How can you interpret the results of a team leadership assessment?

Interpreting team leadership assessment results involves analyzing individual and collective strengths, weaknesses, and communication styles. Focus on identifying key leadership traits such as communication, collaboration, and decision-making skills. Assess team dynamics, recognizing potential conflicts or synergies. Prioritize areas for development and leverage existing strengths. Look for patterns in leadership styles to enhance team cohesion. Consider feedback from team members and align results with organizational goals. Ultimately, use the assessment as a tool to guide tailored leadership development strategies, fostering a more effective and harmonious team environment.

Diving deep into the framework behind a leadership assessment helps you get a clearer understanding of your strengths and weaknesses in the context of that model. It's not just about numbers or scores, but about understanding what those numbers mean and how they can be used for personal and team development.

From a systemic team coaching perspective, team leadership assessments like “Belbin Team Roles” can be a good start for reflection within the team around current ways in which each of the team member contributes and the strengths they bring to the table. And then as you paint the go to vision of the team, further team coaching sessions can delve deeper into creating higher synergies and get the multiplier effect of team efforts.

In additional to understanding the framework used for the assessment, it is also important to understand the context in which the team assessment was conducted. Often, this is assumed, but it would be helpful for team members to understanding that context for the evaluation (e.g. who is the team, what is the scope of the team, what does the team value, how is this team assessment expected to support the team's work). Outside of this context, there is a risk that the team assessment becomes a helpful individual reflection exercise only without leading to the changes expected by the team.

Interpreting the results of a team leadership assessment involves analyzing individual and collective strengths, weaknesses, and potential areas for improvement. Identify patterns and trends in leadership styles, communication preferences, and decision-making approaches within the team. Look for complementary skills and diversity in leadership attributes, as this can contribute to a well-rounded team dynamic. Assess how individual leaders contribute to overall team effectiveness and if there are any gaps that need addressing. The interpretation should serve as a foundation for targeted leadership development initiatives, fostering a collaborative and synergistic leadership approach within the team.

8/10 leaders think they’re self aware, only 1.5/10 actually are. Go into it assuming you have ways of showing up you’re not aware of and creatively engage with the feedback. Most leaders assume their intention is how things land for people, but that is rarely the case. For example, as a leader my intention may be to challenge a person to grow, but it landed as though I was saying they weren’t good enough. Simple example, but there’s so much growth to be had when you check in on the delta between your intention and how something landed. Above all, and this is the most difficult, don’t take the feedback personally. Sounds counterintuitive, but it helps truly metabolize and integrate the important things being shared.

Assessment tools can be powerful if you understand how a person’s brain will interpret the results. We spend more time on what to fix, and less time talking about what is a strength. To help build the celebration and recognition muscle or a team make it a weekly practice to share the wins of the week.

In my experience, very few people can review their scores objectively. Here's three three lens to review your scores. 1. What resonates? There are most likely weaknesses that are common themes in other places. There are strengths you've heard before. Add those into your "trending data" category. 2. What shocks you. This is where to get curious. It's good to ask trusted friends, colleagues, partners if they see some of this in you. 3. What's the tone of the comments. The comments can be the most hurtful. True or not we tend to interpret the tone to be stronger than it was written. Remember people were busy and short to get it over with. Treat everyone as if they wrote the nicest comment and you'll be fine.

It is very important that we get regular feedback from team on 'team leadership'. I have seen some of the best practices which includes: 1. Weekly inputs on how we are working as a team. This includes getting a pulse check on how we are prioritizing, how we are sharing and managing challenges together. 2. End of case / project feedback: This includes getting anonymous inputs from the team across leadership aspects on recent projects.

Reviewing the score needs to be done in dialogue with the team. If the results are interpreted by an expert only for the team to absorb, it may not lead to the shared understanding that is required to move forward. While the quantitative results may be helpful, it is the conversation around the meaning of the results that is more meaningful than the results itself.

As a mid-career leader, utilize industry benchmarks to contextualize your assessment results. Seek expert insights and constructively align your leadership skills towards progressive performance. The goal should be continuous improvement, not a mere destination.

Comparar los resultados con estándares relevantes es esencial en la interpretación de la evaluación de liderazgo de equipo. Utilizar normas proporcionadas por la herramienta o buscar ejemplos de líderes efectivos en el sector brinda perspectiva. Además, obtener retroalimentación de mentores y expertos en el campo ofrece valiosos consejos para el crecimiento. En mi experiencia, esta comparación proporcionó una guía sólida para enfocarme en áreas específicas de mejora, contribuyendo significativamente a mi desarrollo como líder de equipo.

We can use benchmark to help us understand our score, but the benchmark should not be used to set the target or the ideal. The team needs to agree on where they want to be. Reaching for the benchmark could lead to getting to the common denominator. Being above the benchmark is not a reason for not acting on the results or the conversation.

Every team is unique as the individuals that make the team are distinct. They have unique traits and the dynamics created when this set of unique set of people come together, may or may not be comparable to other such teams. Comparison against benchmarks may be valid for metrics such as performance, quality, etc. however may not hold for qualitative areas that are critical for a team's success such as trust, camaraderie, alignment, collaboration etc. If the scores must be compared, the first instance's score can act as a baseline for susbequest cycles to measure improvement.

SMART goals are of course helpful, but it’s also identifying what does the next level of performance look like and how do you know when you have arrived? Of course we are always in a state of arriving and leveling up, but being specific on what those steps are, working on the plan to make it happen, and having someone or a team keep you accountable can level you up quickly.

Working on an action plan can be helpful, but I also note that change doesn't occur with new work only. Based on Keagan's work with immunity to change, he suggests a different approach where team's describe their desired state, and then identify what barriers are in the way. Often removing the barriers and clarifying assumptions is all that is needed for a team to naturally behave towards its shared desired state.

In my experience people put way too much on their action plan and end up doing very little of it. Instead create an action plan that can be done daily, and make sure to have a way to measure what you want to be different. Measurement can be in the form of feedback or a daily action.

Prioriza las áreas de mejora y establece metas SMART para tu desarrollo. Identifica recursos necesarios, como capacitación o mentoría, y sigue tu progreso regularmente. En mi trayectoria, este enfoque proactivo no solo mejoró mis habilidades de liderazgo, sino que también fortaleció la cohesión y eficacia de mi equipo.

Once the assessment model and the team scores are delved into, the consultant can facilitate the discussions to help the team identify core areas of priority. These work best when the areas come from the assessment model, as the scores can then be used as a baseline for the future. Once a set of areas are prioritised, the consultant can help the group come up with goals (measurable as well as subjective) in that area. Exploring team norms (behaviors that all team members will exhibit and commit to) can also help the team come up with some tangible actions.

There are preconditions to leading a team assessment. The leader must be willing to invest the time, there must be a safe and open space to share. This can be done by the leader going first and demonstrating vulnerability in what they learn and what they will do differently. It is also important to discuss accountability and have a process to follow through. Otherwise, the team assessment becomes a deliverable that can marked as completed without any mechanisms to ensure that the team is moving in the right direction.

While assessments provide a structured way to dive deep into key areas, exploring other available inputs to the team also, can also make the process richer. Also, focusing only on the quantitative score may not help the purpose. The outcome and the spirit should be focussed on, more than the tasks.

L'impact du leadership est visible sur 03 aspects majeurs: Les aspects humains (cohésion sociale, motivation des employées, satisfaction...), les aspects techniques (l'amélioration des processus, l'amélioration de la satisfaction client, etc.) et les aspects financiers. Tout outil d'analyse doit porter au moins ces trois dimensions. Il serait difficile d'avoir un excellent leadership en péchant sur un de ces trois aspects. Avoir cette lecture, permet de savoir comment construire un plan d'action qui très probablement portera du fruit.