I’ve seen this short movie at an event about HR. The speaker used this movie to emphasize the difference between the current generation of employees and the older generations. It’s definitely something to think about…

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Researched by Karl Fisch, Scott McLeod, and Jeff Brenman

These are difficult times for everyone. Every day I wake up and am confronted with news on how many people are getting fired from their company. It is very tough for everyone: losing jobs, living in uncertainty about their job or remaining behind to pick up the work from your colleagues who got fired.

However, a New Yorker came up with an inventive way of dealing with the lemons that life is handing them. He decided to make lemonade! He has organized an “Unemployment Olympics” for all the unemployed people in New York. Very inventive

Click for the article here.

Last week I went to see the Canadian author Malcolm Gladwell in Amsterdam, where he was giving a lecture on his new book “Outliers”. That evening he was discussing the various factors to success as described in his new book. On the one hand I found it very intriguing to hear how certain factors that the person cannot influence (e.g. poverty) has an impact on someone’s path to success and how other factors really depends on the person itself (e.g. attitude). It might sound quite obvious in a way, but it does make you think… and that is the purpose, I would assume.

I guess his new book reminds me in a way of his previous book “Blink”. The theory that he discusses in ”Blink” is actually quite obvious as well when you’re reading it: how people can make decisions in split seconds. So Malcolm is staying true to the style of his previous book.

If you’re just as intrigued as I am by Malcolm Gladwell, then click here for the exclusive interview that MT had with him.

Apparently during difficult times it is a great opportunity for managers to buy themselves into a company. According to this Dutch article. This is due to the fact that some managers have always had the ambition to become an entrepreneur and when they are friendly asked to leave their current company with a bag of money, then they will get the financial opportunity to fulfil their dream. Every cloud does have its silver lining…

I would to take this opportunity to wish everyone a Merry X-mas!
Enjoy the time off!

Christmas Tree in Rome

Just about a week ago a freight train derailed between the stations Amsterdam Central and Amsterdam Muiderpoort. Unfortunately, due to this incident there was no train traffic possible between Amsterdam Central and Amsterdam Bijlmer Arena. The train travellers were already warned that the traffic could be a bit unorganized on the monday morning, especially since it was also snowing…

Schiedam Centrum Train Station lees verder…

Contrary to what people believe, consultants don’t always just work… from time to time we will also have some fun with our colleagues, such as last month when we went to a golfclinic in Biddinghuizen. It was my first time playing golf, if you don’t count the time that I played midgetgolf

As you might know Accenture sponsors Tiger Woods,  but just to manage your expectations… not all of the Accenture employees know how to play golf and no we aren’t required to learn golf when we join the company. After playing it for an hour or so I can understand why some people like it, but to play 18 holes? I don’t think I will still enjoy it after the 5th hole… maybe someday…

Golfclinic

This weekend I’ve had some time to catch up on some of my overdue reading and found an interesting article on the new office disease called “boreout”. In short, employees become depressed from being underchallenged at work. Click here for an article on boreout.

Just a short message on the fact that we’ve won the Oracle Award in the category: Partner of the Year Applications. As a member of the Accenture Oracle group I’m proud that we’ve received this award and I would like to congratulate everyone for making this happen. Click here for the news article.

Accenture is named number 2 Dutch eHRM-Service Provider! Click here for the article. It’s nice to see that the contribution of the group that I’m in (our Oracle Fusion HR Focus Group) together with all other groups within Accenture, has made it into a number 2 position.