Building your Dream Team, Part 3

Adapted from Fred Lee's book, "If Disney Ran Your Hospital: 9 1/2 Things You Would Do Differently."

Last week we talked about the importance of sharing your dream with your team.

Let’s look at how we can develop a dream that the entire team is a part of creating. Here are some ideas to get you going:

Finish this sentence: “I dream of working on a team where ________________.” You might take a minute to answer this question yourself first. What’s important to you? You might list:

• Everyone puts forth their best efforts.
• We reach – and exceed – our company goals.
• We have extremely satisfied clients.
• We all feel like good friends.

How does your team finish the same sentence? Try it – and then be open to a full, rousing discussion about how the team will work together to become the “dream team” we all want to be working with.

Ask your team to finish a couple more sentences, too, and see where that discussion leads. Here are some you might try:

I want to work for a manager who ________________.
I want to work with coworkers who ________________.
I enjoy my work most when ________________.
I wish there was more ________________ here at work.

Get the conversation going – engage your team in the journey and in reaching for the dream!

More next week!

Building your Dream Team, Part 2

Adapted from Fred Lee's book, "If Disney Ran Your Hospital:  9 1/2 Things You Would Do Differently."

One of the lessons we can learn from Disney in building the dream team of caregiving staff is simply this: Have a dream.

Before he was president, America would flock to listen to Barack Obama speak, because he so eloquently articulates a dream for this country. Whether you are a supporter or not, it’s hard not to feel the passion of his dream (check out this You Tube video titled “Yes We Can” if you haven’t experienced it yet).

In days past, Martin Luther King shared his “I have a Dream” speech – a speech that lifted our national discussion about race and relationships to an entirely new level.

Goals, objectives and mission statements don’t really motivate people to stretch outside their usual behaviors. Dreams do.

Some days, your dreams may simply include having every shift filled and never having to pull a night shift yourself again.

But to truly motivate your own team to work at their highest level, share the dreams you had when you first began in this field. Did you dream of creating a caring environment that felt like a home? A team that loved every single person in your care? A place where people came together to accomplish more than they could do on their own – and had fun, laughed and hugged freely?

In our office, we’ve written the dream on the wall – literally. Through an inexpensive website source we ordered vinyl lettering and carefully applied our dream (borrowing from the words of John Quincy Adams) on the wall: “If your words inspire others to dream more, learn more, do more and become more, you are a leader.”

It is our dream to become leaders by inspiring others to do all of those things.

What are your dreams? How do you share them with your team?

Next week, we’ll look at some additional, concrete steps you can use to help share your dream, and build your team.

Building your Dream Team, Part 1

One of my favorite books is Fred Lee’s “If Disney Ran Your Hospital: 9 ½ Things You Would Do Differently.”

I heard Lee speak at a conference a few years ago, and was completely sold. If we could capture the team – the energy – the enthusiasm of Disney in our building, people would not only want to live there, people would want to work there, too – in droves. What a nice mental picture that makes!

In the conclusion of the book, Lee poses this question:

“Have you ever worked very hard along side other people and absolutely loved every minute of it, even though you were physically exhausted at the end of the day? Is so, what made it so enjoyable?”

Lee goes on to answer the question for himself, sharing a story of backbreaking work side by side with family members, repairing his mother-in-law's house. Using precious vacation time to do it, too. And loving every minute of the work.

At the end of the story, Lee remarks,

“…I would describe the perfect work environment as finding an unsurpassed level of joy in hard work with good friends, doing something important for someone else who cannot do it for themselves. What comes closer to this picture than being a caregiver in a hospital [or senior care community]? The question is, how does one create such a team, and maintain such a spirit?”

Lee goes on to review some of the ways he believes this can happen. We’ll continue next week with some of his concrete ideas to make this happen for you!

Top Ways to Build your Team with Fun

Do your staff meetings go something like this?

“Could everyone please sit down and stop talking? We’ve got a lot to cover today and you guys need to get back out there as quickly as possible, so let’s get going."

“We’re having problems getting laundry to the right person. Mr. Marcus’ family is complaining again that his sweater is missing – has anyone seen it?”

And on and on… not really a whole lot of fun, is it?

What if, instead of lecturing on the need to be more careful with residents’ clothing, you pulled two people aside ahead of time and planned a little skit:

Actor #1 (playing the part of the family member): “Darn it, my dad’s sweater is missing AGAIN. Can’t you guys EVER get the clothes straight around here?”

Actor #2 (playing the part of the manager): “I’ll be happy to try to find your dad’s sweater. Let me ask around and see if we can get it back to him today.”

Actor #1: “I’m just sick and tired of my dad’s clothes missing. What kind of place are you running, anyway?”

Actor #2, gathering a group of employees together): “OK you guys, we’ve GOT to find Mr. Marcus’s sweater RIGHT NOW. His family is throwing a fit and yelling at me. GET BUSY – and FIND THAT SWEATER!!”

Actor #1, standing by the front door when a visitor (Actor #3) walks in: “I hope you’re not thinking of moving someone here – they can’t keep track of anything!”

Actor #3 to manager: “I think I’ll come back another time. Maybe this isn’t such a good idea for my mom…”

Do you think your team would remember this better than the monthly lecture? Try it – I’d bet you’ll be surprised!

If you like some more ideas for fun team-building activities (modify them to fit your needs, obviously), check out this great resource-packed website: http://wilderdom.com/games/InitiativeGames.html

Have fun – and build your team!