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How to Build a High Performing Team with Multigenerational Teammates
Teamwork Makes the Dream Work
John Eades
03 Apr
3 Insights for Your Leadership Journey
Teamwork makes the dream work.
Building amazing teams by bringing people from different backgrounds, generations, and abilities is a skill you can develop. Helping people collaborate to achieve something bigger than they can themselves is a worthwhile cause.
If you care about leading people from different generations, here are three principles to remember:
I. Every generation needs to hear the truth, but how you share it might be different.
What it means:
All improvement starts with the truth. It is impossible to make significant progress if you don’t have a grasp on reality.
However, every team member might be different when it comes to improving performance. One person might need to be challenged, while the next person needs to be hugged. Use empathy and emotional intelligence to share the truth, but do so in alignment with how that person best responds.
Be a truthteller to others, but how you deliver matters in achieving a positive outcome.
II. The path to effective leadership is paved with learning to lead people different than you.
What it means:
The right thing is usually the hard thing.
The world would be a boring place if everyone were exactly the same. The issue is that we gravitate toward people who look like us, act like us, or remind us of our younger selves.
I was reminded of this while watching the show Suits on Netflix. The main character, Harvey Spector, is immediately drawn to a younger, up-and-coming fake attorney named Mike Ross, because he reminds him of a younger version of himself. Spector pours time, energy, money, and company exposure into Ross’ development. While the show is wildly entertaining, it exposes an insight that leading people similar to you is easy. Leading people different from you is hard.
You don’t have to be friends or even like someone to effectively lead them. However, you do have to give them respect and take the same actions you would to help someone you like.
III. If you want to go fast, go alone. If you want to go far, go together.
What it means:
It’s typically faster to do something yourself than show someone else how to do it. It’s typically easier to do something yourself to ensure it’s done the way you want. However, this African Proverb is always a stark reminder that achieving bigger and better things requires others.
If that wasn’t enough, it’s more enjoyable to to achieve something meaningful with other people than to do it by yourself. A party of one isn’t much of a celebration.
Keep Leading Your Best,
John Eades | CEO LearnLoft
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The Best Leaders Inspire (Video)
Most managers try and motivate team members. It doesn’t work. The best leaders do something different, they inspire. They breathe life into team members.
Today’s Leadership Trivia — Guess Right and Win
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What is the most challenging generation to lead? |
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