I admit I am a bit of a location snob. Having grown up in a large suburb 15 minutes from the city, then living in an actual city for most of my 20s, I am little biased when it comes to anything beyond those places. That’s where my comfort zone is, and I am fully aware of the limitations it puts on me! So when I was offered to do some Connecting with Respect work in a less than urban or even suburban area, I was kind of nervous, but [...]

Imagine that each and every day you are wearing an invisible backpack. And that the people you interact with either add to it with positive or negative emotions. At the end of the day, how heavy is your emotional backpack? This is a metaphor that stems from our Connecting With Respect program that we lead for organizations. In this program, we ask participants to explain (in behavioral and actionable) terms what respect and disrespect feel like. We then go on to explain how those behaviors create the emotions that end [...]

Value the many different sources of knowledge that exist is one of the Rules of Engagement that we use in our program, and it is also the theme of my latest installment in the adventures of cultural tourist. I began this series last month with an introduction and this month I’ll take you on my first adventure: attending a worship service at an African-American church. Religion in our country is often a very personal and very segregated experience. I’ll admit that my own religious experience is limited to sporadically attending Catholic services, attending [...]

After I participated in our most recent Connecting With Respect workshop, I had an idea for a new blog series. At the conclusion of the day and half session, we were left with some tips for moving forward on the path to respect. One of the suggestions stuck in my mind: practice curiosity. I’ve always been a person curious about other cultures. I mean I am the same person who, while in high school, enrolled in an Intercultural Communications class at a local college. On my travels and in my life, [...]

Like most people, I woke up yesterday morning and was greeted by a somewhat new interface on my Facebook page. The changes were minor but enough to disrupt my usual routine. It was apparent that what I was looking for was much more difficult to find and everything else seemed to be overly complicated. I wasn’t the only one having difficulty adjusting to these changes. I checked  my news feed and saw post after post of people complaining about the new look of their home page and how much they [...]

*This article first appeared on the Politics of the Workplace website. There are tons of rules in society, some written and some implicit— a red light means stop and most people obey. In the workplace there are established rules of respect as well.  For example, if you physically assault someone, steal, or don’t show up for work, it’s likely you will be fired. For the most part, most employees have grasped those rules, but it tends to be the unspoken, often unwritten rules of behavior that cause the most problems in [...]

Earlier this week, along with over 30 million other viewers, I watched President Obama’s heartfelt speech at the memorial for the Tucson shooting victims. Like his predecessors after similar national tragedies, The President of the United States called on us all, as Americans, to make a change for the better. But will we? We’ve been down many similar roads and seemed to have failed and went back to our old ways. Remember 9/11? Of course, you do. You probably even remember exactly where you were when you heard the news. I know I [...]

Today is UN-declared Human Rights Day. It is a day devoted to promoting dignity and respect for all humans. The theme this year is Speak Up, Stop Discrimination and focuses specifially on the defenders of human rights and acknowledges them for all their hard work. To learn more about the work of these human rights defenders, the UN has developed an amazing website that allows you to: Read their inspiring stories Watch videos with messages from top leaders at the UN Take a quiz to determine how much you know [...]

I was recently inspired by this blog post on recognition. In it, the author focused not only on good forms of recognition but also created a list of the best approaches to use recognition in the workplace. I decided to work off that list to create a similar one for respect in the workplace. 1. Anyone Can Give Respect. It doesn’t just have to be a bottom up or top down approach. Feel free to respect your co-workers too! 2. Anyone Can Receive Respect. Same as above. Respect is not reserved [...]

Not too long ago I came across a blog post – My Passion for Great Workplaces Comes from Hellish Boss Experience – that resonated with me. Kevin Kennemer of the People Group, LLC wrote a deeply personal account about how he got into the business of championing great workplaces. It got me to thinking about my own story, and how I ended up promoting respectful workplaces.