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  Guest Post by Patrick Del Rosario It can be tempting to turn a blind eye to pesky employee squabbles and hope they simply work themselves out. Unfortunately, though, workplace disputes rarely work themselves out on their own, and even the smallest disagreements can escalate into more serious problems if left to fester for too long. According to recent research, between 24 and 60% of management time is spent on dealing with conflicts and anger in the work place. While it may seem like all this time would be better spent on some other aspect of running a business, it is important to keep in mind that employees are the very thing that keep a company going, and in order to keep your workforce productive, happy and stress-free, interventions are often necessary. Here are a few tips to keep in mind when settling conflicts in the workplace. 1. Stay neutral and listen to both sides of the story When dealing with conflicts amongst your employees, it is important that you stay neutral an...

Adapted from Dan Pink's talk at the RSA, illustrates the hidden truths behind what really motivates us at home and in the workplace. Interesting research work showing how higher rewards not always leads to higher or better performance for knowledge workers.  Makes you wonder if we need to review and redesign performance management philosophy and Organizations reward approach. Higher performance need not always be driven by higher rewards, economic behavior is also a function of purpose of work and inherent satisfaction which a job provides. I am reminded of Herbert Simon's Satisficing approach where he pointed out that human beings lack the cognitive resources to maximize: we usually do not know the relevant probabilities of outcomes, we can rarely evaluate all outcomes with sufficient precision, and our memories are weak and unreliable. A more realistic approach to rationality takes into account these limitations: This is called bounded rationality .  These observations ...

Changing times needs different strategies to engage and retain key employees. Organizations adopt different approach towards managing talent and working towards improving deliverables for business profitability.  Mckinsey study shows that too many companies approach the retention of key employees during disruptive periods of organizational change by throwing financial incentives at senior executives, star performers, or other “rainmakers.”The money is rarely well spent. Many of the recipients would have stayed put anyway; others have concerns that money alone can’t address. Moreover, by focusing exclusively on high fliers, companies often overlook those “normal” performers who are nonetheless critical for the success of any change effort. Some of the key observations are: Find the “hidden gems” Once HR and line managers have generated a thoughtful and more inclusive list of key players (usually 30 to 45 percent of all employees), they can begin to prioritize groups and individuals ...

Its difficult being a good Boss in bad times when layoffs, pay cuts, and restructing have hit organisations everywhere .In this video interview, management professor and author Robert Sutton offers his advice on how to be a good boss in today’s difficult climate.

Managing a team with members from different cultural background and nationality has its own unique dimensions and challenges. Typically organizations have different training modules which train people on cross cultural aspects before they get exposed to the people of various nationality and culture. Research shows that most of the organizations have few common issues which inhibit the advancement of diverse groups in the workplace : (1) negative attitudes and discomfort toward people who are different, (2) discrimination, (3) prejudice, (4) stereotyping, (5) racism, and (6) bias. In one of the HBR series discussions , Navi Radjou, VP at Forrester Research shares his insight on why Indians score over their western counterparts. He asked senior execs at both Western and Indian multinationals with R&D operations across US, Europe, and India what challenges they face in managing their firms’ transnational innovation networks. They pointed out that the biggest hurdle is socio-cultural, ...

Is Employee engagement all about inspiring people and managing emotions at work ? More than organizational policies, compensation and recreational activities at work, its leadership at various levels in the organization which engages employees. HR may always strive to come up with great policies, themes for engagement and fancy branding activities. But if there’s one aspect inspire people for superior performance at work is the quality of leadership and mentoring ability of leaders at multiple levels which organization culture facilitates . Some of the great places to work are those which have strong middle management leadership talent and they have always energized and inspired individuals in teams to go for extra mile. I have seldom come across a disengaged employee in teams which have good leaders. By leaders I do not necessarily means the ones who make so called “strategic moves” at corporate level. For an employee leadership is experienced and exhibited at team level. It need n...