Weekly Impact Brief (2023.Oct.08)
The secret to work happiness; Stop impostor syndrome; Optimize work for happiness and productivity; Activate managers; Give constructive feedback; and Use brain hacks to learn.
Note: We are in private beta. There are rough edges; this Brief will evolve in the coming weeks before we launch more broadly. We value your feedback! To share your input, click here.
Read time: 3.5 min
Welcome
It’s great to have you here!
This Brief offers leaders quick, fact-driven insights on trending articles released in the last week around leadership, innovation, and more. These are curated from top sources, such as McKinsey, Harvard, and many others, looking at elements of the Impactful Framework.
In case you missed the last Impact Briefs, here are the links for the previous two: Oct 1st and Sep 24th.
Thought Starter
Last week, we covered the element of “Management”; this week, we cover “Culture”, or, in other words, "how we do things around here". Company culture is a critical determinant of both individual behavior and collective performance within any business or entity.
Highlights
Harvard Business Review: Arthur C. Brooks on the Secrets to Happiness at Work
MIT Sloan Management Review: Halt Impostor Syndrome Before It Happens
Forbes: It’s Time To Optimize Work For Both Productivity And Joy
McKinsey & Company: Activating Middle Managers Through Capability Building
London School of Economics and Political Science: How To Give And Receive Feedback More Easily
[Feature] Accenture: Brain Hacks To Facilitate Learning - Part 3
Impact Pulse
Each week, we review 200+ articles from 50+ premier academic and consulting firm sources to highlight a few “essentials” below.
The Secrets to Happiness at Work
Big Idea: People are becoming less happy due to social media, relationship struggles, the Covid-19 pandemic and remote working challenges. Reducing workaholism, understanding emotions and actively engaging to contribute and create value will help balance happiness and work and maintain personal and professional well-being.
Quick Quote: “Just 16% of employees self-report that they're very satisfied with their work... college educated, not college educated, white collar, blue collar, none of it matters. Two things show up on the happiest workers, the people who have the greatest happiness from work. They feel like they're earning their success, which is to say that they're creating value with their lives and with their work lives, that their accomplishments are moving the needle, and they're being recognized for those accomplishments. And number two, they feel like they're serving people so that they're needed. These are the two big things.”
Halt Impostor Syndrome Before It Happens
Big Idea: Negative workplace practices cause employees to feel inadequate, reluctant to apply for leadership positions, leading to “impostorization”, where employees question their competence and sense of belonging. Avoid this issue by using objective promotion criteria, providing resources, and implementing meeting norms that promote listening and idea-crediting to create a culture of psychological safety.
Quick Quote: “While much of the literature and discussions on impostor syndrome have focused on the individual, and strategies to counter its effects have taken a fix-the-individual approach, it is in fact organizations — through policies, practices, and seemingly innocuous interactions — that might be inadvertently triggering the problem.”
It’s Time To Optimize Work For Both Productivity And Joy
Big Idea: Focusing only on restructuring and improving operating models instead of understanding and optimizing the daily work of employees can lead to missed opportunities to enhance productivity and employee satisfaction. Use data-driven insights into how work is done and technology to augment or replace human-driven work.
Quick Quote: “Companies can and should apply the… analytical process to work—what people do, where they do it, how they do it, possible alternative ways to do it, whether it’s even necessary, and if so, whether people should do it, or if technology (AI, GenAI) should do it instead of humans—in a way that drives both joy for employees and value for the organization.”
Activating Middle Managers Through Capability Building
Big Idea: Empowering middle managers with targeted skills training can optimize organizational success, reduce inefficiencies, and bridge the gap between strategy and execution.
Quick Quote: "Middle managers who are equipped with the skills and support they need to succeed can reduce friction, accelerate action, and ensure that an organization achieves its vision… Proactive skill-building investments by senior leadership empowered middle managers to develop themselves as strategic thought partners, problem-solving navigators, communicative connectors, and talent multipliers… Organizations with strong managers realize 21 times greater TSR than those with weak managers."
How To Give And Receive Feedback More Easily
Big Idea: Feedback is essential for personal and professional growth but can lead to stress if incorrectly delivered. Use the PACES feedback model (shown below) to open a feedback dialogue and focus on observed behaviors to make feedback more constructive and less defensive.
Quick Quote: "Good feedback focuses on the behaviours people can see and change (the outer circle) rather than challenging their values, beliefs and attitudes (the middle circle) or commenting on people’s personality and self-esteem (the inner circle)."
Featured Summary
Below are our featured insights for the week; a series of Accenture videos highlighting brain hacks to facilitate learning.
Brain Hacks To Facilitate Learning - Part 3
Employ Brain Hacks to enhance learning.
For example: "Storytelling bypasses judgment centers, enabling open thinking. It releases oxytocin, fostering empathy and collaboration. Storytelling helps you understand complex concepts and effectively communicate them."
Lighter Side
As usual, let's end on a light note!
Here’s today’s cartoon.
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Parting Thoughts
Thank you for spending your precious time with us.
We are still in early “beta” mode for the coming weeks. If you find this Brief useful, please forward it now to share it far and wide!
Please feel free to reach out with any thoughts or questions today’s insights might have sparked.
Impactfully yours,
Ali Monadjem (LinkedIn profile)
For The Impactful Executive Team
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