Take responsibility for improving your leadership

Make employee engagement a priority or don't bother | Take responsibility for improving your leadership | Smart succession strategies mean more outsider CEOs Created for {EMAIL} | [Web Version] May 3, 2016 CONNECT WITH SMARTBRIEF  [LinkedIn] [Facebook] [Twitter] [Google+] [Â] [SmartBrief on Leadership] Innovative Ideas. Ahead of the Curve. [SIGN UP] ⋅ [FORWARD] Leading Edge [Make employee engagement a priority or don't bother] Most people don't really care about employee engagement, and HR isn't the department capable of improving the situation, writes Ted Bauer. Engagement programs need to be connected to business value, he argues, and if you're an executive who doesn't care about engagement, simply don't talk about it. "Because when you bring it up but then are constantly two-faced about it and it clearly doesn't really matter to you, that also sends a message to employees," Bauer writes. [The Context of Things] (5/2) [LinkedIn] [Twitter] [Facebook] [Google+] [Email] [Take responsibility for improving your leadership] Many people receive little or no leadership training, so it's up to them, writes Marlene Chism. Prioritize who you are, what your weak points are and how you can improve, she advises. "You don't have to wait if you have an entrepreneurial mindset and commit to your own leadership journey," she writes. [SmartBrief/SmartBlog on Leadership] (5/2) [LinkedIn] [Twitter] [Facebook] [Google+] [Email] [2016 State of Employee Benefits Report] New report that analyzed actual open enrollment choices from more than 700,000 employees reveals: • What percent of employers now offer HDHPs alongside PPO and HMOs? • What plans are employees selecting and how does it vary based on demographics, industry and location? [Get the answers!] Advertisement Strategic Management [Smart succession strategies mean more outsider CEOs] Companies used to view hiring an outside leader as a last resort, but no more. Rapid change requiring new skill sets is often an impetus for an outside hire. "The pool for available talent has never been deeper or more densely populated. To their credit, more boards are casting wider nets," write DeAnne Aguirre, Per-Ola Karlsson and Gary Neilson. [Strategy+Business online (free registration)] (5/2) [LinkedIn] [Twitter] [Facebook] [Google+] [Email] [Inside Nestle's tainted-noodle scandal] In 2014, Nestle India's Maggi noodles brand accounted for a quarter of the company's $1.6 billion in revenue, but after testing suggested the product was tainted with lead, the company was stuck with declining sales, a damaged brand and a costly recall. Nestle strongly disputed the test results but was unable to avert a scandal that could cost hundreds of millions of dollars in brand value. "It's not a matter of being right. It's a matter of engaging the right way and finding a solution," says Nestle CEO Paul Bulcke. [Fortune] (5/1) [LinkedIn] [Twitter] [Facebook] [Google+] [Email] Why Bad Bosses Sabotage Their Teams Ever been undermined at work? Here's what you can do. [Learn more] from research by Kellogg School of Management Professor Jon Maner. ADVERTISEMENT Smarter Communication [How to hear out and help an unhappy employee] Helping upset employees work through their issues is a classic job of a boss, writes Marc Robertson. Start by listening, then empathizing with their concerns while steering them toward positive solutions. When successful, employees "know you actually care about how they are doing; everyone wants to be supported in this way," Robertson writes. [ThoughtLeaders blog] (5/2) [LinkedIn] [Twitter] [Facebook] [Google+] [Email] Innovation & Creativity A weekly spotlight on making the next big thing happen [Leaders must help their teams adjust to new ideas] Change leadership isn't just about announcing changes and telling people to get with the program, writes Chris Laping, the former chief information officer at Red Robin. Instead, it's about putting the conditions in place that will lead people to accept changes, including giving them more time to absorb new ideas. [InnovationExcellence.com] (4/28) [LinkedIn] [Twitter] [Facebook] [Google+] [Email] SmartPulse How effective is your organization's goal-setting process? Not very -- our goal-setting is inconsistent 39.25% Somewhat -- we set goals for big items but not smaller ones 31.74% Very -- we have clear and actionable goals all the time 19.45% Not at all -- what's a goal? 9.56% Set a destination. It's hard for your team to know where it's going and why their work matters if they're not clear on the destination. You have a responsibility to set clear goals that the team can focus on and drive toward. Without those goals in place, they won't know if they're working on the right things or if their efforts have been successful. Sit down and set some targets today. Your team will appreciate you doing so. Eighty percent of you aren't being as effective as you can be. With a little effort, you can set clear goals that your team can rally behind. -- Mike Figliuolo is managing director of [thoughtLEADERS], author of the upcoming book “[The Elegant Pitch: Create a Compelling Recommendation, Build Broad Support, and Get it Approved]” and [“One Piece of Paper: The Simple Approach to Powerful, Personal Leadership.”] [Discuss the results.] How often does your organization take big risks? [Vote] [All the time -- We make a lot of big bets] [Vote] [Occasionally -- We'll take a big risk from time to time] [Vote] [Rarely -- We're generally risk-averse] [Vote] [Never -- We're extremely conservative] In Their Own Words [So much data, so little human interaction] Great leaders like happy employees and know the business outcomes will align, Rodd Wagner says, but they also view their leadership as a duty. He emphasizes small, personal interactions as an accompaniment to data. "We have exceptional insights, what's going on inside an employee's brain," Wagner says. "But we're not taking advantage of the simplest kinds of things that we can do to make that employee's life better." [Association for Talent Development] (5/1) [LinkedIn] [Twitter] [Facebook] [Google+] [Email] Daily Diversion [Photographer creates "photo ark" for endangered species] [Joel Sartore] Sartore (Jerod Harris/Getty Images) Photographer Joel Sartore has taken portraits of plants and animals representing more than 5,000 endangered species, in a bid to create a "photo ark" that can record nature's beauty and be used to raise awareness of its vulnerability. "When we save other species we are actually saving ourselves in a way," he says. [The Washington Post (tiered subscription model)] (4/25) [LinkedIn] [Twitter] [Facebook] [Google+] [Email] We must walk consciously only part way toward our goal, and then leap in the dark to our success. Henry David Thoreau, writer [LinkedIn] [Twitter] [Facebook] [Google+] [Email] [Sign Up] [SmartBrief offers 200+ newsletters] [Advertise] [Learn more about the SmartBrief audience] Subscriber Tools: [Manage Subscriptions] [Update Your Profile] [Unsubscribe] [Send Feedback] [Archive] [Search] Contact Us: Jobs Contact - [jobhelp@smartbrief.com] Advertising - [Laura Thompson] Editor - [James daSilva] Contributing Editor - [Ben Whitford] Mailing Address: SmartBrief, Inc.®, 555 11th ST NW, Suite 600, Washington, DC 20004 © 1999-2016 SmartBrief, Inc.® [Privacy policy] | [Legal Information] Â