Transcript

JEAN HARTLEY:

The second element is to make sure that people are clear about the task and where their contribution to that task is, as well. It can be quite difficult in high-energy teams to make sure that people stay focused on the task. And part of a leader's job is to be clear about what the task is, to check that people understand the task, to ask them if they've got any better ideas about the way that the task may be carried out, or whatever. But, really, that sense of purpose is very important.

And then thirdly, a very important part of a leader's role with their team is to help manage the context within which that team is operating. So, there will be a wider context for that team. You might be a small team in a big department or a team within an organisation or a team that's working across a set of organisations. So there's always a wider context.

And part of the way of developing and engaging your team is to help them understand enough of that context to enable them to see where their work fits, but also to protect them from too much context that actually might be distracting or distressing or, in other ways, make it quite difficult. If we see our own team in the context of the huge, wider world, we can feel really insignificant and it's not worth doing. But if you can see where your work fits in a bigger picture without that picture being too huge, then it can be very helpful indeed.

There's a story told at NASA in America, the space science group, that a visiting dignitary was talking to a number of people and he talked to a cleaner at the NASA base. And then the cleaner said, my job is to help put men on the Moon. And I think that's a really good example. It may be apocryphal, I don't know. But it's a really good example of where people know what their own job is, but they know where it fits- the bigger purpose. And that in itself can be incredibly motivating for people.