There are plenty of ways to annoy our colleagues at work. But there are seven negative behaviours that will fast track this frustration and seven lessons we can learn. 1. Vague and unreliable People who forget what’s important, have mixed priorities and are generally not committed are quickly labelled unreliable. Worse, what they are doing […]
Author at SmartCompany
Our current era may be digital and sexily “disruptive”, but there are undoubtedly widening fault-lines in people’s capacity to cope. One doesn’t even have to step outside the door to perceive how very tightly strung most of us are. Sally Blount in her “Wormhole Decade” piece aptly summarised many of the recent causes. In the wake of […]
Dominic Knight’s critique of LinkedIn’s idiosyncrasies a few weeks ago draws attention to people’s increasing use of LinkedIn as a ‘work version’ of Facebook. Ironically, some are also using Facebook to discuss their business dealings and partnerships. In a recent example, one person’s Facebook post about the break up of his business relationship immediately triggered the other […]
There are articles bubbling everywhere on the importance of developing true grit. This is because an American academic Angela Duckworth has been busy publishing and speaking on her research that effort-PLUS matters more in achieving success than talent or intelligence. In a sense, there’s little new about grit: Thomas Edison affirmed well over a century […]
This indeed is an interesting time to be evaluating leaders and politicians, with the US presidential election heating up, the UK Prime Minister resigning and closer to home, our political stars out to impress in the last few days before the federal election. But have we had enough? Do we turn off easily? Here are seven […]
Last week I wrote about intimidation and bullying. But it is such a critical, often unresolved, issue in schools and workplaces we need to keep the discussion going. The impact of bullying on the brain Neuroscientists studying the impact of bullying on people’s brains have discovered emotional trauma can literally short-circuit people’s ability to recover. Emotional […]
A construction company manager/owner was recently fined $12,500 for appalling bullying and allowing his staff to harass and physically and psychologically abuse a 16-year-old apprentice. The apprentice has suffered emotional trauma and has ongoing anxiety, depression and nightmares. The abuse reportedly included holding hot drill-bits to his skin, scraping sandpaper over his face, making him […]
It isn’t hard to ensure cooperation and trust in a team. Some team leaders don’t need to be told because this all comes naturally. Here are four simple Cs to help you build trust with your team: 1. Communication Be open and honest – because secretiveness is the quickest route to distrust. You know how […]
Mistakes can range from annoying to catastrophic. Few of us want to make them; most of us hate it when we do. Mistakes can prove very costly; emotionally, financially and in terms of life itself. No wonder we feel edgy when doing something out of the norm. But mistakes occur just as often when we’re going […]