You need to make sure you hire people who are capable of being strong team players. Team members should fit the company's culture, be committed to the team, and be capable of being genuinely vulnerable and selfless.
Interpretation
Hiring the right team members is crucial for a company's success, focusing on their ability to work collaboratively and embrace vulnerability.
This quote emphasizes the importance of hiring individuals who not only possess strong skills but also align with the company's culture and values. It suggests that effective team players are those who commit to the collective goals of the team while being open to vulnerability and selflessness, which fosters a cohesive and supportive work environment essential for success.
In practice
In a team meeting discussing hiring practices, this quote can be used to highlight the importance of cultural fit in team dynamics.
I know that any group of people can become a team if they do the right things, but I came to realize over time that if you acquire or develop the right kind of people, that process of building a team is going to be much more effective and easier.
The truth is that intelligence, knowledge, and domain expertise are vastly overrated as the driving forces behind competitive advantage and sustainable success.
The kind of people that all teams need are people who are humble, hungry, and smart: humble being little ego, focusing more on their teammates than on themselves. Hungry, meaning they have a strong work ethic, are determined to get things done, and contribute any way they can. Smart, meaning not intellectually smart but inner personally smart.
Team members have to be focused on the collective good of the team. Too often, they focus their attention on their department, their budget, their career aspirations, their egos.
Teamwork remains a sustainable competitive advantage that has been largely untapped because it is hard to measure (teamwork impacts the outcome of an organization in such comprehensive and invasive ways that it's virtually impossible to isolate it as a single variable) and because it is extremely hard to achieve (it requires levels of courage and discipline that few executives possess) - ironically, building a strong team is very simple (it doesn't require masterful insights or tactics).
Clients don't expect perfection from the service providers they hire, but they do expect honesty and transparency. There is no better way to demonstrate this than by acknowledging when a mistake has been made and humbly apologizing for it.
Most people believe that great leaders are distinguished by their ability to give compelling answers. This profound book shatters that assumption, showing that the more vital skill is asking the right questions…. Berger poses many fascinating questions, including this one: What if companies had mission questions rather than mission statements? This is a book everyone ought to read—without question.
Any Idiot can point out a problem .... A leader is willing to do something about it! Leaders solve problems!
Thus, then, on the night of the tenth of May, at the outset of this mighty battle, I acquired the chief power in the State, which henceforth I wielded in ever-growing measure for five years and three months of world war, at the end of which time, all our enemies having surrendered unconditionally or being about to do so, I was immediately dismissed by the British electorate from all further conduct of their affairs.
As far as the job of President goes, its rewarding and I've given before this group the definition of happiness for the Greeks. I'll define it again: the full use of your powers along lines of excellence. I find, therefore, that the Presidency provides some happiness.
Some people feel, you make your case, if they listen to you, fine, if they don't, that's it. That's not what leadership is. Leadership is trying to continue to make a case.
I make no apologies for being reasonable.
Subscribe for the occasional hand-picked quote. No noise.