How you react to commitments — whether they’re to yourself or others — leaves important clues on how to motivate yourself and coach others to motivate you. I love it when coaching clients and professional colleagues recommend new tools that help me understand them (and myself) better. So earlier this year,...
Today's always-on work culture can sometimes feel like we're slacking off if we're not available 24/7. But to be ridiculously efficient, we've got to find ways to rebel against this paradigm, reset expectations and aggressively protect downtime so that we can free up our evenings. What follows is the...
Managers, listen up: micromanagement kills your team's efficiency and will slowly drive you insane. I've prepared a simple four-step plan to help you stop micromanaging and thereby preserve your employees' productivity. 1. Reset expectations. Many managers micromanage because they don't trust their employees to do the job right. What training...
Matthew Swyers wrote an excellent piece for Inc. today about why ultimatums don't work in employer-employee relationships, but all I could think about was how proactive management would eliminate the need for an ultimatum in the first place. Proactive management requires that leaders clearly express expectations -- of an employee's...
Work means different things to everyone, and understanding whether you have a job, a career or a calling represents the first step in assessing your productivity needs. In a piece for Harvard Business Review, Bill Barnett discusses Amy Wrzesniewski's research on employees' various attitudes toward work. Here are my recommendations...
Good morning! This week's Monday Must-Reads turn the lens inward. * How to stay positive at work when you're surrounded by negative people and negative feedback (and read my spin on it here). [The 99 Percent] * There's nothing like a little reverse psychology for a good kick in the pants: How...
