Ted Bauer
Transactional leadership style: What it is, plus the pros and cons
There are 11 identified types of leadership styles, with the transactional leadership style often viewed through the prism of someone who values order and structure. A transactional leader focuses on results, conforms to the existing structure of an organization and measures success according to that organization's system of rewards and penalties.
Ted Bauer
A definitive guide to fostering interpersonal relationships at work
It can be tricky to navigate interpersonal relationships at work, without question -- just as it can be tricky to navigate any interpersonal relationship.
Ted Bauer
Creative problem solving: 6 steps to improve yours
Creative problem solving, sometimes called CPS, is a proven method for approaching a problem or a challenge in an imaginative and innovative way. It helps you redefine the problems and opportunities you face, come up with new, innovative responses and solutions, and then take action. The creative problem solving approach comes from the work of Alex Osborn in the 1940s, which was then subsequently nurtured at Buffalo State University. It's one of the most tangible problem solving approaches out there today; you can view it almost as a mix of creative thinking and critical thinking.
Ted Bauer
The definitive guide to leading a team
Leadership is one of the most complicated human endeavors, both at work and beyond.
Ted Bauer
Mastering the complicated world of stakeholder management
First things first: let's define stakeholder management.
Ted Bauer
Examples of a situational leadership style and how to develop it
A situational leadership style actually encompasses four other leadership styles under one umbrella, with those being:
Ted Bauer
5 easy habits to develop personal accountability
What is personal accountability?
Ted Bauer
How to be tactful: Nine science-backed approaches
What is tactful behavior, and what’s the process of how to be tactful?
Ted Bauer
A delegating leadership style: The big wins, and the big challenges
The delegating leadership style: What’s the definition?
Ted Bauer
Observation skills: How to improve them (starring a clown, a gorilla and some scientists)
Normally we begin these guides with a series of statistics related to the topic, but when discussing observation skills, statistics don’t even do it justice. Instead, something common from the mouths of parents and caregivers might work: “You were given two ears and one mouth for a reason.” The implication is that you should listen roughly twice as much as you speak, although we know from general life observation that’s not true of most people.
Ted Bauer
How to stop feeling guilty: 7 ways to beat back the universal emotion
As far back as 1955, researchers have indicated guilt is an universal emotion, meaning it’s felt by everyone at some level. The psychological research belief is generally that the feeling of guilt, like that of any other emotion, is the same anywhere in the world -- but its causes and consequences can vary a lot from an individual to another and from one culture to another.
Ted Bauer
Conscientiousness: Why it matters, and seven ways to develop it
As defined in Psychology Today: “Conscientiousness is a fundamental personality trait—one of the Big Five—that reflects the tendency to be responsible, organized, hard-working, goal-directed, and to adhere to norms and rules. Like the other core personality factors, it has multiple facets; conscientiousness comprises self-control, industriousness, responsibility, and reliability.”
Ted Bauer
How to deal with loneliness: 11 key coping strategies
When approaching how to deal with loneliness, we need to start with a definition of being lonely. While there’s no universally agreed definition, Wikipedia is a good start:
Ted Bauer
How to prioritize tasks (and stop putting out fires)
Even before COVID shifted us to thinking about a “New Normal,” people were stressed at work. Four years ago, Groupon commissioned a study of 2,000+ professionals about their work lives. Some findings:
Ted Bauer
How to develop grit (and the 1 critical ingredient that makes it work)
If you’ve dabbled in researching the word “grit” in the past decade or so, you’ve likely stumbled across Angela Duckworth’s book of the same name. Duckworth is the founder and CEO of Character Lab, a nonprofit whose mission is to advance scientific insights that help children thrive. She is also the Christopher H. Browne Distinguished Professor of Psychology at the University of Pennsylvania, faculty co-director of the Penn-Wharton Behavior Change for Good Initiative, and faculty co-director of Wharton People Analytics. In short: she’s very accomplished, and knows a lot about grit.
Ted Bauer
How to Conduct an After Action Review (With Minimal Stress)
An after action review (AAR) is a structured review or debrief for analyzing an event or project in the context of:
Ted Bauer
40+ unique employee appreciation ideas (because your team needs some love right now)
This is broadly a good place to start any discussion on employee appreciation ideas. Any attempts to appreciate an employee -- whether you want to call that employee experience, employee engagement, employee appreciation, employee respect, or just leadership (your choice!) -- can fall into one of two buckets.
Ted Bauer
How to start managing your boss (with no hard feelings)
Managing your boss, often referred to as “managing up” (with the idea of “managing down” being conventional management, i.e. you as a manager to your direct reports), is a very important aspect of work -- and, honestly, of happiness at work.
Ted Bauer
Generational differences in the workplace — and how to embrace them
35%: The percentage of millennials (1981-2000 birthdays) currently in the workforce, the most of any generational cohort at present. [1]39%: Among Millennials, around four-in-ten (39%) of those ages 25 to 37 have a bachelor’s degree or higher, compared with just 15% of the Silent Generation, roughly a quarter of Baby Boomers and about three-in-ten Gen Xers (29%) when they were the same age. [2]66%: In the past five years, the majority of Gen X leaders (66%) had received only one promotion or none at all — significantly fewer than their younger millennial counterparts (52%) and more senior baby boomers (58%) who were more likely to have received two or more promotions during the same period of time. [3]58%: Only 58% of Gen X feels that they are advancing within their organization at an acceptable rate, in comparison to 65% of Millennials. [4]37%: Of Gen Z believe that technology is weakening their ability to develop strong interpersonal skills and build relationships. [5]10,000: The number of Baby Boomers retiring every day at this point. [6]67%: The percentage of Gen X leaders who would like more external coaching. [3]Emerging data from Fingerprint for Success shows that Millennials have a very strong bias towards Shared Responsibility (average score of 80 and higher) and very low motivation for Sole Responsibility. [7]Generational differences in the workplace: Defining the generationsThis can actually be somewhat of a tricky part to discussing generational differences in the workplace, because there’s not necessarily consensus on what date of birth ranges constitute each cohort. Within a few years on each side, the most commonly-accepted birth year ranges for each cohort are:
Ted Bauer
How to Deal With a Disgruntled Employee (A Complete Guide)
As much as we’d like to believe life is a perfect Instagram post/Kumbaya-singing drum circle, it’s unfortunately not. Look at 2020. There was a global pandemic, numerous iterations of social unrest, massive layoffs in some industries, and entire pivots in working style for some people. Sadly, it’s going to lead to some disgruntled employees.
Ted Bauer
The post-COVID guide to self fulfillment
The dictionary definition is “the full use of one’s own abilities” or “the ability to make yourself happy and complete through your own efforts.”
Ted Bauer
New job anxiety: How to cope in 9 easy steps
Let’s start with a quick story. It’s not directly about new job anxiety, but don’t worry, we will get there quickly.
Ted Bauer
“Alexa, what is my talent?” Six ways to find what you’re good at
Sadly, it’s not that simple -- although asking her, Siri, Google Home, or another device might yield some interesting answers. One of the biggest questions of a person’s life -- not to be too dramatic, but it’s true -- is simply “What is my talent?” and its cousin, “How do I find my talent?”
Ted Bauer
The genuine person revolution, and how you can be part of it
In the course of COVID ravaging society in various ways, one aspect that repeatedly came to the forefront was stark differences among us: the already-rich seemed to get infinitely richer, and many of the rest of us struggled with a mix of stress, new norms, responsibilities, health concerns, and connection.
Ted Bauer
Creating a culture of excellence: the Goldilocks approach
At Fingerprint for Success, our core belief around leadership and culture-building rests on the importance of empathy and being understanding of each other’s unique circumstances, while coaching for performance and wellbeing.
Ted Bauer
Why is team building important?
There are explicit and implicit reasons for why team building is important. Let’s start with some of the explicit, more financial ones.
Ted Bauer
What is a life coach? And how to know if it’s right for you
For better or worse, we’ve been taught to think about work in specific ways, usually involving productivity and innovation, and often rooted in metrics. These are what we’ve come to call “hard” concepts, i.e. they can be easily tracked and documented: earnings, revenue, growth, calls made, campaigns sent, products launched, etc.
Ted Bauer
How to build a successful team: Six core approaches
While a good portion of work does get done in teams these days, there has been academic research that a lot of managers simply fall back on the superstars of a team, give them the work of other people, and essentially burn them out.
Ted Bauer
Adapting to change: How to master it, personally and professionally
The importance of adapting to changePersonally and professionally, change is one of the most flummoxing -- and also one of the best -- things we encounter in our lives. It can be terrifying in the moment (think of a new job, the end of a relationship, or a friend/pet passing away), but also spur you on to new heights.
Ted Bauer
Organizational climate: What is it, and does it differ from culture?
We talk often about “organizational culture,” but a new term has come en vogue in the last 2-3 years: organizational climate. The terms “organizational culture” and “organizational climate” are often used interchangeably, but the concepts are actually a bit different.
Ted Bauer
Communication styles in the workplace - it’s personal
Communication skills are one of the most sought-after attributes in the workplace. Still, 57% of employees report not being given clear directions on projects, and 69% of managers are not comfortable communicating with employees in general.
Ted Bauer
The pros and cons of working remotely: How to thrive at home
We all inherently know that COVID-19 shifted a tremendous amount of thinking and doing around work, but … how significant is it, really? Fairly significant.
Ted Bauer
Five team meeting agenda examples for high-impact meetings
Imagine you walk into a room and have no real idea why you’re there. You recognize some of the other people there, but not everyone. Someone starts speaking, but you're unsure what they're talking about. Acronyms are tossed around that you're unable to decipher. You do your best to follow along, but it’s hard to stay focused.
Ted Bauer
The matrix organizational structure was hot, then fell out of favor. Can it still work?
A matrix organizational structure, or “matrix management,” is a way to organize individuals in a business whereby they report to more than one person. Oftentimes this is framed up as having a “solid line” reporting relationship to your direct boss -- that being the person who does your reviews, etc. -- and a “dashed line” or “dotted line” relationship to other bosses, functions, and silos that you need to work with regularly. Sometimes you’ll hear this whole concept described as “working cross-functionally.”
Ted Bauer
Boundaryless Organizations: What are they and do they matter in 2024?
The term “boundary less organization” comes from a 1995 book (since updated multiple times) which argued that organizations were, in a sense, constrained by notions such as hierarchy, geography, and physical structure. The authors, partners at a consulting firm, wanted organizations to focus on a free flow of information instead of any internal politics or other factors. The timing of the book is interesting, because Google -- also predicated on a free flow of information -- would be founded in a Northern California garage just the next year.
Ted Bauer
Holding people accountable is the cornerstone of effective work. But how?
In some ways, accountability is the entire cornerstone of the work experience. Although some leaders contextualize it around scaring employees, that’s not the right definition of “accountability.” Much more than taking the blame when something goes wrong or confessing to your organizational sins, accountability is about following through on a commitment.
Ted Bauer
What is transformational coaching?
210 coaching clients, most of whom had experienced transformational coaching -- which we will continue to define in a moment -- were surveyed about their experiences after the coaching by the International Coach Federation.
Ted Bauer
Team effectiveness: The 5 conditions (and how to measure it)
Is team effectiveness the white whale of modern work?In some ways, absolutely yes. There are entire sections of bookstores dedicated to team-building, communication, and collaboration -- and yet, from the stats above and anecdotal evidence within organizations, it feels like many haven’t quite achieved team effectiveness yet.
Ted Bauer
Work anxiety: signs, symptoms and how to manage it
In the 1930s, John Maynard Keynes predicted we’d all be working 15 hours or less per week by now. That prediction was largely driven by technology. Instead, we’ve gone in the other direction.
Ted Bauer
The complex, but important, picture around dignity at work
Dignity at work is emerging as a huge issue
Ted Bauer