Teamwork – Creating a high five team

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Intent & Why

• To highlight 4 key ingredients for developing winning teams

• Discuss how you could apply these elements to existing teams

• Why create winning teams? – ...

High-five Teams

1. Provide purpose, vision, shared goals and values

2. Unleash and develop skills

3. Create “Team Power”

4. Keep the focus on the positive!

• High Five! – You can’t high-five yourself!– You know/feel when it ‘clicks’– Same is true of winning teams

1. Provide purpose

• Provide purpose, shared values and goals– The compelling purpose for being (worthwhile work)

• A good enough reason to get people fired up and wanting to head in the same direction – the holy grail– Without this, you don’t have a team – just a crowd

• Reinforce with Team Charter/covenant

• Great examples: – Medical teams – saving lives– Sports teams – silverware, rivalries, bragging rights

• Q: What tools could you apply to create this with your teams?

2. Develop High Skills

• Unleash capabilities, encourage individuals to use them

• Start with individual skills and get everyone committed to constant improvement – cross-train

• As leaders, you need to be able to measure and compare – and provide feedback

• Set individual goals

• Q: What tools could you employ here?

3. Create Team Power

• Collective power of the group outshines individual performance

• Shifts focus from looking good to ensuring the team looks good

• Synergetic harmony – None of us is as smart as all of us– 1+1=3– Individuals can never have ‘team skills’

4. Keep the focus on the positive

• Reinforces the first three – people repeat performance that garners reward

• Accentuate the positive - Repeated reward and recognition

• Catch people doing the right things – and recognise it (no negative feedback)

• Catch them aligned – to purpose, skills development – and heap on the recognition/rewards

• Q: Tools for this? – Recognition is often its own reward

4 Key Ingredients for high-five teams

1. Create a sense of purpose, plus shared values and goal– Good enough reason to get people fired up - without this you don’t have a team– Create team charter or covenant to reinforce this

2. Develop high skills– Unleash capabilities, encourage individuals to use them– Start with individual skills and get everyone committed to constant improvement – Need to be able to measure and compare – and provide feedback– Set individual goals (SMART)

3. Create Team Power - None of us is as smart as all of us – Collective power of the group outshines individual performance– Not focused on looking good – focus on the team looking good– Synergetic harmony

4. Repeated reward and recognition – accentuate the positive– Reinforces the first three - People repeat performance that garners reward (Killer whale)– Catch people doing the right things – and recognise it (no negative feedback)– Catch them aligned (to purpose, skills development, synergy) and heap on the recognition/rewards– Recognition is often its own reward – think about Most Valuable Player award/man of the match – instant

feedback, immediate accountability

P

Provide purpose values

and goals

U

Unleash and

develop skills

C

Create team

power

K

Keep the

focus on the

positive

P.U.C.K.4 Key Ingredients for Successful Teams

One of us is smarter than all of us - A quick reframe

• Ants get smarter while we get dumber

• The wisdom of crowds comes not from the consensus, but the aggregation of ideas/thoughts/decisions of each individual

• The best collective decisions are the product of disagreement and contest not consensus or compromise

• Diversity increases the quality of the aggregated wisdom of the group– Different paradigms/MOWs – positive deviance

"Paradoxically, the best way for a group to be smart is for each person in it to think and act as independently as possible.“

How to make it happen• Ask rather than tell - evoke an exploratory ‘let’s see what happens’ frame of mind

• The three R's - respect recognition and reassurance - need to be in place.  Without these most people will simply not take the risk of engaging in exploring with you (Old school-anchors of being made to look silly can kick in)

• Eliminate the right-answer attitude – NLP Principles of "the map is not the territory" and "respect the other person's model of the world" (although, can be deeply ingrained from school days)

• No surprises – let people know what to expect.  When people come to your coaching session, team or management meeting, tell them in advance that things are going to be different.

• Allow silence – People need time to digest what you have asked before they answer or come up with ideas and suggestions

Recap

1. Provide a clear sense of purpose with values and goals, reinforced with a charter or a covenant that gives the team members a reason to trade self for selflessness

– Get them fired up

2. Unleash and develop skills continuously, building individual skills that in turn bolster collective skills

– Continuously improve skills to achieve purpose

3. Create team power – none of us is smarter than all of us– Ensure aligned - synergetic harmony

4. Keep the accent on the positive– people repeat performance for which they get praised

Questions to ask yourselves• Does your team have agreed-upon goals they created as a team?

• Do the players openly encourage and support one another?

• Do they have open communication with one another?

• Does each player know what their role on the team is?

• Is there mutual respect among the members?

• Do players use statements such as "we" when referring to the team, or is it an "every man for himself" mentality?

• Have they created a positive team image for themselves?

• Is the team as a whole committed to improving performance?

• Does each member consider themselves as a "team player?"