The Blog

By Andrea Chilcote

It was early evening on a Friday night. I replied to an email from a client, stating that I had been traveling all week and would get her what she was requesting on Monday. Shortly after hitting send, I glanced at the preview pane and noticed a typo. I had told her I had been “raveling” all week.

By Andrea Chilcote

I’ve noticed something lately – no one seems to be listening.

During an intense bout of post-holiday travel, I encountered many customer service personnel attending to the business of planes, trains and automobiles. Despite a fair amount of cheeriness given large crowds and weather-related delays, few appeared to pay attention to the matter at hand. Many seemed lost in their thoughts as they asked me questions I had already answered.

By Andrea Chilcote

On Monday I joined some friends for coffee, friends who meet regularly at a time I’m usually on a plane or have some scheduled task. Since I’m not a regular member of this group, I was in for surprise.

One member, my friend Sheppard Lake, is a life coach. So at these gatherings, she regularly leads exercises designed to – well, coach us in life.

By Karla Boyd, Ph.D. and Andrea Chilcote

The extraordinary events of the past months have brought most of us face-to-face with new fears and anxieties, and they are playing out in the workplace. In last month’s article, the authors, Karla and Andrea, concluded that organizations are recognizing the very real need for support for leaders and employees at all levels.

By Andrea Chilcote

“How are you doing?” What would you answer, right now, if a friend or significant other asked you this question? What about a co-worker? Your boss? Would you even know the answer?

Perhaps, if I asked you that question, you would start speaking, thinking out loud. You might feel your way into it, but it’s likely you would not know how you were doing when you started to speak. Or, maybe you would not want to talk about it.

By Karla Boyd, Ph.D. and Andrea Chilcote

The extraordinary events of the past months have brought most of us face-to-face with new fears and anxieties, and they are playing out in the workplace. Are organizations recognizing the very real need for support for leaders and employees at all levels?

By Andrea Chilcote

During a recent webinar, my colleagues and I affirmed the notion that the use of video is a significant plus for the many conference calls newly-virtual teams are involved in. We were asked: “How you do convince a team member to use video when he wants to reap the work-from-home benefit of wearing pajamas?” I responded, perhaps too quickly, that the pajamas themselves were the problem and that this individual needs to get himself dressed for work.

By Andrea Chilcote

Many are talking about “getting back to normal.” Regardless of what side of the debate you are on – open businesses and workplaces now or wait – going back is not an option. We can’t return to “normal” because we are not who we were when we left.

The word “emergence” has been on my mind all weekend. A simple definition is “the process of coming into view or becoming exposed after being concealed.”

By Andrea Chilcote

Consider for a moment that most of us lead from the middle at times – in work, and in life. Oh, a typical middle dilemma is the literal middle manager torn between “bottoms” and “tops,” as described in Barry Oshry’s research on organizational systems. He describes the problem, in part, as a “middle’s” diminished knowledge of broad issues weakening the role of “connector.” Yet even if you’re not a middle manager, my guess is that you often find yourself caught in the middle, trying to influence some outcome important to you.

By Andrea Chilcote

My colleague, author Randy Hain, suggested I do an exercise. He told me to write my clients’ names on a piece of paper (I added close friends), and circle them. Then, I was to write what each one cares most about next to their circled name. Randy predicted that I would see themes.

Did I ever.