Sports psychologists and Washington Post columnists Joe Frontiera and Daniel Leidl reveal that process, distilled from five years of research of business, sports and government teams, in their book Team Turnarounds: A Playbook for Transforming Underperforming Teams.
They spoke with CEOs, frontline managers and governors, as well as owners, general managers and coaches in the National Football League, Major League Baseball, and the National Basketball Association to explore what it takes to get a failing team back on track. All of the teams they analyzed—across every sector—reversed their fortunes and did a 180 from failure to success.
The $64K question:
What’s the one ingredient needed for any successful turnaround?
No matter what kind of team it is, the process for a turnaround is the same. A leader has to boldly identify where the turnaround is needed, say it, and then guide the team forward. However, you need trust for any of this to happen—trust within the team that the turnaround is possible and trust from customers or constituents that the turnaround is taking place.