It
is clear that the technological ecosystem in the North is becoming friendly to
Tech start-ups. We are at the "open arms" phase. The North is still
an open and untouched segment of the country for every innovative start-up to
explore. The above stated is easier said than done. Starting up a technology
company in a system like this has its ups and downs. I will be talking about
one of the major factors that determine the success of any tech startup comprising
of a team. Team work.
Like
it or not the Nigerian environment unconsciously disallows team work. The
educational system, the social environment, the social media, and many more
unknowingly disallows it. Looking back I can’t remember anytime I was
deliberately taught the values of partnership. This little concept we fail to
deliberately teach affects a lot of potential entrepreneurs, especially at the
startup stage. This however is a damage that slowly creeps into our mindset, we
don’t notice the damage till it’s done. This short story about Adamu
illustrates how.
Adamu
is a computer geek. He studied and lived in the Northern part of the country
all his Life. Right from his primary to secondary school days, everything
seemed to him like they will go right if he gets to do it alone. In school he
was always given individual assignments, and whenever they were given a group
project, he would be automatically made the group leader, and would be left to
do it alone. The saying "too many cooks spoils the broth" sank into
his head and his subconscious, so much that he thought the lone wolf was the
smartest and most efficient wolf. He wouldn't let anyone see his code, let
alone touch it. The trust issues in the country made it worse because he heard stories
of how so many people were duped and taken advantage of in business. He has
seen example of groups that split ways like musical groups for instance. He is
a reserved introvert like some nerds are, and he feels since it’s "the
North", people like him to share ideas with are rare and hard to find.
Finally
Adamu decides he wants to start a company, he is inspired by people he thinks
are "lone wolves" like him. Steve Jobs, Warren Buffet, Aliko Dangote,
Bill Gates, Elon Musk. He fails to understand that the success of these people
at many points in their lives was not a product of their creative genius and
hard work alone, but other ingredients like partnership, and team play.
He
tries, only to find out that he needs help. He is bad at communicating
properly, managing revenue, and relating with customers, so he learns the hard
way. He gets an extroverted person for a team mate. Chinedu. They both share
the same goal, but the route they prefer to take to reach the goal are
different. There is a clash. Adamu thinks his team mate acts like those
classmates he used to have in the group assignments. The team mate thinks Adamu
is just being bossy because of his technical skills. No one listens to one
another, there is a misunderstanding, and they are young people with no experience
when it comes to working in a team. They become one big unproductive duo.
Getting
the right team mate to strengthen your weakness is as difficult as getting the
perfect life partner, sometimes you would just have to mould the effort of your
team mate into something that compliments yours. This is a key team play
technique. Sometimes it takes luck to find the right people to partner with. But
once you get a team, together the possibilities are endless. Each team member
fitting neatly into the puzzle. Let's outline a few tips that I'm sure would
have helped Adamu and Chinedu.
Eliminate the lone wolf syndrome. Understand that if you really want to achieve
your entrepreneurial goals excellently in a system like this, you need good
helping hands. 99.9% of the time this is true, 0.01% means your project is
extremely concentrated on one activity, so you need no diversification. That's
a small chance. You have to forget all you see on the media, look deeper and
you will see the hands that helped. The reason why too many cooks spoil the
broth is that they all have different pictures in their heads of what a good
soup should be like.
Take time to understand your team members. This will help increase productivity and
satisfaction in yourselves. Understand what your team member is comfortable
with, his strengths, his weakness, the environment he is most productive in,
and many other attributes. The idea is to get the most out of each other for
maximum productivity. It will be of great help if everyone in the team works
towards the aim, by understanding how each of their fellow members love to
work. For instance i learned that some of my team members are more productive
at night. So the efficient option was to give them the task to work on
overnight, while we all give feedback during the day.
Be ready to sacrifice and leave
your comfort zone. Appreciate when the same is done for you.
People hardly want to leave their comfort zone for anything let alone another
person. It's natural to feel it’s too much of a sacrifice to come early to the
brainstorm workshop, write code when you don't want to, spend your pocket money
on the startup. And this revolves around the fact that you think it wouldn't be
noticed or appreciated. It sucks to come early when everyone else is late. You
will seem like the over enthusiastic one. Over time you lose interest and you
begin to point fingers. This is bad for any start-up team. Everyone must
sacrifice visibly for the goal, and these sacrifices should be acknowledged and
appreciated no matter how little. It boosts the team’s morale.
Be open to criticism, Share new ideas, and focus
your criticism on the team’s growth, not on the person. Every action of a team player should be for the
teams greater good. Nothing must compromise the growth of the team. But the
growth of the team depends on the individual growth of the members, and one way
to make your team grow is to constructively criticize each other, while
appreciating your efforts. If you don’t do it, other people outside will. The
only difference is, they wouldn’t care much about your team member’s feelings. it's
awesome when everyone in the team wants to be better at what he does.
Treat Tribalism, Religious beliefs,
Age, Sex, and Social status like it didn't exist.
In Nigeria people allow these things to cloud their judgments daily. It is bad
for any team. A perfect team is a diverse one. The team must share equal goals
and zeal. And that is enough to make it work.
Communicate. Effective communication saves a lot of time spent on dealing with a
misunderstanding. One team member must not assume another understands a concept
when there is a possibility he doesn’t. Do more talking less working. Not less
talking more working. This doesn’t mean the workspace should always be a noisy
place. There is a right time for everything. This means if ideas, concepts, and
tasks and communicated properly, there would be a decrease in errors and
assumptions hence lesser working time. I'll say amongst all, the most important
and common way to cultivate team spirit is to always believe in your team, and it’s
potential. Getting the great team is not straight forward, but it's actually
less complicated than working alone.
Author: Faruk Shuaib
Phone: 08148882058, 08176836670
Email: Farookshuaibu@gmail.com
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