Whether you work for a Fortune 500 company or a small mom-and-pop machine shop, chances are performance reviews aren’t very high up on the list of your employee’s favorite things to do at work. Whatever the shortfalls, perceived or real, of the performance management process at your organization, the angst around reviews is only magnified when working through the process with employees who receive less than stellar ratings.

A new year brings New Year's Resolutions. The most common personal resolutions are to be more health conscious, work out more, and spend more time with friends and family. But what about your professional life?

Soft skills are essential for successful professional development. According to Stanford Research Institute International and the Carnegie Mellon Foundation, 75% of long-term job success depends on soft skills.

Talent, in many organizations, seek learning and development opportunities to advance their careers. They often look to their employer for support and guidance. Therefore, it is important for organizations to provide structured learning. However, many employees may not know where to start when it comes to their professional and career development. Organizations have the unique opportunity to provide the “where to start” for employees in conjunction with developing the skills necessary for the overall goals of the organization.

Employee engagement is generally defined as a positive, fulfilled state of the employee regarding their work and their organization. Employee engagement is characterized by vigor, dedication, and absorption in work-related activities. Unsurprisingly, employee engagement connects with many desirable outcomes, including high performance, overall positive attitudes, better mental health, and increased innovation. If employees are not engaged, they tend to burn out and disconnect from their work.

The 2016 ERC Performance Management Survey reported that 79% of the organizations surveyed use job knowledge/job specific competencies as key performance criteria when assessing performance. If that many organizations evaluate performance based on competencies, what are you doing to ensure that the training you provide to your employees is strengthening those skills?

Work can be stressful at times. Projects may be piling up or sales goals aren’t being met. Depending on the leadership in your organization, you may come across a supervisor or manager who tends to communicate in a more aggressive fashion, by yelling. A supervisor’s tendency to yell at employees may seem like it is the “wrong” way to manage people. But is it?

Online training and e-learning have become increasingly popular over the past decade. There are a number of advantages when it comes to technology-based training but do they really overshadow the advantages of traditional, classroom-based training?

A report by IBM found that “84% of employees in Best Performing Organizations are receiving the training they need compared with 16% in the worst performing companies.” To ensure that employees are receiving the training they need, it is important to stay up training trends. Learning and development is an ever-evolving concept that adapts to enhance the experience and the outcomes of learners.

Sexual harassment is a form of discrimination that violates Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. The U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) defines harassment as any “offensive conduct that may include, but is not limited to, offensive jokes, slurs, epithets or name calling, physical assaults or threats, intimidation, ridicule or mockery, insults or put-downs, offensive objects or pictures, and interference with work performance.”