Focus the Team With Shared Priorities ..............................................................
Great coaches guide their teams to do the right work. Things
are easier when tasks are clearly prioritized. In many companies,
management may feel in control but the employees don’t at all.
Employees aren’t sure which tasks have top priority
because everything is “hot,” and the team thus loses its
synergistic strength.
As a coach, you can create an atmosphere that lets you
integrate their work in an orderly, prioritized way. It is your job to
protect them from being abused by the system or assaulted by
conflicting goals and too many directives.
Five essential steps for prioritizing team
responsibilities include:- Identify and minimize “hot” projects.
If you’ve ever had someone give you a job marked
“urgent” and then another marked “urgent” and still
another marked “urgent,” you know what eventually
happens. You ignore the word “urgent.” It’s like the boy
who cried wolf. People must know what the real priorities
are or they won’t do anything. Distinguish between urgent
and important. Urgent, like crisis, means do immediately.
Important is that which gives value to the team output.
While urgent work must get done, planning makes sure
that what’s important gets the team’s attention. - If the team deals with multiple bosses,
coordinate priorities.
Don’t force the team member to choose which boss she
will please next. Come to an agreement with other
managers about how priorities will be handled and then
communicate this to your employee. If an urgent
exception arises, don’t expect your employee to handle it.
Work it out with the other managers before handing the
project over to the team member. Coming to such an
agreement doesn’t take long to do — not nearly as long as
it takes to train a new employee to replace the one who
quit because she couldn’t take the pressure any longer.
You can trust your individual associates to make their own
Coaching, Mentoring and Managing6
Great coaches free
their teams to do
the right work.