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10 ways a positive culture builds positive results

10 ways a positive culture builds positive results

I have been in the workforce for more than three decades, and I can say without hesitation that positive cultures breed sound strategies and deliver results that exceed expectations. On the surface, it would seem like I am stating the obvious. But those who have worked for tyrants, or have worked in kill-or-be-killed cultures, know that they too can be successful, but the pain, drama and carnage doesn’t lead to long-term success... Click here to read more
Dr Neil Thompson
November 30, 2017
Bringing visibility to black British women

Bringing visibility to black British women

In the wake of Black History Month 2017, Jane Tanner of the Women's Resource Centre describes how helping with her niece's school project brought the importance role models into sharp relief. Everyone needs that inspirational person; someone you can see pave the way to your more ambitious climbs. I strongly suspect that there are many women who, like me, have felt life is a disappointing quest for reflections of oneself. My mother and aunts are phenomenal women and fantastic role models. But outside of my immediate family, I craved to see black women in public life – ‘on the telly’ achieving in the way their white counterparts were doing. Thankfully this is (gradually) changing, however I continue to ask myself ‘why are black women…
Dr Neil Thompson
November 30, 2017
Neil Thompson’s Lesson for Living – Don’t be a fashion victim

Neil Thompson’s Lesson for Living – Don’t be a fashion victim

When anyone mentions fashion, we tend to think of clothes, the latest designer trends and so on. Indeed, there is a huge, multi-million pound business based on fashion in clothing. But, fashion is not restricted to clothes or other relatively superficial matters. There are also fashions in thought and, because of that, fashions in behaviour. For example, think about how certain ideas have changed since your childhood. Changes in people’s thinking about same sex relationships is a clear instance of what I have in mind. With the changes in thinking have come changes in attitude, changes in behaviour and changes in how we relate to one another. These changes were in large part due to years of campaigning and political…
Dr Neil Thompson
November 16, 2017
Embracing grief

Embracing grief

"NO ONE ever told me that grief felt so like fear," C S Lewis once wrote, and he was right. Stepping into the Intensive Care Unit (ICU) ward, I tried to remain calm. But what was waiting behind those tinted-glass panels, I wasn't prepared for. Lying lifelessly on a bed with tubes attached to her body was my beloved aunt, unconscious and quite possibly, brain dead. Having to pace the hallways of a hospital is something I wouldn't wish on anyone. But grief comes to us all, in one way or another. "We all deal with loss: jobs lost, loves lost and lives lost. The question is not whether these things will happen. They will, and we will have to face them,"…
Dr Neil Thompson
November 16, 2017
Sorry, being born rich still leads to success more than working hard in school

Sorry, being born rich still leads to success more than working hard in school

Sweeping education reforms have done very little to change the fact that in the UK, being born well is by far the surest route to prosperity. Since the 1980s, the degree of social fluidity in Britain has plummeted with more people experiencing descent than ascent. "Decades of educational policy have completely overlooked that younger generations of men and women now face less favorable mobility prospects than did their parents—or their grandparents despite having earned higher qualifications," Dr. John Goldthorpe – a leading sociologist at the University of Oxford and author of the study Social Class Mobility in Modern Britain: Changing Structure, Constant Process – told VICE Impact. "That is, they are less likely to experience upward mobility and more likely to experience downward mobility,'…
Dr Neil Thompson
November 16, 2017
Professor Ian Deary interview on ‘The Disconnected Mind’

Professor Ian Deary interview on ‘The Disconnected Mind’

The Disconnected Mind is a research project that aims to discover how our thinking skills change with age, and what we can do to protect our cognitive health in later life. The project is funded by Age UK. Losing our thinking skills is one of the greatest fears about ageing. We don’t know why it happens to some of us but not others. The Disconnected Mind project aims to find out. Ultimately, that knowledge will help us to protect our cognitive health as we get older. In June 1947, over 70,000 school children aged 11 in Scotland took an intelligence test as part of the Scottish Mental Survey. The test measured their cognitive abilities in a consistent and replicable way.…
Dr Neil Thompson
November 16, 2017
Everyone can help to make women safer at work

Everyone can help to make women safer at work

In workplaces up and down the UK, including the Houses of Parliament, people are rejecting the idea that those in positions of power can sexually harass – or even assault – with impunity. It’s inspiring to see so many women (and many men) speaking out and demanding better treatment. Because we’re not talking about a few bad apples here. TUC research suggests that more than half of women have experienced some form of sexual harassment at work. This is a vast, systemic problem whose implications can be felt in every area of our society. It goes far beyond specific industries, businesses or political parties. In fact, the issue is so serious that it’s easy to feel overwhelmed. In the past few weeks, I’ve…
Dr Neil Thompson
November 16, 2017
Neil Thompson’s Lesson for Living – Find ‘flow’

Neil Thompson’s Lesson for Living – Find ‘flow’

Athletes will often talk about being ‘in the zone’, by which they mean achieving optimal performance, with body and mind operating to the full. That is when they get the best results. Similarly, psychologists have talked more broadly about finding ‘flow’, by which they mean getting to a state of mind where you are, to use the modern idiom, ‘cooking on gas’. It refers to feeling that things are ‘just right’ and you are achieving your best. This can apply to any aspect of life – not just athletics – where the conditions are right. Flow happens when we are fully immersed in an activity, when we are free from distractions, interruptions or anything else that can stand in the…
Dr Neil Thompson
November 2, 2017