“No one can whistle a symphony; it takes a whole orchestra to play it” – H.E. Luccock

Every member of the orchestra must understand the piece as the whole and also his own notes; only then the symphony will emerge. Similarly, any achievements of the organization are the results of the combined work by each individual in the company. The team members must have the same mindset, the same feeling, the same character to be able to work together.

As a people leader, your job is to get the task done by the people. Hiring someone is easier than getting them to be a team player. As a leader, your goal is not only to accomplish organizational goals, but also build up team spirit.

Building the desire and willingness of people to work together, help each other, making them loyal and supportive to achieve functional and organizational objectives is important. Therefore, the function of the leader is to achieve the organizational task by building effective team spirit. Let’s see below how a leader can build winning team S-P-I-R-I-T.

“Alone we can do so little; together we can do so much– Helen Keller”

Sell vision and its benefits

“Leadership is the capacity to translate vision into reality “- Warren G Bennis

The first and foremost thing that a leader needs to do to build a winning team spirit is to vividly articulate a vision, course of action and its benefits to the team. Avidly selling organizational vision, mission and values shape the culture of the organization and lead to a set of strategic goals that outlines expected performance to attain the desired goals. As Warren said, leadership is the capacity to translate vision into action. Selling the vision alone will not meet the requirements of your employees. So, the leader need to talk about what it would mean to them in terms of growth and development opportunities to them like rewards and recognitions. Be sure to provide clear direction and always welcome questions and feedback from others. Help your team see the “BIG picture.” Take time out to explain to your team how their assignments and projects fit into the company’s larger goals and overall objectives. This will help demonstrate that every task they complete can have an impact on the company’s reputation, success, top line and bottom line. So first sell vision as well as the benefits to build effective winning team spirit

Personal commitment

The second important step in building a winning team spirit is leaders’ personal commitment to achieve desired results. If you show commitment to people on your team, they will return the same commitment level. Every time and any time if you put yourself on the line for your team and as a result they work hard, serve better and complete whatever the mission you had set even in the most difficult circumstances. Your commitment fosters trust, which will in turn promote relationship. Relationships breed unity and unity breeds team spirit and finally team spirit breeds success. If the leader is committed, his followers will also do the same willingly and naturally and team will work more effectively and efficiently. Like Vince Lombardi says, “Individual commitment to a group effort that is what makes a team work, a company work, society work, a civilization work.”

Inspiring leadership

The third important thing is that a leader must be able to lead the team towards accomplishing the objectives of the organization. Leadership is the ability of manager to induce team to work with desire, confidence, and enthusiasm. Inspiration provides a cohesive force, which keeps the team intact and develops team spirit and is able to influence the behaviors, attitudes and belief of their followers and directs their energies towards the common goals. Inspire people to encourage extraordinary performance. You must create an inspiring corporate culture to engage and empower your team. Engage them in meaningful tasks, leverage their diversity and encourage risk taking ability. “If your actions inspire others to dream more, learn more, do more and become more, you are a leader.” -John Quincy Adams. An inspired and motivated team is very essential for any business organizations that hope to stay ahead of the competition. Inspire others to high level of efforts and performance and energize people to achieve exceptional success. The more you demonstrate the inspiring actions, the more inspiration your team will be perceive.

Responsible leadership

“The price of greatness is responsibility”. -Winston Churchill Leadership means responsibility and responsibility means focusing on getting the job done through people by finding results rather than reasons. It’s the responsibility of the leaders to satisfactorily perform a task that one must fulfill and has a consequent penalty for failure as well. It’s a leader’s responsibility to carry forward an assigned task to a successful competition morally and ethically in a professional manner. The leader must accept that he remains responsible for the actions of the group and results of those actions. He is responsible to create a vision, motivate and inspire their people towards that vision and face any challenging situation that undermines unit effectiveness and cohesion. Finally, the leader must have willingness to assume the responsibility not merely for success but also for failure. Most leaders are happy enough to take the credit for being right but few are willing to take the blame of being wrong as well. The genuine leader is equally indifferent to praise and blame. “It is better to lead from behind and to put others in front, especially when you celebrate victory when nice things occur. You take the front line when there is danger. Then people will appreciate your leadership”. -Nelson Mandela So leader must be responsible for himself and for his team and be with his team through thick and thin times

Interpersonal Relationships

Interpersonal skills are important because as a leader needs to get things done through people, you need to get along well with people to get things done well. Interpersonal relationship cultivates the culture of an organization through motivation and appreciation of teams. Develop and maintain effective interpersonal relationships with others relating well to people from diverse backgrounds and in different situations, showing understanding, courtesy, tact, empathy, concern and politeness. Relate to people in an open, friendly and professional manner. Cooperate, work to gain support and gain commitment from others when performing tasks. Discuss subjects in a constructive manner with all team members. Foster cooperation, collaboration and communication to facilitate consensus to accomplish desired tasks. Interpersonal relationships are driving forces in our lives. Quality of life is depending on quality of relationships. Team with good interpersonal relationship perform better and achieve higher level of goals at all times

Togetherness to triumphs

The sixth and the last important action you need to do is to bring your team together – every member should feel happy and engaged when they are with you. Then, that time will strive willingly and gives the highest degree of cooperation in order to accomplish the desired objectives. Your leadership style can be an important modifier of behavior of people working in the organization. It provides a cohesive force, which holds the team intact develops a spirit of cooperation, influence and inspire on team to provide extraordinary results because it’s a force that binds the team together and motivates it towards certain desire results. “Teamwork is no accident. It is the by-product of good leadership.” It is quality of behavior of a leader whereby he is able to persuade others to the goals enthusiastically by bringing people together

SPIRIT in short

A winning team is a team with spirit that has the desire and willingness of the people to work together and help each other as part of team. As Emily Voyles said “It doesn’t take strength to win; it takes the true heart of the team to win”. The strength of the team is each individual member. The strength of each member is the team,” said by Phil Jackson. As a leader, it is your prime responsibility to build and maintain team spirit to achieve any insurmountable goals. The ultimate test of leadership is performance. I wish you will try and keep your team SPIRIT up and achieve higher level of team goals

“Talent wins games, But teamwork and intelligence wins championships” -Michael Jordan

"None of us, including me, ever do great things. But we can all do small things, with great love, and together we can do something wonderful”. -Mother Teresa