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You Weren’t Born with It: Learning to Manage Others

Well done! You now have one of the most important jobs out there, managing a team! This is an important position in a company because good managers—or the lack thereof—can make or break a business. If you succeed in your position and your team meets goals and fulfills expectations, you’ve succeeded with arguably one of…

Bring on 2024

Amidst the political turmoil, climate disasters and other world problems that loomed large in 2023, it can be difficult to find good news. But—let’s be clear—the hunt is worth it. We’re talking about stories that give us hope and confidence in the future. If medical research discovers the promise of effective therapies for individuals that…

Metacognition and Managing Stress

No matter who you are—or how “balanced and calm” you claim to be—at some level you are affected by stress. We all are. A universal human condition that shaped us through the ages, stress has served us well through time. At one time, stress triggered the energy needed to survive the dangers associated with life…

Five Things to Know about Engineers

The antics of executives at Facebook and Twitter get the media’s attention, but—let’s be honest—the work that they and their employees do is not really necessary to our collective well-being. We could survive well enough—and maybe even fare better—without much of the chatter that takes place on these media platforms. But what about our physical…

The Perks of a Positive Attitude

Do you want to make your day a little brighter—and a little easier too? Most of us do. Then consider this: Research shows that if we make some simple shifts in how we think about—and react to—normal day-to-day occurrences, we are likely to benefit in multiple ways. Most importantly, we are likely to vastly improve…

A Year in Review: Focus on the “Good”

The year 2022 is gradually coming to a close. Looking back, it has never been more obvious that our world is complex, teeming with the good and the bad—and everything in between. But even in the thick of the innumerable crises and world problems that plague us, I prefer to focus on the positive by…

In the Corporation We Trust?

Let us Count the Ways…. Corporations are major players in our global culture. Year by year, they upend historic benchmarks—larger payrolls, more offices throughout the world, millions in quarterly revenue. They operate, in short, on a scale that would have been inconceivable some 20 years ago, collectively employing billions of people across the planet and,…

How Trust Makes the World—and Office—Go Around

If you consider the most supportive relationships in your life, would you say that trust is a main component? At a fundamental emotional and developmental level, trust is key. Children blossom through infancy and adolescence if they trust their environments and caretakers. We, as adults, need relationships based in trust in order to thrive—both at…

The Future Amidst Change: Connected, Collaborative and Creative

The last two years have been unsettling in multiple ways and—in view of Russia’s recent invasion of Ukraine—more changes could be around the corner. It seems we will need to reconsider daily routines, business practices and long-term expectations on a regular basis. What the future holds is a toss-up obviously, but long-term trends are becoming…

The Over-Designed Product and Other Lessons on Feature Creep

More than once when considering the purchase of a software product, I have set aside the feature-heavy package for a simpler version with a better price and better mix of key functionality. More often than not, the package I choose has the core features that sold me on the product in the first place. More…