How to Build Your Team's 'Code of Honor'

It is no secret the key to a business’s success is to have a successful team as its foundation. Picture the process of building a house, it begins with laying a foundation, but before laying the said foundation, one must carefully decide the material to use. Would you choose weak materials (ie. straw or hay) to build your foundation? Or materials that reflect strength, stability and contain the ability to withstand hardships and won't crumble under pressure? The same can be said with the build-up of a successful team.  

At the core of a successful team, you will find two things, a strong leader and a set of simple rules founded on superior ethics and morals also referred to as a code of honor.

A good leader can make or break the success of a team. As a leader, your team’s success, or drawbacks, are a direct reflection of who you are as a leader. You should see yourself reflected in your team this includes the good, the bad and the ugly. Instilling a good yet reasonable ‘code of honor’ for you and your team to follow is a top priority. These principles allow everyone to function on the same page and sets the tone for a business.

A healthy ‘code of honor’ that reflects balance, is reasonable, clear and concise. While it is perfectly fine to create these rules to reflect your personal morals and ethics, it is of great importance they also make sense to your team. They should be strong yet realistic.

A few examples of clear and valuable rules are as follows:

• Respect our time and show up on time.

• Treat others as you would want to be treated.

• No question is a dumb question, always ask for clarity.

Whatever you do, be sure to have boundaries set in place. For in the absence of rules, chaos ensues. Success is a hard feat to achieve while operating in chaos. With the success of your team in mind, here is a guideline for developing your own Code of Honor:

Find Some Time for Silence

Getting quiet is a great way to bring clarity to any situation. Think about meditation or accounts from people who do those 10-day silence retreats; they come away from the experience with clarity, focus, and revelation because they've been able to clear out all the noise.

Finding the good and ethical requires you to shut out all the noise, and find a space where you can be honest with yourself and your team about what's important to you.

Taking time to de-stress and calm down facilitates an atmosphere for a healthy and productive conversation to take place. It allows decisions to be made sans anger and eliminates operating from a place of dysfunction which can lead to a rapid decline in morale.

Identify Recurring Performance Issues

Chances are, your team slips up in a similar place every time. Once you identify the bottleneck, you can set about to fix it. And sometimes you can do this through ethics.

For example, if your content writing team doesn't turn in their work on time, perhaps punctuality and meeting deadlines should be in your honor code.

You should not set out to fix the problem yourself but invite the rest of the team to help in the resolution of the problem too. A good leader serves his people while a ruler rules his. People are more likely to respond well to the former and strive to uphold the standards.

Get as Specific as Possible

There's a difference between saying, "Be punctual," and, "Always turn in your articles by the deadline." See how it makes a different impact? Leave room for little error and misinterpretation.

If rules aren’t specific, it creates an environment where everyone will do things their own way. The team will no longer have the same goal in mind which can lead to confusion. This can negatively impact training new recruits.

Be Reasonable With Your Code

Specific doesn't give you an excuse to get excessive. There shouldn't be that many "honor" rules for your business. The key is to find a healthy balance.

Too many restrictions create a tense environment and lead to an unpleasant work experience. It can cause more harm than good. Even the bible had it right with the 10 Commandments. These were a set of rules for the world to follow and reflected simple, straight to the point commands, this left little room to be lost in translation.

Create an Atmosphere of Accountability

You shouldn't have to go around the office parenting everyone. Micromanaging isn’t a quality of a good leader but more of a dictator. Dictatorships are often met with revolts. Setup the rules, then cultivate a culture that inherently promotes the ethical guidelines.

With a good ‘code of honor’ to follow, everyone should be motivated to strive for success. In doing so, if someone violates the ‘code of honor’ point out their transgression and ask the same be done for you. A good leader leads by example, so if you accept responsibility for your mishaps, so will your team.

Behind any successful family, business, or nation you’ll find a set of clear and powerful rules. The rules found at the center of these social units is the glue that binds it all together.

As an all-star team, team members reflect respect, rationality, integrity, and excellence. They all work together, motivating one another to strive to accomplish the same goal. They are morally and ethically sound and are humble in their approach to correcting any mistakes.

A strong ‘code of honor’ helps to create a powerful workforce. It can also be used as a tool in the new hiring process. If a new recruit doesn't abide by the ‘code of honor’ he may not be suitable for your team.

A humble leader with strong moral backing enables his team to function to the best of their ability. Remember, "there is no I in a team."