Team Building - Full Sail Leadership Academy

Opportunity on the Horizon

4 min read

Have you ever seen a person tattooed with the word “quitter?” Never giving up is about as American as apple pie.

So why are so many people quitting? We are currently in the middle of what social scientists are calling “The Great Resignation.”

The U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics reported that over four million Americans quit their jobs in August 2021. That’s essentially 3% of the entire workforce.

Four more million quit in April. Now we’re up to 6% of the workforce. Unless some of the people who resigned in April quit in August as well.

Imagine the impact. Derek Thompson from The Atlantic paints this picture: “..one in 14 hotel clerks, restaurant servers, and barbacks said sayonara in a single month.”

You’ve probably felt this. Longer wait times at restaurants. Low levels of inventory. “Now Hiring” signs are everywhere. With sign-on bonuses.

Tipping Point

This may be what Malcom Gladwell calls a cultural tipping point. 2020 crashed through our neatly ordered living rooms. Pandemics and civil rights movements knocked over the living Monopoly Boards many relied on.

According to several studies, culture “tips” in a new direction when 25 % – 35% of people walk down a different path than the current status quo.

While we may not be at the tipping point, overall, many industries may be on the brink.

A Break In The Clouds

If you’re a leader in an organization or an entrepreneur – how does this make you feel? Anxious? Concerned? Hopeful? Optimistic?

Can you see the opportunity on the horizon? Consider how The Great Resignation may just be the wind your sails need.

Why are so many people resigning? Have we tipped into a culture of laziness? Entitlement? Many have found that they can make more money on unemployment than from their employer.

Would that feel fulfilling, though? Could you look in the mirror with pride if you had no meaningful work? Purpose? Vocation?

While you may want to rest on the sea for a minute to catch your breath, absorb some beauty, get lost in awe and wonder – you do not want to live there.

What are you looking for in your career? What would make you jump ship? What could keep you holding on?

Richer than Money

How about dignity? Respect? Purpose? While some former workers are certainly taking the money and running, many aren’t resigning for more or easier money.

Consider volunteerism. People freely give their energy to what makes them feel dignity and purpose. 25% of Americans volunteer their time to an organization. That, to the tune of over $184 billion annually!

Money isn’t all that matters.

We all desire to be treated with respect. When people don’t feel respected in their workplace, they will likely cut ties in search of greener pastures.

The authors of the best-selling book Crucial Conversations say it well. “Respect is like air. As long as it’s present, nobody thinks about it. But if you take it away, it’s all that people can think about.”

This begs the million-dollar question – what makes people feel respected in general and in the workplace in particular?

The answer is simple. But don’t confuse simple with easy.

R-E-S-P-E-C-T – Find Out What It Means to Them

If you swim through the sea of content on “respect in the workplace,” you will find one common theme beneath the surface.

Communication.

People want to know they are seen. They want to feel like they matter. Employees want their employer to embrace the challenge of work-life harmony. With them.

How does this happen? It boils down to communication.

Communication is more than the act of speaking. Or listening. Or body language. Though all are required. And essential.

Healthy communication requires a heart that desires to see other people. To respect them. To empathize. To try to understand the perspective of another.

Further, good communicators appreciate different forms of communication. Written. Interpersonal. Public. Nonverbal.

But not as a salesperson. More so as an ally who recognizes what different people need to feel heard and respected.

Comprehensive communication runs deeper than form or skill. Timing and purpose are essential. Healthy leaders intuitively sense the difference between the time to cast vision, address conflict, offer encouragement, and more.

Opportunity on the Horizon

Can you see the opportunity on the horizon? Workers across the country are demanding respect. Respect demands communication.

Communication is a resource you can provide.

You may not be able to offer fame or fortune. But you can have an abundance of the resource everyone is actually asking for – respect.

Full Sail Leadership Academy has been charting these waters for years. Licensed U.S. Coast Guard Captain, Certified John Maxwell Facilitator, and Certified ASA Sailing Instructor, Captain Tim Dittloff offers workshops, coaching, and certification that will empower you to seize this opportunity.

Don’t miss this moment. The wind is right. Let us come alongside you, raise your sails, and point you to the golden opportunity on the horizon.

Over the next several months, we’ll dive into the importance of communication in leadership. We’ll address conflict, meaningful feedback, casting vision, listening, and more.

Stay connected by subscribing. Contact us directly. Or cruise through our course offerings.

A sea of opportunity awaits. Let’s set sail together.

December 8, 2021/0 Comments/by Full Sail Leadership

The Importance of Team Building: How Confidence Affects Leadership Development

Leadership Development, Team Building

4 min read

The cold waves of Lake Michigan lap at the sailboat. Above deck, a well-synchronized team works to trim the sails and maintain course over the choppy water.

But one young man sits by himself, watching his teammates work. He seems to be actively disengaged from the challenge at hand, and his coworkers mutter among themselves about his laziness as they shoot glares at him.

He senses their resentment, and it makes him feel even more alienated.

The truth is, he isn’t lazy. He wants to help trim the sails but he doesn’t know-how. And now that he sees the hostile looks and believes his teammates hate him, he feels like he can’t ask them for advice and guidance to join in. It’s better to sit quietly out of the way and let them handle the work.

This situation happens time and time again, in many different settings and conditions. Whether it’s on a sailboat, in a construction zone, shipping center, office, or anywhere else, employees fall through the cracks when a lack of confidence causes them to stand on the sidelines.

They’re missing out on leadership and growth opportunities, not to mention hurting the team by reducing productivity. This is a serious problem in today’s workplace.

But how can steward leaders spot the signs and take proactive action to keep their teams working like a well-oiled machine?

3 Ways to Nurture Confidence for Team Building and Leadership Development

The hypothetical young man on the sailboat isn’t an anomaly. Chances are, you know someone just like him.

Gallup estimates that only 36% of employees are engaged at work, while 13% are actively disengaged.

Lack of interest and motivation can be attributed to a variety of factors both inside and outside of the workplace. Employers can only do so much when their employees are struggling with personal issues beyond the scope of work, but some issues, such as lack of confidence or enthusiasm about the job, can be remedied.

In this article, we’ll cover some basic tips to help you bring your team together for maximum efficiency.

1. Look Out for Warning Signs of Actively Disengaged Employees

Employees who have fully “checked out” at work can be detrimental to a company’s bottom line as well as its overall morale among other employees.

Be alert for some of the warning signs of disengagement and employee burnout:

Lack of participation: This goes deeper than simply being an introvert. Actively disengaged employees are likely to stop participating in group activities. They don’t form friendships with colleagues, don’t speak up in meetings, and may even eat lunch by themselves to avoid socializing.
Too many breaks: While employees should be encouraged to step away from their desks every now and then to stretch, disengaged employees often take advantage of this with extra bathroom breaks, snack runs, and any excuse to avoid focusing on work.
Punctuality: Disengaged employees are usually the last to arrive and the first to leave. If confronted, they’ll probably make excuses and avoid taking responsibility.
Negative attitude: This can take the form of sarcasm, defensiveness, belligerence, or disrespectful silence.
Absenteeism: Disengaged employees would rather be anywhere but work. They’re likely to take sick days, even if they aren’t actually sick, especially on Mondays or Fridays to get a long weekend.
Moderate to low work performance: Some disengaged employees may exhibit a drop in productivity or quality of work. Others will do just enough to get by. But in both cases, these employees are highly unlikely to go above and beyond expectations.

2. Take an Active Approach in Employee Goals, Needs, and Growth

An estimated 1 in 4 Americans plan to look for a new job as soon as the threat of the pandemic declines. Of those planning to leave, 80% cite a concern about their career advancement.

One of the most effective ways to engage and retain employees is to understand their needs, desires, ideas, goals, and long-term plans. Employees who feel like leadership listens and cares about them are more likely to feel engaged at work.

However, 86% of surveyed employees said they don’t feel they’re heard fairly or equally, which can take a devasting toll on confidence, satisfaction, and happiness at work. Likewise, employees who don’t see the right advancement opportunities often feel stuck, like they can’t climb any higher toward their aspirations.

If an employee is going to be engaged and make a long-term commitment, their goals need to align with the company. This might involve policy changes, upskilling, extra training, mentorship, classes, et cetera to retain and engage employees.

The important first step is to reach out, initiate a conversation, listen, and then plan accordingly and with empathy.

3. Invest in Team Building Activities to Boost Comradery and Confidence

In addition to addressing the concerns of individual employees, companies should also focus on the team atmosphere. Team-building activities bring many benefits to a workplace.

They help to break down barriers between coworkers, which in turn improves conflict resolution, reduces workplace clashes, and develops trusting relationships.

These benefits result in more confidence and respect. Colleagues are less likely to feel self-conscious about asking for help. They feel safer in a trusting environment and don’t have to worry as much about being judged for admitting they don’t know how to do something.

Leaders are Born from Confidence

If the man on the sailboat had a better relationship with his team, he probably wouldn’t have felt as self-conscious about stepping forward and saying, “I’d like to help. Would you please teach me?”

Leaders are able to build stronger teams when they have confident members willing to help each other and learn. This productive, positive atmosphere doesn’t just lift a company’s bottom line with a more efficient workforce – it also fosters the kind of environment that produces more leaders.

Hiring is more expensive than retaining. Companies who make smart investments in their team can save a lot of money and time in the long run by fostering natural-born leaders to rise through the ranks with a priceless loyalty to the business that helped them grow.

Turn your disengaged employees into happy workers and leaders. You’ll be amazed by all the positive changes that will follow.

A healthier work environment starts by taking an active interest in strengthening your team. Sign up for our Full Sail Leadership workshop and see the benefits of team building for yourself.

August 27, 2021/1 Comment/by Tim Dittloff

Best Business Investments: 5 Benefits of Team Building and Leadership Development

Leadership Development, Team Building

4 min read

Business owners invest in many different products and services for their companies: computers, insurance, utilities, office space, advertising, onboarding, training, taxes, 401k matches, disability, health benefits, phones, printers, equipment, office supplies, shipping services… the list goes on and on.

But if you’re not investing in team-building and leadership development within your existing workforce, you’re missing a huge opportunity for the company’s long-term growth and prosperity.

The workforce is currently experiencing a massive shift during pandemic recovery. Companies are struggling to fill open positions and keep their employees.

But although people are quick to point their fingers at COVID-19 and unemployment benefits, the truth is, employers had been struggling to retain employees before the pandemic hit.

Gallup reported that millennials, the generation born between 1980 and 1996, are notorious job-hoppers, more so than previous generations have ever been. This trend may have been exacerbated by the COVID pandemic, but it isn’t new.

Gallup’s report, How Millennials Want to Work and Live, revealed that 60% of millennials are actively open to seeking different job opportunities, compared to 45% of non-millennials. On average, millennial turnover costs the U.S. economy an estimated $30.5 billion annually.

As millennials replace older generations in the workforce and post-COVID recovery efforts shine a spotlight on employees fed up with being underpaid and underappreciated, retention rates are likely to continue being a struggle for many companies.

One easy solution – investing in existing employees to make sure they want to stick around.

5 Benefits of Leadership Development and Team Building

The benefits go far beyond simply retaining employees. By investing in your team, you can have a major impact on your bottom line, and the future of your company.

Taking the time to properly invest in team-building and leadership development exercises help to:

1. Increase Employee Engagement

Retaining your employees isn’t enough. If your employees don’t enjoy their work, your business isn’t operating at peak efficiency.

Gallup’s study revealed that only 29% of millennials are engaged at work, which means 7 out of 10 millennial employees don’t feel passionate about their job. An alarming 16% of millennials are actively disengaged at work, which can have detrimental consequences for the company. The others are nonengaged, meaning they are clocking in for the paycheck and that’s it.

Engaged employees bring a myriad of benefits, including:

Healthier work culture: Engaged employees are happy at work. They’re more likely to be proactive and help others, and they’re less likely to experience workplace burnout.
Accountability: When employees are engaged, they take pride in their work. They want to do a good job, and if they make a mistake, they will work hard to resolve the issue quickly and efficiently.
No micromanaging: Engaged employees are usually self-sufficient. They don’t need to be constantly monitored, which then frees up a supervisor’s time for more important tasks.
Confidence: Actively engaged employees are open to learning and self-improvement. They become more confident at work, which often has an impact on their confidence outside of work, too. Success both inside and outside of the workplace is a recipe for a happier life.
Word-of-mouth praise: Happy employees often talk about how much they love their job. Their glowing recommendations can help attract talented professionals to your business.
Bottom line: An engaged employee who is passionate about the job will have a higher productivity rate than someone who’s just there to collect a paycheck, or worse – someone who resents being there in the first place.

2. Develop Trusting Relationships

Teamwork is a critical component of most jobs. Rarely does an employee act as a lone wolf and not impact other people’s responsibilities and deadlines.

If your team is going to operate at maximum efficiency, they need to trust one another to step up and fulfill their duties. That level of trust takes a while to develop in the day-to-day activities of the job.

However, setting aside designated times and activities for team building can drastically accelerate and deepen the trust among employees so they’re working like an efficient, well-oiled machine in no time.

3. Reduce Workplace Clashes and Improve Conflict Resolution

Strengthening relationships between team members has the added benefit of minimizing conflicts. Not only are employees less likely to have major clashes, but they are also better equipped with the skills to resolve issues.

Team building helps employees better understand their network of resources and feel comfortable trusting and confiding in each other. If there is a problem that workers can’t resolve on their own, they’re more likely to seek help from a supervisor or human resources.

4. Develop Leadership Skills

Your company needs dedicated and competent leaders to sustain long-term growth. Instead of seeking outside talent for leadership positions, you can invest in cultivating leaders from within.

Employees tend to have more trust in leaders who started at the bottom and rose through the ranks with hard work and dedication, more so than they trust an outsider who comes in without knowing any of the workers or company policies.

Allowing your current workforce to stay and grow sends a positive message to those who are interested in advancing. It’s a great way to encourage steward leaders who guide with faith over fear.

5. Invest in Long-Term Professional Growth

High turnover rates hemorrhage money, time, and resources away from your company. It is not a sustainable growth model. Over time, these types of companies end up with nonengaged or actively disengaged employees, few qualified leaders, and a lot of wasted expenses and resources trying to fill open positions, only to lose those workers soon thereafter.

According to the Society for Human Resource Management (SHRM), the average cost to replace a salaried employee is 6 to 9 months’ salary.

But that waste isn’t necessary if you’re taking the time to invest in your current team, improve their skills and teamwork, and develop leadership within your ranks. These measures are setting your business up for success in the long run.

Take the Steps Toward Building the Team You Want for Success

Team-building activities are one of the most effective ways to encourage your employees to socialize, get to know each other, have fun, trust one another, and develop collaboration, communication, teamwork, and leadership skills.

The benefits are well worth the cost to invest in a more efficient, happier team of highly engaged employees.

Are you ready to get started? Sign up for our Full Sail Leadership workshop and invest in your team’s future.

August 2, 2021/0 Comments/by Tim Dittloff

Self-Mastery on the Seas: Daily Debrief in the Life of a Steward Leader

Team Building

4 min read

There’s always more to learn in all aspects of life.

Even masters of their craft will tell you they know nothing. Such is the nature of life.

Taking in our surroundings to adapt our behavior and mindset is a lifelong approach – not a one-off strategy.

As I was recently reminded during our latest Full Sail Workshop, I have plenty more to learn about steward leadership. Every day and every interaction is an opportunity.

Every Moment is an Opportunity for Leadership Coaching

What can a navy seal sailing an 82’ classic schooner teach you about leadership?

Simply put, more than you might think.

I recently had the pleasure to sit in on a training program led by former Navy SEAL Mark Divine. Divine talked about developing self-mastery of our skills and mindset to serve others to the fullest ability.

He stressed that only after we get past our own limiting beliefs and lack of skill can we fully engage ourselves to serve others and be a true steward of a team.

The authors of the book Steward Leadership – A Maturational Approach reinforce this message as well. However, it wasn’t until we did a team debrief after a recent Teams on Course ™ workshop in the Florida Keys that my learning came full circle.

Old Dogs Learn New Tricks in Team Building

We enjoyed the stout and beautiful winds for the sailing portions of our Teams on Course ™ workshop. Our chartered vessel went by the name When and If.

But this isn’t just any sailing vessel you’ll see on a Sunday afternoon on Lake Michigan. This is the boat General George S. Patton commissioned famed naval architect John Alden to build for him.

Patton so eloquently named the vessel When and If proclaiming “Bea [Patton’s wife] and I are going to sail this vessel around the world when and if the war ever ends.”

The boat is a two-mast schooner. Imagine – all original masts from the moment of its first launch.

If you aren’t familiar with sailing, even sailors experienced in modern sloops required some “on the job” training to manage the beauty’s rigging system.

The learning experience also served as a pertinent reminder for the corporate workplace: When organizations onboard fresh staff members, teaching a team’s shared language is critical for achieving success in respect of the mission.

The Ethos of Steward Leadership

In the classroom portion of our workshop, we discussed the importance of maintaining a personal and corporate ethos.

The essence of this ethos doubles as a code of excellence, as Commander Devine describes in his book Unbeatable Mind:

“Excellent results in life are the result of hard work built on a personal code of excellence. I call this your personal ethos. Defining this ethos requires deep introspection and skillful methods leading to a continuous pursuit of self-knowledge and growth. Life without a personal ethos can leave you directionless, not able to answer the question, Why? when faced with life’s many challenges”

Just as individuals can develop a personal ethos, organizations can develop them as well – and they should. For Divine, this includes the Naval Special Warfare ethos embodied nicely in this passage:

“We demand discipline. We expect innovation. The lives of my teammates and the success of our mission depend on me – my technical skill, tactical proficiency, and attention to detail. My training is never complete.”

Verbosity is nice, but why bother?

What purpose does an ethos statement serve in a corporate organization?

For starters, it uses a simultaneously shared yet unique language across the entire organization. Also, it dictates a specific yet flexible roll as the chief steward of the organization – in other words, shared qualities with room for individuality.

Again, words are nice, but they’re nothing without action. How does ethos translate into action?

In one way, the ethos provides a dogma for holding team members accountable and caring for them on a personal level – all in relation to their job performance.

The ethos statement should always reference how team members utilize their strengths for the greater good of others, the customers, and the overall organization.

Taking Our Experience Back to Full Sail for Leadership Coaching and Team Building

Post-workshop, our team did a deep dive to evaluate our performance-based largely on our ethos statement. The incredible experience we gained will embolden the value of our future Full Sail workshops with a fresh approach about:

How we as steward leaders can optimize our organization to benefit our customers.
How to identify our most important strengths that will help our clients discover their strengths to the fullest
How to maximize our client’s value from their first investment with us, in both time and money
How to prioritize a culture of psychological and emotional safety in an organization to create an environment where learning can thrive

As you become a steward leader, remember that you need to need to breathe, pause, think, and act so your team becomes stronger and serves your customers better.

Just like we needed some “on the job training” on the classic boat, your organization can benefit from a culture of learning and quest for knowledge.

Join us on our next adventure for a similar yet totally unique experience. Our next Full Sail Summit Workshop embarks from Salem, Massachusetts. We’d also be happy to serve you on Lake Michigan, Lake Erie, or the Seattle area waters during the months of May- October. Contact us for more details.

May 13, 2021/0 Comments/by Tim Dittloff

How to Position Your Team to Weather the Storm

Team Building

< 1 minute

The Positive Polarity Featuring Tim Dittloff

In a recent episode of The Positive Polarity, I had the pleasure of meeting with the host Dave Molenda who is also a #1 Amazon Best Selling Author and Speaker. It’s here that I shared key strategies on how you can utilize shared language, positive conflict, and connection to weather any business storm ahead.

March 1, 2021/0 Comments/by Tim Dittloff