relationships and community on Teamwork

Teamwork is the ability to work together toward a common vision. The ability to direct individual accomplishments toward organizational objectives. It is the fuel that allows common people to attain u...

Trust is knowing that when a team member does push you, they're doing it because they care about the team.

A team is a group of people who may not be equal in experience, talent, or education but in commitment.

Great teams do not hold back with one another. They are unafraid to air their dirty laundry. They admit their mistakes, their weaknesses, and their concerns without fear of reprisal.

When teams fail, they are almost always too big.

Collaboration, it turns out, is not a gift from the gods but a skill that requires effort and practice.

None of us is as smart as all of us.

I can do things you cannot, you can do things I cannot; together we can do great things.

In a team setting, leadership is shared by a community of people, which counters the tendency for pastors to form congregations in their own images.

Alone we can do so little; together we can do so much. While they were saying among themselves it cannot be done, it was done.

Competition has been shown to be useful up to a certain point and no further, but cooperation, which is the thing we must strive for today, begins where competition leaves off.

Two shipwrecked men in tattered clothes slouch together at one end of a lifeboat. They watch casually as three people at the other end of the boat bail furiously, trying to keep the vessel afloat. One...

A great building will never stand if you neglect the small bricks.

I’m just a plow hand from Arkansas, but I have learned how to hold a team together. How to lift some men up, how to calm down others, until finally they’ve got one heartbeat together, a team. There’s ...

Here is the uncomfortable truth: Humans run to a much slower evolutionary clock than our inventions. To use an engineering term, we are the “gating factor” that keeps a process from running faster. It...

A pastor friend of mine once brought about ten people onto the stage at his church and assigned them roles to play on an imaginary fire truck. One person was assigned to drive; another controlled the ...

In one of Aesop's familiar fables, an old man has several sons who are always fighting among themselves. He had often, but without success, exhorted them to live together in harmony. One day, he c...

Teams with a vision also perform better. Abraham Maslow is well known as one of the most significant psychologists of the last century. His research into high-performing teams found that the most stri...

In most cities, statues are reserved for founders and the famous, but in Stockholm, Sweden, things are a bit different, at least in one place. Stockholm’s town hall stands as a masterpiece of architec...

A team is not a group of people that work together. A team is a group of people that trust each other.

Trust is absolutely essential in all we do-trust in marriage, between friends, at work, in public life… Without trust we are doomed to chaos and confusion because nothing can work.

Trust is the glue of life. It's the most essential ingredient in effective communication. It's the foundational principle that holds all relationships.

When the trust account is high, communication is easy, instant, and effective.

We all want to feel like we come together as equals, with each of us bringing something unique and vital to the table. That’s how friendship works: we join forces, knowing each of us has something to ...

True friends face in the same direction, toward common projects, interests, goals.

On a beautiful April afternoon in 2008, two college softball teams faced off in a decisive playoff game beneath the Cascade Mountains. The Western Oregon Wolves battled Central Washington University, ...

Sharan Merriam and Carolyn Clark, in their fine study Lifelines , effectively show that life is fundamentally about two things—our work and our relationships. And maturity is found in having the c...

Gracious God, you have called us to be a unified body, working together that which you have willed for the world. In our apathy, we fail to participate in the work you have called us to do. In our div...

We are each other's harvest; we are each other's business; we are each other's magnitude and bond.

Jim Collins writes in his book Good to Great, we need the right people on our bus and we also need them in the right seats. Relational Intelligence: The People Skills You Need for the Life of Purpo...