Are you a team player?
Posted: 24 November 2015 at 4:32 pm | Author: Laura Morris
How much does your team help each other out? Are you all on the same page or reading totally different books?!
It can be very easy when you have your own responsibilities to become so involved in those that you forget there are other people around you experiencing difficulties and levels of isolation.
It can be extremely frustrating when you’re working on a particular project or waiting for a call to be returned and you happen to be in a meeting when this occurs. However, instead of helping you out your colleague takes the most basic message or does the minimal amount of work so it doesn’t disrupt their work flow.
Perhaps this is correct, we are all busy people and what time do we have to help everyone else out right?
Well wait . . . wouldn’t it be nice if we all supported one another in our way of working and sharing ideas. This can lead to an enhanced, coherent and motivated team, that’ll produce healthier results.
Even a small element of additional communication amongst your immediate work colleagues can lead to a big difference. For example, a team discuss how they are all struggling with managing their time effectively. The outcome of the conversation resulted in all members agreeing to only respond to emails at set times each day. Consequently everyone on the team is then aware that if they need something urgently then they should actually speak to their co-worker face-to face (the horror!) as an email will not illicit an immediate response. This enables each person to focus on the task at hand without additional pressures.
The knock on effect of helping other people is possibly not always realised. By finding out that extra detail in a phone call could lead to an improved service for a client, a positive company reputation, which may lead to repeat business and increased word-of-mouth referrals. Ultimately more business can be generated and this will have a positive impact on everyone in the organisation.
Perhaps this is an overly simplistic example, but it is important for all employees to see the bigger picture of how their roles are interlinked. This company culture will not occur overnight but with effective leadership it can be developed over time.
So the question remains – is your team all for one and one for all? Or is everyone out for themselves?
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