Teams365 Blog - POTENTIALS REALIZED

#TEAMS365 #2004: Downshifting and Renewal

6/26/2019

The final mid-year check in post for the month is all about downshifting and renewal. It can be hard to switch off during the summer months, and yet it is imperative. We need time to renew and recharge. Teams today can’t function 100% of the time at full force. We know from the field of high performance sport, that athletes need phases to renew after a big race. What are you doing to renew in the next few months?

For many businesses the next month or two involves a lot of time when people are offline for summer holidays. It may be an opportune time for downshifting and renewal.

In order to get the most out of your time off, consider these questions:

What do I need to do to wrap up before I go on holidays?
Who will be covering for me, when I am gone? How do I communicate this (internally/externally)? What do I need to make sure I have for them?
What do I do to ensure coverage so I can go offline during my time off?

As you focus on your time off ask yourself:

What is important to do during my time off?
Who do I want to connect with?
What, if anything, do I want to check off my summer project or bucket list?
What’s a non-negotiable around my holiday time?

Enjoy the reflection!
Jennifer

Jennifer Britton – Potentials Realized
Leadership | Teamwork | Business Success
Author of multiple books including Effective Virtual Conversations (2017), PlanDoTrack (2019) and From One to Many: Best Practices for Team and Group Coaching (2013)
Follow along with the #90DaysPlanDoTrack series over at Instagram @CoachingBizBuilder
Join the conversation at the Conversation Sparker Zone - our online community where you can explore virtual and team issues, coaching, productivity and business development.
Pick up a copy of Volume 1 of the Weekly Journaling Prompts in a digital format. Print it out and take it with you for some inspiration and writing on the go! Available at the Potentials Realized Store.

#TEAMS365 #1985 - #FLASHBACKFRIDAY: Preparing For the Feedback Conversation

6/7/2019

This week’s flashback Friday takes us to preparing for the feedback conversation. When feedback is unplanned or unscheduled things can go awry. Even taking a few minutes on a regular basis to review your team members performance, can be a useful habit to get into. Providing feedback on a regular basis is a best practice of leadership today.

Check out Teams365 1252 Preparing for the Feedback Conversation. This is useful for both the person giving and the person receiving the feedback.

Here’s what I wrote in Teams365 #1252:
Today's post takes us to the realm of feedback, an area I often find myself working with teams around. The performance conversation should not be a one-off conversation. In fact, it should be an on-going dialogue (two-way) between staff and their leader.

Taking time to prepare for the feedback conversation is an essential step in the process, and it is often one that is overlooked. It's important to take some time to think about the performance conversation, rather than just winging it.

Some things to do when you are starting to prepare for any feedback conversation is:

Make sure that you have solid items to talk about. What are the facts? What is hearsay? What have you seen yourself? If you realize that you don't have a lot to share, this is a flag to make some changes so that next time you do.

What are the key goals which are important to discuss? Another challenge in the feedback conversation is that the team leader may be focusing on different things than the employee. What are the key goals which are important to discuss? Are these aligned?

How have you set the employee up for success in scheduling this meeting? Performance conversations should be a two-way process. What have you done to set the employee up for success? Have you asked them to consider any questions prior to meeting? Have you invited them to do a self-assessment? When was the last time the two of you sat down to explore performance issues? Nothing raised in an annual review should be a surprize.

Dedicate time and space for the performance conversation and preparation. Even though many of us feel we need to run from task to task, feedback and performance conversations should not be left as a low item priority. Make sure you are dedicating time and space for not only holding the performance conversation, but also preparing for it.

What other tips do you have for preparing for the performance conversation?

Enjoy the conversations!
Jennifer

Jennifer Britton – Potentials Realized
Leadership | Teamwork | Business Success
Author of multiple books including Effective Virtual Conversations (2017), PlanDoTrack (2019) and From One to Many: Best Practices for Team and Group Coaching (2013)
Follow along with the #90DaysPlanDoTrack series over at Instagram @CoachingBizBuilder
Join the conversation at the Conversation Sparker Zone - our online community where you can explore virtual and team issues, coaching, productivity and business development.
Pick up a copy of Volume 1 of the Weekly Journaling Prompts in a digital format. Print it out and take it with you for some inspiration and writing on the go! Available at the Potentials Realized Store.

#TEAMS365 #1976 – Teamwork in Uncertainty – Synergy

5/29/2019

In keeping aligned with this month’s focus on Teamwork in Uncertainty, today’s blog post gets you thinking about how you can leverage synergy across your team.

When situations are complex and uncertain, it may be difficult to bring all the skills required for success. Therefore, being able to focus in on leveraging the skills that are available to you as a group or team can help maximize your skill base as well as what is available to you.

As I wrote in yesterdays’ post, knowing our strengths is important on the individual and team levels.

In synergy, we are looking at how 1+1 equals more than 2.

If you have completed some strengths-based work, some additional questions to explore as a team are:

What the core strengths we bring as a collective?
What can we harness as a team?
Where might we be over-developed?
What is missing?
Where are the gaps?
When we think about current projects what strengths would benefit them?
Who is best suited to support which project?
What else is important to note?

In situations of uncertainty, it can be important to consider risk, and also contingencies. Given that contexts may be changing rapidly leading from strengths allows us to do things quicker and with less energy expended, freeing up focus and energy for other items.

What’s is important to note around synergy?

Best wishes,
Jennifer

Jennifer Britton – Potentials Realized
Leadership | Teamwork | Business Success
Author of multiple books including Effective Virtual Conversations (2017), PlanDoTrack (2019) and From One to Many: Best Practices for Team and Group Coaching (2013)
Follow along with the #90DaysPlanDoTrack series over at Instagram @CoachingBizBuilder
Join the conversation at the Conversation Sparker Zone - our online community where you can explore virtual and team issues, coaching, productivity and business development.
Pick up a copy of Volume 1 of the Weekly Journaling Prompts in a digital format. Print it out and take it with you for some inspiration and writing on the go! Available at the Potentials Realized Store.

#TEAMS365 #1959 – Montage 18 and PlanDoTrack Virtual Retreat May 30th

5/12/2019

It’s Sunday which means that it is time for another Video Montage from PlanDoTrack. Take a look at this week’s video montage.

In bringing this work out into the world, one of my favorite program offerings at the moment is the four-hour PlanDoTrack Virtual Retreat. Check it out here.

The program is geared for business owners and professionals who are looking to reconnect or create their vision OR take action on a creative project. We meet throughout the four-hour retreat every hour as a group, leaving you ample time in between our group touch-points to engage in structured activities to help you PLAN, take action (DO) and TRACK your results.

Here’s what two participants from the April session wrote about their experience:

"The PlanDoTrack session was everything I hoped for and more! These 4 hours were a super useful and productive pause to work on my business vision and goals for the year. It was a hands-on approach, very much helped by the worksheets in the Coaching Business Builder and also Jennifer's guidance.
I would certainly do at least one more session!”
- Rute Silva - Organizational Development Consultant/Executive Coach - PCC

"Jennifer - thank you for creating a space to allow me to focus on the deep work that I am committed to getting out into the world. On a normal day, the whirlwind of life would have prevented me from putting pen to paper and designing a problem that could have easily been put off until "someday". Today I prioritized the important over the urgent and I feel so accomplished to have created content that will make a difference. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. If you are committed to creating a program, a business plan, content, or whatever is meaningful to you and your clients, but you do not have the space or time to focus, this program is a game changer. Block the time. You will be thrilled with the outcome and the support along the way.”
- Jacyln M. Bradley

The next one will be held on Thursday May 30th from 10 am – 2 pm Eastern/Toronto.

I hope that you will join us. The cost is $129 US and includes a virtual retreat workbook, structured exercises to work on during the afternoon and access to me during the 4 hours for some individual coaching.

You need to bring a copy of the PlanDoTrack Workbook and Planner, OR the Coaching Business Builder Workbook and Planner, an idea of what you want to focus on, and four-hours of dedicated space.

Reserve your spot at the next PlanDoTrack Virtual Retreat – Thursday May 30th here.

Look forward to connecting!
Jennifer

Jennifer Britton – Potentials Realized
Leadership | Teamwork | Business Success
Author of multiple books including Effective Virtual Conversations (2017), PlanDoTrack (2018) and From One to Many: Best Practices for Team and Group Coaching (2013)
Follow along with the #90DaysPlanDoTrack series over at Instagram @CoachingBizBuilder
Now available – PlanDoTrack Workbook and Planner - Order a copy today on Amazon
Join the conversation at the Conversation Sparker Zone - our online community where you can explore virtual and team issues, coaching, productivity and business development).
Check out the new 19 Tips for Productivity On-Demand Course. If this is your year to get things moving, check it out now. Join Jenn for bi-weekly live group calls until July. $129 US. Learn more and enroll here.

#TEAMS365 #1945 – Check out the PlanDoTrack Weekly Planning Hacks

4/28/2019

This weekend I wanted to share links to one of my sister blogs, the PlanDoTrack blog which is focused on personal productivity and time management issues, particularly for virtual and remote team members, entrepreneurs and leaders.

For several months now I have hosted a weekly Wednesday series on short productivity hacks - things that you might keep in mind to get more leverage with your time, focus and work. They are posted at the PlanDoTrack blog, and then I also do a quick Facebook Live around them as well.

Here’s what I’ve covered since the start of this series:

Pomodoro Technique
Color Coding
Master Minds
Accountability
Write it down
Weekly Journal Prompts
Month End Planning Sessions
Top 5
Themes - monthly, quarterly, annual
Relationships

Read more about these here.

Each Wednesday I post a short blog which often includes a quick activity you might consider undertaking t support your own planning and productivity. Just as the name implies, these are short things you can action right away.

Check out some of the past 3-5 minute Facebook Live posts which include more detail about that week’s hack. If you are on Facebook, do consider liking PlanDoTrack so you can be alerted to the weekly videos.

Wishing you the best,
Jennifer

Jennifer Britton – Potentials Realized
Leadership | Teamwork | Business Success
Author of multiple books including Effective Virtual Conversations (2017), PlanDoTrack (2018) and From One to Many: Best Practices for Team and Group Coaching (2013)
Follow along with the #90DaysPlanDoTrack series over at Instagram @CoachingBizBuilder
Now available – PlanDoTrack Workbook and Planner - Order a copy today on Amazon
Join the conversation at the Conversation Sparker Zone - our online community where you can explore virtual and team issues, coaching, productivity and business development).
Check out the new 19 Tips for Productivity On-Demand Course. If this is your year to get things moving, check it out now. Join Jenn for bi-weekly live group calls until July. $129 US. Learn more and enroll here.

#TEAMS365 #1938 – Interesting Resources – Organizing and Minimizing

4/21/2019

One of the themes this month has been about getting organized and minimizing. With this in mind, here are three resources you might find useful:

1. Outer Order, Inner Calm by Gretchen Rubin – Having been a podcast listener of Gretchen’s Happier podcast for a couple of years now, I was so excited to hear about her recent release of Outer Order, Inner Calm. It’s a quick read, chock full of practical tips and strategies you can implement right away. True to her work and philosophy that there’s not a one size fits all, consider how your own tendency might impact the way you organize. If you haven’t explored the work and writing of Gretchen Rubin, check her out, including the Four Tendencies.

2. Cal Newport – Digital Minimalism. As someone heavily enmeshed in the digital ecosystem in my work as a virtual educator, coach and solopreneur, I appreciated this new book. It speaks to the challenge of the digital world we live within. While the ability to switch on and off has been part of my own work over the last 3 decades, the book offers practical approaches to minimizing what you have and what you are connected to in order to create more space for what’s important. Like many other books on the topic of minimalism, what it means and looks like for each of us might be different.

Personally, I am looking forward to taking some quieter time this July and August when I work out of the cottage to further cull my digital landscape. Letting go of TV and streaming almost 2 years ago has made a big difference in my time available for things I love, creative pursuits and time spent with loved ones. I can feel the pressure of emails creeping up however and will be focusing on that first this summer when I have earmarked my annual “return to basics” six weeks.

3. I also have appreciated the resources of Organizing365’s Lisa Woodrow in the last few weeks. This year she hosted a Decluttering Blitz. Her podcast series is also a great tone to follow if organizing is important for you on a personal or professional level. You can follow it up here.

What resources are you finding useful in your work and world right now around this topic?

Warm regards,
Jennifer

Jennifer Britton – Potentials Realized
Leadership | Teamwork | Business Success
Author of multiple books including Effective Virtual Conversations (2017), PlanDoTrack (2018) and From One to Many: Best Practices for Team and Group Coaching (2013)
Follow along with the #90DaysPlanDoTrack series over at Instagram @CoachingBizBuilder
Now available – PlanDoTrack Workbook and Planner - Order a copy today on Amazon
Join the conversation at the Conversation Sparker Zone - our online community where you can explore virtual and team issues, coaching, productivity and business development).
Check out the new 19 Tips for Productivity On-Demand Course. If this is your year to get things moving, check it out now. Join Jenn for bi-weekly live group calls until July. $129 US. Learn more and enroll here.

#TEAMS365 #1935 – Team Building Tip 232

4/18/2019

This week’s Thursday Team Building Tip gets you as a team to consider the question: "_____ is strengthening our results."

As you consider your results so far this year, what has helped you. Consider:

Resourcing – Human Resources/People, Materials, Budget
Processes
Practices - coming together for meetings which have been made more efficient with the 8 Meeting Questions
Alignment

What else?

Given these items, what can you be doing to leverage them more?

Enjoy your conversation,
Jennifer

Jennifer Britton – Potentials Realized
Leadership | Teamwork | Business Success
Author of multiple books including Effective Virtual Conversations (2017), PlanDoTrack (2018) and From One to Many: Best Practices for Team and Group Coaching (2013)
Follow along with the #90DaysPlanDoTrack series over at Instagram @CoachingBizBuilder
Now available – PlanDoTrack Workbook and Planner - Order a copy today on Amazon
Join the conversation at the Conversation Sparker Zone - our online community where you can explore virtual and team issues, coaching, productivity and business development).
Check out the new 19 Tips for Productivity On-Demand Course. If this is your year to get things moving, check it out now. Join Jenn for bi-weekly live group calls until July. $129 US. Learn more and enroll here.

#TEAMS365 #1933 – Digital Distractions

4/16/2019

From open office spaces to a focus on collaboration, there can also be a pendulum swing in organizations where sometimes things go too far.

As I mentioned over the weekend, there are a number of studies exploring this topic of distraction including Udemy In Depth’s 2018 Workplace Distraction Survey. You can read it here.

The report asserts that distractions have an impact on productivity. Some of the distractions noted in that study are talkative co-workers, email and others.
Many of the distractions I hear of in the work of my clients are:

Unscheduled meetings
Co-workers dropping by to chat
Email
Social media which takes you “down the rabbit hole”
Materials and information which are not readily accessible and have not been stored in the locations you thought they would be in

What are you doing to minimize the distractions? What do you find distracting?

What conversations are important to have?

Here are some other articles of interest:

Check out this article from Financial Times – “Digital Distractions are Making Us Dumb and Twitchy” which also includes some great tips from Professor Cal Newport.

Suresh Subamdam’s article on Is Your Work's Communication Channel Turning Your Team Into a Bunch of 'Slack'-ers?

Take a look at Digital Responsibility’s website and ideas on Digital Distraction.

Wishing you all the best,
Jennifer

Jennifer Britton – Potentials Realized
Leadership | Teamwork | Business Success
Author of multiple books including Effective Virtual Conversations (2017), PlanDoTrack (2018) and From One to Many: Best Practices for Team and Group Coaching (2013)
Follow along with the #90DaysPlanDoTrack series over at Instagram @CoachingBizBuilder
Now available – PlanDoTrack Workbook and Planner - Order a copy today on Amazon
Join the conversation at the Conversation Sparker Zone - our online community where you can explore virtual and team issues, coaching, productivity and business development).
Check out the new 19 Tips for Productivity On-Demand Course. If this is your year to get things moving, check it out now. Join Jenn for bi-weekly live group calls until July. $129 US. Learn more and enroll here.

#Teams365 #1406: Effective Virtual Conversation Tip #20: Capacity Development

11/6/2017

It's Monday and time for another Virtual Facilitation Conversations Tip. Today we are at Effective Virtual Conversations Tip #20. Today's tip comes from my new book, Effective Virtual Conversations, page 331 where I write "In virtual teams, it is also imperative that we build capability in the skills of new team members".

While capacity development is critical in many teams today, it can be absolutely essential to high performance in virtual teams, given that people are working independently in many instances.

As a team leader, consider how you can be building capability within your team around:
Goal Setting
Reporting
Coaching Skills - particularly peer coaching skills
Feedback
Business Acumen (as appropriate to the work you do)
Difficult Conversations
Relationship Building
Emotional Intelligence
Conflict Management
Influence

For many remote team members they are having to utilize these skills each and every day.

Just as onboarding of new team leaders is important, the onboarding of new team members can be just as critical. Some of the areas you will want to focus on in the onboarding process for new team members are:

Team culture - who you are
Who to Go to - Key resource people - other members of the team, internal resources, external stakeholders
Reporting requirements - budget, resources, status updates
Team meetings
Understanding your role
Key Goals, KPIs (Key Performance Indicators) and Corporate Priorities
Goal Setting (whether you use a one-page plan or other)
Feedback and Performance Management issues
Expectations around:
- Surfacing important issues
- Availability (when you are on and when you are off)
- Quality and completion of tasks
- Navigating Conflict
- Work-life (again boundaries around when you are on and off)
- Reporting
- Collaboration with others on the team
- Meeting focus

What other issues are important for you to brief new team members on? How do you want to undertake your onboarding. Do you spend a day together onsite and/or virtually? Do you spend a few hours together several times during the first week or month? Let us know what you do to onboard new team members using the comments below.

Have a great start to your week,
Jennifer

Jennifer Britton
Potentials Realized | Coaching Team Leaders
Team and Leadership Development | Coaching | Retreats.
Follow us on Twitter @Teams365
Phone: (416)996-8326

Looking to enhance your virtual conversations - Conference calls? Webinars? Virtual coaching work? Pick up a copy of my new book, Effective Virtual Conversations, at Amazon.

#Teams365 #412: Three More Activities You can do with Your Team

2/16/2015

Last week I spotlighted four quick team activities you as a leader can undertake with your team to boost connection and knowledge of each other (read the blog post here). These activities don’t need to take a long time and are a welcome respite from the typical “ Hi I’m Jennifer and I’m jolly”.

Today’s post goes on to share three more team activities you might want to consider in building some team time into your next team meeting. Each one of these contributes to some of the factors we know create exceptional team process and performance (Read past posts on this topic here)

Focus - Our Foundation: Using a blank piece of flip chart have team members share one of their most important accomplishments. Research on pride ha found that the emotion actually has the ability to support thinking bigger and therefore leading to further achievements (Barbara Frederickson in her book Positivity. (Link to research summary here). This activity can also support the development of a wider base of knowledge of past successes and things you can build on, individually or collectively as a team.

Focus - Our Values - Knowing what is important to you as a team is key in support of making better decisions, prioritizing and also seeing how things fit together. While most organizations will have their own organizational values widely emblazoned, you and your team may have slightly different values. Using index cards or post it notes, ask team members write down what they see as the most important values of the team. Another way to phrase this is “What’s most important in our work as a team?” Various values may emerge such as quality, respect, customer service, doing it right. Have team members group the similar values and check if this is representative of the entire scope. At this point you may want to work to distill it down to the top five or six. A next conversation can focus in on what are the behaviors which demonstrate our values.

Focus - Our Vision. Having a clear and shared vision is key to a high performing team. This activity can incorporate one of the various photo decks I mentioned or you can draw it free hand. Ask the team the questions, image it's a year down the road - Who are we? What are we doing? What have we achieved?

Have team members work together to create a drawing of a vision, or have them select photos which represent what their vision is. This activity can unearth some interesting themes, metaphors and other chunks that the team may want to revisit throughout the year. (Note this activity is not a 5 minute activity and may fall anywhere between 15-60 minutes).

Have a great start to your week!
Jennifer

Jennifer Britton, MES, CPT, PCC
Potentials Realized
Author of From One to Many: Best Practices for Team and Group Coaching(Jossey-Bass, 2013) and Effective Group Coaching (Wiley, 2010)
Team and Leadership Development | Coaching | Retreats
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Everything DiSC® Authorized Partner
Contact us and let us know how we can support you in helping your team reach its' full potential - (416)996-8326