I’m being reminded about how life is all about team work. Even the little things of life are easier when done through two or more people. All of the things I done this week (serving coffee and lattes to 2600 church planters, pulling electric cord through a twisted pice of conduit at Chris’, and putting up the corner posts on my in-law’s pole barn) have been so smooth because we worked as a team to get them done.
As I sit here and think about team work I’m reminded of the things that make team work happen.
Knowing where your team is headed
Every team has a coach, some times a player-coach, that sets the direction of where the team is headed. It is absolutely necessary to listen to the coach(s) on your team so that every player is playing their role and execute the game plan so that what ever your organization considers a win happens.
Know your role
Knowing your role only happens through communication. Through communication you find out what your expects you to do and how you are going to help with the win.
Stay inside your role
To many times we play outside of our role. Maybe we think we are better than where the coach sticks us, maybe we think we will have a big impact doing the something outside our role, or maybe we don’t clearly understand what our role is and we drift outside where we are supposed to be. Think if Shaq wanted to handle the ball and Steve Nash stood under the basket would they be a successful basketball team? Staying in your role is as important to team work as any.
But outside of the bullet points of successful teamwork lies the the most important reason for teamwork is what we were meant to live. When we are living in community and on mission we will see team work as absolutely necessary to accomplish that. How can we live on mission and try to meet needs or those around us by ourselves? A lot of the time we will try to accomplish to many things in life that would be so much easier with an extra set of hands.
So the next time you have something to do think about asking someone to come along and help. Think of people you are trying to build new friendships with, those you are discipling or mentoring or want to, or just someone you’ve not seen or talked with in a while.
