15 Team Members Your Business Needs To Be Successful

15 Team Members Your Business Needs To Be Successful

You may be really skilled in your field or business.

You may even have a number of workers currently giving your business the kind of support it needs.

However, when that pressing time comes – the time that demands a certain kind of skill you may not currently have on your team, you have to get specific team members to make your project and overall business successful. This might mean 20-30% of your entire staff.

Mind you, your regular employees are no less than these team members. The only difference is that the latter is seriously needed for a crucial time/task. This article highlights the kinds of workers you should have on your team especially when it’s a short notice plan.

1. The Competent Worker

The labour market is full of workers, but what truly differentiates a worker from a professional is competence. If the team member isn’t competent i.e you can’t rely on this person to deliver quality service, then you are really just pouring water in a basket.

Competence is not just skilfulness. Competence is to deliver an agreed and satisfactory result without faults.

In a football scenario for instance, if you are a striker, and you dribbled six defenders and ended up not scoring a goal, then you’ve just ended up entertaining your fans since you couldn’t get the desired end result.

2. The Creative Worker

I am very sure I am not the only one with a strong detest for the ‘usual’. I hate it when usual becomes normal, and normal refuses to improve because normal is easy and cosy. Listen, nothing great was ever achieved from a comfort zone.

Creativity is the bedrock for development. You need creative team members to actually make a difference in your business. Creative workers can take your company to the next level with new ideas and inventions. In a contingency situation, make sure you choose the creative option to the mind-numbing ‘usual’.

Personally, I am a huge fan of creativity and a rather big antagonist for mediocrity and normal. I fear that creativity is being downtrodden sometimes, however, I try to remind people that no great invention/discovery will happen while doing normal things. Honestly, I can pay twice as much for a creative worker.

They will most likely figure out a new way of performing a particular task and save the business loads of money in the future. I hope you see what I mean. A creative team member is flexible, adaptive and open. I like to advise new managers to not strictly define a particular approach to tasks, instead, try to give employees some space to practice new ideas that might just put the business on a new level.

3. The Team Worker

Have you ever wondered why termites could eat up a whole tree in one day? Termites are social insects which means they work together. One termite, however, is so small and negligible, but when they come together they become very powerful. It goes to prove that two good heads are better than one.

Teamwork is a blessing to any business. When workers can successfully come together, communicate and organize each other to perform a certain task, the results are usually better than that of a one-man squad.

A good team member should be able to adapt and adjust properly with others to achieve a common goal.

Read: 21 Keys To Becoming An Effective Leader in the workplace

4. The Consistent Worker

Consistency is a brand image on its own. Consistency is reliability. If you can’t count on your team members to deliver with the same enthusiasm, then you really need another team. Consistent people are highly regarded in any society.

These are people that will give you their word and you can hold them by that word. When an inconsistent worker tells you he can deliver a proposal tomorrow, a part of you will want to arrange for a plan B because the worker isn’t reliable.

However, when you always have to arrange a plan B, then your team members aren’t reliable.

5. The Flexible Worker

If you live in an area prone to natural disasters like hurricanes, or floods, it is really a bonus to have flexible workers that can adjust. Work in conditions that might not be too conducive. Very flexible team members are like gold. Willing to stick around even in very bad situations.

I know a friend who had two workers he now calls partners. There was a really bad flood in Lagos state Nigeria and my friend had just two workers who still showed up for work that day. He was really joyful and went ahead to give them a raise.

6. The Accountable 

As much as your team members in your business are brought on board to perform a particular task, they must also be accountable for their actions for the period of time they will be working with you as a company.

If he was to finalize a business deal or solve a client’s problem, he should also be able to account for any miscellaneous spending during the course of the trip.

The Lack of accountability leads to corruption, laxity and premium complacency. Imagine if workers didn’t have to answer for their actions, your business might as well be an 18th-century monarchy with a leader who has absolutely no one to answer to other than his conscience.

It is a complete disaster; there is no discipline or creativity, just people who don’t care because nobody cares.

7. The Professional

Imagine skills without professionalism in a corporate setting. It is analogous to an ostrich – although they can run as fast as any sports car, they can never take a flight. Your business team members should be professional enough when they offer services on behalf of the business.

The last thing you want is to have your business overwhelmed by the unprofessionalism of your team members. Therefore, it is important to lay down a couple of company rules to prevent one of those brand-burying scandalous incidents.  

8. The Eloquent Worker

Statistics have shown that a great number of contingent workers are hired for important company tasks such as proposals, presentations and special customer service. In order for your team to be able to carry out such tasks, they must be able to present your companies case, portfolio or proposal orally. 

An eloquent worker is a valuable asset to any company. Let me drop like a little tip here – A major factor that decides if your proposal will be accepted or not isn’t the way it’s written on paper. In fact,  your oral representation does the whole persuasion, the paper is merely a formality.

9. The Compliant Worker

You know when you give out explicit instructions, and you come back a few minutes later to find out that things were done a little differently. I don’t know about you, but this could really set me off. So, in order to avoid situations like this, why not just settle for the compliant team members from the get-go.

Frankly, there are people who are biased and hate to see things any other way. These kinds of people can pose a serious threat to your business, especially if your business is seriously reliant on the power of teamwork. 

This isn’t a character that can hide for long. You should be able to filter these characters out like chaff in rice.

10. The Diligent Worker

Diligence, I will say, is very important in any person’s life. It’s a virtue that you must imbibe as an individual to move fast in life. Diligence is dedication towards perfecting a particular task to the best of your ability. I remember as a kid my dad will continuously tell me why I should be diligent in everything I do. I got to find out the benefits that come with doing something well.

A diligent worker is priceless. They are as rare as diamonds and hey, it’s really not about the compensation after a diligent work, it’s more about the satisfaction within yourself that you did your best.

A diligent team member will make sure that customers get the service they deserve value for their money. This is one of the reasons why the diligent handle customer service well because they have the patience to talk and listen to customers complaints.

Read: Creative Ways To Retain Employees

11. The Diplomatic 

It is only normal that your routine workers feel a little bit edgy about having some faces come to fill up positions for a while. This is one of the reasons why your key members should be a little bit diplomatic, especially when working as a team.

This is something you should look out for when employing new staff. You want to avoid frictions in your office due to bad blood between your entire staff.

12. Efficient team members 

Obviously, your core team members should be effective, especially when making use of company resources. If they aren’t effective, they will not only waste your time, but also waste your resources as a startup which generally mean they are wasting your money.

Staff must be effective each time they are directing efforts to secure customers/clients for the business, which is what you are paying them for anyway.

Read: 10 human rights and ethics in the workplace

13. The Self-Motivated

A driven team member doesn’t need to be a push to work. I personally hate pushing people to get stuff done.

It’s stressful, unnecessary and the worker in question may not give his best because they were hard-pressed to get the work done. Imagine having to remind your employee to work on a proposal every single day and end up with half-baked results. This is premium nonsense and you shouldn’t tolerate such anywhere, even in smaller corporations.

14. Hard-working team

It is quite difficult to find a worker who doesn’t succumb to the usual ‘it isn’t my business, so why should I care?’.

Finding people, who are willing to work hard every day they show up for work, throw in that commitment, passion like it is their own business is also very priceless. What I am trying to say in essence is – find a guy that can work the talk, simple.

15. The Passionate

Passion is a driving force! It is paramount that your first team members as a startup are passionate about what they do. If there is no passion, there is no drive, and without drive, workers are complacent, lazy and unimaginative. For instance, you want to hire a worker for a voluntary program, you can check applicants’ records for previous accounts of community service.

This is one of the ways to check for passion. Someone who voluntarily decides to work without pay for the benefit of the less privileged, community or for the general public is most likely to give twice as much effort when you compensate them.

It applies to all walks of life. Passion is usually the key to success in any career. With passion, you can be sure to succeed in your profession, as long as you make that initial energy constant.

Conclusion

Even though your in-house or contingent team members are temporary hands for a task, it does not take away the fact that they are your employees and you should treat them as such. They will be using your resources and will also be getting paid, therefore, you should demand their undivided commitment to your brand.

Remember to allow them to work and get creative, accommodate their changes and consider their advice on what needs to change. That external opinion is usually good for your business as well.