"Commitment Starts When the Fun Stops" - How Committed are your team members?
Posted on October 15, 2019 by Emily Donaldson De Voto PhD, One of Thousands of Executive Coaches on Noomii.
Are your people willing to ask for or offer help? Carry the team if needed? Do whatever it takes to help you customers and each other be successful?
How are your teams doing? Are the barely functioning? ROCKSTAR teams require SYNERGISTIC COLLABORATION?
Most employees agree that while their company’s tendency to hit or miss deadlines will impact the bottom-line results of the business, they believe there is a lack of alignment within teams and/or with management – directly impacting the outcome of projects and tasks. They also site lack of collaboration and/or ineffective communication practices for workplace failures.
In a study conducted by Salesforce, employees stated that decision-makers should seek other opinions and involve other employees in brainstorming solutions for reaching targets before making a final decisions about execution. Additionally, employees requested that management identify and discuss issues truthfully and effectively.
How can you start to move your teams from getting by to SYNERGISTIC COLLABORATION?
Have a clearly defined mission and long-term vision for the company and for each team. Establishing a long-term vision, helps drive short-term goals and helps the teams understand how their daily actions impact the long-term direction and growth of the company. Involve the entire team in brainstorming solutions for both solving problems and reaching short-term and long-term goals. Employees who truly understand why they are doing what they are doing are naturally more effective.
Teach and practice effective time-management. You and your team needs to understand what your most important priorities are in terms of achieving your short-term goals and then schedule those in to your week FIRST. Without mastering the skill of time management, people have a tendency to spend the majority of their time chasing whatever is urgent at the moment. Days and weeks will be spent chasing urgencies with little or no time spend on important mission/vision – critical issues. It’s then no wonder that critical targets are missed.
Lead project outcomes with online progress tracking systems to promote transparency and built-in accountability. Have weekly check-in meetings to reconnect to vision, mission, goals and progress. Everyone needs to know how they are doing in relationship to the project and the teams needs to communicate with each other about where they are in the process (both as individuals and as the entire team.) Built-in accountability fosters collaboration between teammates – from cheerleading to mentoring to offering assistance.
Create a positive and support culture for your teams – this includes helping your team members create daily habits to support a healthy, positive mindset and actions. Obviously if your team feels defeated or disempowered that will not be effective – but what about if they are complacent, bored or just “blah”. Take the time to identify and create a culture mindset that supports the mission and long-term vision of the company. Engage your teams to help transform the culture by actively seeking and implementing their ideas and suggestions.
Celebrate victories and acknowledge contributions along the way. Success breeds success. Acknowledging the efforts of your team focuses the team on daily actions, progress and moving forward. Encouraging team members to acknowledge each other helps create a culture of mentoring and SYNERGISTIC COLLABORATION.
If your teams are just squeaking by and you are looking to transform them ROCK STAR teams – begin with the steps above. If you need help, make your life easier and employ a coach who knows how to help implement this transformation. Often times teams are more open to this type of change initially being lead by an outside resource. Communication is more honest and open and teams can quickly come together.
