A team of disengaged, disenfranchised and unproductive employees can be challenging to any business leader. If left ignored or unchallenged, employees like this can eventually turn the workplace into a toxic environment.
Earlier in my career, I realized that most working relationships can show marked improvements when people practice thinking before speaking. I’ll share an experience to help illustrate.
A few years ago, I led a team of 12 managers. This team included a diverse group of individuals. I found myself repeating to them, “Row the boat in the same direction.” About 20 percent of these team members continually wanted to use tennis rackets as rowing oars, figuratively speaking of course. So my challenge was to get them collectively rowing toward the ideal: a collaborative team environment. Plain and simple, they were not behaving as a healthy functioning team.
So, here follows how I handled the situation. Of course, I wanted to lead them toward becoming a high performance team. I started out by figuring out how to communicate with those 20 percent referenced above. I had to seriously ‘crack the code’ with them. I had to think really hard and it took a lot of practice. In other words, I had to practice thinking before speaking.
Looking back, interestingly enough, that strategy made all the difference. We needed to find some common ground, so I set out to tap into what was really important to each one of them. Once I cracked that code, I was in a better position to lead the team. So as I worked to follow these two basic steps below, 12 managers began developing a foundation of mutual understanding and team rapport:
- Acknowledging, in an individual sense, what was important to each one of them.
- Engaging them in personal conversations or letting them know I was interested in them on a personal level. I dropped them personal notes or simply asked how their weekend was; whatever worked to engage them in conversations. For instance, “How was that baseball game this weekend?”
As I figured this out, and stepped more into their worlds, the team gathered momentum and got up to speed on a business level. As it turned out, everyone got together and worked to support and help these individuals along. It worked, and the team was transformed by 100 percent. In fact, after spending six fiscal periods together, we were the top performing team in our organization. So, we went from being an average-performing team to one that no one could touch. That success took place because we were all rowing 100 percent in the same direction.
As a final note, especially now during these dire economic times, it is very important to remember communication nuances. Many people today are feeling uneasy and, as they say, ready for that next shoe to drop. Employees are worried. Vendors are wondering, “Are we going to have to raise prices?” Other businesses are thinking, “Are we going to have to restructure?” Or, “Are we going to keep your business?” Some business strategists might be thinking, “Are we going to have to renegotiate our contracts?” As we know, invariably, these issues have a cascading effect across the board, affecting all stakeholders.
These are very good times to practice thinking before speaking.