Boss Keeps Denying PTO? Ask Madeleine

Dear Madeleine, I have been working for a company for a few years now. They moved to an Unlimited PTO policy just as I joined. It was heavily promoted in the recruiting stage. Things went fine the first couple of years. I took the typical PTO breaks—December holiday time, a couple of days in the…

Team Member Accused Another of Sabotaging Their Work? Ask Madeleine

Dear Madeleine, I manage three large global teams. They do similar customer service, but for different product lines. They all have very seasoned team leads and produce excellent results. Our business really took off because of the pandemic and we implemented a data-driven way to measure results that has worked well. For a long time…

Not Sure You Want to Stay with Your Company? Ask Madeleine

Dear Madeleine, I manage a small team for a startup health and wellbeing subscription platform. I was super excited at the beginning—the founders seemed to have the right values and care about their employees. As time has passed, though, the competition has increased and none of the strategic targets have been met. With every all-company…

Need Your Team to Be More Innovative? Ask Madeleine

Dear Madeleine I am fairly new director in a large global organisation. We are a liaison team designed to work in tandem with product development and marketing. I have a great team—all inherited and all very skilled and experienced. Their former boss (who was let go) was very rigid and very focused on process and…

The Power of Micro-Innovations

When we think of innovation, people like Thomas Edison, Henry Ford, and Steve Jobs tend to come to mind. The lone hero in solitude has a hold on our imagination, but the truth is that innovation is rarely the result of an inspired genius toiling away in a garage. Groundbreaking innovation takes lots of people.…

Boss Is Always Criticizing You? Ask Madeleine

Dear Madeleine, I have always really liked my job even though the workload is oversized and the hours are long. I provide expert advice and coaching around diet and weight management in a community medical clinic. I have a master’s degree in nutrition and am a registered dietitian. We are government funded and located in…