When you’re working and collaborating with clients, suppliers, colleagues, team members, what questions do you hear? What questions do you ask? Most of us don’t give it too much thought – it’s just a conversation, right? Well, yes and no. Yes, I hope you have two-way conversations with these people. No, asking the right… Read more
A question that often comes up when I facilitate Zoomly’s ‘How to give effective feedback’ workshop is who to ask for it. After all, feedback isn’t just about commenting on others’ performance; we need feedback on ours too. Some people seem to think there’s no-one to ask or feel a bit awkward about asking. I’m… Read more
Poor you, that doesn’t sound good. Yet what strikes me most is that you believe you’re stuck. Who says you must stick around and can’t leave? I wonder if you’re finding your present situation so tough you’re struggling to find ways through, around or out of it. If that’s the case, possibilities may not spring… Read more
What is International Women’s Day and how did it come about? We have The United Nations to thank; they officially began the Day in 1975, the year designated International Women’s Year. But #IWD’s origins go back to 1908 in USA, when women working in the garment industry took strike action over poor workplace conditions. A… Read more
We’re all busy – so it seems. With research reporting that almost half of UK workers feel overwhelmed at work, it’s no wonder I often hear people asking for tips on ‘time management’. My first response is that time isn’t something we can manage – it will be 4 minutes’ later in 4 minutes’… Read more
The idea generation, or ‘brainstorm’ (or ‘thought shower’ as someone suggested recently) is done. You’ve got heaps of wild and wonderful ideas, concepts, and suggestions. So now what? A point that’s made crystal clear in Zoomly’s ‘How to brainstorm ideas’ workshop is the need to separate idea generation from idea evaluation. These are two… Read more
How do you respond when you’ve stuffed up on a task? Or when you’ve planned to walk part of the way to work – and it rains? How about when you get some criticism from a colleague? The chatterbox in our head has a huge bearing on how we feel, and therefore on our resilience to… Read more
Participants in Zoomly’s workshops often hang back to ask me questions at the end, and I feel privileged to be asked. The ‘How to manage upwards’ session is typical. I’ll always do what I can to help. Yet I’m acutely aware that I don’t work there and I’m not their manager. But I try to… Read more
“How do I motivate people?” is a question that we deal with early on in Zoomly’s bite-sized workshop on the topic, as well as how NOT to. There’s more to it than high-fiving people or telling them they’re ‘awesome’ – much more. A useful exercise is to think of when you’ve felt really motivated about… Read more
So let’s get the shameless plug out of the way first: I’m often asked to train and support trainers who run in-house training sessions. Phew, that’s better. Now, having been doing this for several years there are 4 traps I frequently see in-house trainers fall into. Here they are, with my advice on what to… Read more
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