How to Solve the “Willie Nelson” Problem

I like team members who are “hungry.” For me, “hungry” means they’re excited about the project and are eager for it to succeed. Attitude is everything, and “hungry” shows up in a team member’s day-to-day communications with others as well in their daily actions. Hungry people always show leadership and initiative. “Hungry” team members are the easiest to spot, they take action. You’ll know them by the proactive actions they take. Bestselling Author Patrick Lencioni provides easy to spot attributes and characteristics for functional versus dysfunctional teams and team-leaders. I’m paraphrasing Lencioni when I say that the 3 traits I always look for in effective team members are “Humility,” “Head-smarts,” and “Hunger.” Those 3 traits signal leadership that I want to encourage and reward. Among other things, “humility” is a person’s ability to learn from their mistakes and to place our clients and other team-members’ ahead of themself. A humble leader is happy when showcasing other people’s great ideas and are happy when other team members succeed. They don’t need all the credit “Head-smarts” means they know their stuff and they consistently display above average competence, which is a rare bird today. Head-smarts means they’ve created ways to ensure nothing falls through the cracks and that careless errors never make it past them. But without “hunger,” it’s hard to give responsibility to any team member. Every project assumes those with responsibility are proactive and are always moving the project forward. So, that’s why I smiled when I saw this item stating “Nobody finds God on a full stomach.” That for the biggest questions facing your project, you don’t want complacent people, who are happy with the status quo. A full stomach to me means that a person doesn’t currently have the urge work hard to hunt or grow the next meal. “Hungry” people are the only ones I trust with responsibility because they never give up. They’re relentlessly moving things forward, especially when others are comfortable with the way things are.