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Develop trust and accountability within the team

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This page is designed to answer the following questions:

NOTE: This page has been quality assured for 2023 as per our Quality Assurance policy.

For this assessment criterion, you will be required to demonstrate that build positive relationships with your team and develop trust and accountability. Some of the elements that you should consider are included below.

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Active listening skills

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Active listening involves utilising several communication techniques to demonstrate that you understand, respect and value others, which can help to build trust within the team.

This includes:

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  • Repeating back or paraphrasing what you have been told to demonstrate that you understand
  • Maintaining eye contact and positive body language
  • Having a genuine interest in what others are saying
  • Asking questions to seek clarification
  • Observing non-verbal cues
  • Using non-verbal cues whilst listening (e.g. nodding, leaning forward etc.)
  • Not interrupting when someone is speaking
  • Showing empathy and compassion
  • Relating what is being said to your own experiences to demonstrate understanding

Team cultures

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We have previously looked at the importance of an organisation’s culture. As a leader, you will reinforce this culture within your own team and you may also go on to develop a sub-culture within your team.

You can develop a positive culture within your team by modelling good practice and values yourself as well as providing guidance and encouragement to team members in both group (e.g. team meetings) and individual (e.g. supervision) settings.

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Team values and values-based culture

Feeding into the team’s culture will be specific values, such as transparency, equality and personal development. Again, as the leader, you should be a role model for these values and take the time to explain their importance to your team members.

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This could include challenging discrimination to ensure that prejudice and exclusion are not tolerated, which supports a fair and inclusive culture.

In the resource management unit, we look at values-based recruitment, which helps to ensure that new employees have similar personal values to those of the organisation that they work for.

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Team diversity

Although a team may share the same values, it is essential to recognise that we all have different backgrounds, experiences, knowledge and skills and these differences should be celebrated and promoted.

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As the leader, you will want to ensure that your team respect the personal values of others that may be different to their own to maintain a harmonious and productive working environment. This will be demonstrated in your own practice and during communication with your team and will be backed up by your organisation’s agreed ways of working.

Team roles and responsibilities

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Each team member should have clarity about their own roles and responsibilities within the team. When team members are unsure of what is expected from them, it can lead to decreased performance and self-confidence.

Your team members should have their general duties and responsibilities set out in their job description, but you will need to reinforce this during team meetings, supervision and appraisal. This will also be the time to communicate any changes to working practices or discuss new roles and responsibilities.

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When a team member’s responsibilities are clear, they can be accountable for these areas of their work.

Team activities

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Team activities can include team meetings, team-building exercises, group training sessions, mentoring and coaching. As well as learning new skills together and sharing knowledge and skills, these activities can help to develop trust between team members.

Individual and team accountability

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It is important that individuals and the team as a whole are held to account if they do not fulfil their responsibilities and it is the leader’s responsibility to do this as part of regular performance reviews.

This should be carried out in a fair and consistent manner and the aim should be to help team members develop rather than assign blame. Being honest about performance helps to build trust in relationships and supports teams and individuals to reach their full potential.

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Provide regular feedback on team performance and achievement

Team performance and achievement should be regularly reviewed and fed back to team members during team meetings. As well as discussing areas for improvement, it is also important to make time to share and celebrate any achievements. This helps to keep team morale high and supports individual job satisfaction and motivation.

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