Hitting Moving Targets

Knowing what they are expected to accomplish provides teams with some sense of security. However, the world is changing. In his popular book Who Moved My Cheese? Spencer Johnson (1998) provided an analogy for how we must prepare our teams. To gain continuous rein-forcement of our efforts, we must strive for continuous improvement. This frustrates many team members and even makes them suspicious of the organization's use of the team concept. Is the company just trying to get more and more work out of them? The reality of global competition is that we must improve productivity or at least add value to everything we door someone else will. Leaders need to make sure teams do not rest on their laurels.

Coaches of sports teams live in fear of complacency. They know they must motivate the players to push for better performance or the chances for a championship season will be lost. Your ability to reinforce progress and use the challenge provided by your company's competitors provides the balance between losing out and burning out. This is not an easy task. You need to lead by example. You can't expect team members to continually improve by working smarter if you do not do the same. Are you able to show them how you are pushing yourself to improve your approaches to helping them help themselves ? What are you doing to become a more effective team leader? Does your team know your goals for development? What are you trying to do to help your team rejuvenate itself? How are you reinforcing its past successes? Are you providing compelling arguments for the need for change? Are you helping team members gain the external perspective needed to know if they are doing "well enough"? Are you helping them become aware of changing times and encouraging them to find ways to stay on top?