Psychological safety

Yesterday I wrote about research from Carnegie Mellon, M.I.T. and Union College that showed the number one factor that influenced team effectiveness was psychological safety. In other words, for teams to work well together, team members must feel comfortable enough to be themselves, then, and only then, will they contribute to their full potential.

Here are some tips on how to build a psychologically safe culture in your workplace:
·      Listen more, talk less.
·      Praise generously.
·      Reframe negative feedback.
·      Pay attention.
And if you cannot do these things, I know someone with the skill set you require, contact me via e-mail for details.

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Please don't silence your team

Researchers from Carnegie Mellon, M.I.T. and Union College discovered that good teams generally did two things:

1. When working on tasks, teammates all got the chance to speak, and no single person dominated the conversation.

2. Teams had high "average social sensitivity." In other words, individual team members were able to correctly interpret fellow teammates' expressions, tone of voice, and nonverbal cues. This led them to be more sensitive to teammates feelings during communication.

Contact me via e-mail if you would like to know how you can apply these findings to your workplace.

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Teams: Diego Maradona (RIP)

Panoramic/Press Association Images

Football (soccer to my American friends) is the sport that has played the biggest role in my life. Yesterday we lost the most iconic footballer of all time, Diego Maradona (RIP). You can read the obituaries online, but I think every great team should have the following:

1. Storyteller

2. Designer

3. Builder

4. Magician

5. Stabiliser

6. Fighter

7. Explorer

8. Dreamer

9. Mentor

10. MARADONA

11. Recruiter

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We can always do it better

Via Getty Images

Stephen Covey said, ”We should always start with the end in mind”.  And getting really clear about not only the vital priorities that organisations are trying to pursue in gaining clarity around that but also what are the vital metrics that they use (KPIs). Essentially, what are the data points that are used to determine if they are on track? 

Now if we have these and know what the performance metrics are, in other words when it's green and when it's red - then focus on how we can do more green stuff. And what are the things we need to do to fit into that? Will it become a predictive and repeatable model (best practice)? This does not mean it works perfectly or that some of the predictions are inaccurate because life changes and business is not static. I think being able to go into a marketing campaign or thought leadership campaign with the end in mind will certainly increases our chances of being successful by a factor of 10. And this is because of having that thoughtful planning from the outset.

Are you looking for a team who you can trust and have your best interests at heart? A team who really want to help your business navigate around the thought leadership process? A team who can help you generate revenue from that content, so you can do a better job in front of your customers? 

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