When you think of a toxic work culture, what comes to mind? Screaming bosses? Fierce competition? Endless arguments? Not me. In my experience, if there’s one telltale sign that a culture is in decline, it’s not shouting. It’s silence. “We’re polite to death,” a client recently told me. “Nobody says what they actually think. We smirk and nod in meetings, then spend the next week in sidebar conversations complaining about what we just agreed to.” Sound familiar? We've been conditioned to see...

We adopted a puppy last week. His name is Axl. When Axl sits, he gets a treat. When he stays, he gets a treat. When he comes when called, another treat. The simple system of training a dog works beautifully—desired behavior, immediate reward, quick results. It’s easy to see why we’ve designed our organizations with this strategy of rewarding specific behaviors with external prizes—it works. Axl is learning to sit because I am teaching him what I value and giving him something he values in...

Have you noticed that there are bad words in business? I mean words that are innocuous in daily life, but when you dare utter them in a work context they’re practically scandalous? I’ve written before about the f-word, and today we’re going to talk about the b-word: Boundaries. The notion of saying no, drawing a line or setting a limit strikes fear in the hearts of many leaders I know. But I believe boundaries are scary because we misunderstand them. We think of them as barriers, brick walls...