New Team Management

Here is the tale of the successful team leader who has successfully groomed his team members to scale new heights as they succeeded in one assignment after the other. The real trouble for the team leader began when there is no more stability in the composition of the team. There is a constant change in the members of the team. The team dynamics are under constant change as well. People with diverse characters and good amount of experience began working together under him and new problems started cropping under the carpet. There is a gradual decline the quality of the work delivered by the team. The leader is worried about reaching the goals of the team. With the deadlines fast approaching, he hardly has any time to follow his traditional strategy of understanding the personalities of his team members and direct their energies in the right direction. In fact, the more experienced members of the team tend to take things for granted and continuously involve in doing things on their own. The sudden promotion of the team leader to deal with experienced people seemed to be a short-lived dream. This happens in most situations where managers have to prove their worth as leaders carefully dealing with the new team members.

Leadership entails continuous change in style. Leaders need to understand the fact that different rules apply for different people. The fact that young executives need more authoritative leaders and the more experience executives need participative leaders has to be realized. However, if the leader fears that the goals cannot be reached by being participative in nature, he needs to go a step further. The focus on motivation and rewards significantly increases at this juncture. The zeal for recognition increases as experience increases for the executives. It is this aspect that the leader has to take into advantage and imbibe the goals of the team within each and every team member.

Secondly, every one is interested in playing the blame game and no one is willing to take responsibility for their actions. The leader has to begin taking the responsibility for the failure of the team and should plan the activities in such a way that no single executive is blamed for the failure of the entire team. At the same time, the focus on rewards and recognition of the entire team in times of success should be attributed to the entire team. Competitive spirit also needs to be encouraged. However, the leader has to emphasize the fact is necessary to work together to win in the competition. The team cohesiveness has to be ensured under all circumstances.

Promotions are favored by everyone. However, many managers and team leaders tend to misinterpret their new responsibilities as mere extensions of their old positions. Indeed, there are a lot of transformations necessary on the part of the team leader and his style of management. The manager needs to be proactive, not only to the external forces, but also to the internal forces that can often act detrimental to the organizational objectives if not properly handled.