Foundational Trust Improves Team Performance

I have a personal mission – something that I think everyone should take the time to define – and a large part of this mission is “to become a great facilitator for positive change.” In this quest for excellence, I have had to look outside of my own limited experience, and seek out the expertise of others. By learning what I can from other experts, I transform my own knowledge base into a more powerful tool for change.

Now, this is a big job, and at times there is more information than I can process. In order to keep things straight I actually wind up writing things down – getting them out of my head and into a format that I can build upon. One simple way to do this is through the process of mind-mapping. With a mind map, I can write down the most important topics in my head, drill down to finer details, draw correlations between similar topics, and graphically display the “brainstorm.” In this way, I am able to process information in a more concise way, and I am less likely to get distracted by something external (phone calls, emails, web surfing, etc…)

In the meantime, I thought I’d give folks a chance to look into the inner workings of how “The Process” got started…

First, I run a teambuilding and adventure instruction company – GO-AdventureSports – which offers ropes challenge courses, portable team challenges, soapbox derby races, community service construction projects, and adventure instruction programs (rock climbing, caving, mountain biking, wilderness skills). These types of experiential education programs have shown time and time again that people learn best when engaged in fun, challenging activities – as opposed to lecture-style programming. In order to achieve maximum effect, we typically precede activities with a “frame-up” and follow activities with a “debrief” discussion period. This free-form discussion enables team members to draw correlations from the activity, back to “real life.”

The shared adventure aspect of traditional teambuilding programs is a great way of engaging people, and makes an excellent first step in building a high performing team. Traditional teambuilding programs are like opening a door, allowing those who have the desire and the commitment to walk into a completely new place. All too often, however, the ropes course or portable teambuilding program is the only opportunity people have for engaging one another in this ‘learning environment.’ Once the program is over, people go back to their normal lives, sometimes talking about the fun they had, but rarely utilizing the teamwork tools they learned during the event. The ropes course becomes a colorful memory, rather than a jump-off point into a brilliant future.

Armed with this knowledge of human tendencies, I began researching a good deal of the literature on the subject of leadership, team dynamics, personal development and success – mostly from the perspective of people in the business community. Trying to sift through the myriad of different books and audiobooks available, I came up with a list that I felt was most useful for building a successful team. The following list of books is linked to a site that describes and sells these excellent books:

The Fifth Discipline Fieldbook
Work Like DaVinci
The Power of an Hour
The Emotional Intelligence Quickbook
The Ten Faces of Innovation
Leadership and Self-Deception
Overcoming the Five Dysfunctions of a Team
Eat That Frog!
What Got You Here Won’t Get You There
The Speed of Trust

Granted, this is a long list, and much of the information found within any one book is similar to that found in many others. However, each of these books had some kernel of truth that I felt teams needed to master in order to become a ‘learning organization,’ capable of innovating to meet the future head-on.

Now, as I begin fine-tuning “The Process,” I am building a mind-map of “kernels of truth” and combining them with powerful traditional teambuilding exercises. This combination of experiential and theoretical education will yield the best results.

I’ll keep you posted!