Tips for Building a High-Performing Quality Team

I’ve built hundreds of teams in life and business. Some small — and some big teams making $10mm+ decisions. Here are 9 principles I use to craft high-performing teams: 🧵 👇 * The Peacemaker Principle It’s tempting to create a team of all hard-chargers. Rookie mistake. High-performing teams often include a “people person." These personalities naturally defuse minor conflicts in the team before they get big. * The Clear Mission Principle Great teams need a North Star. Can the team make a difference? What purpose do they serve? Create an inspiring mission to perform at the highest level. The whole team should know their WHY. * Skin in the Game Principle Teams perform best when personally incentivized to succeed. This can be ownership, a bonus, or a promotion. Or non-monetary rewards like acclaim or recognition. Tie personal outcome to the team outcome -- and win more. * The Anchors Away Principle Those projects when you covered for weak teammates? Do not ask your stars to cover weaker contributors regularly. Best case, it slows them down. Worst case, the whole thing implodes. * The Benetton Principle Teams with a variety of backgrounds and cultures perform better. This isn’t just about DEI lip service. Studies show diverse teams produce more patents than average. It’s not just right – it’s good business. * The No Responsibility Without Authority Principle Responsibility = “you own this” Authority = “you have the power to enact change.” If you don’t give a team both, they will feel powerless. Or worse, like they're working on a pointless project. * The Hierarchy Principle Sure, it’d be nice not to pick a leader for your team. But business isn’t a commune, a potluck, or a campfire. You get the best results with a single person leading. And accountable for the team's performance. * The We Are Humans Principle Get the team out of the office. Encourage them to know each other personally. Have fun. Build trust. Be people — even at the office. Studies show the highest-performing teams bond over non-work topics. * The Swoop Principle Sometimes you need to get in there. Email wars? Tell them to pick up the phone. Stupid meetings? Do some coaching! Is good work happening? Compliment! Leaders must step in when needed.

Do you feel part of a real team? Or are there moments when you feel isolated, uncertain, and disconnected, even though you're surrounded by colleagues? In the early stages of my career, I had the simplistic view that bringing together a bunch of high achievers would naturally create an outstanding team. However, the reality was quite different. Instead of creating synergy, there was noticeable discord. The team didn't seem to gel; it was akin to cogs not aligning in a machine. Every top performer, exceptional in their own right, appeared to follow their own path, often pulling in different directions. The amount of energy and time lost to internal strife was significant, and the expected outcomes? They remained just that – expected. This experience was a clear lesson that the success of a team isn't merely based on individual talent; it's about harmony, alignment, and collaboration. With today’s workplaces being more diverse, widespread, digitized, and ever-changing, achieving this is certainly challenging. So, in my quest to understand the nuances of high-performing teams, I reached out to my friend Hari Haralambiev. As a coach of dev teams who care about people, Hari has worked with numerous tech organizations, guiding them to unlock their teams’ potential. Here are his top 5 tips for developing high performing teams: 1. Be Inclusive ↳Put a structure in place so that the most vocal people don’t suffocate the silent voices. Great teams make sure minority views are heard and taken into account. They make it safe for people to speak up. 2. Leverage Conflict ↳Disagreements should be encouraged and how you handle them is what makes your team poor or great. Great teams mine for conflict - they cherish disagreements. To handle disagreements properly make sure to separate discussion from decision. 3. Decision Making Process ↳Have a clear team decision-making method to resolve conflicts quickly. The most important decision a team should make is how to make decisions. Don’t look for 100% agreement. Look for 100% commitment. 4. Care and Connect ↳This is by far the most important tip. Teams who are oriented only on results are not high-performing. You need to create psychological safety and build trust between people. To do that - focus on actually knowing the other people and to make it safe to be vulnerable in front of others. Say these 4 phrases more often: ‘I don’t know’, ‘I made a mistake’, ‘I’m sorry’, ‘I need help’. 5. Reward experimentation and risk taking ↳No solution is 100% certain. People should feel safe to take risks and make mistakes. Reward smart failure. Over-communicate that it’s better to take action and take accountability than play it safe. Remember, 'team' isn't just a noun—it's a verb. It requires ongoing effort and commitment to work at it, refine it, and nurture it. Do give Hari a follow and join over 6K+ professionals who receive his leadership comics in his newsletter A Leader’s Tale.

Teamwork is a system you design, not a speech you give.   What do teams need?   💎 Speaking up.   Teams need people willing to speak up when they sense a problem or opportunity. Leaders must set these conditions by "listening with the will to learn." It is easy to speak up when you have confidence your perspective matters and your voice will be heard. Ask yourself this honest question: do you need more telling from your boss or more listening?   💎 Disagreeing well.   High-performing teams -engineer- constructive conflict. They separate critique of ideas from critique of people, surface dissent early, and close with unity. Practiced respectfully, debate becomes a rehearsal for crisis: it strengthens bravery, kills artificial harmony, and turns meetings from boring "status theater" into advantage generators.   💎 Showing love.   The L-word at work. Cringe. Maybe not good timing after that Coldplay kiss-cam video. Teams need people who feel the professional love of their leaders. Showing professional love is learning who they are and saying it to them in the way they can hear it and understand it. Its not just recognition or celebrating a milestone, its true compromise to demonstrate the team is bigger than any one of us, including the leader. You want people all in? Show - repeatedly - that you are all in on them.   💎 Instilling ownership.   Teams need people who feel the autonomy, mastery and purpose of their work. Instilling ownership means engineering the conditions for intrinsic motivation: explicit decision rights, co-created outcome metrics, and context transparency. Add small discretionary budgets and rotating stewardship roles so many people get to exercise judgment. Shift your default response to escalations from giving answers to asking: What do you recommend? And why?   💎 Nothing time.   Teams need downtime because that's how relationships extend beyond work and beyond the field. Travel together. Goof off. Host a team meal with no business, just spending time together and having laughs. Do things together to create common experiences and inside jokes. Skip the temptation to over-orchestrate offsites. Help your team build camaraderie before you need it. You will know how connected to each other they are when times get tough.   What teams need is a systematic approach to high performance and fulfillment.   What is on your wish list as a team member? What does your team need?   Backstory: I was inspired to write on teams as this week had several milestones: mid-year self-assessments for myself and my global team, final game of the regular season for a team I oversee, final tournament of a team I recently retired from, time with extended family in a mini-reunion, planning a presentation to the Board on AI, guiding sub-teams on AI Governance, observing increasing dysfunction and polarization in public forums. They look and sound different but there are common threads. That's what emerged for me this week, which became this post. 

How to build high-performing teams and cultures of excellence with authentic leadership: 1️⃣ Create transparent and collaborative relationships within your work group and with the teams you support. I was successful at large, matrixed corporations because I was committed to building relationships at all levels of the organization. This included scheduling meet-and-greets any time I entered a new role or company, engaging my active listening skills to creating lasting connections. 2️⃣ Create environments where people understand their role and how their work performance will help the team achieve its goals. I firmly believe in qualitative and quantitative goals, and breaking down those goals into small, digestible pieces that your team can truly own and influence. For me, it starts with a three- to five-year strategic plan process that is inclusive, transparent, and collaboratively developed. 3️⃣ Allow anyone to earn their way into "the room where it happens." I learned from Bob Iger that hierarchy kills creativity. Don't let status or position be the deciding factor on your team. Let people prove they belong with their ideas and solid execution. 4️⃣ Consider an "open-door policy," to allow free flow of conversations and ideas. Good ideas can come from anywhere, and two heads are better than one. Of course, I employed amazing gatekeepers, and there were and are times I need to work behind closed doors, but I try to keep that to a minimum. 5️⃣ Embrace the realities of today's workforce and competition for talent. If you are open to a hybrid way of working and not being bound by geography, you are opening your access to true talent. I do not think we will ever return to five days a week in an office setting. I still believe it is important to pull your team together for key work events or strategy sessions, but as the leader, you must create and craft these opportunities to maximize the in-person times. I learned these lessons the hard way, through decades of trial-and-error, big wins and painful losses, through good times and bad! What would you add? How do you think about building high-performing teams? #leadership #authenticity #allpridenoego

One of the most important and toughest job of a product leader is to build a great team. That doesn’t happen by accident. You can build a great team, a high-performing team, an empowered team when that team is grounded in purpose, clear on where they’re going, and trusted to do meaningful work while achieving their individual dreams as well as that of customers and the business. Here’s what I see helps with building such teams: → Be clear about the mission. Connect it to a purpose that makes a difference in the lives of customers or the community. → Connect the dots between the mission, customer outcomes, business goals, and individual and team success. → Help people see how their work ladders up to strategy, to outcomes, to impact. → Communicate often. More importantly, communicate with clarity. → Hire for mindset over skillset. The right people will learn what they need. → Invest in each and every individual. A good manager takes care of the team's outputs and a great leader takes care of the team great outcomes will be achieved. But that can't happen until we build a strong team. → Create space where everyone, at every level, can ask questions and be heard. They can shape the future of the team. → Treat the team itself like a product. Check for friction, alignment, and long-term health. Have a team backlog and continuously improve things for the team. - Just care deeply for each and every one on your team. And while we are on the path to building great teams, it’s important to look for signals of growth. When we’re deep in the work, it’s easy to miss the forest for the trees. It can feel painful while we’re going through transformation. That pain might be the clearest signal that something is shifting for us, for our teams, and for what we’re building together. At the heart of it all, I believe leaders have to embody what Brené Brown calls a “strong back, soft front, wild heart.” #leadership #productleadership #purposefulproductmanagement

Find your sweet spot and help your team find theirs. Each person on your team is on their own career journey. As a leader of the team, it’s your responsibility to nurture and support career development AND to keep a pulse of the overall health of the team. Here’s an approach I’ve used in the past that I hope you'll find helpful. The key to high performance is to find the sweet spot where each person on the team is really motivated by their work and also has a high degree of skill to actually do the work well. A great starting point is to have a conversation with each person on your team to get a sense of where they are in their journey. Using this framework can give you a sense of where they are in these four quadrants, and help you prioritize how you spend your time supporting the team. It can also be a useful tool for you to think about where you are personally on this arc. 𝐐𝐮𝐚𝐝𝐫𝐚𝐧𝐭 𝐀 (𝐁𝐮𝐢𝐥𝐝𝐢𝐧𝐠) People usually start here. Eager to learn and seek out opportunities to stretch, but haven’t yet developed a high degree of competence in the work. * Action: connect them to experts to learn from and shadow. Expose them to stretch assignments to learn by doing. 𝐐𝐮𝐚𝐝𝐫𝐚𝐧𝐭 𝐁 (𝐒𝐰𝐞𝐞𝐭 𝐒𝐩𝐨𝐭) This is someone that’s really motivated by the work and is recognized as an expert. * Action: find out where they want to continue to grow to build upon their expertise. This could be expanding the scope of their role to anchor on areas of strength while exposing them to new opportunities. Find opportunities for them to mentor and coach others. 𝐐𝐮𝐚𝐝𝐫𝐚𝐧𝐭 𝐂 (𝐃𝐚𝐧𝐠𝐞𝐫 𝐙𝐨𝐧𝐞) Someone that’s been doing the same thing for too long may become less interested in the work over time. It’s a natural progression. This is when people may be at risk of leaving or under performing. If they stay in this headspace for too long, they may become less effective in their role because they’re not motivated to learn new skills as the role evolves.  * Action: these are often people on the team that have been around longer or have more experience in a certain area. Look for opportunities to reboot and spark interest. These are great opportunities to leverage their expertise to apply to other types of adjacent work. For example, an experienced sourcer may be getting burned out from high volume engineering and could be energized by getting exposure to executive or leadership level searches. 𝐐𝐮𝐚𝐝𝐫𝐚𝐧𝐭 𝐃 (𝐂𝐡𝐞𝐜𝐤𝐞𝐝 𝐎𝐮𝐭) When someone is here they’re not engaged with the work and don’t have a high degree of competence in the work either. This is a place that isn’t healthy for the team or the individual. * Action: find a role that plays to their strengths either on your team or elsewhere in the company. If there isn’t an opportunity internally, it may be time to help support them in finding something externally so that you can bring on someone that’s more motivated and qualified to do the work.

You start from 0 with any new team you lead. So where do you begin? → Seek knowledge. → Establish credibility. → Score easy successes. → Don't make radical changes. → Build a foundation for the future. The first few months serve as a critical period. You build a foundation on which your team will rise or fall. Here's what I do: 1️⃣ Start with the people ↳ Understand their skills and attitudes. ↳ So you avoid issues with team dynamics. 2️⃣ Build relationships ↳ Get to know the people in your team. ↳ So you build trust and a positive culture. 3️⃣ Communicate clearly and often ↳ Set the expectation that information is shared. ↳ Effective teamwork depends on communication. 4️⃣ Be humble. ↳ Show that you don’t have all the answers. ↳ So you are approachable. 5️⃣ Lead by example ↳ Model the behavior you expect from your team. ↳ So the team aligns around the right behavior. 6️⃣ Create a feedback culture ↳ Encourage constructive criticism. ↳ So there is continuous improvement. 7️⃣ Think about feedforward too ↳ Identify proactive solutions. ↳ So you create momentum for change. 8️⃣ Improve processes and practices ↳ Get input on inefficiencies and improvements. ↳ So you and the team can build successes. 9️⃣ Prioritize team development ↳ Invest in and prepare your team for the future. ↳ So as your team grows, so do their successes. Remember: Your new team is assessing you, your skills, and the culture you want to create. Their morale, productivity, and success depend on your actions. PS. What steps do you take in a new leadership role? 🔔 Follow Chris Cotter for more on leadership.

Do you want to lead a top-performing team? Someone once shared with me that a true sign of a strong team is how they operate and perform when their leader is absent. This idea stuck with me, and I became curious about what it would take to build a team that could function at a high level without me. I concluded that if I wanted my team to be the best, I needed to make myself less of a factor (”zero” myself out). Not so I can disappear and play golf; I am horrible, by the way, but more so to ensure the team continues to elevate. With that, I asked myself a couple of questions: - What do I need to do differently as a team leader? - What factors should I consider as I go through this process? Here's what I landed on: 1. Empower Through Delegation: Give your team autonomy and ownership over meeting agendas, projects, and tasks while providing guidance and support when needed. Trusting your team members to make decisions fosters confidence and boosts morale. 2. Encourage Collaboration: Foster a culture of collaboration where ideas are valued, respectfully challenged, and everyone's voice is heard. Encourage open communication and teamwork to leverage the collective intelligence of your team. Collaboration not only enhances creativity but also strengthens togetherness. 3. Provide Ongoing Development: Invest in your team's growth by offering continuous learning opportunities. Whether through 1:1 connects, team calls, or training programs, prioritize their development. 4. Provide Access: Connect your team to different departments and resources within your company. To enhance their network, try to give them access to some of the leaders and decision-makers you interact with. This not only gives them valuable exposure but also allows them to gather information and influence decisions. 5. Celebrate Successes: Recognize and celebrate your team's achievements. Celebrating successes reinforces positive behavior and motivates the team to continue their collective journey. Remember: -Be present daily for your team. -Success belongs to the team; the leader owns any misses. -Tailor your approach to your team's abilities. -Enjoy watching your team grow! #Leadership #LeadershipDevelopment #TeamSuccess

High-performing teams don’t happen by accident. They’re built. Intentionally. Day after day. And it comes from doing the hard stuff as a leader. No AI here. 1. Create authentic bridges and connection. You can’t lead people you don’t really know. 2. Be transparent about the strategy, about the tactics, even when you have to say, “This sucks and I wish it weren’t this way.” 3. Set clear expectations with defined outcomes. No one should wonder what success looks like. 4. Hold people accountable. As a mentor once told me: “Sometimes you have to send them to jail. You can bring cigarettes and candy when you visit, but if they deserve to go, you have to do it.” Skip this step, and people stop taking you seriously. 5. Recognize people the way they want to be recognized. It matters. 6. Have integrity. If your team can’t trust you, nothing else works. 7. Support your team publicly and privately. And give credit where it’s due. 8. Be predictable in how you make decisions. Predictable leads to repeatable. Repeatable leads to scale. 9. Deliver tough messages clearly. If they don’t understand it, they can’t move forward and solve it. 10. Lead with empathy. Leadership without it produces compliance, not commitment. These aren’t “nice-to-haves.” They’re non-negotiables for anyone serious about building teams that perform at their peak. What’s your non-negotiable for building a high-performing team?

Best advice for acing management? Don't be a genius. Why aim to be the smartest in the room when you can elevate everyone around you? Be a genius maker instead. (Here’s why) You see, a high-performing team comes from a high-performing environment. It’s a consequence of a strategic step that every leader needs to take. So, How do you create a high-performing environment? 1. Active listening  - Make sure every team member feels heard.  - This builds trust and opens up avenues for innovative ideas. 2. Clear expectations.  - Transparency in what you expect and  - what it takes to succeed eliminates confusion and boosts efficiency. 3. Specific & good praise - Recognize achievements with details.  -This motivates & reinforces behaviors that you want to see more often 4. Mindful and constructive feedback.  - Feedback should be a tool for growth, not fear.  - Frame it in a way that encourages improvement and learning. 5. Team involvement in decisions: - Shared decision-making fosters a sense of ownership  - and commitment, making the team feel valued and respected. Being a genius maker isn't about taking a back seat—it's about driving team success by ensuring everyone has the opportunity to shine. What kind of environment have you created for your team?