Lisette Sutherland is the director of Collaboration Superpowers, a company that helps people work together from anywhere through online and in-person workshops. She also produces a regular podcast featuring interviews with remote working experts highlighting the challenges and successes of working with virtual teams. In this Q&A interview, we discuss her latest book, "Work Together Anywhere" and how it could help you work in a virtual team. Q: Why did you write "Work Together ... Read More
Virtual Teams for Dummies – Q&A with Tara Powers
Tara Powers is an award-winning expert on talent and leadership development, and she's the founder & CEO of Powers Resource Center. She’s worked with over 200 companies and more than 15,000 leaders building programs and launching initiatives that deliver high impact for her clients. Her leadership programs have earned her recognition as a Top 10 Leadership 500 Award winner by HR.com, and she was recognized in Colorado Business Magazine as a Woman to Watch. In this Q&A interview, ... Read More
How to Stop Unwanted Behavior Without Sounding Rude [Video]
In an HBR article entitled "A Simple Way to Be More Assertive (Without Being Pushy)," Professor Andy Molinsky references an assertive formula from a book called People Skills book by Robert Bolton. It's a great formula that will help you stop unwanted behavior by a colleague without sounding rude. Check out the video to learn all about that formula and how you can use it in the workplace. Learn more: Read my "Influencing Virtual Teams" Amazon best selling book Subscribe to my ... Read More
How to Avoid The Curse of Knowledge [Video]
Learn how to avoid the Curse of Knowledge with your team in 3 easy steps. In the video, I discuss the famous Tappers & Listeners study which was conducted by Elizabeth Newton back in 1990. Learn more: Read my "Influencing Virtual Teams" Amazon best selling book Subscribe to my YouTube Channel Follow my Facebook Page Check out Made To Stick by Chip & Dan Heath ... Read More
Why the Future of Work is Virtual [Video]
I believe the future of work is virtual. I work from home, and this is the story of how I got my current job at Cisco Systems. The talk is about "The Future of Work," which I gave at the NewCon conference in South Africa to explain the trend of both working and learning from home. I couldn't present at the conference live due to the timezone difference between Boston & South Africa (I was scheduled to talk at 2:30am my time - which would have been a disaster!), so I pre-recorded the ... Read More
9 Trust Building Activities for Virtual Teams
One of the primary prerequisites for any successful virtual team is to establish trust among your team members. This post will give you simple and easy to implement trust building activities that will help you build a solid level of trust within your team. Let's start with what trust actually means. What is trust? Here’s one definition: Trust is the assured reliance on the character, ability, strength, or truth of someone or something. (from Merriam-Webster) Although this is a ... Read More
How to Facilitate a Meeting [Includes FREE Meeting Agenda Template and Meeting Minutes Template]
This post will give you everything you need to know about how to facilitate a meeting. You'll learn what you need to do before your meeting, during your meeting, and after your meeting to run it effectively. As a bonus, I'll also give you a free meeting agenda template and a free meeting minutes template that you can download and use instantly with your own team. Quick side note: This post is an excerpt from my bestselling book Influencing Virtual Teams, and the meeting minutes template ... Read More
A cheap standing desk solution
I don’t want to die. I sit down for 12+ hours a day in my home office. Sitting for that long every day is definitely going to kill me. And the fact that I binge on junk food every now and then makes things worse. (I have a sweet tooth – can’t help it) This standing desk craze isn’t some fad. Just google “sitting kills you” and read all the science-based research on this stuff. There’s study after study after study proving that "sitting is the new smoking." To make things worse, sitting ... Read More
How to Set Up a Telecommuting Policy for your Company the Right Way
A short while ago, I was invited to speak (along with a panel of experts) about how to set up a telecommuting policy for your company. The webinar was organized by AgilQuest - a company that offers software and services solutions for the mobile workforce - and moderated by Doug Lucy, AgilQuest's director of marketing. The webinar was divided into two main parts: Part 1 was about organizations that are just starting out with a new telework or flexible work strategy, and what they should ... Read More
Webinar Replay: Building Trust in Your Virtual Team
I had a great conversation with a team of experts about building and increasing trust in your virtual team. Here is the webinar replay if you missed it (click play on the YouTube video below to watch it). I highly recommend you watch it, especially if you work as part of a virtual team or manage a remote workforce. Dr. Howard B. Esbin of PlayPrelude, and Lisette Sutherland, of Collaboration Superpowers hosted the webinar on Google Hangouts. The panel also included Alexey ... Read More