Laying to Rest the Ghost that Haunts your Team

Many people mistakenly look at the world and think that what they see is reality. In fact, what they see is merely their perception of reality. Unfortunately, these perceptions often evolve into restrictive limiting beliefs, coloring our views about how the world works and preventing us from reaching our full potential.

Like a virus, these limiting beliefs can quickly spread throughout your team and become collective beliefs. In his book “What got you here won’t get you there,” Marshall Goldsmith makes a strong case that there are a handful of workplace habits (e.g., negativity, clinging to the past, failing to adapt or embrace change) that tend to keep successful people and teams from making the next big leap forward.

As a team leader, therefore, it’s your job to analyze the agility of your team to help uncover, identify and dispel these limiting beliefs.

Is your team simply repeating the same activities without generating any appreciably different results?

Have team meetings become uninspired and rote?

When was the last time as a team you evaluated your approach to marketing, your onboarding process or your service delivery model?

All too often, teams tend to find themselves in an operational rut that’s precluding them from generating the type of growth they’re truly capable of.

Clear out the cobwebs

Invite your team to become more active participants. Encourage them to consistently seek new opportunities to enhance their skillsets, using team meetings as an opportunity to discuss new ideas and improve processes. Strive to foster an environment where team members are eager to learn from each other, curious to find out what’s working at other firms, and perhaps most importantly, not depending on you for it all. 

And if old structures aren’t working, don’t be afraid to throw them out. Sometimes starting from scratch and coming up with something new yields far better results than trying to refine a flawed process

Once you are clear about what your team’s limiting beliefs are, you’ll be well on your way to overcoming them.

Coaching Questions from this article:

1. Think about the past few team meetings you’ve held. What was the energy level like? How engaged were your team members? Did anyone suggest any new or novel ideas?
2. As team leader, what actions could you take in order to encourage team members to shed their limiting beliefs and look for better ways to do things?
3. When was the last time as a team you evaluated your approach to marketing, your onboarding process or your service delivery model? How will you go about engaging your team in conducting these assessments?