We've all heard that there is no I in team work and a bunch of other cliches and quotes along the same line. You can find the hidden "i" in team or the one in "win" and twist and turn things around to your heart's content, but adage that together everyone achieves more really does hold water.
I cannot stress the importance of team work. I don't code. I can pseudo code enough to get my point across, but I don't have the know-how to write actual, functional code. I could learn, but I doubt I'd be half as talented as my team's amazing development leader. In her sleep she could probably write better code than I ever could! Nor do I have the patience and thoroughness of our amazing QA team. They comb through our software finding glitches that have probably been over seen hundreds if not thousands of times, but never acknowledged or brought up by any of our clients.
Everyone wants recognition. We see it as early as during infancy - crying for recognition of needs. As we grow, so does the desire for recognition. It isn't just about getting praise for a job well done - it's about being acknowledged.
Shift the focus from yourself to the team.
In order to have people want to follow your lead, understand why they are part of the team, what they contribute and what they want to get out of it all. Find out what value each team member is looking for - be it financial, profession or intrinsic. Find ways to incorporate their own goals into the teamwork. Assign the developer who is always looking to get ahead with a task in the new technology that needs to be explored. The next time you send an email, think about additional value that can be added - information sharing, recognition, coaching. Open up the potential for deeper engagement and better alignment with the team member's own missions to reach higher performance.
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