Teams at the Top:  What it Takes to be High-Performing

We are working with several clients that have experienced (or will experience) a significant change in their top leadership teams.  This comes at a time when they are also facing a challenging competitive climate or, in the case of non-profits, a challenging political and funding climate. 

The Teams at the Top have to quickly come up to speed and focus on the factors that will assure their joint leadership effectiveness.  Where does a Team at the Top start?

There has been a lot written and researched about Teams at the Top (or in that case, team effectiveness at any level.)  I believe the best work to date comes from the powerful duo of Bob Eichinger and Michael Lombardo.  Their summary of the research on team effectiveness synthesized 7 factors critical for team success, 5 of which are internal to teams and 2 are external to the team.  The 5 internal team effectiveness factors are:

• Thrust - having a common purpose
• Trust - in the actions and communication of team members
• Talent - the combined skills of the team members
• Teaming skills - how efficiently and effectively the team operates
• Task Skills - How well the team gets things done.

The two external factors are Team Support from the Organization and Team Leader Fit.

Lombardo and Eichinger found the factors to be clearly behavior-based and stayed away from personality or trait-based descriptions.  I've found that teams can therefore easily assess themselves on these behavior-based factors and create a team development plan.   The other plus with this model is that the Team Factors can also be linked to behavior-based leadership competencies so team members can also create an individual development plan linked to the Teams goals.

Who Is Taking Over?

Developing Your Next Generation of Leaders  

Workshop presented by Michael Couch and Richard Citrin 

 Bayer Center for Non-Profit Management

Robert Morris University

Tuesday, March 26 from 9 a.m. - noon

Many for-profits and nonprofits are facing a changing of the guard in leadership.  In addition, the demands placed on leadership are ever changing.  What assurances exist that the next crop of leaders will be ready to assume the ranks of responsibility in growing your nonprofit towards the fulfillment of your mission?

This workshop will provide a systematic process to identify the key elements of what makes a great leader for your nonprofit, where leaders come from within the organization and how best to develop them so they will have the skills and competencies to assume the role when their day arrives.

Fee: $65 ($55 if paid online)

Click here to register or for more information

I get that question all the time so here is a quick summary of a few of our recent projects.