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Articles by Paul Falcone
Communicating Ethical Guardrails in AI Rollouts
Mention “artificial intelligence implementation” in a management meeting and you'll likely draw a mix of curiosity and quiet anxiety — conjuring images of complex algorithms, job displacement, or automated decision-making. When organizations begin talking about “AI ethics,” the conversation can quickly feel heavy, academic, or restrictive. But it doesn’t have to be that way. Ethics isn’t a wet blanket designed to smother innovation or generate anxiety.
Avoiding a chain of custody crisis: why CIOs are bringing data destruction in-house
For CIOs, data security doesn’t end when devices reach end-of-life. In many cases, that’s where risk intensifies. As organizations modernize infrastructure and cycle through increasing volumes of data-bearing assets such as hard drives, SSDs, and backup media, the question isn’t just how data is stored and protected. It’s how it’s ultimately destroyed, and whether that process can stand up to scrutiny.
Building a risk-based data sanitization strategy: When to use Cryptographic erasure vs. physical destruction
The landscape of data sanitization is evolving. With emerging technologies like cryptographic erasure gaining traction alongside traditional physical destruction methods, security leaders face a critical question: which approach should we use and when? The answer isn't either/or, it's both. Organizations that get data sanitization right understand that different scenarios demand different solutions. Here's how to build a risk-based sanitization strategy that uses the right tool for the right job.
The Traditional Progressive Discipline Paradigm
This article is excerpted from Chapter 1 of 101 Sample Write-Ups for Documenting Employee Performance Problems: A Guide to Progressive Discipline & Termination, Third Edition (Amacom/SHRM, 2017), written by Paul Falcone. This is the second in a three-part series on progressive discipline and its legal considerations. The traditional paradigm is used to prove, via documentation, that you made a good-faith effort to lead the employee down the right path.
The Role of a Career Coach in Professional Development
By Paul Falcone Managers coach employees by focusing on career and professional development, guidance and feedback rather than just giving directions and telling people what to do. Put another way, managers teach employees how to fish rather than simply giving them one.
Toxic team turnarounds: Leading the group reconciliation meeting
By Paul Falcone Hopefully, you read part 1 of this column last week detailing a particular example of how HR can lead a toxic team turnaround, this one involving hospital nurses. We conclude that series with how to lead a large group reconciliation meeting. When you come together again as the larger team after hearing from the smaller groups, HR can open the meeting as follows: “Everyone, we’ve had a chance to sit and listen to both sides, and we hear you.
Real-world scenarios: Toxic team turnarounds in action
Much of the literature available around employee accountability, performance management and constructive confrontation focuses on individual relationships between managers and their direct reports. However, so much work is done by teams, and it’s important that we look at a team equivalent to ensure we’re able to address larger groups of people with similar types of accountability, performance or behavioral challenges.
Managing conflict in a divided workplace? Try this sample script
By Paul Falcone Have you ever heard of the STEEP framework? Social scientists, economists and others use it to understand the large-scale drivers from which trends are born. STEEP stands for social, technological, economic, environmental and political. It applies well to the many challenges employers and workers face today. Managing conflict in the workplace nowadays comes from several STEEP sources, especially the political category, and it’s no wonder.
Setting expectations for dealing with conflict resolution on your team
By Paul Falcone Mediating employee disputes is never easy. Many managers typically look the other way, sweep matters under the rug and hope problems magically fix themselves. Unfortunately, that approach—typically known in legal and ethics circles as “deliberate ignorance” or “willful blindness theory”—rarely fixes problems.
Leadership success: Shift from control to collaboration
By Paul Falcone Congratulations on becoming a people manager. Now comes the challenge of transitioning from individual contributor to manager. As you continue your leadership journey, watch out for one behavior that can hold you back from success: control. When transitioning to a leadership role, it’s natural to want to gain control of your team’s work. However, you risk micromanaging if you give in to that tendency.
Conquering the challenges of becoming a new manager
Transitioning successfully from an individual contributor to a people-manager role is no easy feat. After all, what made you successful as an individual contributor can potentially hold you back in terms of your leadership success. Why? One simple word: Control. When you were an individual contributor, you controlled everything on your desk or work area.
Navigating emotions in crisis: A guide to finding strength and resilience
No one else is responsible for our emotions; we own them and must know how to handle them. Anxiety, fear, apprehension, uncertainty, and stress are natural outcomes when experiencing a crisis. The good news is that improving emotional self-awareness and responding more positively and constructively is within our control. Learning to manage and strengthen your EQ, or emotional quotient, is akin to building new muscle.
Survival mode: 5 steps to handling mergers, acquisitions and integrations
By Paul Falcone When I wrote the book The First-Time Manager: Leading Through Crisis (September 2023) for HarperCollins Leadership, my goal was to address the incredible pace of change and disruption that so many of us have faced since the COVID pandemic.
How New-Age Mentorship Programs Have the Potential to Increase Employee Retention
The workforce is a living, breathing entity that changes with each generation. The speed of this change has never been more significant than now. There are several key factors driving this accelerated change: Labor scarcity faced by industrialized nations in a post-pandemic world The digital revolution experienced by Gen Y millennials and Gen Z Zoomers—the two generational cohorts that represent the future of the modern workforce. No workplace generations have been studied more carefully.
How to deal with a micromanager and avoid becoming one
Regularly convene knowledge-sharing sessions to ensure your team aligns with your expectations for quality and customer service. This fosters trust and empowers your team to excel. Regularly convene knowledge-sharing sessions to ensure your team aligns with your expectations for quality and customer service. This fosters trust and empowers your team to excel.
Dealing Effectively With Attitude Problems
One of the most common challenges facing managers is dealing with employee attitude problems, typically evidenced when employees roll their eyes, sigh, or use antagonistic body language. Trying to stop such “silent” behavior is difficult because employees can so easily deny it. Frequently, managers tend to avoid confronting employees who “cop a ’tude” because the path of least resistance is avoidance and because the whole matter seems so slippery.
A key communication strategy for delivering difficult news
Holding tough conversations with employees is a challenge at all levels of an organization. After all, who wants to address an issue that could lead to confrontation, drama, or resentment? Wouldn’t it be easier to sweep the matter under the rug and simply look the other way? If you’ve ever experienced such feelings, you’re not alone. The path of least resistance is avoidance.
Career development opportunities and the future of work
From time to time, it’s important to take a 30,000-foot look at future careers in the modern workplace. Doing so is particularly relevant for managers and leaders who are looking to scale their careers and assume greater responsibilities over time. What are the key attributes that will help you navigate the ever-changing world that awaits? How can you gear yourself up to prepare for tomorrow’s unknown challenges and opportunities?
Recognizing and responding to a person in crisis
We all know the importance of mental health and how prominent this issue has become in the workplace. We likewise know that managers are often the ones on the front lines of these conversations. We’ve published numerous articles on the importance of keeping communication open with employees, ways to reduce stress, and helping employees do their best work every day with peace of mind. But how do you deal with staff members facing a crisis in the workplace?
How to hone managerial ethics in employee relations
Have you ever wondered what workplace ethics is all about? Does it sound like a lofty topic that’s reserved for law, medical and business school students, or does it play a critical role in your daily life as a senior or operational leader in your organization? If you guessed the latter, you would be correct.
How to handle difficult employee situations with ease
Few things are more frustrating and angst-ridden than dealing with difficult employees, and even fewer things keep managers up more at night than worrying about an upcoming confrontation with substandard job performers or workers with conduct problems. Still, there are certain ways of managing challenging individuals that are more effective than others.
When Managers Feel Intimidated by Their Subordinates
Managers have been well-trained on what discrimination, retaliation, harassment and bullying look and feel like in the workplace. But "reverse bullying" often gets short shrift, even though it is just as real. Subordinates have been known to "intimidate upward," making their managers afraid to hold them directly accountable for their actions. And managers have often turned a blind eye to inappropriate workplace behaviors in order to avoid confrontation at all costs.
How Formal Quarterly Check-Ins Boost Employee Engagement
In my most recent article, " Developing a Habit of Delivering Frequent but Informal Feedback," I introduced Lindsay, an HR director at an aerospace manufacturing and design firm with 200 employees. Lindsay was concerned that her analytical, introverted management team may not be communicating enough with staff engineers and workers in support roles.
Relationship Building: A Core Element of Leadership Preparedness
Paul Falcone is principal of Paul Falcone Workplace Leadership Consulting, LLC, specializing in management & leadership training, executive coaching, international keynote speaking, and HR advisory services. He is the former CHRO of Nickelodeon and has held senior-level HR positions with Paramount Pictures, Time Warner, and City of Hope. He has extensive experience in entertainment, healthcare/biotech, and financial services, including in international, nonprofit, and union environments.
Talent scarcity: Creative alternatives when job applicants are hard to find
Does your company find itself struggling to keep up on the talent acquisition front? If so, you’re not alone. Despite a somewhat hectic job market where many companies struggle to find qualified talent while others are experiencing large-scale layoffs, the general trend remains that good candidates are hard to find, and jobs are taking longer than expected to fill.
Stop undermanaging-step up and manage using these 3 principles
The path of least resistance is often avoidance. As a result, many managers look the other way and sweep things under the rug rather than address them head on. It’s one thing to hold tough conversations with your employees about their performance, conduct or reliability (attendance); it’s another to ease into “safe” conversations that help them feel more at ease in delivering constructive feedback to you, their boss.
Adjust negative attitudes with employee coaching
A lot of confusion surrounds the idea of “employee coaching,” as it invokes perceptions of coddling or otherwise spoiling employees. That couldn’t be further from the truth. The leader-as-coach model simply addresses your approach to leadership—how you choose to lead and touch others’ lives. It doesn’t mean holding others to lower standards, needing to be popular or “friends” with your staff members, or compromising your beliefs.
Developing a Habit of Delivering Frequent but Informal Feedback
Lindsay is an HR director at an aerospace manufacturing and design company with 200 employees, and she's concerned that her analytical, introverted management team may not be communicating enough with staff engineers and workers in support roles. Staff members are doing their work, no doubt, but they are lacking in spirit. There's low recognition in general, and employee morale seems to be down.
Employee Experience
Discover pioneering and research-backed strategies, models, and methods for improving employee experience. From new approaches for navigating culture change to embracing digital HR across the employee lifecycle, HRD Connect thought leaders share innovative ways to boost satisfaction, engagement, and productivity. HRD Live - Listen Now Subscribe to Get Weekly Dose of Business Insights We sent a code to your email. Enter the 6-digit verification code sent to
The leader-as-coach model: a critical paradigm for employee retention and professional development
Employee retention is a hot topic in this post-COVID reintegration period because talent is so difficult to come by. However, Gen-Y Millennials and Gen-Z Zoomers are the most studied generational cohorts in world history, and we know that career and professional development ranks highest in many surveys, along with working for an ethical company and a management team that cares about them personally.
The leader-as-coach model: a critical paradigm for employee retention and professional development
Employee retention is a hot topic in this post-COVID reintegration period because talent is so difficult to come by. However, Gen-Y Millennials and Gen-Z Zoomers are the most studied generational cohorts in world history, and we know that career and professional development ranks highest in many surveys, along with working for an ethical company and a management team that cares about them personally.
Leader-as-coach: a critical paradigm for employee retention and professional development
Employee retention is a hot topic in this post-COVID reintegration period because talent is so difficult to come by. However, Gen-Y Millennials and Gen-Z Zoomers are the most studied generational cohorts in world history, and we know that career and professional development ranks highest in many surveys, along with working for an ethical company and a management team that cares about them personally.
Paul Falcone, Author at HRD
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Employee Engagement
HomeEmployee ExperienceEngagementEmployee Engagement HRD Live - Listen Now Subscribe to Get Weekly Dose of Business Insights Enter the 6-digit verification code sent to
How to Avoid Legal Nightmares in Emails and Instant Messages
How to Avoid Legal Nightmares in Emails and Instant Messages Security Management has partnered with SHRM to bring you relevant articles on key workplace topics and strategies. Imagine discussing an employee-related legal concern with your boss, in-house counsel, or outside labor attorney, only to realize that you wrote something in an email or instant message that could devastate your case in litigation. Have you ever heard something like: “Paul, don't worry.
How to Avoid Legal Nightmares in Emails and Instant Messages
Imagine discussing an employee-related legal concern with your boss, in-house counsel or outside labor attorney, only to realize that you wrote something in an email or instant message that could devastate your case in litigation. Have you ever heard something like: "Paul, don't worry. As long as you didn't reference his age in that email or refer to him as a dinosaur or anything similar, we'll be fine. ... Wait, you didn't commit that to an email, did you?" (Gulp!) Time to 'fess up.
Common traps for new managers to avoid
Transitioning from an individual contributor to a people manager sounds straightforward. You did a great job in your particular role, and now you’re being tapped for greater responsibility by joining management ranks and formally leading others. Piece of cake! Before you jump into the pool too quickly, though, it’s essential to get into the appropriate mind space.
How to Motivate Employees Without Money or Promotions
The reality in many workplaces today is that the best and brightest talent will jump ship if they feel they've topped out on salary or can't expect a promotion anytime soon. And that's fair: Workers, especially top performers, will naturally want higher titles and compensation to reflect their contribution levels. That's especially true at companies where pay has skyrocketed for certain hard-to-find employees while remaining flat or falling for others.
Dealing with Microaggression in the Workplace
Cara is a human resource director at a Chicago-based creative marketing firm that prides itself on how well it treats its employees. Excellent benefits and a strong practice of flexibility and autonomy, along with a keen focus on career and professional development, are core cultural values the company generously communicates and celebrates. An exception is Martin, the head of the digital design team, who has a reputation as a passive-aggressive leader.
Delivering Bad News
The first rule of performance reviews is that employees should never be surprised by what is said. Assuming that managers are speaking with their reports in real time throughout the year, providing transparent communication and soliciting feedback, the information discussed during a review should be a summary of past conversations. But that doesn't always happen.
How to master the art of leadership, communication and teambuilding
New leaders often face the combined challenges of continuing as individual contributors while assuming responsibility for others’ work. It’s never an easy balance, but there are certain insights that can help you keep a healthy perspective. First, remember that you’re not responsible for having all the right answers. Top-down management, where frontline leaders “told” their workers what to do, went out with early 20th-century manufacturing.
Become the best boss you can be
American poet Maya Angelou famously said, “I’ve learned that people will forget what you said, people will forget what you did, but people will never forget how you made them feel.” In that simple wisdom lies the heart of inspirational leadership and becoming a “favorite boss” to those you lead. Great bosses do this Think about it: When people are asked to describe the best boss they’ve ever had, they typically share things like: She made me feel like my opinion mattered.
28 Best HR Books You Should Read In 2023
9. Agile HR: Deliver Value in a Changing World of Work Authors: Natal Dank and Riina Hellström Agile is prevalent project management methodology in tech world and, as Dank and Hellström argue, HR professional and teams can use it too. They take you through why and how HR professionals and teams can break out of the traditional ways of thinking about delivering HR services to a more ‘customer’-focused, iterative approach.
How to Get Great Results when Checking Candidate References
Questions abound about whether reference checks are lawful, practical or even worth an employer's time. However, you can rest assured that hiring candidates without checking references is like having a loose cannon on the deck of your ship: You simply don't know what you're getting. Candidates can display certain characteristics about themselves during an interview that don't reflect what they're like on the job.
How to Deliver Constructive Feedback Effectively
Why is it that so many managers tend to look the other way when attempting to deliver corrective feedback to their employees? We know the path of least resistance is avoidance, but in truth, problematic workplace issues rarely fix themselves. Instead, they build up over time, causing resentment and frustration until a proverbial straw is broken and then, Boom! In most cases, it's a manager who wants an employee fired.
How to Avoid a Claim of 'Pretaliation'
Travis is an HR director. One afternoon, the vice president of sales, Daniel, stopped by to speak with him about problems he was having with one of his direct reports, the recently hired sales manager, Carla. Daniel shared multiple issues with Carla's performance. She'd only been with the organization for two months and seemed to not be taking her responsibilities seriously.
How to Handle Overtime, Meal Break and Other Wage and Hour Crises
Some workplace crises blow up instantaneously, exploding onto the scene with immediacy and urgency that can take one's breath away. Wage and hour liability is different. It lurks below the surface, sometimes for years, before the problem is discovered and brought to management's attention. The problem, of course, is that once the crisis hits, companies have little to defend themselves with unless they've been managing time-keeping procedures exceptionally well.
An Ethical Filter for Addressing Questionable Situations in the Workplace
Sam is an HR director at a midsize manufacturing plant. At times, he feels at a loss for helping managers within his organization deal with ethical and moral challenges that come their way. He certainly appreciates them seeking his guidance, but their questions can place him in a conflicting position because he must protect the organization's interests while addressing each manager's specific needs.
How to nurture high-potential employees
High-potential employees, or HIPOs, typically stand out among their peers based on superior performance. They often master their roles and responsibilities early in their tenure and look for additional opportunities to excel. Proactive companies try to make the most of their highest-performing talent, and building a HIPO (AKA fast track) program often makes sense.
How to Re-Energize a Team That Shows Signs of Burnout
Emma is an HR director overseeing a team of four specialists in a 400-person organization, and she suspects that her team may be suffering from quiet quitting. She suspects that the rest of the organization is, as well, and wants to build a roadmap for addressing the issue openly and transparently.
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