The morning team huddles with staff: a good risk management strategy (2)

“Challenges are what make life interesting and overcoming them is what makes life meaningful.” – Joshua J. Marine

Dear readers, last week I shared titbits on how morning huddles can be utilized effectively as a risk management tool.

The uniqueness of morning huddles

Before I continue, I wish to reiterate some of the key reasons why morning huddles are unique:

• They are different from staff meetings and building a morning huddle ritual will help make your team more effective by getting your team to vocalize what they are working on to their colleagues.
• The shift huddle is an excellent way for the team to get together and connect each day.
• Aligns the team on the day’s priorities and ensures everyone is on the same page.
• In banking, even though no two scenarios are the same, by sharing obstacles faced on the job, someone else may have a solution to help a colleague.
• Its good to share some great encounters with teammates as well. For all you know, it will motivate another team member to keep on staying positive. After all, success breeds success, so sharing quick wins will help the team start positively.
• Improve communication. Having everyone together for those critical updates will reduce emails and unwanted interruptions. It will also reduce the need to track down the team members to give constant updates.
• Enforce accountability. When individuals communicate their plans for the day to the team, they are likelier to commit and do what they say they will do.
• Morning huddles creates trust amongst the team when everybody sees that everyone else is working as hard as they are.
• It creates unity, reduces isolation, and reinforces cohesion.
• A daily huddle meeting also helps new hires transition quickly into the team.

Don’t make your morning huddles monotonous and boring

There is no fixed list of daily huddle topics you should discuss for your morning team huddle. The specific topics that you discuss will obviously depend on the specifics of your company. The morning huddle is not the time to plan projects or negotiate. It is about the immediate and more relevant issue for the day, so your main focus should be the day’s events. If there are emergency issues, it can be discussed or scheduled for a meeting later.

You need to reflect on whether it’s important to have a team huddle every morning. Since you’re looking for effectiveness, a team huddle every other day may still make as much sense as one that’s held every morning. Remember that the number of days in a week that you do hold a huddle shouldn’t be set in stone. There are, however, some dos and don’ts that you should observe when holding a team huddle to keep it relevant.

Are you short of issues to discuss about at morning huddles? Let us look at a few risk management-infused morning huddles for the month of December. Remember that the month of December is a significant one due to performance standards, appraisal of staff, customer data analytics for research and other purposes, not forgetting the financial status of your branch or company. Why don’t you re-focus your Team’s attention along the following lines:

• Give a catchy slogan for December huddles eg. “Getting it Right!”, “Operation Fraud Prevention!”, “Meeting the Target!”, “December, here we come!”
• Agree and adopt one and ask each team member what unique strategy they would use to meet the goal.
• Allow each member to speak at every huddle.
• Do not use more than 15-20 minutes.
• Allow the team to go through their daily routine to be ready to meet clients on time.
• Identify the shy ones and ensure they are not left out.
• Any member with a unique problem can be assisted privately after the huddle.
• Remember to criticize in private and praise in public.
• Encourage creativity but legal ideas, so long as they are implemented within the company’s regulations and are ethical, especially when it is related to sales and marketing.
• Accomplishments achieved by the team so far should also be recognized. If any team members have particularly stood out for their efforts and achievements, they are publicly thanked during the team huddle.
• Your morning huddle should be customized for your team and should be whatever works. If the huddle begins to impede productivity, rather than improve it as intended, perhaps it would be a good idea to switch the format and try something different.
• The morning team huddle is the perfect time to get everyone on the same wavelength and to give them some morale for the workday ahead. A team huddle helps to foster a feeling of unity in the team.
• Finally, team members should regularly be asked to raise any issues they have or ask any burning questions. If the question is of a complex nature or applies specifically to a person or group, then it will be sorted out after the huddle. The point of raising it during the huddle is to answer what can quickly be answered and to decide what cannot immediately be dealt with so that it can be addressed later.

The morning huddle as a Team Building exercise

Do you know that morning huddles are actually team building exercises? Find one morning and devote it for the following exercise, called the Survival Scenario: It teaches team members about themselves and each other. Break the group into teams of about 3 to 5 people. Each group is told that their plane or boat has crashed and landed in a deserted location.

Each member must make a list of the 12 most important items needed to survive. He or she must then rank the 12 items by importance. Then the group must compare their lists and come up with an agreed-upon list of 12 items. The group will learn about how to compromise and work for the best interest of the group.

Short role plays

This method of sharing is my all-time favourite training model. Allow a day for role playing as part of some morning huddles, for example one that may involve a banker-customer relationship, most likely the angry customer. Use ten minutes for role play and allow others to critique the sketch. Valuable lesson can be learnt here, which may not always be found in books.

The fun part in team building

Working should be serious but laden with fun. My most memorable banking experiences were when I worked with the branch Teams. We all made use of our various strengths to build a cohesive group. My last branch team still maintains a what’s up group despite the fact we are now scattered across the globe.

Let me end with some motivational morning huddle quotes to share with the team:

Best Morning Huddle Quotes To Motivate Your Team

1. “It’s hard to beat a person who never gives up.” — Babe Ruth
2. Motivation is the art of getting people to do what you want them to do because they want to do it. —Dwight D. Eisenhower
3. “Real change, enduring change, happens one step at a time.”
4. “Success is to wake up each morning and consciously decide that today will be the best day of your life.” —Ken Poirot
5. No matter how brilliant your mind or strategy, if you’re playing a solo game, you’ll always lose out to a team. – Reid Hoffman
6. “I have not failed. I’ve just found 10,000 ways that won’t work.” —Thomas A. Edison
7. The sun himself is weak when he first rises, and gathers strength and courage as the day gets on. —Charles Dickens, The Old Curiosity Shop
8. “The only thing that overcomes hard luck is hard work.” —Harry Golden, writer
9. “If you’re not taking care of your customer, your competitor will.” – Bob Hooey
10. “When you wake up every morning, let thanksgiving be your first thought.”― Lailah Gifty Akita
11. “Your imagination is your preview of life’s coming attractions.” —Albert Einstein
12. “Lose an hour in the morning and you will be all day hunting for it.”—Richard Whately
13. “Today is your opportunity to build the tomorrow you want.” — Ken Poirot
14. “I wake up every morning literally with a smile on my face, grateful for another day I never thought I’d see.” — Dick Cheney
15. “I like my coffee black and my mornings bright.” — Terri Guillemets
16. “I try not to make any decisions that I’m not excited about.” —Jake Nickell, founder and CEO of Threadless
17. “Lack of direction, not lack of time, is the problem. We all have twenty-four hour days.” – Zig Ziglar
18. “Every morning is a revolution against the darkness.” ― Mehmet Murat Ildan
19. “Risk more than others think is safe. Dream more than others think is practical.” —Howard Schultz, interim CEO of Starbucks
20. “Many ideas grow better when transplanted into another mind than the one where they sprang up.” – Oliver Wendell Holmes
21. “The secret of getting ahead is getting started.”

Enjoy your working life.