This book gives the reader a step by step guide on how to obtain and maintain sustainable competitive advantage through the correct management of individuals in today's workplace. More importantly, it's about giving purpose to people at work and increasing their engagement to both you as their manager and the organisation as a whole. Engagement or the lack of it is one of the major challenges that companies face today and for the foreseeable future. This lack of engagement results in extremely high costs to organisations in terms of retention (the lack of), leading to excessive turnover costs, unreasonably high recruitment and training costs as well as a lowering of productivity. This book demonstrates how employee engagement can be improved through the proper running of one-to-one meetings. It gives very clear step-by-step guidance and instructions about everything that needs to be done to run these meetings in the most optimal way possible. Ultimately, this book demonstrates both how and why running effective one-to-one meetings with individuals properly results in the creation of additional value for companies both for today and tomorrow. This, in turn, leads to a situation where everyone wins: you as the manager, the employee and the organisation. www.robertsonhunterstewart.com

A Five-part Approach to Making Organizations Stronger, More Profitable, and Better Places to Work. Employees and leaders intuitively know that when we find a place where we can throw our hearts, spirits, minds, and hands into our work, we are happier, healthier, and produce better results. Yet, most struggle to understand exactly why we engage in some environments, and don’t in others. Magic introduces the five MAGIC keys of employee engagement—Meaning, Autonomy, Growth, Impact, and Connection—and shows how leaders can help employees achieve higher levels of engagement, as well as how employees can be more successful by taking ownership for their own MAGIC. The Research Based on over 14 million employee survey responses across 70 countries—the most extensive employee engagement survey database of its kind—Magic combines principles of psychology and motivation with solid business concepts. Written by internationally recognized experts in leadership and employee engagement, Dr. Tracy Maylett and Dr. Paul Warner, Magic provides actionable advice that will reduce employee attrition, encourage initiative, drive growth and profit, and increase personal engagement in one’s work. Engaging Content In this book, leaders and employees will find real-world case studies, exercises, assessments, thought-provoking questions, and suggestions that increase engagement on the individual, manager, and organizational levels.

Imagine a management philosophy based not upon serving a company's customers, but on serving the company's employees. Vineet Nayar, CEO of HCL Technologies in India, has put such a philosophy into practice with remarkable results. His "employee first, customer second" mantra has been recognized globally as an example of organizational innovation, and was deemed a "new and radical management philosophy" ripe for the picking in the Western world by Business Week. In this book, Nayar himself describes his blunt refusal to treat the flesh and blood of HCL--its people--as "human resource" or as "intellectual capital" or even as an asset like all its other assets-and how his unique perspective led to an holistic transformation of his organization. By putting employees on top of the organizational pyramid, he argues, your company can fully realize the value created in the interface between customers and employees. This book leads managers and executives through the five core aspects of Nayar's approach, demonstrating how to create a sense of urgency, overhaul incentives and reporting structures, foster transparency in communications and feedback, provide platforms for achievement and personal growth, and finally recognize the potential of every individual in the organization. The "Employee First" philosophy should be the fulcrum of the transformation journey of any organization.

What really sets the best managers above the rest? It’s their power to build a cadre of employees who have great inner work lives—consistently positive emotions; strong motivation; and favorable perceptions of the organization, their work, and their colleagues. The worst managers undermine inner work life, often unwittingly. As Teresa Amabile and Steven Kramer explain in The Progress Principle, seemingly mundane workday events can make or break employees’ inner work lives. But it’s forward momentum in meaningful work—progress—that creates the best inner work lives. Through rigorous analysis of nearly 12,000 diary entries provided by 238 employees in 7 companies, the authors explain how managers can foster progress and enhance inner work life every day. The book shows how to remove obstacles to progress, including meaningless tasks and toxic relationships. It also explains how to activate two forces that enable progress: (1) catalysts—events that directly facilitate project work, such as clear goals and autonomy—and (2) nourishers—interpersonal events that uplift workers, including encouragement and demonstrations of respect and collegiality. Brimming with honest examples from the companies studied, The Progress Principle equips aspiring and seasoned leaders alike with the insights they need to maximize their people’s performance.

A manager's guide to the evolution of employee expectations.

Happy customers. Passionate employees. A highly recognizable brand known for delivering on its promises. That's the power of WOW. From its birth during the Dot Com Boom in 1999 to its acquisition by Amazon in 2009, Zappos, the customer service company that just happens to sell things online, continues to turn heads with its disruptively entrepreneurial spirit and radically innovative employees. Ever unfolding throughout two decades, Zappos continues to outlive the seemingly inevitable short lifespan of the average corporate company. How do they do it? In The Power of WOW, the essential follow-up to Tony Hsieh's Delivering Happiness, Zapponians from every part of the business share powerful stories and lessons that they have learned in business and life––from delivering empathetic customer service in the face of devastating circumstances to creating a self-organized organizational structure using Market-Based Dynamics and everything in between. Fast-paced and filled with authentic, diverse voices, The Power of WOW gives readers an exclusive and immersive understanding of how one company is finding resilience. This glimpse inside the world of Zappos shows how a self-organized company is opening up avenues for passionate individuals to unleash their undiscovered strengths in the workplace and evolve the business from the inside out. Whether you are a customer, an employee, a business leader, shareholder, entrepreneur, or just happened to pick up this book, The Power of WOW will, ultimately, show how leading and infusing humanity into the workplace can change everything in your business, your community, and your life.

From the creator of the popular website Ask a Manager and New York’s work-advice columnist comes a witty, practical guide to 200 difficult professional conversations—featuring all-new advice! There’s a reason Alison Green has been called “the Dear Abby of the work world.” Ten years as a workplace-advice columnist have taught her that people avoid awkward conversations in the office because they simply don’t know what to say. Thankfully, Green does—and in this incredibly helpful book, she tackles the tough discussions you may need to have during your career. You’ll learn what to say when • coworkers push their work on you—then take credit for it • you accidentally trash-talk someone in an email then hit “reply all” • you’re being micromanaged—or not being managed at all • you catch a colleague in a lie • your boss seems unhappy with your work • your cubemate’s loud speakerphone is making you homicidal • you got drunk at the holiday party Praise for Ask a Manager “A must-read for anyone who works . . . [Alison Green’s] advice boils down to the idea that you should be professional (even when others are not) and that communicating in a straightforward manner with candor and kindness will get you far, no matter where you work.”—Booklist (starred review) “The author’s friendly, warm, no-nonsense writing is a pleasure to read, and her advice can be widely applied to relationships in all areas of readers’ lives. Ideal for anyone new to the job market or new to management, or anyone hoping to improve their work experience.”—Library Journal (starred review) “I am a huge fan of Alison Green’s Ask a Manager column. This book is even better. It teaches us how to deal with many of the most vexing big and little problems in our workplaces—and to do so with grace, confidence, and a sense of humor.”—Robert Sutton, Stanford professor and author of The No Asshole Rule and The Asshole Survival Guide “Ask a Manager is the ultimate playbook for navigating the traditional workforce in a diplomatic but firm way.”—Erin Lowry, author of Broke Millennial: Stop Scraping By and Get Your Financial Life Together

Rather than explain the power of recognition in a typical business book, acclaimed CEO David Novak wrote a fun story that draws on his real-world experiences at Pepsi and Yum! Brands, as well as his personal life. When was the last time you told your colleagues how much you value them? It sounds like a trivial thing in the middle of a busy work day. But as Novak discovered during his years as a hard charging executive, there’s nothing trivial about recognition. It can make a life-or-death difference to any organization, when people see that someone important really notices and appreciates their contributions. The story of O Great One! opens when Jeff Johnson becomes the third-generation CEO of his family business, after the sudden death of his father. The Happy Face Toy Company had many hits in the 1950s and 60s, including Crazy Paste, but its results have been declining for more than a decade. The board has given Jeff just one year to turn the business around, or else they’ll have to sell it to the highest bidder. As Jeff races to save his family’s legacy by getting the company back on track, he meets downtrodden factory workers and an uninspired executive team. Then a birthday gift from his grandson gives Jeff an important insight into why Happy Face lost its culture of innovation and excitement, along with its profitability. He comes up with an idea that seems crazy… But is it crazy enough to work? Whether you’re trying to lead a small department, a Fortune 500 company, a non-profit, or your own family, the story and lessons of O Great One! can help you make everyone around you happier and more effective.

This is a book about the incredible source of largely untapped power which exists within organisations and companies today, namely your employees. It explains why this is the case and what to do about it. The main paradigm of the book is that employees are the most important resource for any organisation and should be treated as such; companies need more than ever to become employee centric.Both now and in the future, key themes such as autonomy, empowerment and employee engagement will become the foundations upon which companies will build competitive advantage. Building confidence and trust will become more and more crucial to success. As I say in the book: "Empowerment is also to do with confidence and trust. If you think about the concepts of confidence and trust in your life outside of work, I am sure that most of you would agree that, if there is no trust within, for example, a family unit, there is a great likelihood that this will lead to a serious problem."About the author: Robertson Hunter Stewart's experience as an employee has now stretched over a period of 36 years (56-years-old at the time of writing) and he has spent the last 26 years in the service sector. Arriving in France in 1992 (and speaking no French), Stewart worked his way up from cleaner to General Manager of some of the biggest Luxury Hotels in Europe (three of which with over a thousand rooms). He has led teams from a few to several hundred during his career.He also continues to teach in both French and English at Bachelors and Masters Level for prestigious Management schools in Paris, France.As he says in his first book: "As both an employee and a manager, I strongly believe that the way that we are treated within an organisation impacts to a very high degree on how we behave as employees and, following on from that, how we perform."Stewart lives in the West of France with his wife and two children.https: //www.linkedin.com/in/robertson-hunter-stewart-90538b1a/

In this new edition, based on new research and double the survey data, ENGAGEMENT MAGIC provides you with an expert approach to increasing workplace engagement. Discover how to engage employees (and yourself) more effectively. Most leaders understand that engaged employees are passionate about their jobs and deliver better results, and most of us know what it’s like to either be engaged or disengaged in a workplace where we spend most of our waking hours. Yet, most don’t understand how engagement really works. Maylett introduces you to the five MAGIC keys of employee engagement—Meaning, Autonomy, Growth, Impact, and Connection—and discusses how leaders can help employees achieve higher levels of engagement, while engaging ourselves in the journey as well. Learn tactics for increasing engagement at all levels of your organization. Based on the most extensive employee engagement survey database of its kind, ENGAGEMENT MAGIC incorporates organizational research with updated case studies, stories, and examples to present you with practical solutions for creating an extraordinary employee experience. In addition, Maylett provides a self-assessment, thought-provoking questions, and specific applications for individuals, managers, and organizations. Benefit from a psychological approach to fundamental business concepts. ​Based on data from over 32 million employee survey responses across 70 countries, ENGAGEMENT MAGIC combines principles of psychology and human motivation with solid business concepts, providing actionable advice for reducing attrition, encouraging initiative, and driving profitable growth at your organization.