For some workplaces, it seems like they have everything nailed down with regards to their teamwork.
It can be a constant puzzle to understand why some teams are quite dysfunctional and yet others are cohesive and work very effectively together.
Dr Imran Akram, former boss of Asons Solicitors in Bolton, believes the success of a team is tied in closely with the company culture of the business. Some organizational cultures work to support teamwork, but many others don’t.
Many teams can struggle to get their relationships right, which makes for awkward interactions and as a result tasks become more difficult to complete.
Let’s take a look at effective tips that Imran Akram has used to make his teams work better together.
People are the problem and solution to better teamwork
At the end of the day, each member of your team brings along with them a wealth of knowledge and experience, but also sometimes many years of negative baggage.
As a team leader, what you need to draw out of them are their accomplishments of prior team projects and try to meld these experiences to create a feeling of positivity with each other.
When facing a new team project together, it can help to bring everyone together around a table to share their previous successes and highlight the techniques used to achieve their past successes. This will encourage your team to work together to create a solid plan to follow using their proven techniques to accomplish their new project.
By consciously bringing everyone together on a level playing field they will be unconsciously developing their collaborative interaction skills and building stronger bonds with each other. What you will end up with is an effective team that functions together well because they will understand why they are using the techniques and approaches in the project plan, and know how they work to deliver positive results.
How you can help your team to succeed
No matter whether you are setting up a new team or joining or overseeing an already established team, you can help them to achieve more success by nurturing communication and contribution.
To help your team you must acknowledge that they have basic needs that must be fulfilled if you ever want them to feel comfortable talking to you – or each other. You need to make them feel confident about making contributions and offering up suggestions, even if their ideas don’t quite hit the mark. There will be no effective teamwork if you don’t meet their basic needs.
Inclusivity and clarity is key
To help your team work better together Imran Akram says that you need to make sure they are all working off the same page. This means that your team should be clear about their mission and the project end goals.
Making sure that your team understand the goal of the project and giving them clear directions to follow can give your team the focus and tools to succeed. But each team member also needs to have agreed upon the plan by being included in the initial discussion and decision making.
The more clarity you can give to your team, the better they will be able to work together to meet your expectations of their results.
Create a positive team environment
As a team leader, you will want to create an environment in which your team members feel comfortable about communicating with each other, recognise each other’s skillsets, be happy with the allocation of positions and tasks, and be confident to take action.
To encourage a positive team environment you must encourage your team members to trust each other. This means that all opinions and suggestions are valued. No one should be punished for disagreeing with an idea or suggestion.
Instead, disagreement should be expected in a team environment and disagreement should be appreciated. Disagreement actually prevents you from developing a team of ‘yes-men’ that will agree with all your decisions, even when they are bad ones.
Encourage respectful communications
For any level of successful teamwork, Imran Akram knows that communication is key! Never forget that you will be dealing with a lot of human emotion and there will always be a risk that tempers may fray and people with stronger personalities may try to dominate your team.
Your team members should feel free to express their thoughts, ideas and opinions to help create solutions to problems as they arise. As long as you can make each of your team members feel as if they are being heard and listened to, you will get a much clearer picture of how your team’s relationship is working.
While it does help to give everyone an equal standing around the table when discussing your next project, it can also help to make yourself available privately for one-to-one meetings with your team.
This will allow individuals to ask you questions for better clarity and will avoid them sitting quietly in team meetings not feeling confident about speaking up to question something while another teammate is talking.
Help forge team commitment
Imran Akram believes that nurturing a strong sense of group commitment can really help cement your team’s relationship. People are social creatures and thrive much better when they are part of a community. So by giving each of your team members a strong sense of belonging to your group it can foster feelings of deep commitment to your team.
By giving your co-workers a strong sense of belonging to your team, they will feel more committed to making group decisions and agreeing on actions that will gain better results. Giving your team a sense of belonging can enhance their confidence and reinforce their belief that the team will have their back and be there to help and support them in times of need.
Recognise the individual
If there is one thing about teamwork that Imran Akram would always ask you to remember, it is that despite giving your team an even playing field and equal footing, you should never forget to view each of your team members as unique individual people.
After spending so much time nurturing your team to bond together and work as one collective mind, it can often be difficult to recognise the value or contribution of an individual team member over an above all the others.
Remember that you should always be on the lookout for natural leaders and future managers to nurture. There will always be people in your team that are ready and willing to take on more responsibility, so if you have a particularly difficult or more involved task to give out, you should know which members of your team are ready to take on this role.