HR Professionals
A Manager’s Guide to Self-Development – book review
What does it take to become a better manager, and can a book help? Olga Anishenkova explores The Manager’s Guide to Self-Development, examining its practical exercises, reflective approach and emphasis on personal responsibility, while considering its strengths and limitations as a resource for leaders at every stage of their careers. Book: A Manager’s Guide to Self-DevelopmentAuthor: Mike Pedler, John Burgoyne, Tom Boydell, Joan Keevill, Kevin Roe and Jean-Anne Stewart For a long time, I have held the belief that any…
What if the biggest workplace risks are hiding in plain sight?
Employee disengagement rarely happens overnight, yet organisations often miss the subtle behavioural changes that signal much trouble ahead. Laura Brennan explores why traditional performance measures fail to capture emerging problems, and how recognising withdrawal, mistrust and declining collaboration could help leaders prevent costly consequences before they become impossible to ignore. In 2024, the drop in global employee engagement cost the world economy $438 billion in lost productivity. This wasn’t through redundancy or restructure, but through the quiet, cumulative effect of…
Resistance to your capability framework is almost always rational
Ben Satchwell argues that pushback on capability frameworks is usually rational feedback, not irrational resistance. Drawing on established research, Ben shows common objections often signal solvable issues: weak co-design, unclear data use, ignored history, time burden, or a missing personal why. Instead, ask what would need to change for support. When people push back on a new capability framework, the project team tends to file it under “resistance to change”, as though resistance were an irrational reflex to be managed,…
Why financial literacy training belongs in the workplace
Financial awareness is high, yet many employees struggle to turn knowledge into meaningful action. Thomas Drury argues that workplace financial education needs a rethink, exploring how L&D teams can remove barriers, personalise support and connect learning to real financial decisions, while measuring success through behaviour change rather than course completion. The case for workplace financial education has been made before, but it’s usually made the wrong way. The framing tends to be “people don’t know about ISAs, pensions or fraud…
Change doesn’t need more intensity, it needs more precision
Organisations often respond to mounting pressure by adding more activity, yet execution suffers when people are overwhelmed. Dr Ravinder Tulsiani argues that effective change depends on precision, consistency and reinforcing a small number of critical behaviours in real work, helping leaders turn urgency into sustainable performance rather than organisational noise. AI is making many CEOs feel that slow adaptation is no longer a strategic inconvenience: It’s a survival risk. Move fast or fall behind. Therefore, responses become predictable. More investment,…
Expertise is no longer enough: Three things senior leaders now need to learn
What does it take to stand out as a senior leader when experience is no longer enough? Richard Edge identifies three essential capabilities that could reshape leadership development and career progression, and explains how L&D teams can help leaders build the confidence, connections and clarity needed to thrive in changing times. For most of the last thirty years, senior development has been built around one idea: deepen your expertise and progression will follow. Leadership programmes, accreditations and technical masterclasses all…
What to Do If…? – book review
From those difficult conversations to everyday leadership challenges, navigating workplace dilemmas takes confidence and reflection. Steph Charlesworth reviews Anne-Maartje Oud’s practical guide to handling everyday professional challenges, exploring how its bite-sized advice, relatable stories and flexible strategies can help readers develop new skills and find solutions throughout their working lives. Book: What To Do If…?: How to Handle Any Situation at Work and Come Out WinningAuthor: Anne-Maartje Oud Anne-Maartje Oud has distilled her extensive career on workplace behaviour into 268 pages…
The sound of authority is changing. Are our assumptions keeping pace?
The way we speak can shape how others perceive our intelligence, credibility and leadership potential. But should it? Cath Baxter challenges the everyday assumptions behind accent bias, explores its damaging impact on careers and confidence, and explains why being understood matters far more than sounding like someone else at work. For the first time in more than a decade, the UK is being led by a voice that sounds unmistakably like where it’s from. Prime Minister Andy Burnham’s voice is…
Is it time to rethink how L&D measures AI success?
As AI transforms workplace productivity, traditional measures of learning success risk overlooking a growing skills gap. Dr Gleb Tsipursky explores why time to proficiency should become L&D’s defining AI metric, helping organisations assess independent judgement, preserve essential learning experiences and ensure employees develop expertise rather than increasing dependence on technology. The most urgent AI problem for L&D may be hiding inside a productivity win. When software drafts the routine email, summarises the case, prepares the first analysis and answers the…
Is AI making your organisation’s echo chamber louder?
AI promises smarter decisions, but can it also reinforce the assumptions organisations need to challenge? Jennifer L. Bryan explores why diverse perspectives, psychological safety and better questions matter when adopting AI, and how leaders can prevent powerful technology from turning familiar biases into increasingly convincing answers that nobody dares question. Artificial intelligence is changing how organisations gather information, analyse problems and make decisions. Yet as businesses rush to adopt increasingly powerful AI tools, there is a less obvious organisational risk…
Want smart, useful L&D insight in your inbox (without the fluff)?
Subscribe to our weekly newsletter for Editor-only commentary, and exclusive insight that isn’t published anywhere else online.
If you want a quick roundup of what matters, fresh ideas you can use, and the best new reads from Training Journal, this is where it lands
It’s free, only takes a minute, and you can unsubscribe any time.
