Read Zengage

Advance Acclaim:

“Zengage is a fast, easy read. If you make it a fast, easy read, you will completely miss the incredible insight that comes from the information on a single page. Or a single line on a page. If you read and reflect, you will learn about yourself and how to engage in your work.”
Scot Herrick
Owner of Cube Rules

Excerpt from Zengage (page 25)

Sample of the Book. If you would like to see a short sample of Zengage, click here

Official Launch September 9. David Zinger’s book Zengage will be officially launched on September 9th.  You can get more information or purchase the book today by clicking here.

Your purchase results in 100% donation to Pakistan Flood Relief. Purchasing before September 9th will result in a significant contribution to Pakistan Flood Relief. 50% of the proceeds from the book will go to Pakistan Flood Relief and currently the Canadian government is matching individual donations so this will result in 100% of the proceeds being used for flood relief.

David Zinger, M.Ed., works with organizations and individuals to foster engagement.  He is a writer, educator, speaker, and consultant who founded the 2900+ member Employee Engagement Network. David’s new book, Zengage: How to Get More Into Your Work to Get More Out of Your Work will be released September 9th.  David’s website offers 1100 free posts/articles on the engagement. David is committed to fostering a movement to increase employee engagement 20% by 2020.

Connect with David Zinger today to improve engagement where you work.

Email: dzinger@shaw.ca  -  Phone 204 254 2130  -  Website: www.davidzinger.com

Advance Acclaim:

“Don’t just “read” Zengage. Savor it line by line. Come back to it again and again. You will learn or remember how to more fully engage with your work. And you may smile a lot. I did.”
~Dick Richards
Change Agent, author of Is Your Genius at Work?

Excerpt from Zengage (page 17)

Engage Action
No problem.
Employee engagement is an experience to be lived not a problem to be solved.
This is the real answer to a problem we do not have.
Remember, work is no problem.

Sample of the Book. If you would like to see a short sample of Zengage, click here.

Official Launch September 9. David Zinger’s book Zengage will be officially launched on September 9th.  You can get more information or purchase the book today by clicking here.

Your purchase results in 100% donation to Pakistan Flood Relief. Purchasing before September 9th will result in a significant contribution to Pakistan Flood Relief. 50% of the proceeds from the book will go to Pakistan Flood Relief and currently the Canadian government is matching individual donations so this will result in 100% of the proceeds being used for flood relief.

David Zinger, M.Ed., works with organizations and individuals to foster engagement.  He is a writer, educator, speaker, and consultant who founded the 2900+ member Employee Engagement Network. David’s new book, Zengage: How to Get More Into Your Work to Get More Out of Your Work will be released September 9th.  David’s website offers 1100 free posts/articles on the engagement. David is committed to fostering a movement to increase employee engagement 20% by 2020.

Connect with David Zinger today to improve engagement where you work.

Email: dzinger@shaw.ca  -  Phone 204 254 2130  -  Website: www.davidzinger.com

]]> http://www.davidzinger.com/zengage-countdown-day-nine-engage-action-8857/feed/ 0 http://www.davidzinger.com/zengage-countdown-day-nine-engage-action-8857/ http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/EmployeeEngagementResultsThatMatter/~3/cqC2FGHCoVk/ http://www.davidzinger.com/10-day-countdown-to-zengage-day-10-8832/#comments Tue, 31 Aug 2010 10:00:02 +0000 David Zinger http://www.davidzinger.com/?p=8832 Read Zengage

Advance Acclaim:

In Zengage, David Zinger has succeeded in communicating his vast knowledge and wisdom with the brevity of a Zen haiku and the heart of a humanist. This is a book that guides through wisdom and information while remaining totally engaging. ~ Judy Bardwick, Author of Danger in the Comfort Zone and One Foot Out of the Door.

Excerpt from Zengage (page 38)

Engage Connection

Stop Going Around in Circles.

Join the circle of self with the circle of work until the two become one.

Sample of the Book. If you would like to see a short sample of Zengage, click here.

Official Launch September 9. David Zinger’s book Zengage will be officially launched on September 9th.  You can get more information or purchase the book today by clicking here.

Your purchase results in 100% donation to Pakistan Flood Relief. Purchasing before September 9th will result in a significant contribution to Pakistan Flood Relief. 50% of the proceeds from the book will go to Pakistan Flood Relief and currently the Canadian government is matching individual donations so this will result in 100% of the proceeds being used for flood relief.

David Zinger, M.Ed., works with organizations and individuals to foster engagement.  He is a writer, educator, speaker, and consultant who founded the 2880 member Employee Engagement Network. David’s new book, Zengage: How to Get More Into Your Work to Get More Out of Your Work will be released September 9th.  David’s website offers 1100 free posts/articles on the engagement. David is committed to fostering a movement to increase employee engagement 20% by 2020.

Connect with David Zinger today to improve engagement where you work.

Email: dzinger@shaw.ca  -  Phone 204 254 2130  -  Website: www.davidzinger.com

]]> http://www.davidzinger.com/10-day-countdown-to-zengage-day-10-8832/feed/ 0 http://www.davidzinger.com/10-day-countdown-to-zengage-day-10-8832/ http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/EmployeeEngagementResultsThatMatter/~3/uBbtzgWjubs/ http://www.davidzinger.com/employee-engagement-and-getting-results-the-agile-way-9016/#comments Mon, 30 Aug 2010 12:46:45 +0000 David Zinger http://www.davidzinger.com/?p=9016 Focus on Agile Results to Enhance Employee Engagement

J. D Meier has crafted an insightful and practical book on Getting Results the Agile Way. He is  a principal program manager for the patterns & practices team at Microsoft and the author of the wonderful blog: Sources of Insight. I have always found his work thorough, thoughtful, and helpful. This book is certainly no exception and I encourage you to study and apply Getting Results the Agile Way to enhance your employee engagement and work results.

Here is a list of the books key chapters:

• Chapter 1 – Why Agile Results
• Chapter 2 – Agile Results Overview
• Chapter 3 – Values, Principles, and Practices
• Chapter 4 – Hot Spots
• Chapter 5 – Monday Vision, Daily Outcomes, and Friday Reflection
• Chapter 6 – Design Your Day
• Chapter 7 – Design Your Week
• Chapter 8 – Design Your Month
• Chapter 9 – Design Your Year
• Chapter 10 – Results Frame, Personas, and Pitfalls
• Chapter 11 – 25 Keys to Results
• Chapter 12 – 25 Strategies for Results
• Chapter 13 – Motivation
• Chapter 14 – Mindsets and Metaphors

3 Power. Overall the book offers stories, scenario-driven results, and timeboxing, to improve your productivity, master your time management, and achieve work-life balance. Readers are encouraged to apply the power of 3 for simplicity, structure, and success. We feel so overloaded that 3 stories for the day or 3 tasks for the year gives us great focus. I have always appreciated the use of 3 and have a 3 word theme each year. This year my 3 word theme is: Engage, Mobilize, and Produce.

Boundaries. J.D. encourages us to set boundaries on our work. Here is a sample snippet from an online version of the book:

Boundaries are simply minimums and maximums. Setting boundaries is a key to success. You’ll produce more effective results by spending the right time and energy on the right things. You can set boundaries with time; for example, tell yourself, “I’ll spend no more than an hour on that.” You can set boundaries in terms of energy; for example, tell yourself, “I’ll stop when I start to feel tired.” Most people trip up by not setting boundaries. They’ll work on something until they crash. They throw all their time in one area at the expense of other areas. Setting boundaries is how you can add balance to your life. You can spread your time and energy across the important Hot Spots.

I find setting boundaries a very helpful tool. It helps me get working on a task without it feeling overwhelming. For example, I set a boundary of 45 minutes to write and revise this review before I started and this eliminated any procrastination or dithering about this task.

Get Agile. Get Results. The key to achieving great results is learning and responding to change. Existing methods of planning and goal setting are heavy and static, and they just aren’t working anymore. Agile Results provides fresh starts for your work. I encourage you to start this September by applying the wisdom J. D. Meier offers in his book packed with practical strategies, tactics, and tools. I have read the book once and I plan to keep coming back to it over the next year to distill and practice getting results with great agility. I feel very confident that practicing Getting Results the Agile Way would be a huge step to enhancing employee engagement for anyone!

…..

David Zinger, M.Ed., works with organizations and individuals to foster engagement.  He is a writer, educator, speaker, and consultant who founded the 2880 member Employee Engagement Network. David’s new book, Zengage: How to Get More Into Your Work to Get More Out of Your Work will be released September 9th.  David’s website offers 1100 free posts/articles on the engagement. David is committed to fostering a movement to increase employee engagement 20% by 2020.

Connect with David Zinger today to improve engagement where you work.

Email: dzinger@shaw.ca  -  Phone 204 254 2130  -  Website: www.davidzinger.com

Tabling strategy.

Gel pens drawn

during fast food lunch

sparking napkin artistry.

Ink bleeds

arrows, words, and stick figures

into thin paper.

Absorbing both

strategic thinking

and mustard drips

oozing from the overflowing cheeseburger.

It is going to be a good year.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~

David Zinger, M.Ed., works with organizations and individuals to foster engagement.  He is a writer, educator, speaker, and consultant who founded the 2880 member Employee Engagement Network. David’s book, Zengage: How to Get More Into Your Work to Get More Out of Your Work will be released this September.  David’s website offers 1100 free posts/articles on the engagement. David is committed to fostering a movement to increase employee engagement 20% by 2020.

Connect with David Zinger today to improve engagement where you work.

Email: dzinger@shaw.ca  -  Phone 204 254 2130  -  Website: www.davidzinger.com

Kevin Ruck wrote a short and thoughtful piece on employee engagement as jargon. Here is a short section from his blog:

Two schools of thought are emerging in the academic world. One is focused on work engagement, or immersion in work through “vigor, dedication and absorption”. This has led to the development of the Utrecht Work Engagement Scale by academics Schaufeli and Bakker. Other academics, such as Macey and Schneider in the US point to wider, organisational identification factors.

Utrecht Scale and Organizational Identification. If you are not familiar with the Utrecht Work Engagement Scale or the work of Macey and Schneider on organizational identification factors I encourage you to read some of the excellent material freely available online about their approaches. I encourage you to read Kevin’s thoughtful and brief post and think about the meaning or meanings of employee engagement and the difficulties or validity of comparing engagement across different organizations using different measures. To read Kevin’s post, click here.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~

David Zinger, M.Ed., works with organizations and individuals to foster engagement.  He is a writer, educator, speaker, and consultant who founded the 2880 member Employee Engagement Network. David’s new book, Zengage: How to Get More Into Your Work to Get More Out of Your Work will be released September 9th.  David’s website offers 1100 free posts/articles on the engagement. David is committed to fostering a movement to increase employee engagement 20% by 2020.

Connect with David Zinger today to improve engagement where you work.

Email: dzinger@shaw.ca  -  Phone 204 254 2130  -  Website: www.davidzinger.com

David Zinger with Albert Bandura

Meeting Dr. Albert Bandura. It was my pleasure and honor to spend a bit of time with Dr. Albert Bandura, the most famous living psychologist,  in Salt Lake City at Reach 2010, and to attend his one hour presentation on his work. I was encourage by his knowledge and information, moved by his humility and engagement in the whole conference, and inspired by his keen insight and hard work at 85 years of age.  The conference was sponsored by Vital Smarts.

Self-Efficacy + Employee Engagement = Powerful Engagement for Results. Dr. Bandura said a number of things during his one hour presentation that I related to  employee engagement. I will summarize a few of his his statements in bold at the start of each paragraph then add an explanation of the connection to engagement.

Make change happen, lead an active inquisitive life, and increase the opportunity that fortuitous meetings present to us. We can’t plan everything. We need to be mindful of chance encounters and along with that develop the competencies and skills to take advantage of these chance encounters and life path changes.  Your work may be changed by a chance encounter but don’t leave your work to chance. Be prepared for changes and to act on those changes. I think sometimes we try to get people engaged and need as often to focus on the “let of engagement.”

Don’t front load imagined difficulties. If you are launching an employee engagement initiative don’t focus too much on the problems ahead or you will never move from dream to reality. Be realistic about the odds and optimistic about the means. Of course between belief and success there is a lot to do in between.  Personally, this was very encouraging for me with my WILD dream of a 20% global increase in employee engagement by the year 2020.

Leverage the 4 sources of self-efficacy. Don’t confuse self-esteem, having a good view of yourself with self-efficacy, your belief about your ability and capacity to accomplish a task or to deal with the challenges of life. I love the action embedded in self-efficacy and that employee engagement is not some sort of feel good thing. Self-efficacy is derived from mastery experiences, modelling, social persuasion, and stress resilience. Help employees to experience mastery of their work and then add challenges as mastery unfolds.  Leverage social persuasion by fusing faith in employees while simultaneously arranging situations for their success.  Highlight credible models of engagement. Help employees develop stamina while reducing anxiety and depression so they know they can do what is necessary to produce a certain outcome.

To move forward we need goals and feedback. We need goals and feedback. Distant goals can inspire the dream while close goals tells us what to do right now. With a sense of high efficacy and high discontent people will redouble their efforts. Ensure that you not only help employees set goals but ensure they keep getting feedback along the way.

Avoid the 4 ways of subverting healthy self-management. Don’t temporize by believing that you will have more time tomorrow. Avoid dawdling -  getting lost on trivial things such as constantly checking the email.  Don’t detour by doing other things first, seize the crucial moment and do what needs doing right then. Stop Excusing of finding reasons why you are not engaged.

May the efficacy force be with you. Learn to make the most of self-efficacy for your own engagement and to contribute to the employee engagement of all employees. To learn more read the Wikipedia entry on self-efficacy and to develop extensive knowledge of Bandura’s work visit the incredibly resource rich community of scholars site on self-efficacy from Emory University.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~

David Zinger, M.Ed., works with organizations and individuals to foster engagement.  He is a writer, educator, speaker, and consultant who founded the 2870 member Employee Engagement Network. David’s book, Zengage: How to Get More Into Your Work to Get More Out of Your Work will be released this September.  David’s website offers 1100 free posts/articles on the engagement. David is committed to fostering a movement to increase employee engagement 20% by 2020.

Connect with David Zinger today to improve engagement where you work.

Email: dzinger@shaw.ca  -  Phone 204 254 2130  -  Website: www.davidzinger.com

@hackmanagement: Work is better together – stop lacking and slacking.

Start hacking with backing by transforming me to we.

The Management Innovation eXchange is sponsoring a twitter hack work contest this week.  The tweet above was my initial attempt to create a pithy message to hack work. I wrote it and thought I better spread the message about this contest from me to we to ensure I practice what I preach/twitter/hack.

Here are the first two paragraphs from Polly outlining their Twitter challenge contest:

Take the Tweet a Hack challenge:

Help us “Take the Work out of Work” and win a $100 Amazon gift certificate!

Is your work as engaging, inspiring, and fulfilling as it could be? Do you (and the people you know) get enough meaning, freedom, energizing challenge, and fun from your job? Does your organization have a smart design for unleashing the best gifts of every individual inside it?

If you answered yes to any of those questions, we could use your help. If you answered no to any of the above, you’re not alone—and the good news is, we’ve designed a new contest to accelerate the process of making allorganizations as adaptable, innovative, and inspiring as the people who work inside them. It’s called Tweet a Hack, and It’s one of the quickest, easiest (not to mention rewarding) ways to participate on the MIX.

Click here to read the full post and then get busy tweeting your short hack to take the work out of work.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~

David Zinger, M.Ed., works with organizations and individuals to foster engagement.  He is a writer, educator, speaker, and consultant who founded the 2840 member Employee Engagement Network. David’s book, Zengage: How to Get More Into Your Work to Get More Out of Your Work will be released this September.  David’s website offers 1100 free posts/articles on the engagement. David is committed to fostering a movement to increase employee engagement 20% by 2020.

Connect with David Zinger today to improve engagement where you work.

Email: dzinger@shaw.ca  -  Phone 204 254 2130  -  Website: www.davidzinger.com

]]> http://www.davidzinger.com/employee-engagement-hack-work-for-100-8603/feed/ 0 http://www.davidzinger.com/employee-engagement-hack-work-for-100-8603/ http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/EmployeeEngagementResultsThatMatter/~3/yn2PCJ4z1Uc/ http://www.davidzinger.com/working-zingers-privacy-8527/#comments Sat, 21 Aug 2010 13:20:40 +0000 David Zinger http://www.davidzinger.com/?p=8527 Looking Out, Looking In

Scott

stuck

his head

into my cubicle

looking for something

that wasn’t there.

Our eyes met

but it was not

I he was looking for.

Sometimes I dream

my cubicle is zoned

inside an aquarium.

I’m about to be

schooled by grumpy guppies

when I notice Scott

peering through the glass.

I wake up

with a terrible need to pee.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~

David Zinger, M.Ed., works with organizations and individuals to foster engagement.  He is a writer, educator, speaker, and consultant who founded the 2840 member Employee Engagement Network. David’s book, Zengage: How to Get More Into Your Work to Get More Out of Your Work will be released this September.  David’s website offers 1100 free posts/articles on the engagement. David is committed to fostering a movement to increase employee engagement 20% by 2020.

Connect with David Zinger today to improve engagement where you work.

Email: dzinger@shaw.ca  -  Phone 204 254 2130  -  Website: www.davidzinger.com

~ ~ ~ ~ ~

David Zinger, M.Ed., works with organizations and individuals to foster engagement.  He is a writer, educator, speaker, and consultant who founded the 2840 member Employee Engagement Network. David’s book, Zengage: How to Get More Into Your Work to Get More Out of Your Work will be released this September.  David’s website offers 1100 free posts/articles on the engagement. David is committed to fostering a movement to increase employee engagement 20% by 2020.

Connect with David Zinger today to improve engagement where you work.

Email: dzinger@shaw.ca  -  Phone 204 254 2130  -  Website: www.davidzinger.com

1. HBR Tip: Stop bringing down the team. DON’T: be a hero, make abrupt decisions, or talk to much. http://bit.ly/90yuAu
2. Employee Engagement Resident Cartoonist @junson–>Very funny cartoon on “being seen in the workplace.”http://bit.ly/rKCXH
3. Living In Fear At Work Is No Way To Live Mark Hirschfeld. http://bit.ly/cnJn7Y
4. Employee Engagement. How to Increase the Success of Change. ~ Anil Saxena http://bit.ly/9kxink
5. Tim Wright on Employee Engagement: A real B.U.M. rap. http://bit.ly/9kxink
6. Employee Engagement: For Bottom Line Impact, Don’t Forget this Crucial Component. http://bit.ly/9pqKkD
7. New Employee Orientation: Engagement or Remorse? http://bit.ly/dugVYW
8. New post: Employee Engagement Is Not A “Target”http://bit.ly/cNfkwo
9. Employee Engagement: Help employees see outcomes the organization is working to achieve and their contribution. http://bit.ly/bOgOfJ
10. Managers who think of employee engagement as a goal rather than a way of working have it all wrong, Dov Seidman http://bit.ly/cH0QO7
11. Engagement Surveys Are Like Home Improvement Projects. http://bit.ly/aFwg8L
12. Engagement Vital but Managers Not Trained http://bit.ly/bTfcmJabout
13. What percentage of companies care about employee engagement? http://bit.ly/bNRVTR
14. Employee Engagement 2008: 34% engaged 29% almost engaged 13% disengaged. ~ HR Anexi Indiahttp://bit.ly/a7Pwca
15. Economic Journal revealed unemployment might be only major life event people do not fully recover within 5 years.http://bit.ly/99rbzU
16. Employee engagement unwritten social contract begins in relationship between a manager and employees.http://bit.ly/9UqOtu
17. “Do your job and keep your mouth shut!” Employee engagement 1970s-style http://j.mp/9PoImf
18. Albert Bandura at REACH 2010 -> “May the efficacy force be with you.”
19. Read the free 95 page Employee Engagement Top 10 Book. No sign in or bait and hook. Great information http://bit.ly/dhtBSN

~ ~ ~ ~ ~

David Zinger, M.Ed., works with organizations and individuals to foster engagement.  He is a writer, educator, speaker, and consultant who founded the 2840 member Employee Engagement Network. David’s book, Zengage: How to Get More Into Your Work to Get More Out of Your Work will be released this September.  David’s website offers 1100 free posts/articles on the engagement. David is committed to fostering a movement to increase employee engagement 20% by 2020.

Connect with David Zinger today to improve engagement where you work.

Email: dzinger@shaw.ca  -  Phone 204 254 2130  -  Website: www.davidzinger.com

A vacation is what you take when you can no longer take what you’ve been taking. ~ Earl Wilson

A vacation is over when you begin to yearn for your work. ~ Morris Fishbein

We can get so stuck on being connected and online that we fail to disengage. There will be no posts at David Zinger Employee Engagement for the next week to 10 days. I plan to have a pleasant and refreshing vacation. I will be back online later in August.

Watch for many exciting new developments in September.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~

David Zinger, M.Ed., works with organizations and individuals foster engagement.  He is a writer, educator, speaker, and consultant who founded the 2800 member Employee Engagement Network. David’s website offers you  1100 free posts/articles on the engagement. David is committed to fostering a movement to increase employee engagement 20% by 2020.

Connect with David Zinger today to improve engagement where you work.

Email: dzinger@shaw.ca  -  Phone 204 254 2130  -  Website: www.davidzinger.com

Author’s engaged inspiration. It was great to hear the authors from Vital Smarts speak. David Maxfield, Ron McMillan, Joseph Grenny, Kerry Patterson, and Al Switzler are bright, articulate, funny, inspired, and focused. What was more amazing was their fully engaged participation. They did not make an appearance, they ENGAGED! A model for any leader who wants to foster engagement from people they lead.

Research. Vital Smarts leverages research for design, delivery, and results. I appreciate their deliberate and careful orientation towards claims blended with action by starting with pathfinder projects.

Albert Bandura. It was a pleasure to meet Dr. Bandura and to see the respect and appreciation Vital Smarts expresses for his terrific contributions to the science of influence and changing behavior. Dr. Bandura demonstrates a fully engaged yet humble presence that is inspiring at 85 years of age. As he said about work, it is not how long you have worked it is how much tread is left on the tire. He claims he still has a lot of tread and it shows. Dr. Bandura is a fantastic model of engagement at 85 years of age and he leads me to believe I have at least 30 more good years of work left.

Fantastic participants. Most people at the conference teach 1 or more of the Vital Smarts 3 courses. The participants are so engaged and helpful. Conversations and help between participants pervaded the day.

Content learning. Yes, I did learn content. My style of learning involves a few days of mulling it over to see what will take hold and help me to help others get fuller levels of employee engagement.

On to day 2 tomorrow!

~ ~ ~ ~ ~

David Zinger, M.Ed., works with organizations and individuals foster engagement.  He is a writer, educator, speaker, and consultant who founded the 2800 member Employee Engagement Network. David’s website offers you  1100 free posts/articles on the engagement. David is committed to fostering a movement to increase employee engagement 20% by 2020.

Connect with David Zinger today to improve engagement where you work.

Email: dzinger@shaw.ca  -  Phone 204 254 2130  -  Website: www.davidzinger.com

Slide overview. Here is an overview of my slides for Thursday’s presentation  on fostering employee engagement through the use of Crucial Conversations, Crucial Confrontations, and The Influencer at the Vital Smarts Reach Conference 2010. After the presentation I will write a bit more explanation for some of the key slides.

Click here if the presentation fails to load in this window.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~

David Zinger, M.Ed., works with organizations and individuals foster engagement.  He is a writer, educator, speaker, and consultant who founded the 2800 member Employee Engagement Network. David’s website offers you  1100 free posts/articles on the engagement. David is committed to fostering a movement to increase employee engagement 20% by 2020.

Connect with David Zinger today to improve engagement where you work.

Email: dzinger@shaw.ca  -  Phone 204 254 2130  -  Website: www.davidzinger.com

Salt Lake City August 4 and 5th. I am attending (and presenting) at the Vital Smarts Reach 2010 Conference on Wednesday and Thursday in Salt Lake City. The primary purpose of the conference is to focus on learning and the key concepts from Vital Smarts powerful set of courses: Crucial Conversations, Crucial Confrontations, and the Influencer.  I facilitate all 3 courses and look forward to what I will learn to improve my facilitation and enhance my participants’ learning and results.

Employee Engagement. I believe these 3 courses are powerful tools in employee engagement and my focus will be on applying what I learn to enhancing your approaches to employee engagement. I will write short blog posts and I will also twitter anecdotes and learning nuggets from the conference.

New Conference Tool. I recently purchased a used ipad (yes, people are already selling them used). I have downloaded a number of excellent PDF’s on employee engagement to read on my flights and I plan to use the tool during the conference for occasional notes and twitter updates. I have heard mixed reviews about this device but I believe I will personally find it invaluable. I have found great value in the following apps (applications): FeeddlerRSS, GoodReader, iAnnotatePDF, Evernote, Flipboard, TweetDeck, Keynote, and iBooks. If you have a favorite application for the ipad, let me know.

Learning from Dr. Albert Bandura. My background is in counselling psychology and I taught Educational Psychology at the University of Manitoba for about 25 years. I have always been impressed by the research and thinking of Dr. Albert Bandura and his work on self-efficacy. Dr. Bandura will be at the conference and this will be a personal highlight for me. I remember reading his article on The Psychology of Chance Encounters and Life Paths back in 1982 and having it influence my viewpoint on career counselling.

Future Steps.

• Read future blog posts.
• Next post: A preview of my session on Extend Your REACH into Employee Engagement.
• Follow travel and conference snippets on Twitter: https://twitter.com/davidzinger
• Follow the Twitter hashtag for the conference #RCH10.
• Learn more about Bandura’s ideas on self-efficacy at this comprehensive site.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~

David Zinger, M.Ed., works with organizations and individuals foster engagement.  He is a writer, educator, speaker, and consultant who founded the 2750 member Employee Engagement Network. David’s website offers you  1100 free posts/articles on the engagement. David is committed to fostering a movement to increase employee engagement 20% by 2020.

Connect with David Zinger today to improve engagement where you work.

Email: dzinger@shaw.ca  -  Phone 204 254 2130  -  Website: www.davidzinger.com

Employee engagement is seeing a stronger focus on well-being in 2010. Happiness is a part of our well-being. I encourage you to watch this video and take steps to enhance your happiness.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~

David Zinger, M.Ed., is an employee engagement writer, educator, speaker, coach, and consultant. He offers exceptional contributions on employee engagement for leaders, managers, and employees. David founded and moderates the 2270 member Employee Engagement Network. His website offers 1000 posts/articles relating to employee engagement and strength based leadership. David is involved in the application of Enterprise 2.0 approaches to engagement and the precursor, creating engaging approaches to communication, collaboration, and community within Enterprise 2.0.

Book David for education, speaking, and coaching on engagement today for 2010.

Email: dzinger@shaw.ca  Phone 204 254 2130  Website: www.davidzinger.com

The return of The One Ball. This post marks the return of the One Ball Theme to this site. The One Ball posts offered guidance in elevating and achieving fully engaged performance. You can read the first post in the series from January 2009: The One Ball: Engaged Performance.

The Red Dot. Did  you watch any of the 2010 British Open and the fantastic performance by South Africa’s Louis Oosthuizen? Louis attributed part of his marvelous golf and focused success to having a red dot placed on his golf glove. This was at the urging of his sports psychology coach Karl Morris. Oosthuizen placed a red dot on his golf glove to reminded himself, whenever his mind wandered, to focus on the task. Since the dot was visible as soon as he took his grip for a shot he was able to use it as a trigger to block all distractions and concentrate on one shot at a time. It was a marvelous performance and made even more marvelous by this fourth place finish the following week in the Scandinavian Masters Tournament. It can be a challenge to focus after a big win and all the demands placed on your time and attention after winning one of golf’s major championships.

Concentrate on the task at hand and switch off. Here are some statement from Karl Morris about the red dot mechanism:  “Louis was concerned about his concentration so we sat down together and talked about it,” said Warrington-based Morris. “We decided the red dot was going to be his trigger point to switch him into a zen-like state. Before every shot at St Andrews he looked down at it. Your mind can wander off and think about a six-shot lead but focusing on something helps bring you back to the present.”  Oosthuizen stated: “I’d always wander off badly and struggle to get back into the moment, just looking down at it and remembering what we were saying helped me quite a lot. I took my time, focused on the shot and did it beautifully.”

Are you seeing red? What triggers or cues do you use at work or in performance to focus and be fully engaged in what you are doing while you are doing it.

• There is no magic to a red dot. I encourage you to find your own cue that helps you bring full attention to the task at hand and of course you could always start with the red dot and see if it works for you.
• Draw a red dot on a sticky note and place it where you can see it when you are about to engage in an activity that demands your focused concentration and full engagement.
• Use your red dot as a cue before a presentation to do your best. It could be on your laptop during a sales presentation or your first slide could be a red dot to help the audience also focus.
• Place a red dot on a file or folder that you struggle to stay focused and not have your mind wander.
• Of course, if you are a golfer you can grab a red marker and put it on your glove. I won’t guarantee you will win the British Open after doing this but you might find yourself more focused on each shot and enjoying the game more.
• You could also use being stopped by a red light (a slightly bigger red dot) to regain your focus and attention.
• Engage the power of red to help you get ahead!

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David Zinger, M.Ed., works with organizations and individuals foster engagement.  He is a writer, educator, speaker, and consultant who founded the 2750 member Employee Engagement Network. David’s website offers you  1100 free posts/articles on the engagement. David is committed to fostering a movement to increase employee engagement 20% by 2020.

Connect with David Zinger today to improve engagement where you work.

Email: dzinger@shaw.ca  -  Phone 204 254 2130  -  Website: www.davidzinger.com

Are you taking the right steps to finding your Mojo at work? Marshall Goldsmith defined Mojo as “that positive spirit toward what we are doing now that starts from the inside and radiates to the outside.”  I just finished rereading Marshall Goldsmith’s book Mojo.  Click here to read my previous review.

Dance a Daily MOJO 2-Step Assessment:

Step 1: Track Your Tasks.

Record your activities for a day.

Step 2: Analyze your Tasks

How much long term benefit or meaning did I experience form each task?

How much short term satisfaction or happiness did I experience from each task?

Meaning and happiness. If you don’t score high on meaning and happiness it is time to enhance your mojo.

MOJO Meter App & Beyond the 2 Step. If you want to learn more read MOJO: How to get it, how to keepit, how to get it back if you lose it. To get more detailed analysis or tools including a MOJO meter app visit www.mojothebook.com.

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David Zinger, M.Ed., works with global organizations and individuals to foster engagement.  David  is a writer, educator, speaker, and consultant. He founded the 2751 member Employee Engagement Network. David’s website offers you  1100 free posts on the engagement. David is committed to fostering a movement to increase employee engagement 20% by 2020!

Connect with David Zinger today to improve engagement where you work.

Email: dzinger@shaw.ca  -  Phone 204 254 2130  -  Website: www.davidzinger.com

]]> http://www.davidzinger.com/employee-engagement-2-steps-to-craft-your-mojo-at-work-8312/feed/ 0 http://www.davidzinger.com/employee-engagement-2-steps-to-craft-your-mojo-at-work-8312/ http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/EmployeeEngagementResultsThatMatter/~3/lR9bvmtKm4w/ http://www.davidzinger.com/employee-morale-and-driving-performance-8264/#comments Mon, 26 Jul 2010 09:47:17 +0000 David Zinger http://www.davidzinger.com/?p=8264 Employee Morale: Driving Performance in Challenging Times by David Bowles and Cary Cooper.

David and Cary created a well-written and well thought out book on employee morale and the links between morale and performance. The biggest benefit of morale is individual and organizational performance and the authors present the evidence for “morale correlating highly with, and driving, performance is strong and growing” (p.59). Morale can empower of disable the organization’s ability to achieve its goals.

A question (questions) of morale. Here is a thoughtful section that began Chapter 2:

Its Monday morning in Beijing, London or Sydney; do you really know how your employees there are doing?

And then:

• How do you know?
• From whom did you learn it?
• Do those from whom you learned it represent the whole organization?
• When did you least find out?
• Could there have been a shift since then?
• Are you SURE that what you know is true?
• What are the consequences if what you think is true, is not?

Management upgrade. The most practical chapter was chapter 5 on creating/maintaining the high morale organization.  We can manage morale and the strongest effect on morale is a “management upgrade.” The authors offer a number of perspective and suggestions around strengthening morale through strengthening management.

I recommend the book and it would make a great textbook for a university course or Morale and Organizational Behavior.

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David Zinger, M.Ed., works with organizations and individuals foster engagement.  He is a writer, educator, speaker, and consultant who founded the 2700 member Employee Engagement Network. David’s website offers you  1100 free posts/articles on the engagement. David is committed to fostering a movement to increase employee engagement 20% by 2020.

Connect with David Zinger today to improve engagement where you work.

Email: dzinger@shaw.ca  -  Phone 204 254 2130  -  Website: www.davidzinger.com

Here is David Clarke’s well-designed short slide share presentation on motivation and engagement using Dan Pink’s drive perspective.

Enjoy and engage.

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David Zinger, M.Ed., works with global organizations and individuals to foster engagement.  David  is a writer, educator, speaker, and consultant. He founded the 2751 member Employee Engagement Network. David’s website offers you  1100 free posts on the engagement. David is committed to fostering a movement to increase employee engagement 20% by 2020!

Connect with David Zinger today to improve engagement where you work.

Email: dzinger@shaw.ca  -  Phone 204 254 2130  -  Website: www.davidzinger.com