Yesterday we looked at part 1 of styles and strengths in teams. Part of the greatest challenge and opportunity in teams is their diversity. Research continues to show that well balanced teams excel, not necessarily teams which are all the same. Today's complex and uncertain environment requires that we look at things in different ways, leveraging different skill sets and being able to work with, and foster, diverse perspectives.

A recent HBR article by Alison Reynolds and David Lewis, "The Two Traits of the Best Problem-Solving Teams" delve into this topic.

Amy Edmonston's newest book, with Jean-Francois Harvey, Extreme Teaming: Lessons in Complex, Cross-Sector Leadership, also feeds into this conversation with teams (and leaders)

In today's post I wanted to get you thinking about what are some of the questions you as a team may want to consider as you start to explore the work this spring (or fall)/quarter:

1. What are the challenges and opportunities we are facing this quarter?
2. How will they necessitate that we look at things in a different way?
3. What diverse skill sets can we leverage across our team?
4. What diverse vantage points can we leverage across our team?
5. What aren't we thinking about, or considering?
6. What else?
7. If we were to look at things in a totally different way, what would that be?

I hope that you enjoy these questions and the conversation that flows out of it. If you didn't see yesterday's Part 1 of the Post -be sure to check out Teams #365 #1569. Enjoy!

Best wishes,
Jennifer

One of the most exciting parts of being on a team, and also one of the most challenging, is working with others who have a different style and different preferences. As someone who has led teams, or worked with teams, globally for the better part of the last three decades, I see this as one of the biggest challenges for teams.
Past posts here at the Teams365 blog
Key to becoming more effective in working with different styles in a team is:

#1 - Know Your Own Style and Strengths
We each have a unique style, and there are many great assessments on the market place today - MBTI, DisC, or the series of strengths based work through assessments such as VIA Character Strengths, or StrengthsFinder2.0. 
What do you know about your style and strengths?
How does that help you? Hinder you in  your work?


# 2 -Understand the limitations of your own style
With strengths come limitations, particularly if we are over utilizing or focusing on those. When others have to work with you as a details oriented person, what is that like? If you are constantly driving for results, how is that for others who have to work with you?

How does your strengths and styles help you? Help the team?
Where do your strengths and styles get in the way?

#3 - Understand what happens to your style when you are under pressure. Pressure in today's context is a daily occurrence for many. Whether it's working with limited resources or getting a project done in half the time it needs, pressure is constant. What typically happens when we are under pressure - time, resource pressure or stress - is that o ur styles can get magnified. Our strengths become  a blindspot. So, our attention to detail becomes over magnified, or our penchant for strategy becomes over utilized without a focus on the practicality of what can, and needs to get one.

What happens to your style, when you are under pressure?

The focus on ourselves is one part of the equation. The other part is to explore what happens across the team and how strengths and styles overlap and connect. There may also be gaps.

Have you as a team created space to talk about strengths/styles?
Where are you aligned?
Where are you in contradiction or opposition to each other?
What gaps exist?

Finally, with these ideas in mind, we also need to think about how we "dial up" and "dial down" our strengths. When do they become over magnified? When are they not enough? When do we become entrenched with them?

I hope that this post sparks some conversation for you as a team around your unique styles and how that is supporting or hindering you this quarter. For those interested in learning more about how I could support you and your team in this discussion, please reach out and set up a phone call.

Best wishes,
Jennifer

In today’s post, we’re exploring strategic planning for virtual teams. How do you make it happen?

Helping team members understand their strengths helps teams leverage their skills and harness their capabilities. Gallup has also found very compelling results when team members are able to bring their strengths to work every day.

In addition to the StrengthsFinder, teams may also want to investigate another strengths assessment that being VIA Strengths – Values in Action.
The following is a short warm-up activity to more detailed discussion as a team around your assessments

When I’ve seen you at your best….

Time: 15 minutes
Materials Needed: None

Instructions:
Virtual team members need acknowledgement as well, particularly as they may receive less feedback that teams who can see each other face-to-face.
This is a short activity which would be part of a
Ask team members to think about one person on the team who they have liaised with, or worked closely with (virtually) in the last quarter. At one of your team meetings you will give people the opportunity to share with that colleague responses to the following questions:

1. I see one of your strengths as….
2. I appreciate …..
3. Going forward, as we work together I’d like to ask you to ______
   
4. You bring ….. to our team.

This is an activity which will cultivate positive emotion and will bring team members closer together. Teams need positive reinforcement, as well as constructive feedback. For more on the concept of constructive feedback, check out the Foundations of Feedback series I did. It will be of interest to teams of all kinds who are hoping to build more of a feedback culture.

Enjoy your Wednesday,
Jennifer


 

One of my favorite coaching questions for teams and groups is "What do you bring that's unique?". Once teams and groups have found to common ground to create safety and belonging, this is a great question to start exploring strengths and what unique skills, talents and experiences each team or group member brings.
We know that teams that excel usually bring complimentary skills. Asking team members to share what they bring which is unique to the team can help identify synergies, opportunities for collaboration, and what skills and strengths you can leverage in the future.

What do you notice about the responses to this question on your team this week?

With best wishes,
Jennifer

This week's team building tip gets you thinking about what you are truly passionate about in your work (and life!) and how that shows up in your actions and results.

As leaders knowing what we will go to "bat" for becomes an important part of our value system, and knowing ourselves (or self-awareness) helps to differentiate between good and great leaders.

Being able to feed our passions and lead with strengths boosts engagement and productivity (see past posts on strengths). Helping to foster an environment where our team members also get to foster their strengths and passions is also important.

What have you done this month to feed what  you are passionate about? How has that helped you and your team? What might need some more attention?

Have a great Thursday,
Jennifer

Today we are at the X, winding down our journey of the a-z of 26 different team development activities. Whether you are looking to bring something quick into a team meeting, or a longer team development process, these 26 different ideas are geared to get you moving into dialogue around your group and team programs.
At x we are thinking about What does it take for us to excel?
You can either design a worksheet around this, or depending on the size of team, have these terms labelled on different sheets of paper, hanging around the room.
What we know is that teams which excel share some common characteristics and have spent time creating alignment and shared agreements around many of these items:

• ·         Clarity on goals
• ·         Communication channels
• ·         Role clarity
• ·         Resourcing needed (overlap, gaps etc)
• ·         Skills required
• ·         Materials needed
• ·         Shared, clear and energizing vision
• ·         Values
• ·         Feedback loops
• ·         How we have each other’s backs

 
If you choose to post these around the room have team members move to the one which they think the team is doing in well right now. If multiple people are at that sign have them talk about examples of when the team demonstrates it, and how it supports the team in “excelling”. If there is sufficient time have the team members share their insights around this.
In a second round, have team members now move to the one area they feel the team could focus on to help them “excel” more. Again, provide some time for individuals or small groups to identify what specific activities or behaviors would help the team excel more in that area.
From this you may have some concrete focus areas which you can then prioritize for the year! This activity will likely take 20-30 minutes for sufficient dialogue and planning, especially if the team is larger than 7 people.
What will it take for your team to excel?

Today we are at U in the a-z of team development activities. U stands for unique. It can be beneficial to work with teams around what makes them unique on two levels - at the individual team member level and what each team member uniquely brings, and two - at the collective level and what makes the team themselves unique.

At the individual team member level providing a team member to learn more and share what makes them unique. As I've written in past posts teams that are able to leverage their unique strengths are both more productive and engaged. Check out Teams365 #1070 for an activity to work with team member around what makes them exceptional. you may also want to look at Teams365 #1106 for last week's strengths post.

The second level at which we can work with uniqueness is at the collective level. This is what I call Team Adjectives.

give each team member 3-5 post its or blank index cards and have them write down 3-5 adjectives that they feel makes the team unique. Another way to frame is to have them capture 3-5 adjectives which which describe the team. Then have them note an example of when the team demonstrated that. So perhaps I have shared the adjective of innovation and I am thinking about a time when we were able to overcome a budget shortfall by recycling some of the materials we needed.

Once everyone has thought of their examples, have each person share their top 3-5 and post them on a wall or whiteboard. Note the ones that are similar. Once everyone has shared, get the team to prioritize their top 5-7, with associated examples.

It can be incredibly powerful for the team to have these 5-7 adjectives  in mind as they note how this makes the team "stand out".

How might you be able to facilitate a discussion around strengths or what makes the team unique this week?

Contact us to discuss how we can support you in exploring strengths through a team event or through some individual or team coaching work.

Have a great Monday,
Jennifer

We are at S in our A-Z journey of different team development activities. S brings us to strengths. There is a huge business case for creating environments where strengths are leveraged within teams. From my many years as a team developer I have found that having dialogue and doing work around helping team members understand their unique contributions and strengths can go a long way. It can help a team understand where their collective strengths are as well as gaps. It can also help a team understand where they may be overcompensating or overfocusing because of their natural abilities.

There are many great resources to look at Strengths including StrengthsFinder 2.0, as well as the VIA Strengths Survey which focuses more on Signature Strengths.

Listen in as I share  a little more about strengths in this short 5 minute video:

How can you be focusing more on strengths in your work as a team? What do you notice?

Today we are at N in the Team Development a - z. As a coach I do a lot of work with the individuals, teams and groups I support around Strengths, Values and Styles. Helping people understand what is in "their nature" or their natural approach to things can help leverage the best of people on a team, as well as create an understanding of what people naturally do well.

In times of stress and pressure - i.e. limited resources, limited time, competing demands - which is more common than not, we tend to revert to our natural strengths and styles. These things usually become more pronounced. So if I am stickler for detail, that may be what I automatically go to. If I am a driver for results, that's what I am going to lean into. Strengths are wonderful and when overused they can become a blindspot in terms of their overuse.

There are a number of great resources we can tap into to when hleping team and group members understand their strengths and/or styles.

When I work with teams around strengths we may use the VIA Strengths Survey, orincorporate the  STrengthsFinder.


In terms of exploring styles, I tend to use the Everything DiSC which provides insights as to people's natural work styles. It maps nicely to the Five Behaviors of a Cohesive Team for teams that want to capitalize on the Team's stengths and capabilities.

What could be possible for you in terms of a focus around strengths and styles? Starting the conversation with the questions of "What's in  your nature?" might be an interesting starting pont.

Have a great Tuesday,
Jennifer

Jennifer Britton, MES, PCC, CPT
Potentials Realized - Leadership and Team Development, Coaching, Retreats
Author of Effective Group Coaching (Wiley, 2010) and From One to Many: Best Practices for Team and Group Coaching (Jossey-Bass, 2013)
Email us to find out how we can support you and your team in getting your best results through coaching, training or a retreat program
Learn more about the Everything DiSC or our other team supports here.
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