Small Team Leader Survival Guide! (For New Managers)

Being a new leader can feel intimidating, especially when part of a small team or startup with little room for error. As a new leader, you’ll need to be on top of things and get to grips with your duties as soon as possible, lest you struggle and convince team members of your capabilities. So how do new leaders survive?

A new leader should get to know their team and develop a clear strategy that everyone understands. It would be best if you were honest and transparent to gain the trust of all team members. Pay attention to what all team members have to say, and take your time to adapt to your new position.

In this article, I will explore the main challenges new leaders face and share tips on how to overcome them. I will also discuss how to build the right strategy and win the trust and respect of employees to get you started on the right foot.

How Do New Leaders Gain Trust?

Managing a team successfully is only possible with mutual trust between you and your colleagues. As a new leader, you should prioritize building trust and focus on your relationships with employees.

New leaders gain trust by practicing honesty and openness. You can also gain your team members’ trust by avoiding controlling behavior, recognizing small wins, and standing up for your team.

However, this process can be challenging, even more so if you are new in this position. Let’s take a closer look at how you can gain your team members’ trust and create a positive work culture.

New leaders gain trust by practicing honesty and openness.

1. Be Honest and Open

Honesty is the basis of trust; one is impossible without the other. If you lie to your employees or don’t keep your word, they won’t feel psychologically safe around you and won’t take what you say seriously.

This will significantly damage your relationship and negatively impact the team’s productivity. When employees don’t trust their leader, their involvement decreases, performance suffers, and they become less confident in their job and those who work alongside them.

Similar outcomes are to be expected if you conceal information from your employees, refuse to provide reasoning for your decisions, or share details beyond the bare scope of each team member’s work.

On the other hand, when your colleagues see that you respect them enough, to tell the truth, they’ll trust you more. Transparency in your decisions, actions, and plans will increase your team members’ confidence in your leadership, and they’ll be more willing to follow and rely on you.

Transparency in your decisions, actions, and plans will increase your team members’ confidence in your leadership, and they’ll be more willing to follow and rely on you.

2. Avoid Controlling Behavior

Another fundamental step to building trust is showing your employees your confidence in them. This is impossible if you micromanage extensively and aim to control every single working process.

Managing the team as a new leader takes some time to get used to, and you need full transparency and accountability to see the picture clearly. However, such behavior signals to your workers that you don’t trust them enough to do their job right.

When they don’t feel trusted, they are also not likely to trust you. On the other hand, a decent amount of freedom for the team shows your confidence in their abilities and competence, improving your relationship significantly.

Even if you don’t know the team well or are unsure if everyone is in the right position yet, giving the employees some space and a chance to prove themselves is essential. Be clear about your goals and expectations, and let your team members do their job.

3. Stand Up for Your Team

Finally, show your employees they can rely on you. Create a sense of unity and support the team spirit by being clear that you are a part of this team as much as everyone else.

Help your workers when they reach out to you and encourage them to do it. Accept and understand their mistakes and stand up for them when you have to. Show them you’re on their side, and you’ll quickly gain their trust.

It’s also important to provide positive feedback when your employees show outstanding performance and work hard. Show your appreciation for their efforts and let them know you notice and value their input.

Appreciating small wins will improve your team member’s sense of belonging, as they’ll feel like they’re contributing to a greater cause. This improves trust in the workplace and your employees’ job satisfaction.

Appreciating small wins will improve your team member’s sense of belonging, as they’ll feel like they’re contributing to a greater cause.

How New Leaders Gain Trust — How new leaders gain trust

What Do New Leaders Struggle With the Most?

Gaining employee trust is not the only challenge new leaders face. Let’s discuss the most common struggles when managing a team and learning how to deal with them efficiently.

Adapting To Authority and Responsibility

Whether it’s your first time accepting a leading role or meeting a completely new team you’ve never worked with, the new job responsibilities and the power you get to take some time to get used to.

If you used to be part of the team, you might struggle to accept the authority you now have and exercise it. Communication with colleagues will be key to finding the balance in this situation. Be an inspiring and trusted leader to earn the respect of your peers and stay in touch with them.

Learning To Delegate

Switching to your new responsibilities and making them your main focus is both your goal and possible struggle. If you’re used to working as a part of a team, you may find it hard to concentrate on managing teamwork instead of actually doing it.

However, your job as the leader is to organize and lead the working process. You need to trust the employees to perform their duties and focus on making them a better team. This requires a high level of trust, open communication, and setting clear expectations.

Building Relationships

Finally, new leaders have to gain the loyalty of employees, earn their respect, and prove themselves credible enough to be followed by others. It can be hard to balance authority and personal relationships; however, finding this balance is crucial for your success.

What Should a New Leader Do for the Team?

Tips for a New Leader	Explanation
Set Clear Goals and Expectations	Clearly communicate team goals and company objectives to team members, connecting them to their duties and responsibilities. Ensure everyone understands their job and what is expected of them.
Ensure a Safe Working Environment	Manage the working environment to create a psychologically safe space for the team. Foster an atmosphere where workers feel valued, respected, and safe to ask questions, express opinions, and debate.
Communicate	Establish healthy communication with the team by talking to colleagues, providing honest and constructive feedback, and encouraging fruitful discussions.
Be an Example	Set an example for the team by implementing your approach to work and inspiring others to follow your lead. Treat your workers with respect, show the qualities and dedication you expect of them, and communicate your values and vision for future teamwork.

Tips for New Leaders

Set Clear Goals and Expectations

One of your responsibilities when managing a team is to make sure all members understand company goals and their roles in achieving them. So, when you come as a new leader, make sure to have this conversation early on.

Your task is to clearly communicate your team goals and the company’s objectives, connecting them to the duties at hand and the responsibilities of the workers. You must also express your vision of the team and how you plan to organize the working process.

Ensure that everyone understands their part of the job and what you expect of them. Clear expectations are crucial for healthy professional communication and efficient teamwork.

Clear expectations are crucial for healthy professional communication and efficient teamwork.

Ensure a Safe Working Environment

As a leader, you are also in charge of managing the working environment. Your organizational skills, transparency, and relationship with workers will determine how psychologically safe that environment will be; here’s an article on how to asses psychological safety in your team.

Management changes bring uncertainty and can be stressful for the team. When leading them, make sure to be attentive to the state of team morale and the degree of emotional safety of your employees.

A healthy and safe working atmosphere will open the way for new initiatives, better communication, and higher productivity. The workers should feel safe asking questions, expressing opinions, debating, and disagreeing. They should know they are valued within the team and treated with respect.

Communicate

Communication is vital, especially when you start leading your new team. It is essential for many aspects of your success, from efficient management to keeping the team morale high.

Talk to your colleagues, provide honest and constructive feedback, and encourage fruitful discussions. During meetings, show appreciation for questions, ask for opinions, and be open to conversations.

Healthy communication will help you avoid potentially disruptive issues along the road. When expectations are clear, and boundaries are defined, it’s easier for team members to do their job as expected. When mistakes and problems are discussed constructively and without judgment, the team grows, and performance improves.

Be an Example

One of the most helpful things you can do for the team is to set an example. It’s best to implement your approach to the team’s work and inspire others to follow your lead.

When you talk about your values and explain your vision for future teamwork to the employees, ensure you are an excellent example of the attitudes and behaviors you expect. Treat your workers the way you want them to treat you and each other, and show the qualities and dedication you expect of them.

Treat your workers the way you want them to treat you and each other, and show the qualities and dedication you expect of them.

What New Team Leaders Should Do First

So, how do you start leading your team to success? What should be your first priorities? Let’s go over the essential first steps that will help you become the leader your team deserves.

1. Get To Know Your Team

Start by meeting your team members and getting to know them better. The key to managing a team successfully is understanding each employee’s motivations, strengths, and weaknesses.

You have better chances of succeeding if you implement an individual approach and acknowledge the uniqueness of each worker.

Take the time to explore your employees’ unique skills, find out what they’re best at, and discover their weak points or things they need to improve on. You’ll find that leading a team is much more efficient when you have a clear picture of your colleagues’ capabilities and potential.

Their personality traits and working habits also influence overall productivity. As a leader, you will benefit from knowing how they prefer to work, what makes them comfortable or uncomfortable, and what motivates them to go forward.

Some employees may be more productive in the morning, while others will perform better in the evening. Certain team members will be more comfortable working independently, while others are great collaborators. When managing your team, consider such nuances to ensure everyone performs best.

2. Let the Team Get To Know You

Introducing yourself to the team properly is no less important. As a new leader, you need to clearly communicate to your colleagues who you are, what you stand for, how you’ll be managing the working process, and give answers to other important questions.

Include these answers in your introductory speech, and go beyond reciting your resume’s points. Be more personal and tell your career story in an engaging way that will let employees know you are a reliable leading figure. I suggest you learn why public speaking is so important in leadership.

Explain what kind of leader you’ll be and what they can expect while working with you. Set clear expectations and discuss your policies. Your goal is to show that employees can trust you and count on your help and that there are clear rules and boundaries that will navigate the working process.

Communication is key, so it’s in your best interest to be open to it, especially as you get started. Some personal time with each team member is also necessary. Let the employees ask questions, discuss the points that concern them, and get to know you better.

3. Develop Your Strategy

To manage the team successfully, you need a defined working strategy. It should be defined by your values, goals, and overall vision of the team’s growth. Decide what kind of leader you want to be and develop your personal leading style.

Look around to evaluate the team’s current state and highlight what needs improvement. Listen to what the employees have to say as you build strategies that will lead the team to success.

Make sure to communicate your strategy to colleagues in detail. Be clear and transparent about how you want the working process to be organized, how responsibilities will be shared, and what will not be tolerated.

4. Take Your Time To Learn and Listen

Most importantly, don’t rush into things. As a new leader, you’ll need time to understand your current working environment, adapt to your new role, meet your employees, discover their professional and personal preferences, and much more.

Listening to your employees and other leaders as you navigate your new position is crucial. Be open to conversations, ask questions, allow your colleagues to raise concerns, welcome their initiatives, and be attentive to their needs. Always look for ways to improve your own performance and perfect your leadership skills.

Below is a quick video of Simon Sinek during an interview talking about the importance of building trust through committed leadership.

Building Trust Through Committed Leadership

Conclusion

New leaders should prioritize building healthy relationships with employees, earning their trust, and creating a safe environment. Be open and communicative, especially at first, and give everyone a chance to know you better and understand what working with you will be like.

Your first steps should be defining your vision for the team and developing a strategy for leading them. Communicate your expectations and goals to everyone and define the roles and responsibilities of the employees. Most importantly, take your time to get to know the people you’re working with and their working process.

5 Causes of Low Psychological Safety in Your Team!

One thing I hate is listening to stories where friends say they don’t feel comfortable speaking up at work. They tell me that when they do, they sometimes get ignored or belittled, causing them only to say things they know will be appreciated. They stop innovating, and they engage less with work. They move closer and closer to only doing what is necessary, never taking any risks. Their team lacks the necessary psychological safety!

Low psychological safety in a team can be caused by a lack of trust, fear of failure, lack of support, unclear expectations, and poor communication. When these factors plague the workplace, it creates an environment of low psychological safety.

As a leader or a small team member, you must be aware of these factors. In this article, I’ll explain what causes low psychological safety and how to lead and manage your team in a way that promotes high psychological safety.

What Causes Low Psychological Safety?

According to the theory of psychological safety in the workplace developed by Google engineer, Harvard Business School researcher, and author Dr. Amy Edmondson, low psychological safety can be caused by five main factors:

Lack of trust
Fear of failure or reprisal
Lack of support
Unclear expectations
Lack of open communication

Dr. Edmondson defines psychological safety as “A shared belief held by team members that the team is safe for interpersonal risk-taking.” This means that the leaders and managers create a sense of security within their teams, allowing everyone to feel safe and fulfilled.

Let me explain the five factors that cause low psychological safety in the workplace, one by one.

Lack of Trust

When there’s a lack of trust in the workplace (here is a great way to assess trust in your team), it takes a lot of work to lead/manage a team toward success.

When everyone is keeping an eye on one another, it’s hard to be productive. Team members who don’t trust one another or feel they can’t trust their leader are less likely to speak up or share their ideas. This creates a negative environment that leads to lower and lower psychological safety.

At Sancus Leadership, we believe that trust is what separates a group of individuals from a team. Without trust, there is no team. Without a team, there is no success!

At Sancus Leadership, we believe that trust is what separates a group of individuals from a team; without trust, there is no team. Without a team, there is no success!

Fear of Failure

When there’s a high degree of fear of failure among the team members, it’s not easy to have a positive, creative environment.

If team members feel they will receive punishment or be harshly criticized for making mistakes, they’re less likely to innovate, take risks, or try new things.

Leaders who use fear to motivate the team members to work proficiently will kill creativity and innovative thinking, in addition to making the team feel psychologically insecure.

Lack of Support

When a group operates under the principle of each on their own, and no one offers support, especially the leaders and managers, a lack of emotional support plagues the work environment, creating low psychological safety.

If team members feel like they don’t have the support and resources needed to do their jobs efficiently and effectively, they are less likely to contribute fully to the group and feel at ease.

Unclear Expectations

Motivation is tightly tied to expectations. Unclear expectations are one of the leading causes of confusion in the workplace, so leaders should be explicit about what they expect from their teams. When the expectations are unclear, it creates a sense of uncertainty, hindering your team members’ motivation.

If team members are uncertain of what is expected of them or feel that expectations are unrealistic or unfair, this will create an environment of uncertainty and stress.

Setting clear expectations and delegating tasks are skillsets I see few managers master. It is up to you as a leader to communicate clearly so that your team can work as autonomously as possible toward goals and visions.

Poor Communication

Communication is a two-way stream: it’s giving and receiving. Communication breakdowns happen when the team members feel unheard or their opinions are not valued.

When the workplace is a poor communication environment that doesn’t allow everyone to be heard when needed, it creates resentment and all sorts of negative attitudes. Some of these are self-victimization, vindictiveness, and passive-aggression.

Breakdowns in communication within the team, where the team members feel that their ideas are unheard or not valued, often lead to low psychological safety.

Breakdowns in communication within the team, where the team members feel that their ideas are unheard or not valued, often lead to low psychological safety.

Factors causing low psychological safety	Description
Lack of Trust	When there is a lack of trust in the workplace, team members are less likely to speak up or share their ideas, which creates a negative environment that leads to lower psychological safety.
Fear of Failure	When there is a high degree of fear of failure among team members, they are less likely to innovate, take risks, or try new things, which leads to a less positive and creative environment.
Lack of Support	When team members feel like they don’t have the support and resources needed to do their jobs efficiently and effectively, they are less likely to contribute fully to the group and feel at ease, which creates low psychological safety.
Unclear Expectations	When team members are uncertain of what is expected of them or feel that expectations are unrealistic or unfair, this creates an environment of uncertainty and stress, which leads to lower psychological safety.
Poor Communication	When there are breakdowns in communication within the team, where team members feel unheard or their opinions are not valued, it creates resentment and negative attitudes, which leads to lower psychological safety.

Factors that cause low psychological safety in the workplace

Why a Team May Lack Psychological Safety

Psychological safety is the belief by team members that they feel safe in their work environment without fearing being punished or humiliated for voicing their ideas, questions, concerns, or mistakes.

If you’re interested in building a psychologically safe environment, I highly advise you to take a look at her two books: The Fearless Organization and Teaming: How Organizations Learn, Innovate, and Compete in the Knowledge Economy. You can also book a FREE psychological safety assessment call with us at Sancus Leadership.

For now, let’s look at three concrete examples of why a team might lack psychological safety.

Fear of Speaking Up

One reason that signals a lack of psychological safety is that team members are reluctant to speak up, fearing coming across as incompetent, foolish, or naive.

An example of this attitude turning into a low degree of psychological safety is when the team is in a high-pressure situation, especially when there are also high stakes and the potential consequences of making mistakes are severe.

Rigid Hierarchies

Another reason that creates a lack of psychological safety is when the leader doesn’t create a relationship of trust.

When team members cannot trust their leader to actively listen to their feedback or opinions, especially in the case of organizations with rigid hierarchies, it creates apprehension, leading to a lack of psychological safety.

Competitive Team Culture

A lack of psychological safety can be rooted in the team culture, especially in highly-competitive environments with quasi-tyrannical leaders.

On the flip side, team cultures where conflict resolutions are avoided, and criticism is not looked at favorably can also create low psychological safety.

The Consequences of Lack of Psychological Safety

A lack of psychological safety has some dire consequences, namely hindering the team’s performance, as well as their degree of engagement and creativity, which can ruin a business in the long run.

Here are the seven main consequences of working in an environment that doesn’t promote psychological safety:

Decreased performance: When team members don’t feel psychologically safe, it can lead to missed opportunities and avoidable errors.
Reduced creativity and innovation: A work environment that lacks psychological safety hinders the team members from sharing unconventional ideas or speaking up about problems, which renders them unable to come up with new and creative solutions.
Increased turnover: When employees don’t feel psychologically safe, they become disengaged and eventually look for alternatives where they can find a more positive work environment.
Poor communication: When psychological safety is lacking, team members find it hard to communicate openly, which leads to misunderstandings and unnecessary conflicts.
Inadequate problem-solving: Without psychological safety, team members don’t feel compelled to raise concerns, which creates an attitude of willful blindness. This leads to problems being overlooked and not addressed adequately, causing negative consequences in the long term.
Decrease in employee engagement: When employees feel that their voice doesn’t matter or that their workplace culture isn’t open for two-way feedback exchange, it can lead to low engagement levels, making them less productive and less motivated to perform well.
Reduced trust: When team members cannot trust their colleagues or leaders/managers, it leads to a negative atmosphere in the workplace, which makes it difficult to work together effectively.

Perhaps the harmful effects of low psychological safety are felt the most during a crisis. Crises can make members afraid of the future and of losing their position in the team. If psychological safety within a team is low, a crisis can cause it to break down entirely.

What Impact Does the Team Leader Have On Psychological Safety?

According to Dr. Amy Edmondson’s research, the team leader has the most critical role in creating and maintaining psychological safety within a team.

Ultimately, a leader’s actions, attitudes, and communication style greatly influence the workplace’s psychological safety level. Fostering a culture of trust, open communication, and learning is how leaders create an environment where team members feel safe to share their thoughts and collaborate efficiently.

Here’s a YouTube video of Dr. Edmondson where she explains the importance of fostering a psychologically safe environment:

Strategies to Promote Psychological Safety in Your Team

To overcome the challenges that come with low psychological safety and create a culture where everyone feels safe, Edmondson suggests that leaders should create an environment where team members can speak up, feedback is actively sought and valued, and mistakes are seen as opportunities for learning and growth.

Here are six strategies you can start implementing in your team to promote psychological safety:

Modeling the behavior: A leader sets the tone for the team by being open to feedback and ideas and able to admit mistakes. The leader should encourage the other team members to do the same.
Encouraging active participation: Leaders must actively solicit input from team members and create opportunities for them to feel like they’re contributing with value, which creates a sense of fulfillment that turns into high psychological safety.
Creating a culture of learning: Leaders can create an environment where the team members feel safe to take risks, solve problems as they arise, and learn from their mistakes.
Encouraging diversity and inclusivity: Leaders should actively work to create a diverse and inclusive team based on people’s merits, which creates an environment where different perspectives and ideas are heard.
Encouraging psychological safety by addressing concerns and conflicts: Leaders can also help to establish psychological safety by addressing any concerns or conflicts that arise within the team in a timely and effective manner.
Appreciating and rewarding feedback: Leaders must create a culture where feedback exchange—positive and negative alike—is valued and rewarded. This involves recognizing and rewarding team members who speak up and encouraging others to do the same.

The Positive Effects of Promoting Psychological Safety

Promoting pyschological safety — Promoting psychological safety improves team performance.

Teams with high levels of psychological safety are more innovative, creative, and productive. They are also more likely to thrive and feel at home working together. Such a positive atmosphere promotes fulfillment and a sense of satisfaction that motivates everyone to perform at their best.

Promoting psychological safety within a team has several positive effects:

Increased performance: When team members feel a high degree of psychological safety, they are more likely to share important information and ideas, which leads to increased productivity and collaboration.
Enhanced creativity and innovation: When team members feel comfortable sharing their ideas—even their unconventional opinions and strategies—they can come up with new and creative solutions, i.e., thinking outside the box.
Improved communication: When psychological safety is present, team members feel more at ease communicating openly and honestly with one another, which leads to more efficient and effective problem-solving.
Increased employee engagement and reduced turnover: When employees feel that they matter and that their ideas are heard, they become more engaged and committed to the team and the organization, leading to fewer resignations.
Greater learning and improvement: When the team fosters a high degree of psychological safety, they become more likely to take risks and learn from their mistakes, leading to progressive improvement over time. This creates a sense of momentum that’s necessary for thriving in any business.
High-quality decision-making: When the team members feel comfortable expressing their thoughts and opinions, they are likely to express diverse perspectives, leading to better decision-making by considering all the multiple viewpoints and options.
Increased trust: When people feel that they can trust their colleagues and leaders, greater trust within the team is created, making it easier to work together as a team.
Increased resilience: Teams with high psychological safety tend to be resilient to change, setbacks, and unexpected circumstances. They’re able to bounce back from failure quite easily.

Overall, promoting psychological safety within a team positively impacts a team’s morale. When morale is high, it’s reflected in the team’s performance, creativity, communication, and overall success. Simply put, a high degree of psychological safety leads to a more productive and positive work environment.

Final Words

Low psychological safety in the workplace is caused by various factors, including a lack of trust and fear of speaking up.

As a leader or team member, it’s important to be aware of these factors and take active steps to create a culture that promotes psychological safety. This can be achieved by managing your team in a manner that accounts for their psychological needs.

Grow New Leaders Without Spending Money?

8 Different Ways That Leaders Can Develop

CEOs often say, “Our new leaders are the organization’s future,” but they don’t spend any money or time training them. I find this very contradictive, but I don’t want this to be a showstopper for those with great leadership aspirations, so I have put together an article on how you can grow your new leaders (and yourself) without spending any money.

New leaders grow by building meaningful connections with their team, practicing active communication, using feedback to make changes, and engaging in professional development experiences. These actions will help you grow into someone your team can look to for guidance.

There are many paths to becoming the best leader you can be. In this article, I’ll explain all the different practices you can do to shape yourself into a dependable, trustworthy, and goal-oriented leader.

8 Different Ways That Leaders Can Develop

Being a great leader who is excellent at managing teams, projects, and other required tasks takes years of concentrated effort; some are assumed to be natural leaders from birth, but I highly doubt that.

Great leaders honor their commitments and foster collaboration with their team members.

To excel at leading, you must constantly improve upon the knowledge you already know and your skill sets. You can achieve this through personalized experiences like professional development or through actively perfecting your communication, organization, and listening skills with your peers.

To excel at leading, you must constantly improve upon the knowledge you already know and your skill sets.

Luckily, there’s a variety of ways to accomplish this. “All” you need is dedication, effort, and hard work.

1. Build Meaningful Connections With Team Members

Assuming you have a basic level of self-awareness and self-management, the first step to becoming great at managing a team is getting to know the team itself. Communication, performance, and organization will be lacking if you don’t establish connections with your team members.

It’s essential to recognize that everyone has a role to play and can uniquely contribute their input, and leading a team means knowing everyone’s strengths and weaknesses and using them.

… leading a team means knowing everyone’s strengths and weaknesses and using them.

From there, you can use that information to effectively distribute tasks that fit everyone’s qualifications and complete the jobs flawlessly.

Additionally, getting to know your team means you’re putting the effort in to see the value in everyone, which creates a sense of bonding and understanding that you’re all working together for the same goal.

I don’t mean “see the value in everyone” in a hippie way; rather, the exact opposite; I want you to find what precisely they contribute or, with some coaching, will be able to contribute in the future. Stop the cliches and get precise! Your team and your organization need it.

You can learn about and connect with your team through something as simple as starting a real conversation with them where you listen intently. To know them even better, you can also ask questions such as:

What experience or skills do you have?
What types of topics or tasks interest you the most?
What other roles have you held on a team in the past?
What ideas can you bring to the table for future projects or tasks?

No matter how many people are on your team, it is essential to connect with them. With these formed relationships, there will be more potential to easily collaborate with your team members to solve problems and work through tasks together.

When you know Why your team shows up for work and what internal driving forces they have, leading will be so much easier.

2. Stay Open To New Ideas and Perspectives

You’ll want to keep an open mind when forming these relationships. Growing as a leader means working harmoniously with people who may not have the same ideas as you do.

Assume that there are things you do not already know, that your colleagues know something you don’t, and that those pieces of knowledge are essential for you as a leader. This will allow you to interact with your team in a way that makes them feel listened to and valued.

When you’re on a team, it’s expected that not all members will agree on things every time. Everyone has their own opinion on things and ideas about how specific tasks should be accomplished, and instead of letting that hinder your team and individual growth, use it to fuel them instead.

Multiple people working together means different perspectives, which might bring contrasting ideas. Yet, they can also raise questions and concerns that were not considered initially.

Everyone also displays acts of personal leadership with a different leadership style, whether working independently or with others in a group. Some people may propose more group-oriented and hands-on ideas.

Others suggest working on independent research with an individualistic approach instead.

Being open-minded brings new ideas that have yet to cross your mind straight into the spotlight. You may even wonder why you didn’t come up with such statements.

Taking the time to listen and learn from these new ideas doesn’t make things more challenging. It only strengthens them and makes you a better leader willing to learn from new opportunities.

To grow as a leader, you must be open and accepting of others with contrasting ideas and thoughts. Differences make every team member unique, so ensuring everyone gets a chance to share their input is important.

Do you think most ideas you hear at work are stupid? Well, they are; I agree with you! But the thing is, if you want to find the next Google or Tesla of ideas, you’ll have to endure and encourage the stupid ones.

Do you think most ideas you hear at work are stupid? Well, they are; I agree with you! But …

Most new ideas could be better; that’s part of a creative endeavor. But how will you generate ideas for the next industry-disrupting one if you discourage your team from presenting “wrong” ideas?

A good leader doesn’t dominate everyone else’s ideas with their own. They listen and work to build from them with everyone else.

A good leader doesn’t dominate everyone else’s ideas with their own. They listen and work to build from them with everyone else.

By working together with people with different mindsets and keeping your interest in new ideas, everyone will be able to build off one another. Rather than having it split everyone into separate categories, it will foster a sense of community as everyone works together to find ideas that work for everyone.

3. Develop Concrete Goals

To be an effective and efficient leader, you must also master the ability to craft goals for your team, company, and yourself.

Goals are essential tools that help you understand what you must complete to help your organization, company, and team succeed. With useful goals, you will have direction and results to lead your team.

They need to be specific and have a reachable due date.

By choosing a detailed, clear, and, most importantly, attainable goal, you’re setting yourself on a path to success. This practice is essential for staying on track and promoting organization among your team because you all have the same objective in mind.

If you’re leading a team, it’s vital to work together to discuss what you want to achieve and why you want to reach it in the first place. With this foundation, you and your team will know what to do.

The how of the goal, I firmly believe, should be up to the person closest to the problem. Give the individual the absolute freedom (within clearly specified boundaries) to do whatever they find suitable to solve the issue best.

Whether you’re working independently or managing a small team, a goal must be set to provide something to work towards. It could be as important as tracking a certain amount of sales by the end of the month.

Or, your shared goal could be smaller, like choosing a date for an upcoming meeting.

Learning to make concrete and precise goals promotes organization and motivation for everyone involved. It keeps everyone on the same page and lets you know exactly what to expect of others and yourself.

Goal setting is one of the foundations of self-management, which is the hammer in the leadership toolbox.

Goal setting is one of the foundations of self-management, which is the hammer in the leadership toolbox.

4. Maintain Good Communication

When it comes to being better at leading, practicing good communication is a must. Good communication is not just talking loudly to be understood (which is what we in the Army say the first lieutenants do if a recruit says they do not get it.)

But instead, it’s about straightforwardly conveying essential information in a way that is easy to understand. The importance of language in leadership must be considered.

Good communication means you can network easily with others outside your workspace. While this is true, it’s much more essential to maintain communication with those you work with daily.

Your team members are the ones who are with you through every day and every task.

To convey information, directions, and other responsibilities, you must speak in a way that makes it easy to understand. One great way to improve your communication skills is by improving your public speaking.

Good communication requires active listening, which shows that you truly hear your team members instead of dismissing them. Good leaders should listen, respond, and take action, whether it’s about a question for part of the project or a problem that needs to be worked out.

Active listening is an easy process:

Listen carefully to your team member by giving them your full attention (assume they know important things that you don’t!)
Respond to them by repeating parts of what they just said to you (ask, “If I understand you correctly, is this… what you meant?).
Take action by making changes, answering a question, or coming up with a solution to a proposed problem.

Use Communication to Build Community

In addition, effective communication always promotes open discussion between you and your team. Just like building relationships with your team member, you want to communicate in a way that sets you as someone who is in charge but also approachable.

A sense of community is built upon one’s ability to communicate effectively with everyone on the team, not just certain members. It would help if you generated an open environment where everyone can contribute ideas, voice concerns, or ask questions without worry.

However, if you talk too harshly or unclearly, you may do more harm to your leading position than good. You might come off as intimidating or disproving. Some people may even consider you someone who does not care for the rest of the team. To avoid this misconception, you need to speak in an authoritative and empathetic way.

Some practices of this include:

Maintaining a positive tone when speaking verbally or in emails, newsletters, and evaluations.
Letting your team members know that you hear them and understand what they are discussing.
Answering questions to the best of your ability or referring them to someone who can help instead of ignoring them.
Refraining from interrupting others as they speak.
Respond to requests or questions promptly.

How to speak in an authoritative and empathetic way	Description
Maintaining a positive tone	When speaking verbally or in emails, newsletters, and evaluations.
Letting your team members know that you hear them	Understand what they are discussing.
Refraining from interrupting	Don’t interrupt others from talking.
Respond to requests	Always respond or help them in their request.

How to speak in an authoritative and empathetic way

5. Accept Feedback To Make Changes

Being a good leader means asking for feedback from people from your shared team or workspace and using that feedback to make important changes for the benefit of everyone involved.

One way is to gather feedback from other team members about your performance through conversation or a formal document like an evaluative survey.

No matter how you seek feedback, it should be obtained in a specific, timely way, cornerstones of input according to my favorite book, Thinking Fast and Slow by Daniel Kahneman (Amazon).

If a team member is concerned that there aren’t enough staff meetings to discuss measures before a deadline, then work to incorporate more communication. If someone points out something that needs to be added to an email, work together to brainstorm how to include it.

As a team leader, you’re the one that they will look to first to see if their requests and needs have been heard. Managing a team doesn’t mean working independently by yourself, nor is it that you’re the only person in charge of how things in the work atmosphere should function.

Leading effectively is based on the opinions of everyone on the team. To strive as a leader, you must translate feedback into positive change so everyone on the team feels represented.

6. Give Useful Feedback To Others

While you need to gather feedback on your actions as a leader, giving feedback to other team members is vital.

Research has revealed that feedback fuels critical aspects of productivity and creativity.

You’ll be ahead of most other business leaders if you offer constructive feedback and compliment your team members.

Because if you highlight the specifics of their accomplishments, you have been paying attention to them. This makes your team feel valued, fueling cohesion, productivity, and efficiency.

As a good leader, your job is to ensure everyone performs to your and the team’s expectations. However, this doesn’t mean you should pick apart everything your team members do negatively. If you only give negative feedback, your relationships with your team members will falter, resulting in less connection among the team.

Instead, use positive feedback and constructive criticism to have a discussion. Yes, you should work together to identify what problems have occurred along the way, but you should highlight all the positive things that have happened.

A newsletter that was sent out got more subscriptions than anticipated, or a critical meeting went very well. If something good happened, take a few moments to address it. This will establish you as a grateful leader and appreciative of the efforts put in by everyone on the team.

Taking the time to send a simple email or have a short discussion to give feedback can go a long way. You’re not just ensuring the team’s tasks go smoothly by providing constructive feedback. You’re also checking up and showing genuine respect towards your team members.

The million-dollar tip is to avoid mixing positive and negative feedback in the same interactions in my twelve years of leadership. The research also supports this; combining the two tends to make people only listen to the negative.

We, as humans, are much more in tune with threats and dangers than praise.

7. Lead By Example Through Modeling

To fulfill your role as a good leader, practice modeling your expectations and responsibilities.

Modeling means demonstrating behavior and showing a visual example of what needs to be done. If you take the time to act in a way you want your team to replicate, you’ll display your expectations.

If you take the time to act in a way you want your team to replicate, you’ll display your expectations.

By modeling these behaviors, you also set the tone for how you want the workplace to function. If you act in a cheerful, sophisticated, and dedicated way, your team will understand that they will need to accomplish that too.

In turn, everyone on the team will be on the same page and know what needs to be done to keep the work environment positive for everyone on the team.

8. Complete Professional Development on Your Own

Pursuing your professional development is vital to growing your skills and knowledge to be your best leader.

Professional development is typically understood as extra education or experience that you do to improve career-based skills. As a leader, professional development helps enrich hard and soft skills.

Hard skills are unique to some professions, while soft skills aren’t centered around a specific career and can be adapted to any discipline.

Some examples of soft skills include:

Public speaking
Time management
Critical thinking
Research

To be a better leader, select professional development that improves both skills at once. Fortunately, professional development comes in a variety of different activities, including:

Researching a topic of your choice.
Earning an online certification.
Attending a seminar or committee meeting.
Interviewing others within your desired field.
Doing community service in a field related to your career.

Professional development is important in your progress towards being a better leader because you learn excellent skills to apply as you work in a team. You can also share these skills with other team members to further a sense of community, generate new ideas, and discuss new project approaches.

New Leaders Grow Through Developing Skills, Communication, and Goals

A good leader takes more than just telling others what to do; to grow into a good leader, you must put in practice and effort.

Learning to be a better leader doesn’t just come from individual work, but rather, it comes from interacting with your team and formulating ideas that include everyone. A leader can only successfully manage a team with communication, acceptance, and connection.

A leader can only successfully manage a team with communication, acceptance, and connection.

You can try out some of these tasks to improve your leadership. However, they will yield different results, so trying different ones is essential to see what works best for you.

Regardless, you must maintain efficient teamwork and collaboration as you develop your skills.

Here’s a video of other essential leadership skills that you can develop to help you be the best leader you can be.

10 Leadership Skills that Every Leader Should Have

Final Thoughts

Leaders grow by developing their mindsets and skills through various practices. Setting goals, collaborating with others, and considering changes are all essential keys to becoming an efficient leader. With dedication and hard work, you, too, can grow into an excellent leader capable of handling anything.

Adversity Will Change Your Leadership, But How?

Adversity is significant in leadership; it is through tough times that we are forced to become better leaders; when the stakes are high, so are the potential wins! In every training session at Sancus Leadership, trust, and adversity are the main building blocks. Adversity will align the atoms of your leadership and make you the best possible leader! When carbon is put under pressure and heat, the atoms align and create one of the strongest materials known to man, diamonds.

Adversity makes you a better leader by getting you out of your comfort zone, making you think proactively, showing you your strengths (and weaknesses), and making you appreciative of your resources. However, this only applies if you approach adversity with an opportunity-focused attitude.

In this article, I’ll make a case for how adversity can positively change and influence your leadership skills – specifically if you’re in charge of small teams or a budding organization. So, if this applies to you, do read on!

How Adversity Will Make You a Better Leader

In this section, I’ll list several ways adversity can help shape you into a better leader. Not all adverse situations will necessarily benefit you this way. Still, if you keep the right attitude, more often than not, you’ll be able to gain something positive out of adversity.

Adversity Helps You Grow

One of the biggest reasons I believe adversity will make a great leader is that it gets you out of your comfort zone. Outside the comfort zone lies adventure, excitement, and purpose.

Outside the comfort zone lies adventure, excitement, and purpose.

I like Aimee Mullins’ quote, “Adversity is just change that we haven’t adapted ourselves to yet,” not just because I think it articulates an important truth but also because it helps us think about adversity in a much more constructive and productive way.

And if you think about it, adversity is only another name for a change. The fact that you’re having a tough time dealing with it should tell you it has brought you out of your comfort zone.

That’s where the real growth happens – you can only expect yourself to know or do better if you stay where you’re comfortable. No, you need to be challenged and pushed for you to get yourself to do better than you are!

In addition, adversity exposes you to “optimal stress.” This is the level of stress that lies in the sweet spot between the high and low extremes.

Why do we need some level of stress? Well, it turns out that too little stress in our lives can cause us to become lethargic, bored, and depressed. We need some pressure to get ourselves out and about and be productive. That’s how adversity facilitates your growth.

Adversity Makes You Proactive

Another way your leadership skills benefit significantly from adversity is that it teaches you to be more proactive.

When you go through a tough time, you realize you have let yourself get comfortable with how things were and stopped thinking about how they would look in the future.

You realize this complacency left you vulnerable to the issue you’re facing now, and you resolve to actively think about possible future problems and contingencies you might have to face.

This helps you anticipate opportunities and risks you and your team might face, allowing you to prepare for those problems and opportunities in time.

Adversity Holds a Mirror to You

Another reason why adversity can help mold you into a better leader is that it holds a mirror to you by showing you your strengths and weaknesses.

When surfing through life without a care in the world, it’s easy to believe you’re equipped with the skills and resources you need to face the future. But in the face of adversity, all of this is tested, and you get to see where you stand in life.

It’s easy to believe you’re equipped with the skills and resources you need to face the future. But in the face of adversity, all of this is tested, and you get to see where you stand in life.

Think of it this way, would you be able to call yourself a competent pilot if you’ve never taken a plane off-ground? Can you call yourself a skilled captain if you’ve never taken a ship to sea? Of course not!

In the same way, the only way you can call yourself a competent leader is if you’ve tested your leadership skills and guided a team through a difficult time.

The only way you can call yourself a competent leader is if you’ve put your leadership skills to the test.

Adversity Makes You Appreciate Your Time & Resources

Appreciation and effective utilization of one’s time and resources are hallmark qualities of great leaders. And adversity does a great job of instilling this appreciation in people.

When everything’s going fine, you’re likely to be reckless with your time and resources, meaning you won’t make the most of what you have. However, when times are tough and a lot is on the line, you have no choice but to make the most of your resources.

When times are tough and a lot is on the line, you have no choice but to make the most of your resources.

For example, we were all guilty of wasting our time doing anything but studying throughout the semester, only to spend several sleepless nights trying to learn as much as we could during exam season.

Moments of intense pressure like these help you realize that it’s a mistake to waste time and resources when things seem manageable. And once this realization hits you, you’ll see yourself become a much more responsible person and, by extension, a leader.

Adversity Helps You Become Decisive

When times are easy, you can afford to be indecisive about things. Even if you take your time evaluating the pros and cons or procrastinate on making the decision, there’s little at stake.

However, when there’s a lot to lose, and you’re required to make important decisions quickly, you learn to quickly access important information and prioritize the moment’s needs to reach a decision quickly.

This skill is crucial for you if you’re responsible for leading a team through a tough time.

In that position, it’s hard to understand what each team member thinks you should do. So, it would help if you learned to trust your abilities to evaluate situations and find the best solution with your resources. And this is exactly what leading through tough times is all about.

Overcoming Difficulty Gives You Confidence in Your Abilities

Another significant way adversity shapes you as a leader is that it gives confidence in your abilities. You get proof of your competence when you see yourself lead your team through a difficult time and survive a challenging situation.

I experienced this proof of competence firsthand with my Bomb Disposal team; I have never been more proud of myself! Bringing that team together and solving all those deployments while maintaining a high level of trust was one of the most significant achievements of my life!

This proof allows you to trust yourself to lead your team through any future problems you must confront.

Why is this trust important? To lead people through difficult times, you need them to put their trust in you, and you can’t get others to put their trust in you if you don’t do so yourself.

At Sancus Leadership, we put trust as the foundation of every team; without trust, there is no team.

When you are ready to stop wasting time on indecisiveness and instead want to start enjoying making tough decisions, I invite you to book a free leadership call with me!

6 ways on how adversity will make you a better leader

Is Adversity Always Good?

Adversity is neither good nor bad; it is only one thing, inevitable!

I’ve talked about adversity in a positive light and made arguments for how it has a lot of utility in honing our leadership skills.

However, I’m not trying to glorify adversity- the point of our discussion in the previous section was only to highlight the often-overlooked ways adversity can come in handy if viewed positively.

Adversity is neither good nor bad; it is only one thing. Inevitable!

But that’s not to say that adversity is necessarily good for you in all situations; no, sometimes, all adversity does is knock you down and set you back with relatively few benefits to set that off with.

It’s really important to recognize this because it allows you to have a realistic assessment of your circumstances instead of naively optimistic ones.

I’ve identified three instances where you won’t benefit from adversity in any of the ways I mentioned in the previous section. This isn’t an exhaustive list of cases where adversity does more harm than good, but these examples will help you understand my point.

Adversity Is Bad When It Is Sudden and Excessive

The first instance where adversity is more counterproductive than beneficial is when it is sudden and excessive.

By sudden adversity, I’m referring to situations that could not have been anticipated by anyone beforehand- even by the most proactive of minds.

And by extreme adversity, I mean adversity that causes significant and unignorable turbulence in your life.

For example, an earthquake wrecking your office building would be sudden and excessive. “Sudden” because even the most agile of minds can’t predict earthquakes, and “excessive” because damage to office premises is a significant setback that takes time, money, and resources to recover from.

As your team leader, you’re unlikely to benefit in any vital way from adversity like this. For example, it’s not like you can train your team to prevent future earthquakes or other natural disasters.

Additionally, when the setback is excessive, i.e., your office premises getting wrecked, sometimes, teams can’t recover from adversity like this- no matter how competent their leader is.

This is the first kind of adversity that, I argue, tends to do more harm than good.

Adversity Is Bad When There’s Nothing You Can Do About It

My experience of twelve years in the army with multiple international deployments tells me adversity serves you no utility when there’s nothing you can do to recover from the situation- either by working around it or working through it.

An example of this kind of adversity would be what restaurants faced when the world went into lockdown due to the Covid-19 pandemic.

Public gatherings were largely banned during that time, so restaurants suffered immensely because the business model depended on people coming in and eating together.

Was this something they could work around or work through? Not really, during strict lockdowns, there was no way customers could go to restaurants, so even the best of managers and leaders could do nothing but “wait it out.”

Now, the pandemic was a teachable moment for many businesses, i.e., it taught them the importance of establishing an online presence and handling their communication and operations online. But if you think about it, these lessons don’t apply to restaurants at all.

Firstly, you must be physically present in a kitchen to make food, so you can only partially take your operations online. Secondly, restaurants were fine trying to reach people online since people generally avoided ordering food out of panic.

Not if the world undergoes another pandemic in the future, people will avoid restaurants the same way, and there’s not much their managers can do to ease the situation.

Sometimes, certain situations are simply unbeatable, and no level of competent leadership can do anything about it.

Sometimes, certain situations are simply unbeatable, and no level of competent leadership can do anything about it.

Adversity Is Bad When You’re Not Looking for the Opportunities

The third situation where adversity will do you more harm than good is when you don’t have the right attitude.

It doesn’t matter how small or large your problem is. If you approach it with a problems-focused attitude, you won’t benefit from it in any way.

This is because to gain anything from adversity, you must look beyond its face value and search for hidden opportunities and insights. And you can’t do this if you’ve labeled the situation horrible and fruitless.

In other words, treating problems like “setbacks” stops you from trying to look for the good that can root in them. As a result, you become less adaptive and turn your back to (what could be) incredible opportunities.

When the demand for your product/ service is low, you, as the leader of your business, can either sulk about it and pity yourself or investigate why this is happening and find out what’s losing you, customers.

The former will do nothing to help your situation. Still, the latter will help you adapt better to your customers’ changing needs and possibly even get you an edge over your competitors.

Adversity will always show you your limits, but whether or not you work to overcome them is a matter of attitude.

Adversity will always show you your limits, but whether or not you work to overcome them is a matter of attitude.

If you want to learn more about what you can do to be a more adaptive leader in the face of adversity, I highly recommend you read Stephen Covey’s book “The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People” from Amazon.com. It talks about attitudes and behaviors that are indispensable for effective leaders.

Is Adversity Always Good?	Description
Adversity Is Bad When It Is Sudden and Excessive	Adversity is necessarily good for you in all situations; no, sometimes, all adversity does is knock you down and set you back with relatively few benefits to set that off with.
Adversity Is Bad When There’s Nothing You Can Do About It	Adversity serves you no utility when there’s nothing you can do to recover from the situation- either by working around it or working through it.
Adversity Is Bad When You’re Not Looking For The Opportunities	It doesn’t matter how small or large your problem is. If you approach it with a problems-focused attitude, you won’t benefit from it in any way.

When is adversity bad?

Here is a talk by Marcus Aurelius Andersen discussing how we can use the adversities we face to become better individuals.

The Gift of Adversity

Conclusion

In summary, while adverse situations certainly aren’t pleasant, they can do a lot to help you grow as both an individual and a leader. Specifically, it will help you:

Get out of your comfort zone and grow.
Make you think proactively.
Show you your true strengths and weaknesses.
Appreciate and effectively utilize your time and resources.
Be more decisive and confident in your abilities.

6 Steps to Motivate Your Stressed-Out Team! (Tight Deadlines Fix)

While preparing for my first international deployment with the army, my team and I went through an extraordinarily stressful time with strict deadlines. I even had soldiers come up to me crying, saying they couldn’t take the pressure anymore. The motivation was at its all-time low, but the problem with military operations is that the enemy doesn’t care. I had to step up and show them this would all be worth it. This was one of the times my leadership was forged, as we call it here at Sancus Leadership.

Motivating your team under tight deadlines and stress includes:

Taking back control of the situation.
Removing all non-vital tasks.
Focusing on short-term wins.
Communicating why the suffering is worth it.

In this article, I’ll discuss how you can keep your team’s spirits up during tight deadlines and high-stress levels. I’ll also explain the power of recalibrating and ensuring that everyone is on the same page, followed by the value of breaking down tasks into smaller portions so they no longer seem daunting. Additionally, I’ll share some tips on perceiving deadlines as motivators rather than stressors.

1. Take Back Control of the Situation

Whenever you feel overwhelmed with tight deadlines and stress and feel like you can no longer think straight, it is important to take a step back to recharge and recalibrate.

When I find myself in a stressful situation, whether it be a car crash on my way home or at work, I follow the S.T.O.P standard operating procedure,

1. Stop

I mean this literally, sit down and breathe slowly for 10 to 15 seconds, preferably with a box or tactical breathing method. This will instantly reduce your stress level, free up some computing power and allow you to make intelligent decisions that will benefit your team.

This is where you can make or break team spirit; if the team sees you are losing control of the situation, they are bound to look elsewhere for guidance.

2. Think

With your body and mind less stressed, observe the situation. What are the threats to your team and the mission? What do you have to do immediately to stop chaos from continuing?

There is almost always time to consult your team members; only in very few highly intense situations should you make decisions on your own, and these situations rarely exist in business.

Get your team involved and allow them to understand that they are a part of the solution. Please encourage them to take extreme ownership of their roles and assignments.

3. Orient Yourself

Now that you have a better idea of the threats and possibilities, it is time to focus your energy on solving the highest priorities first. Orient yourself and your point toward that which would give the most significant benefits the fastest.

Cut away anything that doesn’t leave directly to the goal. There is a better time to make things perfect, your team is having a tough time, and you should respect that by only doing the necessities and not overwhelming them.

4. Plan

At this stage, you should have a somewhat clear idea of what is stopping your team and what you need to get done to get your guys back up the ladder of motivation and continue towards the goals.

It is time to start figuring out the long-term plan; how do we solve the problems that got us into this mess, and how do we do it in a way that also encourages growth is growth in the long term?

These four steps are a practical outcome of the self-management theory, a skill vital to good leadership.

Leading and managing your team means knowing when to keep pushing and when to stop. It can be very destructive to keep pressing your team members closer to your goals beyond what they can handle.

Leading and managing your team means knowing when to keep pushing and when to stop.

Sometimes, your team will be much better off with a short break so everyone can relax, find their bearings, and devise a road map to get things done more efficiently.

S.T.O.P. Procedure	Description
Stop	Take a break and breathe slowly for 10-15 seconds to reduce stress levels and make better decisions.
Think	Observe the situation and identify threats to the team and mission. Consult with team members to involve them in finding a solution.
Orient Yourself	Focus on solving the highest priorities first, cutting away anything that does not directly lead to the goal.
Plan	Figure out a long-term plan to solve the problems and encourage growth. Know when to stop pushing your team and when to take a break.

The standard operating procedure

How Do You Motivate Your Team in Stressful Situations?

You can motivate your team in stressful situations by showing them why the suffering will be worth it, that you have their back, and how valuable their role on the team is. Help them further by canceling all non-vital tasks and letting them focus on the essentials and conserve energy.

Keeping your team’s spirits up during difficult times is essential to maintain efficiency and productivity. We rarely find ourselves motivated to compete for a task when we are exhausted, so encouraging your team to take care of themselves inside and outside of the job is important.

Here are some tips on motivating your team in stressful situations.

Collaborate With Your Team

One way to ignite team spirit is by allowing your team to brainstorm on tackling stressful situations. Please encourage them to unleash their creativity and suggest ways to better deal with factors such as deadlines, demanding clients, or delayed deliverables.

Listen to their story to uncover any negative feedback or complaints. Please encourage them to give suggestions on how to improve the situation or execute things more efficiently. If you listen to your employees and make them realize that their input is important to you, they will be inspired to always aim for excellence.

Be Open With Your Team

Always be clear and straightforward about the expectations and goals you’ve set for the team. Doing so is a great way to let them in on what the next few months will be like so they know what to expect and what their roles will be in ensuring that these targets will be met.

Maintaining open communication lines with your team ensures they stay engaged despite difficulties and stress. It helps them stay aligned with the organization even when obstacles stand in their way.

It is important that you connect with your team so you understand what they need, not only what you think they need because you read something on a blog post.😉

Be Generous With Praise

Make it a point to recognize your team members for good results and excellent effort. There are different ways to do so, but determine how best to show your appreciation to your team.

Consider launching a rewards program to show you value your team members’ efforts and achievements. You can draw up incentive schemes where your team can collect points to exchange for cash, gift checks, household appliances, or food items. You can also treat your entire team to a fun and relaxation-filled night after reaching milestones.

Ensure you understand the differences between intrinsic and extrinsic motivators and how they will impact your team. Many team leaders I meet need to correct this.

Emphasize the Value of Self-Care

Highly stressful circumstances often make people have tunnel vision in matters pertaining only to work and tasks at hand. If your team members are frequently stressed about tight deadlines, they might already neglect self-care, negatively affecting how they execute their job.

Emphasize the importance of caring for oneself despite challenges and difficulties. People who feel good about themselves generally perform better and can deliver quality results.

Here are some pointers to give your team members during particularly stressful days at work:

Stay healthy. Eating healthy when you are stressed is essential, and the demands on your body are higher. A higher calorie intake during a stressful time can be good for you.
Stay hydrated—drink water. Make it simple!
Prioritize exercise. You have the time to go work out! I don’t mean a short walk; I mean getting sweaty and tired. The benefits you already know.

Tips for motivating your team in stressful situations	Description
Collaborate with your team	Allow them to brainstorm and suggest ways to tackle stressful situations. Listen to their feedback and encourage suggestions for improvements.
Be open with your team	Clearly communicate expectations and goals for the team to ensure they know what to expect and what their role is in achieving targets. Maintain open communication to keep them engaged and aligned with the organization.
Be generous with praise	Recognize team members for their good work and effort. Consider launching a rewards program to show you value their contributions.
Emphasize the value of self-care	Encourage your team to take care of themselves both inside and outside of work. People who feel good about themselves tend to perform better and deliver quality results.

Tips for motivating your team

2. Set Progressive Goals

Deadlines and the amount of work that needs to be done within a limited period can often be overwhelming. Sometimes, team members might feel frustrated or intimidated, causing them to feel disengaged from the tasks at hand. This mindset may result in low productivity and poor-quality output.

Consider breaking up larger goals into smaller, more manageable objectives so that employees will experience a sense of achievement every time they reach a milestone.

Consider breaking up larger goals into smaller, more manageable objectives so that employees will experience a sense of achievement every time they reach a milestone.

Your team members will eventually notice that they’re steadily gaining traction and moving continuously closer to the primary goal. Effectively leading and managing your team means you must be capable of guiding them through the most efficient paths leading to success.

Here are some tips on how to do it:

Sort your tasks. Prioritize tasks based on importance and urgency. Usually, urgent tasks mean you have less time to accomplish them. In contrast, important tasks have a more significant impact on the organization but only need to be completed after some time.
Consider the level of difficulty. Complex tasks require more time and effort. You should hold off on these tasks to ensure that the urgent and important ones are carried out on time.
Group similar tasks together. Grouping related tasks allow you to focus better and develop a rhythm as you go along, which helps you accomplish tasks faster and with seemingly less effort.

Some people also find it motivating to set “fake” deadlines for themselves. They set a personal deadline considerably earlier than the official deadline, so they have enough time to review their work, make corrections, or improve it. Consider suggesting this idea to your team members to reduce the burden for those who find deadlines quite nerve-racking.

3. Delegate Tasks

Now that you’ve set progressive goals within your team, it’s time to initiate the assault and win the fight. Delegate tasks to your team members while considering each of their strengths. Assign each individual to areas where they are most proficient so that tasks can be accomplished sooner and more efficiently.

Assigning relevant tasks to your team members is a great way to boost their morale and give them a chance to showcase their expertise and sharpen their skills.

However, make it a point to get feedback from your team members on the task delegation process. Some employees are eager to explore and try new areas, but this should probably be done after a stressful period rather than during one.

Consider providing additional support in developing your employees by providing training programs suited to their needs. Someone well-trained is likely to stay calm and motivated.

A crash course on your organization’s profile, clientele, and expertise would be helpful for newer team members. For more tenured employees, honing their skills in various aspects, such as selling, marketing, or administrative tasks, will help improve their work quality.

By giving importance to your team’s development, you show them you value their presence and contributions to the company. A boost in their self-confidence will significantly impact how they perceive their job. They will be inspired to enhance their talents and skills further and always deliver quality work.

By giving importance to your team’s development, you show them you value their presence and contributions to the company.

4. Map Out an Action Plan

Draw up a plan of action with your team and take note of all deadlines. It would help to visually represent your plan and distribute copies to all team members. This tactic allows complete transparency and accountability for all tasks and deadlines. Making the project readily available to everyone at any given time will also help keep the team aware of their roles and unique contributions to the group.

It is hard to motivate someone with something they don’t believe will work. We are much more likely to accept and engage with the idea we have created ourselves. This is why it is so important for you to involve your team in the planning process.

5. Encourage a Healthy Mindset

Leading and managing your team means you also have to think about how you can encourage your employees to adopt a healthy mindset about work. Often, looming deadlines are seen as highly stressful occurrences.

Most people who tend to procrastinate typically find themselves pulling all-nighters to meet deadlines. Thus, they easily cringe at the mere idea of delivering quality results within a set timeline.

One way to significantly curb work-related stress is to encourage your team to think of deadlines as motivators rather than stressors. Here are some vital elements about deadlines that your team members may not have come to realize yet:

They’re great yardsticks. Tracking where you are in terms of getting to the finish line — the deadline — can be quite rewarding and fulfilling. With each deadline you meet, you get closer to your goals.
They allow you to manage your time wisely. Deadlines provide you with a clear and specific direction. Knowing you must work on a particular task within a limited period teaches you to prioritize and focus on what’s critically important.
They help develop better work habits. Being regularly faced with tight deadlines trains you to be mindful of how you spend your time at work. Resisting distractions can sometimes be challenging, but if you have deadlines looming ahead, you’ll stick to the plan rather than stray.

6. Regularly Meet for Updates

Excellent communication is crucial to meeting deadlines and achieving goals as a team. Meet with your team members regularly to update each other on how much progress has been made. It’s also an excellent chance to share insights, tips, and relevant advice on accomplishing tasks.

Remind your team that each member is connected, especially regarding task accomplishment. Each member has a significant role in ensuring the organization’s goals are met (Otherwise, you would have them on the team, right?).

These regular meetings will help enlighten team members on how close they’re getting to accomplishing the expected tasks and how they fare about their peers.

Leading and managing a team means you must understand and develop your employees’ talents and skills so they can perform at a high level for a long time.

Bonus Tip!

A big part of leadership is giving your team a sense that you “Have your shit together!”

If all they see is a disorganized manager always asking to borrow a pen, it’s much harder for them to trust decisions and put in the effort.

A skill that should be remembered, especially with us more creatively oriented leaders, is organizational skills. Reducing chaos and clutter — in your mind and work environment — can significantly help boost productivity and reduce stress.

Here are some tips on how to make your space more organized:

Make a to-do list. Your list can be daily, weekly, or even monthly. What’s important is you have a clear idea of what needs to be done at the start of every workday. You start with the most critical tasks and do nothing else until they are down.
Prepare ahead. Make a list of tools, resources, and any other information you need. This way, you can acquire these necessary things before you need them.
Group things together. Constantly looking for items like pens, papers, or contact numbers wastes precious time. Gather them in a way that makes sense so you know exactly where to look when you need something.

Here’s a quick video of Simon Sinek giving tips on how to motivate your team members when they seem unmotivated and stressed.

How to motivate your team

Boost Small Team Motivation Without Team Building or Money?

Many believe that keeping teams motivated takes a lot of time, effort, and money. Although it may ring true for the first two aspects, the third is not necessarily accurate. With minimal to no budget, you can keep your employees inspired, productive, and eager to excel.

You can boost motivation for small teams without team-building or money by being loud and vocal with your praises on big and small wins. Encourage autonomy in your team and make your space conducive to working. Maintain a good work-life balance so your employees see purpose in their work.

In this article, I’ll share different ways to boost your employees’ self-esteem and motivational levels without breaking the bank or having your employees endure one of those awkward team-building events that most of us hate.

I’ll also give tips on making your workplace more welcoming and being generous and impactful with your praises. I’ll also discuss some misconceptions about team motivation and explain how being flexible can make your team feel more valued.

How Do You Motivate Small Teams?

You motivate small teams by ensuring they always feel appreciated and respected. Make it a point to value their opinions, suggestions, and ideas to help them feel like significant contributors to the team. Allow them some independence so they can fully utilize their skills and talents.

It can be challenging to keep a small team motivated, considering the limitations that come with a fewer headcount. Especially when budget may be a primary concern and usual team-building activities are out of the picture. Besides, monetary incentives aren’t always reliable in enhancing team motivation and achieving desired results.

Yet, with some creativity and ingenuity, you can keep your team inspired more engagingly without breaking the bank. Here are some things you can try:

Go All Out on Recognition

Recognizing your employees for a job well done is crucial to keeping them motivated. It may seem like a simple gesture, but it affects them in many ways. When you praise them, they’ll feel appreciated and respected, motivating them to continue improving and go beyond their comfort zone.

Recognizing your employees for a job well done is crucial to keeping them motivated.

Make sure to recognize small and big wins. Avoid reserving your praises only for significant moments and impressive gains. Make sure to pay attention to small efforts and day-to-day achievements because these bring the team closer to the set goals.

More importantly, specify what task or behavior you appreciate rather than offer generalized statements, highlighting how this has positively affected the organization. A simple “Good job!” or a pat on the back won’t cut it. Your approach must be more tangible for employees to feel genuinely valued and appreciated. Consider these ideas:

Recognition wall. Create a space in your office to post employee achievements, whether in print or through photos. Place it in an area easily accessible to everyone so that featured employees are well-acknowledged. Be loud and artistic when posting on the wall. I personally don’t like this idea at all, but I do know that it works for some companies, so I honor the experience and keep it on the list!
Praise publicly. Recognize your employees in front of their peers for maximum effect. You can do this during meetings or gatherings where everyone can recognize individuals for a job well done. It is once again vital to be extremely specific to avoid people thinking you are favoring certain individuals.
Send emails. In today’s digital world, almost everything is uncovered, announced, or discussed via email or newsletters. Why not commend your excelling employees via these mediums? This way, everyone in the organization is aware of their accomplishments. Make sure this is an add-on to the one-on-one feedback that should be the core of your leadership.

Encourage Autonomy

When leaders micromanage, they’re inadvertently sending a message to employees that they cannot be trusted with making decisions, devising strategies, or formulating plans of action to meet goals. This quickly affects the team’s motivational levels and makes them feel insecure and frustrated.

Instead, give employees space to thrive. Allow and trust them to make decisions and devise their own strategies to accomplish tasks. This way, they can maximize the use of their skills and experiences. They’ll gain self-confidence and eventually step out of their comfort zone. Giving them some independence will help them achieve their full potential.

Remember that you shouldn’t be the sole decision-maker when you’re leading and managing a team. Avoid being a “helicopter boss” and allow your employees to make suggestions and share their ideas. Rather than being a mere dictator, invite your team to brainstorm and share their thoughts. This simple gesture will make them feel valued and notably affect their morale.

Be Flexible

Always remember that keeping a good work-life balance is crucial to keeping your employees motivated and grateful for being part of your team. Don’t expect them to make work their main priority. Keep in mind that there are other vital aspects in their lives that they need to focus on, too.

Give your employees opportunities to spend their valuable free time in pursuits that matter to them. It could be about giving a particular employee flexible work hours because she’s a single mom and needs to take her kids to school every morning. Perhaps you can keep weekends work-free and avoid reaching out to employees during these days to allow them to spend uninterrupted time with their families.

Give your employees opportunities to spend their valuable free time in pursuits that matter to them.

Create a Positive Work Atmosphere

Make your office a place employees want to be in. This doesn’t mean you must invest in expensive office chairs or gadgets. Simple strategies to help make your space more inviting and conducive to work will make a huge difference.

The benefit of running a small team is that you can design the workplace so it specifically fits your team. Avoid general trends that don’t suit your people!

The benefit of running a small team is that you can design the workplace so it specifically fits your team.

Here are some tips:

Clear your windows. Make sure you have unobstructed views from your windows to the outside. This gives the illusion that your space is bigger and will not make it seem so tight. Letting natural light in will also help perk your team’s spirits up.
Buy plants. Greenery is always refreshing to see. Stationing plants in corners, shelves, and empty spaces will make your office space seem homelier and more attractive.
Use artwork. Place artwork on walls and stands to give your space more character.

Key Points	Description
*Go All Out on Recognition*	Recognize and appreciate employees’ achievements, big or small, to make them feel valued and motivated to improve and exceed expectations.
*Encourage Autonomy*	Trust employees to make decisions and create their own strategies, empowering them to utilize their skills, gain confidence, and reach their full potential.
*Be Flexible*	Support work-life balance by accommodating personal needs and commitments, such as offering flexible work hours or work-free weekends, which helps employees prioritize their well-being and maintain motivation.
*Create a Positive Work Atmosphere*	Foster a positive work environment by creating a space that aligns with the team’s preferences and values, making employees feel comfortable, engaged, and motivated to be productive.

How you can motivate small teams

Increase Motivation, From Low to High

Boost your team's motivation! — Boost your team’s motivation!

The bottom line in keeping employees engaged is increasing low to high motivation. Peak engagement and motivation ensure boosted efficiency and productivity. With more tasks accomplished promptly, the team can systematically move closer to attaining goals.

Misconceptions About Motivating Small Teams

Keeping a small team motivated is challenging, and you can quickly fall into traps where you’ll unknowingly destroy your employees’ spirit and enthusiasm about work. There are many fallacies surrounding this, and it’s best to avoid them so frustration and feelings of disparity don’t sidetrack your team.

Here are some so-called motivational tactics to avoid:

Raising Your Voice

This is one of the quickest ways to demotivate employees. If you yell at them when they commit mistakes or when things don’t go as planned, you’ll make them feel disrespected and embarrassed, especially if you do this in front of their peers.

This is not to say that you shouldn’t call out bad behavior or point out errors and deficiencies. What matters is how you say it and when. You’ll make more of an impact if you treat your employees respectfully. Ask them about what happened, how they could’ve done things differently, and what they plan to do to correct the situation. You can then give tips and advice.

Assume that there is something you don’t know of that explains what happened, and be curious instead of judgmental.

Assume that there is something you don’t know of that explains what happened, and be curious instead of judgmental.

Positively dealing with crises sends the message to your team that you trust in them even if they sometimes falter. You know they’ll learn from their mistakes and always strive for excellence. This lets them know that you’re on their side, always willing to work hand-in-hand with them in finding solutions to problems.

Issuing Threats

Some leaders resort to threats to scare their employees into performing better. However, this often backfires, especially if you fail to follow through because it only makes your team resent you.

Leading and managing a team means being on their side. Positivity in the face of adversity shows your team that you believe in their abilities and understand the difficulties that come with the job. Adopt a corrective stance during difficult times rather than being accusatory and antagonistic.

Positivity in the face of adversity shows your team that you believe in their abilities and understand the difficulties that come with the job.

Here’s a quick but insightful video where Simon Sinek explains how as leaders, we should first evaluate whether or not we’ve created an environment that inspires our employees.

How do you spark motivation in a team?

Final Thoughts

Boosting motivation for your small team requires creativity and ingenuity. There are many simple ways to keep your employees inspired, so strive to get to know them more personally to uncover what tactics will work.

Making your employees feel respected, trusted, and valuable is the key. Remember that they have lives outside the workplace, so it’s important not to expect them always to prioritize work. This helps keep employees motivated to push forward. Also, aim to maintain good work-life harmony, so your team can.

Recent Posts

How Do New Leaders Gain Trust?

1. Be Honest and Open

2. Avoid Controlling Behavior

3. Stand Up for Your Team

What Do New Leaders Struggle With the Most?

Adapting To Authority and Responsibility

Learning To Delegate

Building Relationships

What Should a New Leader Do for the Team?

Set Clear Goals and Expectations

Ensure a Safe Working Environment

Communicate

Be an Example

What New Team Leaders Should Do First

1. Get To Know Your Team

2. Let the Team Get To Know You

3. Develop Your Strategy

4. Take Your Time To Learn and Listen

Conclusion

What Causes Low Psychological Safety?

Lack of Trust

Fear of Failure

Lack of Support

Unclear Expectations

Poor Communication

Why a Team May Lack Psychological Safety

Fear of Speaking Up

Rigid Hierarchies

Competitive Team Culture

The Consequences of Lack of Psychological Safety

What Impact Does the Team Leader Have On Psychological Safety?

Strategies to Promote Psychological Safety in Your Team

The Positive Effects of Promoting Psychological Safety

Final Words

8 Different Ways That Leaders Can Develop

1. Build Meaningful Connections With Team Members

2. Stay Open To New Ideas and Perspectives

3. Develop Concrete Goals

4. Maintain Good Communication

Use Communication to Build Community

5. Accept Feedback To Make Changes

6. Give Useful Feedback To Others

7. Lead By Example Through Modeling

8. Complete Professional Development on Your Own

New Leaders Grow Through Developing Skills, Communication, and Goals

Final Thoughts

How Adversity Will Make You a Better Leader

Adversity Helps You Grow

Adversity Makes You Proactive

Adversity Holds a Mirror to You

Adversity Makes You Appreciate Your Time & Resources

Adversity Helps You Become Decisive

Overcoming Difficulty Gives You Confidence in Your Abilities

Is Adversity Always Good?

Adversity Is Bad When It Is Sudden and Excessive

Adversity Is Bad When There’s Nothing You Can Do About It

Adversity Is Bad When You’re Not Looking for the Opportunities

Conclusion

1. Take Back Control of the Situation

1. Stop

2. Think

3. Orient Yourself

4. Plan

How Do You Motivate Your Team in Stressful Situations?

Collaborate With Your Team

Be Open With Your Team

Be Generous With Praise

Emphasize the Value of Self-Care

2. Set Progressive Goals

3. Delegate Tasks

4. Map Out an Action Plan

5. Encourage a Healthy Mindset

6. Regularly Meet for Updates

Bonus Tip!

How Do You Motivate Small Teams?

Go All Out on Recognition

Encourage Autonomy

Be Flexible

Create a Positive Work Atmosphere