Cross pollination of ideas

Recently at the Churchill Club, we were honoured to have Det. Sen. Sgt. Ron Iddles as a panellist for the Clarity of Thought event. Ron is the longest serving member of the Victorian Homicide squad, having been there over 20 years and has investigated over 200 murders.

Ron’s everyday work life is a hell of a lot tougher than anyone in the room had ever had to deal with, as it includes dealing with horrific scenes, inflammatory accusations and emotionally distraught parents and partners. So getting his team to work together well and think clearly in highly stressful environments was something that Ron knew all about. I thought it would be beneficial to pass on the five lessons he shared with us.

1. Get the culture right

You need to develop a culture where members admit errors early and easily. Everyone is resource constrained so less time spent on activities based in faulty logic, the better. Learning from mistakes is also extremely valuable for a team, so ensure this occurs as part of the process and without defensiveness of members. Your team members can’t grow if they don’t learn easily from their mistakes.

2. Depersonalise the thinking

Train your team to depersonalise themselves from the thinking by laying their ideas out visually and seeking input from others. Diagrams, maps, charts, etc are much better for communicating and figuring out what’s going on in a complex area than written or verbal briefings.

3. Get the environment right

The environment the team works in dramatically impacts the effectiveness, eg. gray walls are really bad for creativity but nature is good for it. If you can’t change your environment, use pictures, props and decorations to improve it, eg. even staring at a picture of nature can make you more creative.

4. Manage the personalities

Every team will have a variety of different personalities, as well as people with different levels of expertise, but don’t let strong wills take over. The team is much more effective when every team member gets challenged and must justify their decisions or adapt their thinking. Making this part of both your process and culture makes for a better team.

5. Make decisions

Avoid analysis paralysis. There is never enough information to make decisions with 100% confidence. So don’t procrastinate about making decisions, however, make sure you can justify your decisions and record the process. For Ron he asks himself the question: “can I justify this decision in court?”.

Nothing better than cross pollination of ideas from other professions!

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Brendan Lewis is a serial technology entrepreneur having founded: Ideas Lighting, Carradale Media, Edion, Verve IT, The Churchill Club, Flinders Pacific and L2i Technology Advisory. He has set up businesses for others in Romania, Indonesia and Vietnam. Qualified in IT and Accounting, he has also spent time running an Advertising agency and as a Cavalry Officer with the Australian Army Reserve.