Elevating your team provides endless opportunities. It also requires focus and clarity.
Understanding what may be blocking your team’s success takes energy, time and a willingness to deal with tough issues and uncertain outcomes.
One leader I love working with says elevating a team is, “Like standing on a mountain top each day and breathing in the cool clear air and seeing the world unfold in the valley below.” Cool vision, right?!
Another leader in the same organization [who I also love working with] says, “I agree, it can be like breathing cool clear air, yet some days it is like breathing in smog, dirt and who knows what from that valley below.” Both visions paint a vivid picture.
For some leaders, elevating a team is a hustle, for others, a struggle, and for some, a joy. I work with those who are in the joy space. Yet, most of those will tell you to get to joy you have to walk the hustle and struggle paths, too.
There are four phases teams tend move through: forming, storming, norming, and performing.
To elevate your team now, understanding each phase helps. To fully unlock the potential of your team and have consistent growth — both in people and revenue — take a look at how you can move beyond the current phase where your team resides.
Beliefs and behaviors either drive success and growth or slow or block success. Elevation requires a look at the drivers — what beliefs and behaviors are accelerating or slowing your growth . . . and why.
What are the beliefs and behaviors of your team? Here are two belief areas to examine:
1. Determination and decision to grow
A team has never “made it.” People evolve, business changes, the world shifts. What do you know about the dreams and goals of your team members? What are their plans for growth this year? Who is happy and stable and who isn’t seeking a challenge?
Stable teams may have developed an ‘”we are fine” attitude. Teams can become like the ostrich burying his head in the sand to avoid danger, risk or growth. Take a look at your team.
Who is sharing and generating ideas? Who knows what your competitors are doing or not doing?
Who is striving and seeking ways to bring in new business? Who is playing, has too much time, or busy trying to be liked or stand in the lime light? Is everyone on the team determined and committed to growing?
2. Current flow of business
Business flows — it has ups and downs. Keeping a business growing means delivering value above expectations, always looking for ways to improve individually and as a team.
Is your team always asking and thanking existing customers for their business? Do they ask customers for referrals?
You can’t take business for granted. Values change for your customers as they grow and evolve and therefore your customers will come and go. If business has shifted and you team prefers the status quo, it is time to undercover the beliefs and behaviors driving the preference.
Some resistance to change is human nature. However, a strong push or pull not to change or an unwillingness to be open to shifts may indicate a BIG red flag.
Your customers are people. All people have a lot on their plates and your team is responsible for helping customers see value, share what’s valuable about what you do and why it matters and to ask your customers for referrals and how to add value.
Are you asking these important questions?
- Who do you know that needs our product and/or service?
- How can we increase the value of our service and/or product to you?
- How else could our products and/or service meet needs that matter?
Teams are small communities, connected for a purpose. The beliefs and behaviors of the members of a team have an impact on the collective results.
When you are serious about elevating your team and having more meaning and satisfaction from your work, take time to think about the beliefs and behaviors of your team. Clarity about who is on the team and what they do helps you quickly eliminate beliefs and behaviors that do not support the current work and your long term goals.
Understanding what leads to success and what may be blocking your team’s will be well worth the effort and time. Here is to a year with filled with purpose and impact. To a year that matters to you and make the world a better and more peaceful place.
Stepping forward into a transition or transformation may feel uncomfortable. When you have been doing something for a long time, feeling pulled to explore something new and different may find you feeling unsteady — without your sea legs. For many successful people stepping forward in this way is an act of courage and vulnerability.
