IT Insights Blog

March Madness is in full swing here in the office, and it’s safe to say that we are experiencing a slightly higher than normal level of work disengagement. It’s easy to see disengagement among coworkers whose brackets have yet to be busted, but sometimes disengagement isn’t so easy to recognize.

It's almost time for the NBA playoffs, and being that we have a lot of basketball fans around the office, we're typically dialed into the latest pro ball goings-on. There are still a handful of regular season games left to be played, but most of the first-round playoff matchups have already been determined. This being the case, teams have gotten even more out-in-the-open about sitting key players to let them rest up while their backups go through the motions of the last gasp of regular season play.

A few weeks ago I was driving on the freeway to one of my favorite restaurants. The closest location is about 25 minutes away, and my friend and I were whizzing along at a great pace, radio blasting and stomachs hungry for the delicious food we would soon be eating.

All "free" stuff is not created equal. If you walk into a convenience store, take a candy bar when no one is looking, and walk out without paying, then you could technically claim to have gotten the candy bar "free." You didn't pay for it, after all. Most people, of course, would use a different word or words to describe that transaction, and most of those words, if applied in a court of law, would result in your "free" candy bar becoming the first line item on your official criminal record.

We don't always think through the full implications of what we say or how we act. This can be damaging in many spheres, but is particularly problematic in the social media realm. Often the public profile (or at least a strong and highly visible element thereof) of an entire organization is in the hands of a single individual. You don't even have to fall flat on your face — a minor misstep can blow up into a major embarrassment.