Transformational Teams - Lesson 4

Hello and welcome back. We're in session number four of Transformational Teams. And in the past three sessions, we've done a little bit of a review about the behaviors and mindsets that you bring to the table and that actually provide a foundation for the value that you bring to the team individually.

We've also talked about your personal and the team's mission, vision, and values. So what we're gonna do in this session is we're gonna transition to what are overall team tendencies. We focused on ourselves and we focused on some things that we bring to the team.

Now, let's look at some of the dynamics that are actually involved in the teams themselves. So as we consider overall team tendencies, it's important that we remember that teams are made up of individuals. And that is why the first part of our course specifically focused on you.

However, teams have personalities too. And as we go through this process, what I want you to understand is that the team's personality is derived from the type of people it attracts, but there are exceptions too. So I want you to think about your team in particular.

And as you think about that team, what types of personalities does it actually attract? How does this speak to your team's strengths? And which people on the team are actually gonna bring something different that initially you may not understand? How does this fit? But their strengths may be a key element to helping you improve as an individual and as a team. So let's consider why we should consider a team's personality. Because if we don't, we can find ourselves in a really challenging position.

The first thing that you've heard probably over your lifetime many times is know yourself. When you know yourself, you're better able to choose between situations where you are challenged and situations where you're more likely to succeed. When you understand those things, it should give you the confidence to put yourself into a role, especially where you have expertise that other team members don't.

But the same thing applies to teams. Teams are often going to be somewhat specialized and they're going to focus in areas that perhaps other groups of people can't focus on. So let's think about a couple reasons why you really need to care about the team's personality.

Because without that focus, you may not even accomplish the things that the team is set out to complete. When we know our team's personality, we can actually identify and apply those strengths as they are relative to the team overall. We can identify how that team actually brings value to the organization itself.

If we don't know that, how do we believe we can actually help the organization? Next, we can anticipate difficult tasks and find the team members that are best able to deal with that problem. Because you may have an individual on your team that has a very specific role, but their hobby may be accounting or crunching figures or analyzing processes. And those people can add a dimension that brings depth to the team, but also helps us better understand the stress factors that they're under in their role and how that may affect the team as a whole in working through those things.

Now, here's the important thing that I want you to remember is the fact that the manager is not just the only person that needs to know this. The entire team cannot rely on one person because then if you do that, that can be very directive and take away the focus of what the team is trying to accomplish because then you have one person's directive rather than the team's directive as a whole. We tend to lose focus, we tend to chase rabbits, and we end up getting to a place where we really don't want to be.

If everyone knows the team's dominant traits, then the team has many more chances to improve. When you first moved into your role in whatever job that might be, you had some expertise or at least the mental makeup to do that job. But you also had factors that stretched you in the process to help you get to that next level.

You learn new things, you experienced new mistakes and successes. But as you move through that process, you began to improve and statistics show us based on the Bureau of Labor Statistics that an individual does not fully actualize into their role into two years. And what's scary is the same labor statistics illustrate that the average tenure of an employee is two years and four months.

So basically what happens is the person gets to a level of competency and then they're gone. Now, here is something that should make us think even deeper in that area. The millennials, the Gen Ys average tenure is one year and nine months.

They don't even get to full effectiveness and efficiency. So what I encourage you to do is make sure that the engagement process starts during that onboarding process so that they become an integral part of the team or department that they work in so that they can begin to see their value early in the process. So how do we determine a team's personality? It's gonna be fun.

Let me show you how. First of all, in the graphic that you see on the screen right now, you're gonna see a little box for each of the behaviors and each of the mindsets, but there's an empty space below it. So what I want you to think about is let's get our team members together, let's pull our assessments together and we're going to put some pluses and minuses in each one of these boxes.

So if you have a very strong D in dominance, personally, put a plus in that box. If your influence is high, put a plus in that box. If your steadiness is just in the middle, put a zero.

If your C is very, very low, put a minus. And we're gonna do the same thing with our mindsets. If it's very strong, you put a plus.

If it's in the middle, you put a zero. If it's very weak, then you put a minus. Now, I want you to do that for each team member.

And as you do that for each team member, you're gonna have lots of pluses and lots of minuses in each box and you're gonna have some zeros in there too, which means they are situational. So when you get all of your team members plus zeros and minuses in there together, I want you to add them up. A plus means one, a zero means nothing, and a minus should be subtracted from the pluses.

So what you're going to do is you're actually going to end up with a particular score when you add up those results. Share the results with your teammates so that you can keep track of those scores. Again, add a plus for one point, subtract one point for the minuses, and once the tally is complete, fill in the chart for the entire team.

Then I want you to ask yourself some questions. I'm gonna give you those questions and I want you to shut the video down at this point with your team. What behaviors and mindsets do you score high in? What behaviors and mindsets are underrepresented on your team? And here's why.

Because if you are extremely high in the eye area and low in the sea area as a team, everybody's gonna wanna talk all the time and nobody's gonna wanna focus on details. Guess what? You're probably never going to get the job accomplished that you were asked to perform. On the other hand, if your mindsets are very high theoretical and utilitarian and very low aesthetic and social, what you're going to find is lots of facts and figures and no real focus on how this is going to impact the people that you're trying to minister to.

This is a problem and you need to know this going into the team session. Otherwise, what you're going to find is that you're gonna have a very distorted view of what the role actually focuses on and what needs to be done in the process. So as you get those scores totaled, shut off the video and when you're ready to come back, I'm gonna help you understand six key principles about your team.

And I want you to associate those with the scores of your team. Okay, welcome back. Now that you've taken the time for each individual to review their scores and decide whether they're high, situational or low, you now have a better understanding of the sum of the parts of your team.

You see, the ideal team is one where the group functions more as the sum of its parts rather than individuals. And let me tell you what's actually going to happen if we begin thinking as individuals rather than as team members. Number one, you're going to have limited ego.

There is not going to be interdependence. There's not going to be shared accountability. There's not gonna be clear leadership.

There is going to be a rejection of the uniqueness of each individual. And there's going to be exceptions. And what we want to do is avoid that.

So let's break down each one so that we can understand how these potential issues can rise up during the functioning of a team. So let's talk about limited ego. Every team will have some who perform better than others.

However, advice from the best performers should be delivered with humility and team first attitude. You see, people that are high S behavioral values and social styles are much more willing to do that. But the high D behavioral styles and strongly objective and individualistic values are going to struggle with that.

So if you have a team that is very high dominant and very objective, you have to remember that this has to be a shared experience and we have to limit individual egos. And in some cases, what I've seen teams do that are made up of people like this, especially board of directors have this particular tendency is that we lay out the agenda and then limit the amount of time each person can interject. You have your two minutes, you have your four minutes or three minutes or whatever it might be.

That way we limit the egos and we get input from everyone and they feel like they've collaborated or contributed, but we don't put them into a position to where one person dominates the process. The second thing we need to remember is that we need to understand that each person brings value to the team. You see, when each team member values the interdependence that we have on each other, it becomes easier to communicate the needs and appreciate each other's strengths.

Now, that's gonna be easy for the high IS person with a moderate C and social mindsets, but it's gonna be hard for the high Ds and the low theoretical and high aesthetic that tend to act more on their gut reaction and their emotional response. So again, what we're trying to do is limit the focus with individuals who may want to dominate and bring that interdependence. And oftentimes what I have seen in these particular type of circumstances is that each person has a place on the agenda to expand on their input and how that is actually going to affect the ultimate objective of what the team has been designed to accomplish.

Thirdly, there needs to be shared accountability. You see, when we have collective responsibility about the team's success or failure, there is gonna be much more willingness on everyone's part to make sure that they are not the reason for failure or also the concept that they are not entirely responsible for the team's success. Now, what we look for here is situational behaviors styles with that high utilitarian and social mindsets, why? Because we want to get things accomplished, but we also want to have people in mind when we do this because after all, ministry is a people business.

And it is a business that, yes, we need to get things done effectively and efficiently because that's what God requires is that we be good stewards with the resources and the money that we have. But it's also critical that we focus on how this impacts the people and the causes that we're embracing. Yes, it is gonna be harder for the DC and the high theoretical people as well as that high D individualistic mindset.

But you know what? If there is a level of humility with these people, the collective responsibility can be focused on and accomplished. Number four, there needs to be clear leadership. That doesn't mean that leadership dominates the process, but there has to be someone to ultimately make a final decision where there are some questions that need to be answered or decisions made.

You see, decision-making power on a team needs to belong to the person who's responsible for the team's failure or success. The buck has to stop someplace. This will allow clear communication as well as the professional development that needs to occur during the team process because when a team comes together, we bring different people from different roles and each person brings something to us for us to grow and develop and learn through this particular process.

So the leadership is probably gonna be easier for the high D or the high DI and the individualistic and utilitarian, but they cannot dominate. People who have the high S and the high C or both, they, along with the highly subjective mindsets, may find it harder to leave because they want to be respected by other people rather than seen as the go-to person. So clear leadership is important, but there has to be that collaborative nature to the process.

Now, here is the key element, especially for the people who tend to be quiet. There has to be a recognition of uniqueness for each person's role and what they contribute to the process. People want to feel a part of something greater than theirselves.

It's one of those questions that every person asks when they walk into a church or they walk into a role. Are you gonna take me for who I am, number one? Is there something bigger going on? And how can I add and contribute? Those are relevant questions that you're going to hear over and over again. People want to be recognized that they are being used and their special talents are being brought together to contribute to that greater goal that we're trying to accomplish and that no one can do by themselves.

Now, here's the one thing that is important for you to remember. This is not purely performance-based. This can be objectively personal in the process because when you enhance another person's life and when they can contribute to the team as a whole, you make them better at what they're trying to accomplish because now they've contributed to the greater cause.

This is gonna be easier for the high IS people or people with individualistic, theoretical and social mindsets, but it's gonna be harder for the D and the Cs and people with that traditional or the very high aesthetics that are very idealistic. One person doesn't have all the answers. We must recognize that God doesn't make mistakes and the person is created there to teach us something, no matter whether they're new, whether they're just out of school or whether they've been there for a long period of time.

So, last but definitely not least in importance is we have to reject exceptionalism. Everybody wants to think that they are so unique that they have specific answers and therefore the rules may not apply at some point in their lives. So, what I want you to understand is that you can't think that your problem is purely exceptional.

Otherwise, there wouldn't be a team here working on this particular issue. The condition of being different from the norm is not a reason for you to slow down, quit or stop this process. Sometimes we see this in the high D and C personality styles or people with extremely objective values.

It's gonna be hard for the high INS people and people with subjective or very low belief mindsets because they have a propensity to see the little nuances that interject emotions. And as we have said in other courses that we've shared with you, emotions have a very significant impact on what you're trying to accomplish. As the emotion increases, the heartbeat increases and the cognitive ability decreases in the exact same percentage.

So, if your heartbeat is up 20 to 30%, which is very normal when a person experiences anxiety, your cognitive abilities are 30% less and you're not reasoning with all of your abilities. So, I want you to think about the fact that there are very few exceptions. The reason that you're there is to help bring the team together and find answers to the challenges more so than the exceptions.

So, it's important that you communicate with your team and achieve your personal and professional goals. If you cannot communicate clearly, you're not gonna reach the final objectives. People quit their jobs because of their boss.

They dislike them or coworkers. And the issue 90% of the time is behavioral personality-based issues, not the fact that you're working towards the same goal. Focus on the issue, not the personality.

Because even though you may not like that personality, they have something to contribute that even if you don't like it, it may stretch you. Second of all, people leave their jobs because they don't feel respected. This is especially true of introverts who are not strongly vocal or the highly task-oriented objective person.

They may contribute a lot. They may have experienced a lot. They may have knowledge, but they're not gonna grab the microphone and take it away to make sure that you know that.

So, when you disrespect a team member and don't allow them to participate, you're setting them up to quit their job. Lastly, if they feel disrespected or every time they make a comment, you think they're wrong and you express that in front of other people, you're gonna find that they won't last long in that particular environment. These departures are caused by a failure to communicate.

And we do that because we're not communicating properly with communication mismatches. So, what is a communication mismatch? Why is it difficult? The answer most people bring about is the fact that we treat people as if they were exactly like us, and that's not true. We measure how good other people communicate based on our standards.

And we can't do that because two dissimilar people may have a difficult time working together unless at least one person adapts. to that communication style. And if one doesn't do that work to adjust to the other person's communication style, they will never build the respect that is necessary to maintain that relationship.

So, good teammates adapt their communication to the other person's personal language. So, how do you do that? You hone your message. Both communications styles come from our genetics, our culture, and our habits.

And that's not a bad thing. That's simply a different thing. But the differences are literally critical to our team's success so that if we observe and learn about other people's personalities and your coworkers, you can frame your questions much differently.

I want you to take a look at the graphics and dig into these. Pause the video if you need to, but focus on the fact that dominant people are to the point. Influential people need to feel needed.

They're big picture. Steadiness people wants to be helpful, putting the team first. And compliant people love details and they like to be logical.

Our cultural objective mindsets prefer to talk about measurables where subjective want to talk about feelings. And the individualistic is gonna be more direct and decisive while the traditional may seem like old school. So when you consider these behavioral and cultural combinations, I want you to think about people on your team that actually fit into this category.

I want you to take a time out right now and I want you to ask yourself who meets each of these different categories. Pause the video so you can keep this on your screen. Go around with your team and start asking yourself these questions.

I'll be right here when you come back. Welcome back. Now that you've had a chance to interact with your team members, I want to focus on the fact that your first step in becoming an expert communicator is finding the right words.

In other words, frame that message so that it's straightforward even though some people may want the big picture. Let's talk about an objective task-oriented quality assurance manager that wants to focus on effective customer service. This manager knows to use words like team, together, and support, but they need help framing that message effectively.

So this task-oriented person needs to, number one, slow down because of that high dominance and high utilitarian and individualistic because his customer service rep is a great listener, which is what a customer needs. And so this slowing down process and that high social of that customer service rep is going to meet the needs of the customer. And for those of you that don't know that 68% of people feel that there is poor customer service in most of the organizations of the world, but the 32% that enjoy a good customer service relationship are the ones who have met and solved the problems.

And that's what this customer service rep is going to do. They're going to listen. They're gonna care about the person.

So that quality assurance manager had better slow down and realize that people are the important things. So in this particular area, I want you to choose a best to worst scenario. Take the time to look at the answers.

Does this person open with praise? Do they use data and statistics? Do they use a story? Or do they compare the employee's response to the group response? Now, naturally our manager is gonna wanna use data and statistics, but that's not the best thing for this individual. A story of their struggles will bring that manager to a point of relatability so that they can share their failures and help this person feel more confident. So in this particular case, we wanna use that third option.

Let's make our message clear. The American Management Association has developed three steps that will help you frame that message. Number one, decide on your purpose and the desired results.

Make sure that we're talking about the end results. Then take the time to frame the message. If you've got a subjective person and you're objective, slow down, don't throw numbers and statistics at them, share a story.

And thirdly, decide on an emotional response that you want your customers to have because 89% of all decisions are made based on emotional responses. Now, we've moved from that individual aspect to some team dynamics. And looking at those team dynamics, we've actually defined in this session how to build the team's personality so that we know where the strengths and the weaknesses are.

We've taken the time to look at individual strengths and weaknesses so that we don't succumb to the six particular problems that are common to a team. So if you have questions, go back and revisit some of these things. But right now, I think we've laid the foundation for how to become a part of a team and the dynamics that you're going to face when you move into a role on your team.

And remember, you're there for purpose. You have something that none of the other team members have and don't be afraid to share it.