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Is it really possible to create a way of working based on love not fear? Yes. It’s not only possible. It’s essential. Learn more from this collection of more than 100 posts to inspire and guide you.
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How to collaborate with love as a guiding principle?
“What’s the one thing that you want to improve the most when it comes to your team culture?” – I often ask senior leaders as we start to scope out what support might be needed for them.
“Collaboration” - almost instantly they respond.
I love this response - it opens up the possibility to dive in and learn more about the conditions under which a team collaborates. When I start to uncover what’s underneath the need for better collaboration, we often land on these questions:
How can we improve the relationships within our team? How can we create psychological safety so that we can talk about what’s most important? How can we promote cross-team communication? How can we become more aware of each other – our needs and expectations? How can we make work to flow in a stable and predictable way?
Powerful questions, don’t you think?
What is fear and why is it important?
“More love. Less fear.” This is what we advocate and work for at A Human Workplace. Those four words offer vast canyons of possibilities to explore with numerous question trails to follow. To go on that journey together in pursuit of understanding deeply what more love and less fear at work really mean, it will help us to share an understanding of some basics about love and fear. These next several posts will give us that common view of this landscape so we can traverse this territory together.
Leaders: You are not alone
These last four weeks I’ve talk to so many Leaders like you who are working valiantly to face this pandemic challenge and who feel utterly alone. Leaders like you who are responding to the latest developments, adapting to restrictions, and trying to keep your organization viable.
Emotions at work
When we experience an action, words, or event, it can bring on bio-chemical and physiological responses that are universal to humans. When we experience a stimulus that is threatening, exciting, hopeful, surprising, worrying, angering, envious, or joyful, our human bodies react consistently.
Make meetings more human: the check-in
You’ve seen this happen, probably multiple times each day. A group of people come into a room and sit down around a table just before a meeting. Barely looking at each other, they might mumble a greeting but give their devices their full attention. When the appointed time arrives, they launch in to the agenda items and get to work.
Make meetings more human, please!
We don’t know who they are, what they care about, what they’ve experienced, what they value, what their talents are. We don’t know what they’ve just come from or what they are carrying. We don’t know if they are distracted or worried. But never mind all that. It’s time to be a professional and get to work.
Can we talk?
Arguably one of the most difficult issues we face as a nation is race. Our painful, ugly history continues to manifest as pain and ugliness in the present. And our challenges extend beyond racial equity and inclusion to gender, ethnicity, sexual orientation, religion, age, socio-economic status, ability.
Being human-centered
When you put humans at the center good things happen. Team members are more loyal, committed, and creative. They are glad to be at work, and they do better work. And customers, Washingtonians, are treated with respect. They receive better value, better services, and a better state to live in.
A love story about work: Carol's social services team
Work in social services, and especially work in direct services to the most vulnerable people in society, is by its very nature a human endeavor. People often choose this field because they are compassionate and motivated to care for others. But social services can be some of the most physically and emotionally demanding work there is.
Three ways to decrease fear and increase love at work
No one wakes up in the morning, bounces out of bed, and eagerly declares, “I can’t wait to be ignored today! I hope my work doesn’t matter to anyone. I’m going in early because I’m not making a difference. Since no one cares about my work I am going after solving that really tough problem.”
A workplace that works
We go to work each day to earn a living so we can make a life for ourselves and our loved ones. But we don’t sign up to be humiliated, to be ignored, to be betrayed. We sign up for the workforce at 18 or maybe 21 to contribute, to do something we enjoy, or at least don’t mind, to make a difference in some way.
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