I was just reading a book on leadership and the authors provided an anecdote of a mid-level manager whose team was in floundering. Then they had a team meeting to discuss and mutually agree on their team values. And that fixed everything!<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Right.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
I\u2019m happy if that truly worked as described. But I\u2019m skeptical. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
I\u2019ve been in those 2-hour team meetings. People offer ideas. They discuss whether they should add \u201cextraordinary\u201d to the idea that they want to deliver quality work. The list will undoubtedly include values like honesty, quality, customer focus, and respect for all. Great generic list. And it\u2019s so superficial that it’s unlikely to change anyone\u2019s commitment or engagement. It was only a word-parsing exercise.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
In my own experience, the team wants to know the leader\u2019s values. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
I think that the 2-hour team meeting is better used by the leader to discuss their own values. To share publicly and transparently a consistent message about how these values impact the leader\u2019s expectations of the team. For those in the meeting who intuitively agree with the leader\u2019s values, engagement just jumped to a higher plateau.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
But don\u2019t stop there. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Over the next week, have one-on-one discussions with team members. Help them understand that values drive a successful life. And help them walk a path where they’ll discover their own values. Maybe they align with the leader\u2019s. If so, a bond is created.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
And if the values don\u2019t align? Maybe it\u2019s time to craft a specific role within the team that\u2019s suited to the individual. Or, maybe it\u2019s a chance to help the individual find a role elsewhere that\u2019s perfectly suited to their values. When a leader does this well, everyone wins. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Or maybe I’m wrong. Maybe teams really do craft their own values independent of the leader.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Teams don’t have values. Leaders have values. I was just reading a book on leadership and the authors provided an anecdote of a mid-level manager whose team was in floundering. Then they had a team meeting to discuss and mutually agree on their team values. And that fixed everything! Right. I\u2019m happy if that truly […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":1088,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"nf_dc_page":"","om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1087","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-governance"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/cdschrock.com\/home1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1087","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/cdschrock.com\/home1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/cdschrock.com\/home1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cdschrock.com\/home1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cdschrock.com\/home1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1087"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/cdschrock.com\/home1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1087\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1089,"href":"https:\/\/cdschrock.com\/home1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1087\/revisions\/1089"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cdschrock.com\/home1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1088"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/cdschrock.com\/home1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1087"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cdschrock.com\/home1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1087"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cdschrock.com\/home1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1087"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}