Categories
Brain Science Emotional Intelligence Employee Engagement Leadership Motivation Organisational Culture Teamwork

Praise – the cost-free incentive

What is the best way for a manager to motivate employees? The traditional answer would be to give them a cash bonus, but studies have shown that cash bonuses are becoming less effective. The practice has become so common that most employees now expect it – it’s just a part of their salary expectation. That […]

Categories
Emotional Intelligence Employee Engagement Leadership Motivation Teamwork Values and Behaviours

4 key characteristics of effective leaders

I have spent many years working with, observing, teaching and coaching leaders. I have also heard many stories from employees about leaders they have loved to work for and those they have not enjoyed as much. There are some key themes that I have observed in leaders who are highly effective and get the best […]

Categories
Employee Engagement Leadership Motivation Organisational Culture Teamwork Values and Behaviours

When culture is a killer

I was recently reading the reports of the inquest into the death of a Merrill Lynch intern who suffered an epileptic fit after working for 72 hours straight. The inquest returned a verdict of death from natural causes that “may have been triggered by fatigue” and has sparked debate about intern working conditions in highly […]

Categories
Employee Engagement Leadership Motivation Organisational Culture Teamwork Values and Behaviours

Employee watching – guess the culture!

On a recent trip for a conference, I had lunch with one of my clients at a restaurant in the casino complex. We were discussing organisational culture as we entered the restaurant, so as a learning experience and a bit of fun I asked my client to “guess the culture”. Her observations were: When we […]

Categories
Brain Science Employee Engagement Leadership Motivation Organisational Culture Teamwork

Goal setting – handle with care!

Think back to your early experiences as a manager – your “Management 101 class”. You were probably given some training or direction on goal setting. It was likely a variation on the SMART acronym, and you would have been told that goals are good because having targets motivates people. All good and useful stuff. However… […]

Categories
Change Emotional Intelligence Leadership Mindfulness Motivation reflection

5 reasons leaders need time out!

In working with leaders, and facilitating leadership programs, one of the key things I am hearing is that leaders are increasingly critically time poor. I had the pleasure of spending 2 days recently with a group of women leaders in a program and the key theme that came out was how valuable it was to […]

Categories
Emotional Intelligence Employee Engagement Leadership Motivation Organisational Culture Teamwork Values and Behaviours

Managing conflict at work

Confrontation and conflict between people is as old as…well…people. Any time you have humans operating together there are going to be times when people disagree, don’t get on, have differences of opinion or just plain can’t stand each other! So how should conflict be managed in teams? It is a mistake to think that no […]

Categories
Change Coaching Difficult Conversations

Good boss / bad boss – is it them, or you?

I was reading a LinkedIn discussion recently from someone seeking help for a client who is intimidated by her boss and wanted resources and reading to help. Lots of replies had been posted, mostly along the lines of “bad boss – what needs to be changed is his behaviour”, until someone pointed out that everyone […]