An inspiring, practical and progress-oriented blueprint for energetic achievement.

Amid constant swirl, uncertainty, and complexity is your team capable of doing big things? Too often people are pulled together, labeled a “team,” given a directive, and expected to deliver results quickly. Soon, however, due to lack of focus, increasing pressures and competing priorities the team suffers from DSD: distracted, hopelessly stressed and disconnected from one another. Predictably, the team flatlines and the energy needed to succeed is lost.

Based upon research of what successful teams do to overcome severe odds, Do Big Things presents an intuitive, seven-step process that equips teams with how to quickly and consistently operate in a manner necessary for success.

Team members develop the self-awareness and ability to:

• Bring their best to every situation
• Bring out the best in others in every interaction
• Partner across the business to deliver common objectives

Filled with practical tools and engaging stories of teams today, Do Big Things equips leaders with “the how” to quickly identify and activate the behaviors needed to achieve more than you or your team ever thought possible. Idea and information exchanges interlock the hand, head and heart of each team member to get everyone moving toward a common goal. Increasingly, individually and collectively, the team becomes emotionally stronger and more productive as they do their work.

Do Big Things provides your team with the common language necessary to be authentic, empathetic and transparent, so that potential barriers to success come to light – faster. This empowers the team to be more accountable with an enterprise mindset, because they can have the profound discussions needed to adapt quicker to unforeseen challenges and demonstrate an innovative reflex.

By applying the concepts in this book, the team’s daily interactions are transformed, focus is sustained, and energetic progress toward your goals is triggered. Every member of your team wants to succeed. Do Big Things provides a straightforward method to bring greater meaning to the work everyone does so the team delivers extraordinary performance together.

You know what your team can achieve—now use the proven method to enable them to do it.

CRAIG W. ROSS is CEO at Verus Global. He is coauthor of ONE Team, Degrees of Strength, and Stomp the Elephant in the Office.

ANGELA V. PACCIONE is senior director of client partnerships at Verus Global. She is coauthor of ONE Team.

VICTORIA L. ROBERTS is president at Verus Global, responsible for the execution and scaling of growth strategy.

Read Me First xiii

1 Teams That Do Big Things 1
Teams that achieve significant outcomes distinguish themselves by taking seven essential steps. The Do Big Things Framework outlines the steps research shows teams must take to do anything extraordinary (without team members killing themselves in the process).

2 Teams That Flatline 23
The needs of every business have changed, yet most teams in companies go about teaming the same way they did years ago. Organizations fail to realize their potential when teamwork is transactional and diminishes people. The end of teamwork (as we know it) is at hand.

3 Commit to the Human Imperative 39
The first step in the Do Big Things Framework is to identify and align team members to the human behaviors essential for delivering the business imperative. Often born from a sense of caring for one another, this is the transformative thinking in how team members perceive each other that sets the stage for values to be put into action.

4 Embody Success (and Leverage Failure) 59
Next, ensure the team personifies the spirit and experience of the success they seek while they pursue their lofty objectives. When excellence is who we are (rather than what we will be someday), then even the hardship we encounter in our journey makes us better and stronger as a team.

5 Choose to Contribute, Activate, and Connect Across the Business 75
Teams that do big things have team members who are equipped to make three specific decisions:

1. The Contributor Decision: I choose to bring my best to this situation.

2. The Activator Decision: I choose to bring out the best in others in every interaction.

3. The Connector Decision: We choose to partner across the business to deliver our shared objective.

6 Exercise Your Barrier-Breaking Authority 99
Determine what stands between the team and success—both real and perceived. Then enable the team to control what they can control, and move issues forward faster by acting upon their inherent authority to choose their response.

7 Focus on What Matters 117
Use the 3 Mind Factors to concentrate on and deliver what causes big things to be achieved: the relationships and teamwork necessary to succeed.

8 Energize Around a Shared Reality 141
Use the Energy Map to make sure the team can tell the truth and function with authenticity. Effectively guide the focus and the common language essential to elevate how team members interact with one another. This step facilitates the needed skills of adaptability and accountability required to do big things.

9 Mobilize Hearts and Minds Forward 169
Empower the team to create and own their role in delivering a stronger future. Use Questions That Trigger Hearts and Minds so everyone internalizes and delivers the team’s business imperative.

10 Is Your Team Ready to Do Big Things? 193
Will the team overcome hidden forces in the culture that sabotage best efforts and destroy teams? Where does your team currently stand in its strength and ability to do big things? Answer these questions by using the simple Team Heart Quotient to assess how ready your team is to do big things.

What Big Things Will Your Team Do? 213

Notes 215

Key Terms and List of Tools 225

Acknowledgments 227

About the Authors 229

Index 231