Mutual Trust or Mutual Bust

When I’m walking on the sidewalk, I trust that the cars will drive on the road. When the cars are driving down the road, they trust that pedestrians will walk on the sidewalk. When I sit down at a restaurant to eat, I trust that the server will bring me the food as quickly as …

The More Things Change, The More They Stay The Same… Wait What?

Change management is the cornerstone of shepherding an organization through and to change. And since change is the only constant in life [side note: how many articles are there out there about change management where you think Heraclitus is not mentioned?], it seems pretty important that we understand the best ways to go about doing …

The Inevitability of Change Forces Faith in the Flexibility of the Flow

You awake on Monday morning ready to meet the day. You’re excited about work today because your new manager is finally ready to join the team. You feel pretty happy to prepare to change your signature from A/Manager back to Senior Analyst/Officer/etc. You get yourself ready to go and make your favourite breakfast because – why not …

The Alluring Aroma of Freshly Baked Pie Cooling on the Windowsill

Remember back to when you were a kid (for some of you, that’s waay back, so I’m sorry for taxing your memory like that, but I appreciate all the wisdom you bring. Too much?). In some cartoons, there was the common TV trope of a pie resting on a windowsill to cool off. Naturally, one …

Silence Isn’t Golden: Everyone Thinks You Should Speak

You’re sitting in the weekly management meeting and the senior person at the table is running through the agenda at a fevered pace. Decisions are being made, left, right, and center, and you can barely keep up with what’s going on. Wondering if you’re alone, you look around the table and it seems that most …

Have You Ever Wanted to Talk to Yourself in the Past?

Most of what I’ve written about in the last few months has focused on change management from a macro-perspective, which is completely natural given my inclination to try and change the “whole” of the system, rather than one piece of it. However, today I’d like to focus on the micro-perspective of change management – the …

Have You Had Your Culture Change Today?

In 2008, the “neighbourhood coffee shop” closed its doors across the US at precisely 5:30p for three hours to retrain its employees on everything from the sound the milk should make when it’s being heated to the particulars of the colour of espresso shots. Fast-forward ten years and the “neighbourhood coffee shop” is at it …