Excellence: Characteristic Six of a Healthy Team

Dr. David Rafeedie

Note: This is the sixth article in the series on healthy teams. https://davidthecoach.com/blog-1/2017/11/14/characteristics-of-a-healthy-team.

The room was beautiful! Will had done his best to make sure everything was perfect. The CEO of the organization was going to be here, along with some very important potential clients. It would be a real feather in the organization’s cap, and in Will’s too if they could land the company as a client. Will’s CEO was a stickler for excellence. He looked at every detail. Will thought he must have been a drill sergeant in another life with all the white glove surprise inspections.

Will didn’t take any chances for this meeting. He called his team together to discuss their role in putting the meeting together, and the responsibility the team had for the success of the outcome. He divvied up the responsibilities for the meeting, including the menu, to his team. He hired a professional to set up the room in accordance with his strict guidelines. In preparation for the meeting and to set up the room, he asked himself this question: “Who is the potential client—not their name or what they do—but who are they as people?” To answer the question required some research. He and his team did their homework.

 Now, as he surveyed the room, he put himself in his boss’s and client’s shoes and asked: “What will his boss and the prospective client see when they walk in the room?” “What will they experience when they sit down?”

He didn’t have long to find out the answer to his questions. His boss and the potential client arrived. His boss was pleased when he walked into the room, and the prospective client was impressed. The hard work, and hiring the professional, paid off.  

His boss expected excellence, and when he walked in the room, he thought he was experiencing it. The trouble began when they sat down.

The sixth characteristic of a healthy team: Excellence is a fundamental value of healthy teams. They are constantly looking for ways to improve and are not satisfied with the mundane or status quo.

Nobody is perfect, so that means there are no perfect teams. Since that is the case, it is always good to have a system of “built-in” evaluation to improve a team’s effectiveness. Evaluation does not mean change is constant; that can cause confusion and low morale. The evaluation might confirm you are doing well. But evaluation is always good because environments change, culture changes, and the team must understand the context in which it works.

Attitude

Some people think attitude is not quantifiable. But I assure you attitude is visible and palpable. We have all experience going into a restaurant. We have all had great servers, servers who smile at you, they are friendly, they look you in the eye, and they are attentive to your desires. We have all had poor servers, who don’t smile, who seem as if they could care less whether you were there or not. Servers you may not see until your meal is over and they bring the bill.

“Attitude is visible, contagious, and inspiring. It is a tangible that reflects an inner desire, or not, to achieve what is good, to be the best, to excel at whatever one does…An organization can’t please every human being every time but it never hurts to try.”

Horst Schulz, the co-founder of the Ritz-Carlton hotel company, says in his book; Excellence Wins: A No-Nonsense Guide To Becoming The Best In A World Of Compromise.  (Schulze, 2019)[1]

If a team does not get the attitude right, forget about the following because attitude is the foundation of excellence.

Attention to detail

“The devil is in the details.” You may get all the big things right like Will in the above made up story. But if you have missed some of the details or even one important detail, no one will be looking at the big picture. They will be focused on the detail or details that didn’t get done.

What makes great athletes, and great teams, great, is the attention to detail. MLB players can catch a baseball, and NBA players can dribble. You get the idea. If you can’t do either of those things respectively, you will not be playing on your team. And if you want to be an All-Star, you must do those things exceptionally well.

Every team needs someone who loves details! If your team doesn’t have a person or persons like that, start looking for one if you want to achieve excellence.

Drive to strive

You have to want it! A healthy team is constantly looking to be the best at what they do. They do not settle for second best or also-rans. They are embarrassed by “participation” ribbons and awards. They want to excel; they want to win. That is why they look out for each other and support one another. A team is only as strong as the weakest member. Team members on a healthy team are self-motivated and do not tolerate team members who do not strive to be the best.

 There is more to achieving excellence than the three points above. A healthy leader is critical, and there are barriers to overcome in becoming excellent. Internal and external barriers that will militate against the above items or anything else you are doing to become excellent. But a determination to be excellent will take you to the lofty winner’s circle in the organization and your field.

It’s about your journey and your vision for your team. I can help. Email me at info@davidthecoach.com, or text with a good day and time to call you, or call me 520-709-1860, and let’s have a conversation to see if we want to establish a coaching relationship.

If you are reading this on social media, check out my website at www.davidthecoach.com.  You will also find more blogs on transitions, fear, leadership, and other subjects dealing with success factors.  

[1] Schulze, H. (2019). Excellence Wins:A No-Nonsense Guide To Becoming The Best In A World of Comprimise. Grand Rapids: Zondervan.