Thinking Out Loud

Maintaining a balance between your work and outside life is a popular topic these days. HR professionals, bloggers, health care professionals, counselors, and others constantly discuss the importance of and how to achieve a balance. Much of the discussion has to do with the accumulated stress and subsequent fallout without balance. Balance, however, is a tricky word in this context. The dictionary definition for the balance tool provides a clear image that can help us visualize the problem: “an instrument for weighing: as a beam that is supported freely in the center and has two pans of equal weight suspended from its ends.” Theoretically, then, if we pile all the stress on one side of the beam, we should be able to pile a whole bunch of other stuff on the other side of that beam to create balance.  This implies that we can achieve equilibrium if we find the right counterbalancing stuff.  Read More

It’s past time to rename “soft skills.” Soft skills, as we all know, are people skills: getting along, communicating well, exhibiting interpersonal finesse.  Calling them soft skills has been a way of differentiating them from hard skills, although no one really uses that term. Hard skills are those associated with numbers: quantitative analysis, efficiency and making hard decisions “based on the numbers,” while you set aside your feelings. Read More

Julian is a high energy guy who speaks quickly because he has so many thoughts occurring simultaneously. He is also quick to react emotionally in highly charged situations, no matter whether what is happening is good or bad. In his role as an EMT (emergency medical technician), Julian stays very focused—calm yet intense—and draws on deep knowledge and experience in emergencies. He is admired for his knowledge and ability to respond effectively in very complex situations, and his co-workers learn a lot from Julian, although sometimes feel intimidated by his intensity when he speaks to them. Read More

Gerry owns and runs a small manufacturing company. His General Manager, Brian, handles the day to day operations—assigning work, managing projects, and billing customers. Gerry and Brian get along well, and in fact, Gerry hopes to sell the business to Brian in about five years. He sees his own younger self in Brian, with similar values and work ethic. Read More