Thought I’d share this question-and-answer exchange between myself and another leader. Our subject – TEAMS.

Q: What is the biggest challenge facing teams in organizations right now?

A: I believe the enduring challenges for teams are engagement, ownership and accountability -- Engagement with the team's purpose and with the power of teams generally; Ownership of each person's role, capacity, and responsibility to make a contribution; Accountability to the other members of the team and to the larger organization/business or community/stakeholders being served. These are the things that separate teams from groups, and meaningful progress from a series of meetings.

Q: What have you found to be the best way to encourage individual team members to recognize and then set aside individual ego's and agenda's in service of the greater team goal?"

A: Tough question! We build cultures that evaluate and reward individual performance, and then seem puzzled when teams don't blossom. The road to good teams begins with creating a team-honoring culture.

Second, I believe that without a compelling vision for the whole organization, nothing moves forward. Tell them we need to "go to the moon" and all of a sudden you can get lots of people working together to create and respond to challenges.

Lastly, when people see the team as "extra," disconnected with their primary responsibilities, or encumbering their personal objectives, the team is destined to fail. This is a particularly difficult challenge -- we build our workforce on specialists, with a rigid sense of personal "job description" instead of group goals, and then we turn around and ask people to operate as generalists and work collaboratively in teams.

But in direct answer to your question - the best way I have found to get people to work in high-impact teams is to convince them that (1) the team has an important purpose, (2) the team can accomplish way more together than as individuals, and (3) that the team has lots of room for servant leaders, and for wildly responsible people, but not for disengagement, selfish egos and agendas. Teams must focus on what they can create together. Teams are not about personal power - they are about shared responsibility and increased effectiveness.

“The difference between a warrior and an ordinary man is that a warrior sees everything as a challenge, while an ordinary man sees everything as either a blessing or a curse.” – from the book A Separate Peace by Carlos Cataneda

In his book “The Back of the Napkin,” Dan Roam shows his readers way to quickly look at problems, understand them more intuitively, confidently address them, and more rapidly communicate those ideas and discoveries to others – all using pictures. The thinking is based on years of research by people like Allan Collins, and in a organizational culture addicted to long, wandering meetings, and ineffective PowerPoint, it is a breath of very fresh air. Pick up a copy, and learn ways to make your strategic and problem-solving discussions more efficient, more effective, and lots more fun!

In another post, I encouraged you to “plan with people, not for people.” I whole-heartedly believe in that principle. But have you ever tried to do a successful brainstorming session with a group of people? The process can leave you exhausted, off-track, and vowing to “never try that again.”

Next time, you might try using mind maps to collect information and guide the discussion. Mind maps are a great brainstorming and “group-think” tool, allowing you to list, connect, and interlink thoughts as they emerge from the group. The format is much more easy to follow that simple lists, and allows you to show relationship between ideas or groups of ideas. Plus, the visual nature of a mind map bolsters the creative thinking of the group overall. Check out http://www.12manage.com/methods_mind_mapping.html for more information and some examples. Then pull out your whiteboard, easel pad, and markers and get started!

A very short and simple idea, but one that I believe in whole-heartedly: “Plan with people, not for people.” Put it to use!

“Business, more than any other occupation, is a continual dealing with the future; it is a continual calculation, an instinctive exercise in foresight.” - Henry R. Luce

11 Terms to Avoid In Your Next Meeting or Presentation

Here’s a great post from BNET on office jargon. Beware of the buzz words!

Once upon a time and about two jobs ago, one of my colleagues who was so officious that she carried around three clipboards to make sure that she was getting on everybody’s nerves, constantly used the expression “going forward.” She usually said it after you made a minor mistake that she deemed outrageous, like filling out a purchase order incorrectly or routing a file to the wrong person. At the end of a long chastising lecture, she would announce, “Going forward, you should blah blah, blah.” For some reason, it grated. “Why can’t she say ‘in future?’” I used to grumble.

Such office jargon is pretty annoying, and it’s an assault on the ears even to hear it. Some frustrated employees have taken to playing “Buzzword Bingo,” during meetings, using cards with expressions like “outside the box” or “on the same page.” Fortunately, such jargon goes out of style pretty quickly. I haven’t heard “going forward” in years. On the flip side, old expressions are almost immediately replaced by new, even more irritating ones.

Fortunately for all cubicle rats, staffing firm Accountemps periodically surveys executives to find out what they deem the most annoying and overused office clichés. Here are this year’s latest results and my own cynical translations and usages:

Leverage. Deployment of an insufficient amount of something to do that which was previously done with much more. Example: “After the layoffs, we can leverage our staff of three to cover the entire Eastern seaboard.”

Reach out. Deliver the bad news. Example: “Reach out to the customers with a letter announcing that their interest rate just doubled.”

It is what it is. Get used to it. Example: “Your administrative assistant doesn’t know how to answer the phone. It is what it is.

Viral. So prevalent that you want to barf when you hear about it. Example: “Twitter has gone viral.”

Game changer. A catalyst that will transform a frog into a prince or vice-versa. Example: “Getting indicted for fraud was a game changer for Bernie Madoff.”

Disconnect. A situation in which you wanted jelly, but someone gave you peanut butter. Example: “There is a disconnect between what the consumer wants and what we intend to provide.”

Value-add. A gain, usually financial. Example:“She refuses to donate to charity unless she sees some value-add, say, eternal salvation.”

Socialize: Jam the idea down their throats. Example: “We need to socialize to our patients our practice of closing the doctor’s office every day for two hours at lunch.” In other words, “Call 911.”

Interface: Have relations with. Example: “I interfaced with Charlie, and now I’m pregnant.”

Cutting edge: So modern, it’s to die for. Example: “Sleeperama’s cutting-edge mattress will take the country by storm.”

Circle back. See you again and again and again whether or not you want to be seen. Example: “I’m having cocktails with Mervin, but I will circle back around midnight to see if you’ve finished the Implebottom Report” or “The stalker abided by the court’s restraining order but then circled back to hang out by my garbage can."

I was going to try to leverage all of the above to produce an essay, but I was afraid that in the effort, I would want to take a cutting edge to my throat. Anyway, word to the wise: now that these expressions have been officially identified as irritating jargon, you might want to give them up. Unless your boss is planning to circle back to reach out to interface and socialize to your value-add. What can I tell you? It is what it is.

Article by Marlys Harris

The average company saves over $7,000 for each employee suggestion that is enacted.