The Ideal Team Player

The “Three Virtues” of “Ideal Team Players“

To hire great team players, evaluate prospective hires in light of the requirements of effective teamwork, which demands a foundation of “vulnerability-based trust, healthy conflict, active commitment, peer-to-peer accountability and a focus on results.” Then, hire people who have the three traits that all good team players share: “humility, hunger” and “people smarts.”

An employee or prospective hire who lacks these qualities isn’t a promising candidate to be a good team member. All three virtues are vital to teamwork, as this business fable demonstrates:

Hiring Ideal Team Players

Jeff Shanley had devoted 20 years of his life to working in Silicon Valley. He had been wanting to make a career change, when his uncle Bob Shanley told him about a change he had to make. Due to a recently diagnosed heart problem requiring surgery, Bob had to retire as CEO of Valley Builders (VB), the Napa Valley contracting firm he’d founded. Jeff asked Bob to appoint him to the position and Bob agreed to make Jeff VB’s new CEO.

Jeff took over the management of a firm with a workforce of more than 200 people. The ...