Let’s start with a riddle: The poor have it. The rich need it. If you eat it you will die. What is it? I’ll answer it at the end of the post. Trust me, it will connect. While you’re thinking of the answer let’s have a quick chat. I’ve been noticing that the loud and monotonous drumbeat of reward and …
I read a lot of HR stuff about high performers. We all want an entire population of these employees at our companies. Adding more high performers means better overall results, which means better everything, right? Maybe not. Depending on your culture, you could be making it hard for the best performers to stay. As Long As It Helps Me A …
I started my own blog in 2006. Not an actual OG but very close. Heck, I used to use Typepad for chrissakes. That’s seriously old school. And some of (most of) my posts since that time have been about employee engagement. I know this because every time I’m up to write on Fistful of Talent I panic because I may …
“But Paul, you’re different. You like that technology stuff.” That’s what I get when I bring up a new way to manage a process with a new project management tool. Or when I try to introduce a web-based collaboration platform. Or even when I suggest we use group collaboration in Office 365. Real truth? I don’t always like “that technology …
I had a nice New Year’s breakfast with a friend and we were talking about VUCA. Yeah… I live on the edge! If you’re not familiar, VUCA stands for volatility, uncertainty, complexity, and ambiguity. The acronym was first described in 1987 and adopted by the U.S. Army War College to describe the multilateral world resulting from the end of the …
Almost 20 years ago I read a book that made me want to see around corners and over the horizon. That book was called “Unleashing the Killer App.” Far from a perfect book – but for me at the time, with my background and exposure to technology – it was an eye-opening read. It really reinforced the need to constantly …
Technology is eating the world. Everything – and I don’t say this with any hyperbole – is technology. Even the human stuff we do every day (or should do every day) is a function of technology. I’m almost positive if HR (and business in general) didn’t have email, SMS, or slack we wouldn’t know how to get a hold of …
As I think back on my career and recall the times I had the best work experiences—where I was connected and engaged the most—it almost always involved a crisis or a pressure-filled project. I can vividly remember working on a big Chrysler account or a huge GM Parts incentive program. We worked 24/7 for weeks. In one case, we slept …
A few short weeks from now many of us will be sitting down with friends, the family we like (and may even love), engaging with new and old acquaintances, laughing, chatting, reveling, playing games and connecting on a truly human level. The rest of us will have Thanksgiving dinner at our own, or a relative’s house, arguing about politics, misremembering …
I’m not going to do my usual screed on why employee engagement is a Sisyphean effort, and almost every intervention is at best a short-term fix to a long-term problem. I believe 90% of the interventions we talk about are like handing out sandwiches to starving people and thinking you’ve fixed their food-acquisition problem. Employee engagement has never been a …
