Hungry For Improvement

In his book The Ideal Team Player, Patrick Lencioni lists three virtues he considered indispensable for “ideal team players”:

• Humility
• Hunger
• People-smarts

To elaborate:

Humility

Humility means focusing on the greater good, instead of focusing on oneself or having an inflated ego. Humble people are willing to own up to their failures or flaws, apologise for their mistakes, accept others’ apologies and can sincerely appreciate others’ strengths/skills.

In Lencioni’s words, humility is probably the most important virtue:

Great team players lack excessive ego or concerns about status. They are quick to point out the contributions of others and slow to seek praise for their own. They share credit, emphasise team over self, and define success collectively rather than individually. It is no great surprise, then, that humility is the single greatest and most indispensable attribute of being a team player.

Hunger

Being hungry means that you always seek more, e.g. to do more, learn more, or take on more responsibility. Hungry people are self-motivated to work hard, take initiative and go beyond their call of duty. Hungry people are never satisfied, and they always want more. They have a drive and a burning ambition to be more than they are. Some folks call this discretionary effort.

Hunger, writes Lencioni,

“is the least sensitive and nuanced of the three virtues. That’s the good news. The bad news is – it’s the hardest to change.”

Smarts (i.e. people-smarts)

People smarts means having common sense about people, i.e. being aware of and perceptive about other people, asking good questions, listening well and knowing how to respond effectively.

Be aware that “people smarts” doesn’t necessarily mean intellectually “brilliant”; but it does mean emotionally intelligence and a capability for skilful interpersonal interactions.

Of course, you can’t have a team if there’s no team chemistry; and folks who are people smart contribute to this chemistry.

Hungry For Improvement?

Improvement – and especially continuous improvement – doesn’t just happen. In most organisations, it rarely happens at all.

When improvement does happen, it’s because someone needs it to happen. For some reason. Personally, I’m hungry for improvement because I find joy in seeing things improve, and joy in seeing things getting better for the people involved. Simple as.

For me, improvement is not a means to some other end, such as higher profits, increased success, or some other common but similarly specious justification. For me, it’s an end in itself.

I’d go further, and suggest that improvement is rare exactly because few people find an innate joy in it.

How about you? Are you hungry for improvement? Do you need it?

– Bob