We coach, develop and work alongside leaders and teams to shift ideas on leadership and provide the skills and tools needed to grow teams.
We know that for teams to maximise the potential of their diversity, they need to regularly use techniques like perspective getting, encouraging contribution, group brainstorming and collaborative problem solving. But none of those practices works particularly well without high levels of psychological safety.
If you dread these words… ‘Can I give you some Feedback?’ you are perfectly normal not super sensitive. Most of us are at least somewhat fearful of getting Feedback.
OK, I’m going to start this off by saying ‘I do!’
I like positive feedback. I like to know that my work or my relationships add value to others. That doesn’t mean I only want positive feedback, but it really helps to know that (and why) I am appreciated.
And I think all people find that genuine appreciation motivating, (even if at times little embarrasing).
I am a leadership coach.
As part of setting up a new coaching relationship, I often have a set-up meeting with the coachee and their manager. During this ‘three-way’ meeting I ask the manager to outline what they would like their direct report to use the coaching to focus on.
“That went well! – I bet we’ll hear from them today!” two reps celebrate as they ride a lift down from a prospective customer’s office.
A manager challenges one of her colleagues: “I’m not sure what happened there. I think she may have taken your comments as a bit blunt. I’ll speak with her and let you know. ”
Answer: It depends how often you engage, what you talk about, and how much directing you do with your people.
Precaution: I have never met a person that agreed they were a micromanager, that didn’t also rationalise what they were doing as being a good thing for several, or many reasons. Most micromanagers do what they do with the best of intentions.
When facilitating team workshops or meetings we typically see at least one or two team members who don’t seem to contribute much.
What do we mean by ‘a big ugly elephant in the room?’. We mean those things that teams tend to avoid speaking openly about. You know, things like…
Teams often do two things that get in the way of good and efficient decision making:
#1 They talk for too long without being clear of the point of the discussion
#2 They rely heavily on the leader of the team to make most of the calls.
Teams often miss the opportunity to genuinely collaborate because they enter into discussions without clarity of what the discussion is for and how the discussion should proceed to get the most from the time together.
Like most of us, you will be really busy just coping with your daily mountain of work.Of course, when you hear an idea that can help you improve how you tackle that work, you take notice and maybe get inspired.
Like many others, and particularly US ex-pats, I’ve been watching the events unfold from the US election. A bit of background: My father was a career US diplomat
We often ask leadership teams to review themselves against these four groupings.
At this point we introduce the Katzenbach & Smith definition of a team:
Maintaining trust in a team that has to work remotely is challenging, but there are some preventative and responsive steps you can take.
Here are a few techniques and tips to help your group work remotely but together.
As early as possible, agree the protocols or ground rules for your team calls or chats (I’ll call these ‘collabs’ from here on). For example, do you need to see each other the entire time or is audio-only fine? …