on October 27, 2023I have been privileged to work with a leadership team over this year accelerating their journey to be a higher performing team. The process of becoming one is well-researched with applications of key elements across a wide range of organizations. How those steps are labeled is less important than how well they translate to the organization and how much the team buys into their use. This team accepted the challenge that they needed three things to be successful:
- Passion for the target to be tenaciously engaged in its pursuit
- Intentionality to direct persistent effort to the process
- Commitment to anticipate expected resistance along with anticipated and unanticipated obstacles.
Throughout the phases of Setting Expectations, Building Passion and Ownership, Driving Commitment, Accelerating Growth, and Elevating Impact and Capability, the team was driven by a variety of questions. This is a sample of questions that worked for them:
- INTENTION: What outcome are we purposefully pursuing that can only best be done by all of us working together
- INFORMATION: What do we know and need to know about individual styles, group norms, organization objectives and culture, available resources?
- INSIGHTS: What known strengths can we further leverage? What known challenges and deficiencies must we address? What strengths were we unaware of? What development areas did we underestimate or did not see? What happens if we achieve our goal? What happens if we fail?
- ACTIONS: What are we going to do?
Is your team functioning at a high performing level? What difference would it make if you were? What would it take to get there?
The process is simple yet substantial. It is clear and it is challenging. You need enough passion for the journey. You need to a commitment of effort and resources to achieve it and sustain it.
Take the steps to get started.