The TRICK to High-Performing Teams
What do parenting and organizational culture have in common?
From her experience raising three highly successful daughters and working in education for half of a century, Esther Wojcicki has synthesized her principles for effective parenting and management into a simple framework, TRICK: trust, respect, independence, collaboration, and kindness. In her book How to Raise Successful People, Wojcicki lays out how the qualities captured in TRICK foster the adaptability and growth mindset that enable both growing children and growing organizations to learn and to perform better.
Background on TRICK
Let’s take each component of TRICK in turn to understand how the full package comes together.
Trust encourages people to take risks. In Wojcicki’s framing, trust kicks off a logical sequence leading to innovation: trusted people are willing to take risks, thus creating vulnerability, and this in turn produces courage to innovate. In other words, “risk-takers are the innovators we all want.” Leaders can build trust by being honest, humble, and caring and by admitting mistakes, among other practical steps.
Respect involves giving people their proper attention. To show respect to others, listen to them with undivided attention, and recognize them appropriately to increase their motivation.
Independence empowers people to solve problems and to innovate on their own. Rather than tell people what to do, offer suggestions and collaborate with them, but leave ultimate agency in their hands. By encouraging others to operate independently, leaders provide space for others to take risks and to make mistakes on the path to innovation.
Collaboration harnesses diversity and creates a community of support. Collaborative cultures embrace transparency, establish processes for sharing work and ideas, set realistic expectations for team members, celebrate diversity, and encourage others to share new ideas — not just “good” ideas.
Kindness involves generosity with time, connections, and resources. For example, taking the time to provide feedback as soon as possible, when it is most valuable, signals kindness toward teammates. A culture based on kindness does not manage through fear and does not embarrass others, but rather fosters inclusion to bring out the best in team members.
With this quick understanding of TRICK, how can business leaders apply it in their own lives?
How to apply TRICK professionally
Applying Wojcicki’s lessons in the TRICK framework benefits both individuals and organizations. At an individual level, leaders can apply TRICK in the way that they relate to their own teams. Even if the broader organizational culture and way of working differ from these principles, steady application of the framework will lead to improved performance and experience over time, helping to enhance the case for growing TRICK across organizations.
As I look ahead to my own career post-Stanford, I see the greatest opportunity in promoting greater independence. From my past experience, I know that I will be tempted to give too much direction to those on my team. But from the insights underpinning TRICK, I understand that providing more independence will better serve the team, the organization, and me in the longer run. By employing TRICK in our professional lives, we can enhance our reputations as effective managers and people-developers.
Learn more
To learn more about TRICK, please check out Wojcicki’s book, How to Raise Successful People.
