Teams365 Blog - Potentials Realized

TEAMS365 #2215 – Team Building Tip 271: Daily Steps + Consistent Action = Momentum

1/23/2020

A couple of weeks ago I shared the blog post which focused in on one of the philosophies underpinning my writing in PlanDoTrack and the Coaching Business Building – Daily Steps + Consistent Action = Momentum.

In today’s business context it’s unlikely some days that we will have a lot of time to focus deeply on large tasks (especially if we don’t schedule time into for them). The notion behind the Daily Steps and Consistent Action creating momentum is that these regular actions start to build up their own muscle and energy. Just like a snowball heading down the hill, the energy behind our tasks can grow.

As a team, what are the regular tasks you are undertaking (or want to undertake)? What momentum is it starting to create? How far have you traveled along that path? What else is important to note?

Enjoy your conversation, and consider picking up a copy of PlanDoTrack, especially if you are a virtual or remote team.

Best wishes,
Jennifer

Jennifer Britton
Potentials Realized | Coaching Team Leaders | Remote Pathways Podcast
Team and Leadership Development | Coaching | Writing
Phone (416)996-8326

As we step into the start of the year, get your planning on with the PlanDoTrack Workbook and Planner or Coaching Business Builder
Looking to enhance your virtual conversations? Webinars? Pick up a copy of Effective Virtual Conversations at Amazon.

Winter 2019 programs start this week including the Coaching Biz Growth Lab (an annual focus on coaching business development), GroupCoachingEssentials (8.75 CCEs), the Advanced Group and Team Coaching Practicum (10 CCEs) and the Virtual Facilitation Essentials program (8.5 CCEs) - geared to support you in creating more exceptional virtual conversations. Finally the Mentor Coaching Group for Winter 2020 will begin - aimed at coaches who are working towards their ACC, PCC or renewing.

TEAMS365 #2208 – 20 for 2020 – Day 16: Team Building Tip 270

1/16/2020

Today’s Team Building Tip gets you to think about and be in dialogue around “What you are aiming for” as a team? Having a clear line of sight around your goals and targets is key, particularly when you are a remote team.

Have you, as a team, clearly identified the goals you are working towards? Have you identified HOW you want to work on them? Have you clearly articulated who on the team connects in with each goal? Have you identified what “success” will look like from each team member’s perspectives and how their contribution is needed for another?

Working with goals should be done in tandem with your vision. Vision helps us connect in with aspirations around a task. Our vision usually is grounded in emotion and other aspirational energy. With that, it can help to keep us motivated around goals, even when things aren’t working as planned. Connecting our goals into the bigger picture helps when things get bumpy, in terms of smoothing things out.

Goals, and Vision, are two topics we’ve covered recently at the Remote Pathways Podcast. Do check out Episodes 3 and 4 for more on goals and vision for remote teams. You will also want to download the associated episode resources which include a One Page Plan and a Vision Worksheet. You could use both of these resources at the team level.

Enjoy the conversation!
Jennifer

Jennifer Britton
Potentials Realized | Coaching Team Leaders | Remote Pathways Podcast
Team and Leadership Development | Coaching | Writing
Phone (416)996-8326

As we step into the start of the year, get your planning on with the PlanDoTrack Workbook and Planner or Coaching Business Builder
Looking to enhance your virtual conversations? Webinars? Pick up a copy of Effective Virtual Conversations at Amazon.

Winter 2019 programs start this week including the Coaching Biz Growth Lab (an annual focus on coaching business development), GroupCoachingEssentials (8.75 CCEs), the Advanced Group and Team Coaching Practicum (10 CCEs) and the Virtual Facilitation Essentials program (8.5 CCEs) - geared to support you in creating more exceptional virtual conversations. Finally the Mentor Coaching Group for Winter 2020 will begin - aimed at coaches who are working towards their ACC, PCC or renewing.

TEAMS365 #2201 –20 for 2020 – Day 9: Team Building Tip 269

1/9/2020

One of the themes I’ve been talking a lot about in recent months as we moved into year end, and now are in the start of the year is that Metrics Matter. On an individual level in our own planning, it can be very useful to note things like:

Key achievements
Time spent on different activities (work, meetings, troubleshooting, coaching, learning, etc.)
The things you actually accomplish in any given day

On a team level, starting the year with a conversation around metrics, achievements and goals can be really important. As part of the start of year kick off you may want to:

Note key metrics (where you are now, where you want to go by end of the year, and what your check in touchpoints are)
Note key goals
Identify aspirations and intentions – as I mentioned in an earlier blog post this year, aspirations and intentions are often wider in focus and help to anchor things.

What are the other items you want to note?

All the best,
Jennifer

Jennifer Britton
Potentials Realized | Coaching Team Leaders | Remote Pathways Podcast
Team and Leadership Development | Coaching | Writing
Phone (416)996-8326

As we step into the start of the year, get your planning on with the PlanDoTrack Workbook and Planner or Coaching Business Builder
Looking to enhance your virtual conversations? Webinars? Pick up a copy of Effective Virtual Conversations at Amazon.

Winter 2019 programs start this week including the Coaching Biz Growth Lab (an annual focus on coaching business development), GroupCoachingEssentials (8.75 CCEs), the Advanced Group and Team Coaching Practicum (10 CCEs) and the Virtual Facilitation Essentials program (8.5 CCEs) - geared to support you in creating more exceptional virtual conversations. Finally the Mentor Coaching Group for Winter 2020 will begin - aimed at coaches who are working towards their ACC, PCC or renewing.

TEAMS365 #2187 – Team Building Tip 268

12/26/2019

It’s Boxing Day here in Canada which used to be THE busiest day of shopping of the year, before Black Friday entered the scene here about a decade ago (we celebrate Thanksgiving in mid-October with the harvest, but most have widely embraced Black Friday!)

This week’s Team Building Tip gets you to think about:

WHAT you want to celebrate

And…

HOW you want to celebrate.

We don’t always slow down and take a moment to STOP and PAUSE and think about all the good things that we (individually and collectively) have accomplished.

While a pause doesn’t have to be for a long period, it can be useful to mark major milestones so that we see where our journeys are taking us.

Here’s an invitation for you today - I hope that you will take a few minutes today to mark down your key accomplishments this year and take a few minutes to share them with someone else. What’s possible for you now? If it’s hard to bring anything to mind, think about where you were a year ago. What’s different today? What’s shifted for you?

Enjoy!
Jennifer

Jennifer Britton
Potentials Realized | Coaching Team Leaders | Remote Pathways Podcast
Team and Leadership Development | Coaching | Writing
Phone (416)996-8326

As we step into the end of the year, get your planning on with the PlanDoTrack Workbook and Planner or Coaching Business Builder
Looking to enhance your virtual conversations? Webinars? Pick up a copy of Effective Virtual Conversations at Amazon.

TEAMS365 #2180 – Team Building Tip 267: Feedback

12/19/2019

This week’s Team Building Tip gets you to consider the question “HOW do you want feedback?” As part of team days, I host for teams (virtually and in person) we usually wind up doing work around strengths or styles, helping team members understand the diverse needs and approaches on the team. From there, we usually start exploring what these differences mean in terms of communication, working style, approaches to conflict and also things that get under our skin, or triggers.

One of the areas where you may see significant differences is in the area of feedback – how we like to give it, and how we like to receive it. Feedback should be a two-way street.

This week’s Team Building Tip asks the question: “How do you want feedback?”
Options might include:

Regular in batches or as things happen
Focused on the big picture vs. Granular in detail
Verbal only vs writing which you can review and then connect verbally to speak about

What are the ways you want to focus on feedback?

Feedback should also be a two-way street, and while asking the question to those we are supporting through feedback, you’ll want to consider asking “What type of feedback do you want as the receiver?”

Note that in many teams, feedback is not just between the leader and team members. There may be peer feedback cycles as well. The question how “How do you want feedback?” may be an interesting one to explore with the entire team.

Enjoy the conversations!
Jennifer

Jennifer Britton
Potentials Realized | Coaching Team Leaders | Remote Pathways Podcast
Team and Leadership Development | Coaching | Writing
Phone (416)996-8326

As we step into the end of the year, get your planning on with the PlanDoTrack Workbook and Planner or Coaching Business Builder
Looking to enhance your virtual conversations? Webinars? Pick up a copy of Effective Virtual Conversations at Amazon.

TEAMS365 #2167 – Flashback Friday: Expectations and CLarification

12/6/2019

This week I am reaching back to one of the original Teams365 blog posts.

Here’s what I wrote, which might be an interesting conversation starter as you go through your year-end discussions. Expectations are often at the heart of a high performing team.

Our final team building tip of the year gets you to think about the expectations which need to be clarified for the team. One of the biggest hindrances to exceptional team performance is lack of clarity around expectations.

Earmarking a focus around clarifying expectations in the new year can pay off in dividends.

Areas you may want to ensure you have clear, and shared, expectations around are:
- What does success look like? For us individually? Collectively as a team?
- What are our start and end times?
- What does quality mean?
- What does being an exceptional team mean?
- What are we committed to creating? What do we need to do in order to get there?
- What do you expect of me as leader this year? What do I expect from you this year?

What other expectations are important for your team to discuss as you get back to work in January?

Enjoy the conversation,
Jennifer

Jennifer Britton
Potentials Realized | Coaching Team Leaders | Remote Pathways Podcast
Team and Leadership Development | Coaching | Writing
Phone (416)996-8326

As we step into the end of the year, get your planning on with the PlanDoTrack Workbook and Planner or Coaching Business Builder
Looking to enhance your virtual conversations? Webinars? Pick up a copy of Effective Virtual Conversations at Amazon.

TEAMS365 #2166 – Team Building Tip 265: Communication

12/5/2019

This week’s Team Building Tip should hopefully surface an interesting dialogue around communication and how people prefer to communicate.

One of the major areas of conflict for teams today can be the varied ways people want to communicate, and becoming entrenched in our own preferences, without embracing other ways of working.

On a team, it’s likely that you all will have different preferences around –

Text vs. Chat
Visual vs. Data
Real-time vs. Recording
Face-to-face vs. Virtual
Big picture vs. Granular detail
Focused on the present vs Focused on the future

This list could continue. As a team, it might be an interesting conversation to go around the table to discuss what:

Different preferences exist along these continua listed above
Focus areas
What you as a team are doing in terms of varying approaches and meeting different people’s needs

Enjoy!
Jennifer

Jennifer Britton
Potentials Realized | Coaching Team Leaders | Remote Pathways Podcast
Team and Leadership Development | Coaching | Writing
Phone (416)996-8326

As we step into the end of the year, get your planning on with the PlanDoTrack Workbook and Planner or Coaching Business Builder
Looking to enhance your virtual conversations? Webinars? Pick up a copy of Effective Virtual Conversations at Amazon.

TEAMS365 #2159 – Thursday November 29: Team Building Tip 263: Remote Work Enabler: Expectations

11/28/2019

It’s Thursday and while some are celebrating Thanksgiving, many of us have a regular day of work. This week’s Team Building Tip is a “Remote Work Enabler”. Throughout the upcoming weeks I’ll be including a number of special items to keep in mind to help your remote team THRIVE, not just SURVIVE!

The first remote work enabler I wanted to point to was that of expectation. In a remote team, we may be part of multiple matrix relationships, which makes it even more important for us to be clear on our expectations about HOW THINGS ARE DONE.

Teams can benefit from taking time to create a WAYS OF WORKING, or Team Agreements about how they will operate together.

What are the team expectations around?:

Showing up for meetings
Focus at meetings
Being prepared
Being punctual
Quality of work
Surfacing issues
Addressing difficult conversations
How you interact with each other
Share information
Connect with others outside of the organization
Participate in ongoing learning

Each one of these could spark a conversation around multiple factors.

When expectations are not clear we run the risk of doing things differently, having varied output, and most importantly, creating assumptions that might not be founded. These can have the most detrimental impact in the long run.
As a team, what do expectations do you want to make clear?

Best wishes,
Jennifer

Jennifer Britton
Potentials Realized | Coaching Team Leaders | Remote Pathways Podcast
Team and Leadership Development | Coaching | Writing
Phone (416)996-8326

As we step into the end of the year, get your planning on with the PlanDoTrack Workbook and Planner or Coaching Business Builder
Looking to enhance your virtual conversations? Webinars? Pick up a copy of Effective Virtual Conversations at Amazon.

TEAMS365 #2152 – Team Building Tip #262: What's Getting in the Way?

11/21/2019

This week’s Team Building Tip gets you to consider the question – “What’s getting in the way?” As a team, what are the things which have obstructed you from what’s really important?

It’s at this time of year that we may become really clear about the SHINY RED OBJECTS which have become an alluring focus but may not have translated to business results. OR WAIT? Have they?

It can be important to think about activities not only from an immediate impact, but also in terms of the longer-term activities and seed-planting work which needs to go into bigger projects. For those reading the Teams 365 blog who are solopreneurs you will probably know what I mean. Many times, we take on creative projects which may not be revenue generating but actually are key in moving the business forward. The challenge is to make sure that there is a good balance between those activities which need to happen NOW and generate revenue, as well as those activities which are key to business growth but may only pay off in the long run.

This week consider the question – What’s getting in the way? Is it a closed road, or an important detour?

What do you need to say YES to? NO to?

Best wishes,
Jennifer

Jennifer Britton
Potentials Realized | Coaching Team Leaders | Remote Pathways Podcast
Team and Leadership Development | Coaching | Writing
Phone (416)996-8326

As we step into the end of the year, get your planning on with the PlanDoTrack Workbook and Planner or Coaching Business Builder
Looking to enhance your virtual conversations? Webinars? Pick up a copy of Effective Virtual Conversations at Amazon.

TEAMS365 #2145 – Team Building Tip #262: RESULTS FOCUS

11/14/2019

This week’s Team Building Tip takes us into another check point -this week around your results focus. As indicated in the posts over the last couple of weeks as we step into the new year it can be valuable to consider where we want to focus and what we want to focus on.

Part of this decision gets us to think about what are the RESULTS we want to FOCUS on?

Consider the following in your next team meeting:

How are we doing with all of our annual/quarterly goals?
What needs attention?
What has given us the most impact this year?
What activities have detracted from our purpose/vision/goals?
What distractions have we faced?
What’s going to help us magnify and accelerate our results?
What is absolutely critical for us to complete before year end? What do we need to say NO to in order for this to happen?
What may we need to shift?

Enjoy the conversation!
Jennifer

Jennifer Britton – Potentials Realized
Leadership | Teamwork | Business Success focusing on the Remote Space
Author of 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.
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Coming soon - the Remote Pathways™ Podcast