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The Best Team Wins: The New Science of High Performance
The New York Times bestselling authors of The Carrot Principle and All In deliver a breakthrough, groundbreaking guide for building today’s most collaborative teams—so any organization can operate at peak performance.
A massive shift is taking place in the business world. In today’s average company, up to eighty percent of employees’ days are now spent working in teams. And yet the teams most people find themselves in are nowhere near as effective as they could be. They’re often divided by tensions, if not outright dissension, and dysfunctional teams drain employees’ energy, enthusiasm, and creativity. Now Adrian Gostick and Chester Elton share the proven ways managers can build cohesive, productive teams, despite the distractions and challenges every business is facing.
In The Best Team Wins , Gostick and Elton studied more than 850,000 employee engagement surveys to develop their “Five Disciplines of Team Leaders,” explaining how to recognize and motivate different generations to enhance individual engagement; ways to promote healthy discord and spark innovation; and techniques to unify customer focus and build bridges across functions, cultures, and distance. They’ve shared these disciplines with their corporate clients and have now distilled their breakthrough findings into a succinct, engaging guide for business leaders everywhere. Gostick and Elton offer practical ways to address the real challenges today’s managers are facing, such as the rise of the Millennials, the increasing speed of change, the growing number of global and virtual teams, and the friction created by working cross-functionally.
This is a must-read for anyone looking to maximize performance at work, from two of the most successful corporate consultants of their generation, whom The New York Times called “creative and refreshing.”
A massive shift is taking place in the business world. In today’s average company, up to eighty percent of employees’ days are now spent working in teams. And yet the teams most people find themselves in are nowhere near as effective as they could be. They’re often divided by tensions, if not outright dissension, and dysfunctional teams drain employees’ energy, enthusiasm, and creativity. Now Adrian Gostick and Chester Elton share the proven ways managers can build cohesive, productive teams, despite the distractions and challenges every business is facing.
In The Best Team Wins , Gostick and Elton studied more than 850,000 employee engagement surveys to develop their “Five Disciplines of Team Leaders,” explaining how to recognize and motivate different generations to enhance individual engagement; ways to promote healthy discord and spark innovation; and techniques to unify customer focus and build bridges across functions, cultures, and distance. They’ve shared these disciplines with their corporate clients and have now distilled their breakthrough findings into a succinct, engaging guide for business leaders everywhere. Gostick and Elton offer practical ways to address the real challenges today’s managers are facing, such as the rise of the Millennials, the increasing speed of change, the growing number of global and virtual teams, and the friction created by working cross-functionally.
This is a must-read for anyone looking to maximize performance at work, from two of the most successful corporate consultants of their generation, whom The New York Times called “creative and refreshing.”
272 pages, Hardcover
Published February 13, 2018
83 people are currently reading
781 people want to read
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 38 reviews
January 9, 2018
Such a good read! I've been an individual contributor and a manager in a few different organizations over the years, so I get both sides of the spectrum when it comes to guiding and contributing. Great stories and realistic tips on being a part of a successful, and functioning team. Going to need a few more copies to pass out!
April 16, 2024
While a little outdated, this was a good read on how to empower your team members. I enjoyed the section around new hires, as it helped me get a good understanding of how to best prepare them. A little long, but a solid read nonetheless
October 11, 2020
I don't know what to say. I really did not enjoy this book.
That doesn't mean it doesn't contain quality, valuable information. But I did not enjoy it.
Saying that, I ought to offer some constructive criticism, but I'm at a loss there. The chapters seemed to go on and on and on. Certainly this was due in part to the constant use of examples from the "research". Actually it may have been largely due to this! And I'm not even sure if research is the right word here, because what I remember was more relating anecdotes from various sources (people in leadership positions) that supported certain points on the subject of what makes the best teams.
Growing up, I remember my Dad sometimes joking "Having a little salad with your dressing?" when, as it would be, I was eating a salad drenching in dressing. That's how this book felt to me; having a little commentary with your relentless anecdotes.
For further honesty, I only read the core part of the book. Once I was about 10 deep into the "101 Ways to Inspire Your Team", I had to say uncle. When I'm in a management position one day, I think it will be a good resource to revisit, but for an enjoyable Sunday morning read no thank you.
That doesn't mean it doesn't contain quality, valuable information. But I did not enjoy it.
Saying that, I ought to offer some constructive criticism, but I'm at a loss there. The chapters seemed to go on and on and on. Certainly this was due in part to the constant use of examples from the "research". Actually it may have been largely due to this! And I'm not even sure if research is the right word here, because what I remember was more relating anecdotes from various sources (people in leadership positions) that supported certain points on the subject of what makes the best teams.
Growing up, I remember my Dad sometimes joking "Having a little salad with your dressing?" when, as it would be, I was eating a salad drenching in dressing. That's how this book felt to me; having a little commentary with your relentless anecdotes.
For further honesty, I only read the core part of the book. Once I was about 10 deep into the "101 Ways to Inspire Your Team", I had to say uncle. When I'm in a management position one day, I think it will be a good resource to revisit, but for an enjoyable Sunday morning read no thank you.
May 25, 2020
Typical business book. There isn't any science in this book. A few vague references to studies. Lots of anecdotes, no attempts at systematic observations.
Why, you ask, are you reading this stuff, Emil? Surely you knew what to expect. Yes, the prior was low on this being good, but I am researching team performance research, mainly looking for ideas to potentially try out, so I read both popular stuff, and obscure academic research.
Why, you ask, are you reading this stuff, Emil? Surely you knew what to expect. Yes, the prior was low on this being good, but I am researching team performance research, mainly looking for ideas to potentially try out, so I read both popular stuff, and obscure academic research.
August 8, 2019
“The Best Team Wins: The New Science of High Performance,” by co-authors Adrian Gostick & Chester Elton in which they share results of their research into high performing teams objective being to identify key disciplines that team leaders must develop to manage teams in today’s business environment. They have distilled the Learnings into five disciplines.
Discipline 1: Understand Generations - Help Millennials, Gen Xers, & Boomers Get Along. Recognize the different needs of each generation to create productive harmony. Millennials, for example, appreciate greater flexibility in their work schedule but also need more recognition from their bosses than older workers do.
Discipline 2: Manage the One – job sculpting concept. This brilliant advice is to allow employees to simply do a little more of what they like & where their strengths lie, and a little less of what irritates them. “Give the Man His Guitar”
Discipline 3: Speed Productivity--Leaders need to ensure that new members can get up to speed and start contributing quickly by emphasizing “security, context and affiliation.” Mentoring and shadowing allow the new person to get a feel for the culture and helps to provide important context.
Discipline 4: Challenge Everything-- Leaders should want team members who are unafraid to ask questions or throw out ideas. A secure team leader won’t be threatened by teammates who question everything. Inspire Innovation Through Healthy Discord
Discipline 5: Don’t Forget Your Customers--Create Alignment around Serving them creating cross-functional teams designed to do “microbattles.” These are customer-focused initiatives designed to improve results for specific problems or issues.
Discipline 1: Understand Generations - Help Millennials, Gen Xers, & Boomers Get Along. Recognize the different needs of each generation to create productive harmony. Millennials, for example, appreciate greater flexibility in their work schedule but also need more recognition from their bosses than older workers do.
Discipline 2: Manage the One – job sculpting concept. This brilliant advice is to allow employees to simply do a little more of what they like & where their strengths lie, and a little less of what irritates them. “Give the Man His Guitar”
Discipline 3: Speed Productivity--Leaders need to ensure that new members can get up to speed and start contributing quickly by emphasizing “security, context and affiliation.” Mentoring and shadowing allow the new person to get a feel for the culture and helps to provide important context.
Discipline 4: Challenge Everything-- Leaders should want team members who are unafraid to ask questions or throw out ideas. A secure team leader won’t be threatened by teammates who question everything. Inspire Innovation Through Healthy Discord
Discipline 5: Don’t Forget Your Customers--Create Alignment around Serving them creating cross-functional teams designed to do “microbattles.” These are customer-focused initiatives designed to improve results for specific problems or issues.
February 10, 2022
*The Best Team Wins* A book by Adrian Gostick & Chester Elton. As you might have got the idea from its title. This book is all about how one can form a great, productive, and creative team. The book starts with different experiences of managers from several fields with a different set of generations coming with Gen X, boomers, and Millennials. how their understanding of the workplace is, how different they are from the previous generations. How the concept of 3Cs: competitiveness, coachability, and curiosity works, then this book guides us on how managers of today's world should be, it highlights how too many managers put the kibosh on employees' willingness to challenge the status quo. How people want happiness in work. One most interesting thing which I found in this book is organizing a buddy for new employees, who can just hang out with them, making them familiar with workplace, environment and with people, and he doesn't need to be someone with great skill in work, he just needs to there for new employees to ease their anxiety, I think this is a great initiative, any organization can think about. What I like most about this book are the 101 ways to inspire your teams. They are leadership key points. So if you want to learn these golden rules, go get your copy☺
May 12, 2018
Continuing on from The Carrot Principle, Gostick and Elton add a little science to the art of treating your co-workers well. They recommend, for example, doing a random act of kindness for everyone on your team each day.
They make the argument that teams are newly important in our fast-moving era. Hardly a surprise, and even less of a surprise is that they argue that the soft stuff (interpersonal relations) is the hard stuff (difficult to do). Yeah.
Their basic 5 takes are solid, however and worth thinking about if you are trying to get the best out of a team at work:
1. Understand differences among generations
2. Focus on career development for individual team members
3. Move fast; bring people up to speed fast
4. Have teams challenge each other regularly
5. Don’t forget the customers
They make the argument that teams are newly important in our fast-moving era. Hardly a surprise, and even less of a surprise is that they argue that the soft stuff (interpersonal relations) is the hard stuff (difficult to do). Yeah.
Their basic 5 takes are solid, however and worth thinking about if you are trying to get the best out of a team at work:
1. Understand differences among generations
2. Focus on career development for individual team members
3. Move fast; bring people up to speed fast
4. Have teams challenge each other regularly
5. Don’t forget the customers
July 24, 2019
Team means something very specific in the military. This has a list of great ideas and insights into the millennials. Not universal truths and very hard to contextualize in someways. One one paragraph in the book says consider organizations with lots of rules, and structure. (Oh thanks! I bought a book for ideas, instead you tell me to consider my context. How about consider your research and make recommendations?) It's a 3 star read, maybe 2 star if it's specific for military. Don't get me wrong there are useful ideas, just need great refining and contextualization.
February 10, 2024
A book filled with wisdom and advice on how to manage teams. There are a lot of good nuggets in this book. My biggest critique is that the subtitle ("The New Science of High Performance") is misleading. There is barely any "science" in this book. It is filled mostly with anecdotes and not data. Primarily the authors share stories and quotes from leaders in the industry and not all of them are directly applicable. You have to take each with a grain of salt. This is a book of wisdom and not research. If you read it in that light, it will be a good read.
April 20, 2018
The authors of The Carrot Stick Principle deliver the finest contemporary book on teams since Lencioni's work and incorporating a variety of examples of exemplary practices from corporations to startups. The appendix chapter "Toolkit: 101 Ways to Inspire Your Team" is worth the price of the book alone. The book contains convincing data and very practical suggestions for team peak performance.
May 27, 2018
Not particularly interesting. No new ideas. What I'm giving them credit for is their solid presentation of recycled information. They do a great job of incorporating statistics with client examples. They could use a little more breadth of client examples. They use the same 3 companies for more of their stories.
October 20, 2018
An outstanding guide to building teams and managing individuals with care, competency and character, causing team members to love what they do because they are working in their strengths, being productive and getting recognized. The authors give 200-250 solid suggestions and dozens of examples. t’s one of the best books on business I’ve read.
May 20, 2019
Lots of real-life examples and specific action tips. Minus half a star for some odd punctuation. Minus another half-star for one example which, when I checked it out with someone more knowledgeable than I am, turned out to have an undiscussed downside. Otherwise, I found it very helpful, and more entertaining than my class textbook.
June 28, 2018
I read this book in the right time in the right place, I was stuck what else can I do to make the team environment keeps on the high level. I like the story/case study behind on each action regarding tips on how to manage and inspire the team.
August 23, 2018
Great book, must read for hiring managers. An academic grade book simplified into an easy to read format and simple framework for applying the concepts. Does pitch the author's services for paid consulting and speaking opportunities but in a tasteful and minimally intrusive way.
February 6, 2019
The continuation of the myth where leadership gurus believe that not taking care of the financial needs and anxieties of employees whose inflation rates exceed the standard 2% COLA can be cured by saying “hey... great job.”
July 30, 2019
I was thinking this book would provide more ideas of how I can better contribute to my work team, but it was mostly geared toward managers. The authors used interesting statistics and helpful examples, so I still learned a few things.
January 25, 2020
A few really great suggestions for building high performance teams... way more suggestions than anyone could possibly implement, but enough to give everyone a chance to develop and attempt a few experiments.
March 5, 2020
Good overview of how to build and lead high performing teams based on 5 disciplines. Nothing surprising, but an excellent summary. The 101 ideas for concrete actions at the end are a great source of inspiration!
February 15, 2021
Great refresher and idea generator! Just read this book for the second time as I transition into a management role within my work. This book sparked a lot of creative ideas that I will be rolling out to my team throughout the coming months!
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March 6, 2021*skimmed*
Hated the millenial call-outs in this book, as if they are some foreign species to contend with. Overall, disliked the structure of the book. Found it hard to read and discern the key takeaways. I did like the last chapter with 101 suggestions.
Hated the millenial call-outs in this book, as if they are some foreign species to contend with. Overall, disliked the structure of the book. Found it hard to read and discern the key takeaways. I did like the last chapter with 101 suggestions.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
December 6, 2021
Like many of these types of books has nuggets of insight and usefulness plopped around so many examples of what they are talking about. Probably to justify making the book actually long enough to be a book.
January 2, 2018
to be reviewed in the May-June issue of Global Business and Organizational Excellence.
March 16, 2018
Nothing revolutionary but it is an easy reference for great ideas (part 2 of book) to keep handy when you notice your team getting off-track.
May 11, 2018
so practical and good examples
May 20, 2018
If you want a high performing team then read this book and when you've read it you'll understand the why and the how.
June 29, 2018
Totally recommended for anyone managing people, or working on near-management positions (aka team leads). There are some questionable bits of advice, but overall it is a great read.
July 20, 2018
A collection of wisdom more than a guide on how to build solid teams.
Some good tips. All over the place without a compelling structure.
Some good tips. All over the place without a compelling structure.
September 7, 2018
This was research for an article. It got the job done.
December 25, 2018
Great book for a first time manager
Displaying 1 - 30 of 38 reviews