Excessive police violence, particularly against Black people, is now part of the national conversation and it’s needed to be. A buddy of mine – a 25-year veteran Wisconsin cop (retired) – sent me a copy of the Training and Standards document that spells out the Use-of-Force Continuum taught to law enforcement officers. This policy guides… read more →
We have a lot of thorny issues to work to resolve in the coming months and years, not the least of which is the movement that suggests police departments should be defunded. Which leads to the question of whether or not people actually want to seriously diminish or truly eliminate the function of public safety.… read more →
I’ve been binge watching The Tudors on Netflix and, in homage to Anne Boleyn, I realize that these are stressful times for most of us. Whenever I start feeling a little whiny, I think about my doc and nursing friends and relatives working in public health, elder care, and in ER and ICU units, which… read more →
A lot of people hate conflict; they avoid it, ignore it, pretend it doesn’t exist and kick the can down the street hoping somebody else will deal with it some other time. Other people attack and bulldoze forward and still some others just roll over to it. None of these result in the best outcomes. Understanding how we intuitively deal with conflict is probably… read more →
There are lots of textbook causes for conflict, but one of the root reasons that I run into has to do with some kind of power imbalance. People will almost always rebel (or try to) if they feel they’re being oppressed by people with more power. The art and science of politics is about finding… read more →
Similar to the benefit of expressing some humility is the benefit of not sounding like you know it all. When experts are dealing with concerned, anxious people, it often feels like the more answers the experts can produce, the more confident and convinced those nervous people will be. But the fact is it just doesn’t… read more →
We work with clients who are expert in their respective fields, and they’re understandably confident in what they know. But in this new age of anti-science and the demonization of expertise, that confidence is often mistaken for arrogance by an angry, skeptical public. When experts need to establish themselves as trustworthy and credible, a certain… read more →
The Facebook page titled ‘Stop Mandatory Vaccinations’ has more than 140,000 followers. These are people who may have meant well in trying to learn what’s best for their children, but have reached dangerous conclusions that put other children at serious and unnecessary risk. Social connections – meaning social media, trust, our engrained need to conform,… read more →
Marketers play on our emotions and sensibilities. People who choose to go out of their way to buy free range eggs do so because at some inner emotional level they can picture that proud, independent chicken majestically loping across the wide open prairie under azure skies with a big happy grin on its beak. Advertisers play the… read more →
Once again, the following article feels like it focuses on internal business problems, but the fact is that it works in just about any kind of issue. Whether you’re working with difficult people in your office or facilitating a public meeting full of upset people, many of the principles are the same. Read More …