Building a High Performance Team

 

Background

One of the most costly business issues facing companies is the loss of productivity due to misunderstanding, resisting what someone else is saying and the amount of wasted effort by working on the wrong things.  It has been estimated that the lack of clear communication costs about 25% to 30% of an organization’s time.  This translates into significant amount of lost revenue, time and ineffectiveness in fulfilling the corporate initiatives.  

The current communication paradigm is “speaking driven”.  In this paradigm, it is important to get your point across.  We live in the illusion that people are hearing everything we are saying exactly as we said it.  Even knowing these dynamics will not alter the outcome.  To change these dynamics, you have to uncover the current communication paradigm to see what is “driving” your need to speak.  Opening this up, gives you a huge insight into the breakdowns in communication that are happening around you. 

In designing a new communication paradigm for business, we create and open up a way of communicating that allows you to significantly increase your effectiveness by being “listening driven”.  “Trying” to be “listening driven” from the current communication paradigm, fundamentally does not work.  It does require a distinctly different operating principle, to be “listening driven”.  This is a “new paradigm”.  This new communication paradigm allows for a velocity, a simplicity, a confidence in knowing what you said has landed, resulting in a significant increase in each person’s effectiveness.  

When a group of people are developed in this new communication paradigm, the group dynamics moves to real teamwork, a profound relatedness of honoring each other for their strengths and a velocity.  Being “listening driven” as a group, allows for unforeseen possibilities to arise from a conversation, which will impact your business initiatives.  

Designed Impact of the Training Sessions

  • The Communication Training sessions are designed to reveal the unseen dynamics that has people’s communications be ineffective and open up new tools that they can use to significantly expand their effectiveness in communication and delivering on-time results. 

  • The Training Sessions are designed to allow each person to “discover” a new way of communicating.  This is accomplished through group dialogue, exercises and questioning that allows each person to discover their dynamics that has their communication be ineffective.  Then, they create structures and practices they will use to shift their effectiveness.

  • All elements of a high performance team in coordinated action are developed and integrated in the operations of the team.

Phases of the Program

1.     Interview/ Analysis Phase

  • The interview / analysis phase:  A 20-30 minute designed confidential phone interview would be conducted with the leadership team.  The interview questionnaire is designed to uncover the operating culture, assess the current level of communication and team in place, and identify the challenges and concerns that are operating in the background for each person and the operational structures that restricts open communication.  This information will be used to tailor the training modules to be more effective.  The interview process will be scheduled over a week period to accommodate people’s schedules.

2.     Implementation/Integration Phase

  • A series of six custom designed training modules will be conducted with the team divided up into groups of 10 people each.  In an ideal series, week 1 would be the Delivery of the first module to both groups on a Monday.  The Delivery of the second module would be on Thursday of week 1.  The non-Delivery days would be available for coaching and sitting in on meeting to support integration of the concepts and principles.  The remaining Delivery of the other 4 modules would be done on week 4 and week 7.  The training modules will be 3 hours each.  The training modules topics and outcomes are as follows:

Module 1:     The Fundamentals of Effective Conversations

  • Effective interaction with people who are not delivering

  • Conversations that gain effective commitments from others and keeps the commitments “alive create clear, concise, accurate and desired results

  • Ways of communicating that create a velocity and increase effectiveness

 Module 2:     Effective Listening

  • Reveal the communication dynamics that effects how you listen and what you can hear

  • Techniques to improve clarity and increase understanding

  • Eliminating misunderstandings, miscommunications, incomplete work and people working on the wrong thing.

Module 3:     Managing Performance

  • Techniques to overcome barriers to meaningful communication

  • Disappearing barriers to holding people to account

  • Ways to communicate to assure complete understanding the deliverables.

  • Ways to manage to assure timely delivery

Module 4:     Designing a High Performance Team

  • Create the dynamics of a High Performance Team

  • Create a Charter of Behaviors

  • Create future you are fulfilling and the operating principles

Module 5: Effective Results Driven Meetings: 

  • To provide a template for effective meeting management which can be used and deployed by the project team

  • To ensure meetings become are more productive and are a more efficient use of an individual's time

Module 6: Handling Excuses, Tough Conversations

  • Techniques to hold people to account with integrity and authenticity

  • Separating out the facts from opinions, eliminating excuses.

  • Methodology for providing tough feedback in an effective way

  • Creating alignment on how to move forward effectively

  • Creating workability and effectiveness

 

Structure

  • During the process of the Delivery of the 6th module a participant feedback form will be conducted on the relevance, value and the impact of the workshops.

  • During the weeks of Delivery, coaching on applying the tools from the communication modules will be available by sitting in on meetings or presentations.  This is a critical phase of applying all of what has been opened up in the communication modules to real life situations the participants are facing.

  • Each participant during the non-Delivery weeks will have a 30 minute coaching call this will continue for 3 weeks after completing the 6th module.

    • Individual coaching calls related to concerns or challenges the participant is facing with a person or a situation.

  • Four weeks after the completion of the 6th module a call will be set up to review all of the results and any next steps required.