During this Thanksgiving Season, be the role model for recognition and appreciation!

This week is the Thanksgiving Holiday in the United States. It’s a good time for leaders to step back from the hustle and bustle and reflect on how they have thanked their teams for their hard work and contributions. Thanksgiving…

Your employee culture is tangible, measurable and will make or break your strategies!

At a recent leadership workshop I was facilitating, an attendee asked me how I work with executives on “soft issues, such as culture?”  My response was that employee culture is not the soft and squishy stuff that many executives, and…

Leading global teams in Shanghai or Kansas City requires agility! Learn what works…

After an exhilarating flight over the Alps, I landed in Milan, Italy to integrate the human resources department of a recent acquisition. I knew the industry, business and integration strategies, and the key talent. The problem was, I didn’t speak…

360° feedback can make all the difference when paired with development! Learn how…

A general manager I worked closely with confided in me that 360 degree feedback and developmental coaching was the most beneficial development he received and enabled him to move into his general manager role and beyond.  It is too bad…

The drama over the next Speaker of the House gives an unexpected boost to work-life integration

Work-life integration, and the work place flexibility necessary to enable it, received an unexpected boost from Republican Congressman Paul Ryan last week. He announced that if he agreed to be Speaker of the House, it would not be at the…

Traditional Performance Management Doesn’t Work Any More. Try this…

GE, Ford, Microsoft, Hewlett Packard and other well-known companies put “up or out” performance management systems in place in the 1980s. These systems rated employees on results and behaviors, and the ratings were used to make decisions about employee potential. …

The real key to employee retention may surprise you

Last week, TINYpulse, the employee survey and engagement company, released its latest report on retention. Employee engagement in the United States and around the globe has been rather anemic—and for a long time! When Gallup released its State of the…

Can You Make More Profit than the Competition with Good Jobs?

Which stock would you rather have owned for the ten years ending in June, 2013, Costco or Walmart? During those years, Costco stock outperformed Walmart stock by more than 200 percent. Why? I am not a stock expert, but a…

Don’t end up camped on Mount Delusional when implementing strategy!

All executives, human resources leaders and organizational development consultants know that leading change and implementing new strategy is difficult. The empirical research tells us that 70% of company strategies fail. I, like many of you, have depended on change methodologies…