Online Civility Magazine by Civility Experts Worldwide

CIVILITY AT WORK September, 2012

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C I V I L I T Y

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Civility at Work® Magazine

Issue #1, 2012 Civility Magazine is published as a print-ready digital edition on the Magazines Canada website ®

www.civilitymagazine.com. For all inquiries, e-mail the editor Tara Crawford at tara@civilityexperts.com Copyright Civility Experts Worldwide. Published by Propriety Publications, a division of Civility Experts Worldwide. Propriety Publishing, Winnipeg, Canada PUBLISHER Tara Crawford MANAGING EDTIOR Tara Crawford ADVERTISING Scott Kasprick DESIGN & LAYOUT Dawn Windsor WEBMASTER CIVILITY MAGAZINE ® is published online quarterly. Yearly subscription rates are $14.95/year. Reproduction of any article or ad in any format for print or a website without written permission from the publisher is prohibited. The comments and opinions expressed are not necessarily those of the publisher.

In this issue... Letter from the editor . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4 Readers Comments and Feedback . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5 Contributors . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6

Civility Initiatives:

Because it Matters! . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10

Civility Blogs:

The Collapse of Civility . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11

Recommended Books:

The Thinking Life . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13

Civility Trainer’s Toolkit: Measuring Organizational Civility and Incivility �� 17 Improving Training Outcomes by Assessing

Customer Needs . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 25

Civility Practitioner Insights:

Jazz Versus the Classics . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 19

Civility Best Practices:

Time for a Company Culture Audit . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 27

Personal Branding with Civility . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 33

Feature Editorials:

What is Incivility Costing Your Organization? ��7

Influence: How to Create it, How to Keep it . . . . . . . . . . 21

Integrity . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 23

Civility Stories:

Ask Louise . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 28

Civility Around the World:

How Professionals in the Phillippines incorporate

civility into their business . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 34

Letter from the editor:

here is tremendous power in civility. And when the expected & respected guidelines for treating each other with kindness and consideration are structured and followed

in our workplaces, there is a measurable impact to the quality of our performance, the bottom line business metrics, and to the quality of our lives and relationships. With this in mind, it is with great pride and anticipation that we launch Civility at Work Magazine®. This first online edition offers timely and practical business solutions for imbedding and maintaining civility in workplaces and organizations big or small. In addition to success stories, resources, trends overviews, Civility Magazine provides up to date research, training tools, case studies and more. But more importantly Civility at Work Magazine® represents a mindset shift in terms of how forwardthinking business professionals are managing the many changes impacting business today. Imbedding civility into business best practices is a values proposition - the acceptance of which offers an invaluable opportunity to embrace and leverage the key tenants of civility which are: courtesy, integrity, respect, leadership, ethics, and courage. Please join the circle of civility and help us launch this exciting civility initiative - Join our mailing list events@civilityexperts.com and receive a free copy of the launch edition and pass it on to your co-workers, colleagues, and friends and then submit your feedback, stories or editorials, events or advertisements for an upcoming edition to me at tara@civilityexperts.com

Tara Crawford, editor, Civility at Work Magazine ®

Tara Crawford is Director of Business Development

for

CivilityExperts.com,

Project Manager; Macaroni and Please Civility in Schools Initiative, member International Civility Trainers’ Consortium, and Children’s Character, Confidence and Courtesy Coach™. Recent - co-author The Power of Civility. Effective June 2011, Tara has also taken on the Editor role for Civility at Work Online Magazine.

Readers Comments and Feedback

n my humble opinion, the timing couldn’t be better for an online magazine about civility. As Canada’s leading expert on civility in the workplace, I have been talking and writing, teaching and preaching civility for almost 15 years. I’ve always felt anytime is the right time for civility but if the outpouring of support, editorial contributions and general interest in this magazine is any indication, the real right time, is NOW. As publisher of Civility at Work® Magazine, I naturally hope that we are successful in selling subscriptions and advertising, but more than that, after all these years of begging to be heard, defending civility as a necessary workplace value and rationalizing civility training to business professionals and others all over the globe- I am grateful for this opportunity to share the knowledge and expertise of my colleagues in the field and truly hope that readers will choose civility and reap the immeasurable benefits of practicing civility in the workplace, in their homes, communities and dayto-day lives. Civility at Work® Magazine will be distributed via Civility Experts Worldwide affiliates and Partners in 12 countries world-wide and is poised to offers solutions for increasing the measurable impact of civility which include: •

increased workplace social capital and trust

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increased employee and customer confidence

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higher and more consistent workplace standards

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greater motivation and productivity

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more effective workplace communication at all levels

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boosted morale and respectful interaction

One cannot forge ahead sharing civility best practices, research, training opportunities, practitioner tips and civility stories, without first clarifying what civility is. This is one of the

ongoing debates among civility trainers and we hope our readers will carefully consider how they define civility as well. This is an important and complicated question that is not easily answered. And while there is not a technically “correct” expanded definition beyond what the Oxford dictionary may suggest, the team at Civility Experts Worldwide has agreed on the definition indicated here. This definition is the culmination of 15 years research, experience in the field, discussions with experts and consideration for the great work of Dr. P. Forni and academics who came before him. It is this definition that drives content in the magazine. In the next issue we will share an excerpt from The Power of Civility – a co-author book from experts in the field where this issue is covered in more depth. Meantime, we look forward to readers’ reviews of the content of this first issue of the magazine, and we welcome your comments and feedback about civility- it’s definitions and applications. Please send your opinions and comments to the editor Tara Crawford tara@civilityexperts.com

CIVILITY IS: A conscious awareness of the impact of one’s thoughts, actions, words and intentions on others; combined with, A continuous acknowledgement of one’s responsibility to ease the experience of others (e.g., through restraint, kindness, non-judgment, respect, and courtesy); and, A consistent effort to adopt and exhibit civil behaviour as a non-negotiable point of one’s character. Lew Bayer, president, Civility Experts Worldwide.

Contributors

Dr. Cynthia (Cindy) Clark is an award winning Professor in the School of Nursing at Boise State University. Her primary teaching responsibilities include teaching and coordinating the Nursing Leadership and Management courses and contributing to Behavioral Health course content. Dr. Clark holds two Bachelor of Science degrees, one in Nursing and the other in Addiction Treatment and Recovery. She is a psychiatric nurse/therapist specializing in adolescent violence prevention and addiction counseling. She also holds a Master of Science degree in Human Development and Family Studies, a postMaster’s certificate in Nursing Leadership, and a PhD in Educational Leadership. Dr P.M. Forni is an awardwinning professor at Johns Hopkins University, where he has taught for the past twenty years. In 1997 Dr. Forni co-founded the Johns Hopkins Civility Project. An aggregation of academic and community outreach activities, the JHCP aimed `at assessing the significance of civility, manners and politeness in contemporary society. He was also the co-director of “Reassessing Civility: Forms and Values at the End of the Century,” an international symposium which took place at Hopkins in March 1998. He now directs The Civility Initiative at Johns Hopkins. Megan Schwabiuk, MSc, is a certified adult educator with over eight years of experience in the application of training needs assessment techniques for the design, promotion, implementation, facilitation, and evaluation of learner-focused adult education and training programming in both corporate and academic settings. 6

R. Eric Landrum is a professor of psychology at Boise State University, receiving his PhD in cognitive psychology (with an emphasis in quantitative methodology) from Southern Illinois UniversityCarbondale in 1989.

Shaun Brown is President and a Founding Principal of Digital Mentor Group Inc., a consulting firm that is focused on strengthening the sustainability of people and organizations. Burton. M Goldfield president and chief executive officer, TriNet, builds high-performance teams by attracting the right candidates, hiring the right employees, and then mentoring and growing them into great leaders and contributors. Douglas Ross is an author, speaker, and consultant advocate of integrity development as the way to individual and organizational success.

Caterina Rando, MA, MCC, provides programs to make careers thrive. Her most popular programs include: Influence, How to Create It, How to Keep It, Networking 2.0 and Public Speaking with Ease.

Research from the field

What is Incivility Costing Your Organization?

ccording to www.thecostofbadbehavior. com, job stress, much of which has been shown to stem from workplace incivility, costs North American corporations more than three hundred billion dollars a year. If there was ever a time- and a need- for a workplace civility solution, that time is now! In 2003, David Trumbell landed a challenging, wellpaying job with a Fortune 500 telecommunications firm. Although the firm had interviewed many qualified candidates, Dave’s enthusiasm and can-do spirit made him the company’s first choice. Once he was on the job, Dave’s prospects seemed bright. His new colleagues were sure that he would succeed. Less than two months later, however, he left the firm. The reason? Poor behavior—not his, but that of his new colleagues. “Leaders ran around shouting at people,” Dave reported. “Employees took out their frustrations on each other. It sure wasn’t what I was looking for in a job. Who treats people that way?” American business has an incivility problem, and it’s getting worse. Tune into interactions in many workplaces today and you’ll spot employees speaking to subordinates in condescending tones, ignoring e-mail or phone messages, claiming excessive credit for their team’s accomplishments, browsing on their iPhones or texting during meetings, and leaving malfunctioning office equipment for the next user to fix. About one-fourth of workers we polled in 1998 said they were treated rudely once or more per week; by 2005 that number had risen to nearly half. An astonishing 95 percent of workers in 2005 reported experiencing incivility from their coworkers. A recent Gallup study entitled “Feeling Good Matters in the Workplace” found that 73 percent of workers don’t “feel good.” Of the respondents to the Gallup poll, 14 percent say that they are actively disengaged as a result, and they admitted to doing what they can to undermine their organizations and their coworkers. The problem of incivility in the workplace has been compounded by our increasing tolerance of nasty behavior as a culture. Witness television shows like The Sopranos, films such as Borat or Jackass, the phenomenon of road rage, or the never-ending parade of ugly incidents at high school and sporting events. Few business leaders take the necessary steps to stop incivility. Some don’t know how to do it, and most simply don’t understand how much incivility is costing them. That’s where this book comes in. Drawing on a decade of path-breaking research, The

Cost of Bad Behavior argues that petty incidences of workplace rudeness exact a staggering economic toll that managers would be foolish to ignore. Incivility’s measurable costs alone are enormous. Job stress, for instance, costs US corporations three hundred billion dollars a year, much of which has been shown to stem from workplace incivility. But incivility’s true impact stretches far beyond that which is measurable in dollar terms. How to tally damage done by increased employee turnover, by the disruption of work teams, by the waning of helpful behavior, or by the tarnishing of corporate and individual reputations? As our research shows, incivility unleashes a set of complicated and destructive dynamics on individuals, teams, and organizations that impede performance and create organizational dysfunction on a number of levels, leading to diminished financial results. Far from a minor inconvenience to millions of American workers, workplace incivility is one of today’s most substantial economic drains on American business, a largely preventable ill that begs to be addressed.

Where We’re Coming From We’re not prim and proper manners crusaders. We’re business school professors, one of us (Pearson) at the Thunderbird School of Global Business, the other (Porath) at the University of Southern California. We have devoted a good part of our careers to researching, writing, consulting on, and teaching about the subject. We didn’t set out to study workplace incivility. What we wanted to do, more than a decade ago, was identify workplace homicide’s early warning signs. We suspected that disrespectful words and thoughtless deeds among employees bore the seeds from which violence grows. To our surprise, we found that although low-intensity bad behavior can help explain violence, it hardly ever causes it. Our hypothesis didn’t pan out, but we discovered something else: that expensive but largely unseen side effects occur when one employee treats another in a disrespectful way— that is, “uncivilly.” Serious costs associated with incivility existed in virtually every organization that we studied. People who experienced incivility were affected deeply, and nearly everyone took action to get even. Targeted 7

employees at all levels intentionally lowered their productivity, cut back work hours, lost respect for their bosses, put in minimal acceptable effort, and sometimes even left their jobs—all because of disrespectful words or deeds. Yet uncivil behavior barely registered as damaging on managers’ radar. How could this be? Simple: The organizations we studied did not recognize the economic consequences of incivility, track them, or include them in accounting tallies. What made the costs associated with incivility especially noteworthy was another finding of ours: that incivility was far more widespread than anybody had anticipated. Gathering experiences and observations from eight hundred employees in the United States, we asked them: Had incivility entered their interactions with their coworkers? The answer was a resounding yes. One in five claimed to be the target of incivility from a coworker at least once per week. About two-thirds told us that they saw incivility occurring among other employees no less than once a month. Ten percent said that they witnessed incivility among their colleagues every single day. Initially, we wondered whether a mefirst attitude on the part of some American workers might have skewed their perspectives. American workers, we thought, may have been too sensitive or demanding about their treatment at work. To test our caveat, we went on to gather views from across the border, where residents were perceived as less self-centered and better mannered. We polled 125 white-collar employees in Canada, asking them whether employee-to-employee incivilities had entered their work lives. The answer, again, was a resounding yes; in fact workplace experiences reported by Canadians were even worse than those reported in our own country. Half of the Canadians told us that they suffered incivility directly from their fellow employees at least once per week. Ninety-nine percent said that they witnessed incivility at work. One in four reported seeing incivility occurring between other colleagues every day. If we had any lingering doubts that incivility was a widespread and tremendously costly workplace phenomenon, these were finally removed by the public response to our work. Within days of the first media reports about our research, we were swamped with phone calls, e-mail inquiries, and requests for interviews from reporters around the globe. Our ﬁndings were covered in more than 450 newspapers and magazines across

Few business leaders take the necessary steps to stop incivility. Some don’t know how to do it, and most simply don’t understand how much incivility is costing them.

the English-speaking world. Subsequent findings prompted interviews with television and radio networks in the United States, Canada, Britain, Australia, and France. We also received a flood of queries from strangers who had been targets of incivility in their own workplaces. Many told us about incidents that caused them to leave their jobs. Some still felt as if they were held hostage, unable to continue working at all. Some were relieved to learn that their strong reactions to the “little” injustices of incivility were not unique. We didn’t anticipate the breadth and depth of responses that our work had stirred, but this feedback only fueled us to dig deeper and look closer. We’ve since spent a decade gathering data about workplace incivility. We’ve interviewed employees, managers, executives, presidents, and CEOs. We’ve administered questionnaires, run experiments, led workshops, observed and consulted doctors, lawyers, law enforcement officers, managers, and executives as they planned for and dealt with contentious employees and clients. All told, we’ve gathered information from more than nine thousand people nationwide. Participants have told us about their uncivil experiences as targets, managers, leaders, witnesses, and offenders. They’ve described how incivility unfolds, how managers respond, how organizations react, how witnesses behave, and how targets feel. They’ve even shared their very valuable insights into how to curtail incivility, insights The Cost of Bad Behavior in turn shares with you. To buy the book please visit www.thecostofbadbehavior.com

Christine Pearson is a professor of management at the Thunderbird School of Global Management. Christine Porath is an assistant professor of management at the Marshall School of Business at the University of Southern California. They have received national and international media attention for their work, and their research has been featured in publications such as the Harvard Business Review, The Wall Street Journal, and the Financial Times. To contact the authors, please email them at Christine.Pearson@thunderbird. edu and Christine.Porath@gmail.com.

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Civility Initiatives

Because it Matters!

ave you heard about innovative and successful Gulf Coast Community Civility Initiative BECAUSE IT MATTERS?

What if you received a smile with every sales transaction and smiled back? What if your neighbor picked up your trash can lid rather than watching it blow down the street? What if you didn’t shake your fist at the driver who wouldn’t allow you to merge into traffic? Research tells us that emotions are contagious. When we feel good we extend those good feelings to the next person we encounter. When we communicate in a more respectful and effective way, our brain chemistry signals us to feel better about the world around us. When we feel better about the world around us, we pass it along. We pay it forward. Our quality of life is improved. That’s what Because It Matters is all about: Improving quality of life by increasing civic participation, civil discourse, and social capital. Those are all stylish words for politeness, good manners, and making connections to the community, and those behaviors are the glue for creating the social network we need to live happy, healthy lives. Because It Matters is a community-wide initiative to promote civility in our workplaces, our neighborhoods and civic organizations, and our schools. It is a campaign to encourage citizens of our region to communicate in a more respectful way, improving public discourse. We all have the ability to display and deliver a positive attitude and good deeds. The result is a strengthening of our social fabric and our region becomes an even better place to live. Excerpt from www.becauseitmatters.net: Our Gulf Coast region was fortunate to become part of a landmark study called “Better Together,” which monitored the effects of social capital. Social capital is a term that entered the mainstream following the publishing of Putnam’s book. The central premise of social capital is that social networks have value. Suburban sprawl, the age of electronics, and consumer

expectations have all caused increased isolation and decreased social networks and social capital, according to Putnam. The study measured social capital in all of Sarasota County, plus Boca Grande and Englewood and was sponsored by Gulf Coast Community Foundation. The first study was conducted in 2003 and the second round in 2005. While we scored well in bonding social capital-birds of a feather f lock together-we did not fare as well with bridging social capital-making connections among more diverse groups.

Because It Matters Comes To Life Early in 2007, the Gulf Coast Community Foundation took “Better Together” a step further with, “The Value of Connections,” a community visit and discussion with noted psychologist and bestselling author Daniel Goleman, PhD. Discussing his most recent work, “Social Intelligence: The New Science of Human Relationships,” Goleman engaged the crowd with information from the field of social neuroscience. Data now suggests that interpersonal relationships actually shape our brains and thus alter our physiology. Our encounters with one another are critical factors in the equation for a healthy and successful life. As a follow-up to that discussion, Gulf Coast Community Foundation invited the community to continue the conversation. Over 100 citizens reacted positively, coming together to shape Because It Matters. An initiative for civility was born.

If you have started a civility initiative in your home, school, community or organization or if you know of one, and you would like it to be featured in the next issue of the magazine, please contact the editor, Tara@civilityexperts.com

civility blogs

The Collapse of Civility Blog http://collapseofcivility.com/category/civility-in-the-news/

he media has been polluted with an abundance of teen and pre-teen bullying cases over the last few weeks. What is troubling is not the amount of bullying that makes the press these days, but the outrageous direction that bullying has taken and how little is being done about it. Bullying is a terrible early manifestation of incivility that is all too frequently waved off by parents as “just a thing that kids do as they grow up”. I’ve always found it interesting that the parents that have a nonchalant attitude about bullying are rarely the parents of a child that is being bullied. I’m not sure whether that suggests that parents are simply not in tune to what their children are doing outside of the home or if it implies that parents may empathize with casual bullies because they were once bullies themselves. My apologies for such a pointed remark; bullying has touched my life personally and I admittedly have challenges remaining objective about the subject. While this is strictly a personal observation, I think that the escalating culture of violence and irresponsible behaviors that have been broadcast through every media channel over the past 10 years or so has created an environment where children to young adults are encouraged to engage in ever more outrageous forms of bullying. As an adult, I find activities like mixed martial arts (MMA) or Ultimate Fighting to be entertaining. I find shows like “Jersey Shore” ridiculous, but like many viewers I find it hard to not watch. I see court jesters like Johnny Knoxville, Bam Magera and Steve-O on “Jackass” and, like most folks, I shake my head in disbelief (and often laugh) at what a half dozen guys with a shopping cart and very little common sense can do to injure themselves and others. The problem is our children view these shows and activities almost as an art form; albeit an ugly and twisted form of performance art. The more insane and over-the-top a behavior seems on television or on the internet, the more that our children want to emulate it. When a trained fighter like Georges St. Pierre uses a devastating choke hold on an equally trained opponent, teenage boys think “hey, I’ll try

that on Billy”. Well, actually they don’t think – they just do. When the cast of “Jackass” engages in the activity of “sack tapping” or “junk punching” (pardon the graphic descriptions – but we need to deal with the facts on this subject) on unsuspecting buddies who are asleep or unprepared for the sneak attack, our kids feel entitled to take this “game” to the same level of intensity in the school yard. On May 29th, the media reported on a 14 year old boy being hit so hard in the groin that he suffered from a ruptured testicle that needed to be removed. Bullying has moved from merely terrorizing others to attempting to inf lict serious damage. Our kids are watching Snookie get punched directly in the face on “Jersey Shore” by a surly, drunk and very large dude while on a night out at the bar. What message is that sending to young minds – and not just in inf luencing bullies but in suggesting how men should interact with women that are supposedly bothering them? I’m no puritan when it comes to violence on television and in film. The difference is that I am not inf luenced to model the behaviors that I see on television or in film. I don’t watch the latest James Bond film and think “Okay, I need go buy a Walther PPK and an Aston Martin and attempt to infiltrate the world’s largest weapons-for-drugs cartel – and I’ll shoot anyone that gets in my way.” But, I know that my own sons are as susceptible as all other children to seeing an activity on television and thinking “Okay, I’m going to go down the street to my buddy’s house, get on his roof and try to bounce off the trampoline and into the pool.” There can be no tolerance in our society for the forcible tattooing (or better described, torturing) of a learning disabled child by a group of bullies. In this event, we see the very worst of outrageous behaviors coupled with a complete absence and abdication of personal responsibility. This terrifying example of bullying showcases the two distinct types of bullies that our children face every day; the psychopathic bully and the copy cat bully. The psychopathic bully is pre-disposed to being a bully for any number of mental health disorders or issues they may be struggling with. The copy-cat

bully emulates the behaviors of bullies they know or that they themselves have been bullied by. As an example, one of the first boys to apologize in the tattooing case readily admitted to the New Hampshire media that he had been bullied by others in the past (although he appears to never have apologized directly to his victim or the victim’s parents). As you think about talking with your own child about civil behaviors and bullying, I want you to stop for just a moment before that conversation begins and get this vision in your mind. Put yourself in the shoes of the young man who was tattooed. You are surrounded by people you thought were your friends. They invited you to hang out with them. Then they pinned you down to a bench. You are threatened repeatedly that you will be beaten or worse if you move or tell anyone. You are tattooed multiple times with crude equipment, feeling the bee sting-like pinches over and over for what seems like an eternity. No one is there for you. Are you getting the picture on how these outrageous bullying events contribute to the acceleration of incivility in our society? Can you see how this single situation has damaged every child involved? Do we continue to leave these behaviors unchecked, only troubling ourselves to feign interest when bullying gets national attention because another teenage girl has been bullied mercilessly on the internet and committed suicide? Do we tolerate the continuation of these bullying behaviors by adults when they enter the workforce and belittle, assault and even kill co-workers? There are now more resources than ever available to identify and combat bullying. Yet, the

pervasive nature of media both as an input device to our children’s behaviors and an output channel (think of students putting video of their beatings of other students on YouTube) seems to be negating all of the solid research and mitigation methods being suggested to defeat this problem. Civility begins with one person; us. Each one of us must take that step towards our children and frankly, towards the children around our children, to instill that most important defense against incivility; teaching our children that every single life has intrinsic value and that value must be respected. Nostalgia for the “old times” is rarely a helpful model for changing behaviors today. But I think that one dynamic from when we were children would go a long way to fixing the problems of bullying. Many of us remember the time when, if we did something wrong and a neighbor or family friend saw it, no matter how fast we ran – that news would beat us home. When the entire community cares about the health and behaviors of all of our children, it makes it much more difficult for entrenched behaviors like bullying to be programmed into our kids. If we don’t take these steps now, it might be your child or my child, but it will definitely be someone’s child who is pinned to the ground and beaten, or sitting alone in a closet thinking about hanging themselves or living with the shameful regret of having hurt someone so badly that they will never be able to walk again. Civility matters. Thanks for visiting “The Collapse of Civility”.

My name is Richard Bird and I am intrigued with identifying the causes for the loss of civility in all aspects of our society, and what can be done to bring about a change in the way that we interact with each other on an individual basis, and within our communities, schools, corporations and amongst nations. My goal is to inspire just one person to think about how their individual actions impact, effect, motivate, form and change the lives of those around them. My analysis, observations, theories and action plans are not intended to change the whole world all at once. Instead, I want to change the world one person at a time; one company at a time and one nation at a time. And, I recognize that the greatest opportunity for change is within myself. I have held several executive positions in corporate America, and I have traveled extensively around the world. Over the last 15 years, I have worked for some of the world’s largest companies as well as startups. During the course of my working career, I have managed large scale change initiatives across multiple industries. Through my community involvement, I have spent a considerable amount of time in both the inner-city and rural areas. I believe that the combination of my corporate, community and travel experiences has led to helping me understand some small bit about why civility has eroded in our modern society – as well as leading me to some conclusions on how we can take steps to bring about a modern, usable and functional form of civility.

Recommended Book

The Thinking Life Book Preface By P.M. Forni

hen the idea of writing a book that would rediscover the merits of the thinking life was still coalescing in my mind, one day I jotted down

a couple of paragraphs with what, in essence, was the rationale behind the project. Quite uncharacteristically, those paragraphs were in the form of a report by a visitor to Earth from another galaxy. Having put them aside while I considered other projects, I had half forgotten them when I found them in a binder’s pocket. As the first week of my mission on Earth comes to a close, I must report a puzzling find. You remember that in a previous message I described the ability that all humans have to silently converse within their own selves. This internal conversation, which they call “thinking,” allows them to take stock of the world around them and to plan their most suitable ways of dealing with it. If there is something that I could determine for sure about life on Earth, it is that happiness is the most coveted good, and that it is a byproduct of the good life. You will then fully understand the importance of thinking when I tell you that it is virtually impossible to build a good life without the foundation of good thinking. What has been puzzling me is the cavalier way in which humans use such a core faculty. Any intergalactic visitor would be as struck as I am by their overindulging in thought- avoidance. The amount of their time spent in serious thinking does not even get close to that spent in mindless entertainment and the exchange of unnecessary information. From lack of thoughtful awareness of any situation in which they find themselves to the failure to prepare for adversity, inadequate thinking is with-out a doubt the number one cause of their grief and sorrow.

Training their children in it has to be a primary concern for human parents, you would think. Well, it is not. Does such training occupy a prominent position in the schools’ curricula? It does not. And so good thinking fails to become second nature. On account of lack of thinking humans keep arriving unprepared to the crossroads of their lives where they must make decisions upon which the quality of their remaining time on Earth depends. In sum: A distinctive human character is the inclination to relentlessly pursue the trivial. That makes them waste an enormous amount of time and energy that would be better spent on matters of consequence. It is heartbreaking indeed to witness their unwitting sabotage of their own lives - because this is what

Even to a novice student of the human experience it

their avoidance of serious thinking amounts to. I

becomes immediately apparent that good thinking

wonder what it is going to take for them to realize

is the necessary prelude to making good decisions.

...continued on page 15 13

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m b e r,

Civility at Work Magazine® represents a mindset shift in terms of how forward-thinking business professionals are managing the many changes impacting business today.

Interested in Contributing or Advertising? • Winter 2012 - Closing date for advertising & editorial is Nov. 1, 2012 - Release Dec. 2012 • Spring 2013 - Closing date for advertising & editorial is Feb. 1, 2013 - Release March 2013 • Summer 2013 - Closing date for advertising & editorial is May 1, 2013 - Release June 2013

• We accept editorial on an ongoing basis; please submit via web form at out website, length must be minimum 300 words and 500 words maximum in lieu of payment for your submission, we will provide you with a 1/3 page ad in the magazine (either in the edition your submission is published in or the subsequent edition).

WHAT WILL YOU FIND IN THE MAGAZINE? • • • • •

Civility in the News Readers Comments and Feedback Research from the Field Civility Best Practices Resources and Tools you can use now

• Civility Initiatives Launches and Updates • Recommended Reading • Practitioner Profile

• • • • •

Global Perspectives Looking Forward Workplace Trends Events and Training Civility Applications

• Civility Stories • Ask the Expert Featuring Louise Fox

For more information www.civilitymagazine.com

...continued from page 13 how crucial this issue is and to start a serious effort

when somebody is handing you a well crafted and

to reform their ways.

perfectly functioning one? This book will acquaint

Now, I am not one who believes that when nobody is looking, extraterrestrial spaceships make scheduled stops in Paramus, New Jersey. In fact, I’m not even a science fiction fan. However, I know that a familiar landscape often escapes attention. It is the eyes of the stranger that see what remains unnoticeable under the varnish of the ordinary. In this case, the stranger was the extragalactic visitor who is struck by the fact that humans don’t seem to realize they are not thinking nearly as much as they should. My challenge with this book is to make a few suggestions about changing that situation. I want to get as many people as possible to get serious about serious thinking.

- or reacquaint - you with the basic and the best in thinking habits and thinking skills. Ultimately, the good life is the thinking life. If you want to reach its sunny shores, you better rediscover the causeways of thinking. It is by choosing to think that you are going to take the first necessary step toward life’s elusive grand prize - true happiness. My job - a very gratifying one - is making it easier for you to take that step. Dr P.M. Forni is an awardwinning professor at Johns Hopkins University, where he has taught for the past twenty

In this age that has made distraction a way of life,

years. In 1997 Dr. Forni co-

the essence of my message could not be simpler:

founded the Johns Hopkins

Think if you wish to thrive. In conveying it, I have

Civility Project. An aggregation

enlisted some of the most influential thinkers from

of academic and community

antiquity, such as Aristotle, Epictetus, Plato, and

outreach activities, the JHCP aimed `at assessing

Marcus Aurelius. Being the product of an education

the significance of civility, manners and politeness

that placed emphasis on the classics, I am at ease

in contemporary society. He was also the co-

in their presence and enjoy pointing out all that in

director of “Reassessing Civility: Forms and Values

their thinking is relevant to our lives today. The

at the End of the Century,” an international

essential features of human life have not changed in

symposium which took place at Hopkins in March

the last twenty-five hundred years, and the eloquent

1998. He now directs The Civility Initiative at

wisdom Athens and Rome have bequeathed us is

Johns Hopkins.

still eminently applicable. Why reinvent the wheel

Task training done differently. Better. On-the-job training specifically designed for manufacturing, service, construction, and processing sectors. Hands on. Step-by-step. In job performance order. Effective. Consistent. Structured. Measurable. For more information, visit everybuddyatrainer.com or Call Digital Mentor Group Inc. at 519 624 5835 Program

“Integrity is doing the right thing, doing the next right thing and doing things the right way.” — Douglas Ross Douglas Ross is an author, speaker, and consultant advocate of integrity development as the way to individual and organizational success. Doug developed the “Led By Integrity™” concept on the factory floor in adversarial situations and in the boardrooms of globally competitive organizations under intense pressure to produce. Doug‘s timeless message of change is available through keynote addresses, seminars, workshops and individual coaching.

Overview When trust is eroded, we are left with nothing. Without integrity we can do nothing. Integrity is an actionable strategy for individuals and organizations in fiercely trying times.

TOpics Led By Integrity examines the simplicity and rawness of integrity. Everyday situations and challenges are explored to reveal the positive outcomes of cultivating integrity as life strategy. The Hero’s Journey simplifies the complexity of personal growth and development. A practical guide is presented for adopting the integrity principles and developing habitual excellence. The Snowflake in the Avalanche explores the role of integrity and trust in the workplace. The hidden but critical factor of integrity in productivity is explored through a discussion of the law of integrity, organizational entropy and the wall of integrity.

DO The righT Thing anD DO Things The righT way Call me, I want to speak to you about Led By Integrity™ and how it can help all of us. Douglas Ross | principledynamics@gmail.com | 706-267-0609

www.principledynamics.com | www.resultsthroughintegrity.com 16

Civility Trainer’s Toolkit

Measuring Organizational Civility and Incivility Cynthia (Cindy) Clark RN, PhD, ANEF, FAAN and R. Eric Landrum PhD

ncivility in the workplace is a serious problem.

resources (availability and importance scales), 3)

Pearson and Porath (2009) found that 95

behavioral frequency of incivility, 4) feelings about

percent of American workers experienced

current employment, 5) employee satisfaction, 6)

incivility from co-workers and concluded that

sources of stress, 7) coping strategies, 8) overall

incivility occurs in “nearly all settings, by people

levels of stress and coping, and 9) overall civility

of all ages, as part of their

ratings. We have also created

daily routine”. Incivility can

take on many forms—from

Civility

subtle behaviors such as eyerolling and arm-crossing to overt expressions of incivility like bullying, taunting, and intimidation. Unfortunately, few business leaders take the initiative to measure and address incivility. Many do not know how to deal with the problem and most are ill-informed about the costs of incivility including increased employee

turn-over,

poor

“The emotional, physical, and economic costs of incivility can be high, thus, it is essential for organizations to recognize, prevent, and address incivility before these behaviors become embedded in the culture and have a negative impact on employees, customers and stakeholders.”

mini-Organizational Scale

(mOCS),

which is very well received, which is a 20-item scale that takes about 3 minutes to complete, either online or paper-and-pencil. So far, the mOCS has shown promising predictive power of overall organizational incivility and has been utilized at a large university in Canada. The OCS has been used in two medical centers in the United States (as of this

productivity, and significant

writing)

economic losses.

have been useful in helping

response,

Drs.

University) developed the Organizational Civility Scale (OCS)—an original measurement instrument based upon existing expertise, consultation with content experts, a thorough review of the literature, and extensive pilot testing. It is a valid and reliable instrument that is administered online using a secure web-based interface, and typically takes the user about 20-25 minutes to complete. The OCS can be customized to include demographic information one’s

position,

department

the

results

the organizations obtain a

Cindy

Clark and Eric Landrum (Professors at Boise State

about

and

within

the

organization, work hours, work shift, educational attainment, and years of service to the organization.

snapshot of current civility threats to the workplace environment, and has led to the development of interventions for maintaining and improving civility (with subsequent OCS administrations to quantify the effectiveness of the interventions). If you are interested in using the OCS or the mOCS, we are happy to send a specimen set in the event you find it helpful in deciding whether to use the OCS. If you choose to use it, we will issue a Licensing Agreement for a single-site, multi-use in the amount of $500 USD which includes sending us the deidentified data so that we can continue to conduct psychometric testing on the OCS.

The OCS contains these sections: 1) perceptions of organizational climate, 2) ratings of civility

of small business CEOs enjoy giving exit interviews.

100% know that people are

their most important resource. You’ve got a business to run. You don’t have time to spend doing payroll, negotiating health benefits or researching pension plans. For more than 20 years, TriNet has been the full-service vendor for entrepreneurs who want to spend more time on business and less time on the finer points of HR. That’s our business. We can help you focus on yours.

VISIT TRINET.COM/CIVILITYATWORK to get your copy of our white paper on “Employee Retention: How to Keep the Keepers.”

OR CALL 888.874.6388 PAYROLL | HR | COMPLIANCE If it’s not your core business, it’s probably ours.

Civility Practitioner Insights

Jazz Versus the Classics By Shaun Brown

hy your workplace should be more like a jazz ensemble than a symphony orchestra – And why that just might be a good thing!

Any music fan will tell you that there’s a difference between the free-form jazz-fusion and a symphony orchestra. While both the symphony orchestra and the jazz group are made up of talented musicians, each has vastly different approaches to playing music. Most companies are run like a symphony orchestra. Leadership counts. The orchestra takes its direction from the leader, called the conductor, and the standard operating procedures, called a score. Structure is important. Music is reduced to a series of notes written down on paper, played in sequence. Variation is not allowed, improvisation frowned upon, and innovation strongly discouraged. The conductor, after all, calls the tune. There are job descriptions. Orchestra members have defined roles and boundaries. A 2nd violinist only plays the 2nd violin part. There’s seniority. You start out as a 3rd bassoonist, move to 2nd, then you become a 1st bassoonist. If you hang around long enough, you might become a soloist. Praise and recognition is limited. The audience applauds only at the end of the performance. It’s usually the conductor who receives the lion’s share of the recognition and notoriety. It’s rare that a 3rd bassoonist is ever singled out for recognition from the audience. A jazz group doesn’t work that way at all. Structure doesn’t matter that much. First of all, there’s no score. The players may have an idea of the theme, there may even be charts, but variation is allowed, improvisation encouraged, and innovation welcomed. While there may be some musical ‘rules’ to follow, most compositions change from performance to performance. Nothing may ever be played the same way twice. Yet, the most important thing is the music.

Leadership doesn’t count that much. In jazz, there is often no readily identifiable leader. Each musician ‘plays off’ other members of the group, taking cues from each through eye contact or the simplest of gestures. No job descriptions. Everybody gets a solo. Because each player is respected for his or her skills, knowledge, and experience, everyone gets to shine and demonstrate their capabilities during the performance. Praise and recognition are abundant. The audience can reward individual players during the performance, applauding at any time during or at the end of a solo. Organizations may have to become less symphonic and more jazz-like if they are to survive and thrive in the years ahead. Less structured and rulebound. More innovative. More improvisational. Companies must be able to read those subtle cues from the marketplace and find creative ways to make the most of opportunities. Employees will have to be more f lexible, skilled, competent, and proficient, too. They will need to understand the mission and values of their organizations and know they have permission to do what it takes to make the music the most important thing. More like jazz. Less like classical.

www.everygirlcancanada.com

Enrich

●

Encourage

●

Elevate

●

Empower

●

Inspire

Civility Experts Worldwide is pleased to announce the opening of In Good Company Etiquette Academy. The flagship location opened in Winnipeg in November 2011. With the Academy opening, we are also launching a series of Social and Life skills training programs for young ladies ages 5-18. The world can be a difficult place, but at Civility Experts we know that teaching young people expected and respected behaviour in social settings, and giving them the knowledge and skills they need to be socially competent boosts their confidence, builds self-esteem, and helps them present themselves more positively. Our programs cover important and practical life l and social skills topics including: ● ● ● ● ● ● ●

Image - Presenting yourself positively Healthy habits - Respecting yourself and buildi building self-esteem Confidence, values, and character Social savvy: Etiquette and protocol for being success successful Communication skills Civility, philanthropy, and being a good role m model Cultural competence and respect for others

Girls aged 5-8 can attend Little Miss Manners, in which they t will develop the skills needed to become successful at school, socially, and in all aspects of life. For young ladies aged 9-13, worries about image and how the world views them can leave them feeling uncomfortable about themselves. In unfamiliar social settings, this can seriously impact self-esteem and confidence. Girls in this age bracket can take part in Every Girl Can, an 8-part social and life skills program designed to introduce the “rules” for meeting social expectations, fitting into the world, and build confidence, social competence and self-esteem. For young women aged 14-18, finishing high school can be a scary as well as an exciting experience. Learning what is expected in various social settings such as mixing with friends, job interviews, and dating can boost confidence and help young women present themselves positively. The 8-part Backpack to Briefcase Finishing School prepares young women to expand their book smarts and increase their social savvy in the real world.

Feature Editorial

INFLUENCE: How to Create it, How to Keep it

Follow these steps to create more influence.

influence invitation

time

Support meeting business professional

Social Network

ow big your network LinkedIn® is, how many people know your name or your face does not ref lect your true inf luence. What matters is who trusts you, respects you, understands your contribution, and wants to support you. When you can create all this with one of your contacts, you now have inf luence. Inf luence equals ease in creating what you want in your career and in the rest of your life.

encouragement

Gracious

By Caterina Rando, MA, MCC

genuine connect

appreciation

understanding

Connect Offline Make an effort to be friendly and gracious in all situations. Extend yourself to people at all levels and identify people you want to know better. Take an interest in what they are interested in if it is a work initiative or a non-profit they support. Create or seek out opportunities to connect with people away from the office at professional associations, workshops or at social events.

Creating Rapport Once you meet someone, you then get to begin to get to know them and build trust. Some easy ways to do this are to remember people’s names, follow up on any action you agreed to take, and invite people to go where you are going to increase your exposure to them. Also of course invite them to join your online network within 24 hours of meeting them. Additionally, because so few people send notes anymore a “nice to meet you” note will go a long way to begin to build up your inf luence.

Be Generous There are several things you can give someone to show them you genuinely care about them and want to support them. You can give them your time, your money, words of appreciation or encouragement, gifts and access or introduction to your contacts.

Be generous with all of these. Pick up the check, buy the fundraising candy bar, and accept the invitation for coffee someone extends to ask your advice. Being generous makes people begin to rave about you. Inf luence is cultivated over time. Take a look now at the people in your network today. Have you created good rapport with them? Do you stay in regular contact so they remember you? Are you generous? If so, then it is time to think about how you can use your inf luence to grow your business. If not, get started on what we have discussed here. The more inf luence you can cultivate, the more your career will thrive.

Caterina Rando, MA, MCC, provides programs to make careers thrive. Her most popular programs include: Influence, How to Create It, How to Keep It, Networking 2.0 and Public Speaking with Ease. To find out more about Caterina visit www.caterinaspeaks.com or contact her at info@caterinaspeaks.com or 415-668-4535. 21

Feature Editorial

Integrity By Douglas Ross

ntegrity is the essence of everything successful.

It is a proven concept that has been true in the past while providing direction for the future. The current research on business integrity reveals new applications for individuals and organizations. The real value of integrity is that it is collective, not personal. Anna Bernasek, in The Economics of Integrity, argues that integrity matters-not just to our moral well-being but to our economic well being. She observes that integrity is an essential part of all business transactions. Profitability is a natural outcome of integrity based relationships where sellers are trustworthy and when consumers trust. These relationships hold everything together and allow the economy to work. Integrity, then, is a shared asset that brings financial rewards. Investing in our collective integrity; is investing in our collective wealth. Without integrity, nothing works. Dr. Michael Jensen, a Harvard Business professor, proposes that “As integrity declines, workability declines, and as workability declines, value declines. “ If you don’t have the right tools or parts to do the job, then the ability to do the job is compromised and value of the final product is diminished.. Maximization of any performance initiative requires integrity. Acting without integrity, he concludes, generates painful consequences just as surely as violating the law of gravity. PricewaterhouseCoopers implements an integrity driven strategy for Governance, Risk and Compliance (GRC) management. The strategy is built on three principles: •

An integrated approach to GRC fosters a culture of business integrity and accountability;

•

The embedding of integrity into organizational structures and processes provides effective coordination of people, process and technology capabilities; and,

•

An integral code of business conduct ensures compliance to the letter and spirit of the law.

Novartis, a leading healthcare company, identifies integrity as the key driver of marketplace differentiation. At Novartis, integrity means doing the right thing, building a culture of integrity, managing risks, strengthening their reputation and fostering a

competitive advantage. They establish performance standards for establishing, promoting and enforcing integrity in all business processes. . Integrity is about firing on all cylinders. Dr. Henry Cloud, a psychologist, states that integrity is the courage to meet the demands of reality. He examines how truthfulness, results orientation, overcoming adversity, continuous improvement and worthwhile purpose are the essential qualities for personal success. . Integrity occurs when everything clicks and things unfold in an undivided, integrated, intact and uncorrupted manner. Integrity is in the eye of the beholder. Tony Simons, in The Integrity Dividend, concludes that manages don’t define their integrity, others do. Employees assess whether management words and actions fit. When employees trust their managers’ integrity, they demonstrate higher levels of engagement. The resulting discretionary effort drives the customer experience and the economic benefit of integrity is actualized. This is the integrity dividend. Without trust you have nothing, without integrity you can do nothing. Integrity is actionable strategy for today’s business environment. If you cultivate integrity within yourself and your organization, everyone has a better chance to succeed.

Douglas Ross is an author, speaker, and consultant advocate of integrity development as the way to individual and organizational success. Doug developed the “Led By Integrity™” concept on the factory floor in adversarial situations and in the boardrooms of globally competitive organizations under intense pressure to produce. He was the lead consultant with two record setting lean product launches in unionized environments. Doug‘s timeless message of change is available through keynote addresses, seminars, workshops and individual coaching.

Civility Trainer’s Toolkit

Improving Training Outcomes by Assessing Customer Needs By Megan Schwabiuk, MSc

key factor in ensuring the success of any type of training initiative is to identify the specific training needs as defined by your customers. No matter what the training topic, the process of undertaking a training needs assessment is a critical first step in ensuring that the training that you will be designing and delivering is relevant to your customers. The results obtained from a training needs assessment are critical not only for the design and delivery of a training initiative, but the information collected is typically useful in clarifying customers expectations for the training, identifying potential training barriers and drivers and establishing preliminary evaluation criteria that can be used later on to assess training outcomes and demonstrate that you have met customers expectations. One of the desired outcomes of the needs assessment process is to identify the gaps (typically in employee performance) that the training will aim to fill. Although the goals of the needs assessment process are relatively consistent for any type of training initiative, the process may differ based on your customer, their organization and their needs. Typically, a training needs assessment will involve collecting input about the gaps from all the stakeholders impacted by the training initiative. In an organization, stakeholders should include senior management (how is the gap impacting their business?), supervisors (what should employees be doing better or what are employees not doing?) and learners (what is your knowledge, skills and abilities when it comes to what you need to be doing for your job?). Once the stakeholders at all levels are identified, various data collection methods such as interviews, surveys, focus group meetings and documentation review can be used based on what your customer and their organization can accommodate. The needs assessment process may, at first, appear to be a “hard sell” to your customer. However, it is a necessary process for generating the information

required to help ensure that your customer’s training investment meets their specific training needs and that it is customized to their organization. And, when done correctly, the information collected from the needs assessment process can provide insight into how training outcomes can be evaluated, and I have yet to meet a CEO who isn’t interested in hearing about how a training initiative can impact their organization’s bottom line. Keep in mind that the gaps revealed by the training needs assessment process may not result in training recommendations. An employee’s knowledge, skills and abilities are only a few of the factors that contribute to efficient and effective job performance. Supports and resources, motivation and knowledge of expectations can also influence performance and are typically challenging to influence by a training intervention within a corporation. As the needs assessment process is primarily customer driven, it is sometimes best to keep expertise and personal agendas aside and listen objectively to your customer and their requests. By doing so, you are ensuring that you are providing the ultimate service to your customers by identifying exactly what it is that your customer needs to achieve success, whether it be training or not.

Megan Schwabiuk, MSc, is a certified adult educator with over eight years of experience in the application of training needs assessment techniques for the design, promotion, implementation, facilitation, and evaluation of learner-focused adult education and training programming in both corporate and academic settings. meganschwabiuk@gmail.com

It’s the right time... for Essential Skills solutions The 21st century workplace needs a skilled workforce that’s efficient, effective and adaptable, while workers need the skills required to perform successfully at work. WEM is considered an Essential Skills leader in Canada with 20 years of expertise, experience and success, and a proven record of Essential Skills solutions and partnerships. An Essential Skills solution begins with a WEM consultation and an Essential Skills analysis of your workplace needs.

Today’s skilled workforce is tomorrow’s competitive edge.

Call a WEM Business Advisor at 272-5030 or visit us at www.wem.mb.ca

Civility Best Practices

Time for a Company Culture Audit By Burton M. Goldfield

sk your employees what your company is getting right--and what needs to change.

As the job market continues to improve, companies need to work harder to keep employees satisfied and in their seats. Whether it’s promoting a positive work environment, enhancing benefits packages or sustaining top talent, a company’s culture can help ensure the success of its business objectives. Workplace culture is about more than providing snacks or offering abbreviated hours during the summer months. Culture is how employees describe where they work, understand the business and see themselves as part of the organization. Building a strong workplace culture will not guarantee a businesses success, but culture is a key determinant in attracting talent, which ultimately enables small businesses to continue upward growth.

What is a Culture Audit and What does it tell you?

•

How do decisions get made within the organization?

•

What are the key business priorities for the company?

•

Do your values match those of the company?

•

Workplace Culture and Hiring

when hiring, it’s important to first find someone who have a vested interest and willingness to support and work toward the vision of the organization. If this doesn’t exist, over time the individual will not be successful and could ultimately tarnish employee morale. Every organization is not the right fit for every person. Hiring and motivating the individuals most aligned with the workplace culture eliminates costs associated with employee turnover and provides an environment for employees to f lourish in because they aren’t afraid of the revolving door.

Getting Creative with Workplace Culture

A culture audit helps determine the culture that currently exists within a company. Surveying employee opinions helps companies determine what keeps stellar staff motivated and happy at the company and offers insights into the means to strengthen the positive traits that currently exist.

Growth-oriented companies are notorious for coming up with unusual ways to improve the work environment--offsite retreats, impromptu programs and the creative use of office space are all examples of how companies implement creative ideas to build their culture.

An effective workplace culture audit determines the overall working environment, identifies the unwritten norms and rules governing employee interactions and workplace practices, highlights possible barriers to effective work practices and communication and makes recommendations for addressing problems identified. Not only will it help retain top performers, it provides a blueprint of what attributes to look for in applicants.

Whether it’s invigorating the company environment, recruiting top talent or seeking holes in an organization’s culture, it’s imperative to craft and build a desired workplace culture.

Sample questions include: •

Are you being compensated fairly?

•

Are your benefits comparable to those of our competitors?

•

Does the company value your work?

•

Are you getting the training you need?

•

Does open communication exist in the company?

•

Do you feel challenged?

•

What are the values of the organization?

Burton. M Goldfield is focused on building high-performance teams. That starts with attracting the right candidates, hiring the right employees, and then mentoring and growing them into great leaders and contributors. In order to cultivate discussion among all colleagues, he incorporates a host of activities, including weekly pod casts, a book club, office hours, all-hands meetings, leadership forums, and team off sites.

Advice

Ask Louise

Louise Fox, president, Etiquette Ladies, CEO, Etiquette Leader; Founder and spokesperson, MannersTV.com; Certification Panelist and Master Trainer, ICTC; and Executive Director the Canadian School of Service; Cordon Blue Trained Chef; Etiquette coach for Women’s Network top rated television program “Style by Jury,”; consultant on the Food Networks show “Chef School,” ; guest expert on the Slice Network’s “Mom Show,” “Downright Domestic”

Q A Q A

Golf Day

The company I work for sponsors a golf day for employees. I play golf but it seems this would be a good opportunity for me to stay back and catch up on all my paper work. Do I need to participate? P. Cipotta, Oshawa In a nutshell, Yes! Golf today is not just a game; a great deal of business is conducted on the golf course. While you are cleaning up your “in” box, people are getting to know one another on a different level, ideas and opinions are being exchanged, friendships and relationships are being developed, and decisions are being made. You aren’t getting caught up, you’re being left out. Remember to familiarize yourself with the rules, dress appropriately, bring a positive attitude, be a good sport and be prepared to enjoy yourself and engage with others on a more social level.

Q A Q A

Prairie Dogging

I work in an office with cubicles and when I have a question of a colleague I usually just stick my head over the cubicle and ask. Some members of our unit say this is bad etiquette because it disturbs others. Are they right? L. Haskin, London Yes, they are! Those of you who constantly pop up over the cubicle walls to make remarks or ask questions are called Prairie Dogs.

It’s just one of the many ways employees demonstrate a lack of courtesy for their cubicle neighbors. Constant interruptions make it difficult to concentrate on your work and surveys have shown when you are interrupted it takes approximately 20 minutes to return to the level of concentration you had reached before you were interrupted. 1. Instead of peeking your head over the top of your neighbor’s cubicle every time you have a “quick” question, get a little exercise by walking around the corner. 2. Assume that there is a door on the cubicle and those cubicle walls go all the way to the ceiling. Knock. 3. Do not use sign language or whisper to attract the attention of someone who is busy or on the phone. Saying, “I know you are busy…but… this will just take a minute,” does not excuse the interruption.

 

    

Research confirms that there is a tangible cost of incivility to business. Whether you are a small business or a multi-national corporation, fostering civility in your workplace can: increase morale, help you leverage Social IQ, facilitate cultural competence, encourage effective communication, decrease turnover, boost service-orientation and significantly impact the bottom line. CivilityExperts.com is an authorized distributor of the OCS. www.civilityexperts.com | ©2010 All rights Reserved | 1-204-996-4792.

Civility Best Practices

Personal Branding with Civility By Maria Cucinotta

ersonal branding can be seen as the process that takes your skills, personality and unique characteristics and packages them into a powerful identity that lifts you above the crowd and has a compelling message that captures your unique presence.

When defining and designing your personal brand your goal for your proven image and brand is to discover the strongest and most appealing aspects of your character. And by choosing civility you can enhance and develop other aspects of your character.

Personal branding that is based with Civility in mind is founded in a sincere and authentic communication of who you are. Also choosing civility as part of your personal brand gives you the opportunity for creating more positive and productive business and personal relationships.

Our personal brand transcends what we do for a living, and this is where the pillars of Civility respect, restraint and responsibility can positively impact our Personal Brand, business and personal relationships.

Your image and appearance are important to creating a successful personal brand. Your image includes everything about your appearance, behaviour and communication—verbal, nonverbal and includes the online space. In business, first impressions are essential and can enhance or detract from your personal brand. The personal branding process allows you to become the person you were meant to be and involves being clear about your values, visions, passion and purpose. The essential components involve having clarity, consistency and authenticity. In personal branding authenticity means communicating what is true for yourself and your goals. Your personal brand inf luences your business and personal relationships. True and lasting success depends on the totality of your personal brand and the image that encompasses it. Your total brand is made up of these five essential elements which must be managed for long term success of your personal brand. These are: 1.

Your hidden image – your attitude, ability, self esteem

2. Your assumed image – your reputation 3. Your visual image – your packaging and appearance 4. Your experienced image – your communication 5. Your proven image – you over a period of time

All relationships that embrace ethics, respect and integrity and honesty provides the very foundation that a positive personal brand consists of. It is important that you ensure that your image and brand accurately ref lects you, your potential and your desired results. So investing in your personal brand with civility is an investment in yourself and your relationship with others which ultimately results in your most valuable asset, your reputation.

Maria Cucinotta -The Image CEO www.mariacuci.com Maria Cucinotta is President of The Image CEO (Chief Empowerment Officer) she is an Image Consultant and Personal Branding Strategist. As the foremost civility expert in Australia, Maria aligns one’s Personal brand and Image to one’s inner essence and she believes firmly in the value of working with the pillars of civility. In this way she is able to assist her clients to enhance their credibility and authenticity in all aspects of their business and personal life.

Civility Around the World

How Professionals in The Philippines incorporate civility into their business By Ms. Olen Juarez-Lim, AICI FLC

he Philippines is situated at the heart of Southeast Asia with the biggest inf luence in culture comes from Spain, Mexico, the United States and from the Catholic Church. Many Western values inf luence the way people do business in the Philippines still holding strongly to their strong Asian morals.

confrontational and unfriendly, so Filipino’s would rather say ‘yes’ even if they mean ‘no.’ The demeanor in every situation should be subtle as Filipinos are very casual, fun loving, sensitive and hospitable people. Their manners are often reserved and caring for their guest and their attempt to please is a priority. However, insincerity is easily detected and can ruin the relationship. Trust and loyalty are central to developing relationships.

The term “hiya” which means loss of face is a dominant issue alongside group orientation and Filipinos are also very big on personal dignity and national pride. Dominant businesses are hierarchical in structure with mostly family owned business with power belonging to key family members. Filipinos are very relational and it would be wise to establish cordial relationships first before directly handling business affairs.

So despite the onslaught of colonialism in Filipino minds today, despite the commercialism and fast paced business practices, Filipinos will stay true to their core – ineffaceable, potent and authentic, sprinkling every Filipino interaction with civility, kindness and respect.

The Filipino family values are very strong and they would always show their regard for the elderly. The family bond is always a way of life even in business as when you had long dealings with them; expect that you be treated like family. Communication styles are indirect, manner is gentle and non-confrontational as the use of diplomatic and coded language can make comprehension somewhat difficult. All forms of communication should be courteous, regardless of its content. To say ‘no’ could be construed as

Ms. Olen Juarez-Lim, AICI FLC

Y T I V I LT WORK

Next Issue: December,

V I C L I Y T I

2012

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