A lovely Valentine's batch of links
Since our last batch of links went out to everyone, paying subscribers received two posts along similar lines. One was about seeing between the cracks when it comes to staying attuned to what others are going through. The more recent one went long on the subtle distinction between being a misfit and being a nonconformist. This coming weekend’s newsletter will get back to professional development, after a brief period away, and bring in our first outside expert from our budding mastermind network. I’m looking forward to running that Q&A with someone who brings more than I could write about myself.
In the interim, here’s a batch of links that came to my attention earlier this week that I thought would serve you well. I hope you continue to see direct connections between what you read in these links roundups and what turns up in the newsletter itself. These topics show up everywhere I look.
Lessons from a management expert: How to run a great one-to-one. I agree with the ideas in this piece more than the execution. I expect in the coming months to write up my own thoughts about how to lead a successful 1:1 with a manager. Yes, it’s on the direct report’s shoulders to make the most of that dedicated time. Don’t look to your manager to bail you out. Get moving. More on that soon.
Why your personality test results are probably wrong.
What We Lose When Work Gets Too Casual. This is the right casting, unlike much of what you’ve read that is far too cynical and far too short-sighted.
“None of this is an argument for sending everyone back to the office and imposing rigid formalities for their own sake. It is, however, a reason to examine which parts of office culture were obliterated by Covid and need to be restored because they benefit workers more than they benefit corporations.”
Saying goodbye to the 9-to-5: How these employees are retiring decades ahead of schedule using FIRE.
Giving Workers More Time to Grieve in an Era of Loss. The opening anecdote in this story is absolutely devastating. I don’t know if most companies are really prepared for what nobody plans for.
ERGs take extra work. Should employees be paid extra for participating?
The New Post-60 Career Paths. I found the suggestions in this piece to be quite insightful, and I’ve bookmarked this article ahead of a later post when we’ll tackle more at length the topic of ageism. We’ll bring in an outside expert for that one, too, no doubt.
CHROs, no longer ‘fighting for a seat’ in the C-suite, are reshaping workforces.
Why Major Employers Are Suddenly Posting Their Paid Leave Benefits on Social Media. I saw a lot of social media chatter about this campaign this month. For people who are making decisions around leave policies, it’s good to have them out in the open. The only pushback to such forgiving policies I’ve heard is that the benefits packages can sometimes come with lighter salaries than common in the industry.
From TikTok to Twitch, Employees Juggle Conflicts While Moonlighting as Influencers.
University students flock to supply chain majors. I guess this was expected, faced with what people are obsessing about right now, as a certain generation comes of age. I don’t know if I took the supply chain all that seriously until recently. Now, I’m aware of what it can do to slow down… everything. It’s heartwarming to know some people have taken the charge seriously.
Work life will never be the same. We need some in-person days and some remote.
‘Great Resignation’ Drives Billions In VC Dollars To Upskilling Startups. The final paragraphs of this story really hammer home the most valuable skill, which is the proven ability to learn and grow. If you’re deciding on who to hire or on who to keep, that’s going to be the measure more often than not. Can they become more than what they are today?
How to ask your manager for a flexible work schedule.
How Working From Home Will Permanently Change the Way We Travel. I found these stats to be informative of a real shift in mindset when it comes to PTO.
“Stays are getting longer, too. In a trends report for the year ahead, Airbnb shared that in the third quarter of 2021 (for which the most recent data were available), almost half of the nights booked on its platform were for stays of at least seven days, up from 44% in 2019. One out of every five gross nights booked in the quarter were for stays of 28 days or longer.
And data from vacation property management platform Guesty suggest the trend of extended stays has continued to grow during the pandemic. In 2021, 14-plus-day bookings grew 33% from a year earlier, with a cumulative rise of 121% since 2019.”