Just like playing a game

Royal Match is one of the games I play to glean leadership lessons

I wish I knew then what I know now.

We’ve all said that before, right?

I’ve been thinking about my experiences working with a new team where I was the leader. There was the first team of one who HR encouraged me to fire on Valentine’s Day. Then I was thrown into a larger team of nine with prior knowledge of only two team members. These poor teams were exposed to my biggest learning curve.

Today, I am thinking about working with a new team like playing a new game on my phone. [Yes, I have a few games I cycle through when I need to give my mind a distraction from itself – don’t worry! I always quit before I have to spend any money… but not always before I’ve been sucked into a rabbit hole of what I like to call sheer determination.]

I approach every new game without reading the non-existent user guide. I play it over and over again until I get to know what each game piece does, paying attention to the end goal in each game. Some game pieces begin to show their superpowers with just one touch. When a group of the same color combines, they can create a new superpower. The greater the number in the combination, the more powerful they become. When that superpower connects to another game piece close to it, it can leverage their collective power. I watch for opportunities to use a superpower which can connect with another superpower which then creates even more superpowers and unlocks others. That is what I like to call great teamwork ;)

I am then in a better position to be more strategic about how I use these game pieces. I can be more deliberate in saving a superpower for a more powerful action. A fresh example comes to mind from the most recent Superbowl game where Travis Kelce of the Kansas City Chiefs was on the sideline watching a teammate fumble the ball near the end zone and had a major meltdown on his coach, who obviously was saving Kelce for a bigger play later in the game.

[Sidebar: Coach Reid used an interesting approach with his “passionate” player which fired him up, as well as the rest of the team…which resulted in their Superbowl win.]

That’s how I began thinking about working with a new team – after my learning curve. I needed to spend time upfront with each team member in order to get to know them and to uncover their superpower. There are varying degrees of self-awareness in play here. For those who don’t know what their superpower is, this opens the door to some beautiful team building potential.

I think I can already hear you exclaim, “People don’t come with a set of instructions. Life would be so easy if they did!”

But what if we did have our very own user guide?

Imagine a scenario where each team member, including the leader, created their own user guide and brought them to a group discussion. We could look for similarities. Then look for where we differ. How far apart are our differences? How much of that actually even matters? Oh, and we could also look for opportunities to help each other spot our blind spots. Wouldn’t that be amazing?

We would take some time to test our assumptions – see how it really plays out in real time. We could lock in the good. Refine what works. Chuck the unimportant. Then go back to see what we might have missed in the first instance.

I am starting to work on my own user guide now. I’ll share that with you when I finish it.

Does this make you want your own user guide?

Image: A screenshot from Royal Match