Imagine coming out of a meeting and thinking about how honestly people shared their opinions, how disagreements were met with understanding, and how you took a few tough nuggets and differing perspectives and heard everyone. What was happening was real dialogue — the kind of conversation where raw opinions can be out there and no one is judging anyone.
I can already hear you: “Not in my organization,” you say. Not in the kind of hyper-structured/way-too-polite/distrustful kind of place I work.
In 2011, Wells Fargo was forced to pay $85 million in fines for selling higher interest rate mortgages to customers who should have qualified for lower rates, and falsifying loan applications in the process.
Not five years later, Well Fargo finds itself faced with a strikingly similar scandal. Last Thursday the bank announced that it reached an agreement with the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) to the tune of $185 million in fines for opening deposit accounts and transferring funds without customers’ consent. This settlement started a landslide of commentary, calls for deeper investigations, increased regulation of the banking industry and questions around how such unethical behavior might become the norm of acceptable behavior across an entire organization.
During the humid summer months of 1954, twenty-two 11 and 12-year-old boys were randomly split into two groups and taken to a 200-acre Boy Scouts of America camp in Robbers Cave State Park, Oklahoma.
Over the next few weeks, they would unknowingly be the subjects of one of the most widely known psychological studies of our time. And the ways these groups bonded and interacted with each other draw some interesting parallels to our understanding of workplace culture.
Think the Olympics were a big distraction at work? Turns out, a major sporting event can’t compete with the likes of coffee breaks, small talk, or trips to the loo. Each edges out even the internet as the top three distractions in the workplace.
There’s good reason to be concerned with the additional distractions. Roughly 55 percent of workers are already distracted during the workday, and just one in three says it’s possible to ignore workplace disturbances.
But in times of distraction, you’re presented with a unique opportunity: to create a shared experience for the individuals in your company.
My son starts kindergarten in a week and a half. It’s a big life change, not only for him but for the entire family. A symbolic coming of age and the beginning of the next stage of his growth and learning.
What have we been doing for the last week to help ensure he gets off on the right foot? Rehearsing. Every morning the alarm goes off and we rouse him from his slumber, just like a normal school day. We usher him through his new routine, going so far as walking him to the bus stop to wait for the pretend bus to arrive.
Guest article by Brooke Cade
Today, social media and other digital platforms are allowing brands a unique opportunity to connect and communicate with their customers in a way to get their voices heard. Instead of simply talking at clients, businesses can now talk with them—which, as more millennials are becoming consumers, is the best way to connect and build authentic relationships with them. Because authentic relationships are becoming more important when interacting with your customers, social media helps to open the conversation and allows companies to actively engage and strengthen those professional relationships. This is why it is important to collect as much customer data as you can through cdp (customer data platforms) to that you can strengthen your professional relationship more with your customers.
Unless you’ve been living under a rock for the last few years, you’ve probably noticed there are no shortage of applications out there offering relief from your people-related woes. These apps offer everything from employee engagement to company culture, to stakeholder communications and pulse surveying and peer feedback in order to solve a wide breadth of people-related challenges in your organization.
But, where to start? If you are a business leader who has taken on the task of trying to identify the right tools for your organization, you no doubt came to the realization that there are an endless number of app companies that want to pitch you.
In case you missed the memo (or the text, IM, emoji, slack, chat, ping, post, email or like), digital communication is a big deal, and it’s not going away. Digital has permeated our lives. And as newer generations continue to enter the workforce, these methods of communication are embedding themselves in the very fabric of our work experience.
The Government Accountability Office recently reported that the pilot program for the DATA Act, passed in 2014 to increase savings and transparency in federal spending, is still not up and running.
The pilot program had not yet specified a methodology or data to be collected, and its outcomes are unlikely to be scalable. To avoid missteps like these, federal agencies need a change management strategy that involves gathering evidence, meticulously outlining goals, and testing iteratively.
When Bill Sandbrook took over as CEO of U.S. Concrete (NASDAQ CM: USCR) in 2011, he stepped into an organization that was hobbling out of bankruptcy and struggling to turn itself around. What he didn’t realize was just how precarious the situation really was.
A graduate of the U.S. Military Academy at West Point, Sandbrook got his start as a leader in the cavalry, serving 13 years before leaving the service in 1992 to take a job with a building materials company.
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