You’re Only as Good as Your Team

Working on a project or a goal alone sucks.

Getting up every morning and working on something, especially when it gets taxing or boring, is really hard. It’s easy to feel lazy, to put something off until the next day, or just give up. That’s exactly why it’s difficult for me to keep up a workout plan for more than a couple weeks. I don’t want to workout with someone else, but because I don’t, my plan falters.

In that same way, it’s hard to start a business or teach yourself a skill without someone pushing you to get it done. That is exactly why it’s important to work with people that will motivate you. And that’s the key: the people need to be motivators, not enablers.

There have been times in my life that I haven’t been surrounded by motivated people. While it feels good at times to be the person constantly ahead of the curve, that kind of environment is detrimental in the long-run. Because I wasn’t challenged, I wasn’t learning as much as I could. Nor was I interested in or challenged by the people around me.

It’s quite similar to working out, honestly. A recent study by the Society of Behavioral Medicine showed that when people work out with a partner, they perform 87% better. But there’s more to it than just having a partner. When partners are motivators, it causes performance to increase even more.

So here are a couple tips on how to choose people that will motivate you:

“Hire people smarter than you.”

We’ve all heard that saying, and for good reason. The people around you influence the way you work. The same goes for people who are coworkers, business partners, or even peers.

You know those people that do everything under the sun, and you have no idea how they can cram so much into a normal day? Those are the kinds of people that will motivate you to do better. When you’re constantly surrounded with people that are more intelligent and do more than you can imagine doing, it’ll inspire you to do the same.

Relating back to the study done by the Society of Behavioral Medicine, when participants were teamed up with partners that were constantly better than they were, they performed 107% better than when working out alone. That shows just how important it is to make sure you’re sticking with people who will push you to be just as good, and even better, than them.

Find people of different skill sets.

This past year, I was fortunate enough to work with a team that is as passionate about Hatchli as I am. The real kicker, though, is that I’m the only person with a business background. All other four members are engineers who are self-taught developers. Yes, that can seem daunting, and of course, there are times when we have different viewpoints. But I’ve learned a lot from them, and (I think) they’ve learned a lot from me too. Working with people with different skill sets allows for a couple of things.

First, it allows for different viewpoints. As a female and as a businesswoman, I naturally think differently than my male developer business partners, and that’s ok. Sometimes, it leads to long nights of back and forth, trying to figure out what should be in the next feature set or what the right approach to user acquisition is. Don’t get me wrong — it’s frustrating. But that discussion is ultimately helping us build a better product and a better business around it.

Second, it allows for people to be domain experts. When there are a couple intelligent people in the room and only one has the final say in a particular area, heads don’t butt. That doesn’t mean that there isn’t collaboration or debate. In fact, working together to come to a solution is crucial to success. But when someone is established as the most knowledgeable in an area, it helps streamline decisions.

Find people that you can admire personally and professionally.

This one is hard. And in some cases, it might not matter as much as in others. In my case, it does. Working on creating a sustainable business is hard, and it requires a lot of hours. That means I see my business partners more than I see anyone else in my life, including out of work hours. Because of this, I need them to (unknowingly) be role models for me. I want to be inspired to be like my partners because spending 18 hours a day with people I don’t like would be terrible.

Having people that I admire in most aspects of life keeps the door open for respect. It helps me understand that I’m working with good people who are passionate, just like me, and their opinions are just as important as mine.

All three of these tips can help you choose people to surround yourself with that will push you to do your best. For me, I’ve already gotten that in the workplace. I guess, all I’m missing is someone to hit the gym with.

-Nugeen Aftab

Want to read more, or join the Hatchli community? It’s easy and free — click here!