This video emphasizes the critical role managers play in shaping employee engagement, motivation, and retention. Managers make daily decisions that profoundly influence their teams, yet they often lack timely, relevant, and accessible data to guide these decisions effectively. Despite the abundance of employee data collected by organizations, a persistent “last mile problem” prevents this data from reaching managers in a usable form. This obstacle manifests as three key barriers: limited access to integrated data, lack of contextualized insights, and outdated information. These challenges force managers to rely on intuition rather than evidence, leading to missed opportunities for early intervention, unfair compensation decisions, and ineffective skill development initiatives. Highlights 📊 Managers influence at least 70% of employee engagement outcomes, underscoring their critical role. 🧩 The “last mile problem” blocks essential employee data from reaching managers when they need it most. 🔐 Data access is hindered by scattered systems, privacy controls, and lack of integration. 📉 Without context, raw data confuses rather than clarifies and often arrives too late to be actionable. 🛠️ Solutions include manager-friendly dashboards, decision workflows, and tiered data access with training. 💡 Real-world cases show improved well-being, reduced pay gaps, and lower turnover through these data-driven practices. 🚀 Starting small with mapping decisions and pilot projects can kickstart closing the HR data gap. Key Insights 📈 Manager Impact on Engagement: Research confirms managers account for at least 70% of the variance in employee engagement, making their decision-making pivotal. This highlights that empowering managers with the right tools and information is one of the most effective levers for boosting organizational performance and morale. 🔄 The Last Mile Problem as a Systemic Issue: Despite sophisticated HR analytics and dashboards at the organizational level, the failure to deliver actionable insights directly to managers reveals a systemic flaw. It’s not just a technical challenge but also an operational and cultural one, requiring intentional design to bridge the gap between data collection and daily managerial use. 🔐 Access Barriers Fragment Managerial Insight: Employee data is siloed across multiple platforms — HRIS, learning management systems, performance tools — and strict privacy protocols further restrict access. This fragmentation means managers rarely get a holistic view of their teams, undermining fairness and effectiveness in decision-making. Solving access requires not only technical integration but also carefully designed permission structures. 🧩 Contextualization is Crucial for Usability: Raw data in spreadsheets or complex reports is overwhelming and often irrelevant to managers’ immediate needs. Providing contextual interpretation—such as highlighting burnout signs, pay equity alerts, or workload imbalances—translates data into stories that inform and empower decisions, reducing confusion and enabling proactive leadership. ⏳ Timeliness Determines Data Utility: Data delayed by weeks or months loses its value for real-time decisions such as retention interventions or performance reviews. Managers need near real-time or frequently updated insights integrated into their workflows to respond quickly to emerging issues rather than reacting to outdated metrics. This shifts HR from a retrospective to a proactive function. 🛠️ Integrated Tools and Guided Workflows Enhance Decision Quality: Embedding data-driven prompts into existing tools (e.g., compensation review forms) helps managers make fairer, more transparent decisions without adding cognitive load. Guided workflows act as decision support systems that ensure equity and consistency, which are key to maintaining trust and reducing unconscious bias. 🎓 Tiered Access and Training Balance Privacy and Empowerment: Not all managers require full data access; starting with aggregated team-level insights and progressively unlocking detailed data after training ensures responsible use and protects employee privacy. Training modules that teach data literacy, privacy principles, and effective communication based on data build managerial competence and confidence. #PeopleAnalytics #HR #Managers #DataDriven #Leadership #TalentManagement OUTLINE: 00:00:00 - The Hidden Cost of Flying Blind 00:02:36 - The Three Walls Between You and Your Data 00:04:11 - Practical Solutions for Today 00:05:49 - How Real Companies Win 00:07:17 - Your First Steps for Tomorrow

This study investigates the critical capabilities and integration mechanisms that enable organizations to achieve substantive sustainability transformations. https://doi.org/10.3390/su17157058 Keywords: sustainability transformation; paradox navigation; organizational capabilities; integration mechanisms; power dynamics; organizational learning; sustainable development; corporate sustainability; systems thinking Future of Work Institute: https://www.futureofworkinstitute.com.au/ Center for Transformative Work Design: https://www.transformativeworkdesign.com/

In this explainer vide, we break down Dr. Jonathan H. Westover’s research, "Sustainable AI Transformation: A Critical Framework for Organizational Resilience and Long-term Viability." Learn the evidence-backed 3D framework—upskilling, distributed innovation, and strategic integration—that drove a 74% AI initiative success rate versus 12% without it. We unpack workforce impacts, governance models (hybrid vs centralized), key enablers (data infrastructure, executive sponsorship, change readiness), and common implementation barriers. Perfect for leaders, HR, and AI practitioners navigating organizational transformation, workforce disruption, and sustainable AI strategy. If this helped, please like and share to spread the evidence-based approach. #artificialintelligence #Upskilling #OrganizationalTransformation #SustainableAI

In this HCI Webinar, Dr. Jonathan H. Westover talks with Hugh Blane about what the leadership industrial complex has gotten wrong. Hugh Blane is a renowned leadership, athletic, and financial coach with over forty years of coaching experience. Hugh, the founder and principal of Claris Consulting, has coached successful CEOs to transform their leadership, which transforms their culture and results. As a coach, Hugh has generated over $75 million of client and enterprise value over the last ten years, and clients include Sony Pictures, Starbucks, Costco, Stanford University, Nordstrom, REI Co-op, and Wells Fargo.

Abstract: Organizations increasingly rely on quantitative metrics to guide decision-making, resource allocation, and performance evaluation. While measurement provides valuable insights, it simultaneously creates powerful behavioral incentives that can systematically undermine organizational effectiveness. This article examines the phenomenon of measurement distortion—the process by which metrics shift organizational attention, resources, and values away from unmeasured but critical activities. Drawing on research from organizational behavior, public administration, healthcare management, and educational policy, we explore how measurement systems create unintended consequences across industries. We analyze the mechanisms through which metrics reshape organizational culture and present evidence-based strategies for designing measurement systems that illuminate rather than distort. The article provides practitioners with frameworks for balancing quantitative accountability with the protection of unmeasured value, ultimately arguing that measurement mastery requires equal attention to what organizations choose not to measure.

In the contemporary world, numbers and metrics dominate how we evaluate success across various domains, from business and healthcare to education and logistics. Dashboards filled with charts and targets promise clarity and progress, but an overreliance on these metrics can distort the very goals they intend to measure. This phenomenon, known as measurement distortion, occurs when the focus on specific numbers causes individuals and organizations to prioritize improving those metrics rather than fulfilling the underlying mission. For example, delivery drivers measured solely on the number of packages delivered may compromise safety and care, hospitals pressured to reduce patient stay lengths may discharge patients prematurely, and schools judged mainly by standardized test scores may sacrifice creativity and critical thinking. Highlights 📊 Modern life is saturated with metrics intended to guide progress and success. ⚠️ Overemphasis on single metrics can lead to “measurement distortion,” where the metric becomes the goal. 🚚 Delivery drivers measured only by package count may compromise safety and customer satisfaction. 🏥 Healthcare metrics focusing on patient discharge speed can harm patient recovery. 🎓 Schools judged by test scores risk sacrificing creativity and deeper learning. 🔍 Measurement distortion harms service quality, trust, and professional well-being. 💡 Solutions involve mission-driven metrics, mixed measurement approaches, and fostering human judgment. Key Insights 📉 Measurement distortion reshapes behavior in harmful ways: When metrics become the primary focus, individuals optimize for the number rather than the meaningful outcome. This shift often results in lower quality, ethical compromises, and unintended consequences, demonstrating that what is measured is not always what truly matters. For example, delivery drivers speeding to increase package counts may damage parcels and frustrate customers, illustrating how numbers can mislead real-world behavior. 🏥 Healthcare metrics can create perverse incentives: Hospitals pressured to minimize patient length of stay might discharge patients prematurely, increasing the risk of relapse and readmission. This example highlights how focusing on easily measurable indicators (like bed occupancy or discharge speed) may overlook the more complex, qualitative goals of patient well-being and lasting health. It underscores the limitations of relying solely on quantitative data in complex human-centered fields. 🎓 Standardized testing narrows educational priorities: School systems judged primarily by test scores encourage teaching to the test, stifling creativity, critical thinking, and a genuine love of learning. This insight reveals how rigid metrics can undervalue essential but harder-to-measure educational outcomes, ultimately undermining the holistic development of students. 💼 Business metrics can incentivize short-term gains at long-term costs: Teams evaluated only on contracts signed might overpromise or pursue ill-fitting deals to boost monthly numbers, damaging customer satisfaction and brand reputation. This phenomenon shows how narrow metrics can prioritize immediate wins over sustainable success, emphasizing the need for balanced performance evaluation. 🌐 Visibility and incentives magnify metric bias: The omnipresence of dashboards and the strong incentive structures tied to measurable results funnel attention toward easily quantifiable metrics, often at the expense of deeper, less tangible qualities like trust, judgment, and learning. This cultural and technological environment cements the metric’s dominance, making it harder to focus on broader missions. 🧩 Complex, mixed measurement approaches reduce distortion: Combining quantitative data with qualitative insights such as customer stories, expert reviews, and process indicators creates a more comprehensive picture. Bundling multiple metrics makes gaming harder and better reflects true performance and outcomes, enabling organizations to resist the temptation to optimize for any single number. 🤝 Human judgment and psychological safety are essential: Separating learning data from evaluative data creates environments where people feel safe to experiment, fail, and improve honestly. Protecting time for innovation and metric-free zones nurtures creativity and critical thinking, reinforcing that numbers should inform rather than dictate decisions. Ultimately, human wisdom remains the indispensable guide for meaningful improvement and success. #MeasurementDistortion #Metrics #OrganizationalBehavior #DataDriven #Leadership OUTLINE: 00:00:00 - The Dashboard's Deception 00:01:55 - Measurement Distortion and Its Harms 00:03:28 - Causes, Fixes, and Restoring Purpose

Abstract: The traditional 9-to-5 workday is experiencing fundamental disruption as workers adopt microshifting—the practice of fragmenting work into flexible, non-contiguous blocks aligned with peak productivity, caregiving demands, and personal wellbeing. Recent data reveal that 65% of office workers seek greater schedule flexibility, while employees demonstrate willingness to sacrifice up to 9% of annual compensation for temporal autonomy (Owl Labs, 2025). This article examines the organizational and individual consequences of microshifting adoption, analyzing drivers including caregiving responsibilities (affecting 62% of employees), poly-employment trends (20% of workers), and productivity-trust dynamics. Evidence-based organizational responses are explored across communication architecture, equity frameworks, outcome-based performance systems, and enabling technologies. The analysis concludes with strategic imperatives for building sustainable flexibility ecosystems that preserve collaboration effectiveness while honoring temporal sovereignty.

The traditional nine-to-five workday, a remnant of the industrial era, no longer fits the complexities of modern life and work. This rigid schedule assumes that presence equals productivity and that all meaningful work must occur in an uninterrupted eight-hour block, an assumption increasingly challenged by today’s demands. The inflexible 9-to-5 model creates friction between personal responsibilities and professional expectations, leading to burnout, disengagement, and talent loss. In response, the concept of micro-shifting has emerged as a transformative approach to work scheduling. Micro-shifting breaks the workday into smaller, intentional work segments interspersed with breaks for personal obligations, aligning work with natural energy cycles and life’s demands. Highlights ⏰ The traditional nine-to-five workday is outdated and misaligned with modern life demands. 🔄 Micro-shifting breaks the workday into smaller focused segments aligned with personal energy and obligations. 👩‍👧‍👦 Over 52 million Americans are caregivers, highlighting the need for flexible work schedules. 💼 Economic pressures fuel the rise of side jobs, which rigid schedules often hinder. 🧠 Human cognitive energy varies throughout the day—micro-shifting respects these natural rhythms. 🏢 Organizational support through clear communication, equity, and asynchronous tools is critical for success. 🛑 Boundaries and the right to disconnect must be prioritized to avoid an “always-on” culture. Key Insights ⏳ The obsolescence of the 9-to-5 model: The traditional work schedule was designed for an industrial economy where productivity was measured by physical presence. It fails to accommodate contemporary realities such as caregiving, multiple jobs, and remote work, creating a disconnect that harms both workers and employers. The persistence of this model undermines productivity and well-being, necessitating a fundamental rethinking of time management in the workplace. 👩‍⚕️ Caregiving as a mainstream work factor: Caregiving responsibilities, once considered niche, now affect a majority of workers. The inability to flexibly manage these duties forces many, especially women, to reduce their work hours or leave employment altogether. Recognizing caregiving as a core factor in work-life balance is essential for retaining talent and promoting equity in the workforce. 💡 Economic necessity driving flexible work adoption: Wage stagnation and rising living costs have made side jobs common, but rigid schedules limit workers’ ability to earn supplemental income. Micro-shifting offers a way to structure work that accommodates multiple income streams, thereby increasing financial security and worker empowerment without compromising primary job performance. 🧠 Biological rhythms and productivity alignment: Cognitive performance fluctuates according to individual chronotypes—some people are more productive in the morning, others at night. The fixed 9-to-5 model ignores these variations, leading to presenteeism and disengagement. Micro-shifting allows workers to schedule demanding tasks during peak energy times, improving quality and efficiency. 🏢 The necessity of organizational culture and structure: Flexible work arrangements require a supportive framework. Without clear communication protocols, agreed core hours, and asynchronous collaboration tools, flexibility can devolve into constant availability and burnout. Leadership must foster trust, equity, and transparency to ensure micro-shifting benefits all employees fairly. 🔍 Avoiding surveillance and fostering autonomy: The use of invasive monitoring software undermines trust and contradicts the autonomy that micro-shifting depends upon. A culture of outcomes-focused management rather than activity surveillance is critical for empowering workers and creating sustainable flexible work environments. 🔄 The future of work is collaborative and adaptive: Transitioning to micro-shifting is not a top-down mandate but a co-created process involving continuous feedback, pilot programs, and manager training. Workers must also take responsibility for setting boundaries and managing availability. This dynamic approach fosters resilience, engagement, and human-centric workplaces that prioritize well-being alongside productivity. #Microshifting #FutureOfWork #FlexibleWork #AsyncWork #WorkDesign