In our last Teamwork in Uncertainty post of the month we’re going to explore a favorite topic here at the Teams365 blog – Strengths. As I have shared in many other posts, strengths have a variety of benefits, from strengthening productivity to creating more engagement in the workplace.

In times of uncertainty the only thing we may be able to rely on are our strengths – our own and others. When we are tasked with new activities and tasks it can be useful to explore who on the team might have brought a similar experience. What are the strengths that can support you as a team?

As I share in PlanDoTrack, there are several key questions you will want to explore on the individual level. Check out the sections on strengths in Sections 1 and 4 of PlanDoTrack.

Some of the more common frameworks include:

• Utilizing Gallup’s StrengthsFinder 2.0 - Purchase a copy of the book for each team member and have them bring their reports to an upcoming team meeting.
• Incorporating the VIA Character Survey – This comes from the Positive Psychology realm and provides another doorway into exploring strengths. The nice thing about this assessment is that it is free.

As with any assessment, it’s important to reinforce a few things:

• This may provide a snapshot in time and can be dependent on a variety of factors.
• Take what is valuable from the information. Assessments are intended to provide insights, not a box.
• Exploring strengths and styles helps us understand ourselves better. Under times of stress and pressure, some of these styles and strengths become magnified. When magnified, some of our strengths become a liability. For example., if one of my strengths is getting results, this is good. However, in times of pressure I may become dogmatic in getting results, pushing harder than needed and burning myself, and others, out. Success in today’s workplace requires a focus on both RESULTS and RELATIONSHIPS.
• Look at both the individual view of things and the collective view. The power of bringing most assessments (not all, but many) into the team context is to provide a snapshot across the team, helping them see the collective. It also provides an opportunity for everyone to have a collective framework for exploration and dialogue.

Questions to consider:

• What are the discussions you want to have around strengths?
• What’s important about exploring this topic individually and collectively?
• What do you notice about the collective strengths of the team?
• Where are there gaps? What might you do about this?
• What will be valuable for you as a team to explore around strengths?

Are you looking to do more work with your team around strengths? Contact me to discuss our team day sessions for teams around strengths. 

Enjoy your 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.

This week’s Effective Virtual Conversations tip is very similar to last week’s statement of “Consider the right modality for the right conversation”, but slightly different.

This week’s Effective Virtual Conversations tip gets you to “Consider the right platform, for the right modality”. In today’s virtual space, there can be multiple channels we hold conversations on. From conference call lines, to Skype, to zoom, to WebEx. Some channels allow us to stream and see each other, while others only allow us to share our screen.

Consider these questions as you go to select the appropriate channel for your next conversation:

1. How important is it that we see each other?
2. How important is it for me to be able to share a PowerPoint deck or some slides?
3. How important is it for us to be able to chat with each other? And also save the chat log?
4. How important is it for us to be able to use annotation, where group members can make notation on the screen?
5. How important is it for us to be able to record the conversation and share it at a later date with those who could not attend?
6. How important is it for us NOT to be able to see each other?
7. How important is it for us to have the ability to break out into smaller conversation pods or breakouts (just like we would in the in-person environment for small group discussion).
8. What are connectivity and bandwidth issues like for the participants

The bulk of the coaching conversations and learning events I have hosted over the last fifteen years has been virtual. Every day I get to work with clients all over the world, not just in my city. With that in mind, each platform has its own pros and cons. Do some research into the different options.

Some of the ones I continue to use regularly are:

• FreeConferenceCalling.com – for when clients want phone only service but one that also allows us to do breakouts
• Zoom – My every day go-to where I host 95% of the programs I offer. The pro account offers breakouts, polls, recording, annotation and pretty much everything I could ever need to create engaging virtual sessions!
• WebEx – usually the preferred platform of my corporate clients. Given that it often signals a more corporate conversation, people may not be as open to dialogue and interaction.

What are your favorite go-tos? I hope you’ll take a few minutes to share your experience in the comments below.

Best,
​Jennifer

This week’s Weekly Journaling Prompt gets you thinking about, and writing around, the question “If I could go back in time, I would….”

Sometimes it can be useful to look backwards to look ahead. What are the inflection points, or events, you would change if you could?

I hope that you enjoy spending a few minutes this week, writing about this question.

Keep in mind the flipside “If I could go forward in time, I would….”

​With best wishes,
Jennifer

We are moving onto productivity tips #8.

“One look at an email can rob you of 15 minutes of focus. One call on your cell phone, one tweet, one instant message can destroy your schedule, forcing you to move meetings, or blow off really important things, like love, and friendship.” -  Jacqueline Leo

The Front Blog has some provocative figures about 2018 email  - They write that in the amount of time we spend checking email in a year, someone could climb Everest twice!  Check out these statistics here!
Taming the inbox is an important part of efficiency in today’s work environment. Email is an essential communication vehicle, but it can disrupt our attention. Becoming more selective and more disciplined with email can go a long way in business success, especially in terms of getting more significant work completed (i.e. projects, new initiatives).
Consider these questions:

• How many emails do you get a day?
• How efficient are you at replying (i.e. how much time does it take to reply)?
• How does email disrupt your focus?

Several pointers around email management include:

• Notice where your email comes from. What emails do you receive? Are there any you want to unsubscribe from?
• Dedicate time to cull your email OR simply archive older ones.
• Consider what filters could support your focus and less time spent on email.
• Streamline. Can any things be batched (i.e. daily summary instead of regular alerts)?
• Turn it off for periods of the day. The disruption an email ping can make could significantly dilute your focus. Would it be useful to establish “check points” during the day?

Activity:

• Review the emails that you have received over the last two weeks. 
• What do you notice?
• How many of them are still outstanding?
• How many are no longer applicable and could be culled by unsubscribing?
• How many could be funneled to their own form?

Conversation Sparkers:

• What’s one tweak you could make to your inbox?
• When are you going to dedicate time for email review?

Enjoy!
​Jennifer

It’s Friday and a great day to get things done! Here’s what I wrote a few years ago now on Tips for Conquering Procrastination in Teams365 489: Read it here.

“It is the start of a new work week and chances are, there may be one or two tasks on your list that you really, really don't want to do. Procrastination is a challenge for many professionals along the way. Today's post points you to some useful resources if you find yourself in the spot of procrastinating around an important task."

Here are a couple of different articles and other posts to refer to:
Business Town.com's Five Reasons We Procrastinate
Jim Selman's Huffington Post article on Why Do We Procrastinate?
And finally a really interesting article from the App developers of Unstuck. You can read their 9 tips for how to stop procrastinating here.

Consider these strategies:
Set a timer for 15 minutes and just get going - It is sometimes hard to get in the flow with tasks and just like in moving through writers block setting a timer and getting into action for 15 minutes may be  the start of creating some momentum and movement around a task.

Create accountability partners: When we publicly commit to task completion with another person, it can up the ante on getting things done. Mastermind groups are often popular for this reason.

Chunk things down- sometimes we put off tasks when they feel too big or overwhelming. Chunking things down in to smaller pieces can help to make things feel more manageable.

Tackle it first in the day or when you are at your best: Many of us have times of day when we are more productive, clearer and more focused. It can be useful to consider tacking those tasks at the times when you are at your best.

What other tips do you have for getting things done when you are procrastinating?

Best wishes,
​Jennifer

Today's blog post focuses on 7 tools for leaders we have covered during 2017. As busy professionals, both team leaders and team members can benefit from having a robust toolkit of tools to pull from. Here are seven that we've focused on throughout the year:

1. Questions - Questions form the backbone to any great conversation. One of the Teams365 videos which has been viewed the most this year is the 20 Coaching Questions video I created from Teams365 #1277. You can view the video here. Subscribe to our Teams365 Leadership YouTube Channel to keep up-to-date with the weekly Teams365 videos I release each Sunday.

​2. Techniques for leading more effective virtual conversations - 1-1s, virtual meetings, and webinars. With the launch of my newest book this past summer, Effective Virtual Conversations, I started dedicating Monday's Teams365 blog posts to the topic of leading more effective virtual conversations. If you have not checked out the 26-ish weekly posts on these, please do so here.
​Whether it's using more breakouts or asking better questions, virtual meetings and webinars can break the mold of what I call "Death by Conference Call" - the multi-tasking, zoning out mindset. Be sure to also check out the related Community Calls I have hosted this fall as well.

​3.   Tools for Collaboration - Working across teams, and organizations, and industries is becoming much more the norm for most leaders and team members today. In February I focused on the topic of Collboration. Take a look at the top posts from February around the topic of collaboration.
 
4.  Strategic planning - Whether strategic in your organization means 36 months or 10 years, planning sessions for teams continued to be very popular in 2017. You will want to check out several of the posts I have included around this topic here at the blog.

​5.  Strengths-based teamwork - Almost every month this year I found myself facilitating strengths-based teamwork sessions with teams, both in persona nd virtually. Whether we explored StrengthsFinder 2.0 or used VIA Strengths, I found these conversations to be extremely vibrant and transformational for teams. Circling back with most of them months later, strengths-based approaches really stuck out for them, and were approaches they could integrate into their every day work. Contact me to discuss how we can bring a strengths-based teamwork session to your team this next year.
  

6.  Feedback and Difficult Conversations - Another area I found most of my team support boiled down to this year was around the areas of feedback and getting more comfortable with difficult, or courageous, conversations. Check out the Teams365 posts on the topic of feedback here. 


7.  
 going hand in hand with feedback was the topic of having more difficult, or courageous, conversations during 2017. Check out the Teams365 posts here on this topic.

​What other tools did you draw upon regularly as a team leder or team member this year?

​Have a great Wednesday,
Jennifer

​

AS a former team leader myself I know how time crunched it can be to find quick things to do with our team. That has spurred me on since 2004 to develop a number of resources for team leaders to bring into their own work with teams.  Today so many of our team members are visually inclined and new conversations can get sparked using visuals.

Earlier this week the Teams365 Team Sparker deck was launched, consisting of 52 questions, the deck can be a great "Sparker" at team meetings or in individual coaching conversations.

For years I have been bringing photos into the facilitation and coaching work I do with teams and groups. Yesterday I launched a new e-manual "40 Ways to Use Visual Cards in your work with groups and teams" which includes detailed instructions and more sparking questions to facilitate insights etc. Whether you are looking for something different to do at your next strategic planning session, looking for a new way to kick off your retreat, or close a team meeting, these forty activities are a little different.  Click here to learn more or view my weekly Group Coaching Design Studio blab where I shared six ways to work with visual cards in the weekly 30 minute live stream show. I use the Conversation Sparker cards as illustration in the conversation.

For others interested in using photos for team development you may want to check out The Coaching Game - Points of View which offer another interesting series of photos.

A fourth resource I wanted to share which leverages photos is the original deck i am aware of - Visual Explorer from the Center for Creative Leadership. I've had the privilege to use the cards I purchased from them with thousands of professionals globally over the last seven or more years.

A fifth and final resource for you to explore is the JICT Images deck,
another excellent resource.

I hope that next time you have a meeting, retreat or team event, you will consider how images can spark some new insights, action and awareness.

Here are the links for more info or or pick up a copy of the  Conversation Sparker Cards(TM), the Teams365 Team Sparker Deck of the 40 Ways to Use Visuals with Groups and Teams. If you have any questions, please let me know. Enjoy!

Best wishes,
Jennifer

Jennifer Britton, MES, CPT, PCC
Potentials Realized
Supporting Team Leaders to do their best work, one conversation at a time
Coaching Skills Training | Teamwork | Leadership
Author of From One to Many: Best Practices for Team and Group Coaching (Jossey-Bass, 2013)
(416)996-TEAM (8326)

As a former team leader myself, I was often tasked with leading the strategic planning for our team and/or department. We didn't always have money to bring in an external facilitator.

Over the next couple of days I want to share with you two strategic planning tools I found invaluable with my work. Today, we will look at the first took - the SWOT.

The first time I saw the SWOT was 1992 and it was part of a board and organizational retreat for an organization I worked for. We were tasked with developing the strategic plan for the next 5 years of the business and the SWOT was introduced as an important part of the process of getting clear on both the internal context of the organization, as well as the external context.

The SWOT is a foundational strategic planning tool and can be used at an offsite, or even in the context of a team meeting. At the top we have two quadrants - S for Strengths (those internal skills, strengths and talents which exist in the team or organization), and W  for Weaknesses (those internal weak areas which might get the team, or organization, into trouble).

If you are considering using this as a tool, have the group (or a subset of the group) brainstorm and list out the internal Strengths and Weaknesses of the team.

The bottom part of the matrix gets you to list, and explore, the EXTERNAL environment- those being the Opportunities (O) - external factors which are working in favor  and T - Threats - internal factors which might derail the business or team.

Again, have the team identify things in the external environment which may be opportunities (new collaborations, new client bases, technology) or Threats (New taxes etc),

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
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-TEAM (8326)