Investing in the growth of your team is a critical part of building momentum. As team members grow, their confidence increases, their impact expands, and the organization accelerates. While there are multiple ways to develop team members, there are three principles that guide the developmental process. Without these principles, you’ll never maximize your team investment.
1. Proximity
The deepest levels of team development happen when there’s relational proximity. Relationships are at the heart of coaching, mentoring, and disciple-making. Relationships sit at the seat of one-on-one’s. And those relationships deploy the tools of development such as training, resources, and experiences.
Proximity happens when relationships drive the developmental process. This makes team development people-centric rather than content-centric. Content is important, but it’s most powerful when deployed and debrief in the context of relationships.
2. Strategy
Developing team members doesn’t happen randomly. It requires a strategy that is clear, systematic, and multi-faceted. A team investment strategy may include conferences, resources, workshops, intensive coaching, books, video courses, and more.
At 7 City Church, we identified layers of volunteer leadership (team members, leaders, and coaches), and then we created training for each layer of leadership. That training is organized into four areas: discipleship, vision and values, leadership skills, and technical skills. My point is simply that team development needs a clear strategy.
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3. Consistency
Developing team members requires consistency. It’s not a one-time event but an ongoing developmental process. Without consistency, leaders fail to close character and competency gaps. Leaders must identify what they’ll do daily, weekly, monthly, quarterly, and annually to invest in their team. You might do daily check-ins, weekly one-on-ones, monthly trainings, quarterly team nights, and annual celebrations. The key is consistency.
Proximity, strategy, and consistency are foundational guiding principles for developing team members. Combined, they’ll accelerate your efforts and maximize your people-development efforts.
