Culture

In a much overlooked 2007 article, “Dignity at Work” (in the journal Organization), sociologist Andrew Sayer outlines the connections between employee autonomy, trust in employees, respect for their work, and being taken seriously as the foundations for what he calls ‘dignity at work.’ Sayer was approaching the subject from perhaps a more critical perspective than most corporate decision…

Puzzles & Roadmaps “Since when did employee engagement in our tenant companies become our business?” The Chief Strategy Officer of one of Singapore’s largest REITs posed the question in the middle of a tense session about how they were looking to reposition their office portfolio. They wanted to ‘activate’ some of their offices buildings in such a way to…

In my current book project (tentatively called “After Corporate Culture”), I am trying to understand the long-term impact that fluid and mobile working is having on company culture. For quite some time, of course, many firms have allowed, either officially or unofficially, employees to work from home or off-site at least some of the time. However, as…

Are You Ready? For the past four years we have been closely watching as more and more mainstream users have embraced coworking as a new way of working. What at first seemed like a fringe phenomenon that was suited primarily for freelancers and startups has grown to be much more than this. Recently, while walking through a…

Culture Past and Future In his 2015 Wall Street Journal article, “Data is our New Middle Manager,” Christopher Mims chronicles the emerging management practices of lean startups. The article suggests that, in an era of radical transparency where ALL employees have access to ALL the relevant data that impacts a company (small or large), there is less…