Tag Archives: Humor

The Levity Effect: Why It Pays to Lighten Up (#HRFL11)

I have read The Levity Effect: Why It Pays to Lighten Up, and I think it’s a fantastic book for people to read in order to understand the impact that humor and levity can have in the workplace. Scott Christopher, the author of the book and speaker at the session, had so many fantastic quips and quotes that it might as well have been a comedy session with some learning thrown in. It was phenomenal and I can’t say enough how much I enjoyed hearing him speak.

One of our core values is to have a safe and enjoyable workplace. That’s why we have photos of office staff in men’s helicopter flight suits and videos of bagpipers playing in our lobby. We take the enjoyable part very seriously. Well, not so seriously. Anyway, you get the point.

Five quick points:

Figure out what’s fun and share that (healing patients vs. serving food, building relationships vs. recruiting candidates, etc.)
Herb Kelleher-Southwest Airlines-order of recruiting importance from least to greatest: education, experience, humor Continue reading →

How to have fun at work

Work communication doesn’t have to be boring and tedious, even if it’s mandated by law or some other legal statute. Make it interesting and fun, and people will be more likely to pay attention and do what you want them to do!

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Working with nuts, fruits, and M&Ms

So I heard that the HR Carnival for this upcoming week was going to be focused on food and HR. For some reason my brain defaulted to comparing the characters in every workplace with a bag of trail mix. Check out the short (kinda funny!) video below for more.

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Notes

Ain’t Bella the cutest? :-)
Fruits-they have been around forever, they are kind of sour, and even if we don’t enjoy them they are pretty boring and don’t rock the boat
M&Ms-these are the best part of the whole batch, but just like in life, we only have a limited number of M&Ms (aka star employees) to work with
Nuts-the nuts make up the bulk of our workforce, they have their little quirks and we spend most of our time dealing with this group

Okay, so it was a fun little exercise. Want to tell a story about a “nut” in your own workplace? I’d love to hear it!

Poaching talent-why isn’t anyone choosing you?

One of the common topics around the HR and recruiting space is talent. How to find it, recruit it, motivate it, retain it, and (at times) get rid of it. Poaching talent is a fact of life. If you get one of those great people to agree to come work for you, there’s only a matter of time before they are courted by another employer.

One thing we don’t really ever consider is the other side of the poaching equation.Â I saw this funny comic the other day and just had to share. Stuart at 1.00 FTE is a funny guy and this comic ranks up there with my daily Dilbert addiction.

Source: 1.00 FTE

What it takes to be a top digital influencer

I recently found out that I made the list of the top 25 digital influencers in the online HR space. Pretty cool, and I’m humbled to be among such esteemed company.

But some of you might wonder what it takes to be a top digital influencer. Here’s my own secret recipe for how to make it happen.

Invest 5+ hours a week writing blog posts, responding to comments, and dreaming up new ideas
Guest blog for anyone who will let you near their site
Decide that one blog isn’t enough and start another one
Write like you speak
Not being afraid to look silly on camera Continue reading →

Swoop and poop management

Swoop and poop.Â We’ve all seen it before. The manager is perpetually disengaged. They are doing their own thing and staying out of the way. Then, without warning, they jump into a situation and use their power to force a decision. Or maybe they drop a lot of criticism on team members and second guess their every action. And, just as quickly as they arrived, they take off again without a moment’s notice, leaving the rest of us to deal with the aftermath.

Sound familiar?

It’s one of the common types of bad management that makes us all cringe. So why is it still around? The instances where I’ve seen it are where teams are scared to stand up to someone or when the person’s in a senior position that is above reproach. Let’s kill this thing once and for all, please?

Ever been in your own personal swoop and poop situation? Let’s hear some details on how things went and how they worked out (or didn’t!) in the end.

Trust, Clear Communication, and Project Management

This week’s been wild and crazy, but I wanted to share some fun (and thought-provoking) pictures I’ve seen in the past few days. Anyone else seen anything particularly neat/interesting this week?

Ain’t that the truth?Â Found here