Connect With Courage – Ep. 10: Building A Great Team
Why build a Loyalist team?
Reason #1: It’s working.
high sustainable performance, inspires people to give and be their best
respond quickly to outside challenges and keep moving forward
intelligent risk-taking, innovation and creativity
Stakeholders perceive the team as effective.
Reason #2: It’s rewarding.
Work is highly engaging and you’re having fun.
You can be your authentic self and do your best work every day.
Reason #3: Because you can.
While only 15 percent of teams are Loyalist Teams, every team can become and stay one. The choice is yours.
If you want to enjoy the results that only the highest-performing teams get, you have to do what it takes to get there and continue to do it to stay there. That is hard work. But: Why settle for anything less?
So without further ado, let’s dig into the tools you need to build the team of your dreams.
Where to begin: Relationships
Extraordinary teams are built on extraordinary relationships.
Each person can only control one side of any relationship. (Henry Cloud: 3 rules in life, cannot control other people)
No matter what your formal role is, you can start right now. Your biggest lever: Review the relationships you have with your teammates and focus on the ones that need repair. Are you doing your part?
Practice number 1: Extend Trust
Great teams work hard to build and maintain trust.
High trust makes it possible to freely debate ideas, openly discuss problems, come to a solution and make a decision that sticks. Also, trust gives people the space and safety to ask for help.
Assume positive intent. Team members give each other the benefit of the doubt. If a team member can’t understand another member’s behavior, they talk with that person directly instead of making assumptions or grousing to someone else.
Practice #2: Have Direct Conversations
In the next episode, we’re having a detailed look into how to have crucial conversations. Here are some of the ground rules:
Talk to each other, not about each other.
Discuss the toughest issues in the room and leave aligned.
Give each other feedback, even when it’s hard.
Practice #3: Be Responsible to each other
Care about each other’s success as they do about their own.
