Leadership Toolkit

The tools you need to be a great leader.

Identify and diagnose issues

Solve the root causes of your team problems
Clarify responsibilities and communicate better
Identify skill gaps and address them
Lead better.

ThoughtfulLeader.com
Welcome to Thoughtful Leader
Thanks for reading this toolkit – I hope it helps you improve your confidence and enables you to
manage your team effectively.

Leading and managing teams is not easy. That’s why I created this toolkit, with some important tools
and techniques to help leaders succeed in their role.

In this leadership toolkit, you will find a bunch of valuable leadership tools, including:

• Tools and techniques to help identify team problems, find the root causes and then solve them.

• Team communication and structural methods to prevent unexpected issues from happening in
your team

• Tools to help you manage accountability and make sure you have the right skills in your team.
These three areas are fundamental and set the foundation for a high-performing team.

I hope you find these resources useful and look forward to joining you on what I hope is a long and
valuable journey with Thoughtful Leader!

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Common Leadership Worries
One of the most difficult aspects of being a leader is attempting to identify issues and making
necessary changes to correct them. The questions that worry many leaders include:

q How can I tell if there are issues within my team?

q How can I tell if my team isn’t functioning well? and;

q How can I better prevent unexpected issues occurring in my team?

Thoughtful leaders consider these types of questions because they know that a team that works well
together will produce better results. Team members are also more likely to help each other and be
more committed to the team.

Some leaders won't notice potential issues until after they've occurred. These leaders won't hesitate to
make drastic changes to the team, often with kneejerk reactions that can cause significant disruption.
This can have the effect of demotivating team members and damaging morale and productivity.

In this toolkit, I’ll attempt to answer these three important questions and get your team moving in the
right direction.
How to Identify Issues Within Your
Team
Identifying issues within your team can be difficult, in part because you aren't able to be everywhere at
once. You can't monitor everyone's actions...but nor should you want to, because then you start to become a
micromanager!
There are a number of signs you should look for that may be an indication of issues within the team. These
are outlined in the sections below.

1. Missed deadlines
When deadlines or milestones are frequently missed without good reason, this can be an indicator of issues
within the team. Failure to hit deadlines can be a result of poor governance, limited motivation, inefficient
processes or an excessive workload.

2. Low quality deliverables or poor customer service

If work is getting done, but the quality is consistently not where you'd like it to be, then this can be a
problem. Poor quality also relates to customer service, not only concrete deliverables. If your team isn’t
providing your internal and external customers with the service that you require, you may have a problem.

Possible causes for these types of issues include low motivation of team members, lack of attention to
detail or excessive workloads resulting in rushed delivery.

3. Lack of awareness
When team members aren't aware of events that impact them, or are caught by surprise by incoming
deadlines, this can be a cause for concern.

Sources of this issue may be personal problems between team members or poorly defined roles and
responsibilities within the team, as well as a lack of structured communication processes.

4. Dysfunctional emotions
Firstly, emotions aren't all bad. In fact, some cultures naturally bring a lot
of emotion to the workplace. However, when emotions are impacting the
functioning of your team, this can be problematic. Open aggression,
frustration, passive-aggression, unhappiness or apathy can all be signs
that something is not quite right. This can lead to increased stress and a
decline in morale.

Dysfunctional emotions can be caused by a huge number of factors, but

often it is because people are not accomplishing things the way they
would like to. This can be symptomatic of process and communication
issues.
 How to Identify the Root Causes of
Team Issues
The issues highlighted above are simply symptoms of a greater problem - they cannot be solved without
looking deeper to find the real issue. For example, directing your team not to shout at each other is fine,
but it would be far more useful to understand why they are shouting at each other and attempt to address
that particular problem.
You need to address the cause and not just the symptom! You do this through Root Cause Analysis (RCA).
The Five Whys
A simple way to undertake Root Cause Analysis is to
use the ”Five Whys" technique.
To use this technique, you simply seek to
understand ”Why?" up to five times until you reach
a root cause that may be able to be addressed.
Each of your answers to the ”Why?" needs to be
grounded in fact, not conjecture. Once you keep
questioning the answers at each stage, you will
eventually come to a cause that is hopefully able to
be addressed via some sort of solution.
Note: The reason that this technique is called the "5
whys" is because it generally takes only up to five
rounds of questioning before a useful root cause is
determined. You don’t necessarily HAVE to do it five
times!
Exercise
Take an issue that you have encountered recently
and work through the Five Whys to see if you can
find the root cause. Ensure that you look for facts to
support your answers.
Note: You may need to discuss the issue with others
to identify the root cause.
Five Whys: An example
1. Tom changed the Executive presentation this
morning and made a mistake which made it
into the final document. Why was there a
mistake?
2. Tom was in a hurry to make a change at the last
minute and rushed the job. Nobody had the
chance to review it either. Why was there a
change at the last minute?
3. The team was only told about the presentation
yesterday, giving them only one day to put it
together. Why were they only told yesterday?
4. The person who manages the Executive events
was sick and didn't have a replacement. Usually
they would have told the team about it. Why
was there nobody covering the events
manager?
5. Because there had been no backup plan
determined for the event that this manager was
absent.
After reaching the fifth “Why”, we can see that the
cause at the root of the problem is becoming
apparent. From this, we can look at possible
solutions.
This may be to assign a backup coordinator for
when the primary coordinator is away, or to publish
the schedule of events so that the team who
creates the presentation can see it coming.
Preventing Unexpected Issues in
Your Team
No leader wants to experience unexpected issues within their team. Unexpected issues increase stress,
reduce morale and can delay work that is currently in progress.

You will never be able to avoid all unexpected issues. However, you can limit the impact and likelihood of
such occurrences by putting a few team structures in place.

Introducing communication processes and structures

Communication processes and structures are important in attempting to formalise, in part, the
communication of a team. It is worth noting that these processes and forums don't need to be extremely
bureaucratic or onerous. It can be beneficial to implement even simple, lightweight processes.

There are good reasons for meetings and communication. They exist so that people understand what is
happening within the organisation and their team, and to coordinate activity.

Meetings no longer need to be face to face all the time. Often they can be held remotely or by phone. This is
likely to be a consideration for your team given the rise of flexible working arrangements in many
workplaces.

The types of processes and forums needed for a team will vary depending on the individual circumstances.
However, there are a number of standard approaches that can be taken.
Stopping Team Issues: Introducing
Basic Communication Forums
Meetings
There is an awful lot of meeting-bashing going on in workplaces these days, saying that meetings are a
“waste of time”. However, there are several types of meetings that will be useful communication forums.
Whole team meetings
Whole-team meetings are useful forums for
discussing work and non-work related issues
together as a team. Depending on the size of your
team, this may be difficult. If you have a large team,
it is unlikely that you’ll be able to productively
discuss many topics with enough detail from the
team to be useful.
Otherwise, whole-team meetings can be good
forums for discussing progress on current work or
improvements as well as strategy. These meetings
shouldn’t happen more than once or twice per
month, because they impact productivity, taking the
team out of action for so long. However, they are
still useful forums to gauge the attitude of the team
and to keep a regular touchpoint where you see
everybody at one time.
Useful for:
q Delivering team announcements and discussing
events that may impact the team
q Discussing progress on current work
q Introducing the team to (or co-creating) new
frameworks or ways of working
q Observing the motivation or mood of the team
q Observing interactions between team members.
Be careful of:
q Trying to solve problems that only affect a few
people in the team
q Having whole-team meetings too frequently
q Discussing topics that aren’t relevant or
interesting to many in the team.
Team leader forums
If you have several team leaders working for you,
team lead forums can be effective ways to
communicate information without interrupting the
work of the entire team and sub-teams. These are
also good forums for discussing and solving issues
amongst the team leaders because you are dealing
with a smaller audience.
Once again, you don’t want to hinder your team
with too many meetings. Remember that when your
team leaders are in meetings with you, they aren’t
leading their teams, so don’t make the meetings too
long or frequent. For these meetings, once per
fortnight is usually frequent enough to be useful.
Useful for:
q Collaboratively solving problems that are
occurring within sub-teams, that aren’t
appropriate to be discussed with the entire
group
q Understanding what people are doing that may
affect other parts of the team
q Introducing new ways of working that team
leaders need to adhere to
q Communicating specific task information that
needs to be actioned by team leaders.
Be careful of:
q Having team leader meetings too frequently
q Discussing confidential performance-related or
personal issues of a particular employee within
a team, when all team leaders are present.
Stopping Team Issues: Introducing
Basic Communication Forums
Individual catch-ups
One on one meetings are particularly useful for having more personal discussions with your team
members. Often it can be good to hold these meetings in a less formal setting such as over coffee at a local
café or similar venue.

Individual meetings are effective because they allow your team members the opportunity to open up and
discuss their goals, aspirations and current issues in a confidential manner, rather than in front of their
peers. Note that some employees will be hesitant in opening up about issues for fear of reprisal. However,
over the course of your working relationship, if you lead in such a way that indicates you aren’t looking to
place blame or punish people, you can counteract this.

Individual meetings are also good for finding out about events that are impacting the team that you may
not hear about in a group setting. It is generally too time consuming to have individual meetings very
frequently. Depending on the size of your team, anywhere between fortnightly to monthly is likely to be
appropriate.

Useful for:
q Discussing issues or aspirations and motivation in a more personal setting
q Discussing confidential matters that shouldn’t be heard by the entire team

Be careful of:
q Having individual meetings too frequently
q Cancelling these meetings. Cancelling individual meetings can give your team members the impression
that you don’t think these catch-ups are important. They can actually be a great way to assess how your
team members are feeling and understand what they are dealing with.
Stopping Team Issues:
Introducing Structure
Communication and accountability structures
Other than communication forums, there are other ways to help ensure that information flows properly
through your team. These structures are really important to have in place to reduce misunderstandings and
clarify roles and responsibilities.
Single points of contact
Some teams have a lot of interaction with external
parties, or other internal teams. In these situations,
it is beneficial to understand how your team
communicates. Is there a single contact point, or do
people from outside the team routinely contact
many people within it?
Multiple contact points can cause communication
issues because important messages can be missed
by other members of the team.
It is a good idea to assign a single point of contact
for communication to external parties. This doesn’t
need to be the same person every time, but can be
multiple people in the team, for different purposes.
Of course, you need to tell your external
stakeholders about this arrangement, so they know
who their contact point is.
Useful for:
q Ensuring there is a single communication
channel into the team to reduce likelihood of
missed information
q Reducing the burden of other team members
needing to receive communication from the
same external party.
Be careful of:
q External parties who ignore your assigned
contact point, you’ll need to monitor this
q Communication being missed if the contact
point is sick or otherwise absent. A backup
person or mechanism to monitor this
communication may help to solve this.
Assigning backup roles
Sometimes when people are on vacation or ill,
communication can suffer if nobody is assigned as
a backup to take on the communication activities of
the absent team member.
Whilst it isn’t critical for every team member to
know everybody else’s job inside out, it is worth
paying attention to the communication
responsibilities of the team and ensuring that there
is some overlap where required.
For example, if somebody normally prepares the
agenda for a regular meeting and they are absent,
there should be somebody appointed who can step
in to fill the breach.
Sometimes it will be necessary to upskill other
members of the team so that multiple people can
understand the work involved.
Otherwise you run the risk of significant delays or
emergencies occurring because your team is
unprepared for such an eventuality.
Useful for:
q Mitigating the risk of issues occurring because
the normal responsible person is unavailable.
Be careful of:
q Preparing backup strategies for non-critical
matters. Backup roles should really only be
assigned for the potential activities with the
most impact, should they fail to be executed.
Stopping Team Issues: Tools
The RACI Matrix
Creating a RACI Matrix
A RACI matrix is useful for determining who in your team is responsible for various activities, and
communicating this within the team. RACI stands for Responsible, Accountable, Consulted and Informed.
A RACI matrix is a useful tool to ensure that everybody knows where they stand and what they are
responsible for doing within the team. The simple activity of documenting responsibilities using a RACI and
then confirming them with the team can be valuable.

A sample fictional RACI matrix for publishing a magazine article is shown below.
Role / Person
Task Editor Journalist Assistant Designer
Write article R I
Approve final article AR
Research article sources A R
Design graphics C AR
Publish article AR I

Responsible means that this person or role is Useful for:

directly undertaking the task. q Communicating who is responsible for what in
the team
Accountable means that this person or role is
q Ensuring everybody knows their role and
accountable for the final delivery of the task. For
responsibilities to reduce conflicts and
example, a team member may create a document
duplication of effort.
(Responsible), but a manager may be ultimately
Accountable for its quality and delivery. Be careful of:
q Creating an extremely detailed and complex
Consulted means that this person or role should be
RACI. The matrix should only be detailed enough
consulted by the Responsible person before or
such that it remains useful to the team and
while the task is being performed. In the example
doesn’t require constant updating. If it is too
below, the Journalist is consulted by the Designer
complex, it is likely that it won’t be used.
during the design of the graphics, to ensure they
are in keeping with the theme of the article.
Exercise
Informed means that the role or person should be
Create a RACI matrix for your team. If you don’t yet lead
informed of the undertaking or completion of the
a team, make one for the team that you’re currently a
activity. For example, while the Journalist is
part of. Start with listing the common tasks your team
Responsible for writing the article, the Designer is
performs on the left of the grid and put the roles in the
informed during the process so they can start
team across the top.
thinking about ideas for appropriate graphics.
You may find that for some tasks, the responsibilities are
not crystal clear in your team. This is good sign that you
may be able to make some improvements!
 Stopping Team Issues: Tools
The Skills Matrix
Creating a skills matrix
A skills matrix is an important tool to document the skills and experience contained in your team. A skills
matrix helps you to identify any shortfalls or surpluses of skills and experience in your team.

One problem that many leaders experience is a situation where they have a team member that “knows
everything” about a certain aspect while other team members know nothing. This drastically increases the
risk in your team as you now have a key person dependency – dependency on a single person who is the
only one who can do this aspect of the team’s work.
Of course, team members are all important to the functioning of your team, but you don’t want to rely on a
single person so much that everything grinds to a halt if they are sick or decide to leave the organisation.

Creating a skills matrix is simple, as shown in the example below.

Skill / Experience
Team Member Skill A Skill B Experience A Experience B
Alex ✓
Bob ✓ ✓ ✓
Jane ✓
Jacob ✓ ✓
Tracy ✓

As you can see, only Jacob has “Experience A” in the entire team. If this is an important aspect of your
team’s operation, you may consider cross-skilling other team members by giving them some exposure to
Experience A, or having Jacob mentor other team members to learn more about Experience A.
Conversely, many team members have Skill B. This may indicate that there is enough expertise in the team
for Skill B already, and therefore there is no need for any more training in this area.

Useful for:
q Assessing skill and experience gaps or excesses across your team
q Reducing the risk of relying on a single team member to carry out a function of your team
q Identifying opportunities for training or upskilling.

Be careful of:
q Going into minute detail for the skill and experience categories. You only need to include the aspects
that are important to the work that your team performs.

Exercise
Create a Skills matrix for your team. If you don’t yet lead a
team, make one for the team that you’re currently a part of.
Start with listing the team members on the left of the grid and
put the key skills or experiences across the top.

Skills include using specific tools and techniques, while

experiences should highlight key domain knowledge or
experience working in a given situation.
Teamwork is often underrated in today’s
work environment. It is often assumed
that everybody is able to work together
productively just because they are part
of the same team.

Leaders need to be able to spot the

warning signs – the signs that show that
your team is not working effectively.
Conflict can be constructive, but when it
occurs daily, it’s likely not going to be
helpful to anybody.

Once a leader has highlighted an issue,

tackling the root cause is the only thing
that will solve it. Many leaders attempt
Band-Aid fixes which never remove the
real problem, instead it becomes hidden
for a short while.

Leaders create effective teams through

intentionally setting out how the team
should communicate and operate,
instead of leaving it to chance.

It’s time to start being intentional about

how you lead your team, so that you can
set up conditions that help your team
members do their best work.

I hope this leadership toolkit is helpful

for you to get the best out of your team.
About the author
Hi, my name is Ben Brearley and I’m a leader, manager, MBA and consultant living
in Perth, Western Australia.

I am passionate about developing leaders who make thoughtful decisions and care
about their teams. In my opinion, this is the key to more functional, efficient,
happy workplaces.

I hope you enjoyed reading this toolkit and hope you learned some techniques you
can apply to help you succeed in your role.

I’m always keen to hear from readers, so be sure to contact me if you have any
questions or just want to say hello.

To contact me, just go to https://www.thoughtfulleader.com/contact or simply

send me an email at ben@thoughtfulleader.com.

Don’t forget to check out my other useful resources below!

Want to learn more?

Enquire about my Leadership Coaching Services. I can help you achieve
your goals and overcome your leadership challenges.

To find out more, visit the link here:

https://www.thoughtfulleader.com/leadership-coaching/

Download the Time Management Toolkit, which will help you to reduce
stress and get more done, with less effort.

You can download the Time Management Toolkit here:

https://www.thoughtfulleader.com/time-management-toolkit/

Download the Leadership Guide Series for critical leadership skills to

help your career.

You can find the Leadership Guide Series here:

https://www.thoughtfulleader.com/improve-leadership-skills-
leadership-guide-pack/

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