Assembling a good team.
How do you assemble a good team? There are a lot of different thoughts on how to answer this question. A successful team requires specialists in their field, the ability to collaborate and self-correct. It requires the individual roles to work as a whole and to sympathetically operate within systems that optimize the outcomes and performance of an entity. The Bible uses the analogy of a body to demonstrate and emphasize how to effectively bring people together to accomplish a mission.
"There is one body, but it has many parts. But all its many parts make up one body"… "the parts of the body will not take sides. All of them will take care of one another. If one part suffers, every part suffers with it. If one part is honored, every part shares in its joy."
Consider the Parts
This road map to team building recognizes both the independence and interdependence of a team member. A diversity of skills that are complementary to one another. When building the team, it is crucial that we pay attention to finding the right parts. Having a good hiring process will help you to find the right people for the job. What is your process and how could it be improved?
Having the right people in the right places enables a team to thrive. Identifying the needed roles on a team is an overlooked skill. Just the way the body has a certain number of parts it needs; teams operate the same way. Anything over 2 hands is superfluous, but one foot would cause an imbalance (no pun intended). Do you have too many creatives and not enough administrators? Finding the balance is key and getting the right people in place creates success.
In business, we can also have the wrong people in place. It is just as important to remove bad agents as it is to get the right ones. When the composition of a team is wrong, you can feel it. When a part of the body starts reproducing the wrong thing it is called cancer and early detection and treatment is key to creating good health. The same is true in your teams and why accountability is vital in promoting healthy teams.
Consider the Systems
When we look at the body there are various systems that make sure the body parts have what they need to survive. They have feedback loops that enable communication. There is a system that monitors pain levels and another that delivers instructions.
What systems are at work in your teams? Can you identify them and what purpose do they serve? With this system inventory in mind, are there new systems that need to be developed to create health?
