Below you'll find a list of all posts that have been tagged as “authentic”
Learning is crucial for a positive culture, but it hardly ever happens without mistakes, hickups, or failures. Learning fast, and learning from others’ failures as well, helps your organization become more agile and better. In conventional cultures, however, it’s not common to admit failures even though failure is critical to success. In nuclear plant accidents, the NASA Challenger disaster and …
When was the last time you learned something new? Being a newbie again, can be a wonderful experience. People who thrive have a sense of learning and vitality, as Gretchen Spreitzer and Christine Porath found. Flow, as Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi showed, is the state where you are challenged and learn, but though there is a “stretch” you are not challenged beyond …
Positive cultures lead to productivity and can even stir high performance or “positive deviance”. How could you make that work? People perform best when they feel good about themselves, plus: when they know what they must do and what the criteria are. Clarity Though rather simple, this is explained in The One Minute Manager by Ken Blanchard and Spencer Johnson. …
It was on a transatlantic flight, more than five years ago, that Henna Inam started to understand she had been lying to herself about who she really was. “Sure, I was happy. I was flying back from Switzerland to Mexico where I ran a branch of a multinational corporation. I was recognized for my team’s business building results, one of …
Eileen Fisher is an American fashion designer and founder of the women’s clothing retailer Eileen Fisher Inc. The company celebrated its 30-year anniversary and has over 1,000 coworkers. For these last thirty years, Eileen Fisher has looked at clothing through the lens of confidence and empowerment. Eileen has always been passionate about using her company as a voice for change …
Ora et labora: the twin pillars of monastic work are of equal importance. For a Trappist monk work is a form of prayer and prayer is a form of work. They practice mindfulness. August Turak, an American salesman and serial entrepreneur, went to Mepkin Abbey, South-Carolina, when he needed time to think – and he kept coming back for years. …
Speaker and best-selling author Kevin Kelly draws from over two decades of research to highlight what makes Xceptional businesses and their leaders succeed beyond all odds: exceptional execution of an ordinary idea. He discusses the concept of DO! in a tiny book, illustrated with entrepreneurial, innovative cases from around the globe. An overview. Idea killer Kelly used to be an …
Deep Democracy is a fascinating approach to both personal and organization development. Join me as I join this wonderful workshop to learn more… Kiss a frog? Ugh! It’s natural for most of us to avoid or ignore ugliness, to control problems, wish them away or fight and conquer them. We tend to dislike problems, obstacles, and challenges. Let alone accept, …
In this reflective time of year, I’d like to ask you how you focus your attention. Do you give genuine attention to the people you meet both in your personal and your professional sphere? Let’s distinguish three levels of reality: the what, the how and the who. Our education and career are based on the what: our knowledge and expertise. But …
Guest post by Gerald Wagner. What if you’d wake up on Monday excited to go back to work? Organizations with “Whole Person Cultures” make this a reality. Not because they offer happiness courses and wellness perks – but because they create organizational cultures in which people thrive. Eliminate fear, add creativity. No need for office politics, if there’s openness. Bye …
Who you are, has become more important since our economies deliver numerous services, and we are knowledge workers in varying projects while our societies ride the waves of global change. It is not just what you do, and how you do it, but WHO you are that makes the difference in all this volatility. Being precedes doing.
You’re working hard – making a living, but are you making a difference? That’s the question that bugged me early in my career as a change guide and leader. At times, I felt discouraged and disappointed trying to create positive change at work. I let reality and the critics get me down. “Change is hard. Leaders are greedy for power …
