Can You Build a Great Team Without Values?

As I opened the second section of Leading With A Clear Purpose, I shared the story of my fondest Major League Baseball memory, the 2004 American League Championship Series where the Boston Red Sox narrowly avoided being swept and came back to win four straight games against the New York Yankees before winning four more in a row against the St Louis Cardinals to win their first World Series since 1918. As much as I enjoyed the Red Sox making history (and knocking out the Yankees while doing so), the point I made was in regards to how much talent there was on that New York roster. On paper, it didn’t seem like Boston stood a chance of coming back when they were down in Game 4, let alone to win the series. For the purposes of Leading With A Clear Purpose, I emphasized how it’s not always just about the pay; a clear and definite purpose can be what drives mediocre talent to out-perform some of the best in any industry. When it comes to our core values, that can be exactly what our folks need to see in action to come together as a team. If we haven’t been intentional about providing our team with a consistent example of exactly what our core values look like in practice, having even the most talented individuals throughout our organization won’t yield a cohesive team.

I remember an announcer making a comment during the 2004 American League Championship Series about the Yankees team being one of the best he had ever seen on paper and his counterpart responding something about the Red Sox actually showing up to finish the series on the field. Not only did I enjoy his sarcastic jab at the Yankees, I loved his point that a group of folks choosing to work as a team can perform so much better than even the most talented individuals working near one another but independently.

If we think back to how things can go really wrong in an organization when our core values, whether we have articulate definitions for each or not, when the people counting on us for leadership don’t see us deliberately walking our talk. Even if we’re fortunate enough to keep the talent on our roster, it’s highly unlikely that the individuals with that talent will have a reason to rally around a common goal. Without values serving as a foundation, those talented team members may actually put more energy into competing against one another than collaborating, so we’ll look at how to recognize and address that next.