5 Mistakes Teams Make and What You Can Do About It
"With every additional team member, the challenge of managing complexity and achieving efficiency grows exponentially," said Kenneth Haman, managing director of The Advisor Institute of AllianceBernstein, during a presentation at the Schwab Impact 2012 conference in Chicago.
Here are 5 common mistakes advisors face as their firms grow, as well as tips on how to avoid them.
Source: Kenneth Haman, managing director of The Advisor Institute of AllianceBernstein
1. Putting People Ahead of Process
Effective leaders accept that planning and managing must be a priority and remain a constant commitment. They create harmony by developing successful methods and rewarding team members.
2. Focusing on team harmony instead of effective methods
The most important question is not, "Do we naturally get along?" Instead, effective team leaders ask, "Do we all know exactly what to do in order to succeed?"
3. Not finding time to work on your business
Effective team leaders must make time for managing the team. To avoid breakdowns, they must devise a business plan, define each team member's role, and establish a communication that clarifies assumptions and perceptions of fairness. They must also develop metrics to manage performance and institute an accountability process to hold each member to their defined role.
4. Failure to clearly define roles, methods or managers
5. Lack of performance metrics
The process of defining, assigning, and tracking metrics is the only way to measure and monitor fairness between team members. Avoid using trailing indicators which only look back, but instead incorporate metrics that also measure success for the next week.