Imagine you are leading a team. You have clarified the team’s strategy for achieving its picture of success. Let’s explore how you can orchestrate people’s talents to reach the goals.
1) You can clarify where people deliver As, Bs and Cs.
Start by writing the names of the people in your team. Looking at each person in turn, describe the specific activities in which they deliver As, Bs and Cs.
As. These are the activities in which they consistently achieve peak performance. Try to be as specific as possible when describing the things they deliver.
Bs. These are the activities they do competently but do not hit the heights. They may also get bored doing these tasks and make occasional mistakes.
Cs. These are the activities they have little feeling for and only limited ability to improve.
One person wrote:
“My Marketing Director, Dave, is brilliant at delivering innovative campaigns that produce bottom-line results. Sally, the HR Director, delivers strategies that enable our people to make their best contributions to the business. She has also produced a programme that retains talented people in the company. Mary, our COO, has the ability to translate our vision into specific actions that deliver the goods."
"Roy, our FD, provides excellent strategic financial advice. That is his A talent. The problem is that he gets bogged down in the day-to-day management of the financial team. Certainly he can do this task, but we need him to play to his As. He needs somebody who can run a more self-managing finance department.”
Try tackling the exercise on this theme. Describe where each person delivers As, Bs and Cs. Continue until you have covered everybody in the team.
2) You can clarify how to co-ordinate people’s strengths to achieve the team's goals.
Let’s assume that you have clarified the team’s picture of success and strategies. You have also clarified people's strengths. Bearing in mind the team’s goals, ask yourself the following questions.
* How can we co-ordinate people’s strengths – where they deliver As – to achieve the goals?
* How can people make clear contracts about their best contributions toward achieving the goals?
* How can we compensate for any weaknessses or gaps that must be filled to deliver the team goals?
Certainly I have found that many teams find ways to answer these questions. They capitalise on their strengths and find solutions to cover any weaknesses. This enables them to achieve peak performance.
Older style organisations sometimes find it difficult to generate creative solutions. So they rush back to putting people in boxes based on historical job descriptions. The problem is that people then mainly use their Bs and Cs, rather than play to their As.
Try tackling the exercise on this theme. First, describe how you can co-ordinate people's strengths to achieve the goals. Second, describe how you can ensure any gaps are filled. Try completing the following sentences.
3) You can continue co-ordinating people’s strengths to reach the team's goals.
The next step is to swing into action. Let’s assume that you made contracts about people’s parts in reaching the goals. You will then focus on managing by outcomes, rather than managing by tasks. Every month you will invite each person to present:
* The specific things I have delivered in the last month towards achieving the picture of success.
* The specific things I plan to deliver in the next month.
* The challenges I face, the strategies for tackling these and the support needed to achieve success.
Continuous Improvement
Great leaders continue to encourage their people to focus on continuous improvement. Bearing this in mind, it can be useful to gather your team together and invite them to provide concrete examples on the following themes.
The things we are doing well
* The specific things we are doing well are:
* The specific things we can do to follow these principles more in the future are:
The things we can do better
* The specific things we can do better and how are:
The things we can do to continue
to co-ordinate our strengths
* The specific things we can do continue capitalising on people's strengths are:
* The specific things we can do to compensate for any weaknesses are:
There are many models for building a team. This article has outlined one approach to using people's talents. Employing it properly can enable your people to move from 8/10 to 10/10. Try completing the following exercise.
Posted on Sunday, January 22nd, 2012 at 4:44 am in Super teams, The Strengths Blog | RSS feed
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