Janus was the Roman God with two faces. In itself striking when he is linked with talent development. The importance to accept talent development with open arms in words and by talking about it is very simple. The other side of the story is to actually do something with it, but often this … Read full story
‘The Spiral of Creation: the natural path from wish to reality’ is an exceptionally practical book written by Marinus Knoope. In it, he describes the twelve steps to follow if you want to turn your wishes into reality. It’s a simple, compact model and it never ceases to amaze me how relatively … Read full story
Any idea what the Chinese character is for ‘to listen’? It’s a combination of no less than 5 elements. On the left you have the symbol for the ear, below that the symbol for the emperor/king. The right side consists of three symbols, one above the other. At the top you have … Read full story
The traditional way to improve team performance is to focus on the individual. For example, by making an individual team member aware of his or her dominant style of thinking, acting and communicating, and by making clear what effect this has on the collaboration within the team. Various instruments or models are … Read full story
Almost every month I have the honour of delivering a training course from the ‘Co-Active Coaching’ curriculum. This is the kind of thing I love doing, and at the same time it makes me even more aware of the fact that there is still a lot of confusion about the notion of … Read full story
In a worldwide survey conducted by research agency Gallup, 198,000 people were asked the question: ‘Are you able to do the work you are good at every day?’ By linking the answers to data on the performances of the business units these people worked for, some valuable insights emerged. For example, where … Read full story
We all tell stories or listen to them. For example, when bringing the children to bed, or at parties or commemorations, in the theatre, when we sit around the campfire or at home on the settee, etc. It’s something universal and it’s a part of every culture. Apart from the fact that … Read full story
It’s Monday morning and you walk into the meeting room. ‘Hi Cindy, how was your weekend?’ ‘Great, and yours?’ ‘Fine thanks. What’s on the agenda today?’ And the conversation switches to work. Sound familiar? Otto Scharmer describes these kinds of polite exchanges in his book ‘Theory U: Leading from the future as … Read full story
It’s Saturday afternoon and I’ve just come to the realisation that it’s really time to write my next newsletter. What shall I do: start on it straight away or leave it till tomorrow? Arguments for starting today enter my mind, as well as arguments for putting off writing it till tomorrow. But… … Read full story
People often ask me what a manager or a team can do about someone who won’t cooperate. The type of problematic individual who behaves ‘antisocially’ (whatever that may mean), who constantly says ‘Yes but…’ (and really means ‘No’), who says ‘Yes’ but does ‘No’ (you can’t count on him), etc. Do you … Read full story
