"Communicating with IMPACT" - Patrick Donadio, MBA

One of my executive coaching clients recently hired me to help his team plan their fall department wide retreat. In our conversation today one of his team memberse asked me, "What do you see as the top five mistakes teams make when planning and executing a retreat?" Here was my answer: Top Five Mistakes Executives Make When Planning/Executing a Retreat: Presenters present information in a lecture/talking head format (boring…) (Presentation Tips) Retreat is not planned/tied to some specific outcomes See the retreat as an event (the end) not a process (the beginning) The ending of the retreat is a let down Little or no action happens after the retreat (or slow to act on ideas) (Organize/Plan) Next time you begin planning a retreat consider avoiding these. Do you have any examples of other retreat mistakes you have seen? Let me know. E-mail me at Patrick@PatrickDonadio.com

I was talking with one of my executive coaching clients today in a coaching session and the topic of employee morale come up. In a recent survey his employees were asked to evaluate “morale” at work. Morale is such a broad subject to evaluate. It can mean different things to different people. One thing I know for sure, whenever studies are conducted on "what motivates your people", being appreciated is on the top of the list . Motivating Employees One recent survey was developed by Accountemps , the world’s first and largest specialized staffing service for temporary accounting, finance and bookkeeping professionals. The survey was conducted by an independent research firm and includes responses from more than 1,400 CFOs from a stratified random sample of U.S. companies with more than 20 employees and 536 full- or part-time office workers. Here is what they found to be the top three: Frequent recognition of accomplishments CFO’s-30% Employees-35% Regular communication with