Work Culture Leadership

There is a massive recalibration taking place around how work fits into peoples’ lives. Winning the new war for talent requires a more humane employee experience, one that meets the needs and values of a changed workforce. Get this wrong, and the future of your organization is in jeopardy. Get this right, and you create an astounding competitive advantage around hiring and retention, while reaping all the benefits and business results that dedicated employees generate.

Kindness isn’t merely about getting along with people and being nice. It’s a game changer in business, the door opener to opportunity, and the key to authenticity and confidence. It’s a superpower that can be honed through an intentional lifestyle of kindness and is especially important in these divisive times.

If you have ever been part of a great team, you will know it is exponentially better than being part of a mediocre team. Teams are at the heart of working in complex domains and are essential to the success of agile approaches yet relatively few teams achieve greatness. Agile and leadership coach Geoff Watts has pulled together his many years of experience with all sorts of teams from software to product development, from medical teams to sports teams and has identified five common characteristics of great teams:

In today’s high stakes game of business, the players on the team are the competitive advantage for any organization. But, only if they are on the field instead of on the bench. Blue-Collar Leadership® & Teamwork provides a simple, yet powerful and unique, resource for individuals who want to increase their influence and make a high impact. It’s also a resource and tool for leaders, teams, and organizations, who are ready to engage the front line to improve the bottom line.

With the unprecedented rise in remote work due to the pandemic, many businesses have struggled with how to effectively transition to a distributed format. Meanwhile, companies who had always been remote-first had a unique advantage: a highly scalable set of work processes, a unique communication style, and the proper “async mindset” required to succeed without an office.

Many White leaders want to create change but don't know how to do so appropriately and effectively. How do you know where the blind spots are that can create obstacles for people of color? Your intentions may be sincere and heartfelt, but intentions aren't enough. In It's Time to Talk About Race at Work, Kelly McDonald delivers a much-needed road map for businesspeople.

For most salespeople, "accountability" is a terrifying word. It usually conjures up images of micromanagers controlling their employees' every move. In Accountability the Sandler Way, Hamish Knox shows how sales managers can create an accountability-driven work culture for their teams and themselves...by investing just 20 minutes a week in the classic Sandler sales and management principles. Sandler clients - both managers and salespeople - discover that sustainable success in the world of sales comes from being accountable to specific, measurable actions.

When we do better work, we live better lives. Share before you’re ready. Get more agreements. Have difficult conversations. These are a few of the practical but profound ideas Lessonly CEO Max Yoder shares in Do Better Work. No matter your rank or role, if you want to see more understanding, accountability, and progress on your team, these stories and examples are for you.

The Ape in the Corner Office connects with the day-to-day of the workplace because it helps explain what people are really concerned about: How come he got the wing chair with the gold trim? How can I survive as that big ape's subordinate without becoming a spineless yes-man? Why does being a lone wolf mean being a loser? And, yes, why is it that jerks seem to prosper, at least in the short run?

In Lead Your Tribe, Love Your Work, Piyush Patel offers an insider’s perspective on how to unify your team around a common purpose by uncovering your core values and transforming your culture. With over 20 years of entrepreneurial experience, Piyush has discovered that - while leaders can provide opportunities - real culture comes from the heart. Using real-life examples and practical takeaways, Lead Your Tribe, Love Your Work is the ultimate guide to creating a tribe to lead and a workplace you love.

Tristan White's story started like many others. He had a dream to work in a job that inspired him. He didn't find that job, so he created it. In 2004, The Physio Co (TPC) was born with one team member: Tristan White. In the 13 years since, TPC has become a remarkable health care success story based upon fast growth and a thriving, systemised company culture. Tristan's obsession with creating an inspiring place to work for himself and others has resulted in more than a decade of learning, testing and refining.

Culture Hacks is filled with simple, actionable ideas that over time, can transform the way that work gets done. From emails to book clubs and meetings to podcasts, take regular steps to build a fantastic work culture that everyone wants to be a part of.

Remote working is on the rise. Whether or not we are remote workers, it is likely we are all part of a global workforce. We need to learn to interact remotely, because we are all remote from someone in some way. Rather than simply simulating the way we'd usually work together via digital means, we have to learn new communication skills and adopt a different mindset in order to work remotely effectively, efficiently, and, most importantly, healthily. We'll start by getting you set up with the right equipment and habits. Then, we'll learn the mindset of treating everyone as remote.

Whether it shows up as stress, top-down leadership styles, drama, or uncertainty, fear kills good decision-making, dampens morale, lowers employee engagement, and hurts bottom-line growth. The good news is that there's an antidote: Freedom at Work. In this groundbreaking book, Traci Fenton brings together decades of original research, based on her team's work with hundreds of top companies around the world, such as The WD-40 Company, Mindvalley, DaVita, Menlo Innovations, Zappos, HCL Technologies, and more, revealing the proven pathway to leadership success.

Utilizing examples from Carol Sanford’s decades of work, learn the flaws in the feedback trap and build conditions for employees to flourish for long-term success.

Culture is the key to success for every organisation, but what do great cultures do, and what makes them successful? In Culture Fix, author and narrator Colin D Ellis shows you how to change the way you do things and create a winning culture that will keep your organisation relevant today and into the future. No matter your business, industry, or country, your culture's success depends on the emotional intelligence and engagement of the people within it.

In the knowledge economy, your team’s brainpower—their intellect, creativity, learning capacity, and decision-making ability—is the key factor in their success at work. And their scattered focus dilutes that brainpower, hindering your organization’s ability to succeed. Today's "always-on" work culture too often prevents your staff from producing what matters most: ideas, innovation, and meaningful results. How can you and your team be successful when exhaustion and frustration from 24/7 communications, changing priorities, and constant distractions are the norm? Executives must protect their teams (and themselves!) from the high cost of chronic stress and burn-out. To achieve this and improve your company’s results, you must invest in how well you and your teams manage attention. When employees master attention management, they are more successful, engaged, and productive.

It’s hard to avoid innovation these days. Nearly every product gets marketed as being disruptive, whether it’s genuinely a new invention or just a new toothbrush. But in this manifesto on the state of American work, historians of technology Lee Vinsel and Andrew L. Russell argue that our way of thinking about and pursuing innovation has made us poorer, less safe, and — ironically — less innovative. Drawing on years of original research and reporting, The Innovation Delusion shows how the ideology of change for its own sake has proved a disaster.

For 20 years, Great Place to Work has published its gold-standard list of the 100 Best Companies to Work For, which appears first in Fortune magazine. But its latest research shows that what was good enough to be a “great” workplace 10 or 20 years ago is not good enough now. Even at the best workplaces, leaders can - and must - do better. The vital differentiator for companies now is their people - all their people.

It's the 21st century, yet most companies maintain a 20th-century corporate culture. Despite instant communication and collaboration through wireless computers and smartphones, employers needlessly rent or own office space. Bryan Miles has a reality check for you: the future of business is virtual, and it's going to take more than technology upgrades for you to upgrade your workplace environment.