Sabotage Part 3 — Saving the Day
“Give a man a fish he’ll eat for a day. Teach a man to fish and he’ll eat for a lifetime”
Many business owners, leaders and managers see their role as applying their expertise to fixing things that are broken, getting projects back on track or generally putting out fires. It feels really good to be able to clearly see where your team is going wrong and be their magnificent hero in fixing it up. In fact, it’s SUCH a good feeling that many business owners, deeply believing only they possess the most true and complete knowledge, get adrenaline rush after adrenaline rush by coming in and saving the day.
This is not the way to get your adrenaline fix. Bungee jump, take a raft trip or ride your bike really fast down a hill — but don’t get in the pattern of continually jumping in to pull your team members out of the fire.
If this is happening in your business, you need to get to the core reason — and you can do it pretty easily by calling your team together and exploring the reasons why this is happening. It will boil down to:
1) Bad processes that need to be explored, understood and fixed
2) A need for training
3) Fear — of the owner in letting too much information out. Fear — of the team member in going out on a limb
4) A need for empowerment — team members need to be left alone to learn from their mistakes and to be able to have the freedom to complete the task in their own way
There may still be EXTREME times when you need to jump in — but they should be rare — and you should always set them up to be supportive, learning experiences. Debrief the experience and extract the learnings. Use this as an opportunity to examine business processes and adjust them as needed.
Whatever path you take — do it openly and in a spirit of continuous improvement using the full power of each and every team member.
Need help? Want to discuss teambuilding options to move your team to higher levels of engagement, empowerment and success?
I have lots more ideas that I’ve successfully used with many different kinds of teams including boards of directors, sales and marketing and finance teams — so I know they work. If you want me to help you plan a fun day with your team, give me a call.
Do you have some fun things that you do with your team that you’d like to share? If so, please send them to me and I’ll share them with this group.
