There must also be a well-established meeting discipline. One where facts and data get on the table and everyone on the team knows what’s going on.

Success does not happen in isolation either. Sales depend on Manufacturing, Operations on Supply Chain, and so on.

This means your expectations of other teams must be clear and your relationships healthy.

What’s surprising is how often they are not!

All of the above takes work, coordination, and intention.

It’s all part of the discipline of execution.

It’s all part of getting people fired up, focussed and fully engaged.

A tool I have found very helpful in making this happen is the Team Charter.

It’s organised under 3 main headings … Purpose, Results, and Behaviours.

The Charter captures why a team exists, how it will succeed, what it’s highest priorities are and how people will behave.

We’ve used this simple format with teams over many years with great success. The key is that it’s simple.

Simplicity is vital.

Everything is on a single page and everyone on the team is part of creating it.

This makes the buy-in so much higher.

The Charter is also used to set expectations with other departments.

Too often ‘Department A’ has no clue what ‘Department B’ is working on. In most cases, very little attempt has been made to clarify goals or synchronise activity.

Sharing the Charter and using it to set expectations solves this problem.

Finally, the Charter helps with team meetings. It offers a template for a simple, yet effective weekly meeting structure.

Teamwork, at the end of the day, is not complicated or hard to understand.

The hard part is showing up every day and doing it.

For a busy team, the Charter makes the hard work much easier to do.

Ultimately, it also does the most important job of all. It gets everyone onto the same page and it keeps them there!

Would you like to use the Team Charter for your team?