Culture at Work

This week, we’re back to the series on rituals in the workplace. The fourth of five. Receiving feedback can be personal and intense. In this episode, Madeline discusses the history of the performance review, and the importance of continued communication to foster psychological safety.

Reach Madeline on Twitter @MadelineBoyer with the #cultureatwork hashtag.

If you like what you hear, be sure to rate and review us on iTunes and Stitcher.

Find more episodes at cultureatwork.percipientpartners.com.

According to recent studies, as many as 50 million Americans, or 40 percent of the workforce, work from home at least part of the time. And 48 percent of managers spend half of their week working from home or the road. In this episode, Madeline describes the ins and outs of working in virtual teams, and talks about learning how to work with someone when you’re not in the same place.

**This week’s Culture At Work Challenge:**

This week, share your experiences with virtual teams. Love them, or hate them, how do you manage to collaborate when you’re not in the same place? Reach Madeline on twitter @madelineboyer with the #cultureatwork hashtag.

Find more episodes at cultureatwork.percipientpartners.com.

This week, we’re back to the series on rituals in the workplace. The third of five.  Madeline talks about the role social rituals play in creating bonds among group members. Specifically, she talks about the office birthday party and the function it serves in organizations.

**This week’s Culture At Work Challenge:**

This week, share your workplace social rituals. Are there monthly birthday parties? Lunchtime rock paper scissors duels? How does your team bond and strengthen social ties? Reach Madeline on twitter @madelineboyer with the #cultureatwork hashtag.

Find more episodes at cultureatwork.percipientpartners.com.

Madeline shares a little bit about her experience in the classroom with the rising millenial workforce, and talks about how managers can start to bridge the generational gap.

In this episode, Madeline discusses introduces a low-effort tool to diagnose misalignments on your team, The Team Temperature Survey. It is available on our Tools page, to help you take steps towards getting your entire team–including millenials–on the same page.

**This week’s Culture At Work Challenge:**

This week, share your experiences with generational clashes. How were you able to bridge the gap between expectations? Reach Madeline on twitter @madelineboyer with the #cultureatwork hashtag.

Find more episodes at cultureatwork.percipientpartners.com

In this episode, Madeline discusses the second of five explorations into workplace rituals—the interview, and relates it to a reflection on the state of dating in the modern world.

This week’s Culture At Work Challenge:
Share your share your best interview stories—whether you were the interviewer or the interviewee. What have you found that works, what doesn’t? Maybe even throw in a few first date stories for good measure.
Reach me on twitter @madelineboyer with the #cultureatwork hashtag.

See more at cultureatwork.percipientpartners.com

For the first video episode of Culture at Work, Madeline interviews professor and finance guru, Joe Perfetti about the intersection of finance and culture in organizations.

The full audio of the conversation was published on the podcast, which you can listen to here:

In this episode, I reveal a little bit about where I grew up, the social networks that maintain the legacy of the Panama Canal Zone, and why understanding social networks is important to organizations.

Here is an example of the office network map that is mentioned in the episode:

I started with myself at the center and thought of all of the (imaginary) people I have interactions with. Then I reflected on who else connects with each other:

• There are fewer connections between the departments than there are within
  • e.g. Everyone within Marketing is connected to each other in some way, but only Adam and Sam have connections outside
• Karl from accounting and Adam from Marketing seem to be very well connected across departments
  • They may be the first people to talk to if I’m ever trying to work on cross-departmental initiatives
• I am really only connected to Marketing and Accounting, and not Product Development or IT directly
  • I may want to work on developing more relationships to become more effective

USE THIS TOOL:

The easiest way to create a network map is to start out on paper. There are many software tools, both desktop and online, that can help you digitize and amend over time. In this example, I used Scapple on my Mac.

It can be helpful to label the lines between individuals to show how/why they are connected: project X; on Y committee; company softball teammates; both went to Notre Dame undergrad.

Good luck!

This week’s Culture At Work Challenge:

Share your experiences with social capital at work. How do networks function in your company? Do people work in siloes, or do strong connections exist between departments?

Reach me on twitter @madelineboyer with the #cultureatwork hashtag.

And learn more about how I can positively affect your culture at work at my website at percipientpartners.com.