How to Approach Conversations That Matter, Without the Worry
Have you ever found yourself wishing that you could have a candid conversation with a friend or colleague but fearing that, if you did so, it might end that relationship? Welcome to the world of conversations that matter.
Paul explains how best to approach these conversations in this blog.
How to Turn on Online Meetings by Default in the Outlook Web App
One of the great features in Outlook now is that you can automatically set up Teams meeting. With a click of a button, Outlook will create a calendar invite with a link for people to join using Teams — saving lots of time!
With many of us now working from home permanently, you can change Outlook to default to online meetings, saving you even more time.
In this blog by our expert trainers Sal and Ebe, find out how to do it.
6 New Features in Excel 2019 That You May Not Know About
The latest update to Excel 2019 includes six new functions: CONCAT, TEXTJOIN, MINIFS And MAXIFS, IFS, SWITCH and XLOOKUP.
In this blog, Edmund, one of our Office experts, explains what you need to know about them.
How to Expand Your Thinking With Mind Maps
When Happy’s Paul Gapper was thirty-eight, he decided he wanted to leave his job as a probation officer and become a freelance trainer. At the time, the BBC had published a series of books by Tony Buzan on mind mapping, speed reading and memory techniques.
Paul was intrigued by the idea that you could start from a central idea and, on a single sheet of paper, expand your thinking around it.
In this blog, Paul talks about how mind maps have helped with the development of his career, as well as how to develop your own effective mind maps.
Leading With Your Heart: The Challenges and Opportunities of Hybrid Working
It is clear we are heading into yet another new phase of working arrangements. Some staff are gleefully returning to working in the office, some are planning on returning soon, and some who are nowhere near ready to do this! So how do we navigate everyone’s wants and needs whilst still running our business, and still providing amazing service to our clients?
In this blog, Cathy shares how Happy has handled hybrid working over the past 18 months during lockdown and beyond.
Be specific with your values if you want to stand out
Dom Monkhouse developed the UK divisions of the web-hosting businesses, Rackspace and Peer 1. His primary goal has always been to boost an organisation’s total revenue, which depends on having an engaged workplace. He also believes companies need to be explicit about their values in order to stand out.
In this three-minute clip from the 2017 Happy Workplaces CEO Conference, Dom explains why this is so essential and why not doing so means an organisation will just end up being beige.
3 v 45: The three most important things I’ve learned about culture change
Over a 25 year career, Isabelle Trowler has worked within children and family services across local government, the civil service, the voluntary sector, and for her own organisation. The roles have taught her a great deal about resilience, remaining upbeat, and facing hard challenges.
Isabelle became the chief social worker for Children and Families in 2013. The title of her talk at the 2017 Creating Happy Workplaces in the Public Sector Conference—“3 versus 45”— refers to her general tendency to speak about 45 things. For this talk, Isabelle sought to condense the lessons she’s learned into three main points she thinks everyone should take on board.
Read the transcript and watch Isabelle’s full talk below.
Why you should give responsibility to frontline practitioners
Isabelle Trowler has been working within children and family services for 25 years, and it hasn’t always been easy. She’s had to consistently rail against the imposed procedures and rules that inhibit children’s social care workers.
In this four minute clip from the 2017 Creating Happy Workplaces in the Public Sector Conference, Isabelle explains what happened when she started to delegate the decision-making as close to the frontline as possible.
Build a business, create a great culture, win awards and make a profit
Dominic Monkhouse knows life is short and he doesn’t want to waste it. Dom developed the UK divisions of the web-hosting businesses, Rackspace and Peer 1, and tried to make them exciting places to work by giving employees freedom within clear guidelines and heeding the “recruit for attitude, train for skill” precept.
Dom’s acutely aware of how little time we have to make a difference. In his talk at the 2017 Happy Workplaces CEO conference, Dom poses the question, “What are you going to make a difference in? Who with?”
Read the transcript and watch Dom’s full talk below.
Implementing Happy Principles in a Public Sector Mutual
Brendan O’Keefe was inspired by the Happy Manifesto and sought to implement its ideas at Epic CiC—an education support public mutual, which was founded in response to the changing landscape of public sector funding.
Brendan knew the organisation’s existing systems were hampering performance and inhibiting staff success. Speaking at the 2017 Creating Happy Workplaces in the Public Sector Conference, Brendan explains how, as managing director, he took a more active role in stimulating great results and growing a happy workplace.
Read the transcript and watch Brendan’s full talk below.
