Sharing Life Stories Builds Trust and Tolerance in Teams
In 2015 I attended a team event in Washington DC. We had the rare opportunity to get the global HR Leadership Team together, we were a large team and diverse in terms of our disciplines and locations. It was a good opportunity to spend some quality time together working as a team.
We had a wonderful facilitator who talked us through Patrick Lencioni’s ‘Five Dysfunctions of Team’ and if you’re familiar with it, you’ll know the model states that trust is the foundation of any high performing team. To build trust, the plan was that we would share our life journey with our team mates. We’d talk about significant milestones and events that had shaped and influenced the people we are today. A simple but powerful concept as we become more open and a little bit vulnerable with the people we work with. I remember our facilitator saying, ‘after this exercise things will never be the same again’. She was right.
What hit me that day was that everyone has a story. Most people live a rollercoaster of highs involving love, pride and achievement (to name a few) as well as times of adversity, pain and challenge. Listening to my colleagues tell their stories made me see them differently, I had new found respect and affection for people I’d worked with for years but simply didn’t really know. My relationships with my colleagues changed for the better. We’d trusted each other with our stories which were told with emotion and passion and received with compassion and care. We understood each other better for it.
Since that day, whether I’m a team member, a team leader or facilitator, I use this very same exercise to build trust and awareness in teams. It continues to be a powerful way of helping teams raise awareness of the diversity in their team, not just in terms of personality, cognitive or social characteristics (all very important) but in terms of where each team member has come from and how their life experiences have shaped the way they are today. I see how it unlocks trust and builds tolerance and understanding of each other’s values, strengths and foibles (we all have them).
My Mum died aged 50 of liver failure when I was 23 years old, her life and her death has had a fundamental influence on the way I am today. For those who I have worked with who know me well, they will know that the 10 years leading up to my Mum’s death influenced many life decisions for me such as a passion for seeing the world and having a career that would always be fulfilling and give me financial independence. Those who know me really well, will know that I’m not my usual self for a few days in early November. I am more melancholy and reflective than I would usually be. It’s not a conscious state, it just happens as I approach another anniversary and reminder of life without my Mum in it.
We don’t always know what is going on in the lives of our colleagues but I have learnt (following our time in DC) that everyone has a story and it is that knowledge that makes us less judgmental and more tolerant and supportive of those around us.