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Building High Performance Teams

by: Srinivasan R.G.

Your managerial success is tied to your team. Teams are the most valuable resource of an organization. The times of lone leadership are over with Alexander the Great. These are the times of the team leadership. If you can build a successful team and work as the leader who is just a little more equal than others you may be able to pull off everything you do with great success.

Successful team building requires a lot of focus and effort. Here are a few tips to build teams that are effective and deliver results.

Define the Objectives: Does the team members understand clearly the expectations from them? Have the performance challenges clearly been defined? Do they know what the expected outcomes are? If there is a misunderstanding on the results expected from each member as well as that of the team, you may as well write off the team. Great Team + Challenging Objective = Extraordinary Results.

Define the vision: The teams realize that they may be able to survive only by delivering the bottom line results. However they need something more than the key results defined to them. They need a vision, something higher than profits and results. A higher ideal fires up the team�s creativity and passion.

Empower to Create Ownership: Empower your team to be independent decision makers to accomplish tasks and team objectives while defining their boundaries. Empowered teams and members carry out its objectives faster as they do not need to wait for the leader to decide for them. Empowered teams own up their responsibility.

Train, Train and Train Some More: A leader has a large stake in the success of each team member. Members of teams require different skills and the leader needs to be a trainer rather than a driver. Identify skill gaps in soft as well as areas of expertise and keep training them to produce better results.

Fostering Right Interpersonal Relationships: Make the team understand that there would be differences. Difference in gender, culture, thought process and approach to work symbolizes the dynamic and diverse members who have come together to achieve common goals. Respecting the difference and valuing others experience and thoughts enable the team to function with the right relationships.

Rewards and Compensation: As they say, first share the cash then the compliments. Everyone talks about the value and benefits of team work. However benefits to individuals must be clear along with the benefits to the organization. Set down the right monetary rewards and incentives for so that the achievement and benefits for the individuals and organization are balanced.

Lead by Example: A leader always leads from the front. Set example of discipline, performance orientation putting aside personal ego to the team�s superiority. Give credit to the others even though you may have contributed more. This nurtures the right team atmosphere and spirit of togetherness.

Celebrate Success: Finally don�t forget to celebrate success. It must become a habit to celebrate every achievement though small they may be. Constant celebration boosts the team morale driving it to perform at higher levels and aim for bigger achievements.

Many of the business cultures and managements celebrate the lone hero leadership much more than the team leaderships. In the modern interdependent world it is the teams within the organizations and multiple teams all collaborating and contributing to the common corporate objectives that really differentiate the dynamic growing organizations from the lone cowboy leaderships that may collapse the moment the leader is not available to lead.

About the author:
R.G. Srinivasan is a Managerial professional, Writer and Author. He writes a regular blog on management thoughts available at with interesting articles on management, managerial resources, strategies and experiences.

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