Building a High Performing Team - Jim Rees

So it's my absolute pleasure to introduce Jim Rees, ultra cyclist, author and executive coach. Jim knows what it takes to push beyond the imaginable. He has completed three consecutive solo finishes in the Race Across America, acknowledged to be one of the toughest races on the planet. So Jim knows about the sort of mindset a team needs to be able to form and sustain that performance. Jim and Mark's company, the long and the short of it, focus on maximising potential at individual, team and organisational level. They work with senior leaders to create an awareness to enable them to be more engaging and more inspiring within the organisations they lead. So thanks, Jim, again and over to you.

It's a pleasure to be here this afternoon, you all. And I guess before I start, I'd just like to sort of give you a little bit of why Mark and I started our company, the long and the short of it. And our purpose behind that is that our purpose is to inspire individuals to believe in their inner greatness, which we believe will help them tap into more of their potential more consistently, no matter what they do, whether that's in the corporate world or whether that's actually out on the tennis court or on the golf course. So that's our purpose and whether that's via one to one coaching, whether it's working with a team or whether it's us doing our speeches at a conference, that's our main core focus, is to inspire people to believe in their inner greatness. So the first question that you put up on the slide is, why are we here? And I have a belief that there's a potential major blind spot currently in the corporate world. And I back this up with data which I'm going to share with you shortly, but also my own personal experience, having worked as a coach in the corporate world for the last 16 years. So let me skip into the data and it's data that a number of you will be familiar with, but it's the study that was done by Gallup and it's their engagement data that was first published back in 2010 and more recently, 2013 was the most recent iteration of their global engagement study. And quite surprisingly, there's not been a big shift from 2010 when it was first published, to, you know, the more recent figures back in 2013. So we're doing a little bit of stargazing. I accept that. I guess that they'll be looking to sort of publish more up to date data as it is now, I'm guessing maybe in the next six months, hopefully. But if we look Back at their study, over 1.3 billion people were surveyed in this global study of 142 countries across the globe. And what they found, which was quite surprising, was that only 13% of people were fully committed and positively contributing in the corporate workplace. Which is quite staggering really when you think about it, because these are people that are fully motivated, the people that offer their discretionary behavior. So these are people that go the extra mile. They're the sort of people that we would want absolutely in our team, within our companies, within our businesses. So 13% is quite shocking really when we think about it. If you look at the middle curve or the typical bell curve that we all look at, when we're looking at studies, you can see here that 63% of people are not engaged, they lack the motivation, so they come in at 9 o' clock and they leave at 5. And they don't offer any of their discretionary behaviors. So they do their job, but they don't go, unfortunately, the extra mile. They don't see a project through to its full completion. And it's an interesting cohort. What's really alarming actually, and what's really disturbing is this final cohort, the actively disengaged group, 24% of staff actively disengage within organizations, sort of walking the corridors, throwing little hand grenades in when they can. We call these individuals, they've been labeled various terminologies in the past, Mood Hoover is one of them, and energy vampires. These are the sort of individuals that throw cold water on the current change program that might be taking place in an organization or the direction, the strategic direction that you're heading in. They're the ones that are very quick to sort of behind everyone else's back, poo, poo, the whole idea. So 24% of people actively disengage, which is quite shocking really. So I think there is a compelling why as to why we're looking at this, building corporate teams or building a high performing team. And it's no wonder that that actively disengaged has a massive impact on the bottom line. So if you look at productivity and you look at profit, then it's absolutely having an impact there as well. I guess if operating, you'd have a real challenge on your hands to be able to get your products to your clients. And similarly, I suppose another good example would be an IT issue if you had 24% of your computers not working. That would be a major nightmare within your business, within any business in today's global operating services. So I think There is a compelling why as to why we might be looking at this topic today. Building high performing teams. We are partners. We've decided to become strategic partners and authorized partners of Patrick Lencioni's group. And a number of you, I'm sure, will have come across his book The Five Dysfunctions of a Team, which was written about 12 years ago. And I'll be referring to that model a little bit later in this presentation. But Patrick's quote here, which you've probably all read whilst I've been talking, highlights the fact that actually teamwork is the main competitive advantage. Of course, it is actually powerful when a team is working cohesively. But the challenge for all of us is that actually it's quite a rare thing to have a cohesive and high performing team. And the great thing about cohesive teams, of course you can read it on the slide yourselves, is that they are, they do create a competitive advantage. They're more fun to be on, they certainly avoid wasting time and energy on politics and destructive conflicts. And of course they make better and faster decisions so they tap into their full potential. So there's no major issue with cohesive teams. We want more of those. Of course, if you look at the organizational piece, so before I look at teams, I want to have a global view of Patrick's model, which is looking at organizational health. If you're looking to have a healthy organization. If you look at the pie, the first step of the pie is to build a cohesive leadership team. And what we're talking about here is the top team, the board, and making sure that the board of directors are fully aligned, fully cohesive. And once you've done that, the next three chunks of the pie are all around, interestingly, all around communication. So creating clarity over communicating that clarity and then reinforcing that clarity within the organization. So if I look at asking this question at a conference, so I know I can't necessarily get an immediate response from the attendees today, but if I was to rhetorically ask this question to you guys and you had time to respond, typically when we ask this question at a conference, it doesn't really matter which audience, which sector that we might be working with, whether it's the pharmaceutical industry, whether it's the banking world, whether it's manufacturing, R and D, if we ask the question, what are the attributes of a peak performer, someone that you might deem world class at what they do, we typically get a list of the one that you can see on your screen now, which is, you know, these individuals are very Enthusiastic, they've got great vision, they're determined, they're motivated, they're very goal directed, they're a great listener, they're engaging, they're committed and they're organized. Now typically when we ask the question, we get this sort of a list back from the audience. And when you then break it down and ask the question, well, what percentage is attitudinal and what percentage is skill? Usually it typically lands on 8. 70% of those attributes attitudinal and 20% give us skill based as a skill. But it's interesting when we think about developing people within our organizations that a lot of the budget and resource goes towards developing skill as opposed to developing attitude. And when I talk about attitude, what we're talking about really is mindset or for want of a better word, emotional intelligence. So when building a high performing team, we use a model, a framework which is a very simple model. It's called the ABC of Success. And the A is awareness. And we use the metaphor of a fingerprint. And the reason for the metaphor of a fingerprint is that it's creating a heightened awareness for the leaders within your organizations of the fingerprint that you leave in every interaction that you have, with every conversation that you have, you're leaving your own DNA, your unique fingerprint in that situation. So the first step we do to create a deeper level of awareness is to use an emotional intelligence questionnaire. And the framework that we use that we're partners again with JCA occupational psychologists and the framework is up on your screen and it's just a core framework. So what we're looking at is the main model. So on the left hand side you can see that it's very self focused, self regard, self awareness and self management. And then it also measures your regard for others, your awareness of others, and then your relationship management scales. And then it boils down into 16 different scales. So give you the opportunity just to sort of look through these. But in essence, when you look at the self management scales, what it does is it measures emotional resilience, it looks at personal power, it looks at goal directedness, flexibility, your ability to connect with others and your authenticity. So that's the self management scales. On the relationship management scales, what it measures is your ability to trust, whether you have a balanced outlook or not, whether you what is your emotional expression and control like, what do you like it to? Handling conflict. And then your interdependence scales as well. And then finally the 16th scale is reflective learning which is becoming an interesting aspect within the Corporate world. Given the fact that we are running at such a pace nowadays, you know, where we've, we're attempting to get more from less and what I mean by that is, you know, we're trying to continue to improve the sales and the bottom line but typically with less staff, you know, so we used to have 10 in a team, now we've got eight and those eight have to take up the slack of the two that have departed. So, you know, there is more pressure, there's more pace and reflective learning gets messed off. And it is actually an interesting one and it's an Achilles heel of the corporate world. We're not that good at looking back and sifting through what's worked well, what we've learned from those situations. We're so busy that we're on the treadmill of next, next, next, next, next. So a little bit more data for you. So our first step is basically when looking to build a high performing team is firstly look at the individual. So look at their emotional intelligence, look at the patterns of behavior that they run and then give them that awareness in a confidential one to one coaching exploration. So we explore this with the individual, it's not shared with other members of the team. It's very personal and very revealing as well. Of course a little bit more data just to sort of strengthen emotional intelligence and why it's so important right now. Rozier did this, looked at this some years ago, looked at 181 different positions from 121 organizations worldwide and the abilities deemed to be critical for effective performance were roughly about 70% of emotionally emotional competencies. So again, just sort of reinforcing the global stuff. And also this EI stuff that I've been talking about, the mindset. So the mindset is a bit of a game changer. I don't think I'm telling you anything new to be fair. Again, just backing it up again with some further data. Zenger and Folkman, the extraordinary leader work that they looked at the technical quotient, they looked at the motivational quotient, they looked at the eq, the emotional quotient to see what was the difference that made the difference for exceptional leadership. And what you can see here fairly quickly is that it's not the technical thing. If you've got the technical but you haven't got the motivation and you haven't got the eq, it doesn't really amount to much. Again, if you haven't got the technical, but you've got the motivation, but you lack the emotional quotient then again, it doesn't really amount to much and again, you can see the slide. What's critical is actually having all three competencies that you've got the technical, you've got the motivational piece and also you've got the emotional quotient as well. So exceptional leadership is all about having the blend of all those three. I mentioned Patrick Lencioni a little bit earlier, his book Five Dysfunctions of a Team. We, as I said, are partners and we use this model. So when looking at building a high performing team, we use this model and I think it's one of the best models out there. In essence, what we're talking about is the foundation level is looking at trust. So not the sort of trust that we're all fairly used to. So if you're working in a team, this is not about predictive trust, this is about vulnerability based trust and making sure that we build a vulnerability based trust environment within our team. So trust, if you haven't got trust, and I'm talking about vulnerability based trust, you can't then move to the next level, which is conflict. You and I can't have a healthy conflict. I can't have a different view to you as an individual if I don't trust you. So it has an impact on conflict. So we need to be able to have healthy conflict, not destructive conflict. Of course, if we can't have conflict, that has an impact on our commitment to the project, our commitment to seeing it through. And then of course that also then has another impact on our accountability, whether we're going to take full accountability for that project or not. And of course, in turn, ultimately that will have an impact on the results. Now I'm just going to go to a question, I'm not going to go for the poll actually, Jane, I'm just going to ask this question and I'll give you the figures. So this question was asked in a poll some time ago. When team members admit their mistakes, does it make them trust them? Does it make you trust them more? And thousands of people polled on this, thousands of people within organizations were polled on this and 84% came back and said, yes, it would make me trust them more if they did actually admit their mistakes. Equally. Another question that was, I thought quite interesting that came up was would you be content to work in a team that was harmonious? So there was no conflict, but it was harmonious. But you didn't actually get the results. And again, a staggering 94% said they prefer to work on a team that was more Chaotic, but actually did get the results. So quite a shock when I first saw those figures. So actually results do actually matter in today's business world. And of course people are very committed to wanting to focus their efforts and attention on achieving those results. The great thing I like about this model is that when working with a team, we can actually measure the team's scales on all these levels. So we can measure the trust, we can measure conflict, we can measure the commitment, the accountability and the results. So it's a very powerful model. And the other good thing about this is of course you can do a stake in the ground, measure the team and then six months or a year later post your change program or leadership development program, you can then re measure it. And this triangle then gives you on one side your previous results and then on the other side in color codes of course your improvements, which is fantastic as well. So look, I'm conscious that we're coming towards the the back end of time for this webinar. I just wanted to make you aware for those people that are here today, we're doing Mark and I are putting on a full day conference, Eight Steps to World Class Performance held in London at the Andes Hotel. And we've got an array of speakers which we're very excited about. We've got the CEO for example of from JCA who's going to be talking about emotional intelligence in a bit more detail. You'll both have Mark and I there talking about performance and what we're offering here. For those members that are here online Today, up until the 1st of October, an early bird discount of £250 for the full day price of that event. Its full price ticket is 2lbs 95. So if you email me at the email address and we'll send that out, we'll send a link to you if you email. We'll honor that until the 1st of October so you can get your early bird ticket to our event. If you'd like to hear a bit more detail and a bit more depth into what I've sort of literally skipped across. I've almost picked up a stone and skimmed it across the water in today's webinar for you. So I'm sort of conscious of the time it's 20 past 1. What I'd like to do is hand over to Kate and Kate, give you the opportunity to ask any questions that might have been coming up through the people that are listening in today.

Great, thanks very much, Jim. Right, we have lots of questions coming in and the first one is Asking about, is global engagement congruent with national cultures? Is it more prevalent in some cultures than others? So be interested in your take on that.

Yeah, it's a great question. And in fact, I urge people to go online, Google the Gallup data because it actually is divided up into countries and also into regions. So it's extremely good data. I think it's worthy of a look because I know most organizations do do their own internal engagement studies and I think there is a bit of a blind spot. I do believe that I hear it often when I go and work and talk with leaders that their engagement studies are through the roof. And I'm slightly concerned about that because I know that the Gallup is an anonymous study and people obviously give their full truth. I'm not sure whether some of the internal engagement studies that organizations are using allow or whether people feel comfortable giving their true opinion. So I don't know whether I've answered that appropriately, Kate, but I'd certainly urge people to go and have a look at the localized data, certainly data for the uk there's data for Western and Eastern Europe and across various regions. How typically global organizations end up chunking up into regions. So the data is really, really compelling. But I didn't really want to take too much time today explaining all that.

No, thanks very much for that. Maybe we could add the link to that when we send out the recording. Another great question here. If you only have limited resources, is it better to try and improve the actively engaged or. Or reduce the actively disengaged?

Great question. And again, I didn't dive into that, but my belief is absolutely we have to take care of the actively engaged. These are people that are actually out there doing a phenomenal job on your behalf. The actively disengaged. It reminds me of the old saying, you can lead a horse to water, but you can't make it drink. And as leaders, and it's been my experience as well, working in this environment, leaders tend to spend so much time and energy focused on the actively disengaged, attempting to sort of bring them along on that journey. The truth is, actually my belief is, yes, do what you can for those individuals, but they're the sort of individuals that you don't really want staying in your organization. I think the best cohort to go for personally is absolutely, keep your top performers, your fully engaged people, happy and content. The big chunk is the 63% that are teetering on that edge of potentially being actively engaged. So it's about inspiring them and engaging them. I think Your efforts and energy should be really focused on that middle cohort and ideally almost encourage those people that aren't aligned with the values of your organisation to lead the actively disengaged. We have been spending so much time on performance managing these individuals, it's terrible.

Right, well thanks very much for that answer. I know this is probably a difficult question, but if you could identify a single, the biggest contributing factor to team success or what would it be?

It's without a doubt my belief would be trust and that's vulnerability based trust. So if I've got predictive trust, if I'm in a team and I've got predictive trust with you and you're a team member, what I'm looking at there is I ask you to do something and I know I can predict that you're going to do it for me. What I'm talking about in terms of trust within this model, within this context, is being vulnerable to be able to speak your truth and have the courage to speak your truth. And I don't see that often within the corporate world people are often sort of ring fencing their own little environment and more concerned about their own self interest as opposed to the interest of the team.

Staying with trust. Somebody wants to know the one thing you can do to gain or regain trust.

I think it goes back to awareness. I think it goes back to are you aware as a leader what fingerprint you're currently leaving in your organization? So it's a bit like, I think Magoo is probably the best example and I hope that this example works for everyone. Magoo was a cartoon character from my childhood many years ago and he basically had very poor eyesight and he was operating out of awareness most of the time he was going along thinking that things were going all swimmingly well, but actually in fact he was creating a whole load of chaos in his wake. So as a leader, are you aware of the fingerprint that you're currently leaving in your organization? And if I can do a quick book recommendation, I absolutely think that a brilliant book for leaders to read is Leadership and Self Deception, a book by the Arbiter Institute. I don't get royalties, I just think it's a fantastic book. It's got some great references in there and some really, really powerful stories.

For that answer. That's one for me to look up. Going back to the high performing teams, you've talked about trust being so important to success, what do you think is the biggest constraining or interference in achieving a high performance team? Is it the absence of trust or maybe is it something else?

Well, without trust, you then can't have the conflict. So trust is the foundation. And once you've got the trust, you can then have healthy conflict. If I trust you, I can then have a proper conversation. You and I can have different views and we can almost agree to disagree, but at least it allows us to get that conversation out on the table, which will then help us lean into being more committed, will take more accountability, which of course will then have an impact on the results.

So when you use the term conflict, are you meaning difference or something else? Because conflict often has quite negative connotations, does it not?

No, I'm talking instead of destructive conflict, I'm talking about healthy conflict. So being in a space of being able to have and respect each other's view and opinion. So that only comes from if I trust you, if I don't believe that you've got the credibility and I don't trust your view, your opinion based on past experience, then of course I'm going to struggle to really share my truth with you. And then we're going to struggle to have healthy conflict. So it's about creating healthy conflict as opposed to destructive conflict. So instead of poking holes in your theories and sniping behind your back, it's about being actually face to face and being able to have that difficult conversation.

So if we think of the model that many people are familiar with for teamwork, the Tuckmans forming Norman Storming, are you saying you can't form and certainly norm without trust and it's the trust that leads you to that storming phase?

Yeah, completely. I think the quicker you can build trust, the better off you are as a team. And you know, you're talking about even when a new team member joins, so you could be an intact team and then all of a sudden someone leaves and then you've got a new team member coming into the team. The biggest thing that you can do in that situation is make sure that everyone encourages them, includes them, that new team member into the team as quickly as possible and builds trust as soon as possible as well. Because of course that will have a destabilizing effect on the team if that's not done.

Well, that's great, actually. Jim, thank you very much because we've now come to the end of the webinar. So I'll hand back to Jane now, just leaves to me. Thank you very much for a very authentic webinar.

Well, thank you very much and it's been an absolute pleasure. So look forward to answering any further questions that we may get via Twitter and via email.

Thank you Jim, and thank you Kate. And thank you everyone for attending today's webinar. Once you leave today's Webinar, you'll receive a survey on the presentation and we'd appreciate it if you could complete this and provide your feedback. You'll also receive a follow up email within 24 hours with a link to the recording of today's webinar. On behalf of the Institute of Leadership and Management and our presenters, thank you for joining us today and enjoy the.

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