Archives

Featured Guest: Rod Lacey

simPRO’s approach to the Great Resignation is simple: empower employees.  And learning how to direct that empowerment is simple, too:  listen to staff.  Employees will tell you what they need, and want!  This employee empowerment prepares simPRo for the future of work. In this episode, simPRO’s Chief People Operations Officer, Rod Lacey, shares insights into how the employer/employee relationship has evolved; what that means for company culture and leadership strategy; how decisions are shaped by employee listening strategies; and how this all manifests as in the employee value proposition.  You’ll learn that, for simPRO, simple solutions mean success!

Featured Guest: Chris Nolan

One look at the headlines on any given day makes it clear: the world is UNclear. How can an organization navigate through the volatility, uncertainty, complexity, and ambiguity to survive – much less succeed? By understanding VUCA, a concept developed by the Pentagon in 1987 to give our military an edge in chaos. Filmmaker Chris Nolan joins Maureen Metcalf to share how this military technique directly applies to businesses and non-profits – information drawn from his new documentary and book: It’s VUCA!

Featured Guest: Rebecca Ryan

All of us took history classes, but who’s taken future classes?

Studying the future is a discipline that stretches back decades. Strategic foresight is the established and proven process of looking at future probabilities, yet many business and NPO leaders either don’t know about it, or don’t understand it.  It’s used by Fortune 200 companies, the U.S. military, the World Bank, and others.  As futurist Rebecca Ryan explains to host Maureen Metcalf, strategic foresight helps those organizations decrease risk and maximize opportunity.  That, in turn, provides them with a competitive advantage. So much so that Disney requires learning it before candidates can enter the C-Suite.  Listen to this episode – and get a glimpse of your future!

Guest: Jim Ritchie-Dunham 

There’s more to grit than determination – a whole lot more.  Knowing that can help you harness this incredible power of passion and perseverance.

Building on the work of Angela Duckworth and her seminal book, guest Jim Ritchie-Dunham shows how there are four levels of grit in an organization…an insight which dovetails neatly with his own work in ecosynomics.  Leaders often unknowingly determine how it cascades through various parts of their business – but because they’re not aware of it, they may be reinforcing the wrong kind for a particular department, team, or employee.  That results in inefficiencies, lower staff engagement, and the loss of talent.  But all of that can be boosted when grit is recognized and deftly applied.  Dig in to a deeper understanding of grit with Jim Ritchie-Dunham and host Maureen Metcalf!

In this episode, you’ll learn:

1. The four lenses for viewing and identifying the grit in your team, and throughout your organization
2. The unstated social agreements you have with every single person you work with, and
3. How the best leaders see grit in their teams.

For daily wisdom from our guests, be sure to follow us on LinkedIn .  We’re on Mastodon, Facebook, and Twitter, too!

Other episodes you’ll enjoy:

• The Science Behind Our Yes! – with Jim Ritchie-Dunham
• The Good Fight: Using Productive Conflict – with Liane Davey
• Mental Toughness: How to Embrace Stress for Greater Success – with Col. Deb Lewis

Featured Guest: Dr. Maryanna Klatt

It’s no secret that the well-being of your workforce directly affects the well-being of your entire organization. Prior to the pandemic, most corporate wellness programs focused on physical fitness.  The stresses of COVID quarantining, though, showed that mental health is every bit as important.

Integrative medicine ties both physical and mental health together, revealing many ways in which they influence each other. In this episode, Dr. Maryanna Klatt discusses the role of integrative medicine, how it affects our well-being, and why this is so important for leaders. Her own research focuses on mindfulness, but the Center works with and researches acupuncture, Ayurvedic medicine, yoga, massage, and more.

There’s a clear ROI for leaders: reducing stress and burnout is a mighty tool in keeping the Great Resignation away!

Featured Guest: Ben Marcovitz

Most often, when employees are labeled as underperforming, leaders write them off. When such an employee inevitably leaves (or is forced out), you’re potentially giving your competition top talent…because with the right approach, those employees can become motivated high-performers. Ben Marcovitz, CEO of the Rise Institute, believes expecting radical growth from struggling staff should be the norm. It’s far less costly than staff churn and training, and can reveal untapped potential. From the classroom to the corporation, Ben has seen this work consistently in practice. He shares the details with host Maureen Metcalf. Join us, and radically grow your in-house pool of talent!

Guest: Greg Moran

“Good afternoon, staff. I’m listening.”

If only your boss truly listened, like Frasier Crane! The reality is most folks high up the chain have little clue about what the front line — and the customers the front line interacts with — are thinking. As the staff at one major company said, “They’re not even listening to us.”

The solution is easy. Slack, Teams, and other chat channels have replaced the watercooler as your company’s own internal social media. Listening to those conversations reveals a wealth of information…and solutions to boost your team’s and customers’ experiences. As an example, guest Greg Moran discusses the basics of how Aware’s AI system finds trending topics without intruding on privacy.

In this episode, you’ll learn:
1. There’s a big difference between monitoring employees and listening to them

2. How listening — directly and via AI — gives people a voice in the head office; a voice not filtered by management

3. How to maintain individuals’ privacy while keeping a finger on the pulse of your team.

Other episodes with Greg Moran:

• Evolving Leadership to Navigate Disruption
• The New Role of Leadership in a Hybrid Workplace
• Watch this video excerpt from this podcast

Featured Guest: Gregory Milano

A leader’s lust for short-term profit often means pulling tomorrow’s results into today’s reports. Those intentions may be well-meaning, intending to please shareholders and the board. But they can result in bankrupting the future. After all, if you’re crediting next quarter’s returns into this quarter, how will you make next quarter look as appealing? It’s unsustainable.

In his new book, Curing Corporate Short-Termism, Gregory Milano guides senior managers who want to encourage more investment in the future of their companies. Many corporate practices are counterproductive, creating stiff headwinds for managers trying to grow their business. The solution: a culture of ownership. When you see yourself as the owner of the company, your decisions change; the long-term becomes more important.

Gregory discusses the dangers of short-termism and the tools to overcome it with host Maureen Metcalf – and how these principles produce long-term value that benefits not just the organization’s shareholders, but all of its many stakeholders…including society at large.

Other episodes you’ll enjoy:

• Do No Harm: Ethics for Leaders with Terri O’Fallon
• Facing Uncertainty: It’s VUCA with Christopher Nolan
• Expecting the Unexpected: VUCA in Action at Red Roof with George Limbert

Season 8 Episode 43

Guests: Roxanne Brown and Edward Cook

85% of employees worldwide are not engaged in their workplaces. That takes an obvious toll on morale…and productivity. What can you do?

Roxanne Brown and Edward Cook have some compelling answers. They cofounded The Change Decision, a change and culture consultancy focused on growing Joy at Work.  Their mission sounds simple, but after decades of disengagement, there is both art and science in boosting your staff. They’ll  explore insightful change leadership tips, including strategies for managing ongoing changes; what to do when facing change resistance; how to inspire teams and managers; and navigating deeply personal, complex feelings that come with being a change leader.

Featured Guests: Bob DeKoch and Phil Clampitt

Only 15% of workers in the U.S. feel engaged with their jobs. That’s just one job ill poor leadership spawns; bad leaders also cause turnover, absenteeism, and more. What is going wrong?  Some leaders have the right beliefs and sentiments. Others may possess the right skills. Yet world-class leaders need BOTH the right beliefs and practices to address the current employee and organizational challenges.  That ideal combination produces a leader who goes beyond servant leadership to truly caring leadership – and the results on employee engagement are profound.

In their new book, Leading With Care in a Tough World:  Beyond Servant Leadership, authors Bob DeKoch and Phil Clampitt detail the transformation to caring leadership – and the reasons it’s so deeply needed by so many organizations. They share those reasons in this episode.