Play to your strengths - excelling is fun

Nobody talks about excelling in Aotearoa, but it is the key to unlocking performance. And it is a blast!

Amidst the noise and fearmongering online, upskilling and being a generalist seem to be what is needed to stay ahead of the AI curve. 

And that’s great, if being a generalist is your strength. Upskill away. 

But all too often in business, we are encouraged to focus on areas where we may be the most challenged. And by that I mean areas where we don’t shine. 

Ever heard of the saying “Where attention flows, energy goes?”

So what ends up happening is most of our attention and energy is being focussed on areas where we don’t naturally find flow; on areas where we don’t perform well. 

And the whole team is focussed on upskilling their areas of obstructed flow. 

In this scenario, flow in general slows down, and with it, productivity. Your people are not in their optimal environment and have been impeded in their performance. 

Because it has been decided that we all need to upskill in a certain area. 

A good exercise when business is BAU or progressing at a predictable pace. 

But incredibly detrimental when we are also being asked to be fluid, flexible and adaptable in a complex work environment. 

I am not advocating not improving, but I am putting a different scenario on the table. 

Playing to our strengths. 

No-one in any performance-based environment is ever asked to focus on a skill that another team player excels at. 

No-one.

It’s neither practical nor efficient. And it doesn’t lead to improved performance.

Business wastes so much time getting everyone on the same level that we smother performance and productivity. Teams end up performing an average instead of each at their best. 

If we continue to uplift and upskill everyone at the same pace, our business is at risk. 

We improve performance, retention and culture by boldly identifying strengths and letting each team member play to theirs.

We amplify performance by quality, not quantity. 

The leadership work becomes identifying what strengths or skills are needed to uplift the team. What skills gaps are missing, not “how do I have more of the same?”.

More of the same does not strengthen a team. It waters it down. 

Leadership starts at recruitment and continues through mapping team members’ areas of strength PER PROJECT. 

The art of leadership piece is in determining when one team member’s strength begins to wane while another’s rises: determining when the task needs to be handed over to the next strong team member.

Roles become crystal clear, individuals come alive in their flow and performance exceeds expectation. 

Individually excellent team members with clear roles and an understanding of when to pass the task become one high performing team. 

High performing teams are an integration of individuals playing to their strengths. 

And practising passing the task. 

Learn how to identify your teams’ strengths and practise progress by passing the task with TouchPoint. 

Messy, human stuff is where we excel. And excelling is fun.

If you're interested in how this could impact your teams, get in touch.

-Kate Bruce