Becoming a Contributing Team Member

In today's workplace, you are expected to be a contributing team player, usually serving on several teams at once. Some teams are comprised entirely of individuals within your work group. Other project teams are cross-functional and consist of colleagues from across the organization, and yet other teams include people from other organizations such as consultants, vendors, and clients.

Your ability to be a valuable, contributing member of these teams can have a significant impact on achieving your career goals. Gaining a reputation as a valuable team member impacts your current work goals, your relationships at work, your opportunities for team leadership, and how satisfied and motivated you feel in your job. Here are some characteristics of a contributing team member.

Cooperative and Supportive Attitude Toward Other Individuals on the Team - For any team to achieve its full potential, you, as an individual team member, need to set aside your own personal agenda and support the other members of the team. Nothing slows down the forward progress of a team more than individuals with uncooperative attitudes. You may not always be in total alignment with the direction of your team, but you need to support your colleagues and leaders and cooperate with them to achieve desired team outcomes.

Focused Listening Skills - For the whole team to operate efficiently, you need to focus on the input of others, integrate the message, and act on it without having to be reminded.

Consistency in Preparation and Performance - Successful teams function well when individuals do their part and then hand the task off to others on the team. If you are poorly prepared or perform your tasks inconsistently, you slow down the entire team effort. Teams live and die by the trust they have in each other, and when you are consistent about performing your tasks, you increase the amount of trust your team members feel comfortable placing in you.

Skilled in Planning, Organizing, and Time Management - Because of the intricate way that workloads are shared and sequenced in a team, you must be skilled in planning your role, organizing your individual workload, and completing your function in a way that enables everyone else to complete their work on time.

Knowledgeable and/or Experienced in Team Role - An ideal team member has the training, knowledge, and experience to perform effectively in their role. If your role is new to you and you lack the desired experience, you have a responsibility to make up that deficit through study, mentoring, or additional training without slowing the team's progress.

Alex Zaborenko

Dale Carnegie Training of Colorado and Southern Wyoming

www.dalecarnegiecolorado.com

Listening More Effectively

Exceptional listening skills and the ability to persuade others to your way of thinking make the difference between good and great teams. Pure listening builds trust, credibility, and respect. One reason is that when you fully listen instead of trying to compose your response, the result is a relevant and on-target response. What you say when you do respond is proof of how well you listen. Here are 7 types of listeners and tips to communicate with them:

1) "Preoccupieds" - These people come across as rushed and are constantly looking around or doing something else. Also known as multitaskers, these people cannot sit still and listen.

Tips - If you are a "Preoccupied" listener, make a point to set aside what you are doing when someone is speaking to you. If you are speaking to a "Preoccupied" listener, you might ask, "Is this a good time?" or say, "I need your undivided attention for just a moment." Begin with a statement that will get their attention, be brief, and get to the bottom line quickly because their attention span is short.

2) "Out-to-Lunchers" - These people are physically there for you, but mentally, they are not. You can tell this by the blank look on their faces. They are either daydreaming or thinking about something else entirely.

Tips - If you are an "Out-to-Luncher," act like a good listener. Be alert, maintain eye contact, lean forward, and show interest by asking questions. If you are speaking to an "Out-to-Luncher," check in with them every now and again and ask if they understood what you were saying. As with the "Preoccupieds," begin with a statement that will catch their attention and be concise and to the point, because their attention span is also short.

3) "Interrupters" - These people are ready to chime in at any given time. They are perched and ready for a break to complete your sentence for you. They are not listening to you. They are focused on trying to guess what you will say and what they want to say.

Tips - If you are an "Interrupter," make a point to apologize every time you catch yourself interrupting. This will make you more conscious of it. If you are speaking to an "Interrupter," when they chime in, stop immediately and let them talk, or they will never listen to you. When they are done, you might say, "As I was saying before..." to bring their interruption to their attention.

4) "Whatevers" - These people remain aloof and show little emotion when listening. They do not seem to care about anything you have to say.

Tips - If you are a "Whatever," concentrate on the full message, not just the verbal message. Make a point to listen with your eyes, ears, and heart. Pay attention to body language and try to understand why this person wants to talk to you about this issue. If you are speaking to a "Whatever," dramatize your ideas and ask your listener questions to maintain their involvement.

5) "Combatives" - These people are armed and ready for war. They enjoy disagreeing and blaming others.

Tips - If you are a "Combative," make an effort to put yourself in the speaker's shoes and understand, accept, and find merit in another's point of view. If you are speaking to a "Combative," when he or she disagrees or points the blame, look forward instead of back. Talk about how you might agree to disagree or about what can be done differently next time.

6) "Analysts" - These people are constantly in the role of counselor or therapist, and they are ready to provide you with unsolicited answers. They think they are great listeners and love to help. They are constantly in an analyze-what-you-are-saying-and-fix-it mode.

Tips - If you are an "Analyst," relax and understand that not everyone is looking for an answer, solution, or advice. Some people just like bouncing ideas off other people because it helps them see the answers more clearly themselves. If you are speaking to an "Analyst," you might begin by saying, "I just need to run something by you. I'm not looking for any advice."

7) "Engagers" - These are the consciously aware listeners. They listen with their eyes, ears, and hearts and try to put themselves in the speaker's shoes. This is listening at the highest level. Their listening skills encourage you to continue talking and give you the opportunity to discover your own solutions and let your ideas unfold.

Tips - If you are an "Engager," keep it up. People truly appreciate this about you. If you are speaking to an "Engager," take the time to acknowledge their attentiveness. Thank them for their interest in you and your topic.

Alex Zaborenko
Dale Carnegie Training of Colorado & Southern Wyoming
www.dalecarnegiecolorado.com

Building Trust Through Conflict

Ironically, you have an opportunity to take a relationship to a higher level of trust after a conflict situation. Think of a time when your car had to be returned to your dealer for repair. You may have felt frustrated and annoyed by the situation, but if your auto dealer handled the situation successfully, you are more likely to choose that dealer over another in the future because you trust that they will come through for you, even if there is an issue. To rise to that level of trust in conflict situations, you must be able to:

Adapt - Nothing is more irritating than being in conflict with another person who is rigidly adhering to their set of rules and who is unwilling to adapt to a particular situation. Be willing to look at the situation objectively and let go of resentment, bias, and inflexible thinking.

Keep the Relationship Warm - Just because you are coming from opposite viewpoints, you don't have to treat each other coldly or rudely. That only deepens the resentment in a conflict situation. Try to continue to connect on a human level with the other person.

Listen to Values - Sometimes a conflict situation gets bogged down in petty details. If you can focus and look for shared values, you can often find a way to resolve the conflict.

Act on What You Hear - If another person has an issue with you and feels strongly enough about it to express it, it is your responsibility as a professional to act on that communication. When you do so, you show your good faith in trying to bring the conflict to a mutually acceptable resolution.

Follow Up - You can't simply walk away from a conflict situation and expect that everything will resolve itself. People need time to cool off and process solutions, but you should always follow up with the other person and check to see that you have moved beyond the conflict in your relationship.

Be Willing to Change Yourself - How can you expect another person to change if you can't change yourself? Someone once said that the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over, but expecting different results. To put the conflict behind you permanently, you have to demonstrate that you are doing your best to change.

Alex Zaborenko
Dale Carnegie Training of Colorado & Southern Wyoming
http://www.dalecarnegiecolorado.com/

Improving Existing Processes

Once you clearly understand a process, you can focus on ways to make improvements. Review each step of the process with the following key points in mind to make your problems SCARCE.

Simplify: Identify steps that can be made easier, done faster, or completed with fewer resources. Look for changes in technology, software, and best practices in the industry. Consider when the number of movements or moving parts can be decreased. Consider the distances to transport people, machines, or raw materials that can be reduced.

Combine: Look for opportunities to combine two or more different operations. Reduce the number of people who interact with the process. Have the same person, function, or department do more so that more value is added to the system at that point. Identify redundancies that create additional steps and rework them.

Add Value: Create added value at new points in the process. Determine what could be done at each step to either add new value or add value that was being created somewhere else in the process. This actually means adding elements to the process, so be certain that the added value is worth the investment. Value is determined by the ultimate customers, so be sure to keep their perspectives in mind. Be careful not to create unnecessary redundancies across departments that could lead to conflicts later.

Re-Arrange: This could involve moving people, equipment, work spaces, raw materials, etc. Look at options to change the sequence of operations or activities. Could something be done earlier or later? By a different person or at a different location? Small changes can make a big difference.

Clarify: Sometimes we discover that a process is correct, but it is not being followed consistently. Be careful of change just for the sake of change. You might discover that people are unaware of processes, need additional training, or have to be convinced why it is important to do the process in the prescribed way. This is where good communication and human relation skills are critical.

Eliminate: This is usually the most effective and easiest approach. Careful examination of long-held processes usually brings to light steps that are no longer necessary. Often there is little or no investment in time or resources required to eliminate these types of steps. Just be careful not to eliminate elements that are essential to downstream operations. Before eliminating something, ask stakeholders in the organization why a step is being done.