Your team is struggling to meet deadlines. How can you ensure everyone understands their expectations?

To ensure everyone on the team understands their expectations and meets deadlines, clear communication is essential. Start by holding a kickoff meeting to outline the project's scope, objectives, and deadlines, ensuring everyone understands their specific roles and responsibilities. Set realistic deadlines by breaking down the project into manageable tasks with individual deadlines that are achievable. Provide detailed documentation of the project plan, including timelines and deliverables, and make this documentation easily accessible to all team members. Schedule regular check-ins to review progress, address any issues, and adjust plans as needed.

Supporting your team to build skills in effective time management can go a long way. Coaching, workshops and conversations can help to build these skills. Understanding the needs of the team, whether they are under stress or demotivated and addressing any issues can be helpful. Encouraging team members to manage their time effectively, through understanding when they work at their best, utilising calendars and timers. Delegating tasks more effectively, breaking down tasks and removing distractions or unnecessary work can also be helpful.

IBM maintained its market leadership for many years, partly due to the effectiveness of its sales force. IBM’s sales quotas were lower than industry standards. This approach was intentional and part of IBM’s broader sales strategy. By having a lower quota not only was the sales team less intimidated to pick up the phone and sell, but they were regularly achieving their targets and receiving a payoff. This boosted the morale and confidence of the sales force, which in turn, increased their productivity and commitment to the company. By managing their goals in digestible increments, IBM was able to maintain its dominance and create a more productive and effective team.