As the midpoint of 2021 approaches, some leaders report they and their teams are facing burnout and need easy techniques to help build morale and reset, according to www.forbes.com.
Executive coach and speaker Anne Sugar advises leaders to ask one question of themselves and their teams: “In the last six months, what are you proud of?”
Rather than focusing on what leaders and their teams want to improve, Sugar offers ideas for how to identify points of pride and boost team morale.
- Focus first on creating time to think about the past six months; allow for quiet time to think alone or brainstorm with your group. Sugar recommends using note cards for everyone to write what they are proud of for themselves and their team members; not everyone will need to share publicly. Another idea is to have teams write letters to themselves or to a team member describing their points of pride. Consider the group’s culture and dynamics to determine the best first step.
- Think about how you will communicate your team’s proudest moments. It could be simply creating a display board with note cards detailing team members’ points of pride. One leader decided to share his team’s anecdotes during the last 15 minutes of a company meeting. Make a plan for how you will celebrate your team’s proud moments and accomplishments.
- Create a plan to know what success looks like, which will help you build on your successes. What kind of work will make you proud in the future? Some questions you can ask include: Does this move us toward a bigger goal? What would success on this project look like? How can we build on this? What metrics can we attach to this goal?
If leaders and their teams do not have enough history together to look back and feel proud of, they can look to the future and think about what would make them proud, creating a vision of something to which they aspire.
