What makes a business successful? Some might argue it’s the high-quality products and services they sell, others think it’s because of great marketing, but truly successful people know that a business can’t survive without a great team.
Above anything else, your business needs a great team of employees.
But what exactly does a team need to become successful? There are a lot of different factors that affect this, and if you want to take your business to the next level, you need a team of people who are ready to help you on that journey.
Here are the qualities that a successful business team needs to have.
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Great leadership
While a great team needs to be filled with talented people, it’s important to realize that talent would go to waste without great leadership. Just like a ship needs an experienced captain, a team needs a great leader that will provide them with guidance, mentorship, and focus.
The leader of the team needs to keep encouraging their employees to work well, stay motivated, and keep their morale high, even when facing obstacles and challenges.
However, it’s important to note that not just anyone can be a great leader. Only 10% of people are natural leaders, but even if you’re not born with leadership skills, you can still learn them.
Some of the qualities a great leader possesses include the ability to build trust, listen and communicate, be collaborative, and promote development on both a personal and professional level. SnackNation explains the qualities of a good manager really well and tells you how you can practice them.
Knowledge sharing
Each member of your team brings something different to the organization, including different types of knowledge. All of this information is incredibly valuable to the success of your business and your team. But a big issue for businesses is that team members are reluctant to share that knowledge.
There are a number of reasons why team members choose to withhold this valuable information, but you can change that. Knowledge sharing is important because it helps everyone in the team to be a better employee and it saves you from the risk of losing knowledge if someone quits.
Some of the benefits of knowledge sharing include:
- Better decision-making;
- Improved business results;
- Higher productivity and team performance;
- Better problem-solving.
Back in the old days, knowledge sharing was hard to achieve, but thanks to the internet, that all changed. Now, we have knowledge bases that allow you to create a pool of information that all of your employees can add to and help out the team.
The best part is that it isn’t even hard to make. All you need is knowledge base software and you’re good to go. With the right tool of this kind, you can build a knowledge base that’s not only beneficial for your employees, but for your customers as well.
Knowledge bases are one of the most effective ways to reduce service desk costs, so creating one for your business should be at the top of your list of priorities. They are becoming one of the most popular customer service tools and 67% of consumers choose the knowledge base self-service over talking to a business agent.
Honest and open communication
The key to any successful relationship, both personal and professional, is good communication. If you know how to communicate with your team members, you can create a cohesive narrative and have no issues creating a collaborative thought process.
People who are part of a successful team don’t mind talking about their ideas and input in front of everyone. When there’s open communication, all of your employees will feel free to express their honest thoughts and opinions, even if they’re presented with a conflict.
You shouldn’t hinder different opinions, but welcome them. See them as a way to improve your brainstorming sessions and come up with new and exciting ideas.
Another important thing to remember is that when one team member has something to say, everyone else should listen attentively and with an open mind. This will show they believe in the integrity and character of the teammate who is talking and have respect for their ideas.
Constructive conflict resolution
Conflict is sometimes inevitable, and your team members are going to have disagreements from time to time. This isn’t a bad thing. It’s completely normal and you shouldn’t shy away from the conflict. But you also shouldn’t allow things to escalate and turn conflict into big fights.
In a successful team that works well together, employees try to have constructive conflict resolutions by approaching each disagreement with the following:
- Using a calm and nonthreatening tone when talking to each other.
- Respecting the viewpoints of the person they have a conflict with, even if they don’t agree.
- Not interrupting one another while one person is speaking.
- Trying to talk only about the issue at hand without attacking the character of the person they disagree with.
- Trying to understand the viewpoint of the other person while practicing active listening.
Conclusion
Anyone can be a good employee who performs their duties, but it takes a special kind of person to be a good team member. Teamwork makes the dream work and as long as your team has a great leader, knows how to communicate and solve any issue, there shouldn’t be any problems.
