Imagine having your own roadmap for team success?

Often it isn’t until we ask people to work with others in teams, that we realise differences in working styles, how we react to things, how we make decisions or process information. All of these dimensions are different from person to person.

The best scenario is that all individuals in a team have high levels of self-awareness and they:

• • Know their personal strengths and challenges
  • Adapt their style to communicate differently with each other
  • Recognise whether they have a task/relationship focus in the way they make decisions
  • Acknowledge whether they perceive the world in a step-by-step or a creative/conceptual way
  • Adopt an agile way of thinking and behaving to suit different situations
  • Are resilient and manage their emotions when the environment is tough.

The worst scenario is that team members have no idea about anything listed above and possible consequences could be:

• • The Highest Paid Person’s Opinion (HIPPO) is the one which dominates the whole team
  • There is a lack of respect for Cognitive Diversity within the team – not recognising the value of different ways of thinking and approaching work
  • There is a tendency for ‘group think’ and decisions typically go the same way, unchallenged
  • There are different factions in a team – the in-crowd and those who aren’t included
  • Great ideas aren’t heard – either because they are ignored or because individuals with those ideas don’t feel valued or know they won’t be heard, so keep that brilliance to themselves
  • People have very similar styles in the team and approach things in the same way and sometimes badly, without realising
  • Without high levels of self-awareness, poor behaviours prevail and get replicated across the team.

Insights Discovery gives us a fighting chance to avoid the possibilities listed above in the worst-case scenario and even if you’re unsure how it works, you’ll be able to recognise some potential challenges in these two teams.

Team 1

This was a senior leadership team I worked with several years ago where you can see that 6 out of the 7 team members exist on the same half of the Insights Discovery Team Wheel. There are strong preferences for Fiery Red and Cool Blue energy which in practice, played out as a strong outcome focus, the need for tangible and timely results, highly driven and sometimes outspoken, lack of patience, less interest in people and relationships, lower levels of trust and less engagement on a personal level. In itself, this isn’t necessarily a bad thing, but without the self-awareness and knowledge that the team could reinforce these behaviours amongst themselves and even more so when under pressure, there could be challenges, radiating beyond the team and out into the whole business.

Team 2

Here’s another team – completely different to Team 1 and due to the nature of their work, they are highly

self-aware and quite skilled at flexing and adapting. Their biggest challenges moving forward could be:
• High levels of introversion and possibly less inclined to openly challenge
• Different styles of decision making where some decide quickly on the basis of their gut instinct and others will need much more evidence before they move forward
• High levels of a working preference which likes things to be grounded in reality and evidence and step by step – this team could all have challenges if needing to be creative, less risk averse and trying new things.

Imagine knowing these things about your team… How good for the team as a whole and the individuals within the team…

Imagine not knowing any of these things…
As a team member, how will you know how to connect most effectively with your colleagues? Or will you just rely on guesswork and telepathy?! How will you know where your team strengths and weaknesses lie and where you may need to be more actively conscious of the ways you tend to behave with each other?
As a manager, how will you know how to lead and inspire your team? How will you ensure you enable everyone to be ‘the best version of themselves’ or will you just manage everyone in exactly the same way and just cross your fingers that some of your management behaviours work?!

Team effectiveness starts with self-awareness and Insights Discovery provides you with an excellent road map for team success. Imagine your whole team having individual profiles. Imagine sharing these to provide inspiration for effective communication, working with people on the opposite side of the wheel, suggestions for personal development, information on the blind spots of working styles, details of the ideal environment in which team members thrive, plus individual strengths and weaknesses.

Imagine not having this kind of information for your team…. Imagine being in the dark…

Wanting your own Insights Discovery profile?

If you’re curious and want to know more, there are all sorts of ways of obtaining your own profile.

ELearning – take yourself on a journey of self-discovery working at your own pace, culminating in a Zoom coaching session.

Arranging a team session to enable all team members to have a profile and embark on a learning journey together.

Devising some leadership development in your organisation tailored to your needs.

Arranging for your own coaching session with a profile

If you would like to make a bespoke enquiry or you’d just like to chat through the options, please do get in touch