High-performance teams within a company are the ones that are more productive, reliable, regularly exceed expectations and stand strong when the business is facing hard times. Analyst firm Gartner has some advice on how to create your own A-team.
Team celebration image on Shutterstock
Teamwork can be a tricky thing and for team leaders, knowing how to encourage members to work better together can be a big challenge. You may think that if you just lump your organisations finest and brightest employees together then you’ll automatically come out with a high-performance team. But that’s not the case, according to Gartner vice president Debra Logan.
“Provided you create the right conditions and leadership, it is possible to significantly elevate the performance of largely average performers as well,” she said in a blog post.
Logan said its important for business and team leaders to encourage their teams to foster the following five qualities:
- Clarity of purpose
With a clear sense of purpose, members feel personal goals align closely with the overall team direction and take pride in being a member. This empowers decision making.- Clarity of roles and contributions
Members have been chosen for particular skills and strengths they offer, and work well together because they complement each other.- Clarity of communication
High-performing teams are great at communicating with each other openly and honestly, tackling even potentially sensitive topics head-on, while being encouraging and supportive.- Clarity of ownershipA clear understanding of ownership and delegation is important when relying on each other to complete complex tasks. This avoid gaps and overlaps that would diminish the team’s effectiveness and create uncertainty and tension.
- Celebration of success
High-performing teams take time to celebrate their successes, to emphasise the team work and reflect on the collective achievement.
As a starting point, you should work with your team to pick three attributes from the list they want to work on first. Bear in mind that a high-performance team is always a work in progress and you should strive to constantly improve them over time.
[Via Smart With Gartner]
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