Teams365 Blog - Potentials Realized

#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 #1934 – Team Springboard: 20 Things that Help Teams

4/17/2019

This month’s focus is on Team Springboards, things that help teams. Let’s take a look at a laundry list of things that help teams excel. Individually they are quite straightforward, collectively they are powerful. As you review this list you might consider giving yourself a rating on a 1-10, with 1 being low and 10 being high.

Clarity around goals
Strong team culture
Knowledge of each other
Connection with other team members
Understanding what people do on the team
Knowing who to go to for _____________ (insert issue)
Clarity around roles on the team
Clarity about how to surface issues
Confidence that issues raised will be heard
Confidence that issues raised will be addressed/considered/responded to
Clarity around how performance is measured
Resources needed to do the work
Mechanisms to flag resources needed
Feedback channels
Acknowledgement for work well done
A clear vision of what the team is aiming for in terms of this year’s/quarter’s goals
Effective Team Meetings on a regular basis
Clear channels for communication
Opportunities for development
Opportunities to have fun and connect with others

What else?

Enjoy the 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 #1928 – Team Building Tip 231

4/11/2019

This week’s Team Building Tip gets you to consider the question: “_____ is strengthening our relationships”.

Teams which excel are great at getting results AS WELL AS having strong relationships. On the relationship front we want to hone areas such as:

Knowing each other
Understanding each other’s strengths and styles
Being able to understand what supports vs. what triggers others
Providing feedback and communication
Being able to work across differences, and difficult issues
Team Spirit (having a sense of team identity – see yesterday’s post on this)

As a team this week consider the things you are doing to strengthen your relationships. This might include practices such as:

taking a coffee break together each week,
ensuring that team meetings happen on a regular basis for virtual teams,
spotlighting the work and background of one of the team members each month in an internal email and/or newsletter,
connecting peers in peer pairings to get to know each other, and their work.

What are the things you are doing as a team to strengthen relationships?

Hope that you are enjoying your mid-week,
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 #1919 Quarter 2 Checkpoint for Your Team – 10 Things to Explore

4/2/2019

As we step into Quarter 2 it can be useful to do a bit of a review – on the individual level, and also with our teams.

For some individual reflection, take a look at the recent Quarterly Reflection Worksheet I created for the PlanDoTrack series of programming I offer around Planning, Productivity and Remote/Virtual Teams. Take a few minutes to complete that before you get too far into the month.

At the same time, it can be useful to do a checkpoint around these items:

How are we going in our progress to our most important goals? Rate this on a 1-10 and get input across the team? What will help you move the #s upward?
Have we had a recent feedback conversation “both ways” – between leader and team member? What’s going well? What’s not? Be sure to provide positive and constructive feedback.
What issues need to be addressed, or have the potential to derail us?
What team practices are working well? Consider meetings, social events, peer mentoring, 1-1 meetings etc.
What systems are helping with information flow and knowledge sharing?
Projects – Where are projects at? What is the status of communication? What project issues require attention? How are they doing according to the spotlight (Red, Yellow, Green)? –Check out this spotlight blog post for more!
Matrix relationships
Reporting
Finances
Other Systems which need attention..

And ANYTHING ELSE?

Best wishes,
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 #1912 – Appreciations in a Virtual Team

3/26/2019

Teams excel when they have a clear focus on results, and the resources and tools to accomplish them, and when they are also focused on relationships.

This month I have been sharing different activities virtual and remote teams may consider integrating into their work. If you didn’t take a look at last week’s post on Creating Virtual Team Culture, take a look at it now.

Today’s post invites you to consider integrating appreciations in your work as a virtual team. What are the pauses you have created so people can thank others and acknowledge them for their strengths?

Peer feedback is often found to be more valuable and impactful that feedback from a superior or other.

To facilitate this activity, make sure you have adequate time. It may take 15 minutes or more. If you have a larger team (8 or more) have people work in triads (use breakouts for this if you are virtual – which is likely).

One at a time, have someone in the “appreciation seat”. Their colleagues are asked to share:

What is an example when I have seen you at your best this week/this month/this quarter?
I see one of your strengths as….
I appreciate….

This should then be rotated so each person gets a chance to receive feedback.
This exercise can also be added onto by discussion around additional questions such as:

One thing I wish you would do more of is….
I can rely on you for…
One request I have for you is….

This can provide space for more support and difficult conversations.

Enjoy!
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 #1884 – Tips for boosting collaboration in the virtual space

2/26/2019

Today’s post focuses on tips for boosting collaboration in the virtual space:

Be proactive in terms of what relationships are important to build. Are you taking time for regular outreach with a purpose?
Be systematic in discussing key elements of collaboration – what is the end result you are aiming towards, what will success look like? Who is in charge of doing what? When will you meet to review how things are going and make adjustments?
Agree on regular feedback loops. Feedback can be a challenge when you don’t know each other too well. What are the touchpoints you are dedicating to feedback? Creating formalized quarterly or mid-point check-ins can be valuable to earmark. Take a look at some of the mid-point or evaluation questions I have pointed to in the past.
Be clear on what you are each bringing to the relationship. What are the things that are going to help your next collaboration thrive?

Best of luck!
Jennifer

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

#TEAMS365 #1849 – Productivity Tip #12: Build In Regular Time for Review

1/22/2019

Tip #12 – Build in regular time for review

"Big thinking precedes great achievement."
— Wilferd Peterson

Part of productivity is about building in pause points to reflect and think about what’s working and what’s not.
Building in time for regular review helps to:

Identify where we are getting our results
Observe the patterns that are occurring
Think about where we want to go
Identify what is important to be able to move forward

Some of the pitfalls we may experience in review is number one we don't have the data our memories are not good at remembering and capturing where we were at different points in time.

With this in mind, I've included in number of monthly daily trackers in the Coaching Business Builder and PlanDoTrack. They get you to regularly track and capture your key metrics. Perhaps you want to track sales. When did sales and revenue come in for the month? Was it on a Friday or was it on Monday?

Another metric you might want to be tracking is social media. How many followers did you have on July 1st? November 1st?

Building in time for regular review helps us to identify what's working and what's not that then gives us the opportunity to make a change.

Activity

Identify the metrics you want to track in your business. Make note of these and start tracking them. Consider using colors to highlight. As you review them consider these questions

What do you notice about your metrics?
Where are you spending a lot of time?
What is giving you impact? What is not?
What changes do you want to make?

Conversation Sparkers

“What we focus on expands”. What do you want to focus on more?
What does the data say?

Best wishes,
Jennifer

Jennifer Britton – Potentials Realized
Leadership | Teamwork | Business Success
Author of multiple books including Effective Virtual Conversations (2017), Coaching Business Builder (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

#TEAMS365 #1810 – FlashbackFriday – 5 year end posts you’ll want to check out #FlashbackFriday

12/14/2018

Last month here at the Teams365 blog I intentionally focused on posts to support you in wrapping up the year. We usually never have enough time at this time of the year, so for today’s FlashbackFriday I want to reconnect you to these five posts. Do make a point of checking at least one of them out!

5 things to get in your calendar for 2019, right now!
Have you got all 5 of these items in your calendar for 2019? Click on over to the post to explore what I’ve written and linked to around team meetings, team development, feedback, mentoring and skill development.

Planning for Year End Activities with your Team

Year end productivity reminders – 4 things to keep in mind
In addition to the 19 Productivity Tips for 2019, you may also want to check out this post which includes 4 key things to keep in mind around productivity (Going back to the basics including - understanding your Pareto Ratio)

18 Questions for 2018 Year-end one on ones
While I have flagged these questions for year-end one-on-ones, these are just as good for the start of the year conversations. What have you already scheduled for 2019 conversations and 1-1 time with your team?

Bringing projects to a close
Some of you may still be moving to get projects to a close. Check out this post for several tips for bringing projects to a close.

Enjoy!
Jennifer

Jennifer Britton – Potentials Realized
Author of multiple books including Effective Virtual Conversations (2017), Coaching Business Builder (2018) and From One to Many: Best Practices for Team and Group Coaching (2013)
Follow along with the #90DaysPlanDoTrack series over at Instagram @CoachingBizBuilder
Today is the day that the PlanDoTrack Workbook and Planner is available on Amazon
Join us for a year-end virtual planning retreat later this week on Thursday December 20th.

#TEAMS365 #1793: 18 Questions for 2018 Year End One-on-Ones

11/27/2018

It’s that time where we start rolling into year end conversations, holding one on ones (coaching conversations) individually and with the team.
As we move into the end of the year, it is invaluable to schedule some one on one time with each team member. Today’s post includes a selection of 18 questions you might include in those conversations (pick and choose as appropriate). Great year end conversations help to create a pause to reflect achievements, synthesize learning and look ahead to the future.
You may want to incorporate these questions into your conversation:

What are the key achievements you have been most proud of this year?
What projects worked well?
Which projects didn’t go so well?
What was your learning there?
What connections/relationships have been most valuable this year?
Which relationships need attention next year?
What’s been your biggest learning this year? What experiences provided that?
What has worked well with the team this year? What hasn’t?
What feedback do you have for me as the leader? (What’s worked and what hasn’t)
What’s one suggestion for how we could do things differently as a team next year?

Looking ahead to next year:

What are you excited about?
What habits do you want to cultivate or lean into?
What do you want to do to keep growing your skills?
By December 31, 2019 what do you hope you will have achieved? OR by January 1, 2020, what do you hope you will have achieved? (Notice the impact of the difference one day makes! Yes, we are wrapping up a decade next year)
What are your top 3 priorities next year?
What feedback and support are you looking for?
What would be useful in terms of our 1-1 time?
What else is going to help you do your best work?

What else do you like to ask at this time of the year? Please let us know by sharing in the comments below.

Best wishes,
Jennifer

Jennifer Britton
Potentials Realized | Effective Virtual Conversations | Coaching Team Leaders
Join Jennifer for a year-end virtual planning retreat in the PlanDoTrack Series!
Instagram @CoachingBizBuilder
YouTube – Teams365 Leadership Channel
Email: info@potentialsrealized.com
(416)996-8326

#TEAMS365 #1779 – Five Books To Explore with Your Team

11/13/2018

As part of our wind down for the year, I wanted to post several very practical and tactical resource posts. Posts around books, apps and other resources I have seen teams and leaders leaning into this year.
As a writer and avid reader, I am starting first with books as I am usually on the search at the library and bookstore for different offerings. Here are ten that I’ve found myself recommending a lot!
Emotional Intelligence – The EQ Leader – Howard Stern. Emotional Intelligence continues with its popularity for good reason. These are the skills we need to succeed in an ever changing world – relationship building, self-management, understanding others and ourselves. Earlier this year I picked up a copy of the EQ Leader and have found it an invaluable read.
The Coaching Habit – Michael Bungay Stanier – I love the way Michael’s book breaks down coaching into bite sized pieces for professionals of all kinds. A definite great read!
Thanks for the Feedback – Douglas Stone and Sheila Heen – Feedback seems to be an ongoing thorn for leaders, teams and anyone who is in relationship with others (i.e. ALL OF US!). This is a great book which gets you thinking about what feedback can look and sound like.
For those that do like to plan – take a look at the Bullet Journal - Ryder Carroll. I’ve been a convert of the Bujo (short form for Bullet Journal) Movement for several years now, finding that the blank planning spaces create a pause in my otherwise busy day. While I use a variety of different planning resources including my own upcoming Plan.Do.Track, I always have my trust Bullet Journal nearby which houses some of the Meta Learning and Themes of the Year.
Amy Edmondson – Extreme Teaming. I’ve continued to recommend the writing and research of Amy Edmondson for many reasons to teams this year. Her research has focused on both the notion of psychological safety, as well as the concept of teaming, which captures the active evolution of teams today. Any of Amy’s books are a great read and an important primer for teams in understanding what she calls the 4 pillars of teaming – Speaking up, Collaboration, Experimentation and Reflection.
What are the books you have been recommending to others this year?

Best wishes,
Jennifer

Jennifer Britton
Potentials Realized | Effective Virtual Conversations | Coaching Team Leaders
We provide team and leadership development support through coaching, consulting and training services
Author of several books including the 2018 Coaching Business Builder Workbook and Planner & Effective Virtual Conversations (2017)
Email: info@potentialsrealized.com
(416)996-8326