7 Keys to Build a Killer Team

What sets apart market leaders, championship teams, and nonprofit organizations with worldwide impact?

Their ability to build and develop high-performance teams.

Strong teams are the secretto outperforming the market, delivering profitable growth year after year, and changing the world.

No wonder big sports franchises spend millions of dollars to build dream teams and big corporations offer great incentives to lure top talent! 

Having the budget to pay top performers is great, but it doesn’t guarantee high-performance teams, nor does it guarantee results. 

Indeed, we can all name iconic corporations who went bankrupt in the last decade despite offering compensation packages that no nonprofit or small to medium company could afford. 

If your budget is grounded in reality, and you need to find practical ways to build your team, what matters most is the leadership team’s ability to:

•           Build a diverse team where each player brings clear strengths and talents

•           Rally the team around a compelling vision

•           Empower and challenge the team to exceed expectations year after year

Tapping into the power of clarity, diversity, genuine care, disciplined collaboration, deliberate empowerment, constant challenge, and timely celebration will allow the leadership team to reach those 3 objectives.

1.         Clarity

Once our basic physiological and safety needs are met, humans crave belonging, esteem, and self-actualization.

Leadership teams should provide a compelling vision and strategy where employees can not only see what is required from them but also visualize the prospect of an impactful career beyond merely performing a job. 

Clarity of vision and strategy will also allow the leadership team to define the right organizational structure and talent profile to smash their goals.

Do you have your exciting 3, 5, and 10-year plans at hand?

2.         Diversity

It is imperative to hire with a clear understanding of the expertise needed in each department (finance, marketing, sales, operations) for each function while ensuring that each person will fit into one unique corporate culture.

Additionally, thanks to technology, the world is getting smaller. However, it remains diverse, and those who are capitalizing on the diversity factor have the edge.

The strength of the team lies in its unity and its diversity.

How diverse is your team in terms of age, gender, race, experience, expertise, culture?

How unified is it in its purpose?

3.         Genuine care

Your team will go above and beyond expectations when you capture their hearts, engage them, and establish trust.

To create this emotional bond to the organization, you must demonstrate that you care sincerely through intentional, transparent, two-way open communication.

You will be able to connect to their aspirations and know what make them tick. Communication can be formal (employee meetings, kick off, coffee talks, open door policy, emails, one to one) or informal (lunches, management by walking around, etc.).

Demonstrate compassion in tough times.

For some strange reason, sometimes leaders intentionally distance themselves from their team and do not demonstrate any sense of humanity. This approach will alienate you from your team and prevent you from getting the best from them.

Do you act on feedback from your team: when was the last time you executed on an idea that came from the front end of your organization and not from you or your leadership team? 

Can you clearly articulate the frustrations and the roadblocks that your team faces daily?

Are you sharing your financial information with your team?

4.         Disciplined collaboration

A high-performance team delivers extraordinary results.

Set up processes that allow you to build a well-oiled execution machine where no silos between departments could stall your growth.

There should be a clear understanding of the role and responsibility of each person.

Does your sales team understand the goals of your finance team?

Do you have clear and established key performance metrics?

5.         Deliberate empowerment

No one knows it all, which is why you want a high-performance team.

Micro-managementkills creativity and agility—the fundamentals for any organization which plans to lead and last.

Delegate, give your team the right tools and systems, and provide timely feedback so your team can be confident in making fast decisions.

Are you constantly evaluating the effectiveness of your processes?

Are you investing in your team’s development?

6.         Constant challenge

Human potential is infinite.

Constantly expose your team to stretch goals—not delusional goals that will demotivate or lead to unethical behavior, as illustrated with the latest Wells Fargo fake accounts scandal.

Do you manage base goals and stretch goals? 

7.         Celebrate small and big wins

If you can afford to bring well known political or business figures to your employee meetings, do it, but team lunches and outdoor activities work wonders too.

Above all, remember to praise and thank your employee each time they go the extra mile.

You will be surprised by the power of one personalized email or a written thank you note to nurture the commitment and faithfulness of your employees to your organization. 

How often do you celebrate as a team?

Do you have a culture where praise and thanksgiving come naturally to any employee?

As stated at the beginning of the article, building a high-performance team doesn’t require an astronomical budget. It does, however, require time, planning, attention, and focus.

How do you measure up on each of those seven points, on a scale from 1 to 10?

What did you discover about you and your team through this self-evaluation?

Feel free to contact me at cindy@newskiesnation.com if you would like my thoughts on your results and guidance on how to boost the performance and engagement of your team.

Former tech executive, Cindy Montgenie is the CEO of New Skies Nation. As a high-performance strategist, keynote speaker and trainer, Cindy Montgenie helps business leaders to win in the disruptive digital era, without losing their sanity by using a game changer mindset