Hi members! I’m excited to share this letter with my pal, Heather Landy, who is the editor of Quartz at Work—our ongoing coverage of all issues related to careers, organizations, and our workplaces. This week, we’re going to take a deep dive into the world of management. Heather will do a better job than I will describing it, so I’m handing the mic over to her. We also have a new episode of Because China today, and stay tuned for our conference call about management this Friday (you can add it to your Google Calendar here). Talk to you later! —Sam
Dear readers,
Few of us crave a return to the days of command-and-control management. The fearsomeness, the yelling—it doesn’t come naturally to a lot of leaders, and it’s just as well. While company cultures may still vary wildly by employer, new technology over the past two decades has bent the arc of the modern workplace toward transparency, collaboration, and a democratization of ideas. None of this favors those who would seek to lead by intimidation.
The expectation now is for managers to engage, inspire, and coach their teams. On this much, leaders of decent workplaces would agree. But what are the best mechanisms for accomplishing that? Here, consensus is harder to come by, and new managers (and even more experienced ones) are often left to learn by trial and error.
Is feedback delivered best in a sandwich of positive comments or not? How accommodating do employers really need to be when employees face new responsibilities at home? What do career paths look like for people who are seeking better balance, working beyond traditional retirement age, or hoping to achieve long-term success without ever becoming a manager?
Our Quartz at Work edition regularly scours the world for the best new ideas about leadership and productivity in the modern workplace. And now we’re giving Quartz members a bird’s-eye view of some of the biggest trends and challenges encountered by modern managers. In this exclusive guide, we’ll help get you up to speed on:
- The smartest ways to deliver feedback
- New approaches to hiring
- Why parental leave is one of the great HR issues of our time
- Training in the age of continual learning
- Career arcs redesigned for the way we live now
We hope these lessons on the new dilemmas of the modern workplace will help you navigate the ever-changing art of leading a team. We’ll kick things off with our look at the latest thinking about feedback, and alert you as new guides become available.
As a Quartz member, you also have unlimited access to all of our Quartz at Work articles, including our library of work guides, our annual Perfect Company project, and the expert views of our outside contributors. We wish you a thought-filled, well-managed week and welcome your feedback (of course we do!) at hi@qz.com.
Sincerely,
Heather Landy
Editor, Quartz at Work