Donald Trump’s approach to leadership saddens me, never more so than when he shoved past the Montenegro president at a NATO meeting. If you missed this you might like to check out the short video below. This behaviour would be inappropriate in a schoolyard, it would be inappropriate in a workplace and it is highly […]
How Teams Can Embrace Positive Conflict
Conflict is a bad thing for a team, right? No, not right. Quite wrong actually. Show me a team where everyone always agrees and I’ll show you a team that’s falling a long way short of its potential. When teams avoid conflict these are some of the results: Growth and improvement will be limited, […]
7 Tips For Surviving Promotions
Congratulations …… you’ve been promoted! You’ve been hoping for this chance for some time and you’re very excited about the new challenges and increased responsibilities the role is going to give you. More money in your pay will also be very welcome. The day comes to start and you take up your position at […]
Small Gestures of Appreciation
Last week I facilitated a workshop to help a management team examine its functioning and consider some ways to improve. It was a real pleasure to work with this team. The conversation was rich, all participants contributed actively, and the session set a useful platform for the team to grow together. The next day, […]
Continuous Learning for Continuous Improvement
Continuous improvement is essential for any modern organisation. Without it customers will go elsewhere, competitors will gain market share, good employees will be lost and the organisation will be at risk of failure. I’m convinced that there can be no continuous improvement in organisations without a continuous learning culture, and I believe there are 3 keys […]
Starting Team Meetings with a Human Moment
Here’ a question for you if you’re a manager or a team leader. How do you spend the first 5 minutes of your your weekly/ fortnightly team meetings? We get straight down to serious business (e.g. we share project status updates) We talk about something work related but fairly light (e.g. we share good […]
Reframing For a Better, Brighter Picture
Recently my daughter Audrey was a bit concerned about something she needed to do at school. She told me she felt nervous. We talked about this for a while and I asked her what might be a different way to think about what she was going to be doing. After a while she looked […]
How Not to Treat Workers Like Robots
Automation has enabled modern organisations to make giant leaps forward. This has led to significant benefits such as improved reliability, greater accuracy, faster results and reduced costs. However, with automation comes a risk – that the people who work in organisations may begin to feel like robots rather than the real live human beings they are. To feel human […]
How to Safely Remove an Elephant From a Room
We all know the term “the elephant in the room”. This phrase usually refers to a serious issue that everyone knows about but doesn’t acknowledge or mention because it’s difficult to discuss or deal with. Examples of elephants hanging about in rooms are all around us. I bet some of these sound familiar: […]