Building a cohesive leadership team is the first critical step that an organization must take if it is to have the best chance at success.

I've become absolutely convinced that the seminal difference between successful companies and mediocre or unsuccessful ones has little, if anything, to do with what they know or how smart they are; it has everything to do with how healthy they are.

Remember teamwork begins by building trust. And the only way to do that is to overcome our need for invulnerability.

Achieving vulnerability-based trust (where team members have overcome their need for invulnerability) is difficult because in the course of career advancement and education, most successful people learn to be competitive with their peers, and protective of their reputations. It is a challenge for them to turn those instincts off for the good of the team, but that is exactly what is required.

It's as simple as this. When people don't unload their opinions and feel like they've been listened to, they won't really get on board.

The team you belong to must come ahead of the team you lead: this is putting team results (e.g., organizational needs) ahead of individual agendas (e.g., the team or division you lead, your ego, your need for recognition, your career development, etc.) Confidentiality is respected downward more than it is respected upward. Organizational alignment is a direct result of this hierarchy (if it were the other way around, organizational alignment would be very difficult to achieve).

Leaders must display their humanness. Those under their authority must be empowered & have the courage to engage in honest dialogue.