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How to Dissuade Your Boss from Making a Bad Decision If your boss is about to make a decision that you think is a bad one, it's important to be mindful of how you address your concerns. Even if all your points are valid, if you make them in a brash or condescending manner, it won't matter. Here are some tips for dissuading your boss from a bad choice in an effective way. |
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For Distributed Team Success, Think Differently about When For distributed teams, activities usually get scheduled based on constraints such as availability and time zone, but people don’t often take into account when the most effective time to meet would be. Neglecting people’s work tendencies and schedule preferences could make it harder for the team to be successful. |
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Handling the Emotional Turmoil of Organizational Change Chaos, confusion, and emotional turmoil are not unusual during major organizational change. Nevertheless, even people at the top sometimes minimize the impact of the change on employees—and on themselves. Worse, they sometimes do so dismissively. It's important not to underestimate the challenge of managing change. |
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How Testers Can Collaborate with the ScrumMaster ScrumMasters serve the team by providing facilitation and coaching, but they also have many challenges. Those in testing roles are in a good position to collaborate with the ScrumMaster to improve agile processes. Here are some ways testers can partner with, support, and assist the ScrumMaster—and the rest of the team. |
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How Face-to-Face Meetings Can Heal Team Conflicts When distributed teams have a conflict, it's easy for one team to place the blame entirely on the other and even start to think of them as disagreeable, incompetent, and worse. This fault-finding can be especially bad when the parties have never met. Face-to-face meetings can make all the difference in improving trust. |
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The Hidden Benefit of One-on-One Manager Meetings Managers may frame one-on-one meetings as a way to “support employees” and check to see if the employee “needs to meet this week.” Supporting an employee is a primary goal of these meetings, but the value of one-on-one time to managers—and the importance of building trust with employees—also should be prioritized. |
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During Times of Major Change, Keep People Informed During times of major change, readily available information can help reduce the fears of those affected about what it means for them. If you’re involved in implementing change, it’s wise to keep people informed—not just about the change itself, but also about its impact on processes, responsibilities, and expectations. |
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The Manager’s Role on a Self-Organizing Agile Team Scrum and other agile methods focus on team roles and dynamics, and because of the emphasis on self-organizing teams, there’s sometimes a misconception that there’s no need for a manager. In reality, good people management can help an agile team thrive—the manager just has to know how to empower the team. |
