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Be prepared for meetings Individual Well-beingWorkplace Well-being

Be prepared for meetings

I have run very many training courses where I have asked the group: ‘How many of you prepare for meetings so that you are better equipped to get the best results from the time you are putting in?’. It is very rare for the majority of responses to be in the affirmative and quite often it is as 10% or so of the group. And yet, if you think about it, many people spend a great deal of time in meetings, much of which can be wasted, unproductive (if not counterproductive) time if it is not focused enough. It can therefore be helpful to do some pre-meeting preparation by asking yourself: (i) What do I want out of this meeting?;…
Dr Neil Thompson
February 24, 2026
Tune in to grief Individual Well-beingWorkplace Well-being

Tune in to grief

The idea that ‘grief is the price we pay for love’ is a longstanding one. When we love (a person, a thing, a job or whatever) we may make an emotional commitment or investment (‘cathexis’, to use the technical term). When we lose who or what we have invested in we feel the emptiness of the emotional void that has been created by that loss. This can affect us at different levels (physically, mentally, emotionally, socially and spiritually) and can have a hugely powerful impact on our lives. Some people make the mistake of assuming that grief applies only to death, but, of course, it can arise as a result of any significant loss. If we make the mistake of…
Dr Neil Thompson
February 10, 2026
Fail to plan and plan to fail Individual Well-beingWorkplace Well-being

Fail to plan and plan to fail

This is one of those tips that sounds so obvious and straightforward and yet is one that is so badly needed, given how often people seem to manage to get themselves into difficulties by either not planning at all or not planning fully enough. In working with people there are so many unpredictable variables but there is also much that can be anticipated if we take the trouble to think ahead and draw on our professional knowledge in the process. There is a great irony that people often say they are too busy to plan, whereas in reality it is more likely to be the case that a lack of planning could well be part of the reason why they…
Dr Neil Thompson
January 14, 2026
Apologize where necessary Individual Well-beingWorkplace Well-being

Apologize where necessary

Some people seem to think that an apology is an admission of guilt or even of negligence and are therefore very careful not to utter the word ‘sorry’. This is very unfortunate, as saying sorry can defuse a tense situation, while not saying sorry when an apology could have helped a great deal can inflame a situation quite significantly. But often it isn’t a deliberate strategy to withhold an apology; it’s simply a matter of allowing work pressures to distract us to the extent that we lose sight of basic manners. Our own pressures stop us from seeing the situation from the other person’s point of view and thereby prevent us from taking their feelings into account. A classic example…
Dr Neil Thompson
December 9, 2025
Need to know not nice to know Workplace Well-being

Need to know not nice to know

Gathering appropriate information to get a helpful picture of the situation we are dealing with is a central part of the role of a wide range of professionals. If we do not have a reasonably clear picture of the circumstances we are engaging with we can miss significant issues, distort and oversimplify the situation and potentially make a bad situations worse. Not having enough information can therefore be problematic. However, what can also be problematic is if we have too much information. This is because: (i) we can waste a lot of time and effort in gathering more information than we need; (ii) we can confuse ourselves and others if we end up drowning in far more information than is…
Dr Neil Thompson
November 26, 2025
Keep your records up to date Workplace Well-being

Keep your records up to date

There is a general expectation that professionals should keep a record of their work. Such records can often be assigned a secondary role and dismissed as relatively unimportant – just the ‘paperwork’. Although this is understandable, we also have to bear in mind that record keeping is a form of professional communication – the absence of which can at times be potentially disastrous. What can easily happen is that a vicious circle can develop: record keeping is put off so that, by the time the professional concerned gets round to getting records up to date, there is an annoying and energy-sapping backlog. Dealing with a backlog of ‘boring records’ can demotivate us and make it even harder to keep up.…
Dr Neil Thompson
November 11, 2025
Set out your stall Individual Well-beingWorkplace Well-being

Set out your stall

If you are skillful at engaging with people and winning their trust, convincing them that you are a helpful and reliable person there is a danger that they will come to rely on you more and more and bring more and more of their problems and concerns to you. This can easily lead to you being overloaded, stretching yourself too thinly and potentially getting yourself into difficulties. So, it is important to be clear about what we can help with and what we can’t – to ‘set out our stall’, as it were. If we lose sight of the boundaries of our role and become a general helper, it can be confusing all round. It can also prove stressful, as…
Dr Neil Thompson
October 28, 2025
Don’t speak (or write) officialese Workplace Well-being

Don’t speak (or write) officialese

The level of formality at which we speak or write is known technically as the ‘register’. Sometimes it is appropriate to communicate fairly informally (informal register), while at others a more formal register is what is needed. However, some people confuse formal register with officialese. Perhaps this is a confidence issue: feeling not very confident about using a formal register may lead to stilted language use. Officialese is a style of language that is full of clichés and jargon terms and is unnecessarily convoluted. It is the opposite of plain language. It is perfectly possible to write formally within the bounds of plain language without resorting to officialese. In any form of communication, the major emphasis needs to be on…
Dr Neil Thompson
October 14, 2025
Don’t be a rescuer Individual Well-beingWorkplace Well-being

Don’t be a rescuer

In conflict situations it is not uncommon for one or more parties to feel that they are being persecuted, that they are being treated unfairly. This is often due to the conflict concerned revolving around different perceptions of the situation. For example, where there are two people in conflict it is very common for each to perceive the other as being ‘difficult’ or ‘awkward’ – that is, each seeing the situation in personal, rather than interpersonal, terms. Where this occurs the result can be what is known as the ‘drama triangle’. This is where one person in the conflict (who plays the role of victim) draws in a third party to seek support (to be a rescuer) against the other…
Dr Neil Thompson
September 30, 2025
Failure is part of success Individual Well-beingWorkplace Well-being

Failure is part of success

We tend to see failure as the opposite of success. But this simplistic way of viewing failure hides some very complex issues. It is more accurate and realistic to think of failure as part of success. A one hundred per cent success rate in any significant project is relatively rare. Most of the time, success encompasses failure. Sometimes, it is failing at one thing that enables us to succeed at something else – for example, by seeing where we have been going wrong, what assumptions we have been making that need to change. Furthermore, fear of failure can be a major obstacle to innovation, to a balanced approach to risk and to learning. And, let’s be clear about it, we…
Dr Neil Thompson
September 3, 2025