3 Things Great Team Leads Always Do

What qualities does a great team lead have?

Till today, I am sure you have met team lead you hate a lot. But there are also team lead whom you like a lot. What makes the difference? What qualities does a great team lead have? Based on my observation and personal experiences, I have found 3 qualities that a great team lead have. We all have to take up some team lead role n some occasions, e.g., leading a basketball team, organizing an outing, managing a project, holding a party. Hope the 3 qualities will help you become a great team lead.

# 1 They Listen.

One day after work, my friends said I was happier than usual. They asked me why. I thought for a while. Actually nothing special. It was just because in the early morning, I had a very pleasant conversation with one of the big boss. I was asked how I was in my current project. This wasn’t the first time I was asked but this was indeed the only time I was listened. Why? In the previous times, when I was asked how I was in my current project, the responses I received were, “Okay, we understood. We will help you.” or, “Don’t worry. Think from another point of view … ” Usually when I received this kind of response, I knew there was no result already. However, the response from this leader was rather different. The question was the same, “How are you?” I hesitated for a second and said, “Well, fine.” Because I thought it was going to be the same response. However, she sensed my hesitation and asked why. I gave the same answer as the previous times. What she did was amazing. She listened to me sincerely and asked me, “so what is your concern and worry?” For the first time, I was paid attention and was offered help find out the problem. I shared with her my concerns. She listened again very carefully and gave me some advice that targets my problems instead of general advice. Since she listened, I opened up more and shared more of my opinions with her. Her emotions changed as my story went. In the end, we had a wonderful conversation. It was all because she did listening.

However, most of us want to express our ideas instead of listening. Especially when we are in a team lead’s position, where we are suppose to give instructions and guidance to our team members. We easily forget to listen to them to find out their real needs. Sometimes we even neglect to give others the opportunities to speak up. Even worse, some team leads think they already give employee the chance to speak by asking them “Understand?!” It does remind me the scene when primary school teacher asked the class, “Understand!!??”.

# 2 They Encourage.

You can never underestimate the power of encouraging. It is always better than criticizing. You just need a little bit of thoughts, you can turn a criticizing words into an encouraging words. When I was learning dance, the dance captain helped me a lot with all kinds of encouraging words. I was already very discouraged by my own performance as I was the worst dancer. My dance captain kept telling me I was better than last time. And she thanked me for my effort to practice. Imagine she said, “Why are you so stupid?” “You are the worst dancer.” I would have already given up dancing. There are couple of words team lead should avoid using. They are Stupid, Bad, Worst, Never, Wrong, You Must, etc. I would stay as far as I can from this kind of team lead and stop any progress of relationship or connections with them even they don’t treat me like.

# 3 They Make Decisions Fast.

I have seen a very girl who is very good at leading a group. When she was asked the secrets. She said, “Secrets? I don’t have any secrets. I am scared of things will go wrong so I quickly make decisions. So it ends up I am always the first one make decisions.” A good team lead dare to make decisions more quickly so that the team is given the direction to start executing earlier. Therefore the team has more time to work on something. Imagine in a project, the team lead takes half a year to make a decision. By that time, the project might have already finished. The half year is basically wasted. More than one time, I was told by big bosses, “just fixed a date and go ahead, don’t wait.” or, “oh, don’t depend on so many things and be so indecisive. Else, you will never do it.” I am also consciously training myself to be more decisive. To be honest, I have already lost 2 investment opportunities which would give me 50% of returns each because I didn’t make the decision fast enough. I will not let it happen again.

Thanks for reading. How do you think of the 3 things? And what qualities do you think a good team lead have or should have? Welcome sharing and comments.