In this week’s blog, I continue with the theme of tips to help develop leadership capability, develop greater employee engagement and create the right environment for high performance.

This week, I am providing some tips to help the team to be enthused about the vision and to be more engaged with it.

One of my favourite stories about the power and importance of a clearly articulated vision in a team involves President Kennedy’s visit to the NASA Space Centre in 1962. During his visit he noticed a janitor carrying a broom. He interrupted his tour, walked over to the man and said, “Hi, I’m Jack Kennedy. What are you doing?”

“Well, Mr. President,” the janitor responded, “I’m helping put a man on the moon.”

To most people the janitor was just cleaning a building but what is wonderful is that the janitor felt part of a team and something larger than just his day to day activities. He felt involved and in his mind he was helping to make history. Without a clean building and facilities the team wouldn’t have been able to operate at optimum levels. Everyone has a part to play in successful team performance.

No matter how large or small someone’s role in a team, they are helping to contribute to something larger that’s being created by the whole team/business. When the entire team adopts this attitude and belief then the team is able to create an amazing team spirit and generate incredible results and achievements.

Here a few tips to develop a sense of ownership of your team’s vision:

  • Frequently talk with enthusiasm about the future prospects and the vision for the team/business. Encourage engagement with the vision by seeking colleague’s ideas and input on how to achieve it.
  • Ensure that everyone in the team has clarity on the core focus and purpose of their role. Discuss with colleagues how their role contributes towards vision achievement. It’s imperative that people feel valued and part of things to create the right environment.
  • Encourage the team to be innovative and creative in their thinking to bring the vision to life and make it a reality. Use mind mapping techniques, the creation of story boards, timelines and vision posters to support this.
  • Be responsive and deal with colleague’s concerns about the obstacles and roadblocks that hamper performance and may get in the way of vision achievement. Look for and implement solutions to these obstacles.
  • Use Storytelling as a powerful tool when you want to drive change and performance improvement. Stories help to develop the imagination and when used effectively can motivate people to achieve more than they thought possible.

This week why not take a few moments to reflect and consider your personal and/or business vision. How clear is your personal vision for the next 12 months? What steps can you take to bring more clarity or to progress your vision? Professionally, how clear is the vision for the team that you are involved with? What steps could you take to get greater engagement and involvement within the team for the vision?

This week’s quotation:

“A vision without action is just a dream; an action without a vision just passes time; a vision with an action changes the world.” Nelson Mandela

To arrange a free no obligation consultation, please contact Stephen Pauley via the contact form or by e mail: Stephen@befirstclass.co.uk