Planners’ Picks:
A collection of resources from CSN planning committee members worth mentioning
Let’s get curious about diverse workers, gratitude practice, and student success in this installment of PP.
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Want to retain your diverse workforce? Focus on removing bias
Many CEOs and business owners know the research. Diverse teams are more innovative, they produce more and they generate more revenue.
But to reap those rewards, companies have to do more than just hire a more diverse workforce, says Valerie Alexander, a Vistage speaker and nationally recognized author on the topics of workplace happiness, the advancement of women and unconscious bias.
https://www.vistage.com/research-center/talent-management/20200902-remove-unconscious-bias
Assessment: What’s Your Curiosity Profile?
Four dozen CSN members are currently in a book club with the book Elevate by Robert Glazer(today is our last book club meeting). During our first session, we talked about defining core values you live by as a roadmap for your goal setting and decision making. One of the popular values we espoused in the group was CURIOSITY. We also did a (free) strengths finder assessment, and many found CURIOSITY as a top strength there.
Organizations and hiring managers are always on the lookout for people who ask smart questions, explore new ideas and solutions, and are eager to grow. Much of that mindset comes down to one vital quality: curiosity. What’s your curiosity profile? To find out, answer these scientifically validated questions, drawn from extensive research on curiosity in educational settings and the personality traits associated with it.
https://hbr.org/2015/12/assessment-whats-your-curiosity-profile#
The Benefits of Being Grateful That You May Not Know About
The people at The Tremendous Collective created this charming, informative video about the power of gratitude. Expressing appreciation and being thankful can reduce depression, lower blood pressure, increase energy and happiness, and even prolong your life! Gratitude also increases the feel-good neurotransmitters dopamine and serotonin and helps you deflect those negative thoughts. So why not celebrate minor accomplishments, perform small acts of kindness, and appreciate the small things? Watch this short video on gratitude benefits.
https://my.happify.com/hd/benefits-of-being-grateful-that-you-may-not-know-about/
Three Reasons to Provide Positive Feedback (or Feedforward)
Great execution requires that positive feedback should always be shared with your teams. Leadership can cause feedback to happen by following up every great performance with recognition. Leaders should never need an excuse to give positive feedback as handing out accolades is at the core of being a great leader. Read more in this Linkedin post from Leadership coach Monte Pedersen.
Future of Work is Caring, Connection, and Contribution Featuring Jason Meucci
Benjamin Warsinske’s Bricks & Brands podcast web guest in this episode is Jason Meucci, a leadership coach, team building facilitator, and teaching assistant at Gonzaga University’s graduate School of Leadership Studies. They discuss how the future of work is caring, connection, and contribution. We can create a better world by building a better world of work. Jason is helping leaders and teams prioritize Care, Connection and Contribution into their everyday work and way of being. His 3C framework unlocks the potential in people, leverages the power of purpose and expands the possibilities for organizations by ensuring everyone knows why who they are and what they do matters. Apologies for some technology issues within this podcast, but it’s worth listening to!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8g6bPelZiAU
How to Cultivate Gratitude, Compassion, and Pride on Your Team
Leaders want teams that work hard and persevere in the face of challenges. But it’s not enough to nurture grit among your employees. You also need to encourage grace – decency, respect, and generosity, all of which mark a person as someone with whom others want to cooperate. Managers can foster grace by cultivating three specific emotions: gratitude, compassion, and pride. Research has shown that employees who feel these emotions at work demonstrate more patience and perseverance, but also stronger social bonds because these feelings make us more willing to cooperate with and invest in others – and encourage others to see us in a positive light.
https://hbr.org/2018/02/how-to-cultivate-gratitude-compassion-and-pride-on-your-team
Resources to Support Student Success
As faculty and staff at UW-Madison, we are partners in helping our students thrive on campus. You play a firsthand and positive role in helping students get the assistance they need. (This is an older post, but the links are still valid today).
https://students.wisc.edu/news/fac-staff-resources-to-support-student-success/
UPCOMING EVENTS:
3/29 The How of Well-Being: Center for Healthy Minds
Monday, March 29, 2021
7-8:15 p.m. CDT
Discover new skills for your mental and emotional well-being from researchers at the University of Wisconsin–Madison’s Center for Healthy Minds. This event will focus on the Healthy Minds Framework consisting of four pillars of well-being that have been studied in the lab and have been shown to improve with training: awareness, or attentiveness to one’s environment and internal cues such as bodily sensations, thoughts and feelings; connection, or appreciation, kindness and compassion; insight, which refers to fostering curiosity and self-knowledge; and purpose, or understanding your values and motivations.
The How of Well-Being is part of the Healthy Minds LIVE virtual event series from the Center for Healthy Minds and its external, affiliated nonprofit Healthy Minds Innovations (makers of the Healthy Minds Program app) to bring you the latest research findings, innovation trends and tips to promote well-being in your daily life and community.
Register:
https://mailchi.mp/centerhealthyminds/healthymindslivemarch
3/30 Student Employment Podcast Series: Supporting LGBTQ+ Students
The Student Employment Podcast Series seeks to support our supervisory and leadership skills with student employees by focusing on diversity, equity, and inclusion topics. No matter whether you supervise students or not, everyone is welcome and encouraged to participate in discussions.
Featuring Guest Facilitators:
- Katherine Charek Briggs – Assistant Director of the Gender and Sexuality Campus Center
- Tiffany Lee – Crossroads Coordinator of the Gender and Sexuality Campus Center
No registration required—you will be able to access the session 15 minutes prior to the start time by clicking “Join the Conversation” below!
HOW TO PARTICIPATE:
- Listen to the featured podcast episode (30 min).
- Join the conversation March 30th, 1:30-2:30 (CT)
Not able to listen ahead of time? No worries, we’d still encourage you to consider attending the discussion session if able. If you need any accommodations for this presentation and discussion, please email us at student.employment@finaid.wisc.edu.
3/30 Agile – Where to Start and Why
You are invited to join the Agile Community of Practice for this month’s lunch & learn titled, “Agile – Where to Start and Why”. Transforming to an agile organization involves making both structural and cultural changes. Only by undergoing a shift in mindset (“being agile”) to understand the “whys” behind the Scrum framework and not just the mechanics (“doing agile”) of the framework can an organization achieve the maximum benefit of Agile.
To help unpack this topic, Organizational Agility Advisor Chad Beier and Professional Scrum Trainer Jeff Bubolz will present a whiteboard talk that clarifies what “agile” is, highlights the most important factors in achieving true agility and why many agile adoptions fail to get there.
Agile – Where to Start and Why
Tuesday, March 30, 2021
12:00-1:00pm – Presentation
1:00-1:30pm – Open discussion/Q&A
For more event information including presenter bios, please visit the Agile Community of Practice website or send inquiries to agilecommunity-admin@g-groups.wisc.edu.
Agile Community of Practice