Thanks but no thanks
September 6, 2023
Sometimes humans really do need a reality check, that’s fair. But if you’re going to reality check someone, we suggest starting with the manager in the mirror.
World's Best Newsletter Archive
The sign of a good compromise
June 28, 2023
The past few years we’ve swung wildly between utopian and dystopian visions.
Behind the scenes at the magic kingdom
November 16, 2022
We don’t need it to be all doom and gloom. But what does it mean when there’s no longer space to talk about what’s working and what isn’t?
What to do when you’re all out of puffins
October 19, 2022
The bullshit is supposed to be in service of something. Ideally, say, work that you’re proud of, whose impact matters to you, and which allows you to live a life you enjoy.
You don’t want to drink that
August 10, 2022
Threats. Dismissiveness. Burnout. Micromanagement. Yelling. Every bad boss behaviour is going to come out of the woodwork in the next few months.
Smile more?
June 15, 2022
If you start from the assumption that you need to make your team happy – that happiness is an input to work that you need to maximize – you reach for one set of tools. Tools that reduce stress, remove discomfort, avoid conflict. And maybe at a birthday party, or a summer camp, those would be appropriate.
The perks are great and the work is fine
February 23, 2022
Faced with that blandness, a lot of leaders are pushing back-to-office plans. They have nostalgia for the flavour of a packed and humming office, and feel like if people would just get back in there, it would fix things.
You can’t seize the moment with your hands full
October 6, 2021
Today, our second book comes out. It’s an ender chest. It is a full year of these newsletters, from the first lockdown to the anniversary of those lockdowns. It is a place to put down some of what the past 18 months have felt like.
Just say hybrid because nobody knows
September 8, 2021
Can we get to a place where we start to reimagine the thing? Whatever the thing is that you miss, you can reinvent it without starting from zero. Pay attention to the ache of the thing that’s missing. What was important about it?
There’s no ‘I’ in Burnout
June 30, 2021
We hear from managers who want strategies for dealing with the burnt out folks on their teams. Doing the equivalent of the trolley problem every time a new project pops up. How do you give someone new work even as they’re drowning under the existing work?
It’s not worth it
May 19, 2021
After a year of being burnt out, crispy fried, work from home, but mostly living at work, employers are asking if we’re ready to come back. Back to commutes and shitty coffee and incompetent management (working on that last one as fast as we can).
Running on empty and full to bursting
April 7, 2021
There’s a grand re-integration coming. As the normalcy of exterior life returns it’s gonna let us focus on what a mess we’ve made of the place, internally.
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