Conflict within a team is an inevitable part of any work environment. The diverse perspectives, ideas, and solutions that team members bring to the table can often lead to disagreements and conflicts. However, it's important to remember that team conflict isn't necessarily a bad thing. In fact, it can be beneficial in many ways. It can help identify blind spots, explore different solutions, and find innovative ways to deliver on objectives. The key lies in managing these conflicts effect...
Jan 02, 2024•10 min
It may seem like leaders need to have all the answers. Presumably, they became leaders by being smart, hardworking individual contributors who had the answers most of the time. But while knowing what to do is important, great leaders believe that knowing what questions to ask is even more vital. Especially when it comes to leading the team. Asking them the right questions instead of barking out the answers will lead to a higher performing team. In this article, we’ll outline 5 questions great le...
Dec 19, 2023•8 min
Teamwork is a constant in organizational life. You will work on teams for the majority of your career. Some of those teams will be an uplifting, engaging experience—but most will be an average or even a draining experience. Because most teams aren’t high-performing ones. Most teams fail to achieve a level of performance above the average of each individual’s capabilities. Most teams lack what Stephen Covey would call “synergy” but what organizational psychologists call “collective intelligence.”...
Dec 11, 2023•9 min
Teamwork is the secret that makes common people achieve uncommon results. However, effective teamwork doesn't just happen; it requires careful planning and implementation. This episode provides six tips for effective teamwork that will help you build a high-performing team. These tips are not just theoretical concepts, but practical strategies that have been proven to work in real-world settings. They are designed to address the common challenges that teams face, such as lack of clarity, poo...
Dec 04, 2023•10 min
Great leaders aren’t born, they’re made. While it’s tempting to look at stories of great leaders and just assume they’re received some divine or genetic gift that turned them into exemplars, the truth is much more nuanced. Leadership is a skill that can be honed and improved with practice and the right guidance. This episode will explore three key habits that can significantly enhance your leadership skills: creating clarity, establishing safety, and speaking purpose. These habits are not just t...
Nov 20, 2023•7 min
Psychological safety is the bedrock of a high-performing team. It's more than just trust; it's about fostering a climate of mutual trust and respect. Building psychological safety at work is not a one-time event, but a continuous process that requires conscious effort and commitment. It's about creating an environment where everyone feels safe to take risks, voice their opinions, and be themselves without fear of judgment or punishment. It's about creating a culture of openness, ...
Nov 13, 2023•9 min
Every team leader knows the importance of keeping their team motivated. The more motivated your team, the more productive they are, and the better results they deliver. Research suggests that the more powerful form of motivation is intrinsic, flowing from an individual’s desire to do the work or achieve the outcome for their own reasons—not bonuses, awards, or other extrinsic motivators leaders often use. But that doesn’t mean leaders are out of options. While your team will still be best motiva...
Nov 06, 2023•8 min
Trust is the bedrock upon which successful teams are built. High-performing teams are characterized by an elevated level of trust. This trust in high performing teams manifests in four distinct ways: teams trust each other to deliver, they trust that they can share new ideas, they trust that they can disagree, and they trust that they can make mistakes. Each of these aspects of trust contributes to the overall success and productivity of the team. As a leader, it is your responsibility to set th...
Oct 30, 2023•11 min
Conflict on a team is inevitable. On diverse teams, where individuals come from varying backgrounds and possess differing opinions, those opinions will clash often in the form of disagreements and conflicts. Understanding the types of team conflict that can arise in a team setting is crucial for effective management and resolution. In this episode, we will delve into the four types of team conflict: relationship conflict, task conflict, status conflict, and process conflict. Each type of conflic...
Oct 23, 2023•13 min
High-performing teams are often perceived as having extraordinary talents and capabilities, but they are not that different from regular teams—at least in terms of composition. Research indicates that high-performing teams are not just about having exceptionally talented individuals. Instead, they excel in understanding how to collaborate effectively and harness the diverse talents within the team. In other words, talent doesn’t make the team. The team makes the talent. The foundational quality ...
Oct 16, 2023•10 min
Icebreakers are not just games or frivolous activities. Many people have memories of cringeworthy and awkward games played under the pretense of “team building.” I was one of them. But the research on icebreakers is pretty clear. Icebreakers are powerful tools that can help teams find uncommon commonalities and build strong connections. Icebreakers can be the key to unlocking a more collaborative, understanding, and high-performing team. However, the effectiveness of an icebreaker hinges on its ...
Oct 09, 2023•9 min
Team building and understanding each other's behavior are crucial elements in creating a strong team culture and creating a high-performing teams. But many leaders struggle to find and deliver effective team building exercises. There are many too choose from, and many fall short. Because so many exercises focus on getting teammates to understand each other’s differences—often expresses as personality, identity, or experiences. But for team building exercises to work, teams can’t just underst...
Oct 02, 2023•11 min
Managers make the difference. Middle managers especially play a crucial role in employee engagement and performance. However, many managers lack proper preparation for their role, and companies often fail to invest in robust leadership training. Great managers understand that their actions have a direct impact on their team's success. In particular, great managers improve their team through four daily actions. In this episode, we will explore four things that great managers do daily to separ...
Sep 25, 2023•12 min
One-on-one meetings with employees are a crucial aspect of effective leadership. Organizations spent countless hours, money, and other resources trying to find the most qualified talent on board, and then spent more money to keep that talent motivated and engaged. And yet, the single most time time-efficient and effective way to invest in the growth and development of employees is a simple feedback session with their direct supervisor. In this episode, we will delve into the three main sections ...
Sep 18, 2023•10 min
It’s often said by teams that “diversity is our strength.” We take for granted the idea that diverse teams bring more lived experiences, ideas, and solutions to the table. When asked, “How does diversity affect teamwork?” most leaders assume that teams composed of individuals from different backgrounds, cultures, and perspectives are more likely to approach problems from various angles and come up with innovative solutions. And hence most leaders assume that diversity is a source of greater perf...
Sep 11, 2023•12 min
Are you a good listener? You may think you’re a good listener—maybe someone even told you were a good listener. Or maybe not. As a leader, this is a very important question. So much of your ability to solve the problems your team is bringing to you depends upon your ability to understand them. And in order to help your team feel heard and listened to when their pitching possible solutions depends on being a good listener. No matter what you answered to the opening question, there’s good news for...
Sep 04, 2023•10 min
Margaret Thatcher once famously quipped that “Being powerful is like being a lady. If you have to tell people you are, you aren't.” As a leader, the same could be said about respect. If you wonder if you’re team respects you, they probably don’t. Being a leader is not just about having authority and power; it's about earning the respect and trust of your team. Your title may have made you the boss. But your team’s respect makes you the leader. In this episode, we will explore how to earn...
Aug 28, 2023•9 min
In a world of growing complexity and seemingly constant crisis, we need great leaders more than ever. But when you look at the stories in the press or check the staggering numbers of burnout and disengagement in surveys, it seems like fewer and fewer leaders are rising to the challenge. It starts to seem like becoming a great leader is too complicated and nearly impossible. But when you survey people on what makes them appreciate and follow leaders, it turns out there are just a few simple habit...
Aug 21, 2023•10 min
Leadership is about relationships. And the cornerstone of just about every relationship is respect. When employees feel respected, they are more engaged, motivated, and productive. But many managers struggle to convey their respect to team members. Consequently, colleagues often experience a sense of being undervalued, disconnected, or even inferior. It is difficult to envision individuals who harbor such sentiments being able to their best work ever. In this article, we will outline how to make...
Aug 14, 2023•11 min
Employee resistance to change is one of the most perplexing and challenging issues that business executives encounter. Senior leaders have mapped out a change initiative and, in the process, gotten themselves excited about the future only to find the rest of the organization doesn’t share their enthusiasm. What’s often overlooked is that employee resistance to change is most likely due to the emotions behind the change, not the change itself. And in examining those emotions, the late Carl Frost ...
Aug 07, 2023•10 min
With work and life becoming more intertwined than ever, people increasingly seek purpose through work. So, leaders are being called upon to create a sense of purpose on a team. When team members feel that their work is connected to a larger company-wide purpose, they are more motivated and perform better. This gives managers and leaders an opportunity to facilitate work environments that provide the sense of purpose people need to thrive. In this article, we will explore five effective ways to c...
Jul 31, 2023•11 min
Creating shared identity on a team is crucial to building a high-performing one. Shared identity refers to the extent to which team members feel the same sense of who they are as a designated group. It indicates whether or not individual members truly feel like this is the team they’re a part of and most loyal to. Decades of social science research have shown that individuals make sense of their world by applying categories and labels to their environment—including themselves and the people arou...
Jul 24, 2023•9 min
A sense of belonging on a team is crucial for its success and productivity. Belonging is that sense of acceptance and inclusion when people feel they can bring their authentic self to work. When team members feel included and valued, they are more likely to be engaged, motivated, and contribute their best work. And on a diverse team, belonging determines how much the team taps into diverse perspectives, opinions, and ideas. As a leader, you encourage that sense of belonging through the habits, n...
Jul 17, 2023•12 min
One of the most common complaints among disengaged employees is about not feeling heard, not being seen or recognized for what they do, who they are and what they are experiencing. As a leader, a lot of this frustration may stem from you. When people approach you with their problems and you jump right to give advice, you may feel you’re helping their problem…but you’re not helping them feel heard. And if they don’t feel heard, they’re not really hearing your advice anyway. Other times people spe...
Jul 10, 2023•12 min
Demands at work have been piling on in recent years. Including the demand on employees to continue to do more with less. And those demands come with a lot of potential burnout at work. Burnout at work is a series problem for most organizations. Burnout can lead to decreased productivity, increased absenteeism, and even physical and mental health issues. It’s incumbent on every leader to be aware of and attempt to avoid burnout on their teams. But burnout isn’t always caused by asking too much of...
Jun 26, 2023•12 min
So much of the struggle of working on teams comes down to one key task: getting a team aligned. Aligned teams lead to better engagement, performance, and retention. Getting and keeping a team aligned is a key task for leaders at all levels. But recognizing the importance of alignment is a lot easier than actually getting everyone on the same page. Team alignment means everyone contributes toward a shared goal, understands their assigned tasks, and sees how their work fits into the team's wor...
Jun 19, 2023•13 min
Trust is the foundation of any successful team. Without trust, team members will not feel comfortable sharing their ideas, taking risks, or admitting their mistakes. Building a culture of trust on a team is crucial for achieving better results, higher levels of engagement, and less stress. But first, we need to confront a brutal truth up front: trust alone is not enough. What teams need is a culture of psychological safety. When team members feel safe to express their opinions and ideas without ...
Jun 12, 2023•10 min
Conflict in the workplace is often seen as negative, but it can be productive if managed well. In fact, lack of conflict on a team is the real negative. When teams lack conflict, it means that either everyone on the team thinks alike or those who think differently are too afraid to speak their mind. Healthy conflict increases communication, trust, teamwork, and innovation. In this episode, we will explore four surprising benefits of conflict in the workplace. And we’ll discuss how leaders can cr...
Jun 06, 2023•12 min
One of the most fascinating concepts in the study of teamwork and collaboration is the concept of collective intelligence—the idea that when teams collaborate exceptionally well, they tap into a reservoir of knowledge and abilities that exceed the sum of each individual’s capability. Research led by Anita Williams Wooley helped solidified this theory with evidence that some teams truly did perform better than merely the average of the individual team member’s abilities. Perhaps more surprisingly...
May 30, 2023•11 min
Keeping a team motivated is the one of the most important aspects of a leader’s job. It’s also one of the most misunderstood aspects of a leader’s job. Many organizations still equate “motivating your team” with “designing the right incentives.” But more than four decades of research into self-determination theory have revealed the limits of these types of extrinsic motivators and offers a wealth of insight into intrinsic motivation and how leaders can leverage it. But even when expanding their ...
May 22, 2023•13 min
