Digital transformation is workforce transformation: Why HR must assume a leadership role
Digital transformation fails without workforce transformation. HR must lead change management efforts, addressing employee concerns and engagement while helping organizations navigate complex process redesigns and skill requirements. Success depends on clear communication and understanding the emotional impact of change on employees.
How EI makes your board more effective and benefits the whole organisation
Emotional Intelligence (EI) in leadership teams naturally fosters diversity and collaboration more effectively than quotas alone. By developing EI skills—such as self-awareness, emotional resilience, and conflict management—senior leaders create a culture of openness that enhances board effectiveness and organisational performance.
When culture kills the killer app
Organizational culture is a strategic operating principle that technology-driven companies often overlook. Uber’s high-profile cultural failures—from leadership misconduct to harassment allegations—demonstrate how weak culture can undermine even the most innovative business models, requiring companies to align leadership behavior with strategic values.
Book review: The Collaborative Leader by Ian McDermott & L. Michael Hall
The Collaborative Leader by Ian McDermott and L. Michael Hall explores how leaders can shift from command-and-control management to collaborative leadership. Reviewer Jasmine Gartner rates it 3 out of 5, finding it most valuable for traditional leaders unfamiliar with collaborative approaches, though potentially over-simplified for experienced professionals.
Book review: Leading With Vision by Bonnie Hagemann & John Maketa
Leading With Vision by Bonnie Hagemann and John Maketa explores how organizations can drive employee engagement through a compelling vision. The book argues that when employees share a clear mental picture of organizational success, they naturally align their actions to achieve it. A practical guide for senior HR directors and business leaders seeking to strengthen workforce alignment.
“In my view, organisations change through tiny adjustments in local climates.”
Organizational change happens through small-scale shifts in local team climates rather than wholesale cultural overhauls, according to NHS leadership development expert Mark Cole. By investing in managers with supportive leadership styles and nurturing micro-changes across teams, organizations can build bottom-up cultural transformation. Active listening emerges as the critical skill for effective mediation and workplace leadership.
Are we setting our leaders up to fail?
Traditional top-down leadership cultures place unrealistic expectations on leaders to know everything and perform flawlessly, setting them up for costly mistakes. HR can support leaders by fostering a culture that values authenticity, accepts failure as a learning opportunity, and provides development support rather than blame.
How to harness the power of critical thinking
Learn how HR leaders can unlock critical thinking and drive innovation across your organization by tapping into employee insights and creating focused frameworks for collaborative problem-solving.
“I’m looking forward to helping empower people across North’s business to reach their full potential.”
Dawn Robinson, newly appointed Global Director of People at North P&I Club, is leading a comprehensive leadership and development programme called “Navigating North” to equip employees with skills to become effective leaders. The initiative, delivered with partner Roffey Park, combines core values training, 360-degree feedback, and practical tools across multiple cohorts of senior and mid-level leaders.
Get ready for the ‘Day After Tomorrow’!
Peter Hinssen, Chairman of Nexxworks, argues that organizations must overcome their fear of radical ideas and risk to prepare for future innovation. He advocates balancing 70% focus on today’s business with 10% investment in revolutionary ‘Day After Tomorrow’ thinking. Successful companies will be agile, customer-focused, and willing to experiment.
Promoting a thinking environment creates inclusion
Creating an inclusive work environment requires addressing behaviors like interrupting, mansplaining, and idea-taking that silence women’s voices in meetings. Research shows these exclusionary practices damage problem-solving quality and undermine confidence, making it essential for organizations to foster thinking environments where all colleagues contribute equally.
Even feminists show bias against female leaders
Research reveals that unconscious gender bias affects everyone, including feminists and women themselves. These automatic mental shortcuts cause us to associate certain roles with specific genders—such as assuming doctors are male or nannies are female—even when reality contradicts these stereotypes. Understanding how our brain’s reward system reinforces biased beliefs is key to overcoming these deeply ingrained patterns.
Menopause is not a women’s issue, at work or anywhere else
Menopause transition significantly impacts working women’s economic participation and workplace experiences, according to recent UK government research. The study reviewed over 100 publications to examine how menopause symptoms affect employment and identifies gaps in support for affected workers across different occupations.
Attachment in the workplace: do you understand how it works?
Attachment Theory, developed by psychiatrist John Bowlby, explains how early relationships with primary caregivers shape our ability to form connections, manage stress, and feel secure. Understanding attachment patterns is essential for effective leadership and workplace relationships.
The 7 best leaders of the 21st century- and what you can learn from them
Discover seven leadership lessons from influential 21st century leaders including Warren Buffett, Barack Obama, Bill Marriott, Shirin Ebadi, Queen Elizabeth II, Richard Branson, and Sheryl Sandberg. Learn key insights on handling mistakes, compromise, people skills, equality, change, autonomy, and adversity.
Leaders must avoid bad thinking leading to bad leadership
Leaders who rely on narrow perspectives—focusing only on metrics or ignoring human needs—risk catastrophic failures, as seen at Volkswagen and Wells Fargo. Understanding multiple leadership frameworks, including rational, people, political, and symbolic perspectives, is essential to avoid the blind spots that lead to organizational scandals and collapse.
“Organisations focus too much on performance being purely on what is in people’s goals.”
Organizations often overemphasize performance metrics tied to individual goals, overlooking the importance of developing people holistically. Effective leaders should understand how employees want to be led, provide autonomy and timely feedback, and recognize each person’s potential as a developing leader rather than focusing solely on task completion.
How to get on the HR speaking circuit
Build your HR speaking career by establishing expert credentials, crafting compelling speeches that make audiences think, and demonstrating deep knowledge of your subject through workplace success and professional content.
Leaders must stay human in a digitizing world
As automation and AI reshape the workplace, leaders must focus on developing uniquely human qualities like empathy, creativity, and judgment—skills that cannot be coded. Personal flourishing, rooted in positive psychology principles, becomes the foundation for building successful performance cultures where employees bring their best selves to work daily.
How to adopt the mindset of a great leader
Leadership is a learnable skill, not an inborn trait. Through understanding brain plasticity and consciously adopting new behaviors, anyone can develop the mindset of a great leader regardless of their starting point or past experiences.
