An interview with Virginia Anderson

Key Take-aways

Passionate teams are able to harness their power together  


My definition [of a passionate team] is a team that has a purpose
and are able to harness their power together. They're able to
take that power and go above and beyond what's expected of them.
So in America you say a person gives 110 percent and that 110
percent can be to surpass expectations or it can be to get
through really difficult times and achieve what they need to
achieve.


Passionate teams have a goal


I would say we had a goal. We knew we had to execute for the
clients. And in the banking sector, which is quite interesting,
is that if you make mistakes you know that there will be
financial losses. So there's another driver there. There's also a
competitive mindset in pride that I'm not going to make a mistake
because I don't want to make a financial loss.


Passionate teams share losses


In the end, what we did was we analyzed what went wrong, what
happened. We looked at it from the people in Brazil and the
people in the UK and the people where I was working in
Luxembourg, and we realized, well wait a second, you know, and I
had people say to me, "But it wasn't your fault. You really
didn't make a mistake," but I still said, "No, wait. I created
the overflow of information," so I created this chain, and in the
end they shared the loss because it's a huge international
organization. They shared the loss between the different offices,
which can be done, and they took that actual mistake and they put
the learnings behind it. And in the end they use it today as a
training course for people.


Passionate teams csn trust each other


So this learning culture is ... they're not forgetting the past
and that really, for me, that creates a really strong team
culture because people will realize, "Wait. I can trust the
person if I have a question, I can pick up the phone, I can ask,
I can get the right information. I don't just have to put my head
down, close my eyes, forget about it, and just do my job. There
are other people out there who can help me," and it was quite
interesting.


Passionate teams support each other


They also need to know that they have support from other people.
For example, if I'm playing basketball and I get injured, I need
to know that if I'm replaced that other person can also come in
and perform at the same type of level as I'm performing. And I
find that's incredibly important is to empower people and trust
them and allow them to, I would say, to have a voice and to be
able to play to their best ability.


Passioante teams balance creativity and regulated processes


I always say your first team is only as good as your second team
pushes you. And many times the first team, if they don't think
they have to improve, they don't think they have to be creative,
or they're forced to work in a certain way, they're never going
to reach their full potential. When you have a second team that's
competing, but also pushing that team, it can be in a very
positive way, it can be in a competitive way, it allows for teams
to really perform and not be complacent. And I think in the
corporate world also, I've seen in the corporate teams, we need
these creative people. We need these people who will speak out,
but we also need the other people who will stick to their
processes and procedures too.


Passionate leaders can be like a conductor


I mean, also as a professional basketball player, I mean, I
could've been that one professional person who takes over and
says, "I'm going to do everything," for me, no. It's like, if I'm
going to be the leader of the team I'm more of an orchestrator,
like a conductor. And I know there's times where if everyone was
going to stop me, that there's a lot of other people who are free
and available. I can be a decoy and I can easily pass the ball to
somebody who can make a basket and win the game and just you see
their eyes light up and feel proud and happy, for me is
absolutely amazing.