Happy holidays! This is SmartBrief's last publication for 2019. To close out the year, we have selected the most-read stories that have caught readers' attention and informed their workday. Hope you enjoy this special edition, and we look forward to keeping you smart in 2020!
McDonald's President and CEO Steve Easterbrook has been ousted after a relationship with an employee violated company policy and demonstrated poor judgment, the company says. Chris Kempczinski, president of McDonald's USA, has been named president and CEO.
McDonald's Chief People Officer David Fairhurst has resigned following the weekend firing of CEO Steve Easterbrook, who is accused of having a relationship with an employee in violation of company policy. Fairhurst has led McDonald's global HR department since 2015.
IBM has apologized for racially insensitive terms on an application on the company's recruitment website. The application had been imported automatically from countries that still use racial labels for government statistics, IBM says.
Thirty-nine percent of employees ages 18 to 49 say the shift toward workers staying longer in the workforce is negative, according to a poll by The Associated Press and NORC Center for Public Affairs Research. Thirty percent of workers in the same age group say the shift will be bad for the US economy.
IBM uses artificial intelligence to identify workers who are about to resign. The technology is 95% accurate and has saved the company almost $300 million in retention costs, CEO Ginni Rometty says.
Five kinds of employees tend to drive others to quit, consultant Gene Hammett writes. Watch out for micromanagers, hotheads, social butterflies, incompetent leaders and toxic superstars, he warns.
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Small, frequent acts of appreciation by leaders -- such as sending handwritten thank-you notes, giving specific praise and remembering people's birthdays -- go a long way toward employee satisfaction, writes Lolly Daskal, who offers 25 such suggestions. "Some leaders take for granted that employees are there to do the work tasked to them, and think that because it is expected, there is no need for a thank you ... that is far from true," she writes.
An absentee manager can be harmful to employees, especially if that manager also shuts out workers from decision-making and networking opportunities. Here are some suggestions for handling this situation.
Ernst & Young has come under fire for a 2018 training presentation for female executives that included advice some found questionable, such as "don't flaunt your body" and "speak briefly" to avoid rambling. EY says the presentation, developed by an outside consultant, has been under review and "is no longer offered in its current form."
