The 2 Most Important Ingredients of a Winning Team

Tag Archive - team

The 2 Most Important Ingredients of a Winning Team

Sunday, November 15, 2015

You’ve probably heard this popular African Proverb before:

“If you want to go fast, go alone. If you want to go far, go together.”

The reason this statement has become so popular and “gone global,” is that it resonates with us at a core level. We inherently know that it’s true; not just from a tactical team building framework, but this is the way God designed life to work.

If you’ve ever played on or been around a winning team you know how much fun it can be. You also know that winning teams are rare, only one team wins the championship each year. You also know that winning teams don’t just happen on accident. They’re built with great intentionality. So as you’re in the process of mixing the right ingredients to build a great team, make sure you mix in the 2 most important ingredients to building a winning team:

Trust

Trust is built up close and over time. It’s more given than earned. But it’s given to people who have a proven track record, because the best predictor of future success is past performance. We know what to expect from each other and trust that we are each going to play our role at a high level.

Humility

While great teams are composed of great players, those great players know how to keep their ego in check. Great players are great not just because of their talent level, but they put the team first. Which means they do what’s best for the team instead of what’s best for themselves or their career. They’d rather be a role player on a championship team than a star on a mediocre team.

Posted in Leadership, Staffing

Breaking Through Your Capacity Lid

Tuesday, October 27, 2015

If you lead long enough eventually every leader and every organization will hit a leadership lid. You are going to outgrow your leadership skills and your organizational structures at some point. But what do you do when the lid at your church is a capacity lid? Capacity lids show up all over the place.

Facilities: If you build it they won’t always come.

Too many churches acquiesce to the pressure to build too soon and as a result they don’t maximize their current space. Instead of building try running multiple weekend services, try multiple venues on the same campus, park off campus, or move to a multisite strategy.

Volunteers: Volunteers are more important than the ministries.

Most churches run short on volunteers because they use volunteers to do the ministry instead of realizing that the volunteers are the ministry. Volunteering is discipleship. Take care of, invest in, and lead your volunteers and they’ll take care of the ministry.

Finances: Financial shortfalls can limit opportunities.

The two sides to finances in a church setting are building a culture of generosity in your church and then managing those finances so you position yourself to say yes to Jesus when He provides clear vision and opportunity. Immature organizations over extend themselves financially and self impose artificial lids as a result.

Staffing: The team outperforms the individual every time.

Scouting, attracting, developing and keeping talented team members are essentials to a growing church. But before you think paid staff think volunteer leaders. Paying people to do ministry should be the last resort.

Leadership: Leadership is a spiritual gift, but you can develop your leadership skills.

Leading a church of 100, 500, 1,000 and 10,000 are not the same thing. The higher you go you move from the science side of leadership to the art side of managing the momentum and emotion of the room. Get outside your tribe and start listening to and learning from successful people and organizations in other industries.

Character: Your talent can take you further than you character can sustain.

Character is the lowest leadership lid. No level of competency will ever make up for a fatal flaw in character because ministry and leadership run on trust. Character flaws erode trust every time.

Posted in Leadership

Mastering the Art of Facilitation

Tuesday, September 22, 2015

If you haven’t noticed leadership and leading young leaders in particular is changing. Peter Drucker, considered to be the father of modern management, actually predicted this shift. He once said that:

“The leader of the past was a person who knew how to tell. The leader of the future will be a person who knows how to ask.”

Most leaders find it easier to tell than to ask. And that’s because it is. It takes less time and it requires less personal security (among other things). But facilitating leaders have got this “ask first tell second” concept down.

The Team Outperforms the Individual

Great facilitators believe that the team outperforms the individual. That “we” is always better than “me.” While you may be a fantastic leader, no leader gets everything right every time. Involving the team reduces your “miss-rate,” and builds trust and buy-in at the same time.

Process not Content

Great facilitators believe that they’re “process” and the “content” lives within their team. The job of the facilitating leader is to mine out and unlock the best ideas from their team. They trust the process and their team. Try believing in your team, you may just be surprised how they rise to the occasion.

Questions not Answers

Instead of leading with answers, facilitating leaders lead with questions. Even if your experience and leadership intuition tells you the right answer, resist the temptation to tell, and instead ask. Facilitating leaders don’t believe they have all the right answers so they ask good questions. Asking great questions teaches people to think and begin to develop their leadership muscle instead of just blindly follow by being told what to do.

By the way, if you haven’t connected the dots yet, let me help. Peter Drucker didn’t think this one up all by himself. This idea is a very Gospel centered idea. The Apostle Paul wrote about this idea multiple times throughout the New Testament comparing Christians to the “body of Christ.” Stating over and over again this idea that we are better together and none of us are as good as all of us.

Posted in Leadership, Staffing

Leadership is a Team Sport

Sunday, July 5, 2015

I find myself turning into one of those dads who brag on their kids. All four of them have strengths and things they’re brilliant at. But Lincoln, my 7-year old, is the athlete of the bunch. He’s fast, athletic, and is a winner (he gets it from his mom). He’s usually the smallest kid on the field, but he doesn’t know it. And he usually goes after the biggest kid on the field. He has that quarterback personality that people are drawn to and he simply believes he can’t lose and that he shouldn’t lose. It’s just hard-wired in him.

Don’t worry I’m not that delusional dad who is set on his kid being a D-1 athlete. But I am glad he’s playing team sports. Because leadership is a team sport, and he’s learning some incredible leadership lessons at a young age that will serve him well the rest of his life.

Most of us adults who are leading would do well to remind ourselves of some of those leadership lessons we can pick up from playing team sports.

1. Learn to Lose

Unless you live a very, very, very blessed life you’re probably going to experience some losses in life. Learning to lose gracefully and bounce back from a loss is a key to team sports. It’s one thing to be beat and lose, it’s a completely other thing to adopt a losers mindset.

2. Learn to Win

The point of playing the game is to win (forget all that don’t keep score and everybody gets a trophy stuff). If it’s worth playing, it’s worth winning. You want your team to adopt a winning mindset and get in the habit of winning. Let’s face it losing isn’t fun. People want to be a part of a winning team. But there’s a reason coaches tell players to, “Act like you’ve been there.” Pride will destroy a team.

3. Authority

At some point every talented player, if they’re going to be a great player, has to learn to submit to the authority of the coach. That it’s not their team, that they’re not running practices, making decisions, or calling the plays. Coach is. The faster everyone realizes who’s in charge and submits to his or her authority the faster the team can get on with winning.

4. Coaching

World-class athletes need coaching. In fact one of the reasons that they’re world-class athletes is because they recognize that they need coaching. They know how to receive, embrace, and learn from their coaches. Even though they’re at the top of the game, the pinnacle of their industry, they’re literally life-long learners when it comes to their craft.

5. Teamwork

You can go fast alone, but you can go far together. When it comes to team sports, mediocre players that have a great team mindset will always beat great players that have a mediocre team mindset. Relationships are key to any winning team. Winning teams don’t win alone they win together. They work hard at the relational integrity of the team. It leads to trust. And a talented team that trusts each other can go far together.

6. Hard Work

Practice doesn’t make perfect. Practice makes permanent. You want to play to win you have to practice to win. Winning isn’t easy. The old adage still rings true today, “Hard work beats talent when talent doesn’t work hard.”

7. Playing Position

Not everybody can play every position on the field. Each position takes a certain mindset, skillset, and body type. When you play to each player’s strength by placing each player in the right position, and when they stay in position, the team has a chance to win.

8. Team First

When you play a team sport you quickly realize that while there may be many players on the field, only one player can have the ball at any given time. And if you want to win, you’ve got to learn to put the team before yourself.

Posted in Leadership, Staffing

How to Keep your Best Staff Members from Leaving

Monday, February 16, 2015

One in two church staff members is open to new employment. At the Unstuck Group were shocked to learn this during our latest research on church staffing and structure. At the same time, our experience confirms that many church staff members are simply unsatisfied. If it’s true that half of staff members are willing to leave, how can you possibly build and retain an effective ministry team?

We’re excited to share that our research also uncovered two characteristics of churches that lead employees to be twice as committed. While these are certainly not quick-fixes, if leaders focus on creating health in a couple of ways, they can significantly raise the level of commitment on their team. Consider these 2 areas of health that keep employees engaged:

1. Church Health and Growth

Staff members who believe their church is healthy and growing are half as likely to be open to new employment. It makes sense that players on a winning team would be more committed. Many church leaders look to leave when they see their church plateau or decline with little response from senior leaders. If you’re looking to keep great players on your team, you must be willing to do whatever it takes to accomplish your vision. Stay focused on growing your church while developing health.

2. Staff Health and Effectiveness

Great staff members take notice of the people around them. Just 31% of staff members who believe the rest of their team is healthy and effective are open to new employment. That is a significant increase in commitment! Yet many church staffs include one or more individuals causing relational unrest. If you’re unwilling to deal with problem-people on your team, it shouldn’t be surprising when others start leaving it.

Other ways to develop staff health and effectiveness include developing leaders, clarifying wins, setting clear goals, and aligning the structure with the vision. Each of these and more are discussed in depth in our Next Level Teams report, which we’re offering to you at no cost. Click here to download your copy and start increasing staff commitment today.