The First Third Blog focuses on work, social justice and the human side of sustainability.

How to build a stronger workforce, have happier employees and fix the economy

When you roll a pair of dice there are 36 possible outcomes. If you make a simple table of all the possibilities, you will quickly see that there are only two ways to roll an eleven (six-five and five-six) but there are six ways to roll a seven (six-one, five-two, four-three, three-four, two-five, and one-six).
Workforce [...]

{ 0 comments }

A Rotten Labor Market Is No Excuse For Treating Employees Badly

As a business owner or manager, you may think that the current labor market will keep your employees working their hardest and giving their best. It won’t. In good times and bad, people respond to the same core messages. And even if you’re not concerned about the culture you create in your workplace, know that [...]

{ 1 comment }

Why Your Employee Handbook Stinks (and how to fix it)

07.09.2009 Uncategorized

Rumor has it that, when the President’s legal counsel told him that waterboarding isn’t torture, he was comparing it to reading a typical employee handbook. Now that is real torture.
“Won’t talk, eh? Read this:”
“This document outlines the general Terms and Conditions of Employment and is a confidential document between you and “X” (hereinafter called “The [...]

Read the full article →

At Work in the Global Village

06.23.2009 Uncategorized

In 1990, Dana Meadows gathered some information about the population of the world and famously turned it into the “State of the Village Report“. Meadows used the image of a community of 1,000 people to help us understand both the demographic makeup of our global population and some of the economic and environmental implications of [...]

Read the full article →

Wolves and Moose… and Jobs

06.04.2009 Uncategorized

There is a wilderness island in Lake Superior that holds great lessons about our economy, unemployment, and what we should expect from our jobs.
Isle Royale is a 210-square-mile north woods island.  It is the third largest island in the contiguous United States yet there are no roads and no permanent human inhabitants. It is just [...]

Read the full article →

Welcome to the First Third blog!

06.03.2009 Uncategorized

There are many ways to define sustainability. The most lyrical definition I’ve come across is from Charles Dickens:
“Annual income twenty pounds, annual expenditure nineteen six, result happiness. Annual income twenty pounds, annual expenditure twenty pound ought and six, result misery” (David Copperfield, 1849).
Dickens never used the term “sustainability” but he grasped the concept perfectly. [...]

Read the full article →