Employees don’t feel empowered to speak up, even when they really should, says a new book Speak Up – Say what needs to be said and hear what needs to be heard, written by Professor Megan Reitz, of the Ashridge Hult Business School, and John Higgins, Research Director at The Right Conversation. The research covers

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I have been teaching online presentation skills for a very long time. Since I led my very first WebEx Introduction class almost 12 years ago, a lot has changed. Technology is better—I can’t remember the last time someone joined a webinar on a dial-up modem, and it’s actually harder to find a computer that doesn’t

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This is an excerpt from Bring Your Brain to Work: Using Cognitive Science to Get a Job, Do it Well, and Advance Your Career, a brand-new leadership book by Art Markman. Think about the requests people make of you. How do you generally respond? If you’re like most of us, you have a dominant response.

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When you take over a team, outline expectations for how you want to communicate with your new employees. Doing so helps to ensure that they meet those expectations, that you reduce misunderstandings and that you prevent productivity-zapping communication breakdowns. As soon as you assume your role as leader, lay out these guidelines: How you prefer

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Are you having trouble maintaining a healthy work-life balance when you work from home? You’re not alone. It’s one of the most common complaints by remote workers. But if you’re tempted to blame your ogre (or ogress) of a boss for this, guess again. Many of these challenges are self-imposed. Over years of working with

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Uh-oh. You caught an employee in a bold-faced lie, and now you’re not sure what to do next. A single lie has the power to destroy your trust in the employee, but what is more concerning is why the person told the lie in the first place. Is he hiding something? Does she fear your

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Here’s a strange question for you: How does your email sound? On one hand, it’s kind of a silly question—there is no sound, email is just words on a screen. If you’re honest though, you know that you can often “hear” the other party in their email, almost as if they were speaking to you.

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  It’s not true in every organization, but it is true in many: Leaders don’t understand their employees. They don’t know how to motivate, inspire and correct people effectively. As I work with my clients, I hear the same questions repeatedly: “How do I get my employees to … Quit complaining?” Do more than the bare

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Employee engagement is often listed as the biggest challenge for people who lead remote, virtual, or hybrid teams. But if this is a problem that requires brand new, cutting-edge solutions, why are so many companies using caveman techniques to keep employees engaged? If you are of a certain age, you remember the cartoons where a

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As you take on a new management role, you want to make sure that you’re communicating effectively with your team members. But how are you going to get them to open up to you? Many employees have trouble being forthcoming with any boss, let alone a brand new one. Try out these encouraging phrases to get

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