How do you sustain momentum as a team leader?
Looking for tips and tricks that have proven to work, not 'academic should-be mumbo jumbo'.
Good Answers (3)
Tom S.
Product Development Executive
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Before one can sustain momentum one must first build the best team possible and get them moving. A weak team member will undermine the progress, cause resentment, and may even sow discontent. Any sense among the team members that someone is not pulling their weight can stall the effort. Make sure that the team has the right mix of skills. Look out for personality issues. Make the goals and the steps to reach them crystal clear. Best when they are 1) understood 2) agreed to by all 3) attainable.
The single most important thing to sustaining momentum is to make decisions. As the "leader" you must, well lead. Momentum will stall if important open issues are left to languish. Be decisive but not dictatorial. Be thoughtful but allow no "analysis paralysis." I've seen joy on the faces of engineers when I made a decision that allowed them to get back to work quickly.
Last tips.
Don't waste the teams time and energy with non-productive meetings. Insulate the team from politics and micro-managers.
Make sure that the work is planned with clear deliverables and dates. Everyone on the team must participate in the planning and agree on the results. Establish checkpoint milestones for all major tasks every 2 weeks. Gather status every week. When unanticipated problems occur, engage the team to find the solution. They advise, you decide.
Tricks.
When an individual is ahead of schedule, send them home. When the project is 100% on track take everyone out or ice cream or bring in really great, gourmet cookies. Post the schedule and chart progress. Team member names optional. Peer pressure works.
Every person is different in a team and needs a personal approach, some people need to be chased, some don't.
Communicate in a clear fashion.(what you expect, when, how)
If there is large list of tasks, be sure to set priority to the most urgent tasks, let them some freedom to decide the others.
Treat people with trust and respect and listen to their opinions
Be decisisve and take responsabilty.
Be there when they need you.
And for gods sake,...pay them a beer once in a while
just be yourself mate that is enough to motivate a team ;-)
Michael K.
Enterprise Productions and Solutions - Technical Account Management at Bloomberg
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Everyone here has said great things, I'm probably mirroring what you can derive in the above, but what the heck...
Goal settting for your team, for yourself. Set the expectation that the goals set should be achieved to a reasonable level, including your own goals.
Open communication between your team and yourself goes along way. I can't understand the secretive manager! He or she fails everytime, but I can say I've seen them in almost every organization I've been in.
Laud the small stuff. Small steps are better than big ones by far, so when your team makes small measurable headway, shout it from the rooftops, make your team know that their small efforts are recognized as well as the large ones.
Manage UP and DOWN- I've seen the manager who provides one way communication (always up to his or her superiors) but never relays what was communicated from the top back to his or her team I find that offensive really, it's a real demoralizer to your team to not know what's happening above. And if anyone says that some things need to remain unsaid, I say that's crap, even bad news needs to be managed down.
Never let a week go by without some one on one time with your team. Depending on your schedule you should have one on ones to air out the issues with your team. It's a two way forum, don't make it about just your wants and needs.
Again, this was a bit of a rant, but I hope it helps.
Michael King
More Answers (10)
Chris W.
17 years internet/new media experience.
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It's all about greasing the path forward! With a good tight team behind you making sure that they are dealing with the lose twines a leader leaves in his or her 'wake' you can concentrate on pushing forward - I call this greasing the way forward. In other words: your team frees you of any management encumbrances that can sometimes weigh you down and hold you back.
Tips:
Listen to your stakeholders and your team and trust your own judgment.
Tricks:
Ask people to do their best and communicate their success. It's not about you.
Ron H.
Owner at Developing Leaders and Adjunct Faculty School of Business at University of La Verne
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A few days ago I listened to an excellent interview on the Cranky Middle Manager podcast. The host interviewed Wally Bock who discussed the fact that most leadership books address leadership of one on many. Few address one on one. In this interview he offers excellent practical advice on leading a team. Specifically be with your team in person frequently communicate by various means often. Deal with problems when they are small don't wait til they become monsters. I encourage you to listen to the interview at the link below. There was even an offer of some free tip cards for listeners. All the advice is practical not theoretical.
These are some of the key things I do, as well, to keep my team motivated. Talk to them often be with them often and nip problems in the bud. Another very useful thing is to find things to celebrate. I get more value out of celebrating achieving a KPI with a barbeque than most of the other things I do.
Links:
Bob B.
Engineering Operations and Product Development Executive
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I think Chris is right.
In addition, since the leader sets the agenda and the tone, he/she has to think about the opportunity to frame challenges against the backdrop of the top level goals. Individuals perform the best when they can connect all the dots between their activities and the overall impact of performing them. If the leader allows people to get lost in the trees and lose that forest view it's hard to keep momentum up.
The leader also has some say in what behaviors are getting recognized as noteworthy and which ones are not. Accolades focused on the fire fighters can start to slow the momentum of the balance of the team trying to be planful and execute.
Bob Becker
www.pd-advantage.com
Terrence S.
Helping Managers Become Engaging Leaders
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Luc,
I presume these are tips for a Team Leader.
Some ways to sustain momentum:
- a dashboard of some kind so that the team can see progress, speed, warnings, etc.
- frequent team touch-points (notice I did not say "meetings")
- celebrate milestones reached
- give recognition, praise
- team building events (e.g. have pizza, go bowling, donate an hour at a soup kitchen as a team, build a house via Habitat for Humanity...etc.)
Another for a Team Leader is Be a Buffer. Protect team members from organizational poachers who want to pick off your team members for other projects.
Terry
Helene F.
Connecting people & ideas across cultures & disciplines... Looking for what inspires, empowers, enables...
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Hi Luc,
Once you have: the team, the path, the listening ear, the relationship, the agenda, the tone, the schedule, what you need is some fuel to keep the pace, otherwise, the movement stops on its own after a while -I will avoid the physics mumbo jumbo ;-).
This means keeping the excitement, a sense of urgency -mise sous tension-, a reactivity. The time factor is important here. This means putting energy in the job, passion in the job, and encouraging the initiatives that do so. This also means giving enough autonomy and initiative to your team members to keep their own momentum going to fuel the collective one. It means never procrastinating, always finding ways to do things better, leveraging what can be leveraged.
I'm sure this could be put in equation...
Steven M.
Director at Grampian Outdoor Pursuits LTD
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be a buffer between the team and "management speak"
listen to the team, collectively and as individuals
give them a mission, allow them to manage the path to it giving guidance/support where required.
don't gripe downhill, never complain to the team about upper management.
Exemplify good behaviours
Praise (and/or reward) collective and individual achievement
Be their advocate to the outside world
Trust the team to deliver
Never lie to the team
Sanjay N.
CIO at Technology for Business Solutions
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Luc, I would give a big tip...DO NOT USE TRICKS, period.
People are not stupid, they see through tricks even though they may not show it. They may even yield to manipulation, but not for long.
What works is respect for people, trust, openness, fostering innovation, subordinating opinions to facts and figures, experimentation without fear of failure, sense of belonging and identity, supporting the weaklings, achievable vision, collective unwinding after a hard day's work...etc. etc....
sanjay9negi@hotmail.com
Paul D.
Professional Interim Executive: Programme Director, Change & Transformation Agent. Business Architect, Executive Coach
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Hi Luc
Start with the goal and the work:
Does everyone know what is expected of them?
I success clearly defined?
Do they feel valued and have their professional view listened to?
Is the route to the goal broken down into time periods of 5 days or less (with defined deliverables) and phases of 30 days or less (all working days)
Do you take the time celebrate the sucess of each work package completing (and each phase) to the time target or less? - go and get the best team/individual Coffee from Sttarbucks or Costa etc.
Hold daily or weekly team learning sessions (30-45min) - what have we learned so far? what can we change about what we do to perform better?
Motivated correctly, every team member can perform well. If indivduals have problems, deal with them immediately, directly and appropriately.
Separate out those who won't from those who can't - and get rid of the former while helping the latter.
Be open about performance - including your own. We all have good days and others!
Get the work done - and have fun: the two are not mutually exclusive!
enjoy
There are three core qualities to leadership: authenticity, self-expression, value creation. Get them right and you have endless momentum
