There’s a lot of flutter and angst around employee engagement and the latest trend of employee experience. Questions abound on everything from how to measure engagement on through to how to improve employee experience, leading to the ultimate dilemma: is it really worth the effort? Do happy employees actually improve the bottom line? For those of us who care about …
Should work be more fun?
Do you bounce out of bed every morning, eager to get to work? Congratulations, if so. And if so, I’ll hazard a guess that either you have a great boss, or you work for yourself. (Or maybe both, eh?) But for a lot of people – an awful lot of people – work isn’t much fun at all. I’m not talking …
Should we ever ask why?
In my last post, I made the point that “why” questions can sound accusing and put people on the defensive – especially if the situation is tense to begin with. And that’s true. But this doesn’t mean you should never ask “why” questions. Sometimes they’re the exact right question to ask. In fact, sometimes “why?” is a really important question to …
Does your team lie to you?
Whoa – did I really ask that? Here’s the thing: we teach people, including our teams, colleagues, and family and friends, to lie to us all the time. Here are three examples. “I don’t like it when you say / tell me {whatever it is}.” Think about times when you’ve heard this. Does it make you reluctant to tell them …
Do you believe Gallup?
A few months ago, Gallup came out with a rather stern report called “State of the American Manager: analytics and advice for leaders.” (You can download a copy here.) In it, they basically claim that yes, indeed, the old saying “Leaders are born, not made” is true. I quote: They go on to say that two out of the remaining nine …
Why be a leader?
If you don’t want to be a leader, then don’t. Seriously. Find some other way to excel in your profession, career, and life. Leaders who don’t enjoy leading – what with the stress, endless subjective gray areas, and quirky people – aren’t ever going to be good leaders. More to the point, they (not to mention the people on their teams) …
It’s February. How are those goals coming?
We start out with a bang in January, all revved up by the sparkly clean untouched New Year. I don’t know about you, but by the middle of February, I’m usually a bit stunned by (a) how can it already be mid-February?, and (b) yikes. I’m not getting done what I meant to get done. This year, I’m happy to …
Interview: Asking for Money!
Whenever I have a chance to talk with Beth Buelow, one of my favorite podcast hosts as well as one of my all-round favorite people, I’m tempted to learn how to turn cartwheels just so I can express my excitement more completely. (No, clearly I was never a cheerleader…!) So yes, I was absolutely delighted to return to her show …
What’s the #1 problem for new managers?
In an informal (but remarkably conclusive) survey I conducted last year, I asked a group of senior leaders, mid-level managers, and executive coaches one simple question: What is the single biggest challenge you see for recently-promoted first-line managers and leaders? The answers were 100% the same – and 100% not what I expected. Without hesitation, every one of them said: …
Did you fall for “go big or go home”?
The Internet wants you to set BHAGs – Big Hairy Audacious Goals. Dream big or don’t bother. Shoot for the stars. Follow your passion. It’s great to have a big dream. But it’s not enough. It doesn’t stop there – because if it does stop there, you won’t get started, which means you’ll never get where you want to go. …