Show up, Speak up, Step up, Own up, and now Team up!
Today’s organizations are like rowing teams - your actions are either moving the boat forward or hurting its progress. You can’t sit out. If you don’t do your bit, you are a deadweight slowing down the boat. If you are brilliant but not in sync with the team, you might be rowing in the opposite direction!
In college, you win when you do better than your classmates. At work, doing better than your peers does not guarantee success - you “beat” your colleague, but then, they are on the same team as you, so your “winning” might even “hurt” the team! This is a difficult transition for early career professionals because all along in school and college, your individual brilliance has automatically resulted in success, whereas in organizations, you need to channel that individual brilliance towards team goals.
Can I not be individually successful even if my team fails? Why should I care for the team’s success? Of course, you can be, but you won’t reach your full potential. Would a Messi and Ronaldo, with all their individual brilliance, have been as successful if they consistently ended up on the losing side? Stars need the team as much as teams need stars! And to put a philosophical spin on this, is there much meaning to your individual success if it didn’t help your team win?
This is also a difficult transition because you need to set aside your ego, and act selflessly at times. We’ll leave it to you to make that journey, but here are some practical tips to consider:
Cooperate, don’t compete. Operate with a mentality of how can I help the team or colleagues, and in turn, how can I benefit from them?
Respect your peers. The ones who you started your career with will turn out to be your biggest network and support group 5-10 years down the line.
If they are smarter than you, learn from them. You can’t beat them if they are that good anyways!
If you are smarter than them, teach them. Worried that will make you less valuable? Well, then are you really smarter than the team?
Remember the rowing team imagery. If you are not helping the boat move forward, you are moving it backward!