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The Shift from Performance Evaluation to Performance Leadership
This is Performance Assessment season in libraries. I see colleagues posting anguished messages on Facebook about this fraught annual ritual. There is really no need for the process to be so stressful! Earlier this week, I introduced managers and supervisors in one library to two concepts that can reduce the anxiety spike of annual performance […]
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Overcoming Irrational Forces in Work Systems
Are you curious about why some work system engagements go so well and others are so difficult when by all appearances, the presenting issues seem similar? Have you thought about irrational forces at work in human systems and the power those forces have to hijack good thinking? What can a consultant do to help people […]
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Keep Calm and Carry On
A leader I know posted a link to a video that explained the history of the Keep Calm and Carry On poster on her Facebook page last week. Watching the video made me think about how attractive the poster’s message is. Why has it become so popular? To think that we (humans) have the capacity […]
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Thinking Systems: An Alternative to Blaming and Scapegoating
Recently, I completed the data collection phase of my dissertation research. I am studying how organization development consultants use Bowen theory in their work. One theme that emerged is the tendency to look for an individual to blame for problems in a work system. This person could be the leader, or another person in the […]
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Leadership Development: Connecting with the Classics
Recently, I read several chapters from On Becoming a Person, a collection of lectures and essays Carl Rogers compiled in 1961 from previously written material. Rogers was a psychotherapist, but he suggested that much of what he had learned in work with clients could be applied in any relationship where one person is helping another to […]
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Coming soon, more time for consulting to organizations!
I am excited by the prospect of spending more time consulting to organizations with motivation to build capacity, improve effectiveness, and grapple with transformational change. For most of my career, I have been engaged in organizational change efforts as a manager and leader. In addition, I have provided consulting services such as meeting facilitation, strategic […]