20 years of marriage
Over Easter, Fraser and I celebrated being married 20 years and together 25 years. We were going to go to Ibiza and renew our vows on a beach but covid … Continue reading
The 3 secret words to feeling better
The last 12 months have been surreal, stressful and bizarre. It’s been hard to focus when things in the world are so crazy and you didn’t know week to week … Continue reading
Surprising HR and management truths from the Queen’s Gambit
Yes I have been binge watching Netflix recently (you have to do something when you’re in semi-lockdown). The Queen’s Gambit was a brilliant series – about a chess prodigy who … Continue reading
Is this missing from your life?
John Lennon once sang ‘Life is what happens when you’re making other plans’. In this case I’m going to have to disagree with him because I love making plans! Fraser … Continue reading
What Bridgerton can teach us about HR and management
Yes I thought my first new blog should be about something very serious and it involves the hit Netflix series Bridgerton. That may not sound serious but bear with me … Continue reading
I’m back!
It’s been 3 years since I last blogged and the other day I realised that I missed it. Writing helps me sort out my thoughts about various things happening in … Continue reading
The seasons of HR
It’s cold, wet and windy in New Zealand and even though winter isn’t officially supposed to start until June, it’s pretty much arrived. I used to love to see the … Continue reading
The HR Metric that can blow minds
I was once working in an insurance company and the Head of Credit came to see me. “I’ve got a poor performer on my hands” he said. “In what way?” … Continue reading
What the tech? 3 case studies of how companies are using HR technology
At the HR Game Changer Conference in March we had a great session on What the Tech? This explored how companies are using HR technology. In this article I wanted … Continue reading
The Future of E-learning (part 2)
Last week Robyn Viljoen from Modlettes shared her thoughts on the future of e-learning. This week we meet Sussan Ockwell, Director of Optimism (pictured on the left at the L&D … Continue reading
The Future of E-learning (part 1)
I remember back in the early 2000’s when e-learning first appeared. Even though it was clunky and expensive at the time, there were many articles saying that L&D teams would … Continue reading
Being an Authentic HR Leader
Can you be yourself in an HR role? Or do you have to a ‘professional’ version of yourself? At the HR Advisors Conference in February, we discussed being an Authentic … Continue reading
The real reason it’s unacceptable for Jacinda Ardern to be pregnant
Last week saw the announcement that Jacinda Arden and partner Clarke Gayford are expecting their first child, due in June. There was instantly a social media furore of commentary about … Continue reading
I’m not a feminist but……
Unless you’ve been living under a rock, you will have seen or heard about the Golden Globes a couple of weeks ago. While there was some focus on the winners, … Continue reading
What follows a horrible year?
2016 was pretty awful for many reasons. The Brexit vote unleashed a torrent of hatred and abuse in the U.K. That guy from the Apprentice (as my brother calls him) actually … Continue reading
Poo fingers and remuera housewives
Once upon a time, in the Auckland suburb of Remuera, people started to get ill. Very, very ill. The kind of ill when it is coming out of both ends. … Continue reading
I’m failing badly…..
Some of you may have seen back at the start of November I signed up for NanoWrimo (National Novel Writing Month). During the month you write 1,667 words a day … Continue reading
Are you getting the right 5+ a day? (and it’s not vegetables!)
We’ve all had the 5+ a day message drilled into us about eating vegetables, but there’s another 5+ that makes you far happier with life. Currently Fraser and I are … Continue reading
Are you Curtis Stone or the Chipotle guy?
One of the short lived reality TV series I enjoyed was where teams competed to launch a restaurant chain. The hosts of the show were Curtis Stone, an Aussie chef … Continue reading
Stop going to boring conferences
On Wednesday we tried an experiment and ran a one-day conference that condensed and summarised a whole lot of ideas from the Elephant HR advisors conferences in London, Wellington and … Continue reading
Why good managers don’t get promoted
I’ve now trained thousands of people managers through the Management Bites programme and I know there are some good ones out there. These are managers that their team respects, who … Continue reading
10 Awesome Diversity Initiatives
We know the research says that diverse organisations do better than homogenous ones. But how can you really build a culture of diversity and inclusion? I’ve search the globe for … Continue reading
Forest fires, idiots & HR policies
Last week we were back in the US re-visiting one of my two favourite cities of 2017 – Portland, Oregon. (I will reveal the other favourite in a later post….) … Continue reading
How does the British Empire link to your development plan?
Now we’ve launched Elephant in the U.K., we spend a few months a year in blighty. That’s as much of the bureaucratic culture that exists here as we can take. … Continue reading
Magic ways to train when your managers are flung far and wide!
The traditional way to train managers was to work out what areas they needed to build skills in and then run a programme of facilitated workshops to cover those skills. … Continue reading
How to make your employees cry
One of my biggest discoveries as a new people manager was that managing people was much harder than it looked! I was 25 years old, HR Manager for a national … Continue reading
Psychology and HR – new ideas for your HR development plan!
Are you stuck with where to develop your HR career next? Wanting to stretch your HR knowledge further? This might be the answer! A few years ago when the HR … Continue reading
Performance Reviews are NOT dead!
You’ve probably seen or read at least one article about the performance review being dead. About how people find them demotivating and disengaging and that companies are throwing them out. … Continue reading
Is this your biggest pitfall?
Every conference that we run at Elephant, I put so much into it that I’m pretty exhausted the following day and can’t do much useful work. I know this from … Continue reading
Building Resilience
Have you ever suffered a horrific loss in your life? Have you gone through something incredibly traumatic? Many of us have, and at the time it can feel extremely … Continue reading
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