Now there is a study to back up what everyone knows: the Gallup Management Journal reports on how workplace socializing actually increases productivity.
An Easy Way to Measure the Creative Environment of Your Organization
Creativity in the business world involves continuously asking “What if . . . ?” Yet when faced with a problem, people tend to quickly lock into “how to” — a quick solution — before exploring all the options.
An easy way to measure the creative environment in an organization is to count how often someone in the company asks questions like “What if we frame the problem this way?” “What if we look at the relationships between these variables?” “What if we explore these options?”
HBR On What Really Motivates Workers
Daniel Pink summarizes an insightful article in the latest HBR on what really motivates workers.
Here is the main idea, which is interesting because it goes beyond simply saying that intrinsic motivation surpasses external motivation:
Amabile tracked the day-to-day activities and motivations of several hundred workers over a few years and found that their greatest motivation isn’t external incentives, but something different: Making progress (or what Drive calls “mastery” — the urge to get better and better at something that matters.)
So a key motivator is making progress. Good insight. Pink gives some more helpful quotes from the article in his post as well.
The article is a part of HBR’s “10 Breakthrough Ideas for 2010,” and I think you can obtain (purchase–sorry) it here.
NY Times Ready to Charge for Online Readers
They haven’t made a final decision yet, but it looks like they will soon, and that it will involve charging. This is an interesting development as newspapers try to figure out their business model in the new environment.
Massachusetts Vote Could Bring an End to the Health Reform Bill
Very interesting turn of events, which could prevent the very wrong-headed health reform bill from being able to pass:
Voter disenchantment in liberal Massachusetts with President Barack Obama’s policies has turned a Senate election into a nail-biter that could imperil U.S. healthcare reform.
Democrats envisioned a smooth passing of the baton in the January 19 special election to fill the seat of the late Edward Kennedy, a political giant who died of brain cancer in August after holding the seat for 46 years.
A victory would maintain the Democrats’ 60-seat Senate majority, allowing them to overcome Republican procedural hurdles that could block reform of the $2.5 trillion healthcare sector, Obama’s top legislative priority.
Instead, some polls say the race between State Attorney-General Martha Coakley, 56, and her Republican opponent, State Senator Scott Brown, is too close to call.
“The closeness of the race reflects deep voter dissatisfaction with how the president and the congressional majority are dealing with vital matters,” including healthcare and the war on terror, said Mark Landy, a political science professor at Boston College.
For my view on health reform, see my posts The Worst Bill Ever and How Health Savings Accounts–Not New Laws–Are the Key to Health Reform.