We don’t always choose our colleagues. We choose a job and the recruiter chooses us. Our colleagues are so important though. They are important to our success, as individuals, as a team and as an organization.
Some colleagues we may like from the start, we just easily hit it off. And then there are those colleagues that we don’t get on with as well, we may not even like each other all that much. But most of that is down to not knowing each other very well or even considering what the others have to offer, how we can benefit from working together.
Great teams know and trust each other. They don’t all have to love each other, but they need to appreciate and accept each other, and this starts with getting to know each other. If you want to get great results as a team, start talking to each other. Learn something about each other, personally and professionally. Understand what each person’s unique strengths are and look at each other openly and without suspicion – assume positive intent. The funny thing is that when we assume positive intent, that is what we tend to get, positive intent.
This is one of the key ingredients of the team formula, outlined in our new book “The Team Formula” which is released 4th March 2013.
Elisabet Vinberg Hearn, co-author of “The Team Formula”
