Fuel Your Team's Success

I don’t know how my car works. 🚗

I mean, I have a general idea, but beyond the fuel injector and the engine and the transmission, I'm not really sure how they put it together. There’s a lot of technical know-how that I’ll never have.

But despite all this, I still put gas in it regularly. And it runs really well. I know where to get the gas, how to put it in, and I fill it up. I make sure that there’s always some fuel and oil in there so I can get where I’m going.

Similarly, as a leader, you might have people on your team whose job you really don't fully understand. You may not know who to do all parts of their jobs. You can give them general direction but you have to trust them to do their job with excellence.

So how do you keep the car humming at (or above, if we're being honest) the speed limit?

You have to put in the right fuel. The right energy. As a leader, the fuel is all of this:

⛽ positive energy, encouragement, and appreciation
⛽ training opportunities
⛽ one on one time with you
⛽ pay increases and bonuses and title changes
⛽ the autonomy and latitude to feel trusted in using their expertise
⛽ trust to use the knowledge that they have or to figure it out and try things
⛽ access to leaders who are above you or leaders in other parts of the company
⛽ connecting them with opportunities outside of your organization, if need be

All of this is the fuel that drives performance and energy.

So fill your team with the fuel that they need to keep going. You don’t have to be an expert and what they do. You don’t have to tell the car how to do what it does. Just fill it with positive energy fuel. Set a general direction. And I’ll see you at the destination.

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Mike Lyons is an HR professional and consultant in the Austin, TX area. He can be found on LinkedIn.