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Skills for Managing Teams

Together Everyone Achieves More Success. That is a fact. However, to make that possible you need to know how to build and sustain high performance TEAMS in the workplace. You can familiarise yourself with the relevant skills by attending workshops offered by a number of organisation.

The traditional organisation that is based on high degree of centralisation with tight command and control will not work today. To meet the challenges and opportunities, successful organisations are making TEAMS as their preferred choice in managing the activities. These organisations expect and encourage their TEAMS to self-manage the work processes. TEAM members perform a whole range of tasks, thus requiring multiple skills and competencies. This would mean supervisors and managers need to master the critical Team Building skills to sustain high performance at their workplace.

Teams generally outperform individuals. Teams are groups that interact closely to complete specific tasks. Team members are accountable to each other. Effective teams have certain common characteristics. These are:

- Team members share a common goal
- Team members have a clear understanding of the goal
- Level of trust is high
- High degree of commitment to achieve the goal
- Team members have the relevant skills

BUILDING EFFECTIVE TEAMS

Since everyone recognise the fact that “Together Everyone Achieves More Success”, organisations design their work activities and processes around teams.
However, it takes time to build a team. As a manager, you should know the process of building a team.

As a team leader you should:
- Assist the members to acquire relevant Abilities, Skills and Experiences
- Help the group to develop S.M.A.R.T. goals and remain focused to the goals.
- Demonstrate appropriate behaviour by being a role model.
- Align the team goals with organisational goals/mission/vision statement.


How can we master the skills for managing teams? Try the following links:
Team Basics

Fundamentals of Team Skills

Centre for Creative Thinking

EQ Skills

Since publication of daniel Coileman's book on EQ, the EQ concept has become one of the most frequently discussed topic among managers. All in a sudden business managers began to recognise the overwhelming power of EQ compared to IQ. The Emotional Intelligence(commonly known as EQ) is seen as critical. Individuals with EQ skills invariably do well, compared to people with poor EQ skills. The EQ skills covering personal areas and social areas can be mastered through focused effort and learning.

the EQ concept covering personal competence and social competence are seen as critical human skills for the success of business firms. Self awareness, self regulation and self motivation are the three main components of personal competence. The social awareness and social skills of the social competence covers the following areas:

- Persuasion and influencing skills
- Effective communication skills for managing groups
- Inspiring and managing people with appropriate leadership skills
- Managing conflicts at work
- Creating and sustaining network for collaboration and cooperative efforts

The following sites provide the required information on EQ:

Emotional Competence Framework

EQ Skills

Emotional Intelligence - Article References

Clustering competence in emotional intelligence: Insights from the Emotional Competence Inventory (ECI)

The Economic Value of Emotional Intelligence Competencies and EIC-Based HR Programs

The Emotional Intelligence Quick Book

Steve Jobs and Bill Gates

Getting Along with Other People

How do we get along with people with opposing personality, likes and dislikes? That is not going to be easy. The following article might provide some new approaches to make that job a little easier.
Relating to Other People

Managing Stress@Work

Do you know how to manage stress at work? We all face stress, yet many of us have no idea how to cope with it. Read the booklet through the following link:

Stress At Work: Information Booklet

Joy of Work

Self Improvement

PickTheBrain.com is an interesting site that offers a broad approach to self improvement including any and all experiences that contribute to a fuller life. This site will help you use the power of your own mind to create the life you deserve.


Pick The Brain

Business Ethics

Passion

Passion

Passion about Work

Managing Your Customer and the Your Workplace

EXPERT Magazine is a training & development and meeting planning publication, providing articles and resources to make organization more effective.

A Crash Course on Customer Service

Learn to say "No"

Building Trust with Your Customers

Expert Magazine

Managing Your Time

To be successful in your career you need to master the skills of managing your Time.
You should learn to:
- Identify the main obstacles to effective Time Management in your daily role..
- Understand the nature of Time Management.
- Understand a range of tools, techniques and concepts for Time Management.
- Use apprpriate techniques to build an effective Time Management process

Read the book using the link below:
Making the Most of Your Time: Going Beyond To-Do Lists By Rajesh Setty

Toastmasters Clubs in Singapore

Public speaking is an important skills. Regardless of what we are doing, each one of us need to master the art of public speaking. What is the best way to learn how to communicate well? try joining a ToastMaster Club. For a club close to you try the link below:



ToastMasters Clubs in Singapore

For Your Reading Pleasure

Start reading. Thee following links provide some interesting PDF books for your reading pleasure. Enjoy it

The Happy at Work Manifesto
By Alexander Kjerulf
Happy at Work

When You Absolutely, Positively Should NOT Use Email: A Civilized List
by David Shipley and Will Schwalbe
A Civilized List


Forget Formulas: How Managers are Fooled in their Search for Success
By Phil Rosenzweig
Forget Formulas

The Greening of Business: Recent Trends & Remaining Hurdles
By Andrew Winston
The Greening of Business

Customer Service - Where do we get started?

Every business organisation knows the importance of customer service standards. Some simply stay with a practical but a powerful GST approach - Ask their employees to Greet, Smile and say Thank You. When every business start incorporating GST in their service standards, you no longer enjoys a competitive advantage. Is there a way to stand out from the rest of crowd? You have to make sure every employee at all levels are actively involved in making their service speacial and unique. Employees at all levels with differing abilities can actively participate in proving customer service. If you want your employees at all level to go for the extra mile, then ask each one to watch this video in the link provided below.

If you are keen to get a in-house customer service excellence workshop for your organisation then: Send E-Mail to Centre for Creatve Thinking. Clients from Malaysia may call: 012-3479113 as well as email for details.

Customer Service Excellence - An Inspiring Video

Developing The Leadership Potential Within You

Is it possible to develop the leadership potential within you? First you must belief that you have the potential for becoming a leader. It is that belief that becomes the basis when unfolding the leadership potentrial within you.

A thorough self awareness of your strengths and weaknesses is the first step if you are keen to develop the leadership skills. Seeking feedback form your friends, colleagues and close family members is one way to assess your strengths and weaknesses. If you are not so comfortable seeking feedback from thes egroup, then stepping aside and learning to self relflect is another option. You should be able to identify a number of assessment tools you can use to identify your areas of expertise, strengths and weaknesses.

Complete the assessment tool below to gain a better understanding about yourself:

Know yourself

Understanding Leadership

Then start with the leadership development plan referred in the following document:

Developing The Leadership Within You

Understanding Leadership

EQ versus IQ

Does IQ really that matters? How important is the EQ skills. Though the term Emotional Intelleigence was coined in 1990 by 2 researchers, it was the publication of Daniel Goleman's book on EI that popularised the concept. View the BBC video.

Battle of the Brain

Understanding Chinese Mind and Chinese Culture

The link from the University of Texas Austin, will be useful in acquiring an understanding of the chinese culture and business practices. It covers a whole range of chinese practices, you will find it useful.

Understanding Chinese Culture and Business Practices

Managing Work related stress

Stress is something we are unable to avoid completely. It is important to learn how to cope with the stress encounters we face in our work. You will find the following document useful.

Understanding Work Related Stress