Is your team out of sync | Issues #262
Improving Team Dynamics: 5 Strategies for Building a Cohesive Team
‘You have no authority here, Jackie Weaver, no authority at all!’ Remember these immortal words? They were uttered in the now infamous parish council meeting of the village of Handforth back in 2021. If ever there was an example of a dysfunctional team, this was it.
There’s a continuum when it comes to team cohesion. Parish Councils are definitely at one end. They’re often a group of individuals with different motivations. Everyone has their agenda, and there’s a strong sense of self-aggrandisement. They see themselves as a committee rather than a team that works together.
Conversely, you have highly successful sports teams that are so cohesive they would die for each other. We’ve seen perfect examples of that in the recent Rugby World Cup. The South Africa/Ireland game particularly. You could see each player’s commitment to the other and the many hours of dedicated practice paying off. Pure magic.
So, what makes a cohesive team? And how do you improve team dynamics?
E268 | The VC Helping Founders Beat The Odds with Nic Brisbourne
This week on The Melting Pot, we delve into the world of venture capital, IPOs, and the limitations of traditional investment structures. We learned from Nic Brisbourne, a serial founder of VC firms and founding partner at Forward Partners, which has some rarity value. It’s one of only a handful of VC firms in the UK that has gone through an IPO. Every year, they get 4,000 pitch decks, from which they only interview 400. Ultimately, they only invest in 1% of the people they meet. That’s a very wide funnel at the top and incredibly narrow at the bottom.
In this episode, Nic dives into the complexities of recruitment and the importance of making the right hiring decisions. Along the way, he unveils his proprietary framework for assessing founders and shares valuable lessons on the IPO process and the structure of venture capital firms.
Download and listen to learn more.
Recommended Podcasts
The High Performance Podcast turns the lived experiences of the planet’s high performers into your life lessons. Jake Humphrey (broadcast presenter of 20 years) and Professor Damian Hughes (leading high performance expert), speak to athletes, authors, entertainers and experts about the key to their success.
Recommended Articles
How to Build a Culture of Feedback: 5 Shifts Required
There’s a big difference between practicing feedback and having a culture of feedback. The first is merely transactional: Feedback is a tool that focuses on personal development – often ineffective and unwelcome. The latter is where feedback happens organically, frequently, and in small doses – it’s welcome and requested.
As important and intuitive as culture is, very few organizations get it right to the degree that it can be counted on by every employee because the overarching experience of working on a team varies greatly from one group to another — in other words, it’s conditional.
A Guide to Memorable Customer Experiences: Forget Heroism – Focus on Thoughtful Collaboration
Great article from Joseph Michelli. To exemplify what excellent customer service looks like, Joseph shares the story of Joshie the Giraffe and the Ritz Carlton. What an incredible testament to customer experience.
We get feedback every day of our lives, from friends and family, colleagues, customers, and bosses, teachers, doctors, and strangers. We’re assessed, coached, and criticized about our performance, personalities and appearance. We know that feedback is essential for professional development and healthy relationships – but we dread it and even dismiss it. That’s because while want to learn and grow, we also want to be accepted just as we are. Thanks for the Feedback is the first book to address this tension head on. In it, the world-renowned team behind the Harvard Negotiation Project offer a simple framework and powerful tools, showing us how to take on life’s blizzard of comments and advice with curiosity and grace.
Quote of the week
“Trust is knowing that when a team member does push you, they’re doing it because they care about the team.”
Patrick Lencioni
Dominic Monkhouse
Dominic offers business coaching and management development, strategy planning and organisational change, using tried and tested methods to launch your organisation onto an unparalleled growth trajectory. His programme is a function of his broad experience, his deep expertise and a proven process used by over 2,700 firms worldwide.