Below you'll find a list of all posts that have been tagged as “Carla Johnson”
June 28, 2022 I had a boss early in my career that almost made me lose my ever-loving mind. Just when we needed to get down to business, he’d meander off on a tangent. I was smart enough to know it wasn’t appropriate to try to wrestle him back to the business at hand, but inexperienced enough to know how …
May 17, 2022 More than 60 years ago, Psychologist J. P. Guilford created the terms convergent and divergent thinking. Convergent refers to your ability to bring things together into a narrow focus or well-defined answer to a problem. This is great when you’re working on logical projects where there is one best answer. Divergent thinking, on the other hand, is …
March 8, 2022 Today is International Women’s Day. There’s no better day of the year to acknowledge and celebrate women who are leading innovation in their areas of expertise around the world. Research shows that when women are in leadership positions, they bring better business performance. When there’s greater gender diversity, especially at the senior level, companies perform better and …
February 15, 2022 Ideas are like parking spots: The more you need one the less likely they are to show up. There’s a simple tool, however, that can change all that. This image is a Necker cube. It’s an illustration of a three-dimensional object that’s designed to alternate between two perspectives. One is a cube facing down and left, and …
February 1, 2022 For 22 years, global communications company Edelman has followed the topic of trust in global business. There have been a tremendous amount of ebbs and flows, disruptions and changes, but few have matched the upheaval in who people turn to for trusted information than the last two years. Elections. Pandemics. Governmental upheaval. Climate change. Supply chain disruption. …
December 14, 2021 In 1999, Carey Smith started a company called the HVLS Fan Co. This name (an acronym for High Volume Low Speed) described the types of fans his company sold: massively big ones that move a huge amount of air but at very low speeds. They’re the kinds you see hanging from ceilings in places that aren’t practical …
May 6, 2021 It’s happened to all of us. We’ve missed the window to feed the meter and ended up with an annoying parking ticket. A sudden storm hit, and we got drenched in the rain between the garage and the concert venue. Or we’ve been late to an important interview because we couldn’t find a %$*&#! parking spot! When …
March 25, 2021 There’s been a rash of research in the last year about the lost productivity of teams because of COVID and the need to work from home. While the new dynamics of how we all go to the office each day has certainly had effects we didn’t count on, some can’t be blamed on the pandemic. Instead, the …
March 11, 2021 Has any role in business morphed more than that of the CMO? It’s a position rife with constantly changing expectations yet most often lacks the necessary support to ensure its success. If you’ve worked in marketing long, this isn’t news. In 2013, the Business Marketing Association and Forrester did research about how CMOs stood at the crossroads …
January 21, 2021 Global pandemic. Fake news. Social protests. Economic turmoil. Political instability. If 2020 were a movie plot, no one would believe it. Unfortunately, this is the world we’ve endured the last 12 months. The effects of this imperfect storm come out this month in Edelman’s 2021 Trust Barometer. This annual index measures the average percent of trust people …
January 7, 2020 TAKE THE 30-DAY CREATIVITY CHALLENGE One the first day of class, a pottery teacher split her class into two halves. To the first half she said, “You will spend the semester studying pottery, planning, designing, and creating your perfect pot. At the end of the semester, we’ll have a competition to see whose pot is the best.” …
December 17, 2020 Find just the right something for the creative person in your life can feel like a lot of pressure. Some original thinkers are more hands on and others prefer more techie things. Regardless of the type you’re looking to please, here’s a list of 28 gifts that will show them you understand their tastes and want to …
November 5, 2020 The manufacturer of window-unit air conditioners wanted customer input but they weren’t sure how to go about it without being overly technical in their questions. They knew the noise level of their units was loud, but they wanted to figure out if customers would pay more for a quieter unit. And if they did, how much would …
October 22, 2020 For innovative leaders, critical thinking is at the heart of everything they do. We’ve developed a tremendous reliance on technology to deliver data and analytics. Heck, I’m not sure I’d know how to get from home to the grocery store 3 blocks away without Google maps. But researchers from McGill University have determined that all the help …
August 13, 2020 “Haven’t I seen you before?” It’s a cheesy pickup line that’s been around for ages. And while it makes people roll their eyes, there’s something to the familiarity quotient. Studies show that we’re attracted to what we find familiar. The more we’re exposed to certain people, the more familiar they become and the more we like them. …
March 5, 2020 In one of the episodes of the U.S. version of the comedy series The Office, Michael Scott rushes into the scene demanding everyone give him ideas. As the narcissistic regional manager of the Scranton branch of Dunder Mifflin paper company, he’s looking to make his mark. On his way into the building that day, Michael saw wet …
February 14, 2020 People say “creatives” have a natural knack for what they do. I think they do, to a certain degree. But mostly these original thinkers have a way of looking at the world that other people don’t. It’s not a hidden secret sauce. In fact, an article on Thrive Global listed the most important things that creative thinkers …
January 9, 2020 Creativity is one of those things that sounds romantically easy to do, but often leaves you scratching your head. Even the creative geniuses get stumped from time to time. The key to getting your creative mojo going is practice. Consistent practice. Since January is International Creativity Month, I wanted to give you some ideas about how you …
December 5, 2019 The strength of bringing people together to innovate as a team is that each person brings their own experiences. They make different observations based on how they see the world and what they notice. As a leader, you may want more creativity, but your ideas will only stretch as far as your team’s experience. Team cohesion is …
November 20, 2019 Mark Twain said that, “Humor is the great thing, the saving thing after all. The minute it crops up, all our hardnesses yield, all our irritations, and resentments flit away, and a sunny spirit takes their place.” He’s not wrong. Studies show that a sense of humor can make you mentally and physically healthier, make you more …
