Ask the Expert- Building Your Team

Question: I hear many people talking about the need to “Build My Team” and I am not sure what they mean by it. Can you give me some idea what they mean?

Answer: There are two ways you can “Build Your Team” and the most important one is having a group of colleagues or coworkers where you feel comfortable and confident in your ability to work successfully with them. Your internal team should be people who look to you as a mentor or one that can add great value to any project or situation. Your external team are industry colleagues who value your opinion and look to you as an industry leader. These can be both clients and competitors.

Question: How should I work to build a team around me?

Answer: The team around you will develop naturally based on your business practices and ethics. People who know and trust you will become your team without you even needing to ask them. The point here is that the way you do business and handle your personal communications will make people gravitate toward you. Your reputation is always your strength and you need to stay consistent. As the saying goes “do the right thing even when no one else is looking.”

Question: Can an organization’s culture influence building a team?

Answer: The environment that people work within will either make them drive harder or cause the best people to leave. Where you see most of the division in an organization come from senior people who want to micro-manage the staff or are very out of touch with the staff and do not understand what has made the organization successful. To build a successful organizational team can only be done by people who not only understand what has built the organization but seek the knowledge from those who may not have a senior title but are the ones who have made the organization what it is today.