[video] Q. and A. with E.W. Tibbs: What’s merit got to do with team building? Everything.

Full Video Transcript:

Claire: Hi, it's great to be here today with E.W. Tibbs. We are going to be addressing a really important topic today, and that's about merit. What's merit got to do with team building.

E.W. Tibbs: Well, Claire, thanks for taking a couple of minutes today. And when you ask the question of what merit has to do with team building, the answer is simple. Everything. Um, Merit simply means, uh, recognize in my world, merit means, uh, recognizing somewhere for their hard work and contributions in measurables, both in what we would consider business results or results from whatever's going on, whether it be in the, again, academic world or in the athletic world or the business world, and also ensuring that you balance those quantitative hard metrics with beautiful qualitative metrics as well.

So think about it maybe as the citizenship side of the world. And the business side of the world. Um, metrics are, are something that have been part of my life for a long time. Grew up in, you know, with an athletic background, had, uh, two daughters, uh, blessed that they're both, you know, incredibly gifted in, in many ways, academics and others.

Uh, and now as a, as a business leader and, and blessed to be, you know, part of an organization that that serves. Underserved seniors today. Um, without merit, you're really just guessing. So when you think about what merit has to do with culture, what, what you want to do is ensure that your culture has a set of, uh, agreed to norms, both in behaviors but also in outcomes.

And so whether you're trying to grow your business, which is a lot of what I spend my day doing in my own organization, you want to ensure that everybody's bought in at that level so that there's. Level of expected playing field just to be on the team that you want to achieve. Now, if you think about some of the amazing sports teams, so I was a Bulls fan when Jordan was at his prime, uh, to make an amazing team.

It took more than Jordan. Jordan was a great player, but he also had a supporting cast. He had Pippen, uh, he had others. He had an amazing coach. , um, and they all had a shared philosophy. There was a single purpose win world championships. So with your teams, you've gotta have a single purpose. Merit has to be in there because you gotta measure, not only do you have to measure, you know, how many goals you score, or what's some, you know, what's your gpa or how much are you growing your business, or what are the qualitative sides in citizenship?

Without all of that, without merit, without measuring and without rewards and recognition for outstanding achievement. , we're really just guessing. And so we wanna make sure we use merit in the sense of, uh, recognizing fantastic, uh, results. And also we use merit to help others see things that they may decide they want to achieve.

Claire: So it, it's puts something out there as a potential goal for, uh, folks that they become interested in it. That makes a lot of sense. I think we're, we're all. Used to working on the basis of, of a certain type of, of merit system. And I feel like, um, from the time that we were born, we, we grow up with, with that type of, um, system in place.

And so it just makes sense that that transitions into the workplace. And that leads me to my next question. How do you use that, um, to create a team with the best.

E.W. Tibbs: Absolutely. So, you know, when, when you're thinking about merit and how do you create the team with, with your best folks, um, you wanna make sure that, uh, that team of people have had input into what that system is.

I mean, not have control, but certainly influence and, and agreement on what it takes to get there. So when you're, when you're picking your team, if you're, you're playing a certain sport, if you're playing basketball, you pick basketball players. Playing football, you play football players. If you're in an academic competition, you're, you're rounding yourself out around those topics.

If you're in a workplace, you wanna make sure you put together a people, a set of people with diverse skills that compliment each other, and that there's a shared mindset on how those complimentary, uh, complementary skills come together to make the team more amazing than it could ever be in isolation. So when I'm building the team and we are thinking about merit, I, I ensure that I've got people aligned that outcomes matter.

And outcomes, again, are more than just business results they are also equally important on the bus, on the, uh, people side. Um, and when you balance those amazing things happen, when you get them out of balance, either way, uh, you really have a risk of leaving somebody behind. So I've seen things in the academic world where, you know, a, a school system or a university decided they weren't gonna honor their valedictorians or their highest academic achievers because maybe they were concerned that it could demotivate somebody or hurts somebody's feelings when there's always a right way to do that. On the athletic side, I've, I've yet to see anybody who didn't celebrate winning the state championship or winning the national championship. So there, there seems to be less of a qualitative concern there about feelings which matter to me.

The people side is equally important, but I do think in, in, in some cases, our world often shifts to. Uh, not recognizing merit. And I think frankly, it's a slippery slope force to be on. And I just hope, and hope and pray that folks will join me in trying to balance both merit, uh, and that business side and also the outcome side around people, uh, to, to help others drive to see things that they can potentially, uh, succeed and, and achieve in their own lives and not walk away from a system, frankly, that is driven in outcomes and achievement.

Claire: That makes a lot of sense. It's, it's trying to, Put that people aspect into place alongside the, the, the metrics, which is tricky. So, yeah, that's, it is tricky.

E.W. Tibbs: That's our job. It's a seesaw. You're standing on it, you're balancing back and forth, and you've gotta read the room. That's gonna be different, uh, where that, where that positioning is, and that balance is, is situational based off of the timing, the people in the room, the topic, the level of trust, your culture, all of those things.

And so it's a living, breathing thing that just, uh, you, you've gotta make sure you're monitoring every minute.

Claire: That's really great and I, I look forward to, to seeing that continue, develop, to develop on with your teams as well.

E.W. Tibbs: Absolutely. I'm blessed, I'm surrounded by unbelievable people. Um, I've been blessed to have several world class teams that had a, had a pretty significant, um, part in developing and, uh, they've achieved some fantastic things for those that we serve and I'm just grateful to be able to serve the.

Claire: Well, thank you so much for joining us today, and we look forward to having you on again soon.

E.W. Tibbs:It's my pleasure, Claire. Take care. Thank you.