Jennifer Tomasik
Principal
I was recently interviewed for a feature article in Healthcare Executive magazine focused on “future fitting” leadership teams at a time of tremendous change and turmoil in healthcare. Building the right leadership team is so essential – not only in healthcare, but arguably every industry and organization. Teams have the unique ability to take their individual strengths and expertise and create a whole that is far greater than the sum of the individual parts.
Fostering the environment for a high performing team that has trust, psychological safety and effective communication takes great skill on any given day, but it’s particularly important (and challenging!) during times of leadership transition. New leaders need to quickly understand how to assess their teams and determinewhether or where to make adjustments. Acting too quickly,or too slowly, can have negative reverberations across the organization. In thinking about these issues, I was reflecting on the wisdom of my colleague and CFAR Founder, Tom Gilmore. Tom spent decades working and reflecting with leaders at critical moments of transition. This year marks the 35th anniversary of his book, Making a Leadership Change: How Organizations and Leaders Can Handle Leadership Transitions Successfully. I find myself referring to this book quite frequently – all these many years later! The lessons and ideas are as, or perhaps even more, relevant today as they were when it was initially published. As we celebrate the anniversary of this terrific book, I hope you will find this particular chapter of interest: Building the New Management Team. It’s filled with important insights about how to both assess and build teams in ways that accelerate their effectiveness and performance. Enjoy!