Team of Activators
Team of Activators
Equip your team to run efficiently
By Raymond White
It’s always exciting when you are on a high-functioning team. Staff are working on all cylinders, in-sync with their processes and activities that are meeting the goals of the organization.
If you are coming into a team with this set up, it becomes slightly easier to get moving on initiatives or have objectives completed with you minimally involved.
Yet, a lot of us, we enter into situations where it might take longer for our teams to take action. Either they are dependent on you to tell them what to do or there is some push back in taking steps forward.
In this post, we will talk about ways to generate a team of activators through your leadership.
What is an Activator?
I Googled the definition of Activator from StrengthFinder:
Definition of Activator. People with the strength of Activator are the ones who make things happen. One of their most recognizable behaviors is the ability to turn thoughts, ideas and concepts into action. In fact, the strength of Activator can be best described or characterized as action.
In short, being an activator means that you are taking action that moves the needle in our objectives.
Why do we want activators?
We need activators because they can make it happen. Activators have the ability to see a need, problem, issue, and create ways towards addressing it. A team of activators take ownership in continuously improving their circumstances that they face. This takes the pressure off of you in being everywhere at once or the bottleneck in getting initiatives moving.
Yet, this is not an easy trait to develop within everyone. I recognize that being an activator isn’t an automatic trait that we share. Why, you may ask?
For starters, your team members might have fear in their eyes to taking action, which could have been generated from past mistakes or unappreciated work.
Another reason, we could have team members who do not have the opportunity to showcase their activation skills! Either there’s no space to do so or they have been strictly instructed to follow the chain of command.
A third hindrance of an activator could be an unclear vision of the team’s direction. Not knowing where they are going, or how they can influence the direction, will create misguided steps of action. The outcomes could damage progress if not correctly addressed.
Developing Activators
Since we can acknowledge some of the barriers towards generating activators, we can also discuss solutions that will get the team started.
As a leader, here are a few actions that you can take in developing a team of activators:
Allowing them to dream
Before anyone can take action, it is important that they have the ability to dream. Dream of what can be possible. Of what the future can look like. Encouraging ourselves to be in a dream states allows the chance to spark creativity in our work.
Share the ultimate goal
We have to know what we are striving towards. Articulating and visualizing the ultimate, collective dream allows others to see what would be done to make that dream work. People need to see it and see themselves in it.
Help them see themselves in the initiatives
Alignment is a major factor for our teams to be effective. A major way to build alignment is overlapping the teams’ strengths into initiatives that meet goals of the organization.
Listen to critique
A lot of times, team members are telling us the issues they see. We want to embrace those discussions because it highlights the gaps that need to be addressed. The key here is to discern what complaint is a true gap or a personal preference. But creating that space to engage and gently challenge could reveal true opportunities for improvement. We can be leaders who create spaces for staff to give their respectful critique.
Give space to innovate
Leaders need to provide opportunities for activators to activate. Projects, ideas, anything that can align their dreams and actions to the organization’s goals. Encourage them to try without fear of failing.
Your Next Steps
I remember hearing a saying saying something like: a great sign of your leadership is if the team can run without you efficiently. I may not subscribe to that statement fully, but I understand the sentiment. Developing teams that are empowered to make the right decisions to achieve organizational success is a desirable goal to reach. We as leaders need to coach staff to be activators and create environments where they can practice.
Take the time to practice the five actions in developing activators on your team.
Remember, you have the capabilities to grow activators on your teams! Keep showing up and leading your teams with care!
Let me know what tactics resonated with you or if you have additional ways to develop a team of activators! I am always finding more ways to grow my leadership!
Ray
