Head Tale

Throwback Thursday – #tbt – Jan Lake Lodge (July 2014)

With the wildfires burning in northern Saskatchewan (and really, across much of Canada’s north), I can’t help but think of the handful of times I’ve been able to travel to the north of the province for vacations or even work.

This was a fishing trip we did with Shea’s family in 2014.

¶ Posted 12 June 2025 § Family § MemoryLane § Photo § Sad § Saskatchewan § Shea § ThrowbackThursday § Travel ‡ Comments (0) ° Tagged: camping, saskatchewan, science, travel

Wisdom Wednesday – HR Rebranding as People & Culture is a Really Dumb Trend

HR doesn’t set the culture, the leaders do.

So look at the top leaders – how do they act? How do they treat people? How do they support people? How do they enable people to do their best work? Are they well-liked by staff? Do staff even know who they are? (If they don’t, do they introduce themselves or just say “hello” when they come to your location?). Do they admit when they make mistakes? Do they apologise? Do they treat the people below them the same as they treat people at their level?

To put it another way, ask yourself – who does the HR/People & Culture Manager report to? That person has infinitely more power to set the culture of an organization than the HR manager.

I have my own example of this – I was working at RPL’s HR Unit (now rebranded as People & Culture – which is totally not the inspiration for this post in the first place!) years ago with the HR Manager and a senior Manager on a project to focus on “core competencies”. The senior managers who was leading the project said to the assembled librarians we were presenting our work to “We’ve brought you here because you represent 80% of our workers in this organization.”

And when he said that, I remember thinking – why isn’t 100% of staff represented? And why is the only person in that room who had more power than any of the people representing the 80% not acknowledging they have more power to set culture than any of the 80% in the room?

@strategytips

Bad Trend in Offices ? Join me next week for a free workshop on 3 Skills To Survive As A Strategy Director. If this interests you, Register via the link in my bio. #communication #meetings #communicationskills #strategicthinking #strategiccommunication #corporatelife

? original sound – Julian Cole | Strategy Trainer – Julian Cole | Strategy Trainer

¶ Posted 11 June 2025 § Jobs § MemoryLane § Wisdom Wednesday § Work ‡ Comments (0) ° Tagged: education, language, orgdevl

Inject It Straight Into My Veins…

¶ Posted 10 June 2025 § Canada § Sports ‡ Comments (0) ° Tagged: alberta, hockey

Music Monday – “When we woke up that morning we had no way of knowing/That in a matter of hours we’d change the way we were going/Where would I be now, where would I be now if we’d never met?/Would I be singing this song to someone else instead?”

“Something Changed” – Pulp

¶ Posted 09 June 2025 § MemoryLane § MusicMonday § PopCulture § UK ‡ Comments (0) ° Tagged: music

Saturday Snap – Date Night Bellini

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¶ Posted 07 June 2025 § Photo § SaturdaySnap § Shea ‡ Comments (0) ° Tagged: food

Friday Fun Link – Florida Former Flames

With all the US-Canada tensions, I would have taken any Canadian team in the Stanley Cup final this year compared to most years when I cheer for whichever team I like best – New York Islanders to Detroit Red Wings to Pittsburgh Penguins. But this year, I wanted a Canadian team in the Cup Final and hell, I would’ve cheered for the Leafs (while choking up the spit-up in my mouth) though they, of course, choked badly themselves!

But I will never ever ever cheer for the Oilers.

So Go Florida Former Flames – may the glory of Tkachuk and Bennett again rescue us from a team that’s one of the worst run franchises in all of sport, that signs criminals and sex offenders, that messed up multiple first round draft picks so much the NHL had to change the draft lottery rules!

¶ Posted 06 June 2025 § Canada § FridayFunLink § Humour § MemoryLane § Sports ‡ Comments (0) ° Tagged: alberta, hockey, unitedstates

Throwback Thursday – #tbt – 10 Promises to Myself (August 2010)

Fairly early in my career, I wrote a post called “10 Promises To Myself” where I tried to outline how I would approach my career and how I would always try to be true to my own values even if there was pressure to compromise for career advancement or financial rewards or even just pressure to “conform” to what everyone else is doing – especially if that’s wrong or misguided or illogical.

I’m pretty proud that I’ve held to these values for the most part and am not compromising myself (if you ever hear me using words like “align with goals”, “circle back” or “return on investment”, please punch me in the face.) 😉

¶ Posted 05 June 2025 § Jobs § Library § LibrarySchool § List § MemoryLane § ThrowbackThursday § Wisdom Wednesday ‡ Comments (0) °

Wisdom Wednesday – The Two Core Types of Personalities

Humanity is forever trying to put people into boxes – 34 CliftonStrengths, 16 Myers-Briggs Personality Types, 5 Conflict Styles, 4 True Colours, etc. etc.

One observation I’ve had over the years is that, when you boil it right down, there are really only two personality types – black & white thinkers and grey area thinkers.

Of course, no one is 100% either way but generally people lean strongly one way or the other in my experience. And you need both types to a degree but generally, being a black and white thinker is the easier option compared to living in the grey area.

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This is because black and white means everything is a binary so yes or no, on or off, etc. and (theoretically) completely objective – even in a world that is nuanced, complicated and ever-changing.

Being a grey area thinker means that every situation, every problem, every decision is open to interpretation and subjective.

It’s not exactly the same but I think of the famous graphic illustrating the differences between equality and equity (and justice and inclusion).

Black and white thinkers will see “equality” as the best because everyone is being treated the same without having to do the much harder work of acknowledging that different people need to be treated differently – based on their personal situations, roles, experience levels and about a million other factors.

Black and white thinking leads to using “absolute” language – “All staff must call-in by a certain time” or “I always talk to staff directly” or whatever – which often leads to black and white thinkers often having to back off or clarify their statements and views.

Grey area thinkers can be frustrating as they view every situation as unique and rarely find rules useful beyond being a framework for guiding decisions but not a clear cut, unchanging answer.

Grey area thinking can also even be better for your mental health!