The Tale of the High Performing Team

Once upon a time there was a high performing team with great workplace wellbeing.

They were all very skilled at their jobs and produced good quarter after good quarter.

Their manager was happy, their manager’s manager was happy, and they all worked well together with no real issues.

Then one spring morning, Dan announced that he and his partner were having a baby.?

This was of course great news, but Dan soon found that his priorities, time management and energy levels were all different now.

Then Anushka also announced she was having a child, and so did Alice.

Soon, most of the team had children, which was fantastic!

However, during this time (mostly unrelatedly), Peter badly injured his knee, Huan started getting severe back pain and Dominique developed a sleeping disorder.

This disrupted their perfect equilibrium and the team’s performance started to suffer.

Then one day, along came a cost of living crisis.

It buffeted the team from all sides and caused a great deal of stress and tension.

Then a war began in a far off land, then another, and another, adding more and more stress to the group.

Soon they were all dealing with their individual health and wellbeing issues and everyone was so focused on their own problems that they completely disregarded that anyone else even had any.

Their manager, knowing this couldn’t go on much longer if they were to stay afloat, called in a specialist to help them.

‘Can you help us please?’ asked the manager.

‘We’ve lost our way a little and need to get back on track for Q4’.

So the specialist called them all together in a room.

He taught them about health, about wellbeing, and about how to perform at a high level not just for today or tomorrow, but for their entire lives.

He taught them how to utilise stress to help them instead of harming them, and how to avoid the dreaded burnout they’d all heard so much about (and 62% of them had already experienced). They then talked about what each of them needs to be healthy and well and sustain their high performance over time.?

They discovered that Dan works better in the mornings and not so well at night.

Huan is the exact opposite.

Alice works best when she gets a good exercise session in the morning, whereas Anushka prefers shorter and more frequent bouts of walking to keep her feeling her best.

They learned to communicate their needs and how to help each other address them in order to stay healthy and well as individuals and as a team.

Over time, they created a micro-culture of wellbeing where everyone felt empowered to take care of themselves and each other.

Soon they were producing truly great work again and even when challenges arose they were able to deal with them both individually and as a team because they now understood their team wellbeing dynamics.

They realised that anyone can perform well in a vacuum, but the real test is how they perform and how healthy and well they can be when things get tough.

They started to think of themselves less as a high performing team and more as a high functioning team and realised they were able to do good work and be well at the same time.

And they all lived happily ever after.

Haha no, they didn’t because that’s not a real thing.

In fact they all worked hard at their health and wellbeing and contributed positively to their team wellbeing dynamics* for the rest of time because that’s what it takes to be a high performing team and a healthy and well individual.?

The end.

Question: Does your team know how to stay healthy and well even when (especially when) things get tough?

*Team Wellbeing Dynamics refers to the complex interplay of factors and conditions that affect the physical, emotional and mental health and wellbeing within groups of people, and how those factors are influenced by the environment, relationships and circumstances that are present.

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I'm Phil - a Workplace Wellbeing Specialist.

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