In 1998, Dr. Spencer Johnson published “Who Moved My Cheese,” a business fable that would remain on the New York Times best seller list for almost five years. Its message is as relevant today as it was when it was published over 20 years ago, and it remains a […] Continue Reading…
“Create a company that’s a great place to be from.” (Part II)
We are experiencing an embarrassment of riches in this country . . . sort of. The rate of unemployment in 2018 was just 3.9%. To find a lower rate than that, you’d have to go all the way back to 1969 when it was 3.5%. Good for employees, but […] Continue Reading…
“Create a company that’s a great place to be from.”
Small companies face a unique problem as they try to minimize turnover and hold onto their best and brightest employees. Namely, they don’t have enough places to put them. In practice, it looks like this. A small company hires a young, ambitious person to do a certain job or […] Continue Reading…
Motivation is all about passion. Discover what people are passionate about and you’ll understand what motivates them.
As business people, we invest a lot of time thinking about motivation. How do we get our employees to work more efficiently, effectively, and productively? Since the dawn of commerce, the favorite solution to a motivation problem has been to throw money at it. The most obvious examples of […] Continue Reading…
“We respond to the environments we’re in. If you get the environment right, you get the right behavior.”
Keynote speaker and bestselling author, Simon Sinek, tells a story about an experience he had at the Four Seasons Hotel in Las Vegas. Sinek had stopped at the lobby coffee bar for a cup of coffee, and there he met a barista who was charming, engaging, funny, and just […] Continue Reading…
Leadership is a privilege to better the lives of others.
Strong leadership is crucial to any organization. Whether we’re talking about a commercial enterprise, a civic group, a church congregation, or a military unit, strong leadership is key to its success. But leadership is not a one-size-fits-all proposition . . . there are lots of commonly recognized leadership styles, […] Continue Reading…
A Few Guidelines for Negotiating Successfully
Jack Kaine is an expert negotiator. He has written about negotiation, given speeches about it, and he has taught it at Stanford. He reminds us that the people sitting at a union bargaining table are not the only people who negotiate. We all negotiate. Every day. We negotiate with […] Continue Reading…
6 Ways to Reduce Turnover and Keep Your Best People on the Job
Employee turnover is a fact of life. It’s inevitable. While we’d like to minimize it . . . particularly among out best employees . . . we can never eliminate it entirely. And that’s a good thing. From time to time, we need new people who bring fresh thinking […] Continue Reading…
Exit interviews: the gold standard for determining how satisfied (or dissatisfied) your workforce is.
Exit interviews are an incredibly effective HR tool that can help you assess the health of your organization. Yet in many companies, it’s a tool that is used sparingly or not at all. Or it’s used in such a perfunctory manner that it doesn’t really produce any useful information. […] Continue Reading…
“The people who get on in this world are the people who get up and look for the circumstances they want, and if they can’t find them, make them.”
Entrepreneurs are a strange breed and largely misunderstood. Some people believe that all small independent businesses are automatically entrepreneurial. Not true. Many small businesses just plod along, day after day, following whatever formula got them to where they are, and never straying into new or uncharted territory. The companion […] Continue Reading…
