7 Steps for Creating Resilient Teams
How to create a culture of resilience in your team
As a manager, creating resilience in myself and the individuals within my teams is crucial to being able to handle the challenges of work and life. MIND, the mental health charity defines Resilience as;
“Resilience is not simply a person’s ability to ‘bounce back’, but their capacity to adapt in the face of challenging circumstances, whilst maintaining a stable mental wellbeing.”
Creating resilient teams is critical to long-term success. We want to create an environment where teams can not only handle challenges, but thrive in them. An environment where everyone is able to stretch themselves, but not overstretch. An environment where our teams are excited and have a passion to turn up and tackle the work to be done.
Throughout my time managing teams, I have seen numerous occasions of people struggling to cope with challenges in their work and life. As a manager, the health and well-being of everyone within the team is my number one priority. With that in mind, here are my seven tips for creating resilient teams;
1. Create a support network
Everyone should have at least one person to rely on for support. As a bare minimum, this should be their manager. But a much better situation is where every individual in the team has a network of buddies, mentors, and coaches who together form their support network. A collection of different individuals that can help in a wide variety of different situations.
An old colleague of mine once said that everyone should have at least one person in the company with who they can be completely and unashamedly honest. I completely agree, and this is one part of a healthy support network.
Throughout my career, I’ve been most successful when I’ve had a broad network of individuals that I can turn to for advice and support when I need it. I now try and create this for every single person in my business area.
2. Take control in difficult situations
As a leader, your job is to lead. When challenging situations occur, people need someone to look to for guidance and reassurance. Someone who can operate with conviction in the face of adversity. If you don’t turn up for your team when challenges arise, it will result in a heightened level of anxiety for your team a lack of resilience. On the contrary, if you turn up for your team in challenging circumstances, then your team will turn up for you and build resilience as they know you will be there for them.
When things are going well, as a leader you may step back, delegate frequently and be more hands-off. In crisis moments though, people look for direction, decisiveness, and confidence. If you provide this for your team, they will forever know you are there for them when they need you.
3. Nurture a culture of positivity
There’s immense power in positivity. If your team believes they will succeed by default, rather than fail by default, it will create a culture of resilience that will overcome any adversity. Successful people believe in themselves and successful teams have a team leader that believes in them.
You can create this culture by praising regularly, celebrating successes, and always having a belief that “we can do this”.
Blind optimism is not what we’re aiming for, but rather an unwavering belief that whatever challenges arise we will be able to overcome them and move forward.
4. Every problem is an opportunity
A few years ago I worked in a team, and whenever a problem would occur I would joke to my colleague;
“Hey G, do you want another growth opporunity?”
In this phrase, I was saying that in every challenge there is opportunity. Every time something goes wrong, there’s an opportunity for someone to step up and prove themself. Every time a project goes off track, there’s an opportunity for someone to bring it back on track. Every time there’s a product defect, there’s an opportunity for someone to fix it.
In my business, lots of people are looking to push themselves to the next level and secure a promotion. We have a tonne of problems that need solving, all of which are opportunities for people to prove themselves. Sometimes all that’s needed is someone to point these out to people.
5. Keep things in perspective
Let me make this clear. It’s only work.
Family, health, life, all these things are higher priority than your work goals. It’s true a lot of people care deeply about their work, but there is usually at least one thing that is more important. Helping your team realise this is important.
I recently had a direct report reach out to me and say how they were struggling to concentrate because they were stressed with some family health issues that were going on. My response? Close the laptop, go be with your family, don’t worry about work, we’ve got things covered.
Making sure your team keeps things in perspective is critical to creating resilience. Sure we all want to achieve our goals, but not to the detriment of our mental health. Some things matter more.
6. Practice emotional awareness
How do you feel? Are you able to tap into your emotional state and understand why you feel that way? If you’re angry, chances are that anger is going to come out in some shape or form to your team. If you’re stressed, upset, tired, depressed, these can come out in ways you don’t envisage.
Next time you’re not feeling great, try writing down how you feel. Writing can have the remarkable effect of keeping you honest about your feelings.
Try being honest with your team, normalising talking about your emotional state, and showing vulnerability as a leader. Imagine saying to your team;
“Hey team, I’m not feeling great today, feeling low because of a lack of sleep last night. Wanted to let you all know.”
Your team will see that it’s ok not to be ok.
7. Encourage your team to look after themselves
As a team lead, role modeling the right behaviors to take care of yourself is critical. Sleeping habits, getting enough exercise, not eating too much junk food, not being hungover. We can’t force people to live a healthy lifestyle, but we can and should encourage it.
I know from myself when I get enough sleep, enough exercise, I eat well and I stay off the booze, then my mood is immeasurably better. As a leader, it’s important that I role model taking care of myself and encouraging others to do the same. My resilience and the resilience of my team are much better when we take care of our minds and body.
Creating resilient teams is about creating a culture where teams have the right culture, tools, and relationships in order to be able to handle the challenges they face.
Our job as leaders is to make sure our teams have the right environment to be resilient in the face of adversity.
