You work for a company day in, day out. You have your own specific role and responsibilities, and you’re in charge of finishing your daily tasks. You also know that your colleagues are in charge of their own responsibilities, but you rarely (if ever) cross into their territory because you believe their priorities and methods are unrelated to yours.
Suddenly, you find yourself swallowed by work. Whether it’s because of external pressure, like a global pandemic, or from internal pressures, such as increasing demands from your boss, it’s becoming more difficult to finish your daily tasks, and soon enough, you find yourself on a sinking ship with no lifeboat. Eventually, you are overworked, stressed out, and feel that you may need to start looking for a new job. What happens then? From our experience, we’ve seen this happen too often to our clients: employees are burnt out and underperform, HR departments must tackle poor employee experience, and companies struggle retaining their workers. In fact, according to a LinkedIn study, employees are 92% more likely to look at a job post when they face work-related stress and 45% more likely to apply for a new job when they feel that they don’t receive support from upper management.
How can this all be avoided? The answer: Teamwork.
Groups vs Teams
In order to visualize what a team is, we have to understand the difference between a group and a coherent team. First, think of a public transit bus. A public bus is packed with people, but riders barely communicate with each other and get off at their distinct stop. Each rider has their own distinct individual needs, unconcerned about others’ purposes. Occasionally, some riders will engage in conversation and establish a passing connection or friendship, but these people are simply a group of people.
Now think of a spirited bus ride taking a team of players to their game. On this bus, the riders get on and off at the same time. The players have uniform values and a mission to accomplish, with roles and goals that are interrelated. They regularly coordinate and communicate individual efforts to achieve a common goal, and they work together to keep each other motivated. They provide each other authentic and ongoing feedback, and they value collective improvement over individual development. Contrary to the public bus, the players on this bus work as a team.
How Does Teamwork Make the Dream Work?
Our last blog post revealed the biggest obstacle that a company can face: silos. We discussed the dangers to your business and the problems organizational barriers cause when your employees aren’t working in close collaboration or as a team, and we even shared the first step of breaking down silos and eradicating the problems they impose on your organization.
We’ve all heard the saying “teamwork makes the dream work.” But let’s break down this line by uncovering the power of teamwork and the benefits it can bring to your organization and bottom-line.
Higher Productivity
Different people approach problem-solving in their own distinct ways. In a team, employees with varied skills and expertise across various departments join forces to perform quality work within a shorter time than any lone worker or department could do. With effective communication and collaboration with multidisciplinary teams, teamwork is a more efficient method of making sure each individual works on the portion that is most aligned with their skills. When operating as a team, you receive the best of what everyone has to give. In turn, you have employees who are less likely to be overburdened by their workload or the level of quality demanded to them, knowing that teamwork breaks down complex activities into smaller, more manageable portions, allowing them to be completed more quickly.
Team Cohesion
For a firm to succeed, cohesiveness is critical. Without teamwork, individuals are more inclined to put their personal gains before the company’s interests. Your business, bottom-line, and corporate culture will suffer as a result of everyone working toward slightly different goals.
By focusing on establishing a well-oiled, cohesive group of employees, you lead the way towards the company’s success. However, it’s important to realize that cohesion does not instantly happen overnight. Your team has to first communicate with impact in order to foster creativity, dedication, and innovation. Only then can diverse minds work together to build on each other’s ideas, generate solutions, and produce fresh ideas that aid in innovation.
Less Managerial Intervention
When employees possess a team mentality, they work harmoniously together to achieve the same end-goal. They win as a team and they lose as a team, so they notice and rely on the quality of one another’s work. If one employee’s performance is insufficient, other team members will have the incentive to step in and offer their expertise and a fresh pair of eyes to assist them. Effective teams can control their own performance and improve alongside their team members without the need for constant management intervention.
When individual workers function as part of a team, there’s a pervasive sense of accountability and self-monitoring that isn’t present when working in silos. Due to a team’s self-correcting behaviour, management does not have to interfere as frequently, and instead, organizations can leverage the power of team support.
Strong Company Culture
A well-functioning team will develop a sense of solidarity, devotion, and synergy that defines the corporate culture. Working in a positive atmosphere improves team morale and employee experience and fulfillment, as well as generating a sense of belonging to something bigger than the employee themselves. When team members hold a shared mindset and purpose, a company can transform into a collaborative community in which everyone contributes to the greater good of the organization.
A strong company culture not only sets a clear image of your company’s brand and workforce, but it ensures that you’re retaining the right people. Employees are more inclined to stay with a company if they feel like they belong to it, implying reduced turnover and fewer new hires to onboard. A healthy company culture recruits, but more importantly, retains valuable talent.
What Are You Waiting For?
All successful businesses are built on the basis of high-performing teams, and knowing how to work effectively together is essential. When members of a team feel linked to one another, their emotional investment in the group grows, as does their dedication to success with their high-functioning team. To foster a genuine sense of community among your employees in order to achieve passionate and effective teams, an organization must build an emotionally intelligent team. By prioritizing emotional intelligence in the workplace, your employees will be able to use the information provided by emotions to act appropriately in the face of daily challenges. Not only will there be more open and honest conversations, but your organization can transform from a group to a team. If you’re ready to take the first step in building trust and developing intimate authentic connections, click here for a free emotional intelligence team activity.
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