A cohesive team is essential to driving engagement, group morale, and ultimately building a high-performing team that achieves excellent results. So how do we get there?

Leadership coach Dr. Quendrida Whitmore, AKA Coach Quen, walked us through her model for developing a high-performance team during Women in Retail Leadership Circle and Women Leading Travel & Hospitality’s latest Virtual Workshop, How Leaders Build Trust to Create a Cohesive Team.

Whitmore says you can’t have a strong, high-performing team without healthy, strong individuals. Her high-performing team model is defined as “a team where individuals feel safe and bring their authentic selves and talents to work collaboratively in service of the larger organization’s goals, development and results.”

Whitmore’s model breaks that down into five buckets: trust and safety; efficacy and confidence; belonging and value; self-actualization and fulfillment of values; and teamwork and collaboration.

Let’s talk about the first bucket, trust and safety. Whitmore says that at the root of this bucket is fear. “If we acknowledge fear, it starts losing its power.”

How do we acknowledge fear as a leader? By making sure we meet our team where they are.

“If your culture doesn’t have trust and isn’t a safe place for your associates to be, then it starts with you,” Whitmore advised. “You have to learn every member and what’s needed from that person to make sure you’re building the right culture.

“Leadership is meeting every individual where they are and helping them come together as a team, and helping them get to where they want to be, and where we need them to be, and where the company needs them to be,” continued Whitmore.

What are some ways you’re learning about your individual associates’ needs in order to build a strong, cohesive team?

Learn more about Whitmore’s high-performing team model, including the rest of the buckets leaders need to address to build trust in their teams, by watching the full Virtual Workshop now. The on-demand workshop is free for Women in Retail Leadership Circle and Women Leading Travel & Hospitality members, and $79 for nonmembers.