People don't resist change, they resist being changed. Awareness enables individual, organisational, and social transformation.
Ten years ago, I had after-work drinks with one of my best friends. Her husband read 100+ books per year, and I found it fascinating (I was in the 20-30 books per year category). I don't have time to read 100 books per year, I said, thinking of my (then) schedule, packed with work, events,... Continue Reading →
... and is the core of this coaching approach: coaching with compassion, developed by Richard Boyatzis, Ellen VanOosten, PhD, and Melvin Smith, professors at Weatherhead School of Management. One morning, I accidentally discovered this coaching approach when I took a taxi to the office (versus my regular reading-in-the-train trip). I looked for an exciting podcast... Continue Reading →
The coaching relationship is at the heart of co-active coaching. Read on for everything you need to know about the framework: values, principles, contexts, and tools for an effective co-active coaching relationship.
I was talking about feedback to a C-level of a startup the other day: "Criticism as feedback is a learned skill, but there are ways to warm up people to it", I said. "I don't think it's a good idea to call it criticism or negative feedback. It has quite a harsh connotation. I would... Continue Reading →
It's a beautiful, sunny day on April, 15°C in the mountains. I'm on top of the world in Bormio, a beautiful resort in Northern Italy. I've been snowboarding the entire day and am content in the warm sun. A week ago, when I arrived, I sadly looked at this slope from below; "I'll never get... Continue Reading →
If you google "organisational change", you get 45.300.000 results. You'll drown if you dig for some practical information you can apply now. Google no more. This blog post will give you all the information you need on organisational change and resources to look into for more. As a bonus, the centrepiece of the blog post... Continue Reading →
Story 1: The Interview One hour before the interview, I changed my clothes, brushed my hair, put on some makeup (my son's having night terrors was taking a toll on my face) and prepared mentally. I checked my internet connection and Google Hangouts and ensured everything was functioning. I was ready. The interview went well... Continue Reading →
I believe all Agile principles are equal in importance, and they work together holistically: focus on customers, iterative development, self-organised teams, technical excellence, and continuous improvement. But this last principle is "more equal than the others": Continuous improvement is the heart of Agile. Without reflection, there is no learning, without learning, there is no continuous... Continue Reading →
The fireball: my first feedback story It was one of my first jobs, the debut of my career. I was working for Procter & Gamble in Bucharest. The Romanian branch had just opened a procurement centre (intending to transfer all procurement activities from Brussels and Geneva), and I was employee number four of the new... Continue Reading →
Empathy and emotional intelligence are the focus of management and leadership research. Not only that but it's considered a core skill for just .. being human. The success of teaching children empathy brought the idea that adults can be taught too. Fortunately, there are a lot of tools to learn empathy, and here's one of... Continue Reading →
I've been living in Malaysia for over five years, working for a company that employs more than 60 nationalities. My first Scrum team had eight nationalities (out of eight team members) spread across all spectrums of cultural differences. My family is also multicultural (my son has Romanian-Malaysian genes, plus influences from Romanian, Chinese, Malaysian and... Continue Reading →
“All that is necessary for effectiveness is output judged acceptable by those who receive or use it, a team that winds up its work at least as capable as when it started, and members who are at least as satisfied as they are frustrated by what has transpired. The challenge is to generate ways of... Continue Reading →
Do you know all those books that teach you how to make your team great or how to push your team to rock-star performance? Toss them aside. You can't make the team great, says Harvard Professor Richard Hackman, a world-leader researcher in group performance, leadership effectiveness and self-managed teams. But, thankfully, there's a but: you... Continue Reading →
I started working with software developers a little under ten years ago. Coming from a business background, my predominant work was communication and relating. But I began to work with people who would spend more time creating, designing, and building products. I had to relearn my approach to work, communication, meeting settings and generally my... Continue Reading →
The way to mastery is a long journey. Yet if you're passionate about your craft, be it writing, designing, building virtual products, building physical products, or just want to become a master at whatever you're currently doing, pick up this book - Apprenticeship Patterns. Guidance for the Aspiring Software Craftsman, by David D. Hoover and... Continue Reading →
Note: This research is part of a series of assignments for Cognitive Psychology, part of my MSc in Psychology. Autobiographical memory (AM) is memories from past experiences of our own lives (Fivush, 2011). This type of memory contains episodic memories (specific events) and semantic memories (personal semantic memories, facts related to those events) (Cabeza &... Continue Reading →
Note: This research is part of a series of assignments for Cognitive Psychology, part of my MSc in Psychology. My first childhood memory comes from being separated from my brother at five in kindergarten. I found out that not having memories as an infant is called childhood amnesia/infantile amnesia, as the earliest memories in children... Continue Reading →
Note: This research is part of a series of assignments for Cognitive Psychology, part of my MSc in Psychology. People make decisions based on past experiences and learning by using shortcuts or “rules of thumb” to reach the correct conclusion and take action. These shortcuts are called heuristics, and they play an essential role in... Continue Reading →
Note: This research is part of a series of assignments for Cognitive Psychology, part of my MSc in Psychology. Growing up in post-communist Romania, we always knew what our future held for us: my brother was meant to study mathematics, and I was meant to study humanities. However, 90% of girls in high school were... Continue Reading →
Note: This research is part of a series of assignments for Cognitive Psychology, part of my MSc in Psychology. Mindfulness means “paying attention in a particular way: on purpose, in the present moment, and nonjudgmentally” (Kabat-Zinn, p. 4, 1994). Thus, mindfulness is a practice that takes us to the present moment, where we exist with... Continue Reading →
Note: an assignment I wrote for Social Psychology (part of my MSc in Psychology). The assignment is a position statement that should answer the question: Are traditional social psychological theories useful for explaining interaction in online environments? The Incel community (Incels) is an internet subculture of men who are involuntary celibates, unable to find a... Continue Reading →
Note: an assignment I wrote for Social Psychology (part of my MSc in Psychology). The assignment is a position statement that should answer the question: Is there evidence that group processes transfer to different contexts and cultures? Laissez-faire is a passive leadership style with devastating effects on employees. Laissez-faire leaders do not recognise or motivate... Continue Reading →
Note: an assignment I wrote for Social Psychology (part of my MSc in Psychology). The assignment is a position statement that should answer the question: Can social psychology be used to address current societal issues? Climate change is a global challenge that requires global solutions involving behavioural change and the cooperation of large groups, from... Continue Reading →
Note: This research is part of a series of assignments for the Cognitive Psychology course, part of my MSc in Psychology. Going through my third lockdown caused by a new strain of COVID-19, I am not as anxious as when the pandemic started. In the beginning, I was in a state of high alert and... Continue Reading →
From Journey to Center: Lessons in Unifying Body, Mind, and Spirit, by Thomas F. Crum "You do the "doing" part of facilitation well; you have to work on centring and entering the conversation", my manager told me some time ago. What does being centred mean? How can you learn to get centred? How does it... Continue Reading →
Agents of Awareness 