Where life and work collide
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Why is pay spiralling?
Last week, accounting network @MGI Worldwide invited me to speak and host panels in Asia, Europe & the Americas… in one day. Interestingly, almost every market reported challenges with keeping talent and escalating pay rises. In interviews I’ve heard of people being offered pay rises 50% or more for senior jobs.
Collaboration overload: What would Kevin Bacon do?
Amidst the endless books about hybrid and remote-first working, launches Rob Cross’ Beyond Collaboration Overload (Harvard Business Review Press).
Driving 800 miles with a stranger
This week I’ve been to Aberystwyth, Newcastle, London and Edinburgh. A lot of that travelling was in filmmaker Graeme Mill’s Ford Fiesta. Graeme and I have worked together a few times over the years, but never spent whole days driving and chatting…
The Great Resignation: Value vs. Churn
I’ve been interviewing people who have resigned, are about to resign, or expect to resign in the next few months. It’s a hot topic right now: Microsoft’s research shows that 41% of employees, globally, are considering changing roles in the next year, and leadership teams everywhere are reporting significant churn. The UK has more unfilled jobs than ever before.
A Diptyque triple-wick pushed me over the edge
Last week, my husband lit my new Diptyque candle for our seven year old’s bath. It is the most beautiful candle I’ve EVER owned (a moving gift from a friend) and I hadn’t had a chance to light it myself yet.
Hello world! Navigating the tricky new etiquette
This week I’ve done seven speaking events, plus kicking off a nationwide research tour, which has demanded navigating the world as it wakes up.
It’s a complex place!
The WORST version of hybrid
A siren started in my head the first time I heard someone—at a bank—proposing a hybrid system in which some of the senior people choose where they work… but juniors are required to be in the office, full time.
Flex for parents and carers? September’s struggle 😩
Terri White, former editor of Esquire magazine, gave a blistering interview on the Media Voices podcast about how she was forced to choose between her baby and the job she loved.
The Great Return? Or Ghost Office?
They said they wanted to come back, so where are they?
Office-life restarts: but there’s no finishing line
We’re back! Hope you had a great summer and found some sunshine somewhere.
I’m excited about this next leap into hybrid work: I hope—believe?—we are embarking on an adventure to find out what makes us more productive, builds better working relationships, and helps us manage the balance between home and work more successfully.
Stressed out? Try the one next thing.
“We are just an advanced breed of monkeys on a minor planet of a very average star” – Stephen Hawking.
I think it was supposed to put our troubles into perspective, but sometimes events can be overwhelming…
Need time to lead? Don’t give a monkey’s
Happy Birthday to me!
To celebrate, I am sharing an idea based on an HBR piece published the year I was born called Management Time: Who’s Got the Monkey?
Authority: it’s a man’s world.
This week, two women asked for my advice on how to tackle being talked over at work. This made it the perfect time to ask journalist and radio presenter Mary Ann Sieghart about her new book, The Authority Gap. Why women are still taken less seriously than men and what to do about it.
Can a £26 burger predict who returns to the office?
On Sunday night, a friend took me to the NoMad hotel in Covent Garden for the most perfect burger and Negroni. The place was the very definition of the draw of cities: a dramatic magistrates’ court, a luscious red velvet and leather library (with genuine books), and an oval marble bar that Jay Gatsby should’ve been draped against, cigarette in hand.
Don’t waste limbo: there’s much to be done!
The government has delayed the end of restrictions: 28 days later indeed.
For me this extra time drifting between the end of lockdown and reopening feels flat. Like the time between A-levels and results when you’re waiting for life to start. Interspersed only by dramatic announcements from the likes of Morgan Stanley chief, James Gorman, threatening to “change his tone” if people don’t return to five days a week in September.
How much do people like you?
And how much do you actually care? As I’ve grown up, I’ve become reasonably comfortable with being a ‘Marmite’ character that a certain percentage of people can’t stand. It doesn’t bother me at all. But I know many women, and some men, who don’t feel the same way.
WFH: Not so flexible after all
Will hybrid work actually demand more leadership control?
The question was raised in an article in the Harvard Business Review, by Nicholas Bloom of Stanford University, based on surveying 30,000 American employees.
The new digital etiquette we’re all being judged on
According to The Journal of Personality & Social Psychology, we misinterpret the tone of half of the emails we receive. Yep, for one in every two messages, we are totally missing the vibe. No wonder everyone is feeling a touch paranoid.
When you SHOULD work for free
I’m often confronted with the question: when is it a good idea to work for free?
There’s a LOT of heat online about why you should not work unpaid. Especially women. Especially if offered ‘exposure’ in return. (Scroll through ForExposure’s feed on Twitter for shocking stories of why people should invest their skills in projects with zero budgets.) Makes total sense, right?
How we stop work from killing us
It’s Mental Health Awareness Week and the focus is on nature. Cue posts about going for another 🤬 walk in the park.
Research published this week by the National Bureau of Economic Research, found that premature aging and death were impacted by:
- battling industry downturns
- the threat of takeovers
- …and pandemics too?
(Based on 1,605 company bosses at large publicly listed US firms over the last 50 years)