Teamwork sounds easy, yet this can be the hardest part of each day at work.

Teamwork within the workplace not only benefits your workers but also significantly affects your company.

Many times throughout the year you may be asked to join a team with your coworkers to achieve a goal the company or your supervisor may have set to be accomplished. You are given a time line and the objectives.

Effective teamwork really depends on the team members and the skills of each individual. The skill sets are determined of each team player and they are strategically placed for the success of the team and the project goal. Leaders of the team inform the team members of their specific roles and the expectations regarding their personal contributions to the team processes. It is very important also that the leadership reinforces the right behavior by promoting employees who are exhibiting the attributes that are important to the team's success.

In our credit department have been reading some really great books as a group. We meet once a month after we have read the chapters necessary for the upcoming meeting and each month one of us gives the breakdown of the chapters to have been read and discussed.  One of these books was entitled The Speed of Trust by Stephen M.R. Covey. The book discusses matching
T A S K S to TASKS.

We are to think about the various dimensions of capabilities using the acronym "TASKS"

T alents

A ttitudes

S kills

K nowledge

S tyle

Talents are our natural gifts and strengths. Attitudes represent our paradigms or our ways of seeing as well as our ways of being. Skills are our proficiencies or the things that we can do very well. Knowledge represents our learning, insight, understanding and awareness. Style represents our unique approach and, of course, our individual personality. These are all a part of what is called our capabilities or our means to produce results. By breaking them down into components, we are we able to look and explore them independently and interdependently.

The Speed of Trust is one of my favorite books from the ones we have read so far as I have learned much about myself and how to work with others in a group by having trust in myself and my team.  

When people work together in an atmosphere of trust and accountability toward a common goal, they tend to put aside turf issues and politics and focus on the tasks set before them. Trust in yourself and your team is necessary and reading this book truly helps with the tools needed to work and perform as a solid team.