How Build a Team of Winners and not Winers
There are some obvious reasons you want people on your team who produce and then maybe there are some not so obvious reasons too.
- Money – Obviously the better the producer on your team the more money you, your company, and they are going to make.
- Culture – Nothing improves the culture of a business, team, organization, or project than having it staffed with high achievers with interpersonal skillsets to communicate and work with colleagues.
- Personal Growth – You nor your team can achieve higher personal objectives without the whole becoming more efficient and effective.
3 areas to look at in order to build a stronger team.
Assumptions –
Sometimes our top performer or producer is going to come packaged completely different than we first though or envisioned. Don’t make the common mistake of creating an avatar in your mind of what the person must fit before you entertain the idea of recruiting them. Naturally you know your product, market, and how they are reached but the person who can perform the activity to be successful in those environments may surprise you. Top producers come in all shapes, sizes, backgrounds, and experiences. Filter for character metrics only. When filtering for character profiles do not conflate character with temperament and personality types. Self awareness and the dichotomies of the distinctions are crucial.
Perceptions –
The way you will perceive another’s strengths and weaknesses are many times a direct reflection of your own. Being self aware of your set of traits will help you build a team that complements and doesn’t distract from your core competencies. Having a better sense of your own weaknesses, communicating it to others, and intentionally recruiting and staffing to help compensate for it will help you and the overall organization. One of the things that always helps an organizations over all growth is when the leadership of it openly communicates its flaws. This creates a work environment of secure team members that facilitates better, more rapid growth.
Time Spent –
You’ve probably either read or lived the 80/20 rule. However guarding against those time vampires is the greatest thing you can do for yourself and your business. Recruiting and staffing your business with the wrong people is the fastest way to burnout, give out, and ultimate failure. I work a lot in the coaching space and encourage my members who are building their own coaching agencies to be intentional and specific when it comes to bringing on new clients. Too often I have seen really talented coaches and consultants at TW3 come in really hot and achieve quick success only to be gone by the waist side in only a few months because they are drowning in support from new clients. How did the support load kill them?
- Expectations of the new clients were not clearly understood
- Wrong client types were recruited
- Organized manner of supporting was not established
Building an effective and efficient team hinges on being able to bring the member up to speed as quickly as possible. Understanding the character and competency types that have the skillsets and mindsets to achieve your business objectives the quickest is paramount in the overall success of building a team of winners. Without understanding how to filter out the wrong mindsets and skillsets in your recruiting process you will potentially build a team of winers instead of winners. Nothing is more discouraging in business then when it’s staffed with the wrong people.