Key Points:
- Creating a successful team requires ongoing measures, but we’re sharing four steps you can take today to set you and your team up for success.
- A leader and their team are all important puzzle pieces in creating a positive and productive work environment.
Building a successful and lasting team is essential for a business, as one person can’t complete all tasks needed for a company. There are various elements to building a successful team, including the team members and their culture that lead to success. So, how do you start building a successful team? We’re sharing five ways to make a successful team starting today.
Evaluate The Leader
Leaders are only as successful as their teams, but a leader can define their team’s success. If a leader isn’t ready to manage a team, they may micro-manage, be self-focused, or even lack a barrier to their team’s bandwidth. There are many characteristics of a great leader that needs to be considered before a team is curated. For more information on these traits, check out this article.
Understand Your Team Dynamics
Before adding new team members, you must understand each member’s strengths, how they can best be utilized, and what’s lacking. Get to know each team member so you can better understand unique growth opportunities and where you may need new team members to fill in the gaps. Gain an understanding of skillsets, personality traits, and working styles so each member can perform at their fullest. All of these facets can determine how the team works together towards overall goals. Differences in personality traits can be evaluated through tests such as Myers-Briggs Type Indicator, DISC Profile, Strengths Finders, and Caliper Profile. While books like Business Chemistry: Practical Magic for Crafting Powerful Work Relationships can show whether certain team members are more pioneers, guardians, drivers, or integrators. If you’re interested in learning more about personality differences and their impact on the success of a team, read more at this article.
Build DE&I Into Your Team
Ensure your team is diverse with various ages, religious backgrounds, races, ethnicity, sexual orientation, culture, and educational experiences. Building a diverse, inclusive, and equal team creates a positive work environment with optimal creativity. There are seven steps that employers can take to assist in having a more inclusive environment for all hires, including systematic inclusive company goals and accountability with leadership. To learn more about the seven steps, click here.
Establish Guidelines
Establish a foundation of agreed-upon roles and responsibilities for each team member and distribute them to the team. By doing so, you’re making your team accountable and building mutual trust and confidence. Then, you can define with your team what success looks like for your team and the goals everyone should be aiming for in a set period. By having these guidelines, your team will have a clear idea of what needs to be accomplished and work together towards those goals based on their responsibilities.
Facilitate Open and Respectful Communication
Creating a positive work culture involves allowing team members to feel comfortable openly discussing their thoughts. In addition, this environment enables teams to problem-solve together to develop creative solutions. Setting the scene of clear communication can lessen tensions that arise from vagueness in the workplace and lead the team to fulfill its goals. The leader can guide conversations to bring a consensus to every meeting.
Creating a successful team takes ongoing efforts, maintenance, and continual evaluation. While a leader’s actions are vital to a team’s success, genuinely understanding each team member is an essential part of the puzzle and everyone working together leads to success. If you’re looking for more ways to motivate your team, check out our other article here.
