Nice Teams Finish Last: The Secret to Unleashing Your Team's Maximum Potential

224 Pages·2010·0.84 MB·English

by  Brian Cole Miller

Nice
Teams
Finish
Last
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Nice
Teams
Finish
Last
The Secret to Unleashing
Your Team’s Maximum Potential
Brian Cole Miller
American Management Association
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Miller,BrianCole
Niceteamsfinishlast:thesecrettounleashingyourteam’smaximumpotential/BrianCole
Miller.
p. cm.
Includesbibliographicalreferencesandindex.
ISBN-13:978-0-8144-1393-7
ISBN-10:0-8144-1393-5
1.Teamsintheworkplace. 2.Communicationinorganizations. 3.Interpersonal
communication. I.Title.
HD66.M5438 2010
658.4(cid:1)022—dc22
2009044569
(cid:1)2010BrianColeMiller.
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Contents
Acknowledgments vii
Introduction ix
1. NICE Teams Are . . . Well, NICE! 1
2. The Opposite of NICE Is MEAN, Isn’t It? 33
3. The Sweet Spot Between NICE and FIERCE: BOLD 59
4. BOLD Principles 85
5. BOLD Feedback 109
6. BOLD Requests 127
7. BOLD Disagreements 143
8. Become BOLD 161
Appendix 1: NICE Team Assessment 177
Appendix 2: Team Member Style Assessment 183
Appendix 3: BOLD Conversation Assessment 193
Appendix 4: BOLD Feedback Planning Sheet 197
Appendix 5: BOLD Request Planning Sheet 201
Index 205
About the Author 209
v
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Acknowledgments
This book came from years of study and work with teams
around the country. Thank you especially to my friends at
Anthem FEP, Communico, VISA, Planned Parenthood,
Wright-Ryan Construction, and Nationwide Insurance.
Your examples of NICE, FIERCE, and BOLD teamwork in
action taught me much.
Thank you Shellie Steinbaker and Greg Hund. I admire
how open you are to others. You approach conversations
from such a beautiful place of curiosity.
Thank you Lisa Alexander, Grace Dennison, and Alejan-
dro Rodriguez. I have learned so much from your examples
of how to give BOLD feedback.
Thank you Scott Shaffer for being a sounding board for
my ideas for this book.
Thank you Lynne Franklin for helping me to say what I
wanted to say, in a way that others would understand.
Thank you Lynn Jackson, again, for reading my nearly
final manuscript and helping me fix it so it could become my
final version.
Thank you Christina Parisi at AMACOM, for your pa-
tience as well as your confidence in me.
vii
viii Acknowledgments
Thank you Heidee, Benjamin, Logan, and Tim. You are
the most important team in my life: my family. Thank you
for helping me learn and practice the principles of BOLD
teams with you every day.
Thank you most of all Tim, for the many sacrifices you
made so that I could write this book. Thank you for your
neverending love, support, and encouragement.
Introduction
A few years ago, I was driving in southern Maine with a
friend, talking about teams. I was lamenting how so many
teams never quite realize their full potential. The team mem-
bers all know what needs to happen for them to be wildly
successful, but each is waiting for someone else to do it. Indi-
vidual accountability is what’s lacking, was my thought. My
friend taunted me, ‘‘Brian, remember: There’s no I in team.’’
I shot back, ‘‘Yes, but there’s a me in there somewhere!’’
Teams are made of individuals. They are a group of me’s.
But as long as everyone keeps believing there is no I in team,
they can continue to abdicate to others—often the team
leader—the responsibility for their team’s success. It
shouldn’t be all on the team leader’s shoulders to make the
team work. Each member has responsibility.
Is Your Team Too NICE?
This book is for people who want to step up and accept
responsibility for the success of their team. Over the years,
I’ve learned that the foundation of any team’s success is open
and honest communication. Unfortunately, our society has
ix