How effectively does your leadership team function?

Our reader poll today asks: How effectively does your leadership team function?

• Extremely — they are a high-performing team 14.60%
• Very — they generally work well together 35.77%
• Somewhat — they function but have their issues 30.66%
• Not very — they struggle to work well together 12.41% 
• Not at all — they’re a dysfunctional team 6.56%

Functional versus dysfunctional leadership teams. It’s about 50/50 that leadership teams are functioning well or poorly. Usually their level of performance directly affects the performance of their broader teams. The real question is why are some teams high-functioning and others aren’t. This is usually a matter of trust. That trust is based on how well the team members know one another, can predict each other’s behaviors, and have team/individual goals that are aligned with organizational goals. How well do your leadership team members really know one another? This is more than happy hour superficial knowledge. It’s about understanding each other’s values, goals, and perspectives. Having a deeper understanding of the individual makes their behaviors more understandable and predictable. That predictability is the basis of trust. If you don’t have this depth of understanding on your leadership team, start building it. Spend time in candid conversations on values, goals, and beliefs. The sooner you improve trust on the team, the sooner you’ll see improved performance.

– Mike Figliuolo at thoughtLEADERS, LLC

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These results were originally a SmartPulse poll in SmartBrief on Leadership which tracks feedback from more than 240,000 business leaders. Get smarter on leadership and sign up for the SmartBrief on Leadership e-newsletter.