How to create a team (Part 1)

IF YOU HAVE A VISION YOU CAN ACCOMPLISH ON YOUR OWN, YOUR VISION IS NOT BIG ENOUGH.

Here are some suggestions on how to build a great team.

1. Select team members, don't just RECRUIT Volunteers.

• It's usually best to select team members as opposed to letting individuals volunteer for your team. This is particularly applicable to non-profit organizations that depend a lot on volunteers (our churches).


• Building an effective team is too important to leave to chance and to other people's whims. Often, people have scant insight into whether or not they are right for particular job and they make hasty decisions based on dubious motivations ("I feel guilty that no one else is volunteering for this need.") When Jesus Began his earthly ministry, he hand-picked twelve men; he didn't ask for volunteers.
  

2. A Leader should be intricately INVOLVED in compiling his/her team

• A leader should have the authority and responsibility to choose her team members. Sometimes a leader inherits a team; in which case, she has to start with what she's been given. But whenever possible, the leader should have significant input in to the process. So when choosing team members, ask others to help you; submit these decisions to the wisdom of others.

3. Carefully SELECT your team members.

• There's an old adage handed down from the garment industry: Measure twice, cut once. Before a seamstress cuts an expensive bolt of cloth he measures multiple times because one the cut is made it cannot be changed.


• Southwest Airlines takes great care in hiring its employees; their 33.000 employees are hand-picked in a screening process that is statistically more rigorous that getting into an Ivy League School. Prospective pilots have been known to disqualify themselves by being curt to receptionists before interviews. Hiring managers sometimes pose as applicants to get unfiltered impressions of job candidates in the waiting room.

Here is what some leading authorities say about the importance of carefully choosing team members.

• "How you select people is more important than how you manage them once they're on the job. if you start with the right people, you won't have problems later on. If you hire the wrong people, for whatever reason, you're in serious trouble and all revolutionary management techniques in the world won't bail you out." -Red Auerbach, longtime Boston Celtics President


• " A Leader's most important decision fall in to two categories: big bets on people and big bets on strategy. The people decisions are arguably more important because they heavily influence the strategy decisions." - David Nadler, Harvard Business Review


• "Given the many things that businesses cant control (the economy, competitors) you'd think that they would pay more careful attention to the one thing they can control - the quality of people, especially those in the leadership pool."

4. Choose LEADERS (or potential leaders)

• If you want your organization to just function smoothly, choose followers for your team. But if you want your organization to grow and be robust, recruit leaders.


• Every organization is restricted by its leadership quotient (the number of leaders in your organization and how competent they are). The higher your leadership quotient, the more your organization will grow and be healthy. So always try to choose leaders to serve on your team, not just followers, and if a team member is lacking in leadership capabilities, train him.
  

more on how to create a team on Part 2...