Page 139 - How to Create a Winning Organization

It Takes 10 Hands to Score a Basket
mance is linked to the team’s welfare and survival. When this is ac- 121
complished, you have made each one feel a part of something
much bigger than her or his individual job. You have expanded that
person’s perception of the connection between his or her role in the
organization and the organization itself.

DON’T LET THE WHEELS FALL OFF
I often used the analogy of a race car team at the Indianapolis 500.
The driver gets all the attention and credit as if he alone wins the
race. The driver is much like a top scorer in basketball—Keith
Wilkes or Dave Meyers or Bill Walton, or perhaps similar to a top
producer in your organization, the one with the so-called hot hand.
However, the driver going around the track at 200 miles per
hour is helpless without the rest of the team filling their “lesser”
roles. One man is solely responsible for putting fuel in the car dur-
ing the pit stop; another is responsible for removing and replacing
lug nuts; another takes off the worn tire; another puts on a new
tire. The man responsible for putting fuel into the race car must do
it without making a mistake or another team member—the one
doing “nothing” but holding the fire extinguisher—will be called
on to prevent total disaster.
The team’s success—even the driver’s life—depends on each
member of the group performing his or her job correctly and ex-
peditiously regardless of how big or small the task may seem in re-
lation to the man or woman behind the wheel. Likewise, the
person who answers the telephone at your company plays a role in
your success (or lack thereof). Do this person and the others who
perform the tasks that make your organization really “hum” un-
derstand their connection and contribution? Do you let these in-
dividuals know, for example, how important that first contact with
a potential customer or client is? Or do you let them operate in a
vacuum, unconnected to everything around them?