Skip navigation
Here’s one of the most important lessons about employee engagement: Everybody has shoves and tugs. Shoves are those issues that demotivate you, drain your energy, stop you from giving maximum effort, and make you want to quit—they “shove” you out the door. Tugs are those issues that motivate and fulfill you, make you want to give maximum effort, and keep you coming back every day—they “tug” at you to stay.
Has your company ever gone through a change effort where some employees got anxious while others stayed calm? Have you ever seen some employees freak out over a mistake they made, while others got right back on the horse?
Whatever you call them, performance appraisals (or employee evaluations or annual reviews) are painful. But our high performers aren’t making these events strenuous; it’s our low performers that make us dread these conversations.
There are different types of work that leaders can do. There’s work for which we feel passion and that propels us towards our big goals. There’s work that we don’t love doing but that still needs to get done. And then there’s what I call Red Light work; activities that bring no value and that are a colossal waste of time. 
What differentiates CEOs from all the people who never make it to the c-suite? Is it brains? Ambition? Luck? The answer will vary from company to company, but there are some characteristics that appear across organizations. And one such characteristic is how people approach change.
About 50% of employees say their leader rarely or never takes an active role in helping them to grow and develop. Think about that: Why do we have leaders if not to help employees grow and develop? And yet, leader directed employee growth and development is rarely or never happening for half of our people.
Too many people think, “I lack the authority to have any real power at work.” It’s not only a false belief; it’s pretty much impossible to live in today’s world by relying solely on titular power (i.e. power based on having a big title like vice president).
What does it mean to have an extraordinary career? I see a lot of people getting it wrong. Some are too hung up on the technical aspects of career. In all my studies, the people who have great careers, it’s not because of technical aptitude. It’s entirely possible to have great skills and still be unfulfilled or even miserable.
We all have our own presentation style, but have you ever thought about how your particular style compares to others? And the strengths and weaknesses of your presentation style?
After years of research, my team and I have found there are four primary presentation styles: the Closer, the Data Scientist, the Director and the Storyteller. You can discover your own style with the quiz What's Your Presentation Style?
Let’s imagine that you’re a manager and your company has just given out bonuses. Each manager received the bonus numbers for their specific employees and everyone was told explicitly not to share the numbers with other managers. So, of course, the manager down the hall catches you later and says “I think my employees got shortchanged on the annual bonus. What did your employees get?”
