30,000 Days

I had a very interesting chat last night with a senior sales executive from one of the Europe's leading IT Services organisations.  We were having a chat about what has been going on in the office and the subject got around to one of the senior chaps in his organisation.  This particular person has had a swift rise to prominence and is now running a large, and successful, part of the business.  What surprised me was that the individual concerned has apparently being getting some flak from colleagues.  No this was not because he is poor at budgeting, nor is he a poor manager and no he hasn't been fiddling his expenses rather he has been subject to ridicule because he has a coach!  I was a little surprised at this and enquired why this was so:

"I mean, it's really a bit much that a grown man needs a coach to get on at work"

I'm afraid I went into full rant mode - I mean for goodness sake I thought we had moved on from the days when "men are men" etc.

Oh and if you are wondering about the 30,000 days in the title, it's the average number of days we live in the UK.....life really is too short.

"Do Amazing Things" in HR

I was having a coffee with one of my clients today who was suffering from what can only be called "change fatigue".  Years of corporate initiatives, restructuring and new legislation had clearly taken their toll.   Inspiration was required and duly given (I hope).  In cases such as this it is often the little things that do the trick, which reminded me of a short ebook I spotted over at Renegade HR.  "Do Amazing Things" is a collection of short, actionable ideas – things you can do to become a better HR professional.

The ideas outlined here are provided by leading thinkers and doers working in the HR field and cover everything from Collaboration, Innovation, Growth and my personal favorite Passion.