Are you courageous enough to take your full seat at the table in your teams, companies and cultures?  Too often, we answer this  question with a yes or no.  The truth is we all have the capacity for courage.  They key is being willing to be courageous!  Being willing is the capacity to say yes to whatever we said we would do...no matter what.  Are you willing to say yes to whatever it takes to be courageous?  With a simple yes, you can courageous take your full seat at the table.

Once you have taken your seat at the table, here comes the difficult part...maintaining that courage so your voice is heard.  When you have an idea, oftentimes our brain gets in the way of sharing that idea.  We may think to ourselves: no one is going to listen to my idea, I am not sure this will be helpful, last time someone laughed at my idea, etc.  This is our survival brain taking over.  Now, as we said earlier, you are willing to be courageous...correct?  If so, thank your brain for the input and move those concerns to the side.  It is time to access that courage and share your idea.

Courageously taking your seat at the table is more than just providing ideas.  Sometimes it is strategically asking questions that help shift the space.  Most meeting discussions seem to center around why an idea cannot work due to lack of resources, times, etc.  Learning to ask certain questions is an excellent way to utilize your courageousness to benefit the team.  Questions you could ask include:

• What might success look like in this situation? (Make it future oriented instead of why things don't work)
• What might our next great success as a team look like?

Companies, teams and cultures with the greatest success have one universal thing in common:  the belief that every employee, no matter their position, education or experience, has the creativity and brilliance to take our company to its next level.  It is all about courageously taking our seat at the table, speaking up and taking our organizations to their next level of greatness!

     Company values are, at their core, designed to be the fundamental beliefs that drive company decisions and behaviors.  Imagine a ship sailing across the ocean but is missing one key component: the rudder.  Can that ship accurately or effectively reach its destination?  The same is true for an organization.  All companies have strategic goals they are trying to reach but without the rudder, the core values, it is extremely difficult to navigate the waves of everyday decisions.  Core values truly drive an organization forward.  So why do so many companies simply place them on the wall and have no way of reinforcing them?
     Well, one of the easiest temptations is the concept of “rebranding”.  Too often, we see this happen by gathering the administration, or higher-level employees, into a room and spending two hours to develop the company’s new values.  However, as discussed above, company values hold a much more significant importance to the success of a company. 
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Learning Laboratory – Client Success Story
     A past client fell right into this temptation.  When “rebranding”, the administration spent their weekly one-hour meeting developing their new company values.  The next week they rolled out their new values to the entire company by posting them on each employee’s nametag and sticking them up on the walls.  Three months later, as we arrived for our training, we decided to use the company values as a way to intertwine our materials with something they already knew.  When I asked them what their core values were, I could literally hear the crickets in the room. 
     As we continued working with this group, our team quickly discovered another problem.  We worked on the concept of appreciation by asking the group to look for places where their coworkers were using the core values.  When reviewing the results after one week, every example was about an employee interacting with a customer.  Though this was a good first step, this trend continued.  Finally, we asked them about where they were using the core values with each other in the office.  Interestingly, not a single person could come up with an example of where they were using the core values with each other.  This is where we had a very important revelation: the administration had designed their core values to focus on the customer and did not focus on how they drive business decisions and behavior.

Coaching Tips
     Every time we finish a presentation or workshop, an individual will come up to our team member and say the same thing: can you fix this problem I am dealing with in this 60-second conversation.  Every time the answer is no.  So, when we write our Coaching Tips, they are designed to spark some energy and creativity in you.

1. Gain Input from Employees – This step is unique to your organization but is essential to gaining ownership (not just buy-in) from your employees.  By figuring out how to involve the employees in the development of the core values, you create a sense of ownership in the end decision.  For a small company, a half day retreat allows time to work on this process.  For a large company, it could be small focus groups or large surveys to gain understanding of employees’ values.
2. Clearly Define Values – The most successful companies take the time to clearly define their values from all aspects (internal use, customer use, marketing use, etc.) and departments (accounting, sales, administration, support staff, etc.).  We have seen companies have their employees provide definitions to shape an understanding for the company as a whole.
3. Constantly Reinforce – As coaches, we suggest three main areas of reinforcement of the core values.  First, with all big decisions made within the company, departments and teams, bringing the decisions back to the core values that drove the decisions will help reinforce the values.  Second, in all meetings, creating a system to either acknowledge values at the beginning or tie decisions and goals to the values will help consistently reinforce them.  Lastly, all performance reviews should incorporate the core values and bring clarity to how they are living out those values with customers, coworkers, etc.

Seek to Mine for Value is all about pulling out the greatest contribution in each employee.  Teams function at their highest when every members is contributing their greatest talents and utilizing those talents in a way that energized them.

For example, imagine a start-up, were the founder specializes in software development.  Once the company reaches a certain size, using that individuals time for accounting, marketing and sales is not an effective use of their time.  That is why start-ups often bring in specialized talent to make each aspect of the business function.

The same is true for a team.  When members of that team are given tasks that frustrate them, they are less likely to put in the effort required for success.  Open the space to explore each person's strengths and be inquisitive about where they would like to work on a project.  You will be surprised by the success of the team when each person is working on the portion of the project that excites them.  Give it a chance.

1. Maximize the Individual
Empower each employee to become their greatest contribution.  Do not let your fear of another individual becoming more successful or productive than yourself outweigh the obligation to build your employees.
2. Create a Community of People
Our need to belong in a group is one of our strongest innate needs.  Ensuring that individual team members feel a part of a team is essential to buy-in and ownership.
3. Define the Purpose
We need to create a shared purpose; therefore, we need each member's input in the vision.  Each level of leadership should have ownership in the purpose and vision of the group.  

"There is No 'I' in Team" - one of the most common sayings when discussing teamwork and collaboration.  

However, this saying is not completely true.  The premise of the saying is that you have to work together in order to be a team, which is true.  But, there truly is an "I" in Team.  Each member of a team brings their unique talents, skills and strengths to the group.  And in order to be their fullest contribution, they need to be allowed to be themselves.  By bring multiple "I"s to the table and learning to work together despite our differing experiences and opinions, we are able to form exceptional teams.

Remember, "there is no 'I' in team"....."but there is a me"!  Be yourself.  Bring your contribution to the table in all that you do.  It is because of individuals like you that organizations thrive.

Did you know there is an actual connection between our Heart and our Brain?  Research by Judith E. Glaser supports just that idea.  She actually goes as far as to called the Heart part of our "6 Brains" - The Heart Brain.

Research shows that when a puppy and a child come together in a room their heartbeats begin to sync up and they become connected on a deeper level.  The same thing happens in our everyday conversations.  When we come into contact with someone stressed, frustrated or anxious, our heart connected to that raised heart rate and without proper tools, we are likely to take on that increase in heart rate.  Additionally, when we connect with someone with a calm presence, we often take on that relaxed heart rate.

In looking at the Heart as a part of the brain, we start to see the impact that our heart's connection has on our chemistry.  

Are you selfish enough?  Do you label yourself as selfless?  It is common for our team to hear people use the word "selfless" whenever they are talking about the qualities they bring to a team or situation.  And that is when we begin to dig in.  Well, what does it mean to be selfless?

Too often, selfless really means that we are giving too much of ourselves, struggle to say no and are exhausted most days.  The beauty of life is that when we become selfish - choose to spend time on ourselves and recharge our own batteries, we are actually able to be more selfless for others as we can be our fullest contribution with them.

Remember, being selfish to become selfless will allow you to be the best version of yourself as you help others.

Traditionally, relationships have been about quid pro quo, or only doing something for someone else because they will agree to do something in return for me.  When relationship focus on this, we are not living in the "WE" but instead focused on "I".  When we come from the "I", we are in a scarcity mindset.  We do things only because we will receive something in return.

However, there is no place for a scarcity mentality in a WE-Centric culture.  When we give and expect nothing in return, that is what it looks like to have true partnership.  How often do we do something for someone else and not keep track in our head.  It doesn't matter if it is a spouse, friend or colleague, our tendency is to keep track of what we do for others.  An abundance mentality allows us to give of our talents, gifts and time without an expectations.

​Where do you have the opportunity to give without expecting anything in return?

​Rules have become such an ingrained part of our reality.  Rules begin forming throughout childhood and each experience, good or bad, create an imprint within our idea of rules.  Most of our rules are actually invisible to our very eyes.  We are governed by these rules.  They make us blind to others ideas and ways of doing things.

In order to CreateWe, we must foster a true sense of "rule breaking".  This means we need to be willing to let go of our governing rules and become open to new possibilities.  Further, we need to foster the "possibilities" mindset that focuses on growth and learning.  By dismantling our belief systems, we give ourselves the ability to partner with others and create a new shared vision of the future.