FIX YOUR BROKEN TEAM CULTURE INTRO VIDEO 3 – FIVE FIXABLE REASONS TEAMS UNDERACHEVE

Hello and welcome to video 3 of How to Fix Your Broken Team Culture. We're gonna learn how to create a more positive, productive, and profitable team culture with ideas from my book, Rapid Teamwork: How to Transform Any Group into a Great Team. In this video, we're gonna focus on the 5 fixable reasons why teams underachieve. And as a team leader, you're here because you know that talent alone does not determine your success. See, talent is absolutely essential, but it's never sufficient. And I've found that teams underachieve for one of five reasons. And since you're committed to being a leader who serves and cares about and encourages and supports people, this video is going to help you to identify which area that your team culture may need your attention for. Now, you may not have read anything from Tolstoy, but my guess is you've lived enough to recognize the wisdom of this quote: All happy families really are alike, and the relevance to us is that all happy and exceptional team cultures are alike as well. Not identical, but they are alike and successful because they focus on the same 5 things that you need to build a positive, productive, and profitable team culture. The problem is that whether through ignorance or neglect or intention, even the happiest of families, even the most exceptional team culture, can be sabotaged. So you're gonna learn today about the 5 things that do sabotage team performance, but luckily all of them are fixable. So here are the 5 fixable reasons that teams underachieve. Reason 1: They don't have a unifying team goal. One of the things that I share with my students as a teacher and then my athletes as a coach, and now for a number of years with teams and leaders around the world regardless of industry is that if you as a leader want the people on your team to do more, you need to make sure that they know why they're here. If they don't know why they're there, they won't do as much while they're there. As a teacher, I found that if students didn't have a purpose for what they were doing in class, they were far less likely to do it and certainly wouldn't do it well. But if they understood that what they're doing that day was one small step in a far more significant and meaningful journey that they were going to take for themselves, then what they did that day, they took more seriously. So the first job you have as a leader is to identify where you're going and why. And once you've identified a challenging, compelling common goal, it's only then that your people become more likely to engage themselves in work that has to be done to get there. But the step doesn't just end with identifying a goal, because that alone doesn't make your team culture high-performing. It's only one part of the puzzle, and there are other parts required to create unifying team goals. You need to clarify exactly why the team exists. You need to make sure you create a relevant and inspiring vision and mission statement. You need to make sure that they know not just what the values on your team are supposed to be, but what those behaviors are going to look like and how they'll be demonstrated. What do they look like in a day-to-day situation? And then finally, how do you take that mission and vision and take that goal that your team has and those values you've identified and translate them into behaviors for each individual? And how do you take numbers and key metrics for your team and turn those into one-on-one conversations that you can have to ensure you're coaching and developing your people so that they become a team? And that so together you get the results you all desire. That's the first fixable thing that can sabotage great leaders. They don't set unifying goals. Now, the second reason that teams underachieve is an absence of supportive relationships. Every teammate wants a safe space in order to share their ideas and to give their best work. So what you have to do is to invest time to make sure that you help people understand who they're trying to get to that destination with. What are their individual desires, strengths, and challenges, and background? Because the better you know the team that you're with, the more likely you are to work successfully with them. So part of connecting people and building relationships starts with you knowing how do you as a leader connect with your team in a meaningful and supportive way. What are some activities you can use, whether it's convocation cards or other ideas, to make sure that you become far more aware of your team and their personalities and their styles of thinking and their challenges and their desires? And then how do you, most importantly, how do you build trust among your team? How do you help your teammates build trust, not just with each other, but with clients? So the first reason teams underachieve is no unifying goals. The second is an absence of supportive relationships. Now, once you get those first two taken care of, a great deal of your work has been done as a leader, because that's how you really create engagement. Knowing what they're working to accomplish and knowing who they're there trying to accomplish it with— those are the two key things that will engage your people in their work. And after you get them to care about where they're going and who they're going with, then you need to establish team agreements. That's the third reason teams underachieve—because of unclear expectations. So your people need to know and understand what the standards are for you and how your team will behave along the way on your team's journey. All failure is the result of vagueness. So what are you doing to clarify those agreements in order to make sure that you set clear expectations? Successful leaders get the team to agree on standards and commitments that they're going to make, their daily behaviors, to make sure they get to that destination successfully together. They know how to use if-thens and pre-mortems so the team can look ahead to identify possible challenges. They define how the team is going to communicate with each other digitally or in meetings or otherwise. They're clear on what that type of communication looks like and how they're going to handle mistakes. Which leads to the fourth reason that teams underachieve: avoiding accountability. See, accountability has become an issue in a number of conversations I've had with leaders recently. And accountability, much like culture, has become a buzzword. But basically, it's taking ownership. And as Molière wrote, "We are not judged by what we do, but also by what we don't do." So how do you inspire initiative and sustain personal accountability? How will you ensure the people on your team do what they say they're going to? How do you create a culture where people will thrive and take ownership? Soon you get people to recognize that the person in the mirror is the one who is responsible for your team's results. That's when your team will begin to thrive. Creating a culture where people take individual ownership and are aware of the ripples of impact that their daily behaviors have on team performance starts with empathy. And so your team needs to understand why it's important to emphasize empathy. You need to make sure that you and your people outlaw rearview criticisms. You'll be much happier when you learn how to stop punishing and to start really coaching and developing people. And then finally, clear expectations require that you redefine how you're going to handle feedback and in those difficult conversations that always need to be had on teams? Is it something that you wait until the end of the year or quarter to say something? Because that's obviously going to be less successful. As a coach, if I had waited until the banquet, we would not have had very good games along the way. Feedback should be immediate and constructive. And if you need tools to do that effectively, I can certainly share a framework that's gonna make you successful. So you're probably wondering what the fifth reason is for teams underachieving. It's probably something that has caused you frustration and disappointment in the past. It's appreciation. See, the last thing that causes underachieving team cultures is a lack of meaningful appreciation. See, not every job is visible on most teams, but every job is valuable. And once you as a leader recognize the impact of recognition recognition, saying thank you for the efforts that often feel unseen by people, you become far more inspiring as a leader and they become far more engaged as teammates. So how and when will you recognize the efforts of your team so they feel valued? For all those people who are not always in the spotlight, how will you make them feel thanked for their efforts? To create a comprehensive recognition program for your team, you're going to need to understand the importance of people being seen. You need to identify and understand the things that people on your team already applaud. Then you need to focus on what it is that you should be celebrating, because what gets rewarded will always get repeated. Have you used the power of milestones, $20 celebrations, to make the journey more exciting, to inspire your people along the way? See, how will you personalize recognition so that you You give each person on your team the praise that they prefer. Those are the 5 things that as a leader you want to make sure you are focusing on to build a high-performing culture: goals, relationships, expectations, accountability, and toasts. The Rapid Teamwork System is the entire puzzle. It's all the pieces we've been talking about and provides you a step-by-step process of activities for implementation. So that your team becomes far more productive and positive. You'll get started with goals, and that will lead to relationships, and you will focus on expectations and establish accountability, and then recognize and thank people for their contributions. This Proven Sequence is something that you as a leader can follow to create a high-performing team culture. And the truth is, you probably already do most of it quite well. But many leaders don't give adequate attention to all 5 areas. So maybe you're not focused on one of the ingredients that are required as part of the recipe for great team cultures. And if you're missing one of those ingredients in a cake you're baking, it's not going to turn out very well. So it's the exact same way with a culture when you're building it. You need all 5 pieces. You need to know how to implement activities to build all 5 successfully into your team, to fix what might be broken. To stop underachieving. And you'd probably like to have an experienced guide available for phone calls or email check-ins to ensure that you're comfortable with implementing each step along the way. Wouldn't it be nice to have a masterclass on team culture that can walk you through a process to give you the confidence and the coaching so that you're 100% sure your team culture would improve? Well, I'm glad to let you know that that does exist. In our next video, you'll learn about the proven system for building exceptional team cultures. You're ready to start fixing your broken team culture now. And now that you know exactly what you need to focus on to stop your people from underachieving, I look forward to helping you lead your team more effectively.