What do coastguard survival training and building a high performance culture have in common? Three very powerful ways to get people working together as a team.
Not many people know that back in the day, I worked as a lead singer on cruise ships. It was an amazing time in my life. I got paid to do what I loved and traveled the world for free. I was on cloud 29! Until I worked for one specific cruise line that required us to go through Coastguard Survival Training before we were allowed to work on the ship. They had us arrive at 5 am and get into freezing cold water in their training pool. Then, we were taught how to work together to turn over a 30 person raft in case the ship sank and we had to lead the passengers to safety. We spent all day learning each role of flipping over the heavy raft. Two people pushed up on one side of the raft, while two others pulled on a rope to get the raft to flip on the other side. The others waited to catch the raft as it fell down so that no one would get trapped underneath it. As if that weren’t challenging enough, the instructors thought it would be a good idea to pretend like we were in the middle of a storm and started throwing buckets of water on us. Each challenge had us working harder together to overcome them. It was team collaboration at its best.
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There were three major lessons I learned that day about how to work as a team:
- Assign Roles. Everyone in our Coastguard survival course was assigned a specific role. A task their team was counting on them to commit to. Without each person’s efforts, the overall project would be held back or ultimately fail. In organizations, I often see leaders assume that everyone knows what their role is on a project, and before they know it, work has either been duplicated or not done at all. In order to have more accountability in the workplace, define exactly what each person’s role is.
- Show Them How. As leaders, we often presume that people know how to do the job we’ve given them, and no one likes to admit they don’t know what they’re doing, so we’re left picking up the pieces of the puzzle that weren’t finished correctly. Delegation is part of being a successful leader. Showing someone how to do the job you’ve delegated is what makes you a significant leader. Your job is to improve team effectiveness by setting each person up for success.
- Develop Team Collaboration. What is teamwork to you? Self-Accountability? Dependability? Absolutely! But let’s not forget taking the initiative to help your team members out. In the coastguard course, one of my roles was to push the raft up while the people on the other side worked hard to pull the rope and bring it down. Once I was confident that they had the raft under control, I was taught to swim around to the other side and help the team catch the raft as it came down. That’s what teamwork is. Looking out for one another.
I believe that challenges are healthy for teams to experience in the workplace. Nothing bonds people together faster than overcoming challenges and succeeding together.
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Those who struggle together, are those who succeed together.
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Betsy Allen-Manning
Leadership Speaker | Best Selling Author | DISC Human Behavior Expert
www.BetsyAllenManning.com
Learn it & Live it:
- To learn more about connecting with your teams, get a copy my book, “ Win With People “, where I show you how to connect, communicate & influence successfully by understanding human behavior!
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3. If you’re looking for more advanced training or are looking for a keynote speaker for your next event, contact Betsy and let’s talk about how we can work together to make your event a success.
You’ve learned it, now go live it and make it a great day because you deserve it!
