Happy hours have become a staple at many organizations, especially startups. While I believe they're well intentioned and usually seen as a way to help team members bond and blow off steam, I'm officially over them. In fact, I'd go so far as to recommend that companies considering completely replacing work-sponsored happy hours with something else this year! **cue audible gasp** Listen, I get it. I myself enjoy a good drink. That said, there are three big reasons I am recomme

Creating better work environments is not about every day being sunshine and rainbows. It's not about ignoring hard work. Or not caring about profit. It's about basic workplace rights everyone deserves in this day in age. You deserve to have a boss that treats you with respect. You deserve to work in an environment free of harassment, sexual or otherwise. You deserve a challenging, but manageable workload. You deserve to live a life not consistently overcome with work anxiety.

If there's been one constant throughout my life, it's reading. Since I can remember, I've been obsessed with books of all kinds. As a kid, I was the one curled up in my room with a Phillip Pullman novel while my brother covered every inch of the neighborhood on his bike. In college, I still found plenty of time to read for fun - which everyone thought was crazy, given how much reading we already had to do for class. Throughout my career, I've turned to dozens of different boo

While I love sharing my thoughts with you here, I'm so excited about the opportunity to share some of my insights with the community over at Fresh Brewed Tech, an online publication that features amazing founders, technologists, companies in San Diego. Each month I dig into the culture of a local San Diego company, getting to the bottom of their employee experience and how they're building intentional company culture. Today my second feature launched - a peek into life at

It's becoming incredibly common for people to mistake perks for company culture. Ask any variety of people about their culture strategy and they will tell you about their party planning committee or the new ping pong table they ordered for the office. And it makes sense! Perks are tangible things that you can easily wrap your head around, while culture is this intangible presence that's much harder to describe. Now don't get me wrong. I'm all about perks! They are a great way

Every August, I head back to my home state of Minnesota to spend time with my family. More often than not, we end up at the Minnesota State Fair and this year was no exception. When I wasn't consuming deep fried pickles (don't knock 'em until you've tried 'em) or Sweet Martha's cookies, I found myself in awe of all the state pride around me. There was no shortage of people wearing t-shirts emblazoned with state-pride centric phrases that had nothing to do with sports. It hit

Earlier this month, I had the pleasure of facilitating some focus groups for a client in Michigan. One of the participants stopped me after her focus group and simply said "Thank you for listening" before continuing on her way. I could see in her eyes just how much she meant it. Thank you for listening. Not thank you for changing our culture. Not thank you for improving our work environment. Not thank you for understanding. Simply, thank you for listening. It reminded me just

"I wish they would have told me!" It's the number one thing I hear from leaders when their best employees leave the company. My response is always the same. "Did you ask?" More times than not, I get a sheepish smile in return. "I guess I never did..." Bingo. When is the last time you asked their employees what they were thinking? Not how their current project is going, but how they're doing at the company. My guess is it's been a while - and you're not alone in that! We get s