Judy Bardwick

Trust is critical for effective leadership.

In an organization, where there is mutual trust, an immense amount of psychological energy can be brought to the organization's mission. If that happens, employees are said to be "actively engaged". It is the condition in which the mission, the organization, and the relationship have the very best chance of flourishing.

When level of mutual trust d... Read more

Every business owner or HR department is responsible for building programs and policies that are designed to let employees know they are a valuable member of the team. Employee appreciation programs run the range of celebrating workplace anniversaries, group recognition, and one-on-one engagement.

However, what most business owners want to know, is how important employee appreciation is in ter... Read more

Ask yourself a simple question. Which organization will hit or exceed its financial results. One where an employee feels:

• no one cares about what happens to me. I hate coming to work. Or,
• we’re a really strong team, with everyone pulling together. This is a great place to be.

You guessed it right. A lot of research points to the second option.

Employee's behavior is more infor... Read more

All of the advice you've already received from members on Mentors Guild has been excellent. I'm going to add an additional idea.

First, is there a major change in the kind of responsibilities between your current position and the next? That could involve different knowledge; or it could involve larger management or leadership roles. Do you have these additional skills?

The problem begins ... Read more

My hunch is that there are two things operating here and as they combine, the result feels like chaos in which no one has personal control over anything. The first relevant fact is you have come from a large organization to a small one. The problem in large organizations, especially if they are successful, is they have too many people because they feel they can afford to carry even less product... Read more

While some of my peers believe age shouldn't be a factor, alas, it is.

Experienced people who have been at the company for many years, can feel cheated or worse when there's a new boss and that person is a) relatively speaking, a kid, and b) has no experience in the company.

Putting a younger person above a productive older employee can be felt as a loss of a promotion and the end of hope for fu... Read more

Not getting along with your boss is a catastrophe but so is losing your job.

The problem in creating an answer for you is there are many reasons why people don't get along and it's your job to find out quite specifically what you do that is irritating your boss. You must also try to figure out what your boss does that irks you.

If you're lucky, and real communication is possible, you will di... Read more

Many years ago my best friend and I were in a standing poker game which met every Wednesday night. All the players were professors at The University of Michigan so at first the banter and ribbing was fast and really funny.

But after a few weeks, two people from the English department quickly took over the conversation. Their banter was not funny; it was personal, mean and cruel. But the other ... Read more

It's important to recognize that, individuals and organizations in competitive societies, are COMPETITIVE! No surprise that it is difficult to create collaboration, without the interference from competitiveness.

Hence, individuals need specific responsibility and be recognized as contributors to the team's goals and the team has to be applauded for contributing to the organization's goals. It'... Read more

I think you need to get some background about the new owners. Have they ordered large layoffs even though their business was profitable? Do they view employees essentially as costs (to be cut) or as core assets? If their behavior demonstrated that they see people as a core asset rather than as a cost, the owners must make that very clear to employees, i.e. Skilled, productive, innovative employe... Read more

Historically, executive coaching embraced quantitative data about the person who would be coached from a sample of people she worked with, for, or who supervised that person. That measure came to be called "a 360" because the views of 5 to 10 other people expressed as answers to a standardized questionnaire was seen as providing a global assessment, with the additional advantage of a quantitative... Read more

Everyone of us has any number of biases for the simple reason that we are more comfortable interacting with some people than with others. People consciously and unconsciously differentiate between people, and this is an automatic response by our brains to efficiently differentiate between people or situations without having to analyze them slowly and fully.

Unfortunately, the focus on the di... Read more

When anyone feels demeaned, ignored or discredited, the first response is usually ANGER. That's why the first rule is Hold your fire! Check first.

1. Were insulting remarks made... by and to whom? And if there were, what was the speaker's intent? Were the remarks intentional? Are there grievances involved? Is misinterpretation possible? Male humor, for example, is typically barbed digs the v... Read more

Everyone above has given thoughtful answers to solving the problem of negative gossip...emphasizing open communication, participatory discussions, respect for the divergent opinions and focused problem solving. These are all appropriate solutions to circumstances which would benefit from a rational approach.

However, gossip is NOT rational.

It is anonymous, frequently vicious and behind peop... Read more