Robinson & Johnson (2024) suggest that every four years, a U.S. presidential election brings voters to an intersection where they decide whether to turn right or left. Halting at these intersections often brings heightened tension and polarizing discourse within our workplaces and society. Taking proactive measures to ensure the safety and well-being of employees and providing an environment conducive to effective collaboration among employees can help prevent fraught work environments from forming. Here are some practical procedures that employers may want to consider implementing throughout standard day-to-day operations, before and after an election, to efficiently navigate establishing ground rules and policies, fostering environments of open dialogue, and providing support.
We can use Everything DiSC® Productive Conflict to help workers improve self-awareness around conflict behaviors. Rather than focus on a step-by-step process for conflict resolution, Everything DiSC Productive Conflict provides participants with techniques to curb destructive behaviors and effectively respond to conflict situations. The program features an exploration of DiSC® in a conflict context, provides an opportunity for participants to explore their destructive conflict responses, and offers them a method for making more productive choices in their response to conflict.
Participant Take-Aways
*Appreciate how their style of handling conflict affects the people around them
*Learn how to “catch” themselves when going down a destructive conflict path
*Learn how to reframe a conflict situation and choose more productive behaviors
*Build a common language in the organization around appropriate conflict behavior
DM me for more info or an example.
Become an Everything DiSC® Certified Practitioner with me!
As the world of work becomes more reliant on technology, we have been challenged to recreate the authentic human connections that drive results. Now, with the proven power of Everything DiSC®, you can help shape a more engaged and collaborative culture by teaching people about themselves and others.
As an Everything DiSC® Certified Practitioner, you’ll build the credibility and expertise needed to deliver impactful DiSC experiences that help people work better together. During this two-week, virtual learning experience, you will:
•Deepen your understanding of the DiSC model, theory, research, and key principles.
•Learn to build custom solutions using the Everything DiSC® on Catalyst™ experience.
•Familiarize yourself with the full Everything DiSC application suite.
•Practice facilitation techniques while receiving feedback in a safe environment.
•Gain access to Wiley’s online training center, connecting you to course content and your peers.
Upon successful completion of the exam, you will earn the credential of Everything DiSC Certified Practitioner, signaling proven competence in shaping an engaged, collaborative, and high-performing culture—knowledgeable in the language of DiSC.
You can get certified in two ways: individually through Wiley or with your team through me in a schedule that works for you.
DM me to get your team certified!
Build meaningful conversations in your organization
Gallup's 2024 Employee Engagement Checklist includes this: Prepare managers to have meaningful conversations with their employees.
It goes on to define 5 characteristics of a meaningful conversation:
1) Recognition or appreciation for recent work.
2) Collaboration and relationships.
3) Current goals and priorities at work.
4) The length of the conversation: Between 15 and 30 minutes is enough time for a meaningful conversation, but only if it happens frequently.
5) Employee strengths or the things they do well: Managers can have much more meaningful discussions about how each person gets their work done if those conversations are based on what they do best. The takeaway is that feedback is meaningful to employees when their manager focuses on recognition, collaboration, goals and priorities, and strengths. And if these conversations happen every week, they can be brief. Naturally, problems and challenges will arise — and managers and employees should discuss them — but to improve engagement, managers must have conversations that inspire each individual.
As you have these meaningful conversations, taking communication preferences into account will make these successful and Wiley's Everything DiSC portfolio provides data to help each person adapt to the other's preferences. DM me for more information.
Let's work together to get your team certified in DiSC!
Build your team's ability to engage and get the best from your workforce using the DiSC family of profiles by asking me to lead their certification! DM me to set up a schedule that works for all of us.
Make your teams immediately effective together!
If your work life consists of people joining ad hoc teams to solve specific problems, Your Groups on Catalyst™ allows those teams to quickly visualize the preferences and tendencies of their teammates.
Group Continua on Catalyst is an effective (and fun!) tool for teams to build connection and community using DiSC®. By plotting members along eight different behavioral continua, teams gain straightforward language for safe conversations about differences, helping them reach new levels of performance. With Group Continua, your teams can:
• Recognize strengths and challenges
• Communicate with clarity
• Make better decisions
• And more!
This tool helps integrate DiSC® into the daily life of your organization and speeds up team effectiveness on the spot.
Become an Everything DiSC® Certified Practitioner with me!
As the world of work becomes more reliant on technology, we have been challenged to recreate the authentic human connections that drive results. Now, with the proven power of Everything DiSC®, you can help shape a more engaged and collaborative culture by teaching people about themselves and others.
As an Everything DiSC® Certified Practitioner, you’ll build the credibility and expertise needed to deliver impactful DiSC experiences that help people work better together. During this two-week, virtual learning experience, you will:
•Deepen your understanding of the DiSC model, theory, research, and key principles.
•Learn to build custom solutions using the Everything DiSC® on Catalyst™ experience.
•Familiarize yourself with the full Everything DiSC application suite.
•Practice facilitation techniques while receiving feedback in a safe environment.
•Gain access to Wiley’s online training center, connecting you to course content and your peers.
Upon successful completion of the exam, you will earn the credential of Everything DiSC Certified Practitioner, signaling proven competence in shaping an engaged, collaborative, and high-performing culture—knowledgeable in the language of DiSC.
You can get certified in two ways: individually through Wiley or with your team through me in a schedule that works for you.
DM me to get your team certified!
Pay Attention to your Managers
From Gallup's 2024 State of the Global Workplace Report:
The hard job of managing people has gotten even harder in recent years.
New demands for worker flexibility in the remote and hybrid workplace and increased risk of employee mental health problems add to the already difficult job of managing. In 2023, Gallup found one in five employees reported feeling loneliness, anger, or sadness during a lot of the previous day, and four in 10 felt a lot of stress.
Managers already have many responsibilities such as carrying out leadership initiatives, keeping up to date with customer and product needs, monitoring time and expenses, performance management, and training. But their role of inspiring people has never been more urgent. They are uniquely positioned to know each employee’s specific needs, career goals and work-life situation.
You can build your managers role awareness, engagement and capacity with the Everything DiSC Management profile either on the Catalyst platform or through traditional training. DM me for more info or a demo.
Hire and retain the best people!
How to select the right people to implement your strategy? Here's a tool that improves your hiring process: PXT Select™.
PXT Select™ helps make the very human decisions about hiring simpler and smarter. It is a powerful selection assessment that measures a candidate’s cognitive abilities, behaviors, and interests. Assessment results equip organizations and hiring managers with easy-to-understand information about the candidate and provides intuitive questions to strengthen the interview process.
One Assessment gives you a suite of reports! PXT Select’s suite of reports helps you select, onboard, coach, and develop employees. Here they are:
o Comprehensive Selection Report
o Comprehensive Selection Report: Sales*
o Multiple Positions Report
o Multiple Candidates Report
o Team Report
o Manager-Employee Report
o Individual’s Feedback Report
o Individual’s Feedback Report: Sales*
o Individual’s Graph
o Coaching Report
o Coaching Report: Sales*
o Performance Model Report
DM me for more information, a demo, or best practices for putting this in place in your organization.
Build your Sales Capability!
Salespeople play a critical role in the success of any business. As Henry Ford famously said, "Nothing happens until someone sells something." While it’s understandable that many steps need to be taken before a product or service can be sold, Ford's point remains valid, sales are necessary for companies to generate revenue and keep the lights on.
What impact could replicating your sales superstars have? These individuals are not just contributors; they are force multipliers. According to research from Mckinsey & Company, top sales performers can be 4x more productive than bottom performers. They consistently meet (or even surpass) their sales targets, clearly understand their client’s needs, and adapt easily in all situations.
When you discover your top performer's secret sauce, you can increase sales productivity, improve conversion rates, and increase YoY growth. PXT Select® and its AI-based testing algorithms are your gateway to this transformation.
Join our virtual showcase July 18 11-noon EST to explore how PXT Select has propelled other organizations to sales successes—and how it can revolutionize yours. You’ll gain:
Actionable Insights: Identify essential data to strategically evolve your sales team for a thriving future.
Empowering Tools: Explore resources that bolster both sales leaders and their teams toward success.
Proven Strategies: Hear success stories from various organizations and their journey with PXT Select.
Don’t miss this opportunity to see PXT Select in Action! DM me to register at no charge!!!
2023 Wiley Annual Report on the State of the Workplace
Wiley Workplace Intelligence does ongoing research about the state of our workplaces and here are the top 10 takeaways from their 2023 Annual Report:
1. People are optimistic about the future of their organization. In addition, a large majority of respondents also shared that managing the well-being of their people while achieving results continues to be a priority.
2. Communication is the most important quality in a leader. It's clear that there is a need for more communication and relationship building skills in order to increase psychological safety across all organizational levels.
3. Communication has a direct impact on engagement. The frequency and kind of communication in your organization has a direct impact on the engagement, morale, and productivity of your people.
4. Individual contributors feel less safe than executives taking risks at work. A psychologically safe environment as defined by Amy Edmonson of Harvard B-School, is an environment where we feel comfortable taking risks, expressing ideas and concerns, asking questions, and admitting mistakes without fear of negative consequences.
5. Generations have more in common than not. Surprisingly, respondents largely feel understood by other generations regardless of the generation they belong to.
6. Managers lack training on how to manage conflict. Only 57% of managers reported receiving training around conflict management.
7. Upskilling employees fills the widening skills gap. Most organizations in the study didn't have a clearly identified process for identifying current skills gaps. But, almost half (42%) reported that technical skills were the most critical missing "hard" skills with interpersonal skills following at 36%.
8. Where you work doesn't impact organizational culture. Many organizations made a return-to-office push in 2023. There were concerns about the impacts of remote work on organizational culture and many companies moved from completely remote to hybrid models or required a full return to the office. This research found that location doesn’t have as big of an impact as we might expect when it comes to creating a positive workplace culture. Instead, we found that feeling connected and experiencing a sense of belonging is more critical to creating a positive culture than simply occupying the same physical space.
9. AI is not ready to replace humans when it comes to learning and development. Using AI for administrative tasks increases efficiency but knowing people seek human connection when learning, L & D practitioners should consider ways to continue meeting that need while incorporating technological advances into their practice.
10. Well-being positively impacts performance. Balancing employee satisfaction and productivity ranked the highest, and the increased focus on well-being positively impacted performance throughout these organizations.
I have tools to help you maximize each of these findings. DM me for more information or a demo!
Build Engagement and Related Results Throughout your Organization!
Gallup's 2024 State of the Global Workplace reports these key findings:
-20% of the world’s employees experience daily loneliness. Loneliness is highest for fully remote workers.
-Well-being among younger employees dropped in 2023.
-Employee engagement is a significant factor in overall life experiences.
-Managers account for 70% of the variance in team employee engagement.
-Across countries, when managers are engaged, employees are more likely to be engaged.
-In best-practice organizations, 3/4 of managers and 7 in 10 non-managers are engaged.
When organizations increase the number of engaged employees, they improve a host of organizational outcomes, including profit, retention rates and customer service.
There are resources I provide that build engagement which increase employee and manager well-being as well as measurable results like profit, retention rates and customer service.
This graphic provides more specifics - dm me for more information or a demo!
Integrate DiSC into your work culture so build capacity and engagement!
You can create a useful shorthand to make the most of your work relationships by integrating DiSC into your language, and introducing the complete portfolio of DiSC applications builds awareness and engagement throughout your organization. This includes Everything DiSC Workplace, Everything DiSC Management, Everything DiSC Sales, Everything DiSC Productive Conflict, Everything DiSC Agile EQ and Everything DiSC Work of Leaders. It's worth a look and has a high payoff!
How Management has Changed Since Covid-19
In an Oct. 2023 Forbes article, Anupam Satyasheel outlines how management has changed since Covid-10 and how future-minded, thoughtful organizations have embraced these changes:
1. Remote Work and Flexibility. Some companies insisted workers return to the office after the pandemic, but other realized employees were happier, more productive, and more willing to participate in company culture remotely.
2. Emphasis on Employee Well-Being. Managers who genuinely ask how their employees are doing will gain their trust and confidence, and know that employee well-being amounts to company well-being.
3. Digital Transformation. We can't forget that employee are the operators of the increased technology we see. Good management encourages online interactions and creates digital experiences for employees.
4. Remote Team Building and Leadership. In a remote work environment, team bonding is not naturally cultivated. This needs to be an intentional effort by managers to maintain morale.
5. Talent Acquisition and Retention. Hiring and retaining talent has become a different effort because interviewing is often remote and managers don't have the bandwidth to respond to every job application. In terms of retaining talent, managers should be proactive with department and team meetings, check-ins and continuous team building.
Our Five Behaviors Personal and Team Development profiles/facilitated conversations can be done virtually or in-person and create a language and connection that's not easily achieved otherwise. DM me for more info or a demo!
Reverse the U.S. Engagement Trend!
Continuing a downward trend, employee engagement in the U.S. has dropped to its lowest level in more than a decade.
Last year, Gallup found U.S. employees were increasingly detached from their employers, with the workforce reporting less role clarity, lower satisfaction with their organizations and less connection to their companies’ mission or purpose. Employees were also less likely to feel someone at work cares about them.
The drop in these employee engagement elements was particularly acute in remote, hybrid and younger workers. By the end of 2023, 33% of U.S. employees overall were highly engaged, meaning they were highly involved and enthusiastic about their work and workplaces.
Unfortunately, the first quarter of 2024 continued this downward trend, with engagement dropping three percentage points to 30% among both full- and part-time employees. This decline represents 4.8 million fewer employees who are engaged in their work and workplace, marking the lowest reported level of engagement since 2013.
Employee engagement trends are significant because they link to many important performance outcomes crucial to organizational leaders such as productivity, employee retention, customer service, safety incidents, quality of work and profitability.
The Wiley tools I provide you increase engagement across the board in your organization, including hiring for fit and engagement, remote teamwork, increasing emotional agility, managing more effectively using style awareness and building teamwork in hybrid work. DM me for more information.
Save the world by managing for maximum engagement!
Gallup’s State of the Global Workplace 2023 Report stresses the ongoing decline in potential economic growth has serious implications for the world’s ability to tackle the challenges ahead of us like stubborn poverty, diverging incomes, and climate change. They propose that our ability to affect change depends on CHANGING THE WAY OUR PEOPLE ARE MANAGED.
They recommend that leaders start here:
1. Focus on your most winnable employees. Nearly 6 in 10 employees are quietly quitting, but they are likely to become engaged with a few changes to their workplace.
2. Give them a better manager. Managing more effectively increases employee engagement.
Tools like Everything DiSC, particularly Everything DiSC Management and Work of Leaders can improve your managers’ ability to establish rapport and build engagement. Each profile comes with a Facilitation Kit that helps you introduce it and adapt it to your group, your culture, and your time parameters.
DM me for more information!
Build teamwork on the spot with Conversation Starters on Catalyst
Does your team struggle to connect? Do group discussions stall? Are you left with more questions than answers after meetings?
With Conversation Starters on Catalyst™, your teams can use DiSC® to tackle common challenges that hinder performance.
By combining DiSC with simple discussion guides, Conversation Starters equips your teams to talk about
personality-based differences—helping you get to know each other faster, communicate more clearly,
and make better decisions.
Getting started is easy!
1. Visit the Your Groups feature on Catalyst
2. Create and save a group with people in your organization
3. Click into Conversation Starters and choose a topic
All it takes is 30 minutes and a Catalyst profile for your team to start working (and performing!) better together.
DM me for more info or a demo!
Make the right DiSC choice!
Everything DiSC resources, published by Wiley, give you the most valid, applicable, easily-facilitated content compared to other tools out there in the market. Here’s how:
* Powered by nearly 50 years of research, Everything DiSC provides self-assessments with flexible facilitation, helping your learners develop the social and emotional know-how for more effective (and enjoyable!) interactions.
• With continuous investment in market research and the Everything DiSC learning experiences, Everything DiSC ensures innovative solutions that address the ever-changing demands of today’s modern organizations.
• With a 97% global satisfaction rating among organizations and learners worldwide, you can feel confident that Everything DiSC will not only satisfy but also delight your workforce.
* Wiley now offers Catalyst - an easy to use platform that allows learners to review and apply Everything DiSC to any situation on the spot.
In a time where many learners just want to check off their to-do lists, you can give them something they can use in any situation.
Use your energy on productive relationships
Our motivation to work has changed after COVID and many of us don’t want to spend energy on relationships that don’t serve either us or the work. Everything DiSC on Catalyst tools help you make small changes that result in less energy spent on unproductive or unsatisfying relationships. DM me for more info or a demo.
Make the right DiSC choice!
Everything DiSC resources, published by Wiley, give you the most valid, applicable, easily-facilitated content compared to other tools out there in the market. Here’s how:
* Powered by nearly 50 years of research, Everything DiSC provides self-assessments with flexible facilitation, helping your learners develop the social and emotional know-how for more effective (and enjoyable!) interactions.
• With continuous investment in market research and the Everything DiSC learning experiences, Everything DiSC ensures innovative solutions that address the ever-changing demands of today’s modern organizations.
• With a 97% global satisfaction rating among organizations and learners worldwide, you can feel confident that Everything DiSC will not only satisfy but also delight your workforce.
* Wiley now offers Catalyst - an easy to use platform that allows learners to review and apply Everything DiSC to any situation on the spot.
In a time where many learners just want to check off their to-do lists, you can give them something they can use in any situation.
Use Group Continua on Catalyst to help your team work better together!
Does your team need a little help understanding their communication blind spots? Group Continua on Catalyst helps teams gain clarity—ultimately helping them work (and perform!) better together.
Contact me to learn more!
