Building More Trust in Team Dynamics During Challenging Times

"How may I help you through this?" ... These are some of the most powerful words one can use in a team environment.

High performing teams are created by working through and overcoming challenges and achieving stretch goals. When the challenge is external to the team, it will bond them to work together and often achieve more than they expected.

When an individual team member feels over-challenged at work or in another area of their life and other team members check in and support them through the rough patch, team loyalty is created and it takes the team unity to a stronger level.

Everyone experiences ups and downs in their lives. No-one escapes the Universal Law of Rhythm! It keeps life interesting and helps us become more resilient in future times of crisis. It is a normal part of life and the sooner we address people's emotional reactions to the challenges they perceive, the easier it is to support them. If we ignore people's emotional reactions they will repeat the challenges in their mind over and over and every time they do, they create a stronger and stronger reaction in their system that takes more and more work to resolve.

Most of the time people only want it acknowledged that they have a big issue to deal with as they want to work out the issue on their own - we all want to be in control - right? Most often people want to feel they are being supported through a challenging time, not have someone else fix it for them.

Other team members may be in overwhelm with major challenges in their lives. These team mates would benefit from some support for a while. The best thing to do first is to check in and find out if they would like to share what is going on. Whether they want to share details or not, you can still ask the question, "How may I help you through this?"

If they share that they want help but don't know how you can help, then you have the opportunity to find professionals who you can refer them to. If they tell you how you can help you have a great place to start. Remember to make sure you don't over support them as it is overcoming challenges that helps us grow and improve our leadership abilities.

It is valuable to understand that the behaviour a person is demonstrating during their challenging time is temporary and they can be helped to work through it and return to full capacity. Life gets in the way! No team has all of the team members working at full capacity all of the time. Supporting each other through the rough patches is what connects us as human beings and strengthens the team. It also has the obvious benefits of not needing to recruit, select and train a replacement team member if they become so overwhelmed they leave.

Teams who are empowered with Optimum Thinking emotional mastery knowledge and skills are able to more easily have meaningful conversations at challenging times that can help team members get themselves out of stuck emotional reaction and quickly return to inspired action.

When the whole team is facing a crisis, building strong teams is best achieved through considering the needs of the individuals whilst keeping everyone's eye on the business mission and goals. In times of crisis, it is very important that we have valuable work to keep us focused and gain a sense of achievement.

If conditions delay or change "business as usual" it is important that individual employees are still able to see the value of the new form of work they may be required to do. We all need to perceive we are in control and that what we are doing is meaningful and valuable according to our unique Hierarchy of Individual Life Priorities (HILP). Take the time to check in with individual team members and have quality conversations using active listening to help them make the links between what is important to them and how the new form or work will help them achieve their goals as well as the goals of the organisation.

The only constant is transformation. Our ability to adapt to change is our superpower in challenging times and is a learned art. 🦋

At Optimum Thinking we are dedicated to helping people develop skills to help themselves understand emotions and how to balance their emotional states to improve their communication, relationships and results.