When I am looking to work with people, people to become part of my team (or myself to become part of another team) I look for three things in people.

Having a team around you is really important to ensure things get done. I don’t mean getting the same things done – I mean getting the right stuff done. An objective can be about transformation and change, it can be about operations and excellence, or it can be about both.

I have worked with teams in the private sector, public sector, and a number of community projects – having a great team around you is essential for success.

The teams members I want to work with need to have: Talent. Trust. Tenacity.

Talent – Firstly, I look for talent. For real change and transformation, or driving excellence talent is critical. You need to know the people you work with can do the right thing for the right reason. I aim to work with people who have done remarkable things and bring and creative ideas – and not just reproduce the same thing someone else could have achieved. Talent brings intelligence (and experience) to a problem.

Trust – Trust is critical for any team. It goes hand in hand with loyalty. Trust is also about challenging people and being challenged. It is about knowing someone will have your back, and also being truthful and honest with you. It is more than loyalty, it is knowing someone will also do thing things they commit too, regardless of the difficulties involved. Trust builds teams.

Tenacity – Most things fail because people stop trying, lose focus on the important, and get complacent. Being tenacious can often be seen as boring , but I find these are excuses from people who find things are either too hard or they get easily distracted. Getting the basics right is critical, as is completing something you set out to achieve. Tenacious people succeed.

When I work with people with these qualities, then I find things get done. Of course there are difficult conversations along the way, disagreements, and debate – but the results and reward of success far exceed challenges.

My final point is this, but it doesn’t fit within the Three T’s (we all love alliterations) and that is DIVERSITY.

Your team of talented, trusted and tenacious people need to be diverse. It took me far to long in my life to realise how important diversity is. Like the missing piece of a jigsaw, having diversity enables you to see and engage with the full picture. If you look around your team, and all you see are people like each other – pretty much all the same colour, gender, social background, sexuality? You are missing out on the opportunity for learning, growth and untapped talent you simply will never be able to obtain.