Day 2 - What Makes a Great Team?

This is my second post for September and already I'm stumbling before I began... A day at work and a fairly productive one at that is always worth celebrating but I am not sure if it is truly blog worthy material. It does make me wonder though what does make a great team...

When you find the perfect partner it just works and your teaming up makes you both so much better as people and so much more capable to achieve. The people you work with you do not have that same level of support with, admiration for or intimacy with but you can still achieve greatness with everything you attempt when you have a solid team.

But what is it that makes a team work? I think it is understanding for one, a sympathy and an empathy for things that are happening to the people around you. I guess this comes from a high emotional intellect, I'm still trying to work out if this is me... What I do know though is that whenever we all have an understanding that people can have an off day/week/month even and that these people need our support but not for us to hand them a solution then our EQ is rising and we are starting to build as a team.

Next we all need the same goal and the same passion to achieve it. With everyone rowing in the same direction it doesn't matter who is steering and who is at the oars, a shared focus results in a successful team...

That brings me to the importance of a leadership team that can engage with the workforce, keep us all focused and remind us of the what and the why of the goal ahead. When the who is clear the what is unified and the why understood then the how just seems to work itself out... It is important to note though that the manager of the team is not necessarily the leader of the team. Leaders appear at all levels of a team structure and this is necessary to support the unified vision. To hear the manager harp on daily about the vision they have is NOT going to result in a motivated team. To have a team of inspired members who can see, breath, live the goal makes it easier to stay focused. You don't want to throw the party because your boss thinks it is a great idea but you do want to throw the party if it makes you feel good or look great or if it just means to you a job well done. A leader at the top is good but leaders everywhere is even better.

So what makes a brilliant team? Unity, understanding and a little bit of luck. Am I feeling lucky? Only time will truly tell...