Nobody in their right mind flies an aircraft, rewires their home, performs surgery, goes skydiving, or engages in many other activities without the benefit of training and/or certification. And if…
Category: Communication
Speaking Each Other's Language
Let’s face it. Communicating at work is tough enough when both the speaker and the listener speak the same native language. Add different tongues to the dynamic and, sacré bleu!…
Eight Lessons Learned While Trapped in an Elevator
Earlier this week, I spent about a half an hour trapped, by myself, in an elevator that I’ve traveled 27 floors up, and down, an average of twice a week…
Should We Stop Doing Performance Reviews?
For the past few years there has been a hue and a cry, joined of late by large numbers of HR professionals, suggesting that companies need to stop doing traditional…
Listening… Really Listening
Recently, I came uncomfortably close to dying in a well-equipped, modern, metropolitan hospital emergency room, a building that I had walked into under my own power. The cause of the…
Leaders… You Really Need Truth-Tellers
My last real (corporate) job was an eleven-year run with a very fast moving “550 mph warehouse” as the company’s founder and CEO has been known to put it. Shortly…
Chikin, Spice, and Authenticity
https://contentedcows.com/blog/item/24-chikin-spice-and-authenticity Earlier this year, Chick-fil-A, the Atlanta-based quick service restaurant chain, became the unwitting object of a firestorm following President and Chief Operating Officer Dan Cathy’s direct answer to an…
Buffett doesn’t invest in things he doesn’t understand. Neither will your workforce.
On Friday, CNBC’s Becky Quick reported that multibillionaire oracle and investor Warren Buffett did not have plans to invest in Facebook, which is set for an initial public stock offering…
Apologies Don’t Put the Worms Back in the Can, or the Words Back in Your Mouth
Ordinarily, we try to have a positive focus in this blog, encouraging leaders to adopt or maintain practices that will coax the very best effort from their teams. As opposed…