A company, like any other system, needs two components to survive and grow:
\nBy 'reliable team member' we mean someone who is consistent, steady and punctual. A team member who always acts in the interests of the system and not only in their own. An accountable team member, who, when facing a problem, considers their own faults before those of others. A disciplined team member, able to pursue projects through to completion without getting distracted and wasting time.
\nIn a word: a team member who knows how to work well.
\nThat said, all that remains is to ask:
\nOne of the most widespread beliefs among business owners is that reliability is a consequence of ownership. Only if you own something can you be reliable toward it.
\nThe classic question put to someone who has behaved rudely or dysfunctionally, 'would you do that in your own home?', is a glaring example of how widespread the belief is that only if you own something can you be reliable toward it.
\nThis belief can be disproved in both directions: it is not true that whoever owns is reliable, and it is not true that whoever doesn't own is unreliable.
\nThere are a great many business owners who, despite feeling the weight of responsibility, are not reliable at all in practice. Just as a great many team members, even among the youngest interns, can show great reliability.
\nReliability doesn't follow from owning a system or an object, but from feeling the authorship of every action you take and every result you generate.
\nEven an intern can be a highly reliable person, as long as they recognize as their own product every single action they carry out in their work.
\nEven a business owner who owns 100% of their company can be unreliable, if they don't feel the authorship of every single action and every product they create with their work.
\nThat reliable team members exist is fairly obvious; if anything, the questions are:
\nReliable team members have specific preferences about the companies they work in. It is hard to find a company where unreliable and reliable team members coexist for a long time.
\nThe people in a system tend to align over time, and therefore to become either generally unreliable or generally reliable.
\nThis means that a reliable team member who can't change or influence the other elements of the system will either tend to become unreliable or decide to leave.
\nThere is no doubt that all business owners, at the start of their venture, must almost certainly have been reliable. But over time, if they surround themselves with unreliable team members, they will inevitably become unreliable too, if only to make up for other people's unreliability.
\nSo either everyone in a company realizes this and starts working to become more reliable, or they will all gradually become more unreliable.
\nThat reliable team members exist, then, is not in question, just as it is not in question that they have specific preferences about the environment they work in.
\nThe question, if anything, is whether your company fits those preferences.
\nNow let's answer the second question.
\nBefore answering this question, it helps to stop and consider how the two alternatives (building or finding) lead to diametrically opposed approaches.
\nThose who believe team members are found will invest much more in, and dig much deeper into, recruiting, talent search and employer branding (promoting the company as a place to work).
\nThose who believe team members are built, on the other hand, will invest more in onboarding new hires, in training and in incentive systems.
\nThat said, it remains to give an objective, rational and scientific answer to the original question: are reliable team members found (there are people who are already reliable in themselves, who therefore need to be identified more carefully and then, of course, nurtured), or are they built (that is, regardless of who you find, it is always possible to make a person reliable)?
\nAn introspective question can help us get to the bottom of the issue and guide us toward a scientific, unambiguous answer.
\nHow much does a person's level of reliability depend on external factors and how much on internal ones?
\nA person's reliability shows not in their isolated behaviors (the ones they might adopt to get something), but above all in their recurring behaviors, the ones that are part of them and that they repeat most often.
\nReliability is perceived through ordinary behaviors, through the habits a person has.
\nArriving on time and meeting deadlines, or rushing and always being late?
\nBeing precise when answering a request, or being superficial and evasive?
\nTaking care of the work you hand in, or working in a sloppy, uninterested way?
\nDoing more than what's asked where it's needed, or doing only the bare minimum?
\nBeing honest and rational, or communicating out of convenience and using logic to confuse?
\nBeing disciplined in following through on your tasks, or getting easily distracted?
\nReliable or unreliable? It depends on habits.
\nUnderstanding how changeable a person's habits are means understanding how changeable their reliability is.
\nAccording to Kurt Lewin's famous law (also known as 'field theory'*1), a person's behavior doesn't depend only on their individual characteristics, but on the interaction between the person and the environment in which they live and work*.
\n*The field theory formula is: B = f(P,E)
\nwhere: * B = Behavior, * P = Person, * E = Environment
\nThis law is the foundation of modern marketing.
\nRules, tools, relationships, culture and expectations make up, in fact, a genuine 'force field' that encourages some behaviors and hinders others. That's why habits should not be considered fixed traits of a person: when the context changes, behavior is likely to change too.
\nLewin's theory therefore shows that, to change people's behavior in a lasting way, it is often more effective to act on the system and the environment in which they work than to ask them to change.
\nThe vast majority of people don't have stable habits, but adapt them to the people they spend time with and to the environment in which they live and work.
\nThe answer to the initial question, read through field theory, is therefore clear-cut: in most cases reliable team members — and unreliable ones — are built in the work context more than they are found already formed.
\nThis is the editorial team's reading of Lewin's model*1 applied to managing team members, not a measurement derived from field research.
\nAlthough the selection and recruiting phases are very important for finding good raw material, it is what happens during onboarding, the working rules and the way the team member is managed that will determine a team member's reliability.
\nNow we come to the third and final question:
\nA team member's reliability shows in their habits, in their ordinary and recurring behaviors. Which ones, specifically?
\nIn particular, three categories of habits:
\nTraining, encouraging and monitoring these habits in team members is the surest way to spread reliability through a system and build reliable team members.
\nTo sum up:
\nProdUP! is the 3-day course that makes it possible to install these habits and skills. A structured training experience designed to have every team member put the habits of reliability into practice.
\nIn our research we have identified objective indicators to measure a team member's degree of responsiveness, capable of predicting their level of reliability.
\nThis information is very important for the business owner or the manager responsible for people, to identify the best people to invest in, anticipate problems and see a team member's progress.
\nIf you'd like to try the reliability test on yourself or your team members, write to valentina@prodability.com
\nSources and references
\n*1-Lewin, K. (1936). \"Principles of Topological Psychology\". New York: McGraw-Hill.
\nLewin, K. (1939). \"Field Theory and Experiment in Social Psychology: Concepts and Methods.\" American Journal of Sociology, 44(6), 868–896.
\nLewin, K. (1951). \"Field Theory in Social Science: Selected Theoretical Papers\". Edited by Dorwin Cartwright. New York: Harper & Brothers.
\nLewin, K. (1947). \"Group Decision and Social Change.\" In T. M. Newcomb & E. L. Hartley (Eds.), Readings in Social Psychology.
\nBurnes, B., & Cooke, B. (2013). \"Kurt Lewin's Field Theory: A Review and Re-evaluation.\" International Journal of Management Reviews, 15(4), 408–425.
","headings":[{"level":2,"text":"Do reliable team members exist?","id":"do-reliable-team-members-exist"},{"level":2,"text":"Are reliable team members built or found?","id":"are-reliable-team-members-built-or-found"},{"level":2,"text":"What do you need to do to have reliable team members?","id":"what-do-you-need-to-do-to-have-reliable-team-members"}],"tldr":"","tldrItems":null}