Have you ever heard of a man named Vic Cianca ? If the name doesn’t ring a bell, don’t worry: he’s one of the many unsung heroes of the world who make their communities just a little bit better by virtue of being themselves. Vic Cianca was a traffic cop in Pittsburgh who was beloved for his, shall we say, unique ways of directing traffic every day on the job. Rather than just standing there, pointing the way with his arms, he truly made the job his own–from pretending to fall asleep when distracted drivers failed to move, to pleading with traffic to keep going, to even using legs and other limbs to direct cars, Cianca turned this one intersection into his own Jester’s Court every day he worked. He even gained some notoriety for his antics: not only did everyone in the city love him, but his passion and humor even made it into the hit 1980’s movie Flashdance , where he served as inspiration for Jennifer Beals ’ would-be dancer. Sadly, Vic Cianca passed away in 2010 at the age of 9...

  This is how leaders  get employees to like or love each other and their work:  When employees like their colleagues, they also like their work. Some people (2 out of 3) hate going to work. This is because they don't like all their colleagues or don't like their boss. The manager can do something about that. But at first glance, it doesn't sound easy to get people to like each other, have fun together, enjoy each other's company. But what if the manager could create a community where everyone likes each other? The solution is here: The manager can use FISH! which is the simplest and cheapest tool on the market. FISH! consists of films, books, posters, booklets, fish, exercises and plans to create a community with good relationships - and good help to get started and keep it going. Any manager can do it themselves - without involving external consultants in the task. First a little background. Pike Place Fish in Seattle created their community in the now world-famo...

Hooray - that's what friends are for FISH! creates friendship The four practices can help any individual and any team to become ‘friends’. Well, ‘friends at work’ at least. The four practices are BE THERE , PLAY , CHOOSE YOUR ATTITUDE and MAKE THEIR DAY . These fabulous four are not just smart headlines. They are interrelated and they are very practical. They are interrelated in the sense that you have to use all four simultaneously. You can not leave out one of them or just go with one of them.  They are practical in the sense that everyone can practise them daily - alone and in the team. FISH! delivers a series of methods and exercises easy to use - and fun too. The leader does not have to invent ways to keep on talking about FISH! - lots of material has been invented. Why is it vitally important that your employees are friends or ‘friends’ at work? The answer is quite easy - and you know it already. People like what they are doing with people they like. The opposite is so full ...

5 FISH! Philosophy Strategies for Avoiding Burnout:  For many people, they think that burnout is the same as stress , but that’s not entirely accurate. Stress is acute – we experience it in-the-moment due to a particular trigger. But burnout? Burnout is more long-term. It stems from accumulated stress over time, and often manifests almost like a depression : you may feel perpetually exhausted and anxious. You may feel like you can’t catch up on sleep, or that nothing brings you pleasure. You have trouble concentrating and connecting with people you love. Burnout takes time to set in, and also takes time to heal, and it’s often caused by long-term workplace stressors (although it can definitely be caused by non-work-related concerns such as marital problems or ongoing crises). What can you do if you’re feeling burned out at work? Here are five things you can do as a coworker or manager to help yourself and others find relief: 1. Take care of yourself (physically and emotionally) On...

Play can’t be forced:  How Children Can Teach Us to Play “The opposite of play is not work. It’s depression,” says Play expert Stuart Brown . Far too often, we think of play and work as being mutually exclusive concepts positioned on opposite ends of the same spectrum, and that’s why we so often hear from people that Play is the most difficult-to-grasp pillar of the FISH! Philosophy . But Play is not mutually exclusive from work; instead, it’s something that can be integrated into our workspaces and our work processes to help improve the quality of our ideas, our outputs, and our collaborative processes. If you’re struggling to wrap your head around the idea of what Play looks like in the workplace, let’s remove the idea of “the workplace” entirely and take a step back to a time when Play was a natural way of being: childhood. Children are the ultimate experts in Play, and adults could learn a thing or two about it from them: after all, we all need to play, and humans (and anima...

Every departmental meeting, team meeting, kick-off meeting needs the participants to hear new things, learn new things and understand new things. This does not happen when the leader is talking everyone to sleep. As you know, nobody learns anything when they are bored or have fallen asleep. Hence this helping hand in the form of a collection of MEETING JOKERS , who create awake and fresh and enterprising employees who are given the opportunity to reflect on what they see, hear and perceive. The manager must therefore accept that the employees challenge and provoke and twist what they have heard. This does not mean that the decisions must therefore be overturned or annulled. This means that all employees must understand and internalize (take it in) and make the 'news' their own. The manager is also not going to hear everything that is said. But there is nothing new in that. What is not said in the conference room is said at the coffee machine or even later - at home. The 'ne...

A friend of mine has a job in a local community. She is head of Human Resources . She has lots of transactions with her leader on a daily basis. The leader happens to be quite aggressive. Last week my friend fainted from stress and was taken to hospital with a stroke that paralysed half of her face. My friend is very dutyful and may be a sensitive woman but this incident is without discussion pure terror. The incident happened at work during daytime. And this is not the first time employees meet terror from this leader. Local newspaper has had several articles about the horrible leader. No colleagues stod up helping my friend. Nobody did a thing. Lots of people knew about it and nobody stopped the leader from repeated actions. This terror is not OK This is not OK at all. We can’t accept a leader with a temper like this, a behaviour this aggressive and a series of consequences like this. I suggest that time has come to introduce a leaders license . I know that lots of companies are abl...

Coaching Cubes with 36 questions on 6 different theme cubes: Explore new areas of discussion with Coaching Cubes  Colorful foam dice that feature positive coaching questions and they are great for promoting discussion and unblocking stuck conversations with your coachees . One of the most effective techniques to help someone develop their own thinking is to ask them questions. Good questions prompt new thoughts, bring previous experiences to bear on present dilemmas, shed new light on the issue, and prompt plans for action. This activity consists of six coloured, soft cubes with positive coaching questions on them. The cubes are designed to be rolled as dice, with each cube having its own theme relating to the coaching process. The Coaching Cubes follow this model. The PRISMM COACHING CUBES Model The PRISMM coaching model combines systemic consulting , appreciative inquiry and positive psychology to create a powerful coaching process. A colourful, tactile, innovative addition ...