performance

June 26, 2013

Categories

Performance

Decisions, Decisions

One-half of the new employees hired leave their positions within one year, according the Dan Heath co-author of Decisive: How To Make Better Choices in Life and Work. This suggests employers are too quick to hire and the candidate may be too quick to accept. Heath offers these reasons for poor decisions; narrow framing such as “whether or not thinking;” confirmation bias; short-term emotions; and overconfidence. The acronym WRAP is used to combat these decision villains. Widen your options. Whenever you find yourself in the “whether or not” decision, stop. Allow that thinking to be an alarm. One technique is […]

February 26, 2013

Categories

Performance

Feedback Is A Gift

Anytime one receives a gift, the right thing to say is Thank you. Whether you cherish the gift, throw the gift away or re-gift it; the giver should be thanked. A gift and feedback have so much in common. Whether feedback is positive or negative, and regardless of whether the feedback will be used or not the proper response of gratitude remains. Delivery has a lot to do with our ability to accept feedback gracefully. Organizations in general have had a tough time providing employees feedback. Most organizations force the feedback once a year during the annual performance appraisal. During […]

January 28, 2013

Categories

Performance

Optimize the Most Valuable Asset

Several terms depict managing a workforce: human capital management, talent development and performance management. The understanding of each of these terms is varied. Perhaps the new terms are an effort to move from a narrow view of employee discipline to making the best of each employee’s work-life. Yet, many organizations continue to focus on discipline or corrective action; others add the performance appraisal process; and some look at the effort to optimize the employee’s life from recruitment to retirement. There are several strategies to increase employee engagement, and many can be considered performance management, or talent development strategies. Performance management […]

October 24, 2012

Categories

Civility

Got Culture?

Social psychologists and business theorists have used the concept of culture to analyze organizations since the 1940s. In 1982, Tom Peters and Robert Waterman brought the concept into the spotlight with In Search of Excellence. The concept of corporate culture is now widely recognized. Google corporate culture and a quarter of a billion hits describe the concept, use of understanding and methods to change culture. Two distinct views of culture emerged in the 1980s; adaptationist and ideational. Peters and Waterman, among others are proponents of the adaptationist view, defining culture by customs, ceremonies and patterns which can be observed by […]