Peak Performance Tuesdays

A poll carried out among British workers suggested that we are at our best at precisely 11.33am on a Tuesday.

Mondays are spent recovering from the weekend and coping with the realisation that there is a full working week ahead, but by Tuesday morning most of us are into our stride and raring to go.

This can-do attitude reaches its peak at around 11.30am on Tuesday, by which time we’re enthusiastic, organised and feeling in control. Unfortunately this positive performance peak only lasts a day – come Wednesday afternoon the motivational heights have been scaled and we’re on the downward slope to the weekend with most of us easing off on the productivity and intensity of work so that by Friday, we’re ready for the weekend again.

If this sounds familiar, or explains working patterns in your own team throughout the week, there are two ways of dealing with it:…

Leading Academics say Tea Breaks make better Teams

There may be no ‘I’ in team but there is ‘tea’ and it turns out that tea (or coffee) could be the key to unlocking the potential of teams, with one US bank anticipating a staggering $15 million productivity increase as a result.

Back in 2004 the Oxford think tank Career Innovation published a paper entitled The Conversation Gap. The basis of their findings was that 4 out of every 10 high performers in several leading companies reported that they have an issue that they want to raise but feel unable to do so – the Conversation Gap of the title. Additionally the increase in electronic communication continues to rise. Average emails received and sent rose by over 30% from 2010 to 2011 despite spam dropping from 19% to 16% in the same period. One of the consequences of this increase is that those spontaneous conversations by the water cooler have reduced. Therefore employees feel less informed and there’s less likelihood that new ideas and opportunities will be discussed unless a formal meeting is convened.

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A Recipe for Successful Teams

Great chefs know that alongside the core ingredients it’s the careful use of seasoning that turns a mediocre meal into a something scrumptious.

Here we offer some tips to help team leaders make their team rise:…

Management Training – The Moral of the Story

It could be said that those with the greatest influence on society are leading the nation astray. MPs cheat on their expenses, bankers alter the rules to suit themselves and journalists listen in on private voicemails to get a story.

Business skeletons seem to be falling out of closets with increasing regularity and Wikipedia’s growing list of corporate scandals features many previously respected companies….

10 Styles of Leadership – Part 1

Leadership is often taught as a single skill whereas in fact the term ‘leadership‘ covers some very different and distinct characteristics. Churchill is widely regarded as one of the world’s greatest leaders, his supreme confidence turning his country’s military approach from defensive to offensive.

Yet this same bombastic approach turned out to be his Achilles heel when, after the war, he failed as a peace time politician. Ghandi achieved similar notoriety yet was a very different character.

Just being a good leader is not always sufficient; here we’ll look at three very different sorts of leader, each uniquely equipped to lead in very different circumstances:…

Leading Gold Medal Teams

As London greets the world’s best teams there’s a great deal that leaders of workplace teams can learn from their example.

Here are three of the things leaders of workplace teams could learn:…

The ‘To Don’t’ List That Will Help Your ‘To Do’ List

Most of us are probably pretty good at listing our priorities for the day, week or even month.

We might use a diary, notebook or MS Outlook’s Task app. Why is it then that all too often we get to the end of the day with so many of our ‘To Dos’ not done?

Interuptions and distractions come in many forms: chatty passers by, text messages, boss’s requests, over-running meetings, clients, traffic delays, conversations with team members, IT failures….

The Four Things That Make a Team Work

Watch our latest 10 minute video on the four things that make a team work.

The four things are:

1. What is a team?
2. Who should be in a team?
3. What do teams need?
4. What do the best teams do?

Do comment below if you think there are other things that we should add to the list.

You’ve got to laugh – 9 reasons why laughing is good for our health

Doctors can achieve greater success by getting to know their patients; similarly leaders will find their teams are more creative, productive and committed when they are given the freedom to have some fun.

The movie Patch Adams tells the true story of how a medical student introduces levity into a clinical profession that alienates patients from their caregivers. In the same way that doctors can achieve greater success by getting to know their patients, leaders will find their teams are more creative, productive and committed when they are given the freedom to have some fun. Furthermore there’s a wealth of scientific evidence that laughter keeps us healthy.

So here are 9 reasons why laughing is good for our health:…

5 Powerful Questions Every Leader Should Ask Their Team

Below are 5 powerful questions that every leader should ask their team.

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