics

What is it that has made famous global organisations such powerful and successful organisations in their respective fields? What are their secrets to success?

They all have one thing in common and it’s not that difficult! They all follow a very structured path to excellence that Alan describes as The 7-Steps to Profit. Alan’s 7-steps to Profit is adapted from the secrets of the global giants and has already helped countless businesses around the world.

Wherever you are in your journey, Alan can inspire your team with great and practical ideas, taken from The 7-Steps to Profit.

Available: Virtually

Everyone knows that culture eats strategy for breakfast. And if you get your culture right, you can take on the world. While others can copy your strategy – no one can copy your culture so it’s vital that you exploit that competitive edge. Alan will share what it will take to achieve a high-performance culture for your organisation.

Alan can ask hard questions about your culture, your values and the engagement of your own people – and encourage you to take a fresh look at your own organisation culture.

Available: Virtually

As globalisation enables transparent comparisons and technology enables fast copying, how to differentiate from your competition is becoming more challenging. Product alone won’t cut it anymore as customer experience has become the new battleground. He wrote the book on it! Premium is the New Black (Put the Customer at the Heart of all Decision-making).

Alan is passionate about customer service. He can tell you how to develop a culture of great service from the board-room to the front-line – whether you’re B2C, B2B or Public Service. He knows that customer service has to be practical and drive sales – and it requires a fully engaged workforce. While that’s obvious and sounds easy, we don’t all do it. He will challenge you with examples, evidence and case studies to help you achieve consistency and to motivate your people into action to increase your sales.

Available: Virtually

From food to fashion, luxury to mass, big box to multiple site and travel retail to the high street, Alan has consulted with countless retailers for over 20 years.

 

Retail is changing rapidly and becoming even more complex. On-line for example, has completely disrupted the industry and has risen significantly throughout C-19. Coping with all that is an ongoing challenge – even for the best. However, blame for the alleged ‘retail apocalypse’ is too easily and frivolously attributed to the growth in on-line.

In actual fact, there’s more to it than that. It’s more like Retail Darwinism in front of our eyes. Bricks and mortar retailing is not dying. But bad retailing IS dying. Those organisations that are not embracing the changes around them, redefining customer-experience and investing appropriately, will continue to
struggle.

Alan can reveal to you the secrets of the successful retailers in a way that you can learn from and adapt for your business. Selfridges in particular is an amazing success story, winning the award for best department store in the world, three times. Alan can share his insights and how he supported them to achieve their ambition.

Available: Virtually

Change is a reality for all and it comes at us in many ways. Covid-19 is a significant example. But be careful, history shows that a small number of change programmes succeed. Your people will either enable it, or obstruct it.

Alan knows what it takes to drive change in a business. Across industry, he has led and facilitated many blue-chip companies through change and overcoming resistance. With case studies tailored for you, he will share the pitfalls and strategies for managing change, overcoming resistance and help you to land key messages for your business.

Available: Virtually

Premium brands traditionally command higher prices. But the downturn caused prices to drop in several sectors. Low prices are usually not sustainable and as the market returns to growth, the legacy of ‘value’ prevails.

Alan can inspire your team with tools, great stories and confidence to sell added value and achieve better margin again.

Available: Virtually

Books

SHOW ME THE LID ON THE BOX: How to Manage Change with Least Resistance

Embark on a transformative journey with “Show Me the Lid on the Box: How to Manage Change with Least Resistance” by Alan O’Neill, a visionary change management consultant with over three decades of experience transforming iconic brands like Selfridges, Emirates Insurance and Toyota. This insightful book is a vital addition to the K.I.S.S. Insights series, unveiling the keys to successful change management in today’s dynamic business landscape. O’Neill draws a compelling analogy between a puzzle’s evolving picture and an organization’s development, emphasizing that as the lid of the box changes, so should the pieces within. Failure to engage employees in this transformation often results in futile attempts to fit outdated strategies to new paradigms—a recipe for frustration and the fallacy of ‘people resist change’. Through his tried-and-tested model, O’Neill deftly navigates readers through the complexities of change, offering practical strategies to avoid common pitfalls. Packed with punchy, actionable insights set in a workbook-style format, this book adheres to the series’ ethos of keeping it short and simple while providing timeless, invaluable concepts for effective change management. Whether you’re a seasoned executive or a budding entrepreneur, “Show Me the Lid on the Box” is your compass for steering through change with agility and minimum resistance, empowering you to sculpt the future success of your organization.

Read more..

SHOW ME THE LID ON THE BOX: How to Manage Change with Least Resistance

Embark on a transformative journey with "Show Me the Lid on the Box: How to Manage Change with Least Resistance" by Alan O'Neill, a visionary change management consultant with over three decades of experience transforming iconic brands like Selfridges, Emirates Insurance and Toyota. This insightful book is a vital addition to the K.I.S.S. Insights series, unveiling the keys to successful change management in today's dynamic business landscape. O'Neill draws a compelling analogy between a puzzle's evolving picture and an organization's development, emphasizing that as the lid of the box changes, so should the pieces within. Failure to engage employees in this transformation often results in futile attempts to fit outdated strategies to new paradigms—a recipe for frustration and the fallacy of 'people resist change'. Through his tried-and-tested model, O'Neill deftly navigates readers through the complexities of change, offering practical strategies to avoid common pitfalls. Packed with punchy, actionable insights set in a workbook-style format, this book adheres to the series' ethos of keeping it short and simple while providing timeless, invaluable concepts for effective change management. Whether you're a seasoned executive or a budding entrepreneur, "Show Me the Lid on the Box" is your compass for steering through change with agility and minimum resistance, empowering you to sculpt the future success of your organization.

Culture Matters: The Four ‘Must-have’ Values to Supercharge Your Business

In Culture Matters: The Four ‘Must-have’ Values to Supercharge Your Business, Alan O’Neill makes an overwhelming case for organisational culture and health eclipsing all other matters. After all, a carefully designed culture presents any organisation with the foundation for differentiation and success. Drawing on his extensive experience consulting with global companies, Alan cleverly weaves the learning into an easy-to-absorb modern business fable. Set on the beautiful River Shannon in Ireland, prepare to be mesmerised with relevant real-life examples that will inspire you to refresh your culture. This book shows how to achieve sustainable growth. Its far-reaching impact extends to all types of organisations, business schools, and career-minded individuals.

Read more..

Culture Matters: The Four ‘Must-have’ Values to Supercharge Your Business

In Culture Matters: The Four ‘Must-have’ Values to Supercharge Your Business, Alan O’Neill makes an overwhelming case for organisational culture and health eclipsing all other matters. After all, a carefully designed culture presents any organisation with the foundation for differentiation and success. Drawing on his extensive experience consulting with global companies, Alan cleverly weaves the learning into an easy-to-absorb modern business fable. Set on the beautiful River Shannon in Ireland, prepare to be mesmerised with relevant real-life examples that will inspire you to refresh your culture. This book shows how to achieve sustainable growth. Its far-reaching impact extends to all types of organisations, business schools, and career-minded individuals.

Premium Is the New Black: In a World of Dynamic Change Put Customer Experience at the Heart of Your Decision-Making

Successful organizations recognize that excellence in customer experience is the new way to differentiate. It is the next great battleground. Ordinary’ customer service is simply not good enough. Drawing on his work with household name brands over twenty years, O’Neill outlines his advice in a highly structured and easy-to-read way – using real-life examples and insights gained in the marketplace. The lessons learnt from working with some of the best global brands are shared in this book, which can be applied to all industries in B2C, B2B and the public sector. The key principle of this practical guide is how to ensure customers of all business types get great experiences consistently – making them more likely to buy from that business repeatedly and become strong advocates for that brand.

Read more..

Premium Is the New Black: In a World of Dynamic Change Put Customer Experience at the Heart of Your Decision-Making

Successful organizations recognize that excellence in customer experience is the new way to differentiate. It is the next great battleground. Ordinary' customer service is simply not good enough. Drawing on his work with household name brands over twenty years, O'Neill outlines his advice in a highly structured and easy-to-read way - using real-life examples and insights gained in the marketplace. The lessons learnt from working with some of the best global brands are shared in this book, which can be applied to all industries in B2C, B2B and the public sector. The key principle of this practical guide is how to ensure customers of all business types get great experiences consistently - making them more likely to buy from that business repeatedly and become strong advocates for that brand.

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