Articles

Making Difficult Choices Myth 31: I Don’t Have to Make the Difficult Choices

"Don't bring me problems; bring me solutions." Sound familiar? Sounds like a management cop out to Johanna Rothman. A primary purpose of managers is to help their teams perform to the best of their abilities, and that includes stepping up and making tough decisions to help solve problems.

Johanna Rothman's picture Johanna Rothman
Management Value Management Myth 30: I Am More Valuable than Other People

Just because you have a fancy job title doesn't mean you can manage your team members by bossing them around. Servant leadership is an important skill for managers, as the best managers are those who serve the people who work for them.

Johanna Rothman's picture Johanna Rothman
DevOps Psychology Using Positive Psychology in DevOps

Bringing different technology groups together can result in some interesting challenges. We often feel like we are doing group therapy for a very dysfunctional family, and many of the challenges encountered highlight the biases people often bring into the workplace. Leslie Sachs describes how to identify these behavioral issues and utilize positive psychology to help develop high-performance teams.

Leslie  Sachs's picture Leslie Sachs
QA Management: All Bark and No Bite? QA Management: All Bark and No Bite?

Mike Talks shares with us the unlikely story of how his pet German Shepherd inadvertently became his team's QA manager. Talks explains how his German Shepherd was able to gather people together and have them talk to each other, similiar to what a QA manager does—keeping people on task, handing out assignments, and following up with team members.

Mike Talks's picture Mike Talks
Pervasive Leadership Can Help You Manage Successful Projects How Pervasive Leadership Can Help You Manage Successful Projects

Jean Richardson shares a story about how the idea of pervasive leadership can help you manage a successful project. In order to practice pervasive leadership, one must change one's mental model of "I" and "thou," act locally and think holistically, and enact empathetic stewardship.

Jean Richardson's picture Jean Richardson
Myth 26: It’s Fine to Micromanage Management Myth 26: It’s Fine to Micromanage

Johanna Rothman explains the challenges and pitfalls of micromanagement. Sometimes, managers micromanage when they need information. In that case, it’s easier to create an information radiator rather than have the manager come running to you every thirty minutes.

Johanna Rothman's picture Johanna Rothman
The Three Pillars of Positive Psychology The Three Pillars of Positive Psychology

Positive psychology encourages positive and effective behaviors that help to bring out desired traits, and it applies well to many business and technical situations. Leslie Sachs explains the third pillar of positive psychology, which is related to organizational psychology and is of great interest to anyone who wants to be part of an effective institution.

Leslie  Sachs's picture Leslie Sachs
Positive Psychology Can Help Your Organization How Positive Psychology Can Help Your Organization

Positive psychology is providing a new focus on effective ways to ensure that teams exhibit the right behaviors in a group or organizational setting. Closely related to many agile and lean concepts, these emerging practices are helping teams to improve communication, collaborate, and emerge as highly effective groups. Leslie Sachs explains what positive psychology is all about and how to start using these practices in your organization.

Leslie  Sachs's picture Leslie Sachs
Operations Teams and Learned Helplessness Operations Teams and Learned Helplessness

Leslie Sachs writes how dysfunctional operations teams are often a consequence of a dysfunctional organizational culture that breeds distrust and results in employees who just sit back and allow disasters to occur. If you want your organization to be successful, you need to ensure that you drive out any aspect of learned helplessness and embrace a positive culture that enjoys a can-do attitude!

Leslie  Sachs's picture Leslie Sachs
 Paranoia in the Workplace How to Deal with Paranoia in the Workplace

One of the most difficult personality types to deal with is the person who always seems mistrustful of others. Sometimes, this lack of trust is justified, but sometimes it is really a manifestation of some dysfunctional personality issue. This article will help you understand this situation and suggest a few ways you can deal with difficult personality types like the paranoid person.

Leslie  Sachs's picture Leslie Sachs

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