Have you ever made a new friend over a meal? Perhaps at an event – like a wedding, a banquet, or party where you didn’t necessarily get to choose who you were sitting next to? Whether that interaction turned into an ongoing long-term friendship or not, did you find that over the course of eatingContinue reading “Bridging Differences through Food”
Category Archives: Contribution
Who’s in Your “Human Library”?
How often have you felt judged by someone you barely know? How often have you formed an opinion of someone based on first impressions, only to be surprised later on as you spend more time with them and get to know them on a deeper level? Perhaps you’ve even had the experience of becoming goodContinue reading “Who’s in Your “Human Library”?”
Workplace Empathy in the New Academic Year
How does the beginning of a new academic year affect you? Even if you don’t have children or work in academia yourself, it might be impacting you more than you realize. If you have children of any age – or if you are a student or an educator yourself – the beginning of a newContinue reading “Workplace Empathy in the New Academic Year”
Creating a Culture of “Tiny Teach” in Your Teams
Do you remember when you first learned to tie your shoelaces? Or how to use a gas pump? Or how to use breakout rooms in a videoconference? Each of these probably wasn’t something you learned on your own, but once someone showed you how to do it, you probably do it regularly without much thought.Continue reading “Creating a Culture of “Tiny Teach” in Your Teams”
Creating a ‘Closing Ceremony’ for Work
How often do you reach the end of a team or solo project that has taken hours, weeks, or even months, and move straight on to the next thing? If this is common for you, is this invigorating and motivating? For some of us, it is – we get momentum and forward motion that kick-startsContinue reading “Creating a ‘Closing Ceremony’ for Work”
What are Your Team’s Fosbury Flop Ideas?
Watching the Paris 2024 Olympics, I have been struck over and over again by the way these games intersect with our everyday lives in the workplace and in our communities. Mental health and self-care continue to be headline topics after rising to the surface at the Tokyo 2020 Olympics; we are seeing much greater discussionContinue reading “What are Your Team’s Fosbury Flop Ideas?”
“The Pommel Horse Guy” and Multiple Intelligences
Are you someone who watches the Olympics religiously, someone who couldn’t care less, or are you somewhere in the middle? Wherever you fall, how can the Olympics help us to learn something about ourselves, and the teams we manage? How might they tie into Howard Gardner’s Theory of Multiple Intelligences? If you watched the USContinue reading ““The Pommel Horse Guy” and Multiple Intelligences”
Keep the Questions Coming: To Inception and Beyond
How do you feel when you have the leeway and support to pursue your own idea? What if the action steps you’re taking are the same, but the idea and the steps were dictated to you by your manager? If the action steps are the same, what feels so different about the two situations? IfContinue reading “Keep the Questions Coming: To Inception and Beyond”
How is Your Team Like a Fireworks Display?
In honor of this week’s Independence Day celebrations in the United States and in Canada, we are revisiting this article, originally posted in 2021: If you live in the United States or Canada, you’ll have the chance to see fireworks at some point this week – in person or on a broadcast. If you’re anythingContinue reading “How is Your Team Like a Fireworks Display?”
Remembering Barbara Jackson, 1944-2024
My mom, Barbara Jackson, died last week after living with Motor Neurone Disease / ALS. How long she lived with it is somewhat unclear, as is sadly the case with many people with this disease; she was diagnosed only nine months ago, but many symptoms overlap with other conditions and she displayed some of thoseContinue reading “Remembering Barbara Jackson, 1944-2024”
Building Bridges Leadership 