Sigmund Freud is often quoted saying, a century ago, that to live a good life we need to be able to love and work. These days, it seems, we must be able to love to work. We no longer want just respect, security, or money from our jobs. We want passion, fulfillment, and surprise too. We want, in a word, romance. But what do you do when the romance has cooled? If it’s time to leave a job you’ve loved, think about what you need to let go of, and what you cannot leave behind. Then make sure you mourn the former, and take the latter with you. And as you go, let your job teach you one last thing: to savor loss. You will need it again. In the mobile workplace of our day and age, being able to move on is as important as being able to commit. It’s not enough to be able to love our jobs, then. We must also learn to leave them. And if loving well is hard, leaving well is harder still.

New research suggests that the highest-performing teams have found subtle ways of leveraging social connections during the pandemic to fuel their success. The findings offer important clues on ways any organization can foster greater connectedness — even within a remote or hybrid work setting — to engineer higher-performing teams. Doing so takes more than simply hiring the right people and arming them with the right tools to do their work. It requires creating opportunities for genuine, authentic relationships to develop. The authors present five key characteristics of high-performing teams, all of which highlight the vital role of close connection among colleagues as a driver of team performance.

Research indicates that only 26% of people often leave the office having accomplished the tasks they set out to. A good first step is to understand the mental mistakes that typically prevent us from focusing on and finishing meaningful work.  Five common ones include underestimating the time you have for focused work, overlooking simple productivity hacks, thinking about change in an all-or-nothing way, forgetting how to do infrequent but recurring tasks, and underestimating the costs of small time or energy leaks. Recognizing these common traps is the first step in regaining productivity.

We often hear about the power of personality in shaping our careers — how some traits are beneficial while others are more harmful. But it is less clear when personality traits matter most and who benefits most from them. A recent paper investigates this by looking at the connection between personality traits and lifetime earnings among men at different ages. It finds that men’s earnings are not affected by personality at all in the beginning of their careers, but that men who are more conscientious and extroverted, as well as less agreeable, reap large benefits between their 40s and 60s. The evidence also points to a subgroup of men who benefit from these traits more than twice as much as others: those with a graduate education.

Employees who differ from most of their colleagues in religion, gender, sexual orientation, socio-economic background, and generation often hide important parts of themselves at work for fear of negative consequences. This makes it difficult to know how these employees feel and what they want, which makes them vulnerable to leaving their organizations. The key to inclusion is understanding who your employees really are. Many organizations conduct employee engagement surveys, but most neglect to segment the data they collect by criteria such as gender, ethnicity, generation, geography, tenure, and role in the organization, missing opportunities to identify issues among smaller groups. Focus groups are another way to gain deeper insight into what employees care about. They are best facilitated by a third party with no vested interest in the outcome so that employees can speak freely. A one-on-one discussion with a manager can be the most powerful tool for finding out what...

Many people are hesitant to step out of their regular roles and routines. The idea of putting yourself in a position to potentially fail can be frightening or stressful. But sometimes what’s keeping you in one spot may not be your own self-interest. In fact, other people’s wishes and the feeling that you “should” stay put may be tamping down your own preferences. What’s holding you back may be compliance, not comfort.

I’ve seen this many times in my research. People have pursued one path in life — influenced by their culture, parents, or sense of what they “should” pursue — that leads them to invest time, money, and skill development in a path that is very hard to escape from.

For example, consider the case of someone I interviewed — we’ll call her Carla. From a young age Carla had an interest in the arts. As a child, she loved to read and write, and as an adult she was a voracious reader and loved contemporary art, theater, and...

In the face of rapid, disruptive change, companies are realizing that managers can’t be expected to have all the answers and that command-and-control leadership is no longer viable. As a result, many firms are moving toward a coaching model in which managers facilitate problem solving and encourage employees’ development by asking questions and offering support and guidance rather than giving orders and making judgments.

The authors explain the merits of different types of coaching—directive, nondirective, and situational—and note that sometimes no coaching at all is appropriate. They describe how managers can use the four-step GROW model to become more skilled at listening, questioning, and drawing insights out of the people they supervise. The article concludes with recommendations for making coaching an organizational capacity—effecting a cultural transformation by articulating why coaching is valuable for the firm as well as individuals, ensuring that...

It’s a common feeling: while you are busy doing a good job, others seem to be advancing much faster in their careers. What’s going on? The answer in many cases is your contributions are not being seen and recognized. One important reason this happens is that people are simply not great at assessing competence — a crucial trait for succeeding at work— and perceptions of competence are just as important for success as actual competence. It turns out, results don’t speak for themselves, even when it’s all about numbers. Consider a salesman: his sales may rise, but they could have risen without his effort due to the superior quality of the product or marketing efforts that finally bore fruit. If sales go down, it could have been the result of increasing competition. It’s often difficult to disentangle actual drivers of performance, including how much luck and difficulty level played a role. Because of this, people tend to evaluate competence based on other factors,...

It can be hard to know how to make your resume stand out. Start by accepting that it’s going to take some time and effort. Don’t try to sit down and knock it out in an hour – you’re carefully crafting a marketing document. Open strong with a summary of your expertise. Use an accomplishments section after the opener to link your experience to the job requirements. You don’t want to waste space upfront on irrelevant job experience. It’s okay to be selective about what employment, achievements, and skills you include; after all, you should tailor your resume for each position. Give concrete examples of your expertise, quantifying your accomplishments with numbers where you can. Seek input from a mentor or friend who can review it and give you feedback. Lastly, create a personable LinkedIn profile to complement your resume.

The practice of giving two weeks’ notice when leaving a job is outdated and inefficient, and can be a contentious and expensive problem for companies. While the job-hopping trend may be difficult to stop, there is a less frustrating approach employers can implement that can not only decrease turnover, but also lead to mutually beneficial solutions when an employee decides to leave. It’s called a Mindful Transition, and it entails creating a culture that encourages open and honest discussions between the employer and employee about happiness on the job, without any fear of retribution, reprisal, or of being escorted out the door if someone is forthcoming about being unhappy. Managers are trained to spot and diagnose early signs of unhappiness or disengagement. When someone decides to move on, there is an open transition period that allows the employee to begin the search for their new job while remaining employed. During this time, the employee agrees not to give two...

One oft-cited reason why more female executives don’t advance to top management jobs is their lack of access to informal organizational and industry networks. Some people blame unconscious bias: High-ranking men connect more easily with other men. Others cite professional and personal obligations, from office housekeeping to child-rearing, that disproportionately fall to women, leaving them less time to develop professional relationships.

Visionary bosses can be exciting, fun, and innovative. They can also feel overwhelming when there’s no way that you can keep up with all of their creative ideas. Instead of letting their ideas overwhelm you, take it as an opportunity to manage up. The next time your boss rattles off a slew of new ideas, redirect their attention back to the team’s monthly and quarterly goals and ask them where these ideas would fit in and how they’d like to prioritize them. By explaining the impact the new ideas will have on other priorities, you can help your boss assess them from a strategic perspective. You may also want to remind your boss of the time commitment that their new ideas would require to implement. And don’t automatically assume that when your boss shares an idea that they expect you to do something about it.

Leaders are often faced with ethical conundrums. So how can they determine when they’re inching toward dangerous territory? There are three main psychological dynamics that lead to crossing moral lines. First, there’s omnipotence: when someone feels so aggrandized and entitled that they believe the rules of decent behavior don’t apply to them. Second, consider cultural numbness: when others play along and gradually begin to accept and embody deviant norms. Finally, when people don’t speak up because they are thinking of more immediate rewards, we see justified neglect. There are several strategies leaders can use to counter these dynamics, including relying on a group of trusted peers to keep you in check, keeping a list of things you will never do for profit, and looking out for ways you explain away borderline actions.

Assessing a job candidate is all about the questions you ask during the interview. But too often leaders ask the wrong things, focusing more on what the interviewee has done in the past rather than what they can do in the future. If you need to hire someone to work on an innovation project, make sure you’re asking questions that get to their ability to collaboratively problem solve. For example, you want to know how they would handle particular problem-solving situations rather than whether they’ve done exactly what you’re looking for in the past. You should assess whether they are able and willing to fill in gaps on teams when it becomes clear a particular role isn’t being filled. And, it’s important to understand what they’re passionate about working on. Innovation happens when you bring people with different passions and approaches together to work toward the same goal.

If we want less incompetent men in leadership roles, those responsible for judging candidates need to improve their ability to distinguish between confidence and competence. The good news is that, for some time now, we have had at our disposal scientifically valid assessments to predict and avoid managerial and leadership incompetence. There are systematic individual differences in how people present themselves, and these differences predict people’s leadership style and competence. When you are able to put thousands of leaders through the same self-report questionnaires, and you link their responses to their leadership style, performance, and effectiveness, you can identify the key patterns of self-presentation that characterize good and bad leaders. The bad news is that, despite the availability of such tools, very few organizations are using them.

Never underestimate the power of great communication. It can help you land the job of your dreams, attract investors to back your idea, or elevate your stature within your organization. But while there are plenty of good speakers in the world, you can set yourself apart out by being the person who can deliver something great over and over. Here are a few tips for business professionals who want to move from being good speakers to great ones: be concise (the fewer words, the better); never use bullet points (photos and images paired together are more memorable); don’t underestimate the power of your voice (raise and lower it for emphasis); give your audience something extra (unexpected moments will grab their attention); rehearse (the best speakers are the best because they practice — a lot).

Last year HBR.org published a survey to help professionals assess their own personal productivity – defined as the habits closely associated with accomplishing more each day. Nearly 20,000 people from six continents completed it, and the results provide some useful insights into important productivity habits and challenges facing professionals. Three general patterns stood out: First, working longer hours does not necessarily mean higher personal productivity. Working smarter is the key to accomplishing more of your top priorities each day. Second, age and seniority were highly correlated with personal productivity — older and more senior professionals recorded higher scores than younger and more junior colleagues. Third, the overall productivity scores of male and female professionals were almost the same, but there were gender differences on particular habits that promote personal productivity.

What makes a successful startup team? One common answer is that prior startup experience, product knowledge, and industry skills predict the success of a new venture. But is prior experience sufficient for a team to work well together? In a recent study of 95 new startup teams in the Netherlands, researchers explored that question. They found that experience alone was not enough to make a team thrive. While experience broadens the teams’ resource pool, helps people identify opportunities, and is positively related to team effectiveness, a team also needs soft skills to truly thrive. Specifically, they found that shared entrepreneurial passion and shared strategic vision are required to get to superior team performance.

Imagine that you’re looking at your company-issued smartphone and you notice an e-mail from LinkedIn: “These companies are looking for candidates like you!” You aren’t necessarily searching for a job, but you’re always open to opportunities, so out of curiosity, you click on the link. A few minutes later your boss appears at your desk. “We’ve noticed that you’re spending more time on LinkedIn lately, so I wanted to talk with you about your career and whether you’re happy here,” she says. Uh-oh.

It’s an awkward and Big Brother–ish scenario—and it’s not so far-fetched. Attrition has always been expensive for companies, but in many industries the cost of losing good workers is rising, owing to tight labor markets and the increasingly collaborative nature of jobs. (As work becomes more team-focused, seamlessly plugging in new players is more challenging.) Thus companies are intensifying their efforts to predict which workers are at high risk of leaving so that managers...

Companies spend millions on antibias training each year in hopes of creating more-inclusive—and thereby innovative and effective—workforces. Studies show that well-managed diverse groups perform better and are more committed, have higher collective intelligence, and excel at making decisions and solving problems. But research also shows that bias-prevention programs rarely deliver. So what can you, as an individual leader, do to ensure that your team is including and making the most of diverse voices? How can one person fix what an entire organization can’t?

Although bias itself is devilishly hard to change, it is not as difficult to interrupt. The authors have identified several practices that managers can use to counter bias (and avoid its negative effects) without spending a lot of time or political capital. In hiring, leaders should insist on a diverse pool, precommit to objective criteria, limit referral hiring, and structure interviews around skills-based...

According to the recent book by Frank Cespedes, a Harvard Business School professor, much of the conventional wisdom for sales is misleading and not supported by empirical data.  In part 1 of our discussion, hear the insights Frank writes about that could help your sales team develop a better strategy for winning in the marketplace. 

Self: Take care of yourself before assisting others. You cannot be anything to anyone (whether boss, friend, spouse, parent, etc.) if you are a nervous wreck. Learn to prioritize. If you’ve chosen a path, don’t second guess yourself. Others: Your perfectionism may be affecting other people, too. For example, if you’re constantly pressuring yourself to perform, your team may feel guilty for not meeting your same standards. System: It’s okay to chill out and do nothing once in a while, guilt free. Don’t let your educational, cultural, or family system drive you to feeling guilty about not using every minute of every day to do something productive.