The book on Conflict Mastery

“You make me angry.” “Don’t get your noise out of joint.” “Settle down.” “Just ‘cause I said it, don’t mean that I meant it.” We use scores of phrases like these when involved in interpersonal conflict. If not spoken out loud, we speak them inside our head. Needless to say, our conflict directives rarely end the […]

Apply A Culture Map To Visualize Interpersonal Differences

One of my newest, favourite communication tools is a Culture Map. I first came across this better way to visualize cultural differences in Erin Meyer’s book, The Culture Map (published earlier this year). Here’s a short interview of Meyer, about her book: (video not displaying? watch here, on YouTube) The Culture Map The Culture Map is […]

The Thank You Game

A couple of years ago, I learned about The Thank You Game via local mediator colleague, Julia Menard. Thank you Julia! I thought it appropriate to share it, given it’s Thanksgiving Day in the US, today. Julia credits the McGonigal sisters, Kelly McGonigal (health psychologist) and Jane McGonigal (game designer) for the idea. The McGonigal sisters […]

Keeping It Human While Collaborating With The Robots

I’m old enough to remember the The Jetsons cartoon show on TV. Technology is our servant. Life is wonderful. Fast forward to today. Life online. Living through our devices. Alone Together. Is technology our servant or master? The upsurge in robotics It’s a tricky business, living and working with technology. We’re in a tech soup, to be […]

Community Kitchens spur Connection, Ideas and Partnership

Last week I led a session at PeopleFocus, an HR conference, focused on collaboration, for credit union professionals. One of the keynote speakers was Tonya Surman, CEO of the Centre for Social Innovation (CSI), Canada’s premier co-working space for social entrepreneurs. Her mention of the CSI ‘Salad Club’, and its role in building a culture of collaboration, and […]