Small businesses are doing their part

A lot of businesses are helping during the pandemic. This includes an Ontario facility MANUFACTURING THEIR FIRST personal protective equipment masks for health care professionals or this SMALL DESIGNER making cotton masks and donating one for one to at-risk community…

Our business community is mobilized

I’m very proud of how our Ontario business community has mobilized. Since launching their ONTARIO TOGETHER portal, “Over 1,200 submissions were received for the first three challenges to support the delivery of mental health solutions to vulnerable populations, ensure the…

Great leaders listen

I came across this old article by Susan Mazza in Saba Blog Digest, where she talks about how listening to people shows them you care. It’s also an excellent skill for leaders to have to show their employees they care.…

Be a better leader

Joanne Trotta has written many excellent articles about the importance of soft skills, such as empathy for effective leadership. She notes, “In my opinion, effective leadership simply does not exist without empathy. I feel this way because of experience: Every…

The use, abuse and disuse of power

We recently facilitated a webinar with Change Management expert and coach Kashmir Birk called Culture is Change: The Use, Abuse and Disuse of Power. He talked about how there is a blind spot in some organizations that allows a culture of…

Dear Abby for the workplace

There’s very good advice found in Alison Green’s ASK A MANAGER website and in her books. Alison’s been answering people’s work-related questions since 2007. She gets questions on topics like how to make your boss adore you, how to take criticism gracefully,…

Bad brainstorming kills ideas

Professor, author and innovation expert, Barry L. Cross has written a discussion paper for Queen’s University Smith School of Business on the topic of brainstorming and how storyboarding can help make brainstorming sessions successful: “Much of what passes for brainstorming are…

Alison Green has biases

Yes, we already posted about advice columnist, Alison Green; however, the biases she lists in her Ask a Manager website are worth their own post: “I believe the whole point of managing is to get things done. Everything else follows from there.…