It’s easy to spot a really dysfunctional team in an organisation. People are political, don’t support each other, are confrontational, divisive and they don’t actually do what they say they’re going to do. At Leaders Lab we rarely have to deal with a senior team in this state (although we are occasionally asked to get involved as a last resort). In such cases, the team is not just going through… read more →
An important leadership skill is the ability to help your team function well under stress, and stay together through any tensions. As team members, you must all respect each other, believe you are all on the same side with the same goal, and have the same level of commitment to achieving it. What happens to teams under stress? Unfortunately, you may find that times of stress bring out patterns of… read more →
Too many people blame circumstances or those around them for the stress in their life. The first step to self-leadership, and ultimately to great leadership of others, is to learn to take responsibility for and manage your own responses to stress. Brian Bacon from Oxford Leadership thoughts on this subject are worth considering: Don’t depend on any other person to relieve your psychological load. There is a good chance that… read more →
When a team, or an organisation, reaches a certain size it begins to have a dynamic of its own, quite different from that of a loose group of individuals – and for managers it can seem as if the skills you’ve learnt about managing yourself, your work and your people, have deserted you. What you’ve probably missed is that there’s been a ‘state change’ in your business. You can no… read more →