Cybersecurity is at the top of the agenda of nearly every board of directors meeting on Wall Street. As the threats evolve, so to do the countermeasures. Firms are deploying new methods to prevent cyberattacks and recover quickly when hackers penetrate defenses. Meanwhile, a big piece of the cybersecurity puzzle lies at the intersection of industry and government, where enhanced collaboration and information sharing are starting to produce positive results. With the above landscape in mind, SmartBrief recently partnered with SIFMA and the Financial Services Roundtable to assemble a pair of panels to talk about the state of cybersecurity in financial services. The panels focused on cybersecurity public policies — those in place and others under consideration — and the best practices current practitioners have adopted to enhance the cybersecurity of their individual firms and the financial services industry as a whole. Below you will find video highlights and a brief description of each panel. You may also scroll to the bottom of this post to view the full-length video of each panel as well as related posts and video highlights based on specific topics/questions. Cybersecurity and Public Policy: The Road Ahead The interaction between the financial sector and policymakers has shifted dramatically over the past few years when it comes to cybersecurity. Greater collaboration has spurred legislative action, but key questions remain: How do current information-sharing proposals address liability concerns? What other policies are needed to protect customer information while ensuring the safe execution of necessary transactions? What are the cross-border ramifications of U.S. policies? What is the industry doing to work with policymakers and shape guidelines that keep pace with the ever-evolving challenges posed by cyber threats? Panelists: Mark Clancy, CEO, Soltra - Managing Director, CISO Technology Risk Management, DTCC Chris Feeney, BITS President, Financial Services Roundtable (formerly Managing Director and Chief Information Officer, LPL Financial) Thomas Ferlazzo, Vice President, Operational Risk, Federal Reserve Bank of New York Karl Schimmeck, Managing Director, Financial Services Operations, SIFMA Moderator: Sean McMahon, Senior Finance Editor, SmartBrief   From the Frontlines: The Practitioner’s Perspective on Cybersecurity Sound cybersecurity practices run the gamut from prevention to resiliency. As threats evolve, so do best practices related to preventing attacks. What are the greatest threats to financial services firms? What tools are experts in the field using to identify and negate internal and external threats? How can firms better respond to attacks and rapidly return to regular business operations? Panelists: Al Berg, Chief Security and Risk Officer, Liquidnet Holdings Inc. Robert Cornish, Chief Technology Officer and Chief Information Security Officer, International Securities Exchange (ISE) Boaz Gelbord, Chief Information Security Officer, Bloomberg LP George Rettas, Managing Director and Chief of Staff, Global Information Security Department - Information Protection Directorate, Citigroup Moderator: Sean McMahon, Senior Finance Editor, SmartBrief   Related posts: Financial sector working to improve speed of cyberthreat info-sharing, experts say  How to recruit and organize cybersecurity talent Experts: Cybersecurity collaboration between industry, government making progress   Highlights of specific questions/topics Information sharing Information sharing was a hot topic on both panels at the SmartBrief Cybersecurity Forum. Panelists from both sessions weighed in with their thoughts on the progress that has been made with regard to information sharing within the financial services industry and how critical it has become in preventing attacks.   Recruiting and organizing cybersecurity talent Cybersecurity experts are a hot commodity these days. Financial firms are pulling out all the stops to recruit top talent. Our panel of experts shares their insights on how the identify and attract talent. They also weigh in on how the cybersecurity org chart should be structured. With CTOs, CIOs, CISOs, etc … who should report to whom?   Full-length videos     https://vimeo.com/131671832 Related Posts: Financial sector working to improve speed of cyberthreat info-sharing, experts say How to recruit and organize cybersecurity talent Experts: Cybersecurity collaboration between government, industry making progress ICYMI - January 10 Sneak Peek: OPS 2015 kicks off Monday in San Diego SmartBrief Cybersecurity Forum originally published by SmartBlogs

The Young Entrepreneur Council is an invite-only organization comprised of the world’s most promising young entrepreneurs. YEC recently launched StartupCollective, a free virtual mentorship program that helps millions of entrepreneurs start and grow businesses. Read previous SmartBlogs posts by YEC. If you enjoy this article, join SmartBrief’s e-mail list for our newsletters on small business and entrepreneurialism. Q. Should I let an underperforming employee go now, or wait until we find a replacement and why? They are not toxic, just time to move on. 1. Give them the choice Bad workers usually get warnings. Businesses are entitled to two weeks’ notice. And here, you have a decent worker who, while continuing to add value, has outlived his or her purpose there, to little fault of their own. So, the fair but not painless path is letting the employee choose between going or staying on to save money until either you replace them or they replace their income source. — Manpreet Singh, TalkLocal 2. Give them a different role Hiring someone is expensive. Once hired, training a new employee is time-consuming. If there’s an employee that is underperforming in their current role, assess what skills they bring to the table and if another role in your company would better suit their talents. Sam might be a poor salesperson, but he could make a fantastic customer care representative. Termination is always my last resort. — Derek Hunter, William Roam 3. Make the hard decision Let the employee go as soon as you know they’re not the right fit. It allows them to find a better fit for themselves, and once they aren’t there it will make you more motivated to fill the void — otherwise you could last with a subpar employee for a much longer period of time than you’d planned. — Sean Ogle, Location 180 LLC 4. Let them go Underperformers are are rarely non-toxic. In my experience, most employees look to each other to gauge the acceptable level of performance within your company. When you hold on to C players, you risk your A players leaving out of frustration and your B players conforming due to the assumption that lower standards are acceptable. — Jesse Lear, V.I.P. Waste Services LLC 5. Move on right away When it comes to building a team, hire slow and fire fast. The worst thing you can do is keep an underperforming employee on your team — it will destroy team morale, create a false sense of expectations and hurt overall performance. — Jonny Simkin, Swyft 6. Make sure they understand from the start Every employee I hire gets the same speech on the first day, "Don’t be good. Don’t be great. Be irreplaceable to me. I am super busy, and I move really fast. If you don’t make yourself irreplaceable to me, I promise that I will replace you." It’s our job to make an environment that people love being in, it’s their job to be valuable enough to stay there. I have never wished I fired someone later. — Andrea Lake, StickerJunkie.com 7. Don’t tolerate underperformance Your team is only as good as your weakest link. Tolerating anything less than great performance undermines your team’s ability to produce the best output. It’s important to solicit constructive feedback from your top performers to ensure deficiencies in your workforce are corrected — either through a performance improvement plan or termination — before it spreads. — Alex Riley, MeritHall 8. Invest in a smooth transition Your reputation is impacted by how employees, both current and former, perceive your company. When you identify an underperformer, spend time understanding why that person wasn’t a good fit (so you don’t hire the wrong candidate again) and invest resources to help that individual find the right position for his or her next career move (to develop long-term karma). — Danny Wong, Grapevine 9. Focus on finding their replacement As tempting as it may be to let them go right away, as underperforming is toxic, the subsequent problems left by not having a replacement in place can be even more toxic. Focus on finding a replacement who you can train in conjunction, so when you terminate the underperforming employee you will not suffer from missed deadlines because there was no one to take over for that person’s duties. — Marcela DeVivo, Gryffin Media 10. Help them find a better fit People often need coaching to get to the next level. If they are not adding value despite your best efforts, don’t keep them as a stop-gap measure. Their poor performance will negatively impact the team, so let them go along with a conversation about why. This will drive you to find your desired A-player while supporting that person’s transition into a different company/role that’s a better fit. — David Hassell, 15Five 11. Keep only the right fits In his book "Good to Great," Jim Collins argues that great companies get the right people on the bus and the wrong people off the bus as soon as they realize someone isn’t fitting. Get the underperforming employee off the bus now, to free up that seat for the right candidate and to make sure you’re not demotivating any of the right people on the bus by keeping the underperforming employee around. — Natalie MacNeil, She Takes on the World 12. Don’t give up This depends on the employee’s overall value to your organization (e.g., he or she has a large role in a current project), as well as whether or not the underperformance is due to a systemic problem or is isolated to the employee. Dig deeper. Identify why the employee has lost interest. If the problem is systemic, find and fix the root cause. — Derek Labian, MediaFire Related Posts: What is the best way to address an underperforming employee? Are your employees people managers or subject-matter experts? How do you decide? What is one critical piece to include in employee performance reviews and why? What resources can help entrepreneurs be better managers? Common mistakes leaders make during periods of fast growth When do you let an underperforming employee go? originally published by SmartBlogs

A skills shortage has cybersecurity experts in high demand on Wall Street as firms boost their game to lure top talent. But how should firms go about recruiting the right personnel to match their needs? A panel of experts at the recent SmartBrief Cybersecurity Forum weighed in on what they are doing to identify and recruit cyber warriors. As George Rettas from Citigroup noted, recent headlines have made an already competitive landscape even tougher as Wall Street, which is already used to competing with companies from other areas of critical infrastructure, must now compete with non-critical infrastructure companies desperate to avoid headline risk. "It’s people like Sony, who are in the entertainment business," Rettas explained. "They’re not even critical infrastructure. Now they are hiring the best cybersecurity professionals in the world." The conversation also touched on how to organize the upper echelons of cybersecurity teams. With CTOs, CIOs, CISOs, etc … who should report to whom? Opinions on the panel differed as Al Berg, chief security and risk officer for Liquidnet, said security executives should not report directly to the CIO. Berg believes there should be room for "healthy tension" between the two positions because some of the recommendations the security team might make could make the CIO "uncomfortable." Meanwhile, International Securities Exchange CTO and CISO Robert Cornish pointed out some of the advantages of having the two positions connected via the chain of command. "One advantage … is being aware of every change that happening in your environment from a technology perspective. … I’ve seen in the past where security ends up being the last to know that some new product system was installed onto the network." Related Posts: SmartBrief Cybersecurity Forum Financial sector working to improve speed of cyberthreat info-sharing, experts say ICYMI - January 10 This week’s most clicked Experts: Cybersecurity collaboration between government, industry making progress How to recruit and organize cybersecurity talent originally published by SmartBlogs

Path to Workforce is SmartBrief Education’s vision of college and career readiness, encompassing K-12, adult learners, career changers, non-traditional students and those who forgo a traditional four-year college experience. Stay tuned for ongoing #Path2W coverage, including model programs, expert insights and reader feedback. In California, our three small districts are maximizing the value of career and technical education courses through an innovative system. As superintendent of the Colton-Redlands-Yucaipa Regional Occupation Program, I have found that a solid college and career readiness program is based in deep community engagement, rigorous core courses and strong student support that can be expanded with the right mix of technology and hands-on experiences. My team at CRY-ROP provides targeted support, curriculum, internships and many other opportunities to the students in each of our three districts. This summer, we look to expand on past success through our Career Express Online. The value of CTE has become more and more apparent in recent years as a way to better prepare students for life after graduation. Excitingly, many industries have expressed an increased need for workers that have hands-on, real-life experience, rather than looking just at a college degree. CTE provides opportunities to explore emerging career paths. Research shows that the completion of career-focused courses result in the development of 21st-century skills, including problem-solving, project completion, research, effective communication, time management and critical thinking. Research by the Southern Regional Education Board shows that CTE courses better prepare students for college and life; 80% of students taking CTE courses in addition to a rigorous academic core meet college and career readiness goals, compared with 63% of students taking the exact same rigorous academic core, without CTE (CTE Works for High School Students, 2013). The social and economic conditions of the 21st century demand that every community engage in conversations and take action to remove obstacles to student success. CRY-ROP relies heavily on our deep-rooted relationships with the industries in our community. Each of our educators at CRY-ROP is also an expert in their field. With the implementation of our Career Express Online, we are able to offer our students a wider variety of career pathways that include an expert in that field is leading instruction. Because of our careful planning, students enrolling in our Career Express Online, as well as traditional CTE courses, now have more than 40 different career pathways to explore, in each of the 15 industry sectors. Internship opportunities emerge from the extended network of industry professionals who teach our courses. It is important that we engage companies and individual professionals effectively and in ways that fit their schedules as well as meet the needs of students. For instance, some of our industry partners participate in mock interviews with students once or twice a year, while others visit classrooms as guest speakers. Industry field trips, both virtual and live, also provide a creative way to experience the world of work. Internships and job-shadow options are more time intensive, but provide sound experiences that benefit students. Any way you slice it, it is of the utmost importance that students connect with professionals throughout their career exploration journey. One of the many benefits of hiring teachers who are also experts in their field is that they maintain valuable industry contacts. From these contacts, CRY-ROP is able to provide programmatic supports that encourage a more holistic approach to college and career readiness. Another, maybe less traditional, but exceptionally valuable aspect of our relationships with industry is that our teachers also participate in job shadow and internship experiences to ensure that they too stay current with the workplace environment and trends. Each school we support has a designated career readiness specialist that is available to help students navigate what can be a bewildering array of opportunities. CRY-ROP provides over 40 career tracks at varying levels of intensity and depth. Career readiness specialists provide guidance, recruitment and placement services on each high-school campus that CRY-ROP serves. These support professionals help to create a learning continuum for students that addresses both academic and career success indicators. Career Express Online will be used to expand options for students to include online classes. These programs feature a rich multimedia format that includes interactive tutorials, avatars, whiteboard illustrations, examples that the students can manipulate, practice games, videos and more. The courses focus on student engagement and motivation while giving us the ability to offer a wider variety of courses in each of the 15 career sectors. As CRY-ROP embraces the complexity associated creating an aligned, 21st century system to prepare students for the competitive global economy, our focus is on knowledge, skills and innovation. Career Express Online is our response to the changing needs of educational delivery. Our launch of Career Express Online is intended to encourage the use of technology to complement educational pathway activities. The new economy requires various skill sets, specifically proficient in thinking and complex communication skills, as well as the use of the most advanced methods of innovation. Our vision is that Career Express Online will enhance the student experience and provide access to high-growth and emerging industries. Our goal is to empower students to imagine their futures and provide possibilities to explore that future. Career Express Online provides students with expanded access to opportunities to attain the skills, knowledge, and abilities needed to be successful; and, because they are delivered virtually, students have autonomy to set their own schedule, while learning the discipline necessary to follow through on their commitments. Students quickly learn about their interests and they can easily explore multiple fields simultaneously. At the end of the day, we are all charged with ensuring each and every student we serve is fully prepared for life after high school, we take that responsibility to heart and look forward to the full implementation of Career Express Online this summer. Stephanie Houston is superintendent of Colton-Redlands-Yucaipa Occupational Program (CRY-ROP) in California. Since starting as a career and technical education professional 20 years ago, she has been a CTE teacher, program manager and director. Superintendent Houston can be reached via email at Stephanie_houston@cry-rop.org If you enjoyed this article, join SmartBrief’s email list for more stories about education. We offer newsletters covering educational leadership, special education and more. Related Posts: Why we shouldn’t glorify billionaires who dropped out of school How is the U.S. faring in the great #skillsrace? How making expands students’ visions of themselves Raising a ready workforce: The missing curriculum component All’s well that ends well? CTE: Creating opportunities for students originally published by SmartBlogs

I work in an industry that has a unique training process. Experiential marketing takes part-time, temporary employees and quickly turns them into go-to experts on products and brands — otherwise known as "brand ambassadors." When you speak with a brand ambassador at an event, it’s possible that he has only been representing that brand for less than a day. This need for instant expertise is a challenge, but it also provides great lessons to other industries that are looking to hone their training processes. Typically, managers want to spend days or weeks training new employees before turning them loose in a real-world setting. But employees usually learn more on their first real day of work than they do during the entire simulated training process. Why on-the-job training works On-the-job training puts employees in a sink-or-swim situation. If they don’t quickly master their duties, they risk making themselves and their new employer look bad. Here’s the good news: In my experience, nine out of 10 employees rise to the challenge. For one thing, learning while doing is an effective way to keep information straight. When you hand a training manual to an employee on his first day and lock him in a room until he’s done reading it, he’ll barely retain the information. But by providing live-action training and forcing employees to learn and succeed on the fly, you’re making their training much easier to remember and apply in the future. Some industries, like experiential marketing, require perfection on day one. In these scenarios, giving employees a brief tutorial and a cheat sheet of important information should be enough before setting them free. This is a proper blend of up-front and on-the-job training, and you’ll find that most employees appreciate the opportunity to jump in and get their hands dirty right away. How to make it work for you With the right preparation and mindset, on-the-job training is actually quite simple to incorporate into your company. Here are five universally applicable pieces of advice: Devote resources. It’s easy to overlook the amount of time and money it takes to properly conduct on-the-job training. Make sure you budget appropriate amounts of each toward your training efforts to ensure everything goes smoothly. Skimping on your training today will lead to an insufficient workforce tomorrow.  Prepare a cheat sheet. Condense all the crucial things your new employees need to know into a fact sheet. They can carry it around and refer to it as they learn. Consider your cheat sheet to be an abridged, portable training manual.  Take responsibility. As the manager or leader of your company, it’s your responsibility to enable the success of your new employees. They’ll look to you as the expert on everything, so make sure you’re available to answer their questions — and actually know the answers.  Be excited. This is your job, and you’ve worked hard to ascend to this managerial role. Your trainees will take notice if you don’t express love for your company and passion for your product. Be charismatic during training, and lead by example.  Stress efficiency. Keep the training process as short as possible, and refuse to let it get off topic. Your new employees — and bosses — will thank you for it. If there’s one thing all industries can learn from experiential marketing, it’s that on-the-job training is the quickest way to produce expert employees. The key is finding a proper, efficient blend of hands-off and hands-on training, all while leading by example. Anthony Russo has been a self-employed business owner for more than five years, and his seven-figure agency, Identity Marketing, is recognized among the top companies in the field of experiential promotional marketing. Russo is also a professional speaker and an emcee for large national events. Related Posts: Make your feedback personal What would your best boss do today? How Team of Leaders helps deal with difficult people 7 essential talents of effective managers How to employ data to empower, not replace, your managers Throw them into the ring: The benefits of on-the-job training originally published by SmartBlogs

According to a recent study by the Korn-Ferry Institute, "knowing thyself" isn’t just a nice-to-to; self-awareness flows directly to a firm’s bottom line. I’ve been sharing this information with my network and it’s generating a lot of interest. While we’ve all know that awareness of strengths and weaknesses and how we are perceived by others is essential to being an effective leader, it’s interesting to see a connection made to a firm’s financial results. Here’s more from a June 15 press release: An analysis by Korn Ferry (NYSE:KFY), the preeminent authority on leadership and talent, shows that public companies with a higher rate of return (ROR) also employ professionals who exhibit higher levels of self-awareness. The Korn Ferry Institute analyzed a total of 6,977 self-assessments from professionals at 486 publicly traded companies to identify the "blind spots" in individuals’ leadership characteristics. A blind spot is defined as a skill that the professional counted among his or her strengths, when coworkers cited that same skill as one of the professional’s weaknesses. The frequency of such blind spots was then gauged against the ROR of those companies’ stock. The analysis demonstrated that, on average: • Poorly performing companies’ professionals had 20 percent more blind spots than those working at financially strong companies. • Poor-performing companies’ professionals were 79 percent more likely to have low overall self-awareness than those at firms with robust ROR. "Self-awareness can directly translate into better choices, and result in more fulfilling careers," said Global Vice President of the Korn Ferry Institute, Joy Hazucha. "On the other hand, those with low self-awareness tend to scramble the messages they receive concerning improvement, interpreting them as a threat rather than an opportunity. They often have an ‘I am what I am’ mentality and continue doing things the way they always have." Hazucha says a person’s level of self-awareness can be increased through 360-degree performance appraisals paired with effective coaching. This in turn drives improved performance and greater work satisfaction. "Feedback helps leaders to identify their blind spots," said Hazucha. "We have known that feedback was important for personal improvement, but this shows that it also pays off in the organization’s performance. A collective focus on personal improvement leads to improvements in the organization." While being aware of your limitations sounds like a no-brainer, it’s not. First of all, it’s hard to get honest, accurate, behavior feedback. People are uncomfortable telling the emperor he/she has no clothes, and leaders often shoot the messenger or ignore the feedback. 360-degree assessments are one way to get feedback and build self-awareness, but not everybody has access to these tools. I’ve written about other ways to get feedback — where there’s a will there’s a way, if a leader is willing to ask and listen. However, I would argue that self-awareness alone is not sufficient to improve leadership effectiveness. Management guru Peter Drucker once said: "The problem in my life and other people’s lives is not the absence of knowing what to do but the absence of doing it." It’s called the "knowing-doing gap." We may know we are supposed to eat healthy foods and exercise, but at the end of the day, we make a zillion excuses not to, put off going to the gym and give in to the temptation of those chocolate chip cookies. So how does a leader move from knowing to doing? Working with an executive coach can help a leader overcome their limiting beliefs and barriers, generate options and action plans, and help keep the leader focused and motivated. But again, not everyone can afford to hire an executive coach. A newly self-aware leader either has to be motivated enough to make it happen (the "just do it approach"), or he or she could work with a supportive manager, mentor or peer coach (a learning partner). That’s assuming the leader wants to change. Take it from executive coach Marshall Goldsmith: When people don’t want to change — don’t waste your time." So the next time someone approaches your tentatively and asks, "Can I give you some feedback?" drop everything, pay attention, and thank the person for the feedback. Then, don’t just stand there, do something about it! You’ll be a better leader, a better person, and you will be making a positive contribution to your organization’s financials. Dan McCarthy is the director of Executive Development Programs at the University of New Hampshire and runs the Management & Leadership channel of About.com. He writes the award-winning leadership development blog Great Leadership and is consistently ranked as one of the top digital influencers in leadership and talent management. He’s a regular contributor to SmartBrief and a member of the SmartBrief on Workforce Advisory Board. E-mail McCarthy. If you enjoyed this article, join SmartBrief’s e-mail list for our daily newsletter on being a better leader and communicator. Related Posts: How to be recognized as a young leader Beware of your leadership strengths How to plan a great off-site meeting What to get your boss for a holiday gift 10 ways to take charge of your leadership development Self-awareness (plus action) translates to the bottom line originally published by SmartBlogs

The financial-services sector needs to strengthen its information-sharing network to learn more quickly of threat data and thereby stay ahead of hackers, said panelists at the recent SmartBrief Cybersecurity Forum in New York City. Cybercriminals are colluding and collaborating frequently, which creates a crucial need for the industry to work more closely together on a regular basis, said George Rettas, managing director and chief of staff, Global Information Security Department — Information Protection Directorate, Citigroup. "You cannot beat a network without being a network yourself. You’re not going to do it alone," Rettas explained. Al Berg, chief security and risk officer of Liquidnet Holdings, said information shared by other organizations "can be a force multiplier for us, because we don’t have to redo that analysis." Karl Schimmeck, managing director of financial services operations for the Securities Industry and Financial Markets Association, said that his group and the industry has spent a decade developing relationships to share information through the Financial Services Information Sharing and Analysis Center, or FS-ISAC. The next steps involve building on that sharing with greater government and law enforcement engagement, then extending it more widely through the industry by including more small firms, he said. While the goal of sharing cybersecurity information in real time remains to be achieved, panelists said the daily sharing of information is a key advantage. Robert Cornish, chief technology officer and chief information security officer of International Securities Exchange, said the FS-ISAC subgroup of exchanges and clearinghouses shares information "readily throughout the day." Mark Clancy, CEO of Soltra, said that cyberthreat data from the government has become available increasingly faster, now taking a few days rather than weeks. "If we can get it down into a few minutes after it’s detected and published, then the attackers have much less latitude to operate," he said. In terms of the role the government can play in helping set priorities, Clancy lauded the value of a recent FBI report identifying the top 10 vulnerabilities that nation-state actors have exploited during the past year. "Basically, it’s a shopping cart of everything I have to fix first," he said. Related Posts: SmartBrief Cybersecurity Forum Experts: Cybersecurity collaboration between government, industry making progress How to recruit and organize cybersecurity talent Ridge, Mandia sound off on cybersecurity Sneak Peek: OPS 2015 kicks off Monday in San Diego Financial sector working to improve speed of cyberthreat info-sharing, experts say originally published by SmartBlogs

Summer’s in full swing and ed-tech organizations have been busy releasing a slew of new offerings. Take a look at what SmartBrief on EdTech readers found interesting in this month’s Product Showcase. IPEVO IW2. The IPEVO IW2 wireless interactive whiteboard system transforms nearly any flat surface into an interactive display. The system retails for $169.00. Content series: Why gaming matters for education. More than 60% of teachers use games in their instruction, according to survey data from the Joan Ganz Cooney Center. Education expert Mitch Weisberg discusses how games support pedagogy and drive engagement in this new content series for K-12TechDecisions. Classroom management for early learning. EdWeb.net has partnered with Kaplan to create Classroom Management for Early Learning, a professional learning community for early childhood educators. Membership is free and includes access to a library of resources, webinars and online discussion forums. Members can receive free CE certificates for viewing webinars. Conference: FlipCon 2015. Educators looking to learn more about flipped learning can register for FlipCon 2015, taking place July 13-15 at Michigan State University. Sessions will cover tools, research and professional development ideas for flipped learning environments. Individuals unable to attend the onsite conference can register for the online event. Report: State digital learning exemplars. States are developing policies and programs aimed at expanding digital learning opportunities in their schools. This report, by SETDA and the Friday Institute for Educational Innovation, profiles five states that have created policies designed to drive funding, digital content, human capacity, network infrastructure and data management and privacy. Download the report from SETDA’s website. i-Ready Diagnostic & Instruction. New lessons in i-Ready Diagnostic & Instruction from Curriculum Associates aim to help students in grades 3-5 build close reading habits. The online lessons include activities designed to aid students in synthesizing ideas from multiple sources and develop comprehension in informational and literary texts. Report: A path to the future: Creating accountability for personalized learning. Personalized learning is gaining momentum in K-12. This report offers recommendations for scaling a personalized learning program while maintaining accountability for outcomes. Among the recommendations made are moving from end-of-year testing to real-time testing within grade levels and allowing states to use more fully adaptive test for accountability. Webinar: Social & emotional learning curriculum and assessment go hand in hand. Community Unit School District 300 in Illinois has integrated social emotional learning curriculum and assessment into its instruction. This on-demand webcast will discuss how the school implemented the program and what outcomes it’s seen since deployment. Newsela summer challenge. Students earn badges and sharpen their literacy skills while reading the latest news and feature stories. Report: Measuring mastery: Best practices for assessment in competency-based education. This report offers tips for designing high-quality assessments for competency-based programs. TrueConf Server. This video conference platform supports up to 250 participants in multi-point conference. Book: Vernier Chemistry Investigations. Vernier has released its new AP Chemistry lab book. The book, which comes with 16 inquiry-based lab experiments, leads students through the process of data collection using electronic sensors. Guide to the E-Rate 2.0. This guide, from SIIA and Funds for Learning, outlines the changes to the E-rate program, including new rules and eligible services, and how these updates influence school technology acquisition and planning. The report (free to SIIA members) and executive summary is available through SIIA’s website. Center for Student Work. The Center for Student Work, created by Harvard Graduate School of Education (HGSE) and Expeditionary Learning (EL), is an online resource housing student projects by K-12 students. The site includes videos and written content on various subjects including English Language Arts, Mathematics, Science and Technology, Visual Arts, Health and Wellness, Performing Arts, Social Studies and World Language. ExacqVision VMS. New video management software from Exacq Technologies enables schools to monitor video, audio and data in real time. Among the features included in the system are two-way audio, notification , interactive mapping and video analytics. Edsby. Learning management system Edsby now offers authentication with Microsoft Azure Active Directory, OAuth2 protocol Related Posts: No Related Posts Ed-tech product roundup: June originally published by SmartBlogs

Geoffrey A. Moore’s 1991 hit book "Crossing the Chasm: Marketing and Selling High-Tech Products to Mainstream Customers" has become a technology industry bible for understanding the recurring patterns of the adoption of disruptive innovation. Moore breaks up the population into five groups: innovators, early adopters, early majority, late majority and laggards. The "chasm" refers to a gap between the innovators/early adopters groups and the others. While the innovators and early adoptions are excited to try new technology for technology’s sake or to gain a differentiator from the competition by being early to adopt, the later groups are harder to convince without solid evidence and may resist technology adoption entirely until the innovation has become the de facto standard. The principle of the innovation lifecycle and the struggle associated with crossing the chasm has been incredibly helpful to me as an innovator within the restaurant industry, thinking about the industry’s innovators, early adopters, early majority, late majority, and laggards. When Olo hit the market in 2005 with a digital ordering platform for online and mobile ordering that would enable any restaurant group to offer its guests a new way to order and pay from their own device and Skip the Line and have a more convenient, accurate and personal experience, I knew that we had to find what Moore calls the "target market" of innovators. We were incredibly lucky to be launching Olo in parallel with the rise of the fast casual segment and to link up with early leaders of the better burger movement like MOOYAH, Jake’s Wayback Burgers, and Five Guys Burgers & Fries as some of Olo’s earliest clients. These fast casual burger chains had similar challenges that Olo’s digital ordering platform could help them to overcome. First and foremost, they weren’t as convenient as their fast food competitors and some would-be guests would choose to go elsewhere on a short lunch break as a result. By using digital ordering to let customers order/pay ahead and schedule a pickup time at the restaurants Olo’s fast casual burger clients could effectively have their meals ready on-demand when the customers walked in the door. This neutralized the "less convenient than fast food" knock on fast casual burgers. From 2005 to 2015, the rise of the smartphone from fewer than 5% of mobile phone users to now more than 75%, along with the consumer familiarity with on-demand apps like Uber, HotelTonight and AirBnB, have set the stage for widespread adoption of digital ordering. As the National Restaurant Association’s "Restaurant Industry 2020: A Snapshot of the Future" says, "to remain integral to consumers’ changing lifestyles, the restaurant industry has had to learn to anticipate diners’ needs. Ordering food on a smartphone or tablet computer would have seemed the stuff of science fiction in the 1960s, but today it is a commonplace occurrence." While fast casual burger chains were the innovators for digital ordering and the broader fast casual chains were the early adopters, we are now witnessing a chasm crossing for digital ordering. If one were to chart the restaurant industry’s chains with "average check size" on the X-axis and "number of units" on the Y-axis, you would see a pattern that resembled a dumbbell. The handgrip in the middle would be the fast casual restaurant chains, with their ‘tweener check size and relatively small (but fast growing) number of units per chain. The left bell would be the quickservice restaurants, with their low check size and high unit counts. The right bell would be the casual dining restaurants, with their relatively high check size and high unit counts. We now see digital ordering crossing two chasms simultaneously: leaping from fast casual to quickservice and from fast casual to casual dining at the same time. Quickservice restaurant chains have come to understand that guests demand the convenience, accuracy and personalization that comes with digital ordering and that they can learn about their guests to become more hospitable. Casual dining restaurant chains have come to understand that 75% of restaurant industry transactions are for off-premise consumption, meaning that digital ordering can be a key tool in creating a great off-premise program around curbside pickup. Noah Glass is the Founder & CEO of Olo. Since 2005, Olo has helped restaurant brands increase revenue per square foot by delivering faster, more accurate, and more personal service through digital ordering. Today, over 10 million consumers use the Olo platform to order ahead and Skip the Line at the restaurants they love. __________________________________________________ If you enjoyed this article, join SmartBrief’s email list for more stories about the food and beverage industry. We offer 14 newsletters covering the industry from restaurants to food manufacturing. Related Posts: A "Moneyball" approach to restaurant real estate The next great American fast casual restaurant is among us How Chipotle tapped into a fast-casual gold mine Report: What do food industry operators want and how do they buy? How Newk’s Eatery sees fast-casual 2.0 Restaurants rising: Eating "food away from home" at home originally published by SmartBlogs

The best executives with whom I have worked make a point of hitting the road. Executives who get out of their offices and make treks to the front lines, as well as to customer locations, get firsthand impressions of what is happening, as well as what is not happening. And it’s not enough to show up. You need to engage. Have real conversations about how the work is going, and especially listen to how people respond. Ask questions. And, most important, listen to what you hear. Hitting the road to discover what’s going on is time-consuming and wearying, but it is necessary for any executive who expects to lead with a clear head, and an even more clear vision of the future. Click here to view the embedded video.   John Baldoni is chair of leadership development at N2Growth, is an internationally recognized leadership educator and executive coach. In 2014, Trust Across America named him to its list of top 100 most trustworthy business experts. Also in 2014, Inc.com named Baldoni to its list of top 100 leadership experts, and Global Gurus ranked him No. 11 on its list of global leadership experts. Baldoni is the author of more than a dozen books, including his newest, "MOXIE: The Secret to Bold and Gutsy Leadership." If you enjoyed this article, join SmartBrief’s e-mail list for our daily newsletter on being a better, smarter leader. Related Posts: How to manage change the right way 3 steps to executive presence Good values spark good customer service The art of the sound bite A-C-T your way to receiving feedback Hit the road, Jack originally published by SmartBlogs

Security, simplifying the user experience and improving the IT and end user relationship were among the top themes discussed at IMCCA’s "UCC Summit 2015: State of the Industry Lunch and Learn" panel event at this year’s Infocomm conference in Orlando, Fl. The 10-member panel included executives from Acano, AVI-SPL, Cisco, Dimension Data, Jupiter, Kraymer, Microsoft, PEXIP, Polycom, Revo Labs, Smart Technologies and Videxio. The discussion, moderated by IMCCA Chairperson Emeritus Ann Earon, offered these insights on unified communications (UC) and collaboration in the enterprise. Unified communications is an outcome, not a technology. Moving organizations toward a smarter, better use of UC and collaboration means changing their perceptions of these approaches, said Scott Cruikshank, director of communications at Dimension Data. "UC is not a technology—it’s an outcome," explained Cruikshank. "It’s an application. The more we educate customers in the industry to get them to start thinking that way, we’ll have more success." When it comes to security, follow the leaders. Pay attention to the organizations that "really require security in order to run their business," suggested Larry Satterfield, global vice-president of sales at Acano. Look at financial institutions and intelligence agencies to see who they lean on for their security solutions and services. "You need to find those organizations that are making their bet on organizations that they tested," said Satterfield. "That’s how you make your choice. Proof is where the customers are buying from." Keep it simple. Users want easy-to-use virtual spaces where they can meet with their colleagues and peers, stated Simen Teigre, CEO of Pexip. Focus on simplifying the user experience. Avoid getting caught up in "unifying everything," he advised. "Simplicity trumps unification." Eliminate security siloes. The security guidelines for your UC and video conference systems should be built in to your organization’s overall security policies and procedures, stated Cruikshank. Institutions can no longer afford to look at video conferencing and UC in a silo, from a security perspective. "The threats are coming from everywhere," he said. "It’s got to be part of that overall portfolio." Work with your end users. Users have found the technology, said Earon. Work with them. The biggest complaint she hears from end users is that their IT department is holding them back and constraining bandwidth. Find a way to support them, warned Earon, or they will go rogue. "If you don’t work with them they’re going to do an end run around you. And they’re going to win if they can justify to their organization that they’ve made money or saved money," she stated. "It behooves all of you to sing ‘Kumbaya’ together and start working together to make this work properly." Related Posts: No Related Posts Experts offer keys for building a collaborative environment originally published by SmartBlogs

SmartBlog on Education will highlight summer learning and enrichment for educators during June. In this post, Kenneth Wilson, director of staff development and teacher evaluation for a South Carolina district, shares his district’s model for summer PD. With a new school year quickly approaching, it’s my job as director of Staff Development and Teacher Evaluation to make sure our staff has the opportunity to continue their professional development throughout the summer months. Our goal is to provide meaningful PD that a large number of staff members find valuable. One of the best ways to ensure that these offerings are effective and successful is to use data and technology to inform your planning strategy. Here are three ways we put data and technology to good use when building our PD programs. Survey data Surveys are a great way to get feedback from your staff and learn about the success of your previous PD offerings. Each year we send out a Staff Development Needs survey that asks questions like: What’s the most ideal time of year for PD; what are the most important topics or concepts; and how would you like to see PD delivered? We also send out an Exit Survey that an attendee may be required to take after completing a PD session. In this survey, we ask questions like: Did you take what you learned in the PD session and implement it in your classroom; were the concepts presented relevant to your job; did you benefit from attending this session; would you recommend this training to others? This data provides invaluable insight into how we, as a district, can improve our professional development offerings. For example, we found that a lot of our staff prefers to have professional learning offerings during the summer. As a result the district now has a very robust summer PD program. We implemented an Instructional Technology Institute over the summer months where we showcase important technology and demonstrate how to use technology to improve teaching and student learning outcomes. This offering is available to our educators and to anyone who is interested in attending. Registration data Another data point we use to inform PD planning is registration data. We can see information like which offerings filled up quickly, which have a wait list or which were not of high interest, all within our management system. Registration data allows us to gauge interest in each course or session offered, allowing us to make strategic adjustments to our offerings more efficiently. It’s important to us that our educators have access to sessions that they see as valuable. If a session is not well attended, we view that as a missed opportunity for professional growth. For example, if our summer curriculum writing sessions fill up very quickly and have a long wait-list, we can plan ahead for the following summer to ensure that every registrant can attend that type of session. Likewise, if an offering received little or no registrants, we can decide if that session should be retired and replaced with a more popular offering that better meets the needs of our staff. Recertification data As you all know, re-certification data is another important element to consider when planning PD. It’s imperative to provide opportunities that allow educators to meet their re-certification requirements. For example, our high-school teachers are required to complete the Jason Foundation suicide training in order to be re-certified. Our teachers also need a certain amount of technology PD hours. Our system automatically tracks individual teacher PD credits and allows us to see if an educator has earned the 120 points required for renewal. Additionally, it provides the necessary documentation from which to enter renewal points on the State Department System. My team can log in to see a list of every PD course a teacher has completed on their profile. While there’s no formula for perfect PD planning, we can use data and technology to make more informed decisions and ultimately offer our staff more relevant and invaluable professional learning opportunities. Kenneth Wilson is the director of Staff Development and Teacher Evaluation at Dorchester County School District Two in Summerville, S.C. As a former educator, principal and director of high schools and career technology, he is dedicated to improving the learning experiences of educators and students of all socio-economic backgrounds. His district uses TeacherMatch Thrive as their PD Management Solution Write to: kwilson@dorchester2.k12.sc.us If you enjoyed this article, join SmartBrief’s email list for more stories about education. We offer newsletters covering educational leadership, special education and more. Related Posts: How exam review prepares students for success Grow like the grass Summer is a great time for self-paced learning How libraries can support summer-reading programs Retreat to advance Use data, tech for stronger PD programs originally published by SmartBlogs

Photo: Janet Forgrieve Two years ago, bean chips were one of the hottest snack foods at the Summer Fancy Food Show. Now we’re seeing the actual roasted chickpeas, the latest step in the evolution toward healthier, more natural snacks, said Louise Kramer, communications director for the Specialty Food Association. "Retailers want what’s new and healthy, less-processed and with simple ingredients," she said. "And people want food with stories behind them. The products have to talk themselves off the shelves." U.S. specialty food sales hit a record $109 billion in retail and foodservice channels last year, and there’s no shortage of stories in the new-brand pavilion at the New York City show, which started Sunday and runs through Tuesday, from a pair of nuclear power plant engineers who created an unsweetened carbonated tea brand to a mom with two sets of twins who launched a vegetarian soup business. Gina Stryker began making vegetarian food 12 years ago for her yoga-instructor husband’s retreats, and eventually the students told Stryker she should bottle and sell her soups. The low-sodium soups made with organic ingredients and no added sugar proved a hit, selling out at local farmer’s markets time and again. She eventually marketed 12 kinds of soups and sauces, all but two of them vegan. Now, the Colorado resident’s brother has created a 40,000-square-foot organic greenhouse in Idaho to grow produce for her and he’s putting the finishing touches on a commercial kitchen to enable Gina Cucina to expand further. Stryker comes from a long line of chefs and she’s sharing her passion for healthy food with the next generation — she gives lessons on nutrition at her older children’s high school and recently hosted the kindergarten graduating class at her home, where they made lunch for their families. Personal issues led several of this year’s crop of foodie entrepreneurs to create their brands, including Michelle Retik who was a pastry chef when she developed Crohn’s disease. She learned to manage her condition with diet and without medication, and then she opened a bakery called The Squirrel and The Bee in Short Hills, N.J., and create Goodness Grainless, a gluten-free line of granola that works for paleo and vegan diets. Allison Luckman’s story also starts with her health issues — she was diagnosed early with lactose intolerance and later found to have ulcerative colitis, conditions she learned to manage with diet. Her son’s egg allergy and her daughter’s gluten intolerance eventually got Luckman baking. She launched Allie’s GF Goodies with the goal of making sure all kids get to have yummy baked goods. The products have always been gluten-free and peanut-free, some are vegan, and she has continued to tweak her recipes to make them suitable for people with a wide range of allergies and food issues. Luisa Mendoza’s celiac diagnosis three years ago was the catalyst for Huga Bars, a line of gluten-free nutrition bars inspired by recipes from friends and family around the globe. Mendoza and her partners worked with a food formulator, baking the original desserts and painstakingly recreating them in bar form. Auria Abraham came to the U.S. 20 years ago for college, with plans to return home to Malaysia after graduation. Instead she met a guy, got married, stayed in the U.S. and carved out a career as a jingle writer. The hours got too long after her first baby came, and eventually she turned her talents to commercializing traditional Malaysian condiments called sambal. Her Auria’s Malaysian Kitchen brand Hot Chili Sambal and new Lime Leaf Sambal helped Abraham win a booth at this year’s show in a contest by the New York Economic Development Corporation. A sampling of other stories from the new-brand pavilion includes: Sound Sparkling Tea, an unsweetened sparkling tea created by health-conscious engineers Tom Kelly and Salim Najjar, who used a Soda Stream to turn cool brewed tea into a carbonated beverage. They left their jobs at Indian Point Nuclear Power Plant in January to do the business full time. Arteasan Beverages, a tea drink made sweet by fruit and botanicals instead of sugar or artificial sweeteners. Former finance executive Fernando Rodriguez left his career, moved his family from Venezuela to the U.S. and created the drink as an alternative to sugary soft drinks for his three sons. Sweet Basil, a line of frozen meatless meals created by Connie Fassuliotis and inspired by her Greek heritage. Bee’s Water, a line of flavored honey waters created by Henry Owunna, a former pharmaceutical researcher who drank honey water as a child in Nigeria, got out of the habit after moving to the U.S. as a young man. Then one day he was home sick, remembered the drink’s soothing properties and created a brand. Backyard Brine, a line of artisan pickles made in Brooklyn by Cori and Randy Kopke who started pickling as a hobby 10 years ago, and turned it into a business after the pickles they made as a relative’s wedding favors were a hit with the guests. Ft. Greene Farms, a small-batch Brooklyn-based producer of products like pickled mustard seeds and red pepper relish created by former fine-dining chef Nathan Meshberg. "It’s about the details that tie dishes together. I’m really fascinated with that aspect of cooking," he said. __________________________________________________ If you enjoyed this article, join SmartBrief’s email list for more stories about the food and beverage industry. We offer 14 newsletters covering the industry from restaurants to food manufacturing. Related Posts: The cultural transformation of the American breakfast Prepared foods report: New consumer behaviors hone in on fresh, healthy and sustainable Retailers, manufacturers ride the wave of gluten-free Brand intimacy: How do food and beverage companies measure up? How to engage millennials through customization and curation Simple ingredients and sweet stories flavor the Fancy Food Show originally published by SmartBlogs

This post is sponsored by Drexel University.  Transitioning from a horizontal world of technical expertise to one of business management is no small feat for engineers. John Via, director of engineering management at Drexel University, outlines why many engineers can become successful business leaders and what they will need in order to successfully make the transition. Engineers are naturally technical, innovative thinkers and methodical problem solvers. How do these skills enable them to be effective leaders?  If you look at Harvard Business Review’s Best Performing CEOs, you will see that 24 out of 100 are engineers. In both engineering and non-engineering firms, executives with a background in engineering tend to excel because their creativity and practical, pragmatic approach lends itself well to leadership positions. What soft skills do engineering leaders need?  While engineering leaders need the same soft skills as any other leaders, there are subtle differences. First, strong communication is critical in leadership and for engineers; it’s about organization and methodology. Second, collaboration is an especially important soft skill for engineering leaders. Engineering is about connecting and bringing teams together to work towards common goals. Third, it’s important to be able to motivate individuals. Too often we focus on the tasks and forget how important it is to make sure everyone is on the same page and excited about the project. What are the top challenges that engineers face when transitioning to a business leader role? How can they successfully clear these hurdles? As an engineer, you are focused on managing yourself, developing your personal technical competence and working as part of a team. When transitioning into a business leader role, the challenges include learning how to manage and lead others and understanding how the business works financially. Fiscal responsibility, in terms of budgeting and accounting, and the ability to communicate and operate effectively throughout the organization are imperative to a new leader’s success. Those who are successful at making the transition into a leadership role have developed the ability to see the big picture and steward a shared vision. What business and/or technology trends do you see redefining the role of today’s engineering manager? What changes have these trends created?   Many of the challenges facing engineers in the 21st century are global in nature. Managing globally-distributed teams, particularly for multinational companies, requires the ability to adapt to diverse cultures. To be successful, leadership styles must also adapt so that societal problems are met with effective and efficient solutions. This will require leadership skills on a much grander scale than we’ve ever seen before. Those who can bring these teams together and lead the solution process will prove invaluable in the coming decades. Related Posts: No Related Posts Taking a vertical leap originally published by SmartBlogs

In the midst of our intense discussion, Dom, a vice president at a financial management firm, told me, "I don’t need great rapport, I just want Karl to show respect by doing what I ask." Dom wanted to prepare this smart professional for a more senior role and was very frustrated by repeated failed attempts to help Karl increase his business development abilities. He tried pointing out to Karl where his approach was lacking, giving guidance on better ways to create partnerships and support annual planning with clients. But over time, there was no real improvement. Dom attributed the lack of success to Karl having a real attitude problem. When I asked Dom whether Karl felt comfortable with him, he responded, "What difference does that make?" The key to unlocking Dom’s challenge lies in unwinding the contention that great rapport with employees is not needed. Having employees comply with directives only takes them so far, and certainly lacks the engagement and developmental factors. While some employees are self-initiators, and others can be motivated by fear of failure, for most employees, support from their manager is a desired decisive factor for development. Developing your staff requires that they: are open to candid performance input, maintain confidence in the face of adversity, and have opportunity and encouragement to take skills to the next level. Ensuring your employees feel comfortable with you is a requisite for this approach. To be clear, "being comfortable with your manager" has definite boundaries. It does not mean you need to be drinking buddies; you can have rapport without being very casual. A relationship which is respectful and trust-inspiring can be cultivated by the manager and become a basis for staff members to take new growth steps, even for the employees with attitude. Can you spot which employees are uncomfortable with you? Employees usually do not let you know that they feel uncomfortable; however the signs are embedded in day-to-day interactions. Even if you have done nothing to engender those uncomfortable feelings (e.g., new employees can feel insecure), you can turn it around. Step back for a moment and objectively consider if your employees show any of these signs on a consistent basis. Hide problems or mistakes — the last thing some employees want to do is bring your attention to their mistake. They scramble to either bury it or try a quick fix, yielding little or no new learning from the experience (and potentially leaving customers upset). Act defensively. These employees regularly blame others or the outside conditions for preventing them from getting the targeted results. And, while those other conditions may have been present, it is their lack of ownership toward making progress which is a sign that they are uncomfortable exploring this with you. Are overly formal. These employees are hoping you will keep your distance, not getting too close or digging too deep. They may be self-protecting because of vulnerabilities they don’t want revealed. Yet, if they cannot open up, there’s less opportunity to take development-focused actions. Getting your employees more comfortable with you (even the employees with attitude) Well, consider who you are most comfortable with — people who are open, non-judgmental, receptive, and allow you to have your foibles while respecting you. What often gets in managers’ way is a desire for expediency and a conviction that they’ve got the right answers. Don’t allow these to be your stumbling blocks. Instead, try these actions that successful development-oriented managers use: Invite their ideas and feedback regularly. You’ve heard this before: one of the most powerful things a leader can do is listen, truly, it engages your staff. By both listening to words and interpreting non-verbals you will get cues about their feelings to a situation and what is holding them back. Summarize what you gather they are thinking and feeling, and you will open the door to a more productive conversation. It’s no surprise that research actually proves that empathic listening correlates with level of support reported by the recipient. Ask specific questions conveying genuine interest. Use thoughtful questions that move the discussion toward the targeted direction (questions such as "how is it going?" are too loose). Ensure your tone of voice is sincere rather than leading or blameful. Grasp their response and double back with more questions to explore further (e.g., "how will you prepare in order to handle this the next time?"). Show faith in their growing abilities. Anticipate imperfections or added time in their work, and build that into your game plan. Learn about your employee’s abilities, their tolerance for risk, and then delegate with appropriate stretch. Contract to turn mistakes into lessons. Be ready to handle their missteps with grace, a defining moment that demonstrates that their growth is your priority. You’ll then have their full attention as together you explore a more skilled approach for the next time, a lesson that will stick. Stay in the wings. Allow them to try things out their way, yet be accessible if really needed. Their struggle to get results, resulting in a sense of accomplishment, is an important element in their progress. It’s a balancing act that requires you to know what is happening while holding off your direct involvement. What would have happened differently if, instead of demanding respect, Dom ensured Karl felt comfortable enough to: accept and talk through issues, acknowledge missteps as part of the equation, and take risks with new behaviors? Karl could have saved face with regard to his mistakes, dumped the chip on his shoulder, and felt supported to try things differently, advancing his skills. Now, next time you see a pattern of avoidance, defensiveness or formality, consider how you can better help your employees develop by making sure your employees are truly comfortable with you and ready for those next strides toward growth. Wendy Axelrod, PhD, is a recognized expert in manager-driven, work-centered people development. She is co-author of the practical "Make Talent Your Business: How exceptional managers develop people while getting results". With over 30 years of experience as a corporate executive and external consultant, she has worked directly with thousands of leaders in workshops and as an executive coach. She speaks frequently at conferences and corporate workshops. Learn more about her consulting, speaking and coaching at www.TalentSavvyManager.com. If you enjoyed this article, join SmartBrief’s e-mail list for our daily newsletter on being a better, smarter leader. Related Posts: 7 phrases a transparent leader would never use What should managers regularly ask team members? 4 tips to help leaders communicate during a crisis 14 ways CEOs can set the tone for their team from afar 4 leadership tips that will make people adore you Make sure employees are comfortable with you originally published by SmartBlogs

What would happen if you trusted your team members enough to give them the freedom to take risks and voice ideas openly? Some of the ideas you receive will sound crazy. Some will flop. But others will be just what your organization needs to solve an important challenge. One of the most remarkable examples of what can happen when group members are given autonomy and encouraged to voice their ideas occurred during WWII, as recounted by Stephen Ambrose in his book "Citizen Soldiers." A thorny issue In June of 1944, after American soldiers landed on the beaches of Normandy on D‐Day and moved about 10 miles inland, they approached the Normandy countryside the French refer to as the Bocage. This part of France consisted of plots of land that farmers separated with hedgerows rather than fences. The hedgerows were made of two to three feet of packed soil at their base and topped off with several feet of brush and vines. When the Sherman tanks attempted to go over the top of the hedgerows, the front of the tank popped up, exposing its thin underbelly to Nazi anti‐tank fire. As it turns out, Allied military planners had spent so much time planning for the D‐Day landings that they hadn’t fully considered the problems troops might encounter in hedgerow country. The Sherman tanks’ vulnerability caught everyone by surprise. At first, the Americans tried blasting the hedgerows open so the Sherman tanks could then progress through the holes created by the explosions. Unfortunately, the explosions only served to give the Nazis advance warning of where the tanks were going. Nearly a month after D‐Day, the Allies were falling behind schedule primarily because of the problems created by the hedgerows and the Nazi defense. Rhino tank from World War II, as seen in Belgium. (Credit: U.S. Department of Defense) An unexpected solution One day, in a discussion between officers and enlisted men, the idea arose of mounting saw teeth on the front of the Sherman tank. Many of those present laughed at the suggestion. One soldier, however, took the idea seriously. Sgt. Curtis G. Culin, a cab driver from Chicago, immediately designed and built a hedgerow-cutting device made from pieces of steel rail that the Nazis had strewn across the beaches to slow down an amphibious attack. When tested, the new device easily sliced through the hedgerows. It wasn’t long before the Sherman tanks mounted with Culin’s device were branded "Rhinos" by the soldiers because they made a Sherman tank look like a rhinoceros. Within days of testing the Rhinos, the idea was presented to Gen. Omar Bradley, head of the First Army. In short order, he attended a demonstration of the Rhino tank and immediately ordered 500 of Culin’s devices. Within two weeks, 60% percent of the First Army’s Sherman tanks were modified into Rhinos. With the Rhinos, the First Army were able to proceed through the hedgerow country in time to crush the Nazi army. Now it’s up to you Curtis Culin’s innovation might not have occurred had it not been for a chain of command consisting of Gens. Bradley, Dwight D. Eisenhower and George C. Marshall, each of whom gave soldiers under his command the freedom to share and test ideas. As a leader, one of the most powerful things you can do is demonstrate that you are willing to listen. Encourage your team to take the initiative to identify problems and give them the freedom to find solutions. By doing so, you just might unleash the type of innovative thinking that allowed a Chicago cab driver to play a crucial role in one of history’s greatest moments. Portions of this post were adapted from "Connection Culture: The Competitive Advantage of Shared Identity, Empathy and Understanding at Work," by Michael Lee Stallard, president of E Pluribus Partners. Stallard speaks, teaches and provides consulting serves on leadership and organizational health. Follow Stallard on his blog, Twitter, Facebook, Google+ or on LinkedIn. If you enjoyed this article, join SmartBrief’s e-mail list for our daily newsletter on being a better, smarter leader. Related Posts: Cultivating a culture of creativity Why culture and leadership matter for disruptive innovation The smart creative: How to spot them, how to use them Inspiring creative thinking by debunking common myths Making room for risk in high-performing companies Unleash your organization’s innovation potential originally published by SmartBlogs

What if educators listened to Frozen’s Queen Elsa a little more and "Let it Go"? Technology integration in the classrooms tends to stall when educators get in the way. Schools take steps to prevent this — professional development, educator resources, strategic rollout initiatives — and yet incorporating technology into the classroom remains a challenge for many sites. How do we change this? Here are five ways you can foster true technology integration with your students: Allow students to play on their devices. We encourage them to play with math manipulatives or other resources before getting started with a lesson. Let’s do the same with technology. Give students time to play with a new app/tool when you introduce it. They want to take selfies and draw on their own faces when they first start to work with Skitch. They want to enter silly names when they play their first game of Kahoot. This is good; it allows them to get familiar and comfortable with the app. Implement a work timeline with a paper or digital calendar. This simple addition will give students a visual cue to remember key dates and serve as touchpoints for teachers to check in. Give students choice when they show their learning. Provide a rubric that outlines what they need to do in order to show mastery, but let students decide how. If you are just getting started, consider limiting the choice of apps or tools to a few. Let them show you their learning in a variety of ways. Don’t worry if you don’t know how to use the app/tool. Students will figure it out and become the experts, and ultimately help their peers. Don’t let technology integration stall because you aren’t ready, don’t feel comfortable or hate to lose the teacher-centered model. Let it go. Kristina Peters is the e-learning specialist and school library liaison for the Nebraska Department of Education in Lincoln, Neb. In this role, she supports the Nebraska BlendEd Initiative, advocates for school libraries, spearheads the NeBooks Project, and provides professional learning opportunities in the department and across the state. Kristina is an Authorized Google Education Trainer and has successfully implemented Google Apps for Government at NDE. She serves as a member of the Edcamp Foundation Partners Program, a board member for the Nebraska Educational Technology Association (NETA) and helps organize EdcampOmaha. Connect with her on Twitter @Mrskmpeters ***** Tech Tips is a content collaboration between SmartBrief Education and GreyED Solutions. Have a tech tip to share? Contact us at techtips@greyedsolutions.com Miss a Tech Tip? Visit our Tech Tip archive. ***** Related Posts: No Related Posts Let it go originally published by SmartBlogs

Welcome to SmartBrief Education’s original content series about the unique stories of teacherpreneurs. These are the innovative individuals confronting challenges, creating solutions and challenging the traditional definition of "educator." What do a Kentucky high-school math teacher and a Colorado middle-school literacy teacher have in common? A shared passion for teacher leadership, a commitment to student-centered implementation of the Common Core and the amazing opportunity to connect and work together as virtual colleagues navigating hybrid roles during the past two school years. Two summers ago, we connected at a Center for Teaching Quality leadership retreat for teacherpreneurs. Since then, we’ve supported, coached and challenged each other to balance teaching and leading simultaneously in our respective states. Recently, we came together to reflect on our experiences. In the informal interview that follows, we hope our reflections encourage current and future teacherpreneurs, while providing ideas for school leaders and districts seeking to scale hybrid roles for supporting and sustaining teacher leadership efforts. What might teachers new — or aspiring — to hybrid roles want to consider? JC: While teaching and leading simultaneously is often characterized as "the best of both worlds," working in a hybrid role is also a delicate balancing act which can sometimes feel like a tug-of-war between two distinct scopes of work. If you are an aspiring teacherpreneur, check out Paul Barnwell’s three tips and begin practicing flexibility in your current context. If you are new to a hybrid role, give yourself grace and space to make mistakes, take risks and be comfortable having more questions than answers in the first year. Like classroom teaching, many days will feel well-planned, uber productive and outcome-based, while others will feel unfinished, messy and incomplete. Anthony Colucci’s "The Four I’s of Teacher Leadership" (imagination, independence, inspiration and integrity) is a powerful frame for determining what projects and opportunities offer authentic teacher leadership development. Learning what (and how) to say, "no" is as critical as tackling the "yes’s" on your hybrid-role plate. AW: Your first year in a hybrid role is not dissimilar to your first year of teaching. Remember those simultaneous feelings of exhilaration and exhaustion? You might be so eager to try out your brand new teacher leader wings that you forget that your new opportunity will require a great deal of patience and embracing the art of "figuring things out as you go." Just like teaching, your hybrid role will demand that you find and use your unique voice and perspective (for this is your superpower!), and this process can take time. Be good to yourself, and don’t be discouraged if you feel like you’re not making progress. For many of us (including me), that critical process of claiming your identity as a hybrid teacher is where we learned and grew the most. What advice would we give districts or organizations interested in scaling hybrid roles? AW: Effective teachers have the opportunity to hone their craft over countless hours of professional learning, reflection and teaching experience. Great teachers are not "born," and the same goes for effective leaders. There is a specific skill set that hybrid teachers have to be provided the opportunity to develop, and this takes time, support and resources. JC: I think there are many considerations in the strategic planning phase, but my top two nonnegotiables are: Let the needs of the district (or individual school) and the skill set of the teacher leader applicants drive the design of the roles. Recognize that hybrid-role teachers need support, too. Coaching, mentoring and professional learning tailored to this specific community of practice is critical for success and sustainability. The hybrid role is a career pathway but perhaps not a final destination. What might teachers with experience in hybrid roles do next? JC: As mentioned, working in a hybrid role can often feel like two full-time jobs instead of one role with multiple parts. As I transition from a hybrid role to a full-time leadership role in my school district next year, I’m still reflecting, processing and weighing the benefits and challenges of hybrid roles. I’m looking forward to focusing my energies in one place and serving as a "dream broker" for other teacher leaders who want to create their own teacher leadership pathway. I believe teacherpreneurs are well-positioned to transition to full-time teaching, full-time leadership or design another iteration of a hybrid role depending on their skill set and the needs of their students, school or district. AW: It’s as if you’ve tried the "just right" bowl of porridge and now have to decide between too hot and too cold. I am still trying to figure out what this means for me, but for now I have settled on trying a full-time leadership position working with teachers in my state. Like any transition, this requires the inevitable embracing of an ending, and packing up the classroom that I have called home for over a decade was one of the hardest things I’ve ever done. But my new-found "preneurial" spirit constantly challenges me to try new things. Stay tuned! Q4: Moving forward, what will we take away from this experience? AW: Having been a teacherpreneur, I have a better sense of who I am as a leader. I was fairly confident in my teaching abilities, but very unsure of the education world beyond Room 126 of Lafayette High School. I know now that I am rebellious and optimistic, constantly pushing boundaries and not afraid to speak to what I know is right — for the interests of my students. I know that teacher leadership is at the center of education reform, and I have a strong desire to help my colleagues find their path toward owning their roles as teacher leaders. JC: I agree with Ali. I am a more effective teacher and a more fearless leader because of the support and implicit trust I received as a teacherpreneur. I understand what it means to be treated as a true professional, and as a result, I want all of my colleagues to have leadership and career lattice opportunities. My main takeaway is the power of expanding our networks and connecting and collaborating virtually with educators beyond our own schools and districts. Social media experiences such as Twitter chats have reframed professional learning. Co-authoring blog posts like this one and blogging about teaching and leading experiences helped me understand the power of teachers "going public" with our stories from the field. I want to leverage these connections and experiences to support other teacher leaders to hone their voice, de-privatize their practice and publicly share their expertise. Ali Wright (@alicrowley) is a National Board certified high-school math teacher who has divided her time between leading other teachers as a CTQ teacherpreneur and teaching algebra 2 and AP Calculus for the past two years. With 14 years of classroom experience, Ali will be taking on a new leadership role next year as Professional Learning for Educator Effectiveness coach at the Kentucky Department of Education. Jessica Cuthbertson (@JJCuthy) is a National Board certified middle-school English language arts teacher who has served as a CTQ teacherpreneur for the past three years. A passionate educator and advocate for teacher leadership, Cuthbertson is excited to transition into the role of Teacher Leadership TOSA for Aurora Public Schools and begin to develop a Teacher Leadership Academy and career lattice of opportunities for other educators in her district. You can read more on her blog, "In A Teacher’s Shoes." If you enjoyed this article, join SmartBrief’s email list for more stories about education. We offer newsletters covering educational leadership, special education and more. Related Posts: Hybrid roles: Making a whole out of two halves How to go from "teacher" to "teacherpreneur" From classroom to boardroom: How to combine your passion for education and innovation "The journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step" Transforming the narrative about teaching Path to innovation: Two teacherpreneurs reflect on the journey originally published by SmartBlogs

SmartPulse — our weekly nonscientific reader poll in SmartBrief on Leadership — tracks feedback from more than 190,000 business leaders. We run the poll question each week in our e-newsletter. How do you invest your time and energy in your team members? I spread it around evenly so it’s fair: 38.53% I invest more heavily in low performers: 15.58% I invest more heavily in high performers: 45.89% Change Your View of Time Allocation. Low performers are being shortchanged. Your high performers might not want so much of your time. After all, they’re pretty self sufficient and your "investment" could be seen as "micromanaging" or a lack of trust. You’d be much better off investing your limited "leadership capital" (your time and energy) where it will yield a higher return in terms of improved performance. When you understand the relationship between your investments and team member results and learn to look at it differently, your allocation of time should shift significantly. Mike Figliuolo is managing director of thoughtLEADERS, author of "Lead Inside the Box: How Smart Leaders Guide Their Teams to Exceptional Results" and "One Piece of Paper: The Simple Approach to Powerful, Personal Leadership." Related Posts: How effectively do you recruit and hire outstanding talent? How quickly does your organization make decisions? How does your organization deal with "bad behavior"? How well do you differentiate performance in performance reviews? How well do you push your own thinking before involving others? How do you invest your time and energy in your team members? originally published by SmartBlogs

Sadly, late last month we learned of the sudden death of Ed Gilligan, president of American Express. Gilligan spent his entire business career at American Express and was considered the likely successor to CEO Ken Chenault. Also last month, David Goldberg, CEO of SurveyMonkey and husband of Facebook executive Sheryl Sandberg, died unexpectedly when he fell while exercising on a treadmill in Mexico. These tragedies are unquestionably and, thankfully, infrequent. Nevertheless, they are a reality and remind us that planning for casualty is a necessity both for families as well as the businesses and organizations we all inhabit. Planning can take many forms, but within the context of businesses, it is succession planning that should take center stage. Who is next in line for a role? Jack Welch, the former chairman and CEO of General Electric, was a proponent of succession planning, and GE is often looked upon as the standard by which succession planning should be practiced. In 1991, Welch famously stated, "From now on, choosing my successor is the most important decision I’ll make." This was a full nine years before his anticipated retirement. Recite.com We are all not GE and perhaps do not have the luxury of succession planning over a period of so many years, but nevertheless some forethought is necessary and indeed prudent. Strategy& (formerly Booz & Co.) studied 4,498 succession events. They found top-performing companies, as measured by total return to shareholders, had planned successions 79% of the time, and, coincidentally, hired 79% of their CEOs from inside. Succession planning is actually part of sound strategic planning and risk management. Strategic planning defines the direction of the organization and risk management identifies and attempts to mitigate risk. Human capital, both current and future is an indispensable aspect of any such analysis and discussion. In spite of its importance, succession planning is still not standard operating procedure, as we see evidenced time and again when companies are caught scrambling. According to a survey done last year by the National Association of Corporate Directors, two-thirds (yes, 2 out of 3) U.S. public and private companies admit that they have no formal CEO succession plan. This is the case despite the fact that CEO succession planning is universally considered a critical business-continuity issue. Another concern with succession planning is that it must go beyond the CEO. That is, to fully mitigate risk, succession should be looked at and planned for all of the key leadership positions. In fact, I would venture to say that the further down the organization the planning goes, the better. This, of course, must always be weighed against the cost to the organization of undertaking such activities. Succession planning is a key responsibility of the board of directors as it pertains to the CEO. It is not an isolated activity but rather should be part of the culture and an ongoing point of reflection and discussion. For levels further down in the organization, preparing successors for various roles is part of leadership development and hence central to the responsibilities of management. It should also be mentioned that, from the other side, the prospect of evolving and advancing within one’s organization is usually very motivating and can be a significant retention factor. Unfortunately, the fate of our leaders is unpredictable. The dreadful passing of our leaders is also unpredictable. However some of the chaos that ensues can be managed by having a plan. Why wait? Planning is so worth it! Patricia Lenkov heads up Agility Executive Search, a boutique firm she founded in 2008. Agility provides bespoke search services to companies of all sizes globally. She was previously an executive recruiter with both Heidrick & Struggles as well as Spencer Stuart. You can connect with her at AgilityExecutiveSearch.com. If you enjoyed this article, join SmartBrief’s e-mail list for our daily newsletter on being a better leader and communicator. Related Posts: Advisory boards: The when, why and how Getting succession planning right at Steelcase Turn your board of directors into a key strategic asset 3 ways to reduce risk of managerial failure Elemental and very essential boardroom manners Succession planning for everyone (almost!) originally published by SmartBlogs

The vast majority of us now work in environments where the ability to learn is more critical than what we know and where the most valuable currency is influence, not power. — Liz Wiseman, Rookie Smarts The education landscape has shifted dramatically during the last 10 years. Tablets have replaced textbooks. Students use smartphones during class — for learning. Educators connect online to share best practices. What does the next decade hold for education? What will become the future of schools? Educator and author Will Richardson took on the topic during his ISTE 2015 session, Tech in 10: Effective Teaching for the Next Decade. "‘Knowledge’ isn’t the word any longer. ‘Skills’ is no longer the term. ‘Learning’ is the word," Richardson said, noting that the jobs of tomorrow will require serial mastery. "If our kids don’t have the ability to learn, it really doesn’t matter how much knowledge we give them." "This is a very different world that our kids are stepping into," he said. And educators may need to modernize their classrooms to prepare students for what they are about to meet with in the workplace. Here’s a snapshot of five new realities in education that Richardson highlighted during his session: Access amplifies agency. Ninety-two percent of teens go online on a daily basis, and 75% of kids in the U.S. have access to a smartphone. When students have this kind of access, it amplifies their ability to learn, and they have more agency — more choice — in learning. Learners are designers of their own education. If students — or adults — want to learn something, they don’t often take a course. Instead, they go online and search "how do I…" Access, creation and sharing of information is uncontrollable. Kids are walking into uncontrolled online environments when they leave school. A better solution than controlling it would be to teach kids how to manage the uncontrolled environment. Courses are active compositions. Learning doesn’t happen in a vacuum. Learners may compose as they go. It’s really about: What do I want to learn and how are you going to help me learn it? PD is the responsibility of the professional. If you don’t know how to use Twitter, and you want to learn how, go learn Twitter. Don’t wait for a Twitter workshop. Students are not waiting for workshops, and educators need to be able to learn — and model learning — in this proactive way. "This isn’t just about learning," Richardson said. "It’s about the future of work and wealth." If kids are only able to do routine jobs that are well defined and go by explicit instruction they are not going to be prepared for the workforce because those kinds of jobs are going away. The jobs of tomorrow will require flexibility, creativity and problem-solving, Richardson noted, leaving us to consider this question: "Are we giving kids opportunities in classrooms to learn continually, to adapt, to be persistent, to develop dispositions around which they can continue to learn?" Path to Workforce is SmartBrief Education’s vision of college and career readiness, encompassing K-12, adult learners, career changers, non-traditional students and those who forgo a traditional four-year college experience. Stay tuned for ongoing #Path2W coverage, including model programs, expert insights and reader feedback. If you enjoyed this article, join SmartBrief’s email list for more stories about education. We offer newsletters covering educational leadership, special education and more. Related Posts: CTE: Creating opportunities for students Why we shouldn’t glorify billionaires who dropped out of school How is the U.S. faring in the great #skillsrace? How making expands students’ visions of themselves Raising a ready workforce: The missing curriculum component 5 new realities in education originally published by SmartBlogs

Photo: Flickr user Alexander Baxevanis Dimitris Politopoulos and his team heard their mobile phones ringing as soon as they turned them back on after landing in New York City for the Sunday start of the Summer Fancy Food Show, with calls of concern about the growing economic turmoil back home. The CEO of 776 Deluxe Foods, a producer of olives, oils and honey spreads, joined executives from a long list of other Greek food companies that filled more than three aisles of the trade show’s floor, making connections with the distributors and retailers with the power to help them start or expand their exporting efforts in the U.S. Many of the companies at the Summer Fancy Food Show already export to the U.S., as well as Europe, Canada and Australia, and those international deals grow more critical as the economic turmoil at home continues. On Tuesday, Greece officially defaulted on a $1.7 billion loan payment to the International Monetary Fund, and on Sunday the citizens will vote on a referendum on whether to remain part of the Eurozone. As part of the Eurozone, many Greek food companies have benefited from EU programs that have helped expand their sales worldwide, said Katerina Papaioannou, export manager for Athens-based Olix Oil International. The company exports its oils and olives to 12 countries, including the U.S. under the brand Aphea, named for the Ancient Greek goddess of agriculture. Olix has invested about $20 million in new processing facilities, she said. "I think we are going to stay in Europe." Exporting and the entrepreneurial spirit of Greece’s younger generation will be key to reviving the country’s economy, said 776 CEO Politopoulos. "It used to be that the public sector was big, it was that way for several decades. Now we’re getting back to our traditional roots of production and trade," he said. Politopoulos’s 776 Deluxe Foods derived its name from 776 BC, the year of the first Olympic games in the Delphi region of Greece that produces the olives and other ingredients that go into the company’s products. The venture launched about 18 months ago, and the main focus now is seeking export deals, Politopoulos said. Greek executives at the show were largely optimistic that things will work out, but there were also real concerns about instilling and retaining the confidence of their customers and prospective customers if Greece goes back to the drachma. Another Greek company, Kyknos, celebrated 100 years of operation this year, selling tomato products in cans and BPA-free paper packaging in 20 countries. The company works with local growers, providing them with the tomato seeds and making sure the non-GMO fruit moves from field to factory in three hours, said Exports Consultant Eric Fischer. "Tomatoes are a 60-day crop, and the season starts in about two weeks time," Fischer said. The company employs 45 regular staff and adds 300 seasonal employees who work round the clock to turn out 200 metric tons of tomatoes a day during the two-month period. Many of the seasonal staffers return year after year, he said, and this year will be no different. "We’re very loyal to our employees and they are loyal to us. Greece has been facing a crisis, but we never lowered wages." Stylis Olive Producers Cooperative includes 1,600 small farmers in Central Greece growing for the brand’s olives stuffed with different flavors including orange, lemon and garlic. A few booths down, Arosis CEO Trifon Fotiadis displayed his company’s organic rice, dried beans and Greek Mama Cooks Best brand prepared products. "We work with local farmers who know the business from their grandparents," he said. "Our country is full of problems, but we’re optimistic," he said. "There should be a Greek shelf in every supermarket in the U.S. Americans are a very open people, they want to try things from all over." Restaurateur and cookbook writer Maria Loi — she wrote the official cookbook of the 2004 Athens Olympics — was on hand, acting as ambassador from the Hellenic Chef’s Association. Loi grew up on a farm outside Nafpaktos in Western Greece. She started cooking at age 7, cooked for the family and grew up to be a lobbyist. Her passion for feeding people eventually brought her back to the culinary world and she now operates a restaurant in Greece as well as Loi Estiatorio in New York City. The economic situation at home won’t be solved in a day, she said. "As a Greek, I blame myself. I haven’t done enough for my country. If every one of us exported, we would show to the world we have the pillars of the Mediterranean diet, the Greek diet." __________________________________________________ If you enjoyed this article, join SmartBrief’s email list for more stories about the food and beverage industry. We offer 14 newsletters covering the industry from restaurants to food manufacturing. Related Posts: Simple ingredients and sweet stories flavor the Fancy Food Show Foodies celebrate summer in the city with specialty foods The cultural transformation of the American breakfast 2015 Construction outlook appears good — sort of Retailers, manufacturers ride the wave of gluten-free Greek food companies explore increasing exports amid economic crisis originally published by SmartBlogs

Engagement. Commitment. Morale. Satisfaction. Meaning. Happiness. A lot of terms get kicked around in the human resources field and the so-called "employee engagement" industry to describe the worker attitudes they are trying to attain. Which of these terms is the right objective has lately become a debate. "The idea of trying to make people happy at work is terrible," Gallup CEO Jim Clifton told Fast Company last fall. "Measuring workers’ satisfaction or happiness levels is just not enough to retain star performers and build a successful business," he wrote on his company’s website. Businesses need their employees "engaged," he argues. Pick any two of the terms above, and it’s possible to find a consultant who is against one and in favor of the other, although the main debate has centered on "engagement" versus "happiness." The arguments will continue fruitlessly until there is, first, better agreement on the meanings of the terms and, second, a better appreciation of the bargain employees make with their employers. Recite.com The term employee "engagement" originated with a 1990 Academy of Management Journal paper by Boston University professor William Kahn. It became part of the mainstream business vernacular with the 1999 bestselling book "First, Break All the Rules." Yet a quarter of a century later, there is no common accepted definition of the term. "Some questions remain about how employee engagement differs from other well-researched and documented constructs such as job satisfaction, job involvement, and job commitment," wrote University of Louisville assistant professor Brad Shuck and three coauthors in a 2013 paper titled, aptly enough, "The Jingle Jangle of Employee Engagement." The same is true of "happiness," the pursuit of which is — depending on how one interprets Thomas Jefferson — a selfish quest or a virtuous one. "StrengthsFinder 2.0″ author Tom Rath recently asserted that "the pursuit of meaning — not happiness — is what makes life worthwhile." People in the field — myself included — have written and will write long treatises and book chapters on the subject. The short version is that employee engagement is what the business wants and happiness is what the employees want, and if they each look out for the other’s interest, the bargain works. By its simplest definition, employee engagement is the intensity an employee brings to the job. It’s a connection to the mission of the company, trust in its leadership, willingness to collaborate, and the resulting work ethic that creates a substantial competitive advantage for the firm. Businesses, not employees, sign the check to bring in the experts and tools to improve engagement, so it should not be surprising that the focus of engagement initiatives is primarily on what the employees can do for the company. Happiness — both the steak-for-dinner hedonic kind and the curing-cancer Aristotelian kind — is what employees want in their lives, including in their jobs. Forget what Jefferson meant when he wrote it; 239 years after the ink dried on the parchment, his phrase "the pursuit of happiness" appears to have caught on. The most compelling reasons why happiness should be what a company delivers in return for an employee’s "engagement" are that "happiness" is what they call it and happiness is what they want. The greatest risk to the continued use of the phrase "employee engagement" and to the success of those programs is that it becomes a one-sided arrangement, a sleight of hand that tries to get the employee so "engaged," so wound up on the goals of the company that she fails to attend to her own objectives, whether that’s work-life balance, financial goals, or having a little fun along the way. When the strategy is truly reciprocal, there is no reason why the goals can’t be symbiotic forms of engagement and happiness. The key implication is that a leader who holds back, who fears he or she will spoil the employees by aiming to make them happy, will find he or she gets neither happiness nor engagement. Conversely, the leader who unreservedly wants the best for his or her workers will find they reciprocate with tremendous commitment to the firm and intensity in their work. Rodd Wagner is the New York Times bestselling author of the new book "Widgets: The 12 New Rules for Managing Your Employees As If They’re Real People" (McGraw-Hill, 2015). He is a contributor to Forbes and vice president of employee engagement strategy for BI Worldwide. He can be reached at rodd@widgetsthebook.com. If you enjoyed this article, join SmartBrief’s e-mail list for our daily newsletter on being a better leader and communicator. Related Posts: 3 secrets to building culture and engagement that lasts What employee engagement data can tell you about change management Getting employees to take accountability Are you the wrong type of "engaged" leader? Don’t settle for a less-than-engaging work environment There’s no reason employees can’t be both engaged and happy originally published by SmartBlogs

Lisa was super-friendly and always eager to serve me. She was one of the main reasons I parked my car every week at the off-airport parking facility where she worked. Arriving at Acme Executive Parking, I would pull into the facility and Lisa would be the driver who always rode with me to the terminal. After I got out and retrieved my luggage, she would give me a ticket and then drive my slick-looking sports car back to the lot to park. As a full-service parking facility, Acme could also wash my car, gas it up or change my oil while I was away. When I landed at the end of the week, I called the phone number on the ticket and someone (usually Lisa) would come to the terminal in my car to transport me back to the parking facility to settle my debt. Since I parked there 40 out of 52 weeks and frequently had other services done to my car, I was what you might call a premium customer. I was also a generous tipper! Most of the time when I arrived at the parking facility and Lisa jumped into the passenger side to ride with me to the terminal, she would say, "Now, if I get a chance, I’ll wash your car while you’re gone." I would typically say, "No, Lisa, you don’t have to wash my car." She would persist with, "But I would love to!" It was ritual we joyfully repeated almost every week. And, it was clear it would be a labor of love for her. Remember, I often paid for the car to be washed! Credit: Quozio.com One week, I returned on Friday evening. Someone else came to get me at the terminal. On my dash was a folded, handwritten note on a sheet of paper from a yellow note pad. It was from Lisa. It read: "Sorry I did not wash your car like I said I would do. My boss told me you would be charged the regular price of $15. I thought it was not right to charge you for the wash job. I was only doing it because you are my favorite customer and I love your sports car." Now, here is the punch line! Her note continued: "If you’d like to have your car washed and parked at a good price, I can recommend Mike’s Cleanup Service at 441-5423. Tell Mike you know me and that you park here at Acme. Sorry I couldn’t wash your car, Lisa." Two weeks later, I was told Lisa had taken a job as a receptionist at a large medical center. Innovative service — the type that is ingenious and delightfully unexpected — requires employees have the authority to be experimental and generous in their role. It takes ensuring employees closest to a problem or need have the capacity and permission to make judgments on how a problem is solved or a need is met. But, empowerment does not mean unlimited license, as in, "Just do whatever you need to do." It means responsible freedom. It means helping employees balance the freedom to go the extra mile on behalf of the customer with the responsibility of taking care of the organization. Bottom line, it’s helping employees have the perspective of an owner. Lisa was a great service provider. She cared about me. She cared about the welfare of the vehicle I entrusted with her. Her service attitude would be an asset to any organization on the planet. Except, Lisa deferred exclusively to taking care of the customer while forgetting about the welfare of the organization she fronted. She recommended me to their competitor! Organizations win when employees creatively serve their customers. They lose when those same employees fail to balance service with stewardship — taking care of the customer and the organization. We can speculate about Lisa’s behind-the-scenes treatment, her customer service training, her incentives, orientation and pay. Bottom line, her loyalty to Acme was not strong enough to keep her. Maybe Acme got tired of her "giving away wash jobs" to their best customers. But, the lesson is this: As important as empowerment of employees is to delivering innovative service, so, too, is the encouragement of employee pride in the organization for which they serve as front-line ambassador. Chip R. Bell is a renowned keynote speaker and the author of several best-selling books including The 9½ Principles of Innovative Service. His newest book is "Sprinkles: Creating Awesome Experiences Through Innovative Service." He can be reached at ChipBell.com. If you enjoyed this article, join SmartBrief’s e-mail list for our daily newsletter on being a better, smarter leader. Related Posts: Why leadership capacity is not the goal The best part of leading Lessons from 3 role models Political savvy gets you the promotion you deserve 3 forgotten ways to boost creativity Innovative service takes responsible freedom originally published by SmartBlogs