With the holiday celebrations now at an end, many of us are returning to our usual daily grind refreshed, rejuvenated and ready to dive into the tasks awaiting our attention. The start of a new year is also a time when many of us make resolutions of what we’d like to accomplish over the next 365 days, and possibly beyond.

Granted, it’s only natural that we’d be motivated right now to create these lists of goals, as the start of a new year often inspires that feeling of a new start; that the turning to a fresh page instills hope for new opportunities and bright possibilities for our future. The buoyant positivity around this time of the year can certainly be quite beneficial as it encourages us to take time for some personal self-reflection, pushing us to define goals of what we’d like to change in ourselves, and what areas of knowledge and understanding we’d like to develop a greater awareness of.

Of course, in order for us to truly reap the benefits of this exercise, we need to review the events of the previous year; of taking note of what we endured, learned and gained from those past experiences which can serve as the foundation that we build upon as we move forward.

Another point to consider when developing these lists of goals is how the focus doesn’t necessarily have to be limited to ourselves. Indeed, the start of a new year is a perfect opportunity for leaders to evaluate how they can help their employees with achieving their professional goals for this year.

Now, before the cynic within all of us dismisses such notions as being the result of an euphoric haze that often comes with celebrating the arrival of a new year, let us consider one of the lessons we learned over the course of the previous one. Namely, how Click here to continue reading »”4 New Year’s Resolutions To Help Your Organization Succeed This Year”

I’m pleased to announce that I have joined in partnership with Sprint to highlight and share some of the valuable content being provided on their new small business information and community site, Business on Main, which can be found on the MSN Network.

On the surface, most leaders will agree that encouraging a workplace where employees feel valued and engaged is important to their organization’s growth and success. Indeed, a recent study by Aon Hewitt has shown that companies with high levels of employee engagement outperformed the total stock market index despite the current economic difficulties.

And yet, despite this understanding of the correlation between employee engagement and financial gains, a recent Gallup poll revealed that more than 70% of employees are “not engaged” or “actively disengaged”.

In the article “Empower Your Employees … Your Business Depends on It“, business consultant and customer service expert John Tschohl, author of the book “Empowerment: A Way of Life”, points out that part of the problem is that the concept of empowering employees is more of a myth as most “business owners think they’ve empowered their employees when in reality they haven’t.”

While corporations have access to a greater number of resources to tackle this issue, if not the ability to offer their employees more opportunities and challenges, how can small businesses address the issue of a disengaged workforce? Check out this article “Empower Your Employees … Your Business Depends on It” to find out what measures small business owners can take to empower their employees and read some of the results other business owners have had with engaging their team to succeed.

Disclaimer: My blog is a part of an online influencer network for Business on Main. I receive monthly incentives to share my views on content I find noteworthy and relevant for my audience.

For the second episode of my podcast series, “Leadership Biz Cafe”, I’m pleased to welcome Teresa Amabile and Steven Kramer. Teresa is the Edsel Bryant Ford Professor of Business Administration and a Director of Research at Harvard Business School. Steven is a developmental psychologist whose writings have appeared in such illustrious publications as the Harvard Business Review and The New York Times.

In this episode, we discuss their research findings which serve as the basis for their new book “The Progress Principle: Using Small Wins to Ignite Joy, Engagement, and Creativity at Work”.

Over the course of the discussion, Teresa and Steven describe:

• What is inner work life and why leaders need to pay more attention to it.
• What is the progress principle and why does it matter in today’s work environment.
• Why leaders need to provide employees with responsibilities that create a sense of purpose or meaning.
• How experiencing setbacks can be more damaging to employee morale than leaders realize.
• What actions leaders should avoid to prevent a loss of productivity from their employees.
• What leaders should be managing, as opposed to what they think they should be managing, to encourage productivity in their organization.
• What two other factors leaders can employ to improve employee performance over the long-term.
• How leaders and employees can help facilitate a shift toward the creation of meaningful work.

As I told Teresa and Steven during our conversation, “The Progress Principle” is easily one of the best books I’ve read this year on leadership and improving an organization’s productivity. I invite you both to listen to this podcast and to check out their book to find out why I so thoroughly enjoyed reading “The Progress Principle”, as well as talking with them about the discoveries they made through their research on the challenges employees face in today’s workplace.

Click on the player below to listen to the podcast:

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Buy Teresa Amabile and Steven Kramer’s book “The Progress Principle” on Amazon.com (or Amazon.ca for Canadian readers)

As a gardener, I enjoy this time in the summer because you get to step back from your garden and appreciate what all that hard work you did in the spring and early summer has given rise to. This time of the year is also an ideal time to review how the plants are faring in your garden so you can anticipate what changes might need to be made in the upcoming fall or spring.

Walking by the various gardens around my house, I noticed how certain flowers planted a few years ago were now doing a great job filling out what used to be bare spots in the garden. At the same, I also noted which perennials would need to be transplanted in the fall given how they were beginning to outgrow their current place in the garden.

Now, it wasn’t always the case that we had a thriving garden full of multi-coloured blooms and various kinds of foliage. In the first few years when we started working on our garden, it felt more like a losing battle with nature given how many plants we lost to pests, problematic growing conditions and who knows what else. Although it was frustrating, those early years provided us with some valuable lessons about our garden, lessons we’ve since used to create a garden we could enjoy and admire.

After reviewing the steps I took over the last few seasons to get my garden to this point of abundance and sustainability, I noticed that there were some interesting parallels that could be drawn to the process of how to go about creating a strong and successful team. And so, I’d like to present these four valuable lessons I learned from my garden which can help you through the process of building and developing a successful team for your organization: Click here to continue reading »”4 Lessons On Team-Building I Learned From My Garden”