Kindness is not a soft skill, it is a practice.
In a world of shorthand, emojis, and people’s necks craned downward looking into their handheld nightmare rectangles, I often find myself swimming as a thoughtful (or at least mindful) person in a sea of thoughtlessness.
Perhaps it’s how I was raised (great parents) or because of my vocation (nonprofit philanthropy), though I am always overly aware of myself and my actions, as they relate to other humans.
I push my cart out of the way at the grocery store; I use pleasant e-mail salutations; I hold doors open for other people; I use my turn signals; I listen (rather than simply waiting for a conversational pause to interject). …
The Peter Principle and Dunning-Kruger Effect are real, and all of us will invariably meet them.
At some point in my career I became painfully aware of two psychological phenomena that explained the behavioral patterns of many colleagues I worked with, and for — and not just colleagues, but people in my personal orbit as well. They are the Peter Principle and the Dunning–Kruger Effect. Understanding the nuances behind these two concepts was hugely important for my growth as a human being, and was especially transformative in my professional life.
I wish I had known these things as I entered the workforce, but ~20 years ago they were not (yet) offering courses on Poor Personalities of the Workplace. …
New study finds people overwhelmingly no longer interested in communication whatsoever.
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
January 22, 2021
An overwhelming number of professionals (88%) no longer respond to any email correspondences from colleagues; the majority (59%) “don’t recall seeing that message, could you resend it?”
The findings, from the nonprofit research institute Society To Understand People’s Indifferent Dialogue, came as a shock to most organizational managers and thought leaders. Founded in 1971, STUPID has long-tracked the transformations with communication in business settings.
Their inaugural report in 1971, titled “Quit bein’ a bummer and return my phone call” was a path-breaking review of how lax employees have become with inner- and inter-office communication.
Over the years, the annual study has shifted with the times to include less-analog forms of communication like phone calls and homing pigeons, and now features AOL Instant Messages, text messages, and emails. …
Do you have a strategic plan? Did it account for COVID-19?
If you’re like me, you answered the questions above: yes → no.
I love strategic planning. It’s one of my favorite things to be part of in organizational life, and it’s also personally rewarding.
In my view, future-visioning is at its best not when it changes who we are, but rather, transforms us into the best-possible version, with the right attention and right resources, of course. An example would be an organization that enhances the quality of its outward-facing communication by helping to develop its marketing/communications staff, rather than simply identifying another electronic or social platform through which to communicate.
As we flip the calendar to a New Year, however, a look back over the last ~10 months has enlightened how Pollyanna much of the world has been in thinking about the future. …
MLK Jr’s inspiring words, 50+ years later, in the context of today.
I have written about the short-sightedness of looking at the language of wordsmiths, poets, and others, and missing the full (or fuller) picture they intended. On Martin Luther King Jr. Day, this year, it feels necessary and important to remove the frame of myopia and look more wholly at what Dr. King, and others, have told us.
On Darkness and Light
We are all likely familiar with the oft-repeated quote from Dr. King’s 1967 masterful speech¹, Where Do We Go From Here?
“Darkness cannot put out darkness; only light can do that.”
This transformative line is preceded by nearly 5,500 uniquely powerful words, and particularly a most-remarkable…
Number 4 will change your life.
During a time of huge technological transformations in response to the global health crisis, nearly all meetings have been refashioned online through platforms like Zoom, Microsoft Teams, Skype, LiveJournal, and others.
What follows is a comprehensive guide on how to lead the most effective video meetings possible, as curated by the Internet’s most prescient thought leaders. You’re welcome.
1. Look away from the camera as much as possible, especially when people are trying to engage with you directly.
2. Keep your microphone on at all times, particularly when you have landscapers working just outside your home, or when your spouse/roommate is washing many dishes. …
Or, at least, unsettled.
Restless.
No, that’s not right.
That’s too frenetic, too clear.
This isn’t restlessness.
This is something else;
the boundaries are not in focus.
This is unsettled.
Things have been unsettling,
so we (I) must be unsettled.
That makes more sense,
because it makes less sense.
All things are at once bright as day,
yet barely translucent. Are they not?
Aren’t things top of mind, yet,
completely absent?
Where are your thoughts? Mine?
We, unsettled masses, have been through the hurricane.
No, that’s not right.
The storm hasn’t moved, it has parked over us.
Around us. Within us.
Unsettled.
Restless, no,
though we rest less.
The space between doing
(and not doing)
lacks transition.
Lacks boundaries. …
A question, in time.
Questions sometimes change with time.
Their meaning, their weight.
Time, too, sometimes changes;
its cadence, its heft.
And, sometimes, profundity can be found
in simplicity.
We might ask, simply:
Are you okay?
Are you? Are we, any of us, okay?
And, in time, questions —
that question —
changes.
Its meaning, its weight, its heft;
all different.
Are you okay?
Are you okay?
Are you okay?
September 2001, are you okay?
A question meant only for New Yorkers,
answered in silence, met with a stare.
America,
at once, together, Yankees.
November 2008, are you okay?
People of color, on the margin,
filled with Hope. Possibility. …
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