Perry Work Report: work&labour news&research, November 13, 2015

November 13, 2015

Announcements:

Canadian Industrial Relations Association 2016 Conference Call for Papers

53rd Annual CIRA Congress: Visions of Work: Examining the Workplace as a Multidisciplinary Meeting Place.

When: May 31 -- June 2, 2016
Where: Edwards School of Business, University of Saskatchewan Saskatoon, Saskatchewan, Canada

The CIRA 2016 conference will bring together academics, students, policy-makers and labour relations practitioners from across Canada and the world on issues of work, trade unions, human resources, labour relations, and relevant public policy fields.

Research Study Participants Wanted

We are two academics -- Professor Rupa Banarjee, Associate Professor of Human Resource Management and Organizational Behaviour at Ryerson University and Elham Marzi, PhD candidate at the Centre for IR/HR at University of Toronto. We are looking for participants for a research study aimed at connecting HR professionals and academics.  The study seeks to explore employers' experiences with developing their global talent pipelines, as well as recruiting and retaining international applicants and new immigrants. 

You can get involved if you are an experienced HR professional and are responsible or involved in any part of the recruiting process at your organization.

There are three ways to participate in this research study:

  • Complete a short online survey (about 15 minutes). Survey respondents will be entered into a draw for a $100 gift certificate for The Shore Club Restaurant. Please click here to complete the survey.
  • Participate in a networking event and focus group (about 1 hour). This event will give you the opportunity to network and engage with HR professionals in similar roles as yourself from around the GTA.  There are a number of dates and times scheduled in November at the Ted Rogers School of Management location on Dundas St. W. Please click here to see dates and times and sign up for the networking event.
  • Participate in a one-on-one interview via skype or phone (about 45 minutes). These interviews will be scheduled based on your availability.

You can choose to participate in any or all of these ways, and are free to stop participating at any time. If you are interested in more information about the study please email us at banerjee@ryerson.ca or call us at 647-273-2270. We have a Company Consent Form for you to obtain institutional approval from your employer before participating in this study, if required. We would really appreciate if you could forward this message to your contacts in the GTA HR community. The more perspectives, the better!

 

Follow us on the CIRHR Library Tumblr and on the CIRHR Library Twitter.

The Boomer Shift

This is part of The Globe and Mail’s week-long series on baby boomers and how their spending, investing, health and lifestyle decisions could affect Canada’s economy in the next fifteen years. Is Canada ready for the boom? 

For more, visit tgam.ca/boomershift and on Twitter at #GlobeBoomers

“The baby boomers -- that massive bubble of people born in the two decades following the Second World War, perhaps the most important cohort for economic, technological and social development in human history -- have begun the transition into old age and, inevitably, death. As of this year, for the first time, Canada has more people over the age of 65 than under 15.” 

The shrinking work force

“The biggest challenge for the Canadian economy ... is that the looming retirement of the boomer generation amounts to a giant brake on the labour force. Labour growth is the key ingredient in the production of more goods and services that adds up to economic expansion. And it is now face to face with a massive and irreversible demographic threat.”

Boomers’ budget pressure

“The waves of retiring baby boomers are putting governments in an increasingly uncomfortable fiscal squeeze. ... [T]he boomers’ exit from the labour force will slow economic growth, eroding the tax base and eating into government revenues.”

Pension plan conundrum

“The biggest current debate about retirement planning is not the fate of CPP or OAS, but how well boomers themselves will be able to finance their retirement years beyond the minimum floor of support provided by government programs.”

The way forward

“‘What really counts is innovation, technology, the organization of business, the expansion of human capital, and the animal spirits of capitalism,’ wrote author Chris Farrell in his 2014 book Unretirement: How Baby Boomers are Changing the Way We Think About Work, Community and the Good Life. ‘In other words, productivity trumps Malthusian demographics.’”

The Globe and Mail, November 8, 2015: “Boom, Bust and Economic Headaches,” by David Parkinson, Janet McFarland, and Barrie McKenna

The Globe and Mail, November 7, 2015: “Baby boomers will drive the sharing economy into the mainstream,” by Linda Nazareth

The Globe and Mail, November 6, 2015: “As the baby boomers retire, the threat of intergenerational inequality looms,” by Barrie McKenna

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Canada's Top 100 Employers

 “Now entering its 17th year, the Canada’s Top 100 Employers project is a national competition to determine which employers lead their industries in offering exceptional workplaces for their employees.”

Selection Process                

“Employers are evaluated by the editors of Canada’s Top 100 Employers using eight criteria, which have remained consistent since the project’s inception: 

  1. Physical Workplace; 
  2. Work Atmosphere & Social; 
  3. Health, Financial & Family Benefits; 
  4. Vacation & Time Off; 
  5. Employee Communications; 
  6. Performance Management; 
  7. Training & Skills Development; and 
  8. Community Involvement.” 

“Employers are compared to other organizations in their field to determine which offers the most progressive and forward-thinking programs.”

The Globe and Mail, November 9, 2015: “Canada’s Top 100 employers 2016″ (56 pages, PDF)

Canada’s Top 100 Employers (2016) Winners from our 16th annual editorial competition  (the list of the 100 winning companies is at the bottom of the page, click on the company name for details)

The Globe and Mail’s Report on Business Top Employers [website]

And at U of T: University of Toronto was selected as one of Canada’s Top 100 Employers (2016)

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Is Canada's War on Science Finally Over?

“Under the Conservative government of Stephen Harper, the country made headlines for restricting communications by federal scientists, shutting down important research stations, phasing out the role of federal science adviser, and generally ignoring evidence in policymaking.”

 “But there’s evidence that under a new government, the war on science is finally over. In the weeks since Canada’s new prime minister, Justin Trudeau, won a Liberal majority, he’s already made some major reforms.”

Scientists can now talk in public

“This is a major reform. It means that all the important information researchers gather can finally be communicated to the public again. It means more transparency in government. It means an end to the demoralization of Canadian researchers. And it means fewer headaches for journalists who are trying to do their job.”

Trudeau restored the mandatory census

“...[A]s soon as Trudeau was sworn in, he announced that he’d reinstate the mandatory census -- a victory for supporters of better data to inform policymaking. As he said at his swearing-in ceremony, "We committed to a government that functions based on evidence and facts, and long-form censuses are an important part of making sure we’re serving constituents in our communities.”

Canada now has two science ministers

After being sworn “Trudeau immediately reestablished the minster of science posting, appointing Kirsty Duncan, a medical geographer from the University of Toronto, to the job. Trudeau also appointed Bains, a politician, to the role of minister of innovation, science, and economic development. The roles are meant to be complementary: According to the government, Duncan will be tasked with ensuring ‘that government science is fully available to the public, that scientists are able to speak freely about their work, and that scientific analyses are considered when the government makes decisions,’ while Bains’s role is meant to be more applied. Two definitely seems better than zero.”

Vox, November 9, 2015: “Canada is finally ending its war on science,” by Julia Belluz

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Much Ado about Data

“Statistics Canada’s budget was cut swiftly and steeply during the Harper years, to the point that it has at times been unable to complete surveys related to the labour market and other key economic areas. If the Liberals are truly committed to data-based decision-making, they must find the money to allow StatsCan do its job properly. The mandatory census is only the beginning.”

The Globe and Mail, November 5, 2015: “Globe editorial: Restoring the long-form census is a good start, but more data needed”

Make Statistics Canada independent

“Munir A. Sheikh is executive fellow at the School of Public Policy, University of Calgary and former chief statistician of Canada:”

“With so much at stake as a result of the cancellation of the long-form census, it is appropriate to celebrate this policy reversal. However, we should also ask why and how we got into this unacceptable situation in the first place, with a government interfering in the very technical issue of which questions should be asked on the census form. Could we find ourselves back in the same situation again one day in the future?”

“The answer is that the Statistics Act, the law governing Statistics Canada, is flawed -- it gives the responsible minister final authority in deciding on technical statistical matters. The law also gives cabinet the authority to determine questions that should go into a census. This is simply not right.”

“Given the law, there is no reason to be sure that a future government would not again cancel the long-form census. I believe the contents of a census should be a decision purely based on a country’s data needs and not on the politics of the day.”
“Indeed, the Liberal Party’s election platform promised to make Statistics Canada independent -- I hope the new government fulfills this promise in the near future.”

The Globe and Mail, November 5, 2015: “There’s too much at stake – make Statistics Canada independent,” by Munir A Sheikh

Which report is better?

“In August, the [Survey of Payroll Employment and Hours] showed that there had been 53,000 jobs lost in Alberta in the past year. The August Labour Force Survey showed that 41,000 jobs had been created over the same period.”

“That’s a difference of 94,000 jobs. So what’s going on? Which report is right?”

“The Labour Force Survey is just that -- a survey. Every month a battalion of interviewers contact 56,000 Canadian households to ask them who in their house has a job, along with a long, long list of other questions. Those numbers are then grossed up or extrapolated to get a picture of the whole country. Once you agree to do the survey once, you have to do it for six months.”

“The Survey of Employment, Payroll and Hours is different. It’s based on companies remitting taxes to the Canada Revenue Agency. The CRA shares with Statistics Canada the numbers of employees on payroll. It’s a raw count of who’s got a job with a company. It doesn’t include household workers, the self-employed, or farmers. It won’t tell you if the jobs were part-time or full-time, or the age, gender or education of the workers who lost or gained jobs.”

“Andrew Fields, an analyst with Statistics Canada, [points] out that SEPH counts payroll entries, not people: 'We do encourage people to look at both, but not necessarily to compare them because they measure different thing. Someone could have two or three jobs, but in LFS, that would only be one person, in SEPH that would be two or three entries.'"

“Emanuella Enenajor, a senior economist with Bank of America Merrill Lynch Global Research: 'You have a household survey that’s quite volatile and a payroll survey that’s lagged and subject to heavy revisions. The payroll survey is probably the lesser of two evils.'"

“Unless you need the unemployment rate. There is only one source for the unemployment rate and that is the Labour Force Survey, which shows Alberta’s unemployment rate marching higher over the past year, from 4.6 per cent in September 2014 to 6.5 per cent a year later.”

CBC News, November 6, 2015: “StatsCans job numbers a puzzle to sort out,” by Tracy Johnson

Statistics Canada’s The Daily, November 6, 2015: “Labour Force Survey, October 2015

Statistics Canada’s The Daily, September 4, 2015: “Labour Force Survey, August 2015"

Statistics Canada, October 29, 2015: “Survey of Employment, Payrolls and Hours (SEPH)”

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Correctional Investigator Urges Government to Improve Treatment of Aboriginals in Prison

“The country’s prison watchdog wants the new Liberal government to act on outstanding recommendations from his office, including a call to create a deputy commissioner of aboriginal corrections. Howard Sapers, the correctional investigator, says outcomes for indigenous prisoners -- who represent 24 per cent of the prison population -- continue to be far worse than for other offenders.”

“He recalled that his office released a 2013 report examining whether the correctional service was doing everything it should be doing, according to the law, to deal with ballooning rates of aboriginal incarceration. ‘It was tabled as a special report in Parliament, one of only two special reports my office has ever issued in its more than 40-year history,’ Sapers said. ‘That, itself, is a signal that this was a very urgent and important matter. It was tabled in Parliament by the minister of public safety as a special report calling for urgent action and really, it received anything but.’” 

“The report noted that close to one-in-four inmates in federal penitentiaries were of aboriginal ancestry, yet specific legislative provisions were chronically under-funded, under-utilized and unevenly applied by the correctional service. Sapers said the government’s overall response was business as usual, which was very disappointing and not at all responsive to the recommendations.”

The Globe and Mail, November 8, 2015: “Watchdog urges Trudeau government to improve treatment of aboriginals in prison,” by Kristy Kirkup

In the U.S.: Thousands Start Life Anew With Early Prison Releases

“Over the next few years, as a result of an across-the-board adjustment of federal drug penalties by the United States Sentencing Commission, tens of thousands [of] inmates may benefit from reductions in their terms, and new sentences will be somewhat shorter than they were in recent decades.”

“The shift reflects concerns about the severe overcrowding and expense of federal prisons and, even more, the widely shared sense among many leaders of both political parties as well as criminologists that the harsh federal penalties of the war on drugs were often too extreme.”

“[Michael] Keating was 22 and addicted to methamphetamine when he was arrested and charged with production ....He was shocked by his sentence of 11 years and three months, he said, but remained a model prisoner. His greatest revelation came, he said, when he was able to move in March to a halfway house, which allowed him to start ... what he calls his ‘dream job,’ with a company that wires houses with utilities and entertainment controllable by cellphone.”

The New York Times, November 1, 2015: “Thousands Start Life Anew With Early Prison Releases,” by Erik Echholmnov

CNN Money, October 30, 2015: “Out of prison and out of work: Jobs out of reach for former inmates,” by Tanzina Vega

The New York Times, October 6, 2015: “U.S. to Release 6,000 Inmates From Prisons,” by Michael S. Schmidt

Fair-Chance or “Ban the Box” Laws are Gaining Traction

“Seventy million Americans have criminal histories that can limit their job opportunities or shut them out of work altogether. This sometimes means they had an arrest that never led to conviction, faced charges that were eventually dismissed or committed minor crimes in the distant past.”

“Fair-chance -- or “ban the box” -- laws have gained traction in both liberal and conservative states as elected officials and businesses have come to understand that shutting people out of work weakens families and communities. It also leaves qualified people out of the applicant pool.”

The New York Times, November 11, 2015: Editorial: “A Criminal Record and a Fair Shot at a Job”

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Prescription Over-Ruled

“The stories told in this report illustrate some of the ways the[Workplace Safety and Insurance Board (WSIB)]’s management of medical care and medical evidence harms patients. This includes failing to heed medical advice regarding readiness to return to work, insufficient treatment, blaming ‘pre-existing’ conditions for ongoing illness, or using independent medical reviews which proclaim patients to be healed, despite the evidence of treating practitioners. When these things happen, the injured patients find themselves re-victimized by the very system that is mandated to compensate and protect them.”

“Recommendations:

  1. Have Ontario’s Ombudsman launch a formal investigation into the WSIB’s treatment of medical advice. Particularly the way in which health care providers’ professional advice is often not considered and the lack of explanation offered.
  2. Collect and make public statistics on how often injured workers’ health care providers’ advice is disregarded.
  3. Create a protocol that regulates rapid response times for requests from injured workers’ health care team. For example, requiring a decision within 48 hours when an urgent request for care is submitted to the Board.
  4. Eliminate the use of so-called “paper doctors,” who render decisions about care without ever meeting the patient.
  5. Give proper weight to the opinions of the medical professionals who know the injured worker best -- their own health care team.”

Ontario Federation of Labour, November 5, 2015: “Prescription Over-Ruled: Report on How Ontario’s Workplace Safety and Insurance Board Systematically Ignores the Advice of Medical Professionals” (16 pages, PDF)

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Volunteering in Canada

“The main objective of the GSS [General Social Survey] on giving, volunteering and participating is to provide an overall picture of unpaid volunteer activities, charitable giving and participation. The survey included individuals aged 15 years and older living in private households in the provinces.” 

Statistics Canada, November 12, 2015: “General Social Survey: Giving, volunteering and participating: Public use microdata file, 2013”

Statistics Canada, April 8, 2015: “Infographic: General Social Survey on Giving, Volunteering and Participating”

Statistics Canada, January 30, 2015: “Volunteering and charitable giving in Canada,” by Martin Turcotte

Statistics Canada, June 18, 2015: “Volunteering in Canada, 2004 to 2013,” by Maire Sinha

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Mercer Survey: Inside Employees' Minds

“For years, the employee value proposition has been predicated on the notion that engaged, happy employees are more productive, committed and loyal. Today, however, this equation is changing. Mercer’s new Inside Employees’ Minds Survey of just over 1,000 Canadian workers finds an intriguing paradox: More than a third (35%) of Canadian workers are seriously considering leaving their organizations at the present time, and this includes many who are satisfied with their jobs, organizations, pay, benefits and other aspects of work."

"Shifting workforce demographics are largely driving this 'happy but leaving' trend. The younger generations -- X, Y (millennials) and the incoming Z -- now account for the majority share of the workforce, and these workers have decidedly different views and expectations about work compared with older colleagues.
For employers and employees alike, the challenge ahead will be two-fold:

  • Redefining commitment at work: The terms and the timing.
  • Transitioning to a more flexible value proposition that reflects the evolving world of work.

Mercer: Inside Employees’ Minds: The Transforming Employment Experience [website]   

Mercer Survey, September 2015: Inside Employees’ Minds: The Transforming Employment Experience, Part 1 Canada (20 pages, PDF)

Mercer Survey, October 2015: Inside Employees’ Minds: The Transforming Employment Experience, Part 2 Canada (26 pages, PDF)

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When the CEO-Employee Pay Gap Goes Public

“Controversy over executive pay is nothing new and probably not going away anytime soon. It is, however, about to change.While companies have long had to share what their CEOs make, financial information about the everyday employee is less readily available. This, of course, has made it difficult to determine the CEO-employee pay ratio and, subsequently, to identify just what kind of gaps exist. But in August, the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) approved a rule requiring companies to regularly reveal the pay ratio between CEOs and employees, starting in 2017. The idea isn’t to embarrass or shame CEOs, but to provide shareholders with valuable financial insights for comparing compensation between similar or competing companies.”

“For many CEOs, the concern is less about the numerical value of that ratio and more about employees’ perceptions once they find out what it is. The unveiling might risk damaging employees’ relationships not just with CEOs, but with their entire organizations, especially when they can draw comparisons with competitors. Needless to say, that makes for a considerable leadership challenge for CEOs. Here are three things executives can do to prepare for when the news breaks:

  1. Consider Sharing your Pay Formula
  2. Hear your Employees Out
  3. Fill the Gap with meaningful Benefits

Fast Company, November 11, 2015: “What To Expect When The CEO-Employee Pay Gap Goes Public,” by Matt Straz

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The Gig Economy: The Great Unbundling of Work

“Some people believe the gig economy will liberate workers from the 9-to-5 grind. Others argue that the rise of companies like Uber, TaskRabbit and Handy will make it harder for workers to make a living.”

“Either way, the gig economy poses a significant problem when it comes to benefits. The solution could lie in a return to a 19th-century phenomenon: mutual aid societies.”

“Just as Netflix and YouTube have unbundled cable TV, so the gig economy is now unbundling work. A traditional job offers workers not only income but also social relationships, training, status, and -- especially in the US -- benefits. But just as Netflix and YouTube have unbundled cable TV, so the gig economy is now unbundling work, as Nick Grossman and Elizabeth Woyke argue in an important new ebook Serving Workers in the Gig Economy."

“Workers in the 19th and 20th-century US faced a similar dilemma before the New Deal was passed. And so mutual aid societies developed as a way of providing workers with services and security, as David Bieto details in his 2000 book From Mutual Aid to the Welfare State.”

Quartz, November 10, 2015: “A 19th-century solution to the high-tech problems of the gig economy”

Serving Workers in the Gig Economy: Emerging Resources for the On-Demand Workforce, by Nick Grossman, Elizabeth Woyke (free download)

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Gender Inequality: Are We Asking the Wrong Questions?

“The most commonly-cited statistic is that women make just 77 cents for every dollar men do, with the implication being that the 23-cent gap is a result of discrimination.” While this statistic isn’t inaccurate, it doesn’t exactly tell the whole story. A portion of the gender pay gap can be explained by differences in things like education, experience, hours worked, or occupation type.

“A new report from PayScale, a jobs website, takes a stab at this very problem by looking at the gender gap in various occupations controlling for factors including experience, education, company size, and crucially, job title. According to their data, female doctors make 29.2% less than their male counterparts, but that gap shrinks to just 4.6% after introducing the controls. A similar pattern exists for lawyers: women make 14.8% less than men, but just 4.1% less on an adjusted basis.”

“A paper published last year by Claudia Goldin, an economist at Harvard University, noted that the gender pay gap was especially acute in law and business ... [because] such professions require copious amounts of ‘face time’. On the other hand, pharmacists, for whom there is little penalty for working part-time, experience virtually no gender pay gap.”

“Another study by Goldin and Lawrence Katz (also of Harvard) noted that being away from work for 18 months was associated with a 29% drop in earnings for mid-career lawyers and PhDs, and a 41% for MBAs. In effect, much of the gender pay gap can be thought of as the cost of having children.”

“In one sense, PayScale’s findings are obvious: one should not expect too much of a difference in pay for two people doing the exact same job. What the report does do is help policymakers ask the right questions. Rather than fixating on just the overall ratio earnings between men and women, it would be more interesting to ask who gets which jobs and why.”

The Economist, November 5, 2015: “Why politicians are asking the wrong questions about gender inequality,” by W.Z

PayScale, November 2015: “The Truth About The Gender Pay Gap”

“The gender gap in pay would be considerably reduced and might vanish altogether if firms did not have an incentive to disproportionately reward individuals who labored long hours and worked particular hours. Such change has taken off in various sectors, such as technology, science, and health, but is less apparent in the corporate, financial, and legal worlds.” 

Goldin, C. (2014). A grand gender convergence: Its last chapter. The American Economic Review, 104(4), 1091.

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Conning the Hustlers

“This vivid account of hustling in New York City explores the sociological reasons why con artists play their game and the psychological tricks they use to win it. Terry Williams and Trevor B. Milton, two prominent sociologists and ethnographers, spent years with New York con artists to uncover their secrets. The result is an unprecedented view into how con games operate, whether in back alleys and side streets or in police precincts and Wall Street boiler rooms. Whether it’s selling bootleg goods, playing the numbers, squatting rent-free, scamming tourists with bogus stories, selling knockoffs on Canal Street, or crafting Ponzi schemes, con artists use verbal persuasion, physical misdirection, and sheer charm to convince others to do what they want.” [Columbia University Press]

“The group cons are on the far artistic side of the hustles Williams and Milton describe. It’s art not just because it requires virtuosity and it’s fun to look at if you know what’s going on, but also because it’s not very utilitarian. For Alibi, the con’s life satisfies a very particular yet understandable set of conditions: He doesn’t want a 9 to 5 job, but he doesn’t have the temperament for violent crime or pimping. He’s quick but not formally educated. The reader gets the sense that this kind of con artistry is, for a crew leader like Alibi, a real vocation. It’s a way for him to use his talents and ingenuity to live in accordance with his day-to-day desires. How many of us can say we do that? It’s the sort of poverty that even capitalists find admirable.”

New Republic, November 5, 2015: “ Conning the Hustlers A new look at New York’s secret workers,” by Malcolm Harris

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Top Ten Books about Working Life

“From daydreaming about sex to the politics of tea-making, Melville’s reluctant scrivener to Sylvia Plath’s New York internship, here are some of the best books about the nine-to-five.”

“It makes sense to me that one of the bestselling genres in China is the workplace novel. The most popular has sold 5m copies and is called Du Lala’s Promotion Diary: it combines soap-opera twists with career advice of the machiavellian kind (’If your boss makes a pass at you, smile and flirt back’) to tell the story of a secretary rising to the position of HR manager. But this is a genre you don’t find in Britain. It didn’t bother me that the books I read rarely dealt with work until I moved to London to find a job: the novels I knew spoke to me of love and betrayal and the particular colour of a Cornish sky, but rarely of the politics of tea-making, everyday ambition or the entwined pleasures and duties of work. Here are some books that do."

  1. Working: People Talk About What They Do All Day and How They Feel About What They Doby Studs Terkel
  2. All the Livelong Day: The Meaning and Demeaning of Routine Work by Barbara Garson
  3. Cubed: A Secret History of the Workplace by Nikil Saval
  4. Three Sisters by Anton Chekhov
  5. Tess of the D’Urbervilles by Thomas Hardy
  6. A Far Cry from Kensington by Muriel Spark
  7. The Crofter and the Laird: Life on a Hebridean Island by John McPhee
  8. At the Works by Florence Bell
  9. The Bell Jar by Sylvia Plath

The Guardian, April 2015: “Top 10 books about working life,” by Joanna Biggs’s author of All Day Long: A Portrait of Britain at Work

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The Beauty of Craft & A Young Boy's Dream

This photo essay explores “the creative process with master artists and craftspeople in the San Francisco Bay Area. Their works are examples of how locally-made goods and services can contribute to dynamic and diverse communities."

“All sorts of artisans create beautiful, appealing alternatives to mass-produced consumer goods and entertainment.”

The lesson plan and additional resources can be found here.

Global Oneness Project, November 2015: “The Beauty of Craft,” by Unnikrishnan Raveendranathen

Amar: A Day in the Life

“This short film follows a 14-year-old boy from Jamshedpur, a major industrialized city in Eastern India, during his daily routine. Amar is the main breadwinner in his family. With perseverance and determination, he works two jobs six days a week in addition to attending school in the afternoons. One of Amar’s dreams is to become a cricket star.”

Click here for the accompanying lesson plan and additional resources.

Global Oneness Project, October 2015: “Amar,” by Andrew Hinton

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Book of the Week

Leadership BS: Fixing Workplaces and Careers One Truth at a Time, by Jeffrey Pfeffer. New York, NY : Harper Business, 2015. 259 p. ISBN 9780062383167 (hardcover)

From the publisher: "Too many leadership failures. Too many career derailments. Too many toxic workplaces filled with disengaged, distrustful employees. Jeffrey Pfeffer, a professor at the Stanford Graduate School of Business and the author of Power, offers an incisive dissection of the multibillion-dollar leadership industry and presents ways to fix its many problems. In Leadership BS, Jeffrey Pfeffer pulls back the curtain, showing how leadership really works and why so many leadership development efforts fail. In this forthright and persuasive critique, Pfeffer argues that much of the oft-repeated wisdom about leadership is based more on hope than reality, on wishes rather than data, on beliefs instead of science. In an age when transparency is considered a virtue, Pfeffer makes the case that strategic misrepresentation isn't as harmful as you think, that breached agreements are a part of business, that immodesty is frequently a path to success, and that relying on the magnanimity of your boss is a bad bet. Using research findings from social psychology, sociology, and sociobiology, and filled with practical, actionable advice, Leadership BS encourages readers to finally stop accepting sugar-laced but toxic potions as cures and to understand the realities of organizations and human behavior. To make real change, Pfeffer argues, we need to get beyond the half-truths and self-serving stories that are so prominent in the mythology of leadership. In calling BS on so much conventional wisdom, Leadership BS offers both a provocative, scientific examination of how leadership actually works -- and how it doesn't -- and a prescription for leaders future and present.”

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