#31 – Satisfaction ≠ Engagement

This is #31 in the series, “50 Ideas Worth Fighting For.” Looking for more? Try this one. Measure satisfaction when you want to find out what people think about the food in the cafeteria or if the marketing team needs new furniture or if your employees would like to form a softball league. Measure engagement

#13 – “I don’t know” is an acceptable answer

This is #13 in the series, “50 Ideas Worth Fighting For.” Actually, it’s not just an acceptable answer, it’s often a great one. It is wonderfully counterintuitive that the ability to say “I don’t know” comes from self-confidence. It is self-assurance in what we do know that allows us the ability to be more curious,

Poem for a Sunday Morning

Dear Mona {Naomi Shihab Nye} Dear Mona, do you know how your old stucco building marks the spot of Something True? Your hand-lettered red sign rises up like a crooked, friendly flag. I can guess the menu: bean & cheese, potato & egg, maybe a specialty of your own making, avocado twist or smoky salsa.

What’s your story?

Today I asked my students to think of a recent experience when they were fully engaged, be it at work, in school or with some other endeavor. I asked them to think of an instance when time slowed down, they were hyper-focused, and they were both cognitively and emotionally dedicated to the work at hand.

The Side Hustle

My side hustle is teaching a class each semester in the College of Business at Cal State San Marcos. I teach a course in organizational behavior for non-management majors. I do it because I love to teach. I do it because the energy of working with aspirational students is addictive and fulfilling. I do it

That’s Not My Job

Imagine that your job is to paint the stripes down the middle of the road. And not just any stripes, but the double yellow ones that create a powerful visual safety barrier on a well-traveled two-lane road. Imagine that you’ve reached the line that demarcates city from county and you are told to stop painting

Hiding in Plain Sight

“What is obscure we will eventually see; what is obvious usually takes a little longer.” {Edward R. Murrow} Your team is hiding in plain sight. They are there, you can see them, they are working…all true. But they are hiding, just the same. What they are hiding is the depth of their creativity, their energy

Choose to Make it Better

“The best criticism of the bad is the practice of the better.” {Richard Rohr} If you’re struggling in a poor work environment – not a toxic one, mind you but one that is marked by ineffectual leadership and uninspired co-workers – you can do one of three things: Leave Stay and join in the misery

How Did You Stay?

The only thing worse – and it’s much, much worse – than someone leaving your organization because they are disconnected, disenchanted and disengaged, is when someone feels that way but decides instead to quit and stay. Even in a great job market like we are experiencing right now, it’s a major inconvenience to research, apply

Somebody is Always Watching

It’s easy to believe, in a world of increased devotion to personal devices and a status quo of extreme busyness, that nobody is paying attention to what we do and how we do it. Somebody is always watching. Creepy though that may sound at one level, it is an imperative reminder that the quality of