Yesterday’s post talked about building a personal creative team that you can reach out to compensate for your creative shortcomings. It’s a tremendously valuable approach to take.
Here are three keys that will help you cultivate a strong personal creative team:
- Start with the attitude of giving yourself to others. Before thinking about how people can benefit you, understand your talents so that you know how you can first serve them. I initially heard Zig Ziglar say that the best way to ensure your own success is by figuring out how to make as many other people as possible successful.
- Treat people nicely, be friendly, and smile (either in person or in your voice or written word if you’re communicating via voice or email). Taking the first step to be kind, appreciative, and friendly will create incredible relationship opportunities and open many doors that might appear to be closed.
- Embrace “mutualism” – a sincere effort to find commonly shared goals, even among potential competitors, where you can realize a greater good. A great example is former presidents Bush and Clinton coming together several years ago for Tsunami relief. Although political rivals, their effort helped others, while benefiting each of them personally in different ways. Embracing mutualism requires the ability to compromise, reprioritize, and share: risk, success, and the limelight.
There are many other keys to building a great team, but these three will take you much of the way. Give them a try as you add to your creative team.