This is Module 5. This is the last module in course Number 1. We're going to talk now about leading through leaders. The first lesson is about building a high performance team. This idea of leading through leaders, this quote here by Tom Peters, leaders don't create followers, they create more leaders. Think that's exactly the frame of reference you are to think about your leadership journey. Hopefully there are leaders out there, that feel that same way, and they are taking you under their wing, and helping you be successful through your first couple of leadership opportunities. Let's talk about building a high-performance team. We'll start with this idea of the difference between a group versus a team. If you look at these two pictures, the top one is a sailing school. It's a bunch of individuals all learning how to sail. It looks like using about the same equipment. Then you look down below and you have a world-class sailing yacht, probably with a very, very well-trained team. Now, both of these pictures show sailors. But in the group, it's really an unaffiliated number of people, they're connected by a shared activity in the case of this, they're in a sailing school. They may or may not share a common goal you don't know. They are all trying, I think, to learn how to sail, but maybe for different reasons. You're not necessarily assigning different roles and duties to these individuals. They're all in it for themselves, such that each one of them learned how to sail their independent, as you can see. They may not know each other because they don't necessarily need to know each other. That's a sailing analogy. Let's put it into an organizational analogy. Let's take the functional groups within a matrix organization; engineering, human resources, production, supply chain management. These departments have many people who are connected by a shared job supply chain. They're all supply chain managers, yet they're all assigned out to different programs. As they sit in their department, they are unaffiliated. They're similar, but they're not a team. If you look over on the team side, teams, this idea refers to people that are associated together in a work activity. They share a common cause or goal. Down below you can see that this is a very competitive team and their common goal, absolutely is to win. Tasks are assigned to each individual and on a racing yacht like that, each individual has very specific tasks they have to accomplish. They are interdependent. They depend on each other for success, and members are aware of each other's weaknesses. I'd like to also say they're also aware of their strengths. Building an effective team. Before descriptions of an effective team are it has a common commitment and purpose, common performance goals, complimentary skills, and mutual accountability. No matter what the team does, it is united in these four principles. You as a leader, very rarely in your career, will you get to build a team from scratch more than likely you will be promoted into a position of leading a team that has already existed. What's interesting about that scenario is that means that the previous leader is gone. I will say it's one of two reasons. One, because they were wildly successful and were promoted. Which means the team is probably running pretty well, or the opposite. The leader was not doing a good job at leading the team and getting the performance necessary that the organization needed and was removed. The team then is probably not performing so well. I think those represents the bookends of as a leader of a team, how do you go about starting your journey there. Just assume that you're coming into a team that has already been formed. One of the things to observe right away is there a diverse mix of styles and perspectives, experiences. Because as we've learned in the past, diversity is a key to success. It's a key to thinking outside of the box, coming up with other opinions and alternatives before you make a decision. If it isn't already set and obvious, you definitely need a common set of objectives and a mindset. The team really needs to understand what are their goals, their commitment, and their purpose. Every single time you enter into a new team or leave a team, you need to share wins and rewards. It's really easy to overlook a great performance and focus on the things that need improvement. But if you don't stop on a regular basis and reward and recognize good performance, the team is going to fall into this. Oh boy, every time our leader talks to us, it's about improving this or fixing that. Really what you want is you want your team to expect both from you, open dialogue, good and bad. All right. How do you build an effective team? Well, like I said, identify clear goals. What is the purpose? Should be self-evident. The purpose of this team is to develop, and then deliver probably a product, maybe to a different team or a higher level of the organization. One of the things that is really important to know is a bigger team is not usually better. What is the essential skills and experiences that you need? Start there and don't let your team grow too big and have a potential for overlap, and that's a motivation killer. A little structure goes a long way. You don't have to put a lot of rules and regulations about how you're going to run the team. You need to make sure that each individual knows what their responsibilities are and then how the team wants to operate, how you make decisions, maybe how meetings are run. But don't go overboard on putting too much structure, especially too early. Model the behavior focus on we before me. As you make decisions and as you talk about allocating work, always talk about we, the team, what's best for the team before we talk about what's best for me. This idea of higher performing teams communicate with maximum impact. There was a study done, two different teams; one a high-performing team, one a lower performing team. They put telemetry on the individuals. They put heart rate monitors and sweat monitors, and just measured the physical nature of the interactions. The higher performing team definitely had elevated heart rates when they were communicating with each other. They made eye contact with each other. They got up, they walked around and they were animated. The lower-performing team had very low heart rates, and there was no activity. They sat at the table and no one made eye contact with anyone to include the people that we're talking. One of the ways to know if you've got the energy associated with higher performing teams is to just watch when the team is working together in a collaborative manner and the energy that is generated as they talk and problem-solve. Manage tension by building trust, that is the number one skill that you need to learn how to do. It's the number one thing that will bind the teammates together and bind you and them together. They need to trust you, you need to trust them. They need to trust each other. The moment there is tension or difficulty you cannot be afraid to have candid conversations, provide feedback. Then finally, the last element of how you build a high-performing team. When there is a new member, think of it as a new team. How many times have you been brought onto a team and you're the new member? Maybe they go around the room and everybody introduces themselves and then you introduce yourself and that's about it. You have no idea how the team operates. What is the common purpose, the common objectives? How do they manage their meetings? How do they make decisions? What is the allowable behaviors? What's expected? Nobody tells that to you. You probably connect with somebody that you're sitting next to or maybe somebody you've known in the past, and then somehow you're supposed to just figure it out. Imagine if you entered a new team that has been formed and working for a while. That team stepped back and said, all right, let's reevaluate our common purpose and goals commitment, the way we operate with each other. Because we now have a new team. We have a new set of experiences. An individual with their own personality and their own style and now we are a new team. Let's make sure that we all are re-calibrated with that. This idea of domain of trust, how do you build trust? It seems nebulous, but it really isn't. It's not something you do per se. It shows up and you earn it through the way you behave, you talk, your principles, your character, and the relationships that you build. Trust is interesting in that it's both a character and a competence issue. For sure, are you of good character? Do you have high integrity? Do you have values that you operate by? Is that clear? Are you honest,? Do you have a level of humility? But the team also needs you to have competence. Do you have the skills and abilities to deliver on your commitments? Now, your commitment isn't being the smartest person in the room. The commitment isn't I know all of the technologies and all of the engineering that's going on. Your commitment is probably delivering a piece of hardware, or software, or a service. Your team wants to know that you have the competence to be able to meet that commitment. That also is a huge level of trust-building. Then listening both with your head and your heart, being accessible. Have you ever worked for someone who was either never there, never in their office or their door was always closed, so it always felt a little bit difficult to want to get in there and have a conversation or explain something. They weren't necessarily accessible. Being accessible is a level of trust that you have with your team. Some people call it an open-door policy. Your behavior should be persistent and consistent. Words matter. Don't be lazy with your word choices. Use words that articulate what you mean to say. Then trust is reciprocal. Trust your team. Micro-managing is never a sign of trust on a team. Imagine in situations where you have team meetings and there is someone who is not there, who maybe has a strong opinion on something. The team will watch you in protecting the interests of those who are not present at that moment. Some might take advantage if a strong opinion is not present in a meeting to be able to make a decision quickly for their benefit. A leader who is vigilant in protecting those interests shows that they care about the integrity of the way that the team operates. That engender is a level of trust. Then always have safety zones that people feel like they can have sensitive or ethical conversations with you. What happens when a breach of trust occurs? It can happen for any reason. This is an interesting summary of how to think about repairing the relationships in the environment if a breach of trust happens. The idea is to restore those letters. Think about your core values, reflect on your priorities. Evaluate what went wrong, and be honest. Gather information, especially if you don't have it. If there's, he said she said things going on. Take responsibility. Then what do you have to do to make amends? Talk, offer resolution and restitution, and then reaffirm your desire for a trusting relationship, and then eliminate the chance of that problem happening again. Are there traps in the way that you might communicate with an individual or the way that you might delegate work to a group of individuals and maybe it looks unfair to others, eliminate the opportunity for that to happen again. This is quote from Phil Jackson, the basketball coach, "The strength of the team is each member and the strength of each member is the team." Really that's it. They work back and forth. I think the idea of if you always think about we before me, the team before an individual, your reward structure is set up that way. The way that you delegate assignments, the way you give praise and reward, is we before me. That will build a high level of trust and that is the very best way to get the discretionary effort and the performance out of a group of very highly skilled and hopefully motivated individuals. This lesson is now done. If you would now watch the video, it's called leaders, leading leaders. I think you'll really like it.
