11. Accept their limitations

"Making mistakes simply means you are learning faster." Weston H. Agor, Intuitive Management

As we saw earlier, effectively fusing a team together means you need several different parts - or team members. Now some of us are good at certain things and others not so. If we were all the same we wouldn't be able to work as a team - we would all be leaders or all followers and you need a combination, not either/or.

So if some members of your team aren't leaders - or followers -you have to accept that. If some are good at figure work and others not, you have to accept that. If some are good at working unsupervised and others not, you have to accept that. And to be able to accept these things you have to know your staff pretty well. You have to know their strengths and weaknesses, good points and bad. If you don't - and I'm sure this doesn't apply to you - you will be forever trying to shove round pegs into square holes and vice versa.

You have to accept that not everyone is going to be as bright, as determined, as ambitious, as clever or as motivated as you are -praise indeed from me, but see the next rule. Some of your team are quite possibly going to be brain dead from the feet up and you might need to practise Rule) 8 before Rule 11 if there simply is no hope. But don't act in haste. You might not need a team of geniuses (in fact if you hire people far too smart for a job, they will just leave, fast).

Suppose your team contains machine operators or admin assis tants. Now you don't need these good people to have Einstein brains nor to be really on the ball when it comes to brain-storming. But you do need them to be able to sit in an arse-numbing position for hours at a time concentrating on a bit of work that would drive you or me batty Just don't go expecting them to take creative wing and soar away with new ideas, new innovations or new technologies. You have to accept their limita­tions - and love them for them because these limitations are their parameters by which you can get the very best out of them - their best of course. And while you're at it, have a quick check of your own limitations. What's that? You haven't got any? Come on.

12. Encourage people

"A group becomes a team when each member is sure enough of himself and his contribution to praise the skills of the others." Norman Glass Shidle, The An of Successful Communication

If you don't let people know you're pleased with them, they'll wilt. People come to work for a whole raft of reasons - most, nothing to do with the money despite what they'll tell you - and right there at the top of their unwritten, unspoken, undeclared list will be 'Praise from the boss'. That's you by the way the boss.

They might call it 'recognition' or 'acknowledgement' or 'feeling I've done well' - but how do they know? They know because you tell them.

Now you can praise them retroactively so to speak - wait until they've done good and then tell them they've done good - or you can encourage them in advance - active praise. Tell them they're going to do good before they've done it. Why? Because the chances of them doing good are that much greater if you have praised them in advance. They won't want to let you down, or themselves.

Being a manager is a minimalist's dream. You want to build a great team and you want to do it with the smallest output of resources. Praise is free. It is instantly replaceable, doesn't wear out, is invariably 100 per cent effective, is incredibly simple to do and takes no time at all.

So why don't more managers do it? Because it takes self-assurance. You have to be feeling pretty good about yourself to be able to dish out praise well in advance. If you doubt yourself, you'll doubt them. If you doubt them, you'll not praise them because you'll be sure they are going to screw up.

It takes nothing except courage to say, 'Come on, you can do it. You'll be fine.' The more responsibility you give people, the more you trust them, the more you praise them, the more you encourage them, the more they'll give you in return. Praise costs nothing and brings in loads. Encouragement should be a given.

Encourage an atmosphere where everyone encourages everyone else - 'You can do it' should be heard every day all around you. If you're not saying it, chances are your team isn't either. Encourage the good ones to give the less good ones a hand up. In any good team an air of fostering help should be actively encouraged and praised when it happens. We're all in this together and we sink or swim together.