Your leadership success and the success of your team will be determined by how well you foster the five qualities of productive work teams throughout the stages of your team’s development.
The first quality is shared values. Ask your team to help you list your shared values on a large board or flipchart. They will contribute the values they consider the most important, such as integrity, excellence, quality, caring about people, profitability and harmony.
The second quality is shared objectives. It is absolutely essential that everyone take the time to discuss the actual reason for forming the team and the chief results that are expected of them.
Leaders are those who can see the big picture. They are absolutely clear about what it is they want to accomplish. They have the ability to articulate this vision in the minds of others and to convince everyone to work together toward the realization of that vision.
People cannot hit a target they cannot see. Again, even though it may appear time-consuming, everyone must have ample opportunity to discuss and agree on the ultimate goals before work begins. The more thorough the discussion of objectives, the more effective the team will be when it begins working.
The third quality is shared activities. As the team leader, you are responsible for dividing the work among your team members. You want everyone to know their roles and the roles of others to achieve the team’s goals.
The fourth quality is the team leader initiates the action. You become the role model for your team members. You continually look for ways to make it easier for your team members to do their jobs. You accept complete responsibility for the achievement of the overall goal. You start a little earlier, you work a little harder, and you stay a little later. You carefully set priorities and always work on your highest value tasks. You never ask anyone to do something that you wouldn’t do yourself. You are a leader because you continually lead.
The fifth quality is that the individual team members and the group continually evaluate their progress toward their goals and values. They are always asking themselves, “How are we doing, and how can we do better?” They ask their customers for continuous feedback and evaluation. They set incredible standards of excellence and they are constantly striving to be better.
Whenever there are problems, misunderstandings or difficulties within the team, they re-examine their values, goals, activities, assignments and responsibilities. They are more concerned with what’s right than who is right. They are more concerned with winning than not losing. High-performing teams run by excellent leaders, are determined to perform in an excellent fashion. All members know that their ability to work together is the key to everyone’s success.
The wonderful thing about becoming a leader in your professional and personal life is that you can practice the skills of influencing and persuading others to work toward a common objective. You can promote the principles of excellent teamwork by establishing your values and goals, determining your activities and then leading the action. You can improve yourself by continually evaluating your performance against your standards.
One of the marks of excellent people is that they never compare themselves with others. They only compare themselves with themselves and with their past accomplishments and future potential. You can become an even more excellent person by constantly setting higher and higher standards for yourself and then doing everything possible to uphold those standards. The more proficient you become at reaching the goals of your school, the more opportunities you will have to produce results through others. Your ability to put together a team and then lead that team to high performance will enable you to accelerate your career and fulfill your goals faster than ever before.
