Het Zakelijke Hart

English

My core message in English: how I can and love to support you.

Madeleine Boerma

I speak English fluently after a 25+ year career in international business and with a university and teaching degree in the English language. My LinkedIn profile is mainly in English by the way and you can find it here.

Madeleine Boerma
Logo rode hart

I started my own business in 2001 and took on the company name Het zakelijke hart in 2015. It combines business & heart aka heartcore results. It’s all about remembering at all times that it’s individual people that drive teamwork, effectiveness and success in business. 

Het zakelijke hart

Three kinds of services

I offer three kinds of services:

  1. Coaching for independent professionals who are breadwinners ~ do you have to turn over enough to make a living? And do you at the same time wish to realise your dreams, vision and plans in a sustainable manner? 
  2. Coaching for SME-business owners & their team(s) ~ Are you growing exponentially, dealing with merges and acquisitions, or, reversely, possibly dealing with issues in your team(s), dilemmas and outside influences that you have no control over? And in the meantime you wish to be a good leader doing the right things? 
  3. Process, project and program management ~ Know your company & influence its results: bring about results that matter in a more efficient, effective and pleasant manner.

Clients

I like to work with ambitious independent professionals who are breadwinners and SME-owners and their team(s): you are the decision-maker yet open to reflection and dialogue and you know that change starts with yourself; and that you’ll achieve more if you team up rather than go at it alone. You want to achieve results while at the same remaining true to your authentic self, having sincere internal and external dialogues and while treasuring our ecosystem.

Table of Contents

An exceptionally communicative and excellent project/program manager with great stakeholder management skills.

Client questions

Coaching for Independent professionals

Questions that I can help you with are related to personal development & leadership in relation to your entrepreneurship and managing your company and team(s). Ranging from questions around translating your ideas and wishes into executable plans, creating healthy financial plans, wanting to do more with your talents, changing your line of business or dealing with issues such as perfectionism, procrastination or more traumatic self sabotaging mechanisms. But also in case of visionary chaos and inability to manage your time and balance out your work and life at the same time etcetera. 

Coaching for SME-business owners & team(s)

Challenges that I can help you with on a personal level are how to lead your team through change and align them to a shared new vision, increase your flexibility as a leader and how to invite feedback on your own leadership. Re your team(s), e.g. help you deal with cultural issues, install dialogue mechanisms that ensure all voices are heard but also, to interview your staff to understand what is going on. 

Process, project and program management

I identify three phases in the three P’s: processes, projects and programs: start, stuck and Safe. And I can help you in all three phases. In my Dutch ebook Leiderschap in Projectmanagement (Leadership in Project management), I explain my SAFE-methodoloy.

SAFE being an acronym for your Strategy, Acceptance, Faith and Effectiveness in any of the P’s. There is a big difference between leading or managing a project. Understand the difference and it will help you deliver results that matter and that are sustainable in the long run. 

My experience

I am a practical, result-oriented & relationship-conscious coach, process, project and program manager.

  • All-round hands-on 25+ yrs of experience with process, project and team management for SME’s and (inter)national enterprises.
  • Project & program management: from office move of 80+ people & technical infrastructure to implementation of IT Helpdesk and on site support function, from management of business games to implementations of ERP and IT service management solutions including training and communication to (user)communities from small teams to over 4000+ employees.
  • Process management: core business processes such as Sales, Billing, Customer Care, IT, Service Delivery and Service Assurance etc. From development to deployment and including training and auditing.
  • Coaching & Team management: from national & international, multi-cultural, cross-functional and including vendors and customers to independent professionals.
  • Various customer service industries: telecommunications, archiving, car leasing, engineering
  • Over 7+ years of experience in the energy transition, mainly as a volunteer including co-founder of and chairing local Energy Cooperative, initiating local Climate Agreement, challenging local businesses to take action and interviewing them on the steps they took for publication in our local newspaper.

Training

I’ve enjoyed training in hard and soft skills such as:

  • Program Management – MSP© or Managing Successful Programmes
  • Process Management – AT&T PQMI, Process Quality Management & Improvement
  • Project Management – KepnerTregoe
  • ISO 9001
  • Deep Democracy: Level 1-3
  • Inner Family: as coach and consultant working with archetypal qualities
  • Family & Organisation constellation facilitator (Hellinger method)
  • Coaching, NLP, Talking Stick dialogue and various healing methods etc.
  • Bushcraft, learning to live in the woods

Types of projects or programs

Let me explain the three different challenges that I can support you with in more detail: Start, Stuck and Safe.

START

Do you have projects where you could do with (more) clarity on its vision, strategy, blueprint, values, outputs, outcomes and benefits? Where it is crucial that you start with a good team spirit and clarity on the drives, wants and needs to all stakeholders? Looking for support in setting up your plans or in gaining stakeholder buy-in?

Do you know:

  • why this project has to happen?
  • what this project has to realise?
  • which internal and external stakeholders require what benefits?
  • how your project contributes to the company strategy?
  • whether you have the right people on the bus?
  • what senior management, sponsors etc. want and whether your project is truly supported?
  • whether you will meet with resistance in the organisation or your team?
  • whether all stakeholders have said what needs to be said and known about your project?
  • whether your budget is sufficient?
  • what values are critical to make this project a success?
  • whether all team members have faith in the project and its required outcome? Etc.

I can help you with

  • Interviewing stakeholders
  • Defining project benefits
  • Reviewing plans
  • Facilitating decision-making process
  • Eliciting project values
  • Facilitate dialogue with senior management
  • Facilitate kick-off etc.

STUCK

Has your project run aground? Suffering from delays, conflicts and under pressure to deliver? Hard to meet planning, budget, stakeholder buy-in expectations?

Do you know:

  • when your project got stuck?
  • what is the main root cause for getting stuck?
  • whether all stakeholders agree on the current status quo?
  • how much it is costing you to be stuck?
  • what your project has delivered till now?
  • what kind of approach is required to get it back on track?
  • whether all involved people still want to be on your project?
  • what senior management really wants from you and your project?
  • whether the project was every truly accepted?
  • whether the project plan was followed and if not, why not?
  • what your personal influence has been on getting stuck?
  • etcetera.

I can help you with:

  • Auditing project process to date
  • Facilitating conflict-resolution
  • Interviewing stakeholders
  • Facilitating 1-on-1 or team dialogues
  • Validating project values
  • Provide coaching
  • Facilitating project restart

Of all the things I've done, the most vital is coordinating the talents of those who work for us and pointing them toward a certain goal.

SAFE

Do you want to be successful with your project from day one and achieve end-to-end sustainable results that matter?

Walt Disney’s quote highlights something that I strongly support: organisations have most if not all required project management and leadership talents and skills in-house. The only thing required is that every single individual is taken seriously and able to contribute with her or his talents in the right manner. How to have everyone work together as effectively and efficiently as is possible is the key question when it comes to managing successful projects.

Successful project management requires good project leadership. Good project leadership requires a 360-degree view on the project at hand. Learn how to use the SAFE-approach to ensure your projects deliver right first time benefits to all relevant stakeholders.

I can and love to:

  • support your project from start-to-finish while at the same time training you or one of your staff in the SAFE-approach so you can do it yourself from then on.

Drivers

Our ability to respond

Every day, we make choices based on feelings, thoughts, past experiences and beliefs. We live a continuously faster changing world. How future-proof is your mindset? I believe that our ability to respond or our response-ability, is the differentiating factor to what the kind of world we create together. How capable are you and I in our response to what happens inside ourselves as a result of these changes? And to what happens to our environment, ways of doing global business, in our communities and in our own companies?

Sustainability 

We have to make more sustainable choices. We’ve past the point of no return. Those of us ignoring the fact that we are not only depleting our natural resources, but also creating havoc in vulnerable ecosystems are turning a blind eye to the truth. And also, as a society we are also dealing with not-so-sustainable polarization situations. Let’s do things differently and from the heart. 

Collective wisdom

Whoever we are, wherever we are & whatever we do, I believe we need to tap into our collective wisdom. If everyone is allowed to contribute his or her unique potential and qualities, we will be successful in creating a world that is a great place for us all. Whatever projects we take on, the outcome depends on our ability to hear and respect all voices, of all living beings.

Leadership

What we focus on is what we get. If we want different results, we need to change our focus. What is our vision? What do we wish to achieve, long term? What approach have we taken and should we be taking? How do we work together and create heartcore results: sustainable results that matter for you, me, our companies and our planet.

Madeleine has a strong intuitive, sensitive, people oriented side as well as an equally developed and powerful business, result-oriented, initiative taking and driving force. She is creative, inquisitive and has a lot of energy.

Values

Courageous

Live from the heart. Feel the fear and do it anyway. In the early 90s I travelled for 2,5 years in the Far and Middle East in the pre-digital days: no email and no smartphones. If I wanted to be in touch with anyone at home, I needed to write a letter or put in a collect call at about $10 per minute. I made many a trip to local General Post Offices to collect letters from dusty shoeboxes behind “Poste Restante” desks. Catching a train in India meant showing up the station hoping the information in my first edition Lonely Planet guidebook was still up to date.

I loved it. I enjoyed and I still do, finding my way in new cultures. Just like getting to know a new team, client and organisation in every new assignment I take on. I have been an entrepreneur for 21 years now and it feels like travelling the globe. In 2015, I wanted to write a book and I took a sabbatical to do so. Pursuing my dream was a courageous move but I needed it: I learn by doing. My book is now published and it feels great. I like to dive into the unknown and make it work, one way or another.

Natural

I love nature and all things natural. I’m passionate about taking more and more sustainable choices, in my personal and professional life. For example, I reduced my plastic garbage within 12 months from 26 bags to 3-4 bags a year.

I co-founded a local energy cooperative in my village in 2014 and worked steadily towards more awareness locally on the need to take more ecologically sound decisions. Also, I take courses in bushcraft, learning all about living in the woods. I believe every step and every action by every individual counts towards local, national and eventually, and hopefully, global change.

Inspirational

I love to read, talk to people and learn about new ways of thinking, be it about personal or professional development. I am always looking for the connection between what I read and hear and how to incorporate this into my life and work.

I am also greatly inspired by people making a difference, pursuing their dreams, and as Brené Brown professor and author puts it in her book Daring Greatly. together is success.

Coming together is the beginning. Keeping together is progress. Working together is success.

Books

Paperback/ebook for independent professionals

2015: published Dutch paperback Het zakelijke hart – ondernemen van binnenuit. Target audience: independent professionals who are breadwinners. Subject: provide both a personal development and a business model to support navigating the desire to realise an entrepreneurial dream alongside the need to make a living. No English version yet.

3D cover paperback Het zakelijke hart
Voorkant ebook Leiderschap in Projectmanagement

2016: published Dutch ebook on importance and relevance of Leadership in project management. Target audience: project sponsors & managers. Can also be applied to program management. Subject: how leadership in project management in today’s world requires totally different skills and tools from management in project management. Includes a number of uncommon tools to increase project performance. Let me know if you’re interested in the English translation which is 80% done. 

eBook on Leadership in project management

Spreek je binnenkort!

Wat leuk dat je met mij van gedachten wilt wisselen. Ik hoor graag waar je het over wilt hebben en zie er naar uit je te spreken. Hartegroet, Madeleine Boerma