Quick Hits

Alexi Bracey started us off by that accepting that mistakes will happen is part of being resilient for her. Not expecting perfection makes it easier to move forward when things don’t go as planned. She also recommends doing things to take care of yourself and feed your soul.   Mario P. Fields says that there are things in life that you go into knowing they will be a challenge, going into the Marin...

Being new to a team comes with all kinds of anxieties and stressors. Coach M J Tolan suggested we start with respect and intentional listening to understand who the players are and what that team is doing.   Todd Karges added that relying on the existing onboarding structure could be risky – sometimes it’s not very good. Make sure you go in being curious about the people and how you and your work...

This was a particularly interesting conversation for me because, while I do have quite a bit of education, I spent 14 years working in the corporate world before I ever went to college. When I went, I had a foundation of real-world experience to build on.   Kevin Wash started this conversation by saying his experience in Europe, where education rules, is very different from his experience in the M...

Karen Loomis opened the conversation with the idea that saying “thank you” is something that should be expected no matter the size of the thing – someone holds a door for you? “Thank you.” Someone gifts you money? “Thank you.”   But is saying “thank you” one size fits all? If not, what is the next thing? What is expected?   Cami Travis-Groves then added that if someone is giving or doing something...

Being in the communications space, Philip Tate was keen to start this conversation and he brought some real-world experience. In the PR world they have the RPIE model. It stands for - Research, Planning, Implementation and Evaluation and can be used to take something from ethereal to strategic.   Tim Hawkes went next. A self-proclaimed “people guy” he talked about the banking community’s view, all...

This question stemmed from a previous Quick Hits where we talked about how to give someone really bad news ( https://youtu.be/f1fiA0bhtfc ). This is the flip-side, when someone tells you bad news.   Dr Cole Galloway started us of with sage advice – engage like a human. Put the business and professional airs aside and really connect with them. Say that it is awful. Meet them where they are. And don...

Brandon Mahoney started us off by saying time. There real is no shortcut to learning about someone.   Jim Tam looks at how someone treats people who can’t do anything for them as a signal to who someone is.   Inga Hebdon countered that someone might just have a bad day so you need to give them a second chance (which aligns with the time aspect).   Are first impressions permanent? Brandon thinks no...

Laura Agafitei started us off by saying in the professional space she is quick to ask, how is this related to the topic we are discussing? Conversely, personally she is more likely to create some space for the person to share is she is able to listen.   Atif Agha agreed that in a professional relationship there are somethings that are better for you not to know. If someone starts oversharing, get...

Dr Jesse Carrie likes to start by having a conversation and letting the person know they are making things difficult for other people and giving them the opportunity to change.   Bo Short brought up that people who are good at sales can be more difficult to work with because they challenge. As long as they are challenging in a productive way, that is okay and even a good thing.   Rick Alcantara po...

I was surprised that this conversation got a little chippy towards the end. Particularly when you realize, I think we all agreed on the main answer to the question.   We started here:   Did you know that marketing professionals are often omitted from answering marketing surveys? Karen Loomis shared that is because marketing people think about marketing differently and could skew survey results. (B...

Philip Tate kicked us off with a story of someone doing a terrible job of delivering the news that someone was being let go from their job. If nothing else awful people can serve as a bad example.   Camille Diaz added that she believes that giving someone bad news and then trying to comfort them by saying, “everything happens for a reason” is simply horrible. It takes away your power and is tellin...

Cole Galloway started us off by saying it is easy to be our biggest critic because we know all the “bad” stuff about ourselves. We’ve been around for all the mistakes. But he added that we can also be our own biggest fan by remembering all the good stuff too.   Lisa McDonald pointed out that we aren’t taught to look at the positives. Being your own critic is kind of accepted but if you are your ow...

Tim Hawkes started us off strong by talking about fighting against selfishness and even Catholic guilt. And that a kindness is kind if it delivers a benefit. Whether it is selfish or not doesn’t matter.   Dave Roberts agreed that there can be ulterior motives to being kind; suggesting that if someone is trying to improve their status in the world by doing something for someone, that isn’t kindness...

Dr Laura Dowling started us off a little differently this time by reading from her book about the dark side and the light side of taking revenge.   Sara Oblak Speicher then took us in a direction I had not thought about – the desire of an athlete to “revenge” a loss, which offsets the work of practicing and drives the desire to play harder. She also related it to the feeling you get when you’re to...

This conversation was hard and is as close to a political conversation as Quick Hits has ever been. Human rights is a touchy subject in general, but trying to figure out what makes something a basic right, that needs more than 10 minutes.   Kevin Wash started us off strong with the idea of anything that preserves human dignity.   Gary Fredericks added taking care of people and brought up healthcar...

Being snobby is so insidious it is viewed as entertainment on reality TV. We inherently know what it means, but could you define it? Do you know when you are being snobby?   Those are some of the questions I asked today’s panel.   Fallon Siniscarco took the first crack at defining it, suggesting that is has to do with thinking you are better than someone else. And even more, that you have a superi...

This conversation started in a very different direction than I expected.   I asked the question because and athlete client and I were talking about how the angst of wanting more or to be better if motivating.   That made me wonder if happiness and contentment were related to a lack of motivation.   All three of the panelists said no. That they thought happiness was a driver for being MORE motivate...

I don’t know why but I did not expect my panelists to have had so much personal experience with this question. The fact that each of us has been in a situation where our friendship was unreciprocated makes me wonder if it happens to everyone.   And if it happens to everyone, does that mean everyone does it? (a question for a different conversation)   Joey Robert Parks started us off by sharing a s...

As with many of the topics we talk about here the answer to this one is – sometimes but not always.   If you are playing poker or involved in a negotiation, it might be ideal that someone not be able to tell what you are thinking.   But in everyday life, micro expressions are part of how we unconsciously decide if we can trust someone (I shared a relevant story during the conversation).   If you a...

If you have never been a panelist on Quick Hits, you likely don’t know that saying the names for the introduction is hard for me. Even easy names can trip me up. It once took me five tries to say “Christina” correctly.   It’s a good laugh for everyone and I just edit it out.   But this time Tim Hawkes had to call me out. My intention was good. I had practiced Francesca Zampaglione’s last name and...

The short answer to this is (sadly) that you should assume there won’t be any confidentiality. Anything you say to anyone at work is likely to be repeated.   Atif Agha pointed out that on the record most organizations will only say, “yes, they worked here” if they are asked for employment information. But individuals within an organization are not nearly as decerning.   Christina Kelley added that...

Rick Alcantara started us off by looking at it from a business perspective. If you aren’t getting what you need from a vendor or if a client isn’t paying their bills, it is pretty straightforward that it is time to go your separate ways.   Laura Agafitei wants to give people second chances. She will discuss what isn’t working and see if anything changes. Once she sees a pattern of things not happe...

We came up with several different kinds of business or organizational trust. Business to business. Person to business. Alexi brought up employee to business. And the I-don’t-have-a-choice-I-have-to-use-your-services “trust” that we might have with business like the cable company.   We didn’t talk about personal trust as much.   Tim Hawkes mentioned it a couple of times - There is something about f...

If you enjoy learning and going down the rabbit trail to see what information leads to the next, it is easy to get lost in researching.   Brandon Mahoney avoids this by giving himself a deadline of when he has to be done with the research and start putting it into action.   Catherine Fitzgerald agreed that she has a lack of motivation unless she has a deadline.   Stewart Wiggins thought about it f...

Defining common sense is not as easy as you might think! But I do know that being told you have no common sense is meant as an insult.   Michael Davis started us off by saying that physical things, like not walking in front of a speeding car or touching a hot stove – that’s pretty easy to say it’s common sense. But moral and ethical things – that’s harder.   One thing for sure, we learn common sen...