Summary: In order for our organizations, businesses, and selves to get ahead, we must be and work with ideal, strong team players. Bestselling author Patrick Lencioni returns with another insightful book where he presents one of the most effective teamwork approach, used by leaders and companies around the world. He says. “The most reliable way to ensure that teamwork takes hold in an organization would be to hire only ideal team players.” Think about this, based on our experiences, if we were asked today, what an Ideal team player may be like, what would we say? We would probably get a list of 15-20 different things that we feel work best for us. We are all trained from a very young age by schooling, that in order to be successful, we need to be really good ourselves. But when we are in the real world, we find that in order to be successful, we need to work with a team. Even the top individual performers and athletes, have a team around them to keep them at their best. What this tells us is that it is hard for us to identify key values of an ideal team player. We normally value ourselves, prideful in our abilities and have some sense of entitlement. Patrick, Based on his years of corporate and consulting experience, he and his team narrowed the characteristics of an ideal team player down to three virtues that can be learned and cultivated. This is what is called the Ideal Team Player Model. The author says “For organizations seriously committed to making teamwork a cultural reality…‘the right people’ are the ones who have the three virtues in common – humility, hunger and people smarts.” To be Ideal team players, we must practice genuine “humility” and place the team above our own interests. Be self-motivated and “hungry” enough to work hard. • And are “smart” about other people. Let's dive into these virtues further. So that we can find them in future teams and develop within us and our current teams.
