2016 is quickly coming to an end. As you finalize your plans for next year, don't forget to think about how you will attract new employees and retain the ones you have throughout 2017. After all, your employees are your greatest asset, and few things are as important as successful recruitment and retention when it comes to building a high-performing team and … [Read more...]
Ignite Your Own Passion to Spark Greater Team Performance
A quote by Dwight L. Moody is my inspiration for this post today. Moody was a 19th century evangelist, who said “The best way to revive a church is to build a fire in the pulpit," and he was sharing a lesson about more than building churches. The lesson is much broader. Consider my adaptation of his quote: “The best way to revive a team (or organization) is to build a fire … [Read more...]
[Infographic] The Workplace is Changing: Do You Know What Employees Want?
Do you really know how to motivate employees and keep them engaged? YouEarnedIt surveyed a large group of new hires and tenured employees to gain insight on what drives them at work. See their feedback below, and then commit to making the types of changes that will help your employees reach their full potential. YouEarnedIt creates award-winning employee recognition and … [Read more...]
Challenge Yourself to Share Your Gratitude This (and Every) Month
It's the beginning of the month in which gratitude is top of mind. A popular exercise this time of year is to write down or share one thing each day for which you are truly grateful. Perhaps you've seen the trend on Facebook or social media. Or maybe your family creates a "Thankful Tree" or "Thankful Jar" each year. Take a 30-day challenge While I suggest that you take … [Read more...]
Your Super Weapon is Actually Your Employees, Not Your Products
Your most important asset may not the products you sell. Rather, it's your employees, especially if you are in a service industry, says Dushyant Sukhija, a former executive with Cisco Systems and author of The Cisco Way: Leadership Lessons Learned from One of the World’s Greatest Technology Services Companies. “Employees are the true intellectual capital of the company and … [Read more...]
How Business Leaders Can Inspire Purpose in Their Employees
This is a guest post by Paul Ratoff, author and Certified Management Consultant. In a tight game's closing seconds, a coach will huddle his players and draw up a play designed to result in a winning play and victory. But, if just one teammate is disengaged, the play can go awry and the team will fall short of accomplishing its purpose. Businesses have something in common … [Read more...]
What Should you Optimize? Define Good Work
This is a guest post by Tom Cox, leadership consultant, author and speaker. One of the most common, and tragic, causes of poor work performance is that everybody assumes the definition of "good work" is obvious, so nobody ever seeks explicit agreement on what it is. When the boss (that's you) doesn’t define "good work," things can get bad. For example, I live in Oregon, … [Read more...]
Keep Your Team Productive During the Summer Slump
On Tuesday, we shared advice for managing productivity-draining and creativity-killing complacency in the workplace. Today, we are going to talk about another productivity destroyer that is wreaking havoc on workplaces right now: summer. In most places across the U.S., the weather is hot, the sun is shining, and people are zoning out, dreaming of being on a beach or by the lake … [Read more...]
6 Ways to Defeat Complacency
Complacency is all around us, but it (and the problems it brings) can be especially noticeable in the workplace. Think about it. How many employees fly under the radar doing just enough to meet the requirements of the job? How many long-time customers did you suddenly lose this year? How often do you see a dip or lull after a really successful period or outstanding … [Read more...]
5 Limits Leaders Must Challenge
We all have limits. Those boundaries beyond which we just don’t go. After all, it wouldn’t be safe. It wouldn’t be prudent. It wouldn’t be easy. We set limits for safety purposes or for logical purposes, but most often, we set them because we need an excuse. We are scared or lazy or we lack confidence in our own abilities, so we need a reason (an excuse) to not try … [Read more...]