TEAM BUILDING
Building A Team In Your Own Capacity
By Lizzie Chege
You have either heard or been taught the acronym for TEAM so many times over the years . I share it here-in for the purposes of my storyline on this column : ‘ T ’ stands for Together ; ‘ E ’ stands for Everyone ; ‘ A ’ stands for Achieves ; while ‘ M ’ stands for More . Simply put , Together Everyone Achieves More !
Let us take a closer look at this from the time the pandemic landed and the current situation . When Covid-19 hit , we disconnected both physically , socially and in our careers . Some of us rushed into businesses blindly due to pay cuts or layoffs and the drastic changes were something we can never forget . Currently , with the pandemic in our ecosystem , we are still dealing with more or less the same issues only now we adopted and are still adapting to the changes all around us .
The fact that we have become more adaptable to the changes around us only goes to show our resilience , strength and capabilities . Like I keep saying “ we got this ”. There are many other changes that are yet to come , and the projection is new businesses opened blindly have got a 50 / 50 chance of success .
Any business doing sanitizers , masks , Agri-business , E-commerce and basically all digital platforms are about to propel in the next 2 to 3 years . And this does not depend on whether or not Covid-19 will persist , it ’ s simply because we all have adapted to being a part of the erupted Digital scene .
This mirrors the doubts and resistance many harbored about online shopping , which has come to pass . Even the brick and mortar businesses have created a digital footprint to complement their drive for traction . This only goes to show how much the changes have drastically revolutionized the business scene , and the amount of energy that has gone into all these changes has already started paying off .
As they say , the only constant thing in life is change , always smell the cheese to know when it starts to mould , that ’ s the only way you will be able to change with the tides .
With Zoom sessions becoming the norm , and no human touch at the end of all tele-sales made during this time we have started learning how to be politer , perhaps even more friendlier and empathetic to the voice on the other end of the line , why ? We ’ ve figured it out finally , you and I can shop for groceries online , Train online and get medical help via an email ! And you know what ? It works .
What I ’ m I getting at ? As Individuals , Companies , and Governments we have all learnt that working together does not necessarily mean being in the same line of work , neither is it being in the same profession , or even in the same premise . Building a team and achieving more means being there for each other , supporting each other without necessarily being there in person , building a community around the same ideologies and sharing our stories on social media so that we can all learn the art of coping .
All the coping mechanisms have proven effective starting with getting feedback from clients to giving it as consumers . We have seen our issues sorted effectively by our Financial Institutions , Sacco ’ s , Banks , the Chama ’ s we go to , our health facilities , to our favorite restaurants .
What ' s more we have hand held our children and seen them learn and embrace change after months of being consumed by too much time on their hands amidst worries on the disrupted school calendar . The education system has adapted to digitization which seems to be working after teething challenges . Our door to door sales has also gone digital and we are selling perhaps a bit more than we were before , we are reaching to other counties and countries from the comfort of our remote working abodes .
So , you know what ; we have all been a huge part of building teams one way or another in each of our individual capacities . We now know the way , we have shown the way , and we are all going the way .
Although looking back on the lessons is important , don ’ t get too drowned there because preparing for what ’ s coming is much more crucial . I say this with utmost conviction , we have become better people , we know how to relate better , communicate better and most of all listen better . We have gone as far as checking on each other from time to time and this is basically the way to go : being your bothers keeper !
The future is a better place with all of us in it , since we have learnt to change with change and not only go with the flow but also go against the tide and come out stronger and better for it .
Lizzie Chege is a Business Development Lead at JamboPay , working in the e-commerce space . You can commune with her via email at : Chegelizzie @ gmail . com .
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