Me, Myself, My Team: How to Become an Effective Team Player Using NLP - Softcover

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Professor Angus McLeod is pre-eminent in coaching technology and practice. His company Angus McLeod Associates trains coaching-skills for managers, leadership and management development 'learning journeys' and e-learning solutions as well as supplying 1-2-1 coaching. They also supply 'ASK MAX', the world's first e-mentoring service, a cost-effective way of getting top coaches into organizations for a whole day at a time, where they coach several people during each day. He is also Principal of the Coaching Foundation, an e-learning platform for practical learning of coaching skills. They cover both life- and executive-coaching as well as business development programmes for coaches as well. A wide range of blended-learning is offered including video-tutorials, webinars, series of small-group tutorials (online) and an e-learners community with monitoring and tutoring by professional coaches. Angus is also Visiting Professor of Coaching at Birmingham City University and a supervisor of PhD applied research in coaching and leadership.

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When I first made the move from academia into industry I

re-invented myself as a go-getting, success-at-any-cost manager. I was bright, self-assured and got things done. People who got in the way of my vision of the corporate goals were manoeuvred out. I was operating from a set of ideas and beliefs which, although apparently successful, made a nonsense of benefits that come from real teamwork or the 'two plus two equals five' phenomenon. What changed me was the catalyst of pain. I rose fast and was cut down twice, in each case my patterns and competencies being outmatched by more politically agile people. With hindsight it would have been cleverer not to fail but to make the essential changes in thinking performance for myself. The two essential traits necessary for that to happen are openness (to challenge and new ideas) and flexible thinking. Each of us is already gifted with phenomenal ability. And some of that ability is invariably trapped in set ideas and beliefs that limit our perception and the chance to perform superbly. The keys to releasing our abilities are those two traits: openness to challenge and new ideas, and flexible thinking. This book is designed to develop openness and flexibility by offering you a set of tools which may be used to create your own change and success both as an individual and as a Team achiever. The first part of this book investigates the similarity/difference you have with your Team as a means of introducing some of the flexible thinking skills that will be used throughout the book. It may be useful to quickly read through the similarity/difference chapters whether you complete the working examples or not. The book is designed as a working manual and reference book which refers both backwards and forwards to other work and working examples. Much of the thinking behind the book comes from current practice and ideas in coaching, learning science, neuro-linguistic programming, and integration coaching. My premise is that individuals operate internally as Teams. For example, I am a Team leader in directing and compelling myself to take my horse over a bigger jump, but there is another part of me (my internal 'follower') which is fearful of doing this! And there may be Team communication going on in my head: 'Go for it!' and 'That's too big!' This approach opens up new perceptions and learning for both the individual and the Team in which he works. I would further argue that unless each individual has a properly functioning and efficient Internal Team, his performance in real Teams is questionable. My aim in sharing this book is to address the Internal Team and extend that thinking into the real (External) Team. The process is one that encourages both flexible thinking but also unique and individual solutions for each reader. My belief is that readers are more compelled to work through their own solutions than to borrow a standard 'system' from management theory. It is part of this thinking that I bring to my work as a coach in business, catalysing individuals to fly. With luck, the receiving Teams will also embrace this work, and the beating of individual wings will be in harmony, allowing the Team to soar beyond the limitations of other Teams. In my experience, any change in one individual leads to change within the Team. Even if only one person is flying, others will quietly practise and adapt themselves for flight! Enough of metaphor! The premise I make is that 'culture' is the result of similar behaviours but it grows by the dynamics of similarity/difference. The skills in this book enable you to have more choice about where you have similarity or difference with your Team (or a desired Team that you aspire to work within). When you change your behaviours then it creates change around you. Where others match this in the Team, you have a changed culture. Matching behaviours constitute Team culture. Your effort can therefore help the success of your organisation and is measurable by you. You can do this by noticing the changes that happen around you and whether or not these changes are in harmony with your own choice of behaviours.