
When writing my book Raise Your BAR, the proven system to stretch yourself to success, there was this persistent thought that kept buzzing around my mind. Like a bee waiting to pollinate its next flower, this thought kept buzzing around my mind until I gave it space to land.
There’s no ‘I’ in team
That was my bee-thought. Buzz. Buzz. Buzz.
There’s no ‘I’ in team. Buzz. Buzz.
That’s CRAP! There. The bee has landed. I feel so much better!
Why do I think the phrase, “There’s no ‘I’ in team” is crap? Because all teams are made up of individual ‘I’s. And each of those individual ‘I’s think differently, act differently and communicate differently then all of the remaining ‘I’s on the team.
In fact, it’s a simple process of chunking down. The organization is the largest ‘team’ and therefor the largest ‘chunk’. When we go down one level, we might get different departments such as finance, HR & operations. Each of those units is its own team & a smaller chunk of the whole organization. Keep chunking down and you have small teams within those departments like accounts receivable, training & development, and customer service. Keep chunking down and you get to the smallest chunk of an organization, the individual.
It’s individuals not teams that get hired.
It’s individuals not teams that get put into groups according to their competencies.
It’s individuals that can make or break the success of any team and therefor the organization.
In the dynamic landscape of the now & future, it’s individuals that will bring their talents, strengths, & competencies together with other individuals to make a stronger organization.
And if those individuals aren’t working on themselves; if they aren’t consistently raising their own BAR, those individuals will be the fungus that kills the rest of the team.
Poor communication, narcissistic tendencies, passive aggressive behavior from just ONE individual can poison a team and an organization. This is especially true the higher up the ladder that individual is.
Remember that great statistic on people leaving their job. People don’t leave organizations. They leave bosses. Individuals! What more needs to be said?
It’s Building-a-Better-YOU time! A bunch of better individuals make a much more successful and harmonious team. Be one yourself. Now, wouldn’t that be something to buzz about?
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