The Beatles and their balance

“My model for business is The Beatles. They were four guys who kept each other kind of negative tendencies in check. They balanced each other and the total was greater than the sum of the parts. That’s how I see business: great things in business are never done by one person, they’re done by a team of people.” Indeed, well said by Steve Jobs.

It is this team of people that needs to be constantly cultivated to be high performers. And cultivating teams is no easy task. It ultimately starts by each team member understanding themselves and the other members of the team. It is about understanding how together they can get together to achieve results and success.

The leaders’ task in all this is to harness the diverse opinions, characteristics, moods, behaviours and perspectives of all members; – and concurrently finding the right balance to ensure all parts of the team work in sync.

There are a few actions that leaders and teams can undergo:

  1. Start by taking a critical look at your team and if need be, engage an external consultant to conduct an audit of the team. Thus helping in understanding the diversity of the people: their different skills set, competences, approach and working styles.
  2. Understand what the gap/s is in the team’s alignment with the overall business strategy, goals and objectives are. Look for the missing ‘links’.
  3. The team should find ways and means to bridge the identified gap/s and balance their diversity so as to create a mix that will indeed lead to doing ‘great things’ together as a team. Develop a roadmap together to create talent opportunities for all. Important to ensure the plan is actionable and everyone is part of and accountable for it.

Lead by example and increase the competencies and performance of your team.

 


About the author

Maria Bartolo Zahra is Managing Director of SurgeAdvisory. She has over fifteen years of human resources and business advisory experience.