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“Whether you are a
steel worker or a kindergarten teacher, the success of your work will
rely on the people you work with.
That doesn’t take magic. It takes prioritizing
and investing your time… Read
more… |
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Building
Strong Work Teams (Part 4): Investing the Time to Build Trust
This is the 4th in a series of practices
rooted in Catalytic
Listening, focused on building supportive, effective, and
joyful work teams. Read
the blog that kicked off this series here.
Practice
#1 focused on how
to begin meetings to bring out the best in people.
Practice
#2 focused on how
to end meetings, to bring out the best in people.
Practice
#3 turned reflection into weekly celebration.
This week, in Practice #4, we’re moving into some bigger, more
intentional practices – prioritizing time for getting to know each
other as people.
Prioritizing and Investing Time
In a post
this weekend, Hildy shared stories of people who have turned
their work around, not by investing huge sums of money, but by investing
time in getting to know each other.
The equation is simple.
Getting
to know each other⇒ builds trust.
Building
trust ⇒ builds teams who bring out the best in each other.
Strong teams ⇒ better results.
This week’s practice is therefore an exploration: Is building trust
really a priority for you?
In next week’s journal, we will share questions that can guide your
relationship / trust-building efforts. But all those questions are a
moot point if you haven’t prioritized taking the time to share those
stories in the first place.
Try
this:
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The
following questions will help you determine your true priorities when
it comes to building trust relationships among your team. This exercise
is most effective when you answer the questions in writing, using 2
sheets of paper - one labelled "Aspirations,"
the other labelled "Fears."
On the Aspirations sheet,
create 2 columns to answer these questions:
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Column 1: What would
it make possible if we prioritized time in our meetings, for our team
members to know each other as whole people?
Column
2: What would it make possible if we do NOT prioritize
time in our meetings for our team members to know each other as whole
people?
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On
the Fears sheet,
create 2 columns to answer these questions:
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Column 1: What is
the worst that could happen if we prioritized time in our meetings, for
our team members to know each other as whole people?
Column
2: What is the worst that could happen if we do NOT
prioritize time in our meetings for our team members to know each other
as whole people?
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Compare
your answers to both questions.
- Which aspirations inspire you more? Which
would you prefer to work towards?
- Which fears concern you more? Which
“worst” are you more willing to live with?
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This
exercise is always revealing, as it makes explicit the assumptions that
often quietly guide our decisions in the background. Bringing those
aspirations
and fears to light, and especially
labeling them as aspirations
and fears,
is a way of listening honestly to ourselves, absent the
rationalizations and other stories we often tell ourselves. That is why
this practice is part of Catalytic Listening and the larger Catalytic
Thinking framework of which Catalytic Listening is a part.
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Want
to learn alongside other people who are trying out these
practices? Join
us at the Catalytic
Thinking in Action community on Facebook -
a welcoming place where you can ask questions and learn from people
like you who are experimenting with these practices. We look forward to
seeing you there!
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eJournal Archives:
If you’re new to our eJournal, or just want to remind yourself of past
practice exercises we’ve shared, check out our eJournal
archives here.
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Keeping Our
Programs Freely Available
Most of the
programs at Creating the Future are free or low cost, with liberal
tuition assistance when they aren’t.
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If you find our
programs of benefit, we hope you will consider
contributing, to help
keep these programs available to as many
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Creating
the
Future
is a
collection of
people around
the world,
supporting
each other in
a grand
experiment.
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The
experiment:
To
determine how
much better
the world
could be if
the questions
we ask in our
day to day
lives are
bringing out
the best in
each other.
If
everyone,
everywhere, is
bringing out
the best in
every person
they encounter
– and if the
systems that
guide our
behaviors are
built to bring
out the best
in all of us -
how much
closer will we
all be to a
healthy,
humane world
that works for
all of us?
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