You can feel a culture change at work before you can chart it. The air gets heavy. The jokes at the all-hands meeting don’t quite land, decisions stretch like taffy at the State Fair, and the most polite people in
The Tyranny of Mandated Merriment
Shannon stood in the fluorescent-lit conference room, a paper plate of stale cookies in one hand and a name tag proclaiming “Holiday Elf #7” in the other. The air was thick with forced cheer and the faint desperation of middle
The Family Business: When Kinship and Commerce Collide
Let’s rewind to 1913. After being widowed, my great-grandmother Ella Sindorf took over Sindorf’s “Staples and Fancy Groceries” on Hadley Street in Milwaukee, WI. A businesswoman by necessity, not by design, she ran the show. Eventually, her son – my
The Leadership Retreat: Are Off-Sites On Point…or Not?
Once a year – sometimes twice, if the budget is healthy – senior leaders everywhere stuff their laptops, a few branded fleece vests, and a stack of lofty intentions into roller bags and head for venues with uplifting names like
