The surprise is on me. Our BLOG two weeks ago addressed the ‘right’ vs. the “wrong” way to function effectively as a team. 
Whereas we usually receive comments on some aspect of the message, this time it took on a different twist. It wasn’t a matter of agreeing or disagreeing with the blog content itself. Rather it was using the components that make for a successful team creation to evaluate their own organizational experience.
To reiterate in brief, the post provided four guidelines for creating an effective and well-oiled team machine as follows:
- Never lose sight of the ultimate purpose and goal of the work being done.
- Understand that your individual purpose is to present your perspective of the situation based on your knowledge and experience.
- Know that your obligation and responsibility is to the team
- Your ONLY true win is a win for your organization … not your department or yourself.
“Ok. So if these are components of being successful in achieving the overriding mission of an organization, how do I think we’re doing in the company where I work?” I am intrigued with the several readers who had a similar tendency to look internally to their own organization. One, in particular, expressed their view with true clarity and is representative of how others used the post to do some introspection of their own experience.
- Having all heads of organization know and understand the importance of motivation to those they oversee.
- Having heads of organizations embrace the reality that each employee is different as a person and often does different work. Thus lumping them together and treating them as clones of one another is not going to get the best result for the organization.
- Having a successful team requires that company heads understand what motivates their employees as well as what de-motivates them.
- The business can only be healthy when your team is healthy in their attitude and purpose.
- Finally, reports are management’s internal customers just as external clients are customers of the organization and for greatest effectiveness, need to be viewed as such.
So if we consider the top leadership as the governing body of the company and the constituents as those employed there, it appears that these guidelines indicated by some of our readers might just make for a more successful result. So maybe … just maybe, finding the individual in the team will enhance the drive and desire of the employees to project positive attitudes and efforts that, in turn, just might raise the level of success the organization will experience. You think?
Mike Dorman
