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A Bum Question

30 June, 2019 by James Lawther 2 Comments

360-degree feedback Does my bum look big in this? If you have ever been asked that question, you know there are two types of answer.  A right and a wrong one. The wrong answer has many variants… Yes — too brutal Try a bigger size — too honest I think it is the colour — […]

Filed Under: Blog, Employee Engagement Tagged With: best practice, credibility, human nature, human resources, performance management, trust

Outcome or Effort, Which Should You Reward?

7 June, 2019 by James Lawther Leave a Comment

You should praise your children Every parent will tell you that you should applaud your children.  Praising them for a job well done and telling them how clever they are builds confidence and self esteem. Or does it? In 1990’s Claudia Mueller and Carol Dweck of Columbia University decided to find out. The experiment The […]

Filed Under: Blog, Employee Engagement Tagged With: employee recognition, human resources, motivation, performance management, reinforcing behaviour

Everybody Cheats

15 October, 2018 by James Lawther Leave a Comment

Everybody Cheats

Who can you trust? When I was a small boy, the most exciting thing in the world was a day trip to London with my father.  I was brought up in a field in deepest Yorkshire.  The big smoke was amazing.  It had museums, skyscrapers, underground trains, toy shops, galleries and ice cream.  Best of […]

Filed Under: Blog, Employee Engagement Tagged With: cheating, human nature, incentives, measurement, performance management, reinforcing behaviour, targets, trust

The Puzzle of Motivation

3 September, 2018 by James Lawther 1 Comment

who've been studying motivation have given us this new approach.

TED Talk Dan Pink Improving employee performance is as easy as 1, 2, 3: Write an objective Define a metric Provide an incentive Then set people off to hit the goal.  It is just a question of building motivation. In his entertaining TED talk Dan Pink explains why this approach destroys motivation  instead of creating […]

Filed Under: Best of the Web, Blog Tagged With: beliefs, command and control, Daniel Pink, human nature, incentives, motivation, performance management, targets, video

Pointless Conversations

30 August, 2018 by James Lawther 1 Comment

Management meetings Do you ever lose the will to live in management meetings?  Sometimes they are so bad I want to scoop out my eyeballs with a tea-spoon.  I’d do anything to get out of the conversation. I hate futile meetings that are a waste of everybody’s time — usually highly paid people’s time. Here […]

Filed Under: Blog, Employee Engagement Tagged With: bureaucracy, command and control, cost saving, diversity, effective meetings, employee performance measures, forced fun, key performance indicators, management style, motivation, objective setting, office productivity, performance management, targets, waste, wasted intellect

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