Team Capabilities: Creating Group Synergy in Pursuing Collective Goals
Some people love working on teams, but there are also many individuals who dislike, and even dread, the thought of being part of a group. Maybe you’re one of the latter, or perhaps you are struggling with Corporate Family® members who demonstrate, one way or another, that they aren’t interested in being team players.
Decades ago, this lack of team spirit might not have been as much of a problem as it is today because numerous jobs were geared toward independent processing and individual performance. Employees might chat around the water cooler or coffee pot, but then they’d head back to their respective cubicles or workstations. 21st century organizations are much different; many of them expect group synergy and teamwork.
Research confirms this shift to team-centered approaches in organizations, and it’s a trend that is on the rise. According to a Deloitte study of over 7000 companies in 130 countries, 62% of organizations utilize “networks of teams.” Larger companies (those with over 5000 employees) actually reported higher levels of team-focused organizational structure. In a March 2016 Forbes article, Josh Bersin explains the findings this way: “We naturally run our businesses in sales teams, manufacturing plants, retail stores, product groups, service teams, and geographically independent operations” (for more details, read Bersin’s piece, “New Research Shows Why Focus on Teams, Not Just Leaders, Is Key to Business Performance” at www.forbes.com).
Interestingly, this focus on Team Capabilities isn’t merely a trend in organizational functioning—it also happens to be one of twenty-five essential characteristics that comprise every individual’s EQ (Emotional Quotient). As LEADon® defines it, Team Capabilities involves creating group synergy in pursuing collective goals. In other words, your EQ ability when it comes to this characteristic includes how well you personally do at creating synergy in a group and how well you encourage others to do the same.
We’ll discuss how you can determine your EQ aptitude shortly. In the meantime, consider these facts that you and your Corporate Family® members face today:
- Teamwork is highly valued by businesses around the globe.
- The formation of “networks of teams”, even digitally connected ones, is increasing in organizations.
Therefore, anyone who struggles with Team Capabilities—perhaps you or others in your Corporate Family®—must discover ways to improve this vital EQ characteristic in order to achieve professional, and even personal, success.
A perfect example of the dilemma caused by poor Team Capabilities was presented to the LEADon® team by an employee of a large insurance company. The woman, who had been in her position for over a decade, expressed how much she hated her formerly fulfilling job. She shared that the company had shifted to a more team-centered organizational structure, but her particular “team” was unreliable and often intentionally counterproductive. Her final statement about this situation summed up her dissatisfaction: “I wish I could just do all the work myself since it’s so difficult to get everyone on the same page.”
Perhaps you can relate, and this relates back to how we began this blog. Some people thrive on teams, but others feel like they are barely surviving. Is there a way to improve circumstances like this, particularly since “networks of teams” will continue to increase in the future? Can individuals actually become better team players? How do teams overcome weaknesses in order to meet and exceed expectations?
At LEADon®, we’ve developed a specific online course entitled LEADing by Building a High Performance T.E.A.M.® which details four vital steps for improving group synergy so that team members can accomplish collective goals. These four steps are:
Trust: commit to one another; trust is a must for High Performing Teams!
Encourage: create a culture of appreciation throughout your organization.
Attach: develop healthy interpersonal relationships; “I need you; you need me.”
Model: demonstrate Values and Beliefs through your Behavior Patterns.
You can also read more about the LEADon® T.E.A.M. approach in chapter six of The Leading Edge: Nine Strategies for Improving Internal and Intentional Leadership. The bottom line is that, for healthier Team Capabilities, you must begin by building trust, encouraging a culture of appreciation, forming stronger interpersonal attachments, and modeling what you value and believe in your personal and professional life.
Finally, you may be interested in finding a reliable method for determining your abilities in the twenty-five characteristics of EQ, including Team Capabilities. If you haven’t done so yet, take LEADon’s® EQ assessment, the DECQ® (Developing Emotional Competency Questionnaire®). This online metric will provide private and confidential results of your EQ strengths and weaknesses, and the DECQ® can be utilized to benchmark your improvement over time. The DECQ® offers the opportunity to assess team and Corporate Family® EQ capabilities, and those results can be reviewed by all team members in order to develop a plan for improvement. DECQ® participants also receive recommendations for specific LEADon® online courses which they can take in order to address areas of weakness discovered in their DECQ® report.
Teamwork is always critical for accomplishing collective goals, and that’s why LEADon® would like to help you and your team create more synergy so you can meet and exceed your goals. Please connect with the LEADon® team at www.LEADonUniversity.com, or call us directly at 858.592.0700 for a free, personal consultation.
