They say we don’t realize our potential that our personal best is just 40% of what we could achieve if we try harder . Agree?

@MarkPaul Are doing your best and being a team player mutually exclusive?? 🤔

@sarabee1995 Well, yes. If you are focused on doing your best, are you doing what is best for the team? Let's say Johnny is on a project team and he does his best to get his part of the project completed on time. Meanwhile, Sally is falling further and further behind on her deliverable. Johnny presents his part of the project, expecting to get kudos for his work. Johnny is not considered a team player.

@MarkPaul Yes, because in that situation Johnny did NOT do his best.

When you are part of a team, then your task is to get the team across the goal line. If you run across the goal line and begin celebrating while your team lay in ruins at the 10 yard line, then you have failed miserably.

I ran a team for a few years in the Navy and I made it clear to all my top performers that their primary duty was to team success. Completing their portion of any task while allowing the team to fall behind is the definition of personal failure.

@sarabee1995 I see what you are saying, but in your experience as a team leader you communicated individual success and team success were integrated. In Johnny's case, either he didn't get that message from his team leader or didn't understand the integration. So, leadership communication AND intention seem to be an important factor here.

I have been on teams at work and before that in school where teamwork was stressed, but the focus was really on who was performing and who wasn't. So, it's a mixed message. If Johnny does help Sally, isn't he really being disadvantaged for doing his best. It kind of encourages him to pace himself so that he does his work at the pace of slow-Sally.

Tbh, I'm kind of confused on this. It's kind of like team leaders going on and on about how the team is like family and in the next breath announcing that some "family members" are going to be eliminated due to job cuts. Some family! I'm beginning to think the best scenario is one focused on individual contributions. But I could be wrong on this.

@MarkPaul A clear failure of leadership then.

Leaders need to foster a high-performance culture. And success needs to be defined as mission success (whether that be taking the next hill or meeting the quarterly sales goals).

Cowboys are as detrimental to mission success as slackers. Both need to be counseled to adjust their behavior in order to ensure mission success.

@MarkPaul nothing I posted is anti-team players.

@MarkPaul I disagree for reasons that others have already provided.

@BiasForAction That's fine. I have reviewed the counterarguments, I understand them, I have taken them into consideration. I continue to disagree for the reasons I have detailed.