Thinking back on the week that was…

I’ve decided to do a weekly round up on Fridays to pull together stuff that I’ve found interesting over the course of the week – with the help of my girl group, Laura and Jenna.  Our weekly cartoon here is really hitting home for me this week.  I am looking for opportunities to architect enhancements to our customer experience, and struggle with the same issues that plague most projects like this – a ton of information, but not enough actionable insight.  Our data is very current – from formal online surveys, customer advisory councils, support calls, social media, etc.  Our challenge is weaving all that information together in a way that makes our improvement efforts scalable.  I’m firmly committed to data-driven decisions, but it’s not for the faint of heart!

Here are some things we found interesting this week.  Enjoy!

What’s your perfect work temperature? Stay Warm This Winter and Your Workers WIll be More Productive http://ow.ly/e2gCw via @TLNT_com

Companies turn to brain games to tackle work stress http://ow.ly/e0uEX via @FortuneMagazine

Managing Others is About…You http://ow.ly/e0qSq via @TrishMcFarlane

It’s The Customer, Stupid http://ow.ly/e0qwv via @hrbartender

RT @williamtincup: RT Long Hours Linked To Health Problems And Lower Productivity http://bit.ly/PzkUA4 @jongelman

Great advice for hiring the right people:

http://www.inc.com/margaret-heffernan/hiring-recruiting-secrets-of-success.html

Everyone was talking about the replacement refs this week – this article does a nice job of linking this to the problem of hiring or promoting people who are “out of their league”

http://www.tlnt.com/2012/09/25/replacement-refs-its-a-lesson-about-getting-the-right-people-on-the-job/

Kronos released some interesting research this week about inefficiencies in public safety:

http://www.kronos.com/pr/new-survey-finds-vast-inefficiencies-in-public-safety-scheduling-and-resource-management.aspx

Everyone wants to distance themselves from failure and/or pretend it didn’t happen – good reminder that failure is one of our greatest teachers:

http://www.tlnt.com/2012/09/17/the-power-of-failure-why-it-is-one-of-our-very-best-teachers/

With all the technology we have to distract ourselves with…is anyone ever going to do anything really creative ever again?

http://www.cnn.com/2012/09/25/tech/mobile/oms-smartphones-boredom/index.html

And if you have a couple more minutes, do check out what my Kronos friends have been blogging and tweeting about this week:

Don’t Drink the Cliché Kool-Aid http://ow.ly/e3VtE via @SmarterCafe

Motherhood, Apple Pie and Upgrading http://ow.ly/e3VBB via @SmarterCafe

Operations, meet Payroll, your new best friend when it comes to understanding labor spend http://ow.ly/e3VEN via @GreggLean

Use 1970′s technology to improve your plant’s performance http://ow.ly/e3VHl via @GreggLean

The Evolution of Workforce Management http://ow.ly/e3VJN via @simonmacpherson

Enjoy your weekend!