6 Trends for High Performing Teams

For the next 6 weeks, join me on a journey of discovery. What are we exploring? The 6 trends in high performing teams...in today's reality.

These 6 trends Include:

1. High performing teams rally and rebuild.
2. Joyful teams are 10x more likely to be high achieving and satisfied.
3. Trust is a critical success factor in high performing teams.
4. Teams that reflect and celebrate wins are 25x more likely to sustain success long-term.
5. Leading hybrid and virtual teams effectively increases team performance.
6. Equipping teams to navigate the increased emotional complexity of today's workplace is critical to success.

New Research

We will start this series with a look at how high performing teams reinvented themselves and the way they work to reach top performance.

Just released research from Six Seconds, the world's largest emotional intelligence organization, called the "Team Vitality Report 2022", provides eye opening data on teams around the world, in many different industries, and various sizes. The fascinating insight - no matter the differences, high performing teams around the world had common elements that fed their success.

Here is a direct quote from this study:

Teams that feel genuine joy, trust each other, and celebrate each other’s successes do best. These elements are not “nice to have” - they are highly predictive of team performance across countries, industries, and company sizes. Since 2019, these three elements have become even more important, suggesting that they are especially critical in times of stress and uncertainty. Six Seconds - Team Vitality Report 2022

 To see the entire report, click here.

So, what does this mean. While the world and the workplace are rapidly changing, teams can and do adapt and even thrive in the new reality. How? By following the success pathway I will show you.

Assess

High performing teams know their strengths and gaps.How is this possible? Through validated assessments that provide actionable data. Take a look at the following graphic. If you had this information on your team, what could you do with this? How would this bring clarity? How could you use this data to better equip team members? What KPIs would you put in place for team growth and performance?

 This is the Team Vital Signs report from Six Seconds. This is a highly validated assessment that I have been using with clients for many years. They have 15 years of data to pull from to show trends and bring focus to critical success factors. In my 35+ years of using various psychometric assessments, this is by far the best I have ever used to measure the team environment. Why? Because the data is actionable!

Equip

Leaders MUST be equipped to lead in new ways, with new skills. Hybrid and virtual teams require an enhanced level of leadership.

High performing teams require leaders who equip themselves with emotional intelligence competencies, an understanding of their team dynamics, and practice connection and trust building at high levels. Leaders who want high performing teams must create a psychologically safe work environment where people have equal opportunity to share their thoughts, concerns, ideas, and suggestions. This fosters trust. Transparency fosters trust. Trust is the currency of collaboration and getting things done.

Align

In this report, high performing teams are joyful, trusting, and celebrate their success and the success of others. For these elements to be present, there must be alignment. Alignment is "getting all heads in the game." This is more than just communication...it is genuinely connecting with each team member to help them clearly understand expectations, how their efforts impact others, how performance will be measured, what resources and equipping are available to them, and the consequences of their performance (rewards or reprimands). This is a critical step to creating a culture and a set of practices of accountability. For more on "Accountability", click here.

Why is alignment important in high performing teams? Alignment promotes connection, collaboration, trust building, a feeling of belonging, greater satisfaction, and more joy.

Critical Success Factors for High Performing Teams - Steps You Can Take:

1. Leaders must equip themselves with new skills like emotional intelligence to be able to navigate increased emotional complexity in hybrid and virtual teams.
2. Creating a psychologically safe work environment accelerates connection and trust building. Practice curiosity, not judgement.
3. Connection and trust building must be shared values and practices throughout the team if the team wants to be a top performing team.
4. Develop practices of celebration and reflection. Both of these add huge value to the team dynamic and foster long-term success.
5. Joy is a critical success factor. The level of joy a team feels is directly related to their level of achievement.

 I hope you will continue with me on this journey exploring the 6 trends in high performing teams.

 Copyright © 2022 EQFIT® - Author: Steven Goodner All rights reserved. No portion of this material may be reproduced in any form without permission from the publisher, except as permitted by U.S. copyright law. For permissions contact: [email protected]