What do Michael Jordan, Mahatma Gandhi and Bill Gates have in common? They are all celebrated team leaders who took on the challenge and brought their respective teams to great heights. Jordan led the Chicago Bulls to six NBA championships, Gandhi is looked upon as India’s political and spiritual leader, while Gates is responsible for making Microsoft one of the most successful and profitable companies in the world. Being a team leader, however, is not about being rich or famous. It is about accepting crucial responsibilities and delivering the results that are expected from you and your team.
Teams and Leaders
A team is a group of individuals that are brought together by a particular need, objective or cause. Its size and type may vary as shown in our example. It may range from a small sports team and may go as large as a heavily-populated country or a global company. Each team consists of a number of members who submit themselves to their team leader. The role of the team leader starts from developing a team, to guiding it through the entire project cycle. The team leader usually provides strategic direction to the group and assigns specific roles and responsibilities to each of his members. Since the success of the team rests heavily on the shoulders of its leader, the team leader should be effective in carrying out his responsibilities.
Effective Team Leaders
Effective team leaders are those that succeed in attaining the team’s targets by capitalizing on the expertise of each of their members. A team leader cannot be considered effective if he was unable to mobilise the entire team or if he did all the work by himself. Effective team leaders maintain open and transparent communication lines with their members to ensure that everyone knows what he is expected to do, and that each member understands how his role contributes to the overall goal. In addition, team leaders become effective when they set a good example to their members, and when they immerse themselves in the actual work instead of just delegating all responsibilities. Effective team leaders become even better when they acknowledge their weak points and are willing to improve on the same by subjecting themselves to training and leaders’ development programs.
How to Lead a Team
To lead a team, a team leader must first know what the team is for or why it was set up. From here, he can establish specific targets and success parameters against which the team’s performance will be evaluated. It would also be good if the team leader does a gap analysis with the team to ensure that the strategies they will come up with addresses these. The team leader should then translate the strategies to individual tasks and action items, assigning roles that are appropriate to each member’s capacity and willingness to work. Throughout the course of the project, the team leader should be on top of things, closely monitoring if all tasks are being performed within the timeline set. Upon project completion, the team leader should conduct an evaluation of the team’s best practices and key success factors, as well as areas for improvement.