Investing in teams

Working with teams is one of my favorite things to do. If you have been called as a leader, you rely on at least one team of people. Teams are how we accomplish big things, those things that are bigger than what we could do alone. This is the whole idea behind leading; we lead because we recognize a problem that is bigger than us, a problem that it will take many people to solve. We each have a limited capacity to work with other people, so we develop teams to manage our working relationships. Depending on the problem you are trying to solve (your vision for a better future) you may either lead teams of individual contributors or teams of leaders. If you lead a team you should focus on two areas to make your team great.
First, invite. This is two fold. First you need to create a great working environment that creates success with those you serve. Success begets success. When you are successful in your mission, people will be attracted to your team. Next, perfect the art of inviting people onto you team. There is no substitute for hand choosing who you want as part of your team. There can only be a small number of people on your team, probably less than 12; why would you let just anyone join your team? If you have created a successful environment, you will have plenty of people to choose from. Be selective.
I will post more later about creating this environment and picking team members, but for now lets move onto the next next area of focus to develop a great team; invest. Your primary responsibility as a team leader is to develop your team members. This flies in the face of common sense. Most team leaders assume their primary responsibility is to their mission. That’s not the case, your teams primary responsibility is to the mission, yours is to your team. Remember, we have a team because the problem (vision) is to big for us to accomplish alone, therefore it is critical to have teams who can accomplish the mission. Viewing our responsibilities this way will change the way we work and how we treat our team members. Our primary thrust as team leaders is investing in the success of our team members. When we do this, our team members become wildly successful at accomplishing our mission. So, at this point you may be asking “so what if you team is of leaders? Who accomplishes the tasks that achieve your mission?” Well, if your team is made of up leaders that means they are leading others because the vision they are pursuing is to large for them to accomplish on their own, so the same principle applies. We all have an eye on the goal, it keeps us inspired and motivated, but we as leaders accomplish the goal by investing in others. Think about it this way, if you could spend your time helping 10 people be 20% more productive you will add 200% productivity to your work force. Isn’t this more than you could ever contribute on your own, doing tasks yourself? So, the question is how do we invest in our teams? That is a topic that I will save for a near future post as well.