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The second in a follow-up series on Debbie Phillips’ four cornerstones for effective teamwork. By
DEBBIE PHILLIPS, Ph.D, CPM, The Quadrillion
Your Role in Teamwork –
Commitment Is commitment a personality trait or is it something you can practice and perfect? Research indicates that a high level of personal commitment requires a high level of emotional intelligence.
www.haaonline.org
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n my last article titled “Your Role in Teamwork,” I introduced commitment as one of the four cornerstones that is essential to high performing teams. In this article, I will share how commitment plays a role in effective teamwork. Anyone who has been in the business world for a fair amount of time is likely familiar with the term Return on Investment or ROI. ROI is the ratio between what you put in (the investment) versus what you get out (the return). I’d like to introduce you to another term: Return on Commitment (ROC). Even for the most seasoned executive, this one is a bit harder to calculate. Notice I used the used the word commitment, not involvement. In this article, I’ll explore the difference between commitment and involvement, as well as suggest ways to measure ROC. Different projects present varying degrees of challenges. The success or failure of a project is directly impacted by the degree of commitment from ourselves and our team members. One analogy used to illustrate the distinction between commitment and involvement is the fable of the chicken and the pig. As the story goes, the pig provides bacon, a sacrificial offering, for which the pig must die to provide, versus a chicken that provides the eggs, which is non-sacrificial. As world-renowned leadership author Ken Blanchard said, “There is a difference between interest and commitment. When you are interested in doing something, you do it only when it’s convenient. When you are committed to
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