Keeping Remote Teams Engaged

IDEAS shared have the power to expand perspectives, change thinking, and move lives. Here are two ideas for the curious mind to engage with: I. Rich Diviney on the notion of peak performance: “Repetitive peak performance is unrealistic because performance is often conditional. It typically requires a predictable and familiar environment. Repetitive peak performance is unrealistic because uncertainty is life’s foundational state. True success in life and business hinges instead on optimal performance, which means delivering your “best” in the moment, whatever your best looks like in that moment. However, sometimes your best is about persevering, moving forward step-by-…

THE WINTER months are the perfect time for a little binge-reading. While I can’t promise that any of the titles suggested are cozy reads, they will get you fired up. Personally, I would start with Productive Failure and Mindshift. Like The Illusion of Innovation by Elliott Parker, they will get you thinking in new ways and set you up for the others. Use this list to create your own winter reading plan. Here are ten suggestions to begin the new year intentionally. On Leadership: Lessons for the 21st Century by Tony Blair - (September 2024) The leadership manual Tony Blair wishes he had when he became prime minister, with personal insights and global examples that s…

IN The Next RenAIssance: AI and the Expansion of Human Potential, AI expert Zack Kass believes “properly harnessed, AI could democratize education, revolutionize healthcare, and accelerate innovation,” but “for Al to truly serve humanity, we will be forced to solve radical new ethical dilemmas, unprecedented economic disruptions, daunting technical challenges, environmental collapse, dehumanization, the loss of identity, and above all, terrifying uncertainty.” Yet because AI is not a tangible tech – something we can see – we are naturally suspicious. How does it work? Kass writes that AI systems must begin to “show their work” rather than just spitting out an answer if t…

LEADERSHIP clarity rarely comes from comfort. More often, it’s found in moments of disruption, when certainty disappears and only what truly matters remains. For more than four decades, I’ve helped leaders learn through experience rather than theory. Across more than 50 countries, I’ve designed leadership development programs built around challenges: ropes courses, night orienteering, search-and-rescue scenarios, scuba expeditions, and even dogsledding in remote environments. The approach draws heavily from the experiential leadership model used by Outward Bound, where I served as both an instructor and board trustee. The premise is simple: place people in unfamiliar si…

TONY BLAIR wrote a book about leadership in government. However, his practical ideas on leading in the 21st century apply across the board. Leadership, both good and bad, leaves clues for us to study how other leaders have handled problems and challenges common in all leadership situations. On Leadership does just that. It is the unwise leader who thinks they know everything. Learning from others’ mistakes and successes is the best way to guard against leadership hubris. Below are a selection of Blair’s thoughts on leadership. Leaders have the courage not to go with the flow. They speak up when others stay silent. They act when others hesitate. They take the risk, not…

ORGANIZATIONAL teams determine overall performance, shape culture, drive growth, and deliver results — or not. Today’s teams face a new reality. Never before have they encountered the changes and challenges brought on them by remote, hybrid, and in-person work environments. Add in the emergence of AI and countless other workforce and societal trends, and it’s apparent that yesterday’s approaches no longer apply to today’s realities. This time of disruption demands that organizational leaders take an honest look at their teams and how they function and then apply accurate data to inform new ideas, explore strategies, and pursue professional development to position themsel…

ORGANIZATIONAL teams determine overall performance, shape culture, drive growth, and deliver results — or not. Today’s teams face a new reality. Never before have they encountered the changes and challenges brought on them by remote, hybrid, and in-person work environments. Add in the emergence of AI and countless other workforce and societal trends, and it’s apparent that yesterday’s approaches no longer apply to today’s realities. This time of disruption demands that organizational leaders take an honest look at their teams and how they function and then apply accurate data to inform new ideas, explore strategies, and pursue professional development to position themsel…

HOW do successful people think? The key to doing well is thinking well. It’s a way of being in the world. Becoming great means making the hard choices necessary to get you there. Performance coach Doug Hirschhorn advances eight principles in 8 Ways to Great that direct the decisions of top performers. Principle #1: Find Your “Why?” How questions bring up negative thoughts and inadequacies. “The reason most people go through life with big dreams but fail to achieve them is because they ask themselves ‘how’ before they know their ‘why.’” The why question energizes and motivates, “Knowing your ‘why’ is what’s going to get you to figure out how.” Ask yourself, “Why have I…

In a market where clients are under pressure to do more with less, they won’t gamble on generalists. The firms and advisors who thrive are those who carve out a niche and lead it. HEADLINES expressing how AI is reshaping knowledge work are everywhere. From legal research to tax prep, technology is automating the rote tasks that used to justify armies of junior staff. Clients are noticing. A 2025 Bloomberg survey of corporate general councils found that 61 percent expect to experiment with AI-powered tools this year, and more than half say they’re scrutinizing external providers to ensure “specialized value” that machines can’t replace. This is the crux for professional e…

EMPOWERMENT has turned into a buzzword that’s lost its meaning. We all know what being powerful—or, euphemistically, influential—looks like. But to be empowering—how clear is that? Worse than unclear, empowering is widely misunderstood. For forceful leaders, it’s seen as giving power away; giving power to your staff means giving up your power. It’s easy for forceful leaders to feel that granting power to others takes away from their own power or that they are somehow rendered “passive,” as one forceful leader put it. Power is simply a means to the end of getting things done. It shouldn’t matter whether it’s your power or “Other” power. You can grind grain into flour by …

HISTORICALLY, women have faced significant hurdles in employment negotiations. Here’s what we know about these barriers, plus strategies leaders can use to improve fairness in the workplace. The Barriers that Women Face In 2006, Carnegie Mellon University professor Linda Babcock and her colleagues published research showing that women tend to initiate negotiations, particularly salary negotiations, significantly less often than men do. The findings appeared to at least partially explain the enduring pay gap between men and women, which has remained frustratingly stable from 2002 to 2023. In a 2007 study, Harvard Kennedy School professor Hannah Riley Bowles, Babcock, a…

A team approach to problem-solving, informed by the process of design thinking, can be optimally effective in triggering inspiration, leading to fresh ideas that are highly responsive to stakeholders. Indeed, collaboration can be a force multiplier in an effort to reach an intended objective. However, what seems to be missing is how team members can perform successfully and work as a collaborative entity for the good of the project. Collaborative design thinking suggests a customized framework for team members and stakeholders to work together so that the process is unique and relevant for a particular challenge and the individuals involved. A project leader can adjust t…

THE challenges organizations face today are becoming increasingly complex, interconnected, and unpredictable. Yet, as we examine these challenges more closely, a striking realization emerges: most are rooted in connection issues. Network science heralded as the science of the 21st century, provides a groundbreaking framework for understanding connections. It uncovers profound insights into the structural and functional challenges organizations encounter, offering a transformative lens for leadership in this era of complexity. To thrive, leaders must embrace a new paradigm that prioritizes the power of connections. Let’s explore two critical domains where connections ar…

THE groundwork for the modern cult of authenticity was laid in our era by philosophers like Rousseau and others of his mindset who followed him. Their idea that any constraints laid on us or attempts to conform us by society make us inauthentic. But the fact is, we find out who we are in relation to other people and the communities in which we interact. Our uninhibited self is rarely our best self. In Don’t Be Yourself: Why Authenticity Is Overrated (and What to Do Instead) published by Harvard Business Review Press, author Tomas Chamorro-Premuzic asks, “What if chasing authenticity was an actual trap—one that oversimplifies human complexity, disregards the necessity of …

NIDO QUBEIN began serving as Highpoint University’s president in 2005. As he toured the school in January of that year, it was not a school that he would even send his own children to. He was about to change that. He has led the university through an extraordinary transformation during his two decades and counting in office, including: Undergraduate and graduate enrollment has increased from 1,500 in 2005 to a record 6,335 students last fall, with the addition of 12 academic schools. This has been supported with a jump in the number of faculty members from 108 to more than 500. The Campus itself has also grown significantly with the construction of 128 new or renovated …

HERE'S A LOOK at some of the best leadership books to be released in April 2025 curated just for you. Be sure to check out the other great titles being offered this month. The Psychology of Leadership: Timeless principles to perfect your leadership of individuals, teams… and yourself! by Sébastien Page The Psychology of Leadership offers a fresh take on leadership through the lens of groundbreaking research in positive, sports, and personality psychology. Leaders will develop what feels like mind-reading abilities for interpreting workplace personalities, hidden motivations, and group dynamics. They will learn how to inspire their organization to move mountains, improv…

HERE'S A LOOK at some of the best leadership books to be released in August 2025 curated just for you. Be sure to check out the other great titles being offered this month. Scaling Innovation: How Smart Companies Architect Profitable Growth by Madhavan Ramanujam and Eddie Hartman The brutal truth: most startups and scale-ups don't fail because of bad products. They fail because they never figure out how to grow fast―and profitably. Some chase market share at all costs, burning cash on customers who won't pay enough to sustain the business. Others over-monetize too soon, pushing away the customers they need to reach scale. Still others obsess over customer loyalty, miss…

HERE'S A LOOK at some of the best leadership books to be released in December 2025 curated just for you. Be sure to check out the other great titles being offered this month. The Seismic Shift in You: The Seven Necessary Shifts to Create Connection and Drive Results by Michelle Johnston and Marshall Goldsmith In a world more connected than ever, why are we all feeling so disconnected? Leadership expert Dr. Michelle K. Johnston reveals the hidden crisis plaguing modern workplaces: an epidemic of disconnection that’s eroding team performance, personal satisfaction, and organizational success. The Seismic Shift in You offers a transformative approach to leadership that st…

HERE'S A LOOK at some of the best leadership books to be released in February 2025 curated just for you. Be sure to check out the other great titles being offered this month. Rethinking Work: Seismic Changes in the Where, When, and Why by Rishad Tobaccowala We have a choice. We can either be reactive and struggle to adjust to transformational events on the fly, or we can be proactive and control the narrative—reinventing work to align with the evolving environment. Futurist Rishad Tobaccowala has had a highly successful career because he has anticipated and capitalized on emerging trends. In Rethinking Work, Rishad outlines the reasons why being proactive in this era o…

HERE'S A LOOK at some of the best leadership books to be released in February 2026 curated just for you. Be sure to check out the other great titles being offered this month. Your Best Meeting Ever: 7 Principles for Designing Meetings That Get Things Done by Rebecca Hinds Meetings are broken. They are relics from a bygone era of top-down hierarchies and factory-like procedures—designed to issue orders, flaunt power, and keep the hierarchy intact. In today’s digital, collaborate-or-bust era, this model isn’t just inefficient, it actively harms employees and organizations. Drawing on decades of research and stories from leading companies like Google, Salesforce, Pixar, Y…

HERE'S A LOOK at some of the best leadership books to be released in January 2025 curated just for you. Be sure to check out the other great titles being offered this month. Mindmasters: The Data-Driven Science of Predicting and Changing Human Behavior by Sandra Matz There are more pieces of digital data than there are stars in the universe. This data helps us monitor our planet, decipher our genetic code, and take a deep dive into our psychology. As algorithms become increasingly adept at accessing the human mind, they also become more and more powerful at controlling it, enticing us to buy a certain product or vote for a certain political candidate. Some of us say t…

HERE'S A LOOK at some of the best leadership books to be released in Janaury 2026 curated just for you. Be sure to check out the other great titles being offered this month. Intentional: How to Finish What You Start by Chris Bailey Setting goals is easy. Following through on them? A whole lot harder. It turns out, the secret to finishing what you start isn’t sheer willpower or the latest productivity hack. It’s becoming more intentional. With Intentional, bestselling author Chris Bailey distills a decade of deep research on productivity to deliver a profound, practical, and counterintuitive road map to getting things done. Forget extensive to-do lists and a never-endin…

HERE'S A LOOK at some of the best leadership books to be released in June 2025 curated just for you. Be sure to check out the other great titles being offered this month. The Systems Leader: Mastering the Cross-Pressures That Make or Break Today's Companies by Robert E. Siegel A groundbreaking blueprint for mastering “cross-pressures” in a rapidly changing world, teaching leaders to execute and innovate, think locally and globally, and project ambition and statesmanship alike—from a Stanford Business School lecturer and consultant to some of the biggest and most innovative CEOs. Part of the problem is that these challenges, while acutely felt, are rarely articulated in…

HERE'S A LOOK at some of the best leadership books to be released in March 2025 curated just for you. Be sure to check out the other great titles being offered this month. You're the Boss: Become the Manager You Want to Be (and Others Need) by Sabina Nawaz as our job expands, the added pressure to perform corrupts our actions, and our increased power will blind us to the impact of those actions. Even the most well-intentioned manager can quickly become the boss nobody wants to work for. You’re the Boss is your executive coach in book form. It offers a fresh, evidence-based framework for managing pressure and power with grace and intelligence. Nawaz’s potent, proven str…

HERE'S A LOOK at some of the best leadership books to be released in March 2026 curated just for you. Be sure to check out the other great titles being offered this month. Genius at Scale: How Great Leaders Drive Innovation by Linda A. Hill, Emily Tedards and Jason Wild Innovation doesn't just happen. You need to lead it. Discover the three critical roles leaders must play in driving—and scaling—innovation. Constant tech disruption. Unrelenting economic volatility. Radically shifting demographics and work norms. More than ever, we need to innovate amid these daunting global challenges. But do we have the leadership it takes to make this innovation happen successfully? …