<484 words> The other day I saw a wedding video on Facebook. A group of men performed the great and terrifying Maori haka with words especially written for the occasion. Millions have watched the video. Some people felt that the haka was threatening and/or insulting, but no, it is a great sign… Read More »“The Answer to the Problem is Here, Inside You.”
<292 words> Stop. Think. Choose. Do. You’ve come through Christmas ok, haven’t you? Kept your mouth shut when you wanted to speak out? Went home before the same old quarrel kicked into gear? Dreading going back to work to face the bully again? Are you always going… Read More »Four New Things for the New Year
<655 words>
“Work is nothing but fun – but you get your work done fast – a lot of different people to meet and learn new things – amazing incentives and bonus structure.”
“Great, fun filled environment to work, good balance of work-life and always excited to speak to people on a day to day basis.”
“Coworkers awesome; management not always trustworthy.”
“Great support & work environment; erratic schedule.”
“Good company to work for – they will look after you during your employment.”
These are comments made by Rogers’ employees in the past 6 or so months at www.indeed.com – a job search/placement site. Usually it is disgruntled employees and ex-employees with an axe to grind who leave comments on these kinds of sites. How does this mesh with Rogers’s own performance measures for their call centres?
<1022 provocative words>
The Paris attacks took place the week before I travelled to St. John’s Newfoundland for some training to upgrade my conflict coaching skills. France had retaliated; some Southern US Governors decided to shut their doors to Syrian refugees; Facebook was full of stories of other massacres that had not received the same level of media attention, with powerful allegations of bias and racism; and some Canadians were calling for Prime Minister Trudeau to renege on his commitment to bring 25,000 Syrian refugees to Canada by year’s end. There have been acts of aggression and violence against Arabs and Muslims.
I admit to sharing some of the African anger at the absence of attention being paid to the massacre in Kenya; the genocide that is building in Burundi; the Boca Haram kidnappings in Nigeria; and the farm killings in South Africa; no doubt because I am an African. But, I remind myself that there is no such thing as truly objective reporting. Everybody has a philosophy and a position. If you think Africa is a lost place full of bloodthirsty and corrupt people who are irrelevant in your life, much as the boat people from Syria may be irrelevant to your life in your comfort zone, then you’re likely to shut CNN down if they dwell on it too much. CNN et al will therefore rather tell you about people and places that you can relate to and maybe even care about because you represent their revenue stream.
The anti-Muslim rhetoric that has escalated on social media is valiantly being countervailed by other postings calling for peace, rationality, appreciation of diversity and tolerance. Quotes by John F. Kennedy and Maya Anjou and ancient sages and current religious leaders are being shared and commented on. I swear my laptop gets hotter the more time I spend reading and then biting my tongue as I see the inflammatory stuff that’s out there (not always successfully biting my tongue as my Facebook and Twitter friends well know).
<4230 words> This is NOT A BLOG. It is a conference paper that I decided to make available via my blog. The PPT (available on LinkedIn) is on a safari theme, so these giraffes suggest we take the long view of where our need for fairness comes from.
FAIRNESS:
A CULTURAL CONSTRUCT OR A UNIVERSAL HUMAN NEED?
The challenge to HR:
Improving workplace fairness by stepping back and taking it all in.
Background paper to a presentation given at the Atlantic Universities and Colleges Human Resources Association (AUCHRA) Conference in Sydney, Nova Scotia, Canada, on 22 October, 2015
Presenter/author: Delphine du Toit. Mediator/Coach/Facilitator.
Fairness is the default position
1. INTRODUCTION
Fairness is a baseline requirement for humans, yet it feels like the harder we try the more difficult it is to achieve. The difficulty with being universally fair is that it is a balancing act. No-one discusses ‘fairness’, generally speaking, unless someone has alleged that something has been unfair. The withdrawal of fairness is a bit like the withdrawal of oxygen: you don’t know you have it until it is taken away.
Unfairness – perceived or real – is a great source of conflict in the workplace. Sometimes it bursts forth in a flurry of accusations; more often it festers in someone’s heart and head, gradually poisoning their feelings about the workplace; being at work; co-workers; management, which then manifests itself in reduction of effort; sloppy work; argumentative responses to requests; squabbling; gossiping; and, in more extreme cases, in absenteeism or overt sabotage.
Read More »Fairness is simple. Bring culture into it and bedevil everything.
The Trudeau Leadership School offers an innovative child-transportation method that builds leadership in the next generation, as can be seen in the featured photograph.
1. Close physical contact with Dad without being mushy or coddled.
2. Eyes forward to take it all in.
3. Build responsibility for keeping self in balance with just enough support to make it safe but not enough to stifle the survival instinct.
4. Build strong neck and back muscles to carry the weight of responsibility for fixing your damaged country.
5. Observe the respect Dad gets from people in uniform and learn to expect same.
Read More »5 Leadership Outcomes offered by the Trudeau Leadership School (TLS)
Sometimes when you’re engaged in a quarrel with someone the things takes on a momentum of its own…..The person who blinked first was hurt and puzzled….it became imperative that a peace be brokered in a family that felt like it was falling apart, before it was too late.
How do we see other people? I know so many people who say ‘I don’t like conflict…I avoid conflict….’, and yet I’ve heard them talk about other people in ways that invites particular behaviours – behaviours that reinforce their (usually negative) perception of those other people.
We create our own conflicts typically without consciously intending to, and then we’re surprised when we discover that other people have seen us in ways we don’t think are true. If I see you as a lesser being; if I see you as an object; it is much easier to feel justified in how I characterise and judge you.
Who is the expert? There is sound theory on how adults prefer to learn, and there is sound theory on how individuals have their own learning styles. The true expertise lies in knowing how to facilitate a learning conversation, not in having the one definitive answer.
I am going to talk about two things that have happened this week. On the face of it they may not appear to be related, but if one moves away from the detail – the ‘what happened’ or the ‘what is’, to the abstract where you might explore themes and lessons learnt, they are very closely related.
Firstly, it is about kitty litter as a tool….
I had just come from a coaching session with a client. This is the second thing I want to talk about. We had been discussing employee engagement surveys….