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Teamwork Makes the Dream Work—But Who Makes the Team?

Dan Messerschmidt, JDS Industries
President, APA - Where Personalization Pros Connect

 

(July/August 2024) For a lot of small businesses, hiring staff is hard. It’s an extra job to do, one that requires different skills than personalizing products or operating a company.

But when you think about it, needing to hire staff is often a good problem to have. If you’re adding to your staff, it’s likely due to the growth of your business, which is definitely a positive. If you are replacing an existing employee, you have an opportunity to add someone who will bring excellent skills and a great work ethic that could help re-energize existing staff.

Even with a lot of hiring experience, we’re always looking to get better. After all, it’s crucial that we hire team players who get what it is that we do and why we do want to be part of that success.

One of the authors that I read regularly is Patrick Lencioni. The founder of the Table Group, he has written 13 books that have sold more than 8 million copies on topics like leadership, teamwork, and organizational health. He published The Ideal Team Player in 2016, and the advice in it has proven valuable to me.

Lencioni explains that “some people are better at teamwork than others. These are the kind of people who add immediate value in a team environment and require much less coaching and management to contribute in a meaningful way.” The key to finding these team players is their shared qualities. They are “humble, hungry, and smart.” (“Smart” here refers to “being wise in how to deal with people,” the author explains.)

Knowing this—and the ways Lencioni explains to look for these traits—you can not only hire well but also coach existing employees who fall short on these measures.

Obviously, there is a lot to unpack in the “humble, hungry, and smart” hiring concept. (That’s why Lencioni wrote an entire book on it!) But you can see the potential of using these qualities as measures for assessing new hires, existing employees, and even yourself.

Hiring team players benefits the team and makes your job as the coach much easier! That’s why hiring fits well into Lencioni’s organizational health niche. While I encourage you to learn more about this for the benefit of your own business, it also applies to other types of organizations—like our association. Look at the people who have made APA the longtime powerhouse it is. Think about how “humble, hungry, and smart” apply.

• Leadership: Our association leadership, from the presidency down, comprises industry volunteers who take on extra work (hungry) to do what’s best for the association’s membership, not themselves (humble), because they know it will benefit their companies and industry in the long run (smart).

Award winners: Each year, we recognize top individuals and companies with Gold Obelisk Awards. It’s remarkable how many of our award recipients are a little uncomfortable in the spotlight (humble) but are deserving of recognition because they’re always doing more (hungry) and earning the appreciation and respect of their colleagues (smart).

• Members: APA membership benefits industry companies, and some business owners quickly learn to leverage their membership into great opportunities for development. They put their company first (humble) as they look to grow their businesses (hungry) through the relationships they create (smart) through APA. These members also jump in where they can for the benefit of the membership as a whole, often becoming leaders.

I encourage all personalization businesses to join APA, because together we’re stronger. With the right people on the team, your business can grow and succeed, too. That’s APA’s mission: “Helping businesses thrive.”

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