September 11, 2014

We’re Up Against our Mindsets

Looking around the news of the world, I see three basic “camps.”  I’m thinking of these “camps” as ways of reacting/responding to the fast-changing world we all face today. The first I’ll call the “Stand Your Ground” camp. This camp is generally uninterested in change. It’s mainly reactive to the world as it unfolds, always strategizing how to maintain the […]
August 11, 2014

Stop Driving Yourself to Distraction: Reclaiming Your Sanity

“We live in a moment of history where change is so speeded up that we begin to see the present only when it is already disappearing.”   ~ R.D Laing The Scottish psychologist, R.D Laing wrote these prescient words in 1970.  In our work we see an alarming increase of the effects of overwork and overwhelm on our clients.  Many of the […]
June 26, 2014

Rethinking the Workplace Relationship of the Future

Diego Rivera’s The Worker Isn’t it time to change the dominant stories we’ve been taught about workplace relationships? They’re old, exhausted and defeating. They’re based on models of thinking about human motivation and dynamics that have been discredited by modern science. These old stories are steeped in mistrust. They’re hierarchical and parental in nature and based on a belief that […]
June 19, 2014

Collaboration: The Essential Emotions

Successful collaboration is built on a high level of emotional literacy. Without the capacity to generate and sustain certain feelings, our ability to collaborate authentically with others isn’t possible. By the time most of us reach adulthood, our emotional repertoire has become habituated.   Emotional habits are then fueled by our thinking process which is also fixed into patterns.  Beliefs […]
June 6, 2014

Your Beliefs Run Your Life But You Can Change the Story

“You see everything is about belief, whatever we believe rules our existence, rules our life.        Don Miguel Ruiz, author The 4 Agreements “What’s the most resilient parasite? An idea. A single idea from the human mind can build cities. An idea can transform the world and rewrite all the rules. Which is why I have to steal it.”  From the film Inception Remember […]
June 5, 2014

Mindfulness is Not a Quick-Fix

Now that we’re in the era of praise, hyperbole and misconception about what mindfulness (meditation) is all about – let’s step back and take a look at what we know. While I’ve often written about mindfulness and personally and professionally endorse its benefits, I’m concerned that the essence of the practice is being co-opted. Business media coverage of a practice […]
April 17, 2014

How Many Hours Do We Need to Work to Be “Productive?” Reprise

“Work is no longer a place; it’s a state of mind. It’s become less about when I turn off the office lights and more about when I turn off (at least mentally) the inbox.” Christa Carone, Chief Marketing Officer, Xerox Is the private life dead? When you hired me, did  you buy my evenings, weekends and holidays? Now that you can […]
March 13, 2014

BeFriending Anger – The Emotions Series Reprise

“Anger can be a wonderful wake up call to help you to understand what you need and what you value.” Thich Nhat Hahn For seven years I regularly facilitated seminars on conflict resolution.  Most of the group participants wanted answers to problems they saw as the source of their conflict. Usually this had to do with fixing the behavior of another person. Imagine […]
February 20, 2014

5 Reasons Why Business Can’t Afford to Ignore Psychology for Another 100 Years

“The problem with business is that it is afraid of dealing with the business of people.”   W. Edwards Deming Honestly, I  don’t get it. Why is so much of business still in the dark about the basics of human dynamics? Appyling awareness of human psychology to work is moving at a glacial pace while technology flies by it at […]