Our Articles
You can also read Dr. Alonso's Ask the Head Coach column in Men's Health's spin-off Best Life magazine.
In these pages you will also find contributions by outside authors.
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Are You Sure You Want Your Company To Do That?
Smart business leaders recognize the importance of culture to their business success. Recently, a client e-mailed me a request: "We are looking for a quick and dirty, internet-based, assessment that will screen out applicants who won't fit the culture we are designing. And of course, I'd want it to be inexpensive and take less than 15 minutes." Unfortunately, there is no "quick and dirty" technique to building corporate culture!
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Entrepreneurs: Know Yourself and Define Your Business Dream
Entrepreneurs starting a business understandably tend to focus on the traditional aspects of running a business—accounting, finances, business plan, etc. There’s usually little thought given to the role played by emotional and psychological dynamics. However, an entrepreneur could avoid significant turbulence down the road by exploring the answer to several major questions. How will my personality contribute to and how will it detract from the business? How will the business affect my current lifestyle? And, what is my personal vision and how is it aligned with my business vision? These are questions a business owner should be asking periodically but not asking them before launching a business may lead to unnecessary personal and financial hardship.
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Resolving Conflict in Key Corporate Relationships
Differences of opinion are not bad. They keep our thinking sharp. They can lead to innovation and progress. However, when the differences are extreme, they can also paralyze relationships, companies, even governments. Can you say “grid-lock”?
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HR's Best Friend
Human Resource personnel are right in the middle of all major, significant changes occurring in the workplace. They are asked to constantly adapt to waves of economic, bureaucratic, governmental, cultural, healthcare-related, and even geopolitical changes. They are asked to be technical experts on issues involving privacy, discrimination, economics, ergonomics, disabilities, benefits, compensation, performance, safety and security, hiring, firing, and last, but certainly not least, human relations. In my 25 years of interacting and consulting with business organizations, my sense is that life has become much more complicated for the HR professional.
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Go Outside the Box When Working on Performance Reviews
Let’s face it: Most managers and supervisees hate traditional performance reviews. The professed purpose of this annual ritual is to improve employees’ performance through feedback. Is that what really happens? I don’t think so.
Performance reviews are seen by most employees as inspections where they will be criticized by their supervisor to justify the minimal raise the company will be giving them. This sets up an adversarial and defensive stance where little learning through constructive feedback takes place. It not only defeats the stated purpose of the review but generates ill feelings and kills motivation. Both managers and supervisees are thankful that it’s only an annual exercise.
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Two Types of Management Thinking
Our world is busy and complex. We are constantly being asked to sort through large amounts of information. In the business world, leaders are regularly being called upon to make quick important decisions. Many of the corporate decision-makers I deal with, upon reflection, will recognize that they are spending most of their “managing” time trying to solve problems. They are constantly trying to put out fires.
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The Golden Rules to a Successful Family Business
Family businesses are the economic backbone of this country.
• Over 80% of US businesses are family owned
• One third of companies in the Fortune 500 are family controlled
• Family firms employ over 50% of the total workforce in the US
• Family businesses generate over 40% of the national income
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Productive Nepotism
It’s always surprising, as well as disturbing, to hear that only three out of 10 family businesses survive into the second generation and only one of eight into the third. Research and anecdotal evidence point to unresolved family conflicts as causing the unraveling of many family businesses.
It is impossible to prevent the interplay between family dynamics and business demands from generating tensions in the family. The worst thing an owner can do is to look the other way. In fact, an effective business owner anticipates potential areas of conflict and plans interventions to deal with them. One crucial dimension of the family business system that must be attended to is the showing of favoritism to family members when it comes to hiring practices – nepotism.
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How Mentally Healthy Is Your Company?
There’s no question that the mental health state of you employees affects the bottom line, in both obvious and subtle ways.
A 2001 World Health Organization study demonstrated how depression alone cost US employers $43 .7 billion - twelve billion in direct treatment costs and the rest in absenteeism, lost productivity, and mortality costs. This does not include the extra costs of physical care that tend to be 4.5 times higher for individuals with mental disorders.
Many others are indirectly affected when an employee suffers from depression. Of course, the family shares in the financial and emotional hardships. In addition, the stress caused by their loved one’s condition, in turn, affects their own job performance and productivity.
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What happens when a client turns to an expert for help?
I recently received a phone call from the owner of a small service company of about twenty employees. He was very alarmed over a recent incident involving a customer complaint. It seems that while the customer was waiting to pay his bill, he observed several employees exhibiting “rowdy and unprofessional behavior” that included loud laughter, tossing objects, and light physical jousting. The customer was incensed and reported that there were several customers who witnessed this behavior.
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Leadership Types and Shared Power
Another book on leadership has arrived. In Their Time: The Greatest Business Leaders of the 20th Century is written by Anthony J. Mayo and Nitin Nohria and published by Harvard Business School Press.
The authors list who they believe are the top 100 business leaders of the past 100 years and provide lessons we can learn through their stories. Their method was to identify 1,000 candidates and then ask 7,000 business executives to rate them on various dimensions. The final list includes famous names like Sam Walton, Walt Disney, and Bill Gates (the top 3 ranked) as well as unknowns like Louis Neumiller, CEO of Caterpillar in the 1940’s.
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Regaining Control After Being Laid Off
Some experience a sinking stomach. Others feel fuzzy and really can’t understand what’s being said to them. Some are totally surprised. Many see it coming but are still shocked. A few actually are relieved to hear: “You are fired!”
Everyone, however, needs to decide how to react.
Leave with dignity.
Ideally, you start your job search as soon as you are told you are unemployed. Yes, I’m asking a lot. However, if you are fairly certain your company will be laying off employees and you may be among them, consider adopting this exit strategy: Don’t burn bridges, instead, leave that HR person or supervisor sorry to see you go and wanting you back as soon as possible. Leave with dignity. Let him know you would welcome being called back or knowing of other employers who may be hiring. Ask if you can check in periodically. Your immediate mission is to be on people’s minds and to help them want to help you.
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