See the 6 Steps You Need to Do to Create a Successful Team

1. Clearly identify the task at hand. If your task is nebulous, you will have a tough time knowing what skills you need to find. You’re likely tempted to jump right in and hire people with the general skills that fit your overall department. (I need marketing people! I need creative people!) But to paraphrase an old adage, hire in haste, repent at leisure. If you start out with the wrong people, you'll regret it.

2. Identify the skills needed to complete the project. You need to identify the soft skills as well as the hard skills you need. Will the employee need to communicate results and progress to senior management? Are there skills that you need that aren't going to be obvious to you without deeply thinking through the issue at hand?

3. Identify the people. If you want to build an internal team, you have advantages and disadvantages. The advantages are that you already know the people from whom you are choosing. You know their strengths and their weaknesses. You know who is good at technical activities. You know who is creative. You know who is whiny. You know who can sell ice cubes in a blizzard.

4. Hire in the right order. Don't hire the administrative assistant first. You may think, “Okay, I'll get this out of the way.” But, the admin's job is to help the rest of the team and support them. If you hire this person first, you need to find additional people whom she can work with, instead of the other way around.

5. Be honest in your hiring. Don't just extol the virtues of working on this team. You need to state the challenges honestly. “We'll implement a new software system. You will work hard and put in long hours. We'll experience pushback from senior managers and I will fight for the team, but it will be difficult.”

6. Remember to manage the team. Once you get your team together, you've got to manage it. Great teams seldom run well without a great leader. That's your job. Make sure you work to make the team cohesive and hard working. Don't ask more of them than you ask of yourself. If you do all of this, you'll have a great team and a successful project.

SOURCE:thebalancecareers.com