There are some foundational elements involved in supporting and growing a team to its potential. Unless these elements are present and fostered by the team leader, the team will not be motivated to accomplish its objectives. Furthermore, it will also be stunted in its growth causing it to continually underperform. I therefore want to share with you 7 key elements that need to be attended to on a continual basis in order to create a high performing team at Jason Hare Kingston. I also want to give you some simple approaches to addressing and improving these elements.

Commitment level

Often leaders are too afraid to be up front about the need for team commitment. Yet in today's environment people are looking for something to commit to. Individuals are looking to belong to something bigger than they are, which is worthy of their attention. Therefore team leaders need to share their commitment expectations and draw a picture of what commitment can do for individuals who commit to a team. Discussions need to be conducted on what behaviours the members feel would be appropriate for successful synergy and productive outcomes.

Some workshop ideas would be to discuss what teamwork looks like for this particular team. What behaviours do they see need to be consistent in order to work well together and to accomplish team objectives? If each member can be given a sheet of paper to write down a list of behaviours and then asked to share in the group. It brings a deeper sense of clarity and accountability to the group about all the unspoken expectations that exist. It can also be helpful to get them to list the unacceptable behaviours for the team. What should not be tolerated?

Be ready if issues arise from this because of existing behaviours that may be currently tolerated by some. If defensive behaviours begin to arise from such a transparent discussion, simply label it. "I'm sensing defensiveness arising in our discussion - I am just wondering if we see it as important to be able to have these types of discussions and not to get caught up in emotional reactiveness? I personally think this is important for high quality teams in order to deal with tough issues. What does everybody else think?"

Clear individual and team values defined

It is astounding how many times people work in teams having individual values that conflict with team values. Much of the time, initially such conflict occurs without awareness from other team members, until there is a collision of perspectives. Hence, it is important for team members to know each other and to respect different ways of viewing things. There are great online assessment tools that can aid team leaders in assisting team members to grow in this process. Each team member can privately clarify what their own values are and how that affects their behavior and each team member also receives an aggregate score of what the team thinks of the organization. For a team to be most effective value conflicts should be minimised, then it will bring a greater natural commitment from individuals to the objectives of the team and to each other.

Some workshop ideas to foster discussions on team values revolve around getting individuals to share what is most important for them in a team. You could use a set of cards with each having a team value on it (eg. focus, challenge, vision, commitment, loyalty, unity, co-operation, trust, diversity, respect, organisation, outcomes, etc...) This works well, I spread them out and ask members to choose one or two that are the most important values for team success. I then get them to go around the room and share what they chose and why they thought it was important. It is not rocket science, but it sure deepens team member awareness.