Blog Posts

Having Fun @ Work? Try These 4 Tips

Fish!

Yesterday was “International Fun at Work Day”.  How did you celebrate?  I’m fortunate to work for a fun boss, who likes to play office pranks on her team members.  She pulled several yesterday…but this was the first year in at least the last five years that I recognized her prank without falling for it!

When I think of fun workplaces, the world famous Pike Place Fish Market in Seattle comes to mind, thanks largely to the business best-seller written by Stephen C. Lundin, Harry Paul, and John Christensen in 2000.  Their book Fish! shows other organizations “a remarkable way to boost morale and improve results.”

The fish guys have fun while they work, and fun is energizing.  How can you have more fun and create more energy for your team?  Click here to learn more.

Want Your Messages to Stick?

Made to Stick

My last post summarized lessons from the last two weeks of the NIV Leadership Bible, focused on the leadership skill of communicating vision.  This hearkens me back to the days of NASA’s Leadership Development Program.  Six years ago, our 12-member group from across NASA was immersed in learning all we could about leadership.  One of our group members learned that a senior executive was reading Chip & Dan Heath’s Made to Stick—the 2007 Best Business Book of the Year by 800-CEO-READ book awards.  So, he offered to lead a book club discussion about why some ideas make it and others don’t based on the Heath brothers’ research.

The Heath brothers start with the assertion that history is littered with good ideas that failed to catch on, as well as bad ideas that didn’t.  So, they dug deeper by asking why?  They define “sticky” as understandable, memorable, and effective in changing thought or behavior.

Then, they outline 6 principles that reinforce one another and multiply the “stickiness factor.”  If you want your ideas to stick…especially if you’re communicating vision to your team, learn more about the 6 principles here.