Nobody Wins Unless Everybody Wins!

"Bosses create teamwork, or kill it, by the way they treat people." -- Carl Sandburg

When people work as a team they create a work environment that makes work a pleasure and achievement a given. To get them there, a company and its management need to create an environment of empowerment and sharing.

- Empowerment comes from being informed. Employees need to know what’s going on in the company, what are its objectives, procedures and values.

- Empowerment comes from sharing responsibilities. An effective team leader spreads responsibilities around by assigning various sub-team-leaders for communications, technology, customer relations, operations, etc.

- Empowerment comes from allowing team members room to exercise their responsibilities. An effective leader sets the goals and the agenda and allows the team members to have the space needed for them to exercise their own initiative and leadership.

- While empowerment comes from sharing responsibility, satisfaction comes from sharing credit. Great team leaders share credit generously and frequently, and make sure that every individual on the team gets credit for something.

- When building a team, try to select people who are compatible with each other, but not similar to each other.

- Know the strengths and weaknesses of your team members and assign responsibilities accordingly.

- Teams work best where there is a sense of pride in the collective achievement of the group as a whole. One rule to live by is:

Nobody wins unless everybody wins!