EDITION 767
27 MAY 2019

As another week slips by, here are 10 things which caught my attention and may have escaped yours. This newsletter is sent to 50,000+ subscribers each Monday. Please share on social media and forward to your colleagues and friends so they can subscribe, learn and engage. I'd be very grateful if you did.

1. How to decide who gets to be coached or mentored. Not every executive will benefit from working with a coach or mentor. If you’re the person who decides which leaders get to work with an outside expert, you want to spend your budget wisely. To assess whether a struggling leader is ready for coaching or mentoring, watch for a few red flags. [MORE]
    

2. 100,000 people to decide the next Prime Minister. In her resignation speech, Theresa May said “it is and will always remain a matter of deep regret to me that I have not been able to deliver Brexit". As a result, 100,000 or so rank-and-file members of the Conservative Party, more than half of whom are over 55 years of age, have a crucial role. They are about to decide the next prime minister of a country of over 65 million people - something which has never happened before. BBC
    
3. Boris says UK must leave with or without a deal. Boris Johnson says the UK must leave the EU by the end of October with or without a deal. The former foreign secretary is the front-runner to replace Theresa May after she announced her resignation on Friday. “A new leader will have the opportunity to do things differently,” he said of Brexit. As many as 20 other candidates are expected to stand against him, including several former cabinet members. The Times
    
4. Sticking to strengths alone can backfire. Having employees focus solely on areas where they are strong may allow managers to avoid uncomfortable feedback sessions, but it does a disservice to employees and companies alike. Avoiding weaknesses altogether encourages employees to believe that those weak spots are not important. It also ignores the fact that the needs of a company (and entire industries) will change over time. askten
    
5. Keeping office conflict from going nuclear. Employees who  are slighted by co-workers are more likely to embrace “eye for an eye” than “turning the other cheek,” We are more likely to retaliate against our offenders at an equal, or even greater, level of harm, the researchers found. That’s how small conflicts can escalate into big ones. One takeaway? Managers inclined to let co-workers work out their differences are better off intervening at square one to avoid a snowballing effect. Journal of Applied Psychology.
    
6. Nice work if you can get it. Nigel Farage, who famously described himself as “skint” in 2017, earns a salary of £92,000 as an MEP and received gifts worth up to £450,000 from insurance tycoon Arron Banks in the year after the EU referendum. The amount included £13,000 monthly rent on a £4.4m house in Chelsea; £50,000 for a car and driver; and £1,500 a month for a private office. Banks also paid for visits to the US and more than £100,000 for a party in Farage’s honour in Washington DC. Channel 4
    
7. Number of over-70s in work doubles in a decade. Campaigners say new figures on people working beyond the age of 70 point to a worrying rise in pensioner poverty. The number of people in that age group still in employment has more than doubled in a decade, figures from the Office for National Statistics show, and now stands at nearly half a million, an increase of 135% since 2009. Daily Mail
    
8. A record 660,000 customers switched energy supplier last month.Energy UK, the trade body, reported a 34% surge in the number of customers who moved to a new supplier, undermining warnings that regulator Ofgem’s price cap would hinder competition. Last week, British Gas owner Centrica revealed it lost 234,000 UK home energy supply accounts at the start of 2019. The UK’s largest household energy supplier blamed a “spike in customer churn” on increases to the default tariff cap. The Independent
    
9. Beware of the holiday scam. British holidaymakers lost £7m to scams last year – a 14% increase on 2017, according to the National Fraud Intelligence Bureau. More than 5,000 crimes were reported, but the true figure is thought to be much higher due to the reluctance of many victims to talk to the police. Evening Standard
    
10. The bottom line.A limited-edition Aston Martin DB5 modelled after the gadget-laden one driven by James Bond in Goldfinger is on sale for £2.75m. The car will feature a revolving number plate, rear smoke screens, retractable bullet-proof shield, and “simulated” machine guns that pop out of the indicator lights. Metro