You’re managing a team in Servant Leadership. What are the best tools for keeping everyone on the same page?

We strongly recommend the FAST goal framework for organisations embracing Servant Leadership. Many of you know what FAST stands for 1. Frequently Discussed 2. Ambitious 3. Specific 4. Transparent. We have developed toolkits like FAST coaching toolkit to help leaders help themselves and their team members set FSAT goals. FAST goals stand out in comparison with SMART goals in several aspects. Let me highlight just Two of them. 1. Ambitious nature of FAST goals, help people get out of the habit of setting lower goals and then overachieving them. Once you set Ambitious goals, you are making your intentions clear that mere achievement is not the objective. excellence is. 2. Transparent Goals ensure that everyone knows about the Goals.

At Zappos we called OKR's BHAG's (Big Hairy Audacious Goals), and would always ask ourselves if we were living and delivering Wow. Our highest purpose was to live and deliver wow to each other, customers, our community, and shareholders. We believed we could do it, and literally measured our success if someone said Wow!

I love love love OKRs. (John Doerr’s book maps them out beautifully if you’re just learning about them.) OKRs stand for Objectives and Key Results, which are metrics to measure big, bold, steps to dream-achieving goals. OKRs aren’t meant to help you play small. They’re designed to keep a constant tension between where you are right now and where you want to go. It’s the focused eye behind the arrow, set for the target. 🎯 Between the time you release the arrow and hit the goal, everything has to align across teams and inside of teams, it has to stay focused, or obstacles have to be moved quickly. Purpose driven OKRs work best for me, rather than “$1Million xyzs. Compel the masses through the heart so everyone feels direct impact.

Align, Communicate, Empower! 🎯🤝 I'd utilize Goals and OKRs to align team objectives. Project management tools like Asana or Trello organize tasks and progress. Communication tools such as Slack or Microsoft Teams facilitate ongoing dialogue. Feedback tools encourage constructive conversations, while recognition tools celebrate successes, big and small. Incorporating learning tools ensures continuous growth. Just as Jim Collins describes in "Good to Great," harnessing the right tools transforms good teams into great ones, keeping everyone engaged and moving forward.

In the realm of servant leadership, a pivotal foundation lies in cultivating a transparent and collective vision for your team's pursuits. Achieving this often involves deploying tools like goals and OKRs (Objectives and Key Results) to harmonize the team's efforts toward a shared objective and gauge their advancement. Goals embody overarching aspirations, while OKRs provide precise, measurable indicators of success. For instance, a goal to enhance customer satisfaction may manifest in OKRs such as reducing response time, boosting retention rates, and elevating the net promoter score. Collaboratively establishing these goals and OKRs engenders a mutual comprehension of the team's trajectory, fostering accountability.

For me PM task is more of a "common-sense which is placed as a process"- what to prioritize fist, when to prioritize, who and get best results at quicker time with in budget. There are varied tools available now a days - all depends on individual which he or she would prefer to use

For project management, go for tools that are easy to understand. Now, tasks can be organized smoothly, and everyone knows their job. Think of it like having a simple control center for your project. Also, use a shared calendar, like a team schedule, to keep everyone in sync with deadlines and important dates. It's an easy way for the whole team to stay on track and work together smoothly.

Extremamente importante termos a visão macro e muitas vezes também a micro do andamento das atividades, projetos e ações. A maneira mais ágil e que traz resultados visíveis a curto prazo é gerenciar esses cenários através de ferramentas acessíveis, com interface amistosa, recursos atuais e que possa ser acessado em qualquer lugar. Atualmente, nos nossos projetos, temos usado o Trello, Jira, Miro ou Asana… a escolha fica condicionada a características do projeto, equipe e cliente.

As companies gain more maturity in bringing systems in place to manage software projects better, one of the first things they do is standardize the - software development process. With Agile methodologies, and its variants gaining more popularity, tools to track the body of work from end-to-end have garnered significant interest. There are particular toolsets even for measuring OKRs which plug in the real time data to other Project Management software. It makes it overall a very easy way to manage the software project process in a transparent fashion across all stakeholders.

Projektmanagement-Tools sind zweifellos wichtig, aber ihre Verbindung zu Servant Leadership erfordert für mich eine tiefere Reflexion. Die Auswahl sollte nicht nur auf Funktionalität im Sinne Management basieren, sondern auf der Frage, was das Team benötigt, um effektiv und gerne zusammenzuarbeiten. In verteilten Teams liegt der Fokus mehr auf Kollaboration als auf reinem Projektmanagement. Der Servant-Anteil bedeutet, die individuellen Bedürfnisse des Teams zu verstehen und zu erfüllen, anstatt sich ausschließlich auf Tools zu verlassen. Ein bewusster Ansatz bei der Tool-Auswahl fördert nicht nur Transparenz, sondern auch eine unterstützende Umgebung, die die Teamzusammenarbeit fördert und die Werte und Prinzipien von Agilität stärkt.

Servant Leaders love their employees. One of the best ways to show love to your team members is to communicate with them regularly. The skill of active listening is very important in this. Here are a couple of tools we recommend for better communication 1. Stay interview. SHRM has published a stay interview template that leaders can use. 2. 3W framework for feedback. What, so what and now what. Our experience shows that use of this template improves the feedback quality significantly 3. One minute praising template for appreciation. Use Ken Blanchard and Spenser Johnson ‘s one minute praise to appreciate team members. 4. One minute redirect template for correcting: same authors provide great guidelines for redirecting people .

Slack has revolutionized our day-to-day interactions. Its real-time messaging and integration capabilities keep conversations organized and accessible, fostering a culture of instant and effective communication.

For near real-time communication, Slack is a great tool. It also allows you to connect different apps such as Google Drive to it, which notifies you when someone leaves you a comment or responds to yours. I also use the “schedule message” feature frequently. For less time-sensitive needs, I use email because I find this helps people also delineate what is urgent versus what can wait.

Servant leadership thrives on open and transparent communication. Encourage active listening, honest dialogue, and a safe space for team members to share their thoughts and ideas. Foster an environment where everyone feels heard and valued. Regular team meetings, one-on-one check-ins, and feedback sessions are also vital components of effective communication in servant leadership.

Open communication, frequent huddles, TEAMs groups and more allow employees to facilitate greater growth through the promotion of a collaborative environment.

Wichtiger als das Tool für das Feedback sind folgende Punkte: - VERTRAUEN: Ein solides Vertrauensverhältnis ist DIE Voraussetzung für ein nachhaltiges Feedback, denn hier ist beidseitige Offenheit erforderlich (beim Empfänger, aber auch beim Sender!). - KONSTRUKTIV: Der Ton sollte wertschätzend und der Fokus lösungsorientiert sein: Welches Verhalten / welcher Zielzustand ist konkret gewünscht und wie kommt man da hin? Werden eventuell weitere Ressourcen (Mitarbeiter/ Befugnisse etc.) oder auch weitere Kompetenzen (Schulungen) benötigt? - ZEITNAH: Mit dem Feedback bitte nicht auf das nächste Mitarbeiter-Gespräch warten, sondern zeitnah das Gespräch suchen. Ziel sollte es sein so schnell wie möglich blinde Flecken aufzudecken und zu lernen.

One thing I found helpful in developing my last team was the use of feedback. I stopped using the term training and started using developing and constantly kept the line of communication open through the use of individual and team feedback. I found that the best feedback I received was when I created a survey on my leadership style and instead of having my employees complete and return it, I had them send it to my leader. I received honest and open impressions from my employees but the gesture raised my standing with my manager.

Anonymous surveys, or somewhere the team can give feedback really work, maybe implement a monthly call where you run through these will help to ensure feedback and also give an outlet for the them to express their views.

We had a custom tool called 360 reviews. You would send a feedback request to a bunch of different people you worked with, and it asked them all to rate us on how we represented our 10 core values (Google Zappos 10 Core Values), and it gave the option to be anonymous or not. You would then work on your bottom core values, and pick someone in the company you admired for their representation of that value. You would request a meeting with them and ask for their mentorship in that area. It helped build relationships across different personalities and value strengths.

My favorite tool we used was something called Wow bonuses. Each employee was given a $50 budget per month to give to any other employee if they were wow'd by them. They had to write a little paragraph on what they did, and when an employee would rack up a bunch of bonuses, our culture team would recognize them in a larger way either at a company wide all hands or email.

Genuine appreciation and recognition are the most important and easy ways to show that you care about the team or individual. Knowing all the facts to offer meaningful recognition and cater to how each person wants to be recognized is essential to a successful leader. Some prefer it privately, while for some, it means the world gets public recognition.

One thing I have found helpful is encouraging team members to recognize their peers by sharing acts of kindness and knowledge share. This builds team morale and also informs others of their key strengths.

Feedback tools are only effective if you have first established rhe merged for communication and expectations of your team. Feedback is vital and should be based on the strengths of individuals not focused on weakness. Pivoting tasks as needed as the goals progress

I have found a lot of tools to recognise contributions, however, - I have found 'vantage circle' to be one of the best employer-employee platform - employers tie up, employee use various sites to have referred links, accumulate points and redeem for vouchers - flexible in terms of monetary or redemption, whichever case

Ensuring you are serving in leadership is key. Filling in the gaps and potholes, learning as many roles as one can, in addition to not being afraid to take the office trash out is servant leadership. Being a team player, and serving your team is contagious. It starts with you.

As a servant leader you should exhibit curiosity about new tools, processes, concepts, etc. be sure to engage your team in conversations about what courses they have taken, what they have read, listened to, etc. but be sure to listen. Encourage an exchange of ideas on how the concepts could be applied. Taking a training only goes so far, while applying the concepts creates value.

Help your team grow by sharing useful resources, like creating a team library for learning together. It's similar to everyone having access to a shared pool of knowledge. Also, encourage team members to share their skills with each other - think of it as having mini-classroom sessions within the team. That's how everyone can keep learning and getting better at what they do - like building a friendly learning community within your team.

Leading with the *servant leadership* application, a true leader will find L&D as a value-add, not as an extra budgetary burden. If this is handled properly, the organization is in good hands. Furthermore, the servant leader will sit and define the Organizational, Functional, Technical, and Mandate Peoples skills the company needs. They will play a crucial role in promoting a hand-in-glove culture with the L&D team.A true blue print of servant leadership can be smelled and identified from a distance by anyL&D person if s/he has proven in lifelong learning and if you check their profiles they have a certified proofs. True leaders will NEVER let go of a good trainer unless politically puppet played by *TA/HR/Bill/Budget* approving team

Tools are NOT the solution. Good Communication and Understanding are the keys. Tools might help, but they are not the panacea.

Tools are just tools, The true power of servant leadership lies in building trust, fostering open communication, and empowering your team to be active participants in their work and growth. By focusing on these key elements, you can create an environment where everyone feels informed, involved, and invested in the team's success.

Structure creates safety to get weird. And by weird, I mean trying wild, creative ideas, or any sentence that begins with “yeah, and what if…?” Finding the right framework to promote freedom and flexibility can be a collaborative effort with your employees. Ask people. Accept contributions and feedback with open ears and minds. Take it slow, hire an expert consultant to guide you through a transformation with grace.

Continued coaching, mentoring and directing the team in right direction is required and needed. I remember once my manager mentioned that being servant-leader is not easy, it is a thank-less job. Your metrics will be spoken by team's and product's success.

Na minha experiência, ao implementar ferramentas como metas e OKRs, percebi que envolver ativamente a equipe na definição dos objetivos fortalece o senso de propósito. Além disso, ao introduzir ferramentas de feedback contínuo, em vez de avaliações formais ocasionais, promovi um ambiente mais aberto e colaborativo. Essas experiências destacam a importância não apenas de adotar ferramentas, mas de integrá-las holisticamente, considerando a dinâmica única da equipe e incentivando a participação ativa.