5 Important Reasons Why Teamwork Matters!

by Published on March 31, 2017

Importance of teamwork

Being a master of one or a jack-of-all-trades in today’s world does not bring about success if you are unable to work as part of a team. The importance of teamwork cannot be stressed enough!
However, it’s hard to get a group of individuals to work together smoothly. Don’t you agree?
Look:
A leader that can’t work with a team, is a failure!
Leaders that develop great teams around them have two things that they do well:
  • they have a lot of emotional intelligence and
  • are able to provide a clear vision for the team.

Well, you are probably wondering what the team members need to have:
The team members themselves also need to possess high emotional intelligence so that they interact with each other with the least amount of friction.
The importance of teamwork is essential in today’s multidisciplinary world. In the past, during the industrial era when most jobs were represented by people on a manufacturing line doing one thing all day – teamwork wasn’t as important as it is today.


In today’s knowledge economy, most of our jobs involve interacting with others that are not even in the same line of profession. The need for effective teamwork is critical for any business.
The ability to simultaneously perform as an individual and together with your colleagues or employees in effective teamwork is key to attaining growth and success.
In every aspect of a business, the diverse skills of teams are needed for reaching success. Make use of every opportunity you have to engage in teamwork so you develop effective communication skills.

Steve Jobs changed the whole pattern of living with his innovative and creative mind. However, without his team of hard-working professionals and their abilities, his innovations would not have reached the hands of so many people around the world.
In effect, teamwork is important and essential in order to accomplish the overall objectives and goals of an organization.
Still not convinced of the importance of teamwork, or you need to know more about the benefits of teamwork?
As a reader of our blog we would like to offer you 30% off our online Teamwork course. Use the discount code: potentialblog when you get to the checkout. Click here to enroll.

The following 5 reasons summarize the importance of teamwork and why it matters to you:

  • Teamwork motivates unity in the workplace

    A teamwork environment promotes an atmosphere that fosters friendship and loyalty. These close-knit relationships motivate employees in parallel and align them to work harder, cooperate and be supportive of one another.
    Individuals possess diverse talents, weaknesses, communication skills, strengths, and habits. Therefore, when a teamwork environment is not encouraged this can pose many challenges towards achieving the overall goals and objectives. This creates an environment where employees become focused on promoting their own achievements and competing against their fellow colleagues. Ultimately, this can lead to an unhealthy and inefficient working environment.
    When teamwork is working the whole team would be motivated and working toward the same goal in harmony.
    – Listen to our teamwork fundamentals audio course:

  • Teamwork offers differing perspectives and feedback

    Good teamwork structures provide your organization with a diversity of thought, creativity, perspectives, opportunities, and problem-solving approaches. A proper team environment allows individuals to brainstorm collectively, which in turn increases their success to problem solve and arrive at solutions more efficiently and effectively.
    Effective teams also allow the initiative to innovate, in turn creating a competitive edge to accomplish goals and objectives. Sharing differing opinions and experiences strengthens accountability and can help make effective decisions faster, than when done alone.
    Team effort increases output by having quick feedback and multiple sets of skills come into play to support your work. You can do the stages of designing, planning, and implementation much more efficiently when a team is functioning well.

  • Teamwork provides improved efficiency and productivity

    When incorporating teamwork strategies, you become more efficient and productive. This is because it allows the workload to be shared, reducing the pressure on individuals, and ensure tasks are completed within a set time frame. It also allows goals to be more attainable, enhances the optimization of performance, improves job satisfaction and increases work pace.
    Ultimately, when a group of individuals works together, compared to one person working alone, they promote a more efficient work output and are able to complete tasks faster due to many minds intertwined on the same goals and objectives of the business.

  • Teamwork provides great learning opportunities

    Working in a team enables us to learn from one another’s mistakes. You are able to avoid future errors, gain insight from differing perspectives, and learn new concepts from more experienced colleagues.
    In addition, individuals can expand their skill sets, discover fresh ideas from newer colleagues and therefore ascertain more effective approaches and solutions towards the tasks at hand. This active engagement generates the future articulation, encouragement and innovative capacity to problem solve and generate ideas more effectively and efficiently.

  • Teamwork promotes workplace synergy

    Mutual support shared goals, cooperation and encouragement provide workplace synergy. With this, team members are able to feel a greater sense of accomplishment, are collectively responsible for outcomes achieved and feed individuals with the incentive to perform at higher levels.
    When team members are aware of their own responsibilities and roles, as well as the significance of their output being relied upon by the rest of their team, team members will be driven to share the same vision, values, and goals. The result creates a workplace environment based on fellowship, trust, support, respect, and cooperation.

Without the ability to effectively work in a team environment, you could delay the success of developing, formulating and implementing new and innovative ideas. The ability to problem solve is reduced, as well as the attainment of meeting goals and objectives, in turn, limiting the efficiency and effectiveness of growing a successful company is hindered.

I’m sure that by now you are totally convinced about the importance of teamwork, but if you would like to see more benefits, here’s a video from our teamwork course that gives you yet another perspective.
The synergy of individuals is a powerful and strong instrument; don’t be fooled by the idea that working alone brings glory. Working alone may help your ego sometimes, however, will not necessarily make you a regular winner!

THE IMPORTANCE OF TEAMWORK IN THE CHURCH

8 Values of TEAMWORK That Keep a Church Healthy

By Pastor Rick Warren
Saddleback Church Staff
The success of your ministry depends largely on developing a strong team with a deep sense of team spirit. I’ve witnessed the incredible power of a unified team to create growth and have counseled many churches who weren’t growing because their team members worked as individuals and not as a team.
A team spirit is never accidental; it is always intentional. Teamwork is built on three factors:
  • a compelling purpose,
  • crystal clear communication,
  • and a code of commonly held values.
At Saddleback Church, we express the eight values of teamwork in a simple acrostic, T.E.A.M.W.O.R.K.:

T – Trust

Trust among your team is the emotional glue that binds them together; it’s essential to producing true confidence in each other. There are three factors that create trust within a team:
  1. Consistency – People will trust you if, time after time, they see you responding in a consistent and reasonable manner. You also need to be readable, in the sense that they need to know where you are coming from in your decisions and responses.
  2. Loyalty – Defend members of your team when they’re criticized and then check the facts later in private, always assuming the best until there is concrete evidence to the contrary.
  3. Delegation – When you delegate to your team the power to make decisions, you’re essentially telling them: “I trust you!” People trust leaders who trust them.

E – Economy of Energy

Even a thoroughbred horse can’t run at a full gait all the time. The quickest way to burn-out a team is to never let them relax. The book of Proverbs teaches: “A relaxed attitude lengthens a man’s life.” (Proverbs 14:30, LB) If you want the people on your team to last, they must have some down time.
Here are some ways you can promote an economy of energy within your team:
  • Anticipate and compensate for personal and family energy drains, such as illnesses and new babies. Your team has a life outside of their area of ministry.
  • Allow people to work at different energy levels on different days. Some days, everyone must work fast and energetic. Other days, it is important to slow the pace a bit. In the long term, slow and steady always outlasts the fast and furious.
  • Plan your year in energy cycles. At Saddleback, we always build in rest periods for consolidation between major growth campaigns and initiatives.
  • Allow flexibility in schedules when possible.
  • Make the work fun!

A – Affirmation

Everybody is hungry for affirmation. When they don’t get it, they get cranky. It’s amazing how a smile and a simple word of encouragement can change a team member’s entire day. Four practical ways you can affirm your team would be:
  1. valuing their ideas
  2. appreciating their uniqueness
  3. commending their efforts
  4. praising their loyalty

M – Management of Mistakes

The Bible teaches: “Even though a righteous man falls seven times, he rises again.” (Proverbs 24:16, NIV) I love that saying because it points out that even righteous people make mistakes and stumble occasionally. Mistakes are not failures, because you’re never a failure until you give up. Mistakes teach us what doesn’t work. If you’re not making any mistakes, it means you’re playing it safe and not trying anything new. I tell my staff that I want every one of them making at least one new mistake a week – as long as it isn’t the same old one! Mistakes are how we learn and get better.

W – Weekly Staff Meetings

For years, I asked my team to bring me a brief weekly report on a small 3-by-5 card. This kept the reports short and to the point. Then those cards became our weekly meeting agenda. Today we use email. Here are the four things you want to know as a leader:
  • “I’ve made progress in ______________________________________”
  • “I’m having difficulty with ___________________________________”
  • “I need a decision from you on ________________________________”
  • “I’m thankful for ___________________________________________”

O – Open Communication

Open communication is the cornerstone of great teamwork. Proverbs 13:17 (LB) says “Reliable communication permits progress.” There are three common barriers to great communication:
  1. Presumption – How many problems have been caused by the phrase “But I assumed…”? Here are some fatal assumptions: assuming that there’s only one way to see a problem; assuming that everyone else feels just like you; assuming that someone will never change (they do); assuming that you can know someone else’s motives (you can’t).
  2. Impatience ruins open communication because we are more interested in what we are going to say than listening to what others say. Impatience causes you to jump to conclusions.
  3. Pride – When you think you know it all, you are resistant to feedback, and you become defensive instead of really listening to others and learning.

R – Recognition and Reward

The more credit you give to others, the more you develop team spirit. It’s that simple. The Bible says, “Give honor and respect to all those to whom it is due.” (Romans 13:7, LB)

K – Keep on Learning

All leaders are learners. The moment you stop learning, you stop being a leader. As I consult with churches, I’ve seen that growing churches require growing leaders.
Another proverb says “The intelligent man is always open to new ideas. In fact, he looks for them.” (Proverbs 18:15, LB) Do you do that? Do you encourage your team members to keep on growing, developing, and learning? At Saddleback, our staff is constantly reading books and listening to tapes to sharpen their skills and develop their character.
If you practice these eight T.E.A.M.W.O.R.K. values with your team, you’ll experience a new level of teamwork in your church that will take your ministry to new heights.