Of The Three Skills, Not Keeping Score comes immediately to mind when thinking about how the skills apply. This is because of the negative impact that judging others has on workplace camaraderie and team building.
In his book, The Five Dysfunctions of a Team: A Leadership Fable, author Patrick Lencioni makes a strong case for team building based on overcoming five separate dysfunctions.
The first dysfunction he lists is Absence of Trust. He goes on to say that Absence of Trust is foundational and high performance, as in a high-performance team, is impossible to achieve unless the Absence of Trust is overcome.
Those of you who are familiar with Stop Keeping Score and Nurturing Intimacy will recognize how quickly scorekeeping erodes trust in relationships. Indeed, Absence of Trust is the fruit of regular scorekeeping. In other words, trust is built when the norm is acceptance and reasonable expectations.
Just imagine your own experience and feelings of safety when you are being judged harshly, compared to when your best efforts are accepted and perhaps even applauded. In which environment do you feel like you can show weakness and ask for help in?
In closing, I’ll say that if you want your workplace to be more functional or if you want your work teams to improve their performance, learn the lessons of Not Keeping Score to build a foundation of trust!