Growing a team pt 2: Developing your self awareness
As part of our blog series on ‘Building an effective team when you are working solo’ I want to start by talking about self-awareness. Very few people go through a process of understanding what they actually want and need from work, and from working with others. We often find ourselves looking at what other people are doing and thinking that must be what I need or what I should be doing. Creating regular opportunities to self-reflect and build that awareness will make it easier for you to build relationships with others as you grow your team.
If you are someone like me who chose to start your own business after being employed by someone else it’s likely you’ve done some of this processing already. Self-employment can be scary and risky but many people intentionally take that risk because they know there’s an opportunity for them to do the work they want to do in the way they want to do it.
However, even if you do know why you run your business in the way you run it it there will still be things you need to build your awareness of before you can expect to build a thriving work relationship with someone else. Below are just a few things that have worked for me when starting out on the journey of building teams and partnerships both at Collaborative Future and in previous roles.
Be clear on your values
One of the reasons I work with other freelancers and small businesses to deliver Collaborative Future work is because I actively value diversity and flexibility. So when I’m considering who to work with this means I look for partners who have different backgrounds and experiences to myself and can bring a different lens to my work. In terms of flexibility, it’s not that everyone I work with needs to value flexibility as much as I do, or even adopt the same approaches to flexibility as I do, it’s more that they need to see and understand why flexibility is important. I’ll often get to test this in our early interactions - how do they cope when I need to juggle our meeting around my kids? How do they react when I tell them the project plan might need to adapt to individual needs and circumstances as we go?
It is also knowing these values that has helped me to be more intentional about specifically working with other freelancers, rather than trying to build up a permanent team at this stage. In the world of work we often let so many of our decisions centre around finances - can I afford to hire someone else right now? Would hiring someone enable my business to earn more money? But this way of thinking about things can be very limiting. Knowing your values will help you define what else you’d want to gain from working with others, and sharing them explicitly will help you build mutually beneficial relationships that work for everyone.
Focus on what boosts your energy
My energy is directly related to the relationships I have with other people. If I don’t have enough dialogue with other people, or if I don’t make time to help other people to explore their challenges, then my energy takes a hit. It’s important for me to know this before embarking with working with others because I can then communicate that with people and they can understand why I want to spend more time talking with them than they might want to spend with me. In contrast you may find that you actually need alone time to boost your energy and being aware of that will enable you to explain to the people you’re working with that sometimes you need a few days where you aren’t contactable.
There may also be elements of working relationships that have drained your energy in the past. In fact, if you’ve actively chosen to go freelance or work for yourself it’s possible that the draining elements of working with colleagues may have influenced your decision. For example, if you know you find long meetings that cover multiple topics draining then you can actively tell people this and set up your working relationship in a way that meets your needs. We’re running a ‘Developing the foundations for effective working relationships’ workshop in a couple of weeks which will give you practical tools for defining expectations and ways of working together that take everyone’s needs into account.
Know what makes you unique
Something that holds all of us back when we work with others is our ego. No matter how hard we try we all have moments of becoming controlling because unconsciously our ego wants us to be the most important person in a room, or getting defensive when our ego is bruised.
Through my diversity and inclusion work I’ve discovered the huge power of focussing on what makes individuals unique. Not only does focussing on our own strengths and our unique experience mean that we are more motivated in our work, but it also reduces defensiveness and other protective behaviours when working in teams because everyone feels they are contributing a different and unique value to that work.
The interns and the businesses that take part in our 6-month programme will gain access to a full strengths report from High5 , and we will use this to match people that compliment one another. Working with people that compliment your unique strengths and experience not only helps you to value what they bring to your work but it also helps you to value yourself and focus your efforts on where you can have most impact.
Make space to keep learning
I’ve been receiving coaching, participating in regular training and actively soliciting feedback on my approach as a colleague, partner, manager and business owner for most of my career and I still have plenty to learn. I make building my self-awareness and my personal development a habit so that it never falls by the wayside because I know how much it helps me to create meaningful relationships. Not only am I part of other communities that encourage me to develop my self-awareness such as the Thrive Society and Tech Nottingham, but I also make this core to the work I do for the Collaborative Future community. Part of the reason I set up our book club was to force myself to prioritise my learning and development - I knew that having a shared goal and space with other people would make me commit to that learning.
If you’re building your team and need to develop your own self-awareness then joining our Collaborative Future work placement programme will help you on this journey. You’ll gain access to all of our training workshops, webinars and online community, plus if you become a Collaborator you’ll get hands-on support for your business from our pool of interns and access to our coaches.