08 Oct Top Tips To Build Team Resilience
Resilience is a regular speaking topic for our director Heather Wright as the skill is one of the key indicators of success, strong leadership, and enables the individual to deal more effectively with change, challenges, and manage stress levels. It is defined as the ability to cope with adversity through developing coping strategies and being able to bounce back from failures.
Team Resilience is not just an extension or collective of each team member’s ability to move forward from a difficult situation. Its strength is defined by the unity and mutual support of the whole group in pursuit of a goal or overcoming challenges.
West et al. (2009) defined team resilience as “a positive team level capacity that aids in the repair and rebound of teams when facing potentially stressful situations.”
Tips to Build Team Resilience
Ensure all team members have a common purpose which they buy into individually and as a whole. If everyone believes the same aim, values, and strategy, this increases the team’s cognitive and moral strengths and increases mutual support to achieve the main goals and everyday situations. If a team is office-based, provide the time for them to visit clients or projects to see how their work impacts directly on others.
Give the team members the decisions on their duties and allow them to be responsible for their actions. A resilient team can only grow when the leader can step back and give them the responsibility to take risks, learn from mistakes and build on successes.
The resilient leader sets the example. No one is inspired or motivated by someone who gives up. The team leader needs to have the resilient growth mindset to rally the team members. If a leader is resilient and positive in their thinking and behaviour, this impacts the rest of the team.
Open the dialogue for constructive communication between the leader, the team, and other individuals they work with. Transparent communication is vital to ensure a team can develop positive and constructive feedback so that individuals speak up about issues so that the team can find solutions.
Be honest about stress and support each other. Stress can have a significant impact on an individual’s resilience, affecting focus, decision making, increase social withdrawal, lower communication, and affect overall team performance. Agreeing to be open about stressful situations, understanding that anyone can make a mistake, and enabling individuals to voice opinions and concerns strengthens the trust and support in a team. It directly heightens the team’s resilience.
Sharing the load. A cohesive team which empowers all members to be their best, use their strengths. There is more strength in a team working towards the end goal and sharing the tasks than in individuals working on their own. By building trust within a team, each member can share their strengths and also request help. Empathy and kindness can be vital when an employee is facing difficult family issues. Sharing the load can relieve stress and strengthen the team.
A resilient team is essentially established when the members are all committed to a common goal and values, communicate and support each other, are willing to share the load and stresses, and take responsibility for their decisions and actions.
Teamwork is the core of team resilience.
If you would like to book Heather to deliver a talk or training course on Building Resilience, contact us at 01772 813969.