The use of small wins and breakthrough projects is especially important when organizations are going through difficult times and teams feel overwhelmed by the changes. Through this tactic teams learn to redirect their energy toward factors that are directly within their scope of control and are better able to buffer themselves against stress. When selecting [...]

Remind your team of its past successes. During tough times, people become preoccupied with the difficulties they are facing and the setbacks they’ve experienced. The talk in the hallways and the company cafeteria begins to focus on the big contract that was just lost, rumors of impending layoffs, or the problems created by the latest [...]

Redefine achievable performance. An important tactic is to encourage members to raise their expectations for their own performance. You may find benchmarking a helpful tool for accomplishing this perceptual shift. Benchmarking can force members to challenge their assumptions about the best possible performance that can be expected within a given area and to identify the [...]