Over the years I’ve authored literally hundreds of articles on a variety of topics from finding a therapist to improving employee engagement. It’s a bit hard to find things because of the volume of material, so here’s what is available on THIS site. As we continue to centralize our web presence, more and more material…
Welcome to our 2024 Edition
Welcome to our 2024 version of The Bacal & Associates Personal and Work Store. It’s more than a store, since we’ll have tons of free material on all kinds of topics, both work, and personal development. As you can see, everything is under construction and will likely not be completed until the end of January,…
What is guilt induction? How does it create conflict and poor relationships
People tend to resist attempts by others to manipulate their emotions and feelings. Guilt-induction attempts are efforts to make someone feel guilty or “less than”, often in an attempt to shame them into going along or changing. While guilt induction attempts are usually subtle, make no mistake — the other person will know exactly what…
Empowering Shy Team Members: Strategies for Effective Leadership
How To Encourage Shy Group Or Team Members To Participate (Leading A Team) Question:As a meeting and group leader how can I encourage one extremely shy and sensitive team member to share her excellent ideas during our group meetings? One of the responsibilities of effective leadership is to harness the diverse and different talents and…
Sweetspot: Communicating Positively and Negatively
Avoiding Overly Positive and Overly Negative Communication The Sweet Spot Between Overly Positive and Overly Negative Communication: Glass Empty, Glass Full You’ve heard the phrase: “There’s two kinds of people. Those that see the glass as half full, and those half empty”. It’s a folksy attempt to identify that people have patterns of behavior, to…
The Three Boorish Buckets Of Social Media Comments
Feedback To Dumb As Rocks People When The People Who NEED The Feedback Are The Least Likely To “Hear” It It’s an odd world. It seems that the people who really need to hear how they are perceived by others, are also the least likely to hear the feedback, or connect the feedback to specific…
Less Is More In Communicating Your Message
Less Makes Better Communication Why LESS Communication Is More Effective To Make Your Point Whether we are trying to communicate a point face to face, on the Internet, on the phone, or to groups of people, many of us have a tendency to use too many words. That happens two ways. First, we say the…
Credibility: Knowing The Difference Between “Understanding From The Outside” and Understanding From The Inside
Communicating Credibly Understanding From The Inside – Understanding From The Outside We all think we know how government works. I thought that, at least until I joined the government as an organizational and development consultant some years ago. I’d always had an interest in politics, being reasonably educated. However, I quickly realized that my first…