The Avengers is an American superhero film based on the Marvel Comics team of superheroes. This movie depicts the challenges faced when building and maintaining a high performance team, while dealing with a crisis situation. Although the Avengers team is made up of high-functioning leaders having their own unique powers and personalities, their unity in trying to navigate through the challenges of compromising and working together as a team towards a common goal (defeating the enemy, i.e., Loki), showcased their real ‘super hero’ characters as they learnt to set aside their individual differences and work together as a team to power through the crisis.
This movie showed leadership, team work, and real scenarios and lessons that could be applied in an organization to build a high performing team even while facing a crisis. Here are the key takeaways from this masterpiece directed by Joss Whedon:
- Recognize every member’s unique differences / personality, and let them use it as their strength within a team. Every team member brings to the table their own personality and strengths. It is important to not let our team members feel inferior because they are lacking in certain skills, but rather recognize what they are good at and let them excel in it. Each person has their own talent that they can contribute to making the ‘work done well’. Remember that it is possible to succeed in achieving the organization’s objectives if the team unites and works together, despite their differences.
- Know how to use available resources and timely execute strategies to succeed. Towards the end of the Avengers movie, we saw how the super hero team worked collectively to achieve success, by delegating tasks based on the talents of each team member. This shows how each of them did their job to divide the larger problem into subproblems, which then became easier to tackle and resolve with their individual strengths. Recognizing and using their available resources effectively helped them to execute the strategy well, in order to succeed as a team.
- Make decisions for the common good. With the existing crisis, team members may tend to be divided and have their own opinions on how to deal with the problems, which could lead to more conflicts within the team. Leaders must know how to guide them to not lose sight of the bigger picture at a time when so many immediate and critical decisions must be made. He/she must highlight the reasons as to why they are a well-functional team, and the team must agree altogether on a decision that would be the best and the most beneficial to everyone.
- Great leaders are great followers. Surrounded by high performing team members, leaders must acknowledge that they may not ‘know-it-all’. They need to recognize when their people offer better plans, especially during a crisis that needs immediate solutions. Leaders need to listen, analyse what the best strategy is, weigh the pros and cons, and discuss the final decision. This will help the team save time and focus on the execution process and checking of results / feedback, rather than waiting for just one person to provide a solution.
Following the above-mentioned pointers would help team members feel that they are heard, and they will be encouraged to speak their minds. With this, they will be more confident, trust is built, and the team members will have better connections amongst themselves.
Source: HD Monthly Influencer, Achieving Teamwork Despite Individual Differences ; authored by Consultant @ Human Dynamic
