LED- DEVELOPING GROUPS AND TEAMS
Yuzhi Zhao
reading3.pptx
LED602
Developing and Implementing Groups and Teams
Week 3 – Lecture 3
Welcome to the Third lecture for Week Three of LED602, Developing and Implementing Groups and Teams.
This lecture will focus on Team Goals, specifically how to integrate theories of leader-group relationships into real world situations and case studies.
Team Goals
Team Goals
Your first responsibility as team leader is to keep your team focused on its goal.
You may refer to it as your team mission, vision, strategy, primary objective, or prime directive. Call it whatever you like as long as you keep it simple.
The team goal is your team’s reason for existence and it should be clear and inspiring.
Team Goals
Your first responsibility as team leader is to keep your team focused on its goal.
You may refer to it as your team mission, vision, strategy, primary objective, or prime directive. Call it whatever you like as long as you keep it simple.
The team goal is your team’s reason for existence and it should be clear and inspiring.
As a team leader, you must help your team achieve as much clarity as humanly possible regarding its direction.
You must help team members believe in that direction, whether the goal is of their own choosing or is handed to them by the larger organization.
Team Goals
As a team leader, you must help your team achieve as much clarity as humanly possible regarding its direction.
You must help team members believe in that direction, whether the goal is of their own choosing or is handed to them by the larger organization.
You must capture their imagination and help them see the goal as worthy of their devoted time and effort for half their waking hours.
You must help them see the relevance of their activities to the master blueprint.
Then you must keep the goal fresh and help them to understand and commit to inevitable adjustments in the team’s direction.
Team Goals
You must capture their imagination and help them see the goal as worthy of their devoted time and effort for half their waking hours.
You must help them see the relevance of their activities to the master blueprint.
Then you must keep the goal fresh and help them to understand and commit to inevitable adjustments in the team’s direction.
Your first task as a team leader is to clearly define the goal.
Goal clarity is critical for team members to have confidence in their direction and to be committed to making it happen.
Clarity also drives the alignment of activities and trust in the team leader’s ability to lead.
Define the Goal in a Clear Way
Define the Goal in a Clear and Elevating Way: Your first task as a team leader is to clearly define the goal. Goal clarity is critical for team members to have confidence in their direction and to be committed to making it happen. Clarity also drives the alignment of activities and trust in the team leader’s ability to lead.
As team leader, your primary responsibility is to ensure that the team reaches its goal.
A cardinal sin of any team leader is allowing anything to weaken your focus on the goal. For example, a team leader can have a dysfunctional relationship with someone in another part of the organization that can cause the leaders to become preoccupied with “maneuvering” around that individual in ways that fracture the team’s efforts.
Equally destructive is the team leader whose eyes are always looking upward for reasons of self-gain.
Resist Work Avoidance Mechanisms
Don’t Play Politics: As team leader, your primary responsibility is to ensure that the team reaches its goal. A cardinal sin of any team leader is allowing anything to weaken your focus on the goal. For example, a team leader can have a dysfunctional relationship with someone in another part of the organization that can cause the leaders to become preoccupied with “maneuvering” around that individual in ways that fracture the team’s efforts. Equally destructive is the team leader whose eyes are always looking upward for reasons of self-gain.
Being in sync with the team goal is crucial to team commitment.
As a team member, or department, or function, or business unit, there is nothing worse than feeling isolated from the passion of the dream, grasping for relevance that seems slightly out of reach.
It’s difficult for team members to prove their worth or measure their merit if they feel marginal to the real action or in clumsy alignment with the grand plan.
A few words and a small investment of time can go a long way to influence the productive effort of an individual or function or business unit, depending on your scope of leadership.
You must constantly work at concisely translating the vision from your private perspective so that others see the relevance and importance of their activities to the goal as you define it.
Help Team Members See Their Relevance to the Goal
Help Team Members See Their Relevance to the Goal: Being in sync with the team goal is crucial to team commitment.
As a team member, or department, or function, or business unit, there is nothing worse than feeling isolated from the passion of the dream, grasping for relevance that seems slightly out of reach.
It’s difficult for team members to prove their worth or measure their merit if they feel marginal to the real action or in clumsy alignment with the grand plan.
A few words and a small investment of time can go a long way to influence the productive effort of an individual or function or business unit, depending on your scope of leadership.
You must constantly work at concisely translating the vision from your private perspective so that others see the relevance and importance of their activities to the goal as you define it.
As team leader, you must look for opportunities to reinforce and breathe life into the team goal.
This can be accomplished by finding fresh approaches for amplifying the meaning of the goal:
Seeking examples that reinforce a sincere and constant pride in the opportunity to achieve a worthwhile objective; and
Searching for events that create a clearer understanding of what the goal means and why it’s worth team members pouring their hearts and souls into making it happen.
Keep the Goal Alive
Keep the Goal Alive: As team leader, you must look for opportunities to reinforce and breathe life into the team goal.
This can be accomplished by finding fresh approaches for amplifying the meaning of the goal:
Seeking examples that reinforce a sincere and constant pride in the opportunity to achieve a worthwhile objective; and
searching for events that create a clearer understanding of what the goal means and why it’s worth team members pouring their hearts and souls into making it happen.
Moreover, it’s important to recognize that a team goal is not always a fixed, single-minded focal point.
Sometimes it’s a focused but fluid direction, a credible trajectory toward a more strategic positioning, such as expansion into related products, services, or markets.
Occasionally a team will put significant pressure on itself to adjust and sharpen its direction. This happens when a team becomes increasingly dissatisfied with its own progress.
This kind of self-imposed pressure is an attempt by the team to motivate itself toward constructive change to avoid ossifying into mediocrity or failure.
Keep the Goal Alive
Moreover, it’s important to recognize that a team goal is not always a fixed, single-minded focal point.
Sometimes it’s a focused but fluid direction, a credible trajectory toward a more strategic positioning, such as expansion into related products, services, or markets.
Occasionally a team will put significant pressure on itself to adjust and sharpen its direction. This happens when a team becomes increasingly dissatisfied with its own progress.
This kind of self-imposed pressure is an attempt by the team to motivate itself toward constructive change to avoid ossifying into mediocrity or failure.
It is not unusual for a team goal to require reasonable adjustments along the way.
As team leader, it’s your responsibility to move skillfully within the goal. Make it clear that there is a wide latitude of possibilities on the path toward the team’s objective.
Leave on-ramps for new ideas and off-ramps to peel away approaches that have outlived their usefulness.
And when it’s necessary to make an adjustment to the team goal, do so in a way that helps team members understand the change as a reasonable and necessary one.
Keep the Goal Alive
It is not unusual for a team goal to require reasonable adjustments along the way.
As team leader, it’s your responsibility to move skillfully within the goal. Make it clear that there is a wide latitude of possibilities on the path toward the team’s objective.
Leave on-ramps for new ideas and off-ramps to peel away approaches that have outlived their usefulness.
And when it’s necessary to make an adjustment to the team goal, do so in a way that helps team members understand the change as a reasonable and necessary one.
End of Lecture 3.3
Please remember to complete:
Introductory Experience
Lectures
Discussions
Assignments and Quizzes
This is the end of Lecture 3.3. Please remember to complete the additional assigned work for the week.
