For this month’s edition of Talent Management magazine, I was invited to contribute a guest editorial. The piece I wrote is entitled “The Science of Engagement.” You can read it at this link to Talent Management’s digital magazine or below.
Category Archives: E Pluribus Partners
Relationship Failure at Microsoft
An article appearing in The New York Times entitled “Microsoft’s Creative Destruction” makes it clear that the company has big problems stemming from internal rivalries. We teach that organizations that sustainable superior performance = task excellence + relationship experience. So often organizations die because the failure to achieve relationship excellence sabotages task excellence. Keep that in mind when you read the article and it will become clear that Microsoft is heading down that path.
Boost Productivity, Innovation: New Program with Linkage
Jason Pankau and I recently teamed up with Linkage to offer a course on our book, Fired Up or Burned Out: How to Reignite Your Team’s Passion. Creativity and Productivity. The course includes video with supporting participant and facilitator guides. Here is a backgrounder on the program entitled Fired Up Leadership to Boost Productivity and Innovation.
Employee Engagement: Beryl Companies
One of my favorite business books is Paul Spiegelman’s Why Is Everyone Smiling?. Spiegelman is the CEO of Beryl Companies, a call center outsource company for the healthcare industry. On March 24-25 I’ll be moderating a session at the Conference Board’s Customer Experience Management Conference in New York City where Paul will be speaking. You can learn more about the conference at this link. And be sure to check out the above webcast I hosted with Paul.
Re-connecting on Capital Hill
The New York Times columnist Mauren Dowd describes President Obama’s effort to reconnect with Republicans at this link. This is a form of the “Knowledge Flow Session” I write about in my book in chapters 11 and 12. You can read about it at this link.
Employee Engagement: Why Now, More Than Ever
Reading this article in The New York Times about the mood in New Orleans now that its football team, the Saints, is in the Super Bowl, got me thinking about employee engagement. The article identifies a factor that has boosted the morale of New Orleans residents. It is a factor that has a positive impact on employee morale, too. What is it?
Jobs, Apple: What’s at their Core?
LiveMint/The Wall Street Journal in India asked me to comment on why Steve Jobs and Apple have been so successful. In an interview entitled “‘Think Different’ is What Makes Apple Stand Out,” I shared that it is more than the beauty and functional excellence of Apple’s products that make the firm so successful. Apple’s inspiring identity plays an important role too. (Above is a video of the original “Think Different” television ad.)
Employee Engagement Conversation w/Michael Bungay Stanier
It was my good fortune to be a guest on Michael Bungay Stanier’s Great Work podcast interviews series to discuss employee engagement and leadership. Michael is the founder and Senior Partner of Box of Crayons, a firm that provides coaching and training services to organizations. He authored the book Do More Great Work and writes the Great Work blog. I find Michael so knowledgeable and interesting. He was the 2006 Canadian Coach of the Year, a Rhodes Scholar at Oxford University, holds a Masters of Philosophy from Oxford, and law and arts degrees with highest honors from the Australian National University. You can listen to our conversation at this link.
Cancer Changed Me In Unexpected Ways
Six years ago this month, while standing in a hospital waiting room with my mother-in-law and my two young daughters nearby, I began having a hard time breathing. My wife Katie’s surgery for ovarian cancer had gone beyond three hours. I knew that normally it shouldn’t have taken that long and I started imagining something had gone wrong. Before too long, the surgeon entered the waiting room and walked toward me. “Katie has ovarian cancer and it has spread. I’m sorry,” he told me. Today, six years later, Katie is cancer free and her doctors at Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center told us they believe it is highly unlikely that she would have a recurrence at this point.
That season in our lives changed me in expected and unexpected ways, including how I view organizations and the workplace. I wrote an essay about it entitled Alone No Longer that was published as an Amazon Short. Each year around the anniversary of Katie’s surgery, I offer a free download of Alone No Longer at this link. I hope you’ll take the time to download and read it, then reflect on its application to your life. The essay has been especially popular with people who want to know how they can help family members or friends with a serious illness. If you know of someone who might benefit from reading Alone No Longer, please pass it along with my best wishes.