Tag: Spring Forward Monday

Choose to help your people Spring Forward!

March 14 is a Monday, the day after Daylight Savings time advances and we lose an hour of sleep. It doesn’t sound like much, but global statistics of many kinds show that there are many, multiple general negative impacts on people and performance.

It will be one of the low productivity workdays of the year — it is also called Sleepy Monday by many — and you know people will be dragging. I mean, really, how many of your people will go to bed an hour early?

So, expect things to look like this:

So, with most people dragging, and with this a known problem, why not choose to do something differently? Why not recharge their batteries and increase involvement and low motivation and teamwork (sometimes not really good anyway) by facilitating a meeting focused on their issues and their ideas for improvement? Why not have some FUN and generate some ideas that you can then implement? Worth a try?

Choose to be a Draggin’ Slayer. Seize The Day!

Choose to do some things different with your onsite and especially your remote workers. Ask them to work together to share ideas for what might be done differently to address those problems that do not roll along smoothly!

People are good problem solvers and when they know that something IS a shared problem, they will collaborate to define the problem and generate the needed perspective and define appropriate resources and support. They can find solutions and if the solutions are their idea, they will be more motivated to implement those ideas. It is an issue of ownership and active involvement; you really cannot push them to make improvements you think are needed, since they resist your changes…

Nobody ever washes a rental car.

So, it is about choice. Put them to work!

We are offering a $15 toolkit that works for onsite and Zoom-type meetings:

It comes complete with our main discussion illustration, called Square Wheels One:

And related worksheets. You can present the image as a screenshare and have your people discuss this to get them started thinking about the many workplace things that do not work smoothly.

From those engaging discussions, you can shift the talk to the workplace issues that the Square Wheels might represent, the many things that do not work smoothly. You can engage them in their normal work teams or create new breakout room to allow them to share thoughts and generate possibilities.

You can close with the image we call Intrinsic Motivation, the reality of how people feel when they implement their own ideas and see resulting improvements.

As a manager or team leader, it is your choice to continue to do things the same way or to actively involve and engage people to interactively consider things from different perspectives, defining some issues and refining some ideas for individual or organizational improvement.

This kind of interactive discussion can be held at the front-line worker level or even among the top management team, although workplace realities would suggest that the people pushing the wagon know a lot more about the realities and problems than the wagon pullers.

Our decades of experience using similar materials repeatedly proves that the Round Wheels are already in the wagon — those good ideas already exist. It is simply a matter of identification of the better ideas once the bad ones are recognized for what they are.

You can choose to be a Draggin’ Slayer on Spring Forward Monday^® or continue to let things thump and bump along. You can choose to improve involvement and engagement by actively involving and engaging your people in a new visions of how things can roll to the goals.

People WANT to be involved. Even the ones that say they don’t will get involved and engaged, since they so-often complain about how things are working and this is the perfect venue for them to contribute! So choose to involve everyone. Let people make some better choices and own the process of implementing workplace improvement.

You can also purchase this simple $15 toolkit to support your engagement efforts with our metaphors and materials. The package contains:

The Square Wheels One image
A simple Leader’s Guide for facilitating the session(s)
Participant Worksheets/Handouts

Optionally, you can access The Square Wheels Project to complete a 30-minute optional course on generating workplace improvement through facilitation. It is a general skill-development course, but focused on our metaphors and worksheets. And it costs only $15 as we gain traction for our approach to organizational performance improvement and motivation of workplaces.

We are continually working hard to make this simple tool available directly to supervisors and managers who need simple and effective tools for motivating their people. Doing this on Spring Forward Monday® would be a nice touch, but doing one of these sessions any time would be of high impact and benefit.

Please note that this Spring Forward Monday® toolkit contains only the two new Divya Style illustrations of Square Wheels One
and the Intrinsic Motivation image and does not include the LEGO images used to illustrate the Draggin’ Slayer idea.
Other Square Wheels® illustrations will become available shortly and we are easily able to support your use of the metaphor with custom-designed tools.

For the FUN of It!

Dr. Scott Simmerman is a designer of team building games and organization improvement tools.
Managing Partner of Performance Management Company since 1984, he is an experienced presenter and consultant who is trying to retire!! He now lives in Cuenca, Ecuador.

You can reach Scott at scott@squarewheels.com

Learn more about Scott at his LinkedIn site.

Square Wheels® is a registered trademark of Performance Management Company
Spring Forward Monday® is a registered trademark of Performance Management Company
LEGO® is a trademark of The LEGO Group
Square Wheels images are copyrighted by Performance Management Company

Spring Forward Monday™ is March 13, 2017 – A Square Wheels® Solution

By Dr. Scott Simmerman

On March 2, 2017

In dis-un-engagement, employee engagement, employee engagement, employee motivation, Engagement, Facilitation, improve organizational performance, innovation, intrinsic motivation, Involving and Engaging People, manager as motivator, motivation in the workplace, motivational team building exercises, people and performance, Spring Forward Monday, Square Wheels LEGO images, team building exercises, team motivation, The Square Wheels Project

Okay, March 13 is a Monday. But it is also the Monday after Sunday morning’s loss of an hour’s sleep as we set the clocks ahead each Spring. AND, it will be one of the low productivity workdays, since you know people will be dragging. (How many do you think will go to bed an hour earlier on Saturday night? Plus, there are lots of statistics on the measured impacts!)

So, with most people dragging, and this to be a known problem, why not choose to do something differently? Why not recharge their batteries and increase involvement (known to be low in general) and motivation (generally low) and teamwork (sometimes very spotty) by having a meeting focused on their issues and their ideas for improvement?

Choose to be a Draggin’ Slayer. Seize The Day! Choose to focus on rebuilding some energy and gaining ideas for improvement.

You can probably expect some low energy from your people. But our experiences show that this will be short-lived as people get involved with the Square Wheels^® metaphor as a vehicle to discuss issues and problems — and there are lots of Square Wheels out there! Simply talking about perceived Square Wheels will generate many Round Wheel solutions to make things roll more better faster.

People want to make improvements and people will work on teams to look at the ideas for improvement and offer ideas for implementation. It is just that they need the collective thinking of the group to really understand the issues more clearly and to better define some solutions.

And it is a fact that people are pretty good problem solvers, when they know that something IS a problem and they have perspective and resources and support. They can find solutions and if the solutions are their idea, they will be more motivated to implement those ideas. It is an issue of ownership and active involvement; you really cannot push them to make improvements you think are needed, since they resist your changes…

Nobody ever washes a rental car.

So, it is about choice. Your choice to simply continue to do things the same way or to involve and engage your people to look at things from different perspectives and define some issues and refine some ideas for workplace improvement. This kind of session can be held at the front-line worker level or even among the top management team, although workplace realities would suggest that the people pushing the wagon know a lot more about the realities and problems than the wagon pullers.

Most organizations do have the tendency to work like this and we will note that our experience proves that the Round Wheels are already in the wagon — those good ideas already exist. It is simply a matter of identification of the better ideas once the bad ones are recognized for what they are.

The reality is that the Square Wheels^® actually DO work, they just do not work smoothly…

Square Wheels One is a metaphor for performance improvement by Scott Simmerman

Square Wheels® One is our main illustration about how things really work.

So, with that perception about how things really work, you can use your imagination to guess at what might be done differently. You can choose to be a Draggin’ Slayer on Spring Forward Monday™ or continue to let things thump and bump. You can choose to improve involvement and engagement by involving and engaging your people in a new vision of how things can roll to the goal.

If we have gotten you interested, here are some simple resources. One is a 2-minute video overview of the whole idea.

You can also purchase a complete $25 toolkit to support your effort with our metaphors and materials. The package contains:

The Square Wheels One image
A Leader’s Guide for facilitating the session
Participant Worksheets/Handouts
A collection of Square Wheels Posters that can be used as anchors to the insights gained as the group rolls down the road.

And, you can access The Square Wheels Project to complete a 30-minute optional course on facilitating workplace improvement through facilitation. It is a general course, but focused on our metaphors and worksheets. And it costs only $10 as we gain traction for our approach to organizational performance improvement and motivation of workplaces.

We are working hard to make this simple tool available directly to supervisors and managers who need simple and effective tools for motivating their people. Doing this on Spring Forward Monday™ would be a nice touch, but doing one of these sessions any time would be impactful.

For the FUN of It!

Dr. Scott Simmerman is a designer of team building games and organization improvement tools. Managing Partner of Performance Management Company since 1984, he is an experienced presenter and consultant.

You can reach Scott at scott@squarewheels.com
Connect with Scott on Google+

Learn more about Scott at his LinkedIn site.

Square Wheels® is a registered trademark of Performance Management Co.
LEGO® is a trademark of The LEGO Group

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Daylight Savings Time – Myths, Realities and Impacts

By Dr. Scott Simmerman

On February 25, 2014

In employee engagement, employee motivation, Engagement, manager as motivator, ownership involvement, productivity improvement, Spring Forward Monday

I’ve been playing with Spring Forward Monday as a proposal to take some time and celebrate employee involvement and to ask for ideas to improve organizational performance and productivity. You can find more about that idea here:

And I had read a good bit about the day, but not really known much. Here is what I found out, much to my surprise.

I was thinking that it was an American phenomenon and that it occurred only in the US, proposed by Ben Franklin or Franklin D. Roosevelt or someone a long time ago.

The modern idea was actually first proposed in 1895 by an English-born New Zealander. It was first implemented by Germany and Austria-Hungary on April 30, 1916. Many countries have used it at different times and it has been more consistently implemented since the energy crises of the 1970s, according to Wikipedia.

It is currently used worldwide (see graph from wikipedia below). A few countries have gone to permanent DST, such as Argentina, Iceland and Russia. It simply changes the times of sunrise and sunset, but that is really for early risers.

Colors are northern hemisphere and southern hemisphere DST countries

When implemented, clocks are moved ahead one hour sometime in the Spring and moved back in the fall so that there is more apparent daylight in the evenings and less in the mornings. A study in Indiana, which has been in and out of the system, found that it actually raised electricity bills significantly when implemented…

On the other hand, it benefits sports and retail sales but makes the July 4^th fireworks shows occur later for the little kids!

With the cellphone and automatic clock issues, many of the old clock resetting problems have gone away. It is estimated, however, that time lost to setting clocks in the US is about $1 billion and estimates are that the loss of sleep causes $450 million in health problems.

Setting clocks ahead means that workers are actually arriving at work an hour earlier than they had the previous week. That clock-shifted biological time does have impacts, just like you would see if you were working an hour earlier that day (duh!). The “nine to five” workday is actually “eight to four.”

This is a modern day, industrial issue, for the most part. Ancient societies were much more attuned to the actual sunrise and sunset and agricultural societies remain tied to the sun and not the time.

The truth about Ben Franklin is also interesting. Franklin is known for publishing the old English proverb, “Early to bed, and early to rise, makes a man healthy, wealthy and wise” During his time as an American envoy to France, he anonymously published a letter suggesting that Parisians economize on candles by rising earlier to use morning sunlight.This 1784 satire also proposed taxing shutters, rationing candles, and waking the public by ringing church bells and firing cannons at sunrise. Franklin did not propose Daylight Savings Time but he was known for tweeking a few cheeks now and again!

You can read a lot more about Daylight Savings Time at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Daylight_saving_time and there are a number of research reports that analyze various economic impacts.

It is not always a great day, but it is an opportunity to choose to do something differently:

If you are looking for a tool to use with your people to better involve and engage them, we have a very special price on a special toolkit designed for this day. For $5.95, you can rock and roll! Click on the image below to find out more:

For the FUN of It!

Dr. Scott Simmerman is a designer of team building games and organization improvement tools. Managing Partner of Performance Management Company since 1984, he is an experienced presenter and consultant.

Connect with Scott on Google+ – you can reach Scott at scott@squarewheels.com

Follow Scott’s posts on Pinterest: pinterest.com/scottsimmerman/
Scott’s blog on Poems and Quips on Workplace Improvement is here.

Alternate Versions of our Spring Forward Monday Square Wheels engagement tools

By Dr. Scott Simmerman

On February 25, 2014

In Change Facilitation, Continuous continuous improvement, employee motivation, Engagement, innovation, Involving and Engaging People, manager as motivator, Organizational Development Tools, Team work

We have created some alternative versions of our toolkit and handouts for employee engagement. One way to acquire the free handout shown below, one that uses a different version of our Square Wheels One illustration (with alternative characters than our fat white guys with hats version) shown below.

If you look closely at the image, you can see we are using Version 2 of the image:

instead of the regular or main version that we display on most of our materials:

Thus, there are differences in the handout from the worksheet shared yesterday.

You can acquire the pdf of this handout by clicking the link below:

Spring Forward Monday — What are SWs
Worksheet Handout – V2

The idea is a simple one to use. You can simply hand out the worksheet and ask how the illustration at the top right might represent how things work in most organizations and then, after they discuss that a bit, ask them for some ideas as to how this works in their work group.

This would work and it is free. Just download the pdf and print a worksheet for each person. Use it to ask them for their ideas about what might be improved that would make a Spring Forward Difference.

As a value-added alternative, you can click on the worksheet image and go to a very special offer of a complete toolkit, including images in powerpoint, a facilitation guide, multiple worksheets and other supporting information including images you can use for promoting the idea within your organization. All for the pretty outstanding and astounding price of $5.95!!

This IS a complete set of tools that we sell for $50…

Have FUN out there and DO make an impact.

Dr. Scott Simmerman is a designer of team building games and organization improvement tools. Managing Partner of Performance Management Company since 1984, he is an experienced presenter and consultant.

Connect with Scott on Google+ – you can reach Scott at scott@squarewheels.com

Follow Scott’s posts on Pinterest: pinterest.com/scottsimmerman/
Scott’s blog on Poems and Quips on Workplace Improvement is here.

Free Engagement Worksheet Tool for Spring Forward Monday

By Dr. Scott Simmerman

On February 24, 2014

In Change Facilitation, employee motivation, Engagement, innovation, Spring Forward Monday, Team work

We’ve been using Square Wheels as a simple tool for employee involvement and engagement for 20 years and in our attempt to help get Spring Forward Monday started, I offer up a free handout worksheet here. Get a pdf file of the worksheet by clicking on this link:

Spring Forward Monday — What are some Square Wheels –
Handout Worksheet

You will get a handout that looks like this:

This would work and it is free. Just download the pdf and print a worksheet for each person.

As a value-added alternative, you can click on the worksheet image and go to a very special offer of a complete toolkit, including images in powerpoint, a facilitation guide, multiple worksheets and other supporting information including images you can use for promoting the idea within your organization. All for the pretty outstanding and astounding price of $5.95!!

Have FUN out there and DO make an impact.

Dr. Scott Simmerman is a designer of team building games and organization improvement tools. Managing Partner of Performance Management Company since 1984, he is an experienced presenter and consultant.

Connect with Scott on Google+ – you can reach Scott at scott@squarewheels.com

Follow Scott’s posts on Pinterest: pinterest.com/scottsimmerman/
Scott’s blog on Poems and Quips on Workplace Improvement is here.

National Day of Celebration in the workplace – Spring Forward Monday

By Dr. Scott Simmerman

On February 19, 2014

In Change Facilitation, employee motivation, Engagement, Facilitation, innovation, Involving and Engaging People, Spring Forward Monday

In the past two days, we have had an interesting time discussing different thoughts around a Spring Forward Monday — it’s a great idea to celebrate what is normally a pretty rough day for many workers. Monday, March 10 is the day after we institute Daylight Savings Time in many places in the US.

There is nothing “light” about Daylight Savings!

The cost to health of US citizens from losing that one hour of sleep when we spring forward was calculated to be $433.982,548 by an economics analysis firm. And when we add in even just the clock changing time, it escalates to more than $1 billion. Take the lateness to work, the above average grumpiness of the workers, and all that other stuff, it has got to be a $10 to $20 billion hit to productivity. (One wonders how many facebook posts will complain about having to work that day…)

So, let’s Reframe The Game — Let’s make this dreadful day into Spring Forward Monday and use it as a reason for supervisors and managers to have conversations with their people about workplace issues and opportunities. The research shows that these kinds of discussions are not very prevalent and that many people feel that no one listens to their ideas in the first place.

I share some ideas around this theme on YouTube — you can see it by clicking on the haiku below:

This was my idea, based on my work using simple tools for improving involvement and engagement for workplace improvement. But accomplishing the goals of Spring Forward Monday certainly do not require any tools; what we need are more conversations about issues and opportunities.

If we can help you in some way, check out our special offer on a toolkit here. But we simply hope that supervisors everywhere will simply take the time to ask for ideas and listen for answers.

For the FUN of It!

Dr. Scott Simmerman is a designer of team building games and organization improvement tools. Managing Partner of Performance Management Company since 1984, he is an experienced presenter and consultant.

Connect with Scott on Google+ – you can reach Scott at scott@squarewheels.com

Follow Scott’s posts on Pinterest: pinterest.com/scottsimmerman/
Scott’s blog on Poems and Quips on Workplace Improvement is here.

Daylight Savings Improvement Day – Spring Forward Monday

By Dr. Scott Simmerman

On February 18, 2014

In Change Facilitation, employee engagement, employee motivation, Engagement, Facilitation, innovation, intrinsic motivation, Involving and Engaging People, manager as motivator, ownership involvement, Performance Feedback, productivity improvement, workplace performance improvement

On Sunday, March 9, at 0200 hours in the early morning of 2014, most of the United States will engage in an exercise called Daylight Savings Time and we will move the clocks forward an hour, making it darker early in the morning and extending daylight in the evening.

It has some historical anchors, but various sources estimate the actual cost in lost productivity to be somewhere between $400 million and $2 billion, with people generally losing an hour of sleep in addition to having to adjust all the manual clocks in their life. (Most cannot remember how to reset the clocks in their cars!)

So, as an alternative to the lost productivity and in recognition of the need to improve workplace productivity and involvement and engagement, I am going to propose we create and celebrate Spring Forward Monday, where supervisors and managers should spend some special time with their people working on the issues of productivity and alignment.

The basic idea is pretty simple:

Things may not be working smoothly. And some round wheels are already in the wagon. So, let’s take a bit of time to stop pushing and pulling and talk together about some of the perceived issues and opportunities and how we can implement some changes and improvements. Most people feel that managers do not listen to ideas, so let’s use this special day for this special purpose: communications!

So, we want to choose to do something that looks more like this to better involve and engage everyone in the workplace and hear their ideas for improvement:

We want to engage all those feet in moving things forward, more better faster.

The conversations could focus on shared goals, missions and visions, and alignment kinds of things to clarify expectations and provide performance feedback or it could focus on themes of issue identification and opportunity implementation.

You can view a 3-minute video on the basic idea of Spring Forward Monday by clicking on the image above or by clicking on this link.

There should be lots of positive impacts for something special like this, including the simple recognition that ideas for improvement already exist and that we should be choosing to do some things more better faster.

Click here to find more information about this specially priced, $5.95 Square Wheels Engagement toolkit by clicking on the link below:

For the FUN of It!

Dr. Scott Simmerman is a designer of team building games and organization improvement tools. Managing Partner of Performance Management Company since 1984, he is an experienced presenter and consultant.

Connect with Scott on Google+ – you can reach Scott at scott@squarewheels.com

Follow Scott’s posts on Pinterest: pinterest.com/scottsimmerman/
Scott’s blog on Poems and Quips on Workplace Improvement is here.

Ideas on People and Performance, Team Building, Motivation and Innovation

Tag: Spring Forward Monday

Make Spring Forward Monday a Day for More Engagement

Spring Forward Monday™ is March 13, 2017 – A Square Wheels® Solution

Daylight Savings Time – Myths, Realities and Impacts

Alternate Versions of our Spring Forward Monday Square Wheels engagement tools

Free Engagement Worksheet Tool for Spring Forward Monday

National Day of Celebration in the workplace – Spring Forward Monday

Daylight Savings Improvement Day – Spring Forward Monday