12 QUESTIONS YOU SHOULD ASK YOUR TEAM Here are 12 very straight forward questions which you can ask your team. The questions are from Chapter One of Marcus Buckingham's and Curt Coffman's book - First, Break All The Rules. The questions for me were so matter of fact and straight forward that they inspired me to ask my team straight away.
You will note from the way the questions are structured that they touch what we would easily identify as key areas in our workplace. You will also note that the questions are simple and they do not use any extreme language. The Gallup Organisation in the United States has surveyed over 1 million team members. Of course the questions have been varied but these 12 questions are what Gallup determined as being the most important you can ask your team as they attained the information which indicated which teams were productive, profit orientated, customer focused and had good team retention.
12 questions you should be asking your team:
1. Do I know what is expected of me at work?
2. Do I have the materials and equipment I need to do my work right?
3. At work, do I have the opportunity to do what I do best every day?
4. In the last seven days, have I received recognition or praise for good work?
5. Does my team leader, or someone at work, seem to care about me as a person?
6. Is there someone at work who encourages my development?
7. At work, do my opinions seem to count?
8. Does the mission/ purpose of my company make me feel like my work is important?
9. Are my co-workers committed to doing quality work?
10. Do I have a best friend at work?
11. In the last six months, have I talked with someone about my progress?
12. At work, have I had the opportunities to learn and grow?
How the 12 questions relate to team performance
Each of the 12 questions related to at least one of three team outcomes:
a. Productivity (10)
b. Profitability (8)
c. Retention (5) The most powerful questions in the 12 are those with a combo of the strongest links to the most business outcomes. So you know, the top 6 questions are the first six: 1. Do I know what is expected of me at work?
2. Do I have the materials and equipment I need to do my work right?
3. At work, do I have the opportunity to do what I do best every day?
4. In the last seven days, have I received recognition or praise for good work?
5. Does my team leader, or someone at work, seem to care about me as a person?
6. Is there someone at work who encourages my development? As a team leader if you ask your team to score for 5 "yes, strongly agree" through to 1 "strongly disagree" it will give you a great starting point. Obviously the closer you are to scoring perfect 5’s in the assessment the closer you will be to having a high performing team. The questions will also help you identify who the positive people are in your team.
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