To-do lists, productivity apps, meditation, morning routines, evening routines -- there are countless ways you could boost your productivity. But, according Richard Branson, the most important one is this: Exercise.

The COVID-19 pandemic has had far-reaching and long-lasting implications for individuals across all aspects of life – health, family, work, and more. Given the impact the pandemic has had on employees, many organizations were prompted to examine the support they provide to them. According to Gartner’s 2020 Well-Being Benchmarking Survey, over three quarters of the 77 U.S.

The business world has changed drastically during the pandemic. It demands innovative ways to speed up the skill acquisition of employees. Training organizations now require a training design that enables much faster development of employees’ skills and performance. Not all training designs are equipped to achieve or support that speed.

That strategy execution is one of the greatest organizational challenges is nothing new. The causes of derailed strategies have been well chronicled — from not actually being strategies, to organization dysfunction and misalignment, to excessive internal focus.

Job burnout is on the rise, according to several surveys. People are feeling emotionally exhausted, detached from their work and colleagues, and less productive and efficacious. This makes them more likely to suffer health consequences, need sick days, and quit their jobs.

A high-paying client calls to say he’ll be in town tomorrow and would like to come meet the team. The manager panics, scrambling to extract the team lead from her country house, the client liaison from the South of France, and Jack … where does Jack even work from these days?

Whatever managers previous fears about remote work, the pandemic has proved that most knowledge workers can get their daily tasks done just as well from their living rooms as from the office. Study after study confirms most people's personal experience that, at least for those without child care, health, or other challenges, productivity has actually inched up with the advent of widespread remote work.

From less social interaction to more opportunities for autonomy, if you’re an introvert, chances are you’ve enjoyed working remotely over the past year plus. On the other hand, if you’re an extrovert, you may have found yourself less productive and more irritable at home, struggling to recreate the external stimuli you had in the office to motivate you.

The Rolodex and the Filofax disappeared a while ago, but we’re still not all using the tools that make it easier to coordinate people and time.

I use Calendly to book various kinds of 1 on 1 discussions. I set it up to have access to certain windows in my calendar.

As the world—cautiously but inexorably—returns to the office, an inescapable concern is how to deal with those who don’t want to return.

That’s a fair question. Some people are going to oppose returning to the office versus working at home. That opposition is legitimate. It could be rooted in work–family balance, flexibility, commuting, workplace distractions, comfort, clothing, conformity, or a hundred other concerns.

Helping employees “live their purpose” may do more to rejuvenate stressed employees than giving them more days off, says best-selling author Daniel Goleman.

What is happiness? Aristotle pondered it, our country’s founders encouraged its pursuit, but only now—thanks to the thriving field of Positive Psychology—have we learned more precisely how to attain and sustain it. In thousands of studies in the last two decades, researchers have watched babies share crackers, put Tibetan monks in brain scanners, asked college students to do kind deeds and explored databases, among other strategies. A major finding has emerged: Happiness is, to a great degree, in our own hands—or more exactly, our own minds.

Since the pandemic began, there’s been a call for managers to be understanding and lenient with employees as they navigate the stressors the global crisis has brought on. Now that restrictions are lifting in many parts of the world, some managers are wondering how to continue to balance compassion for the people on their team and accountability for getting work done.

New research suggests that gratitude plays an indirect role in improving our health.

Being grateful seems to have a lot of positive effects on our lives. In fact, grateful people may have better sleep, healthier hearts, and fewer aches and pains.

We all know what happened last year.

Suddenly, everything turned on a dime. Organizations across all industries — including L&D — had to figure out how to adapt and fast.

12 Driving Forces are personal drivers or motivators; the “why” someone does what they do. Created by TTI Success Insights, 12 Driving Forces helps to uncover and explain a person’s motivating factors. Motivators/ drivers can be thought of as the areas of life that a person is passionate about or things perceived by an individual as important. A person's drivers provide their purpose and direction in life.

How is the issue of personal accountability viewed in your organization? Seasoned workers have undoubtedly seen their share of finger-pointing, dishonesty, and “CYOA.” However, personal accountability is a critical step toward improving leadership. When people are accountable for their own decisions, work, and results, the effectiveness of an organization can greatly increase.

Nic spent most of her childhood avoiding people. She was raised by a volatile father and a mother who transferred much of the trauma she’d experienced onto her daughter. The combination left Nic fearful and isolated. “My primitive brain was programmed to be afraid of everybody, because everybody’s evil and they’re gonna hurt you,” she told me. (Nic asked to be referred to by only her first name to protect her privacy.)

We are often asked into organizations to present workshops on “building resilience” — giving managers the tools to help their employees manage anxiety and improve their ability to respond to change and recover from challenges. Perhaps, as a learning and development (L&D) professional, you have been tasked with developing a similar program for your organization or clients.

The TTI SI research team is always hard at work to uncover the industry insights and patterns of behavior that you need to know. Our latest Research Cliffnotes is called What Assessments Revealed About Gender & Skills Development in University Students.