John C. Maxwell, one of the leading experts on team behavior, tells us that, “You cannot build a great (value analysis) team without great players. This is a fact. You can lose with good players, but you cannot win without them.” So how do you get great team players?

If you want the best players on your value analysis teams, follow these four steps:

(i) Select Them Right

Most value analysis team leaders and members are selected because of their titles or because of their influence in an organization. They are chosen without any regard to their ideal competencies or the qualities that will make them the best team players. This is a fatal mistake!

All winning value analysis teams are a combination of attitudes, talents, and traits matched with the right leadership to give them the vision, goals, objectives, and “can-do” attitude: A team that takes responsibility for its actions and pride in its accomplishments. This synergism can only take place if your team players have the ideal competencies or qualities (i.e., analytical thinker, organized, reliable, dependable, enthusiastic, selfless, tenacious, etc.) on which to build and to make them champions.

(ii) Train Them

Larry Miles, the father of value analysis, recommended 40 hours of value analysis training initially, then another 40 hours of training in six months for value analysis teams to ensure that all players were well grounded in the value analysis methodology. Incredibly, organizations are giving little to NO TRAINING to their value analysis team members, but expect them to be winners! This is like asking your team leaders and team members to fly a plane for the first time without any flight training, then watching them crash and burn when they try to take off.

Do you really need 80 hours of value analysis training to get your plane off the ground? The answer is, no! With new scientific training methods and guided software applications, we have found that two or three days of training initially suffices, along with ongoing coaching that can make any value analysis team a GREAT VALUE ANALYSIS TEAM.

(iii) Grow Them

After your initial value analysis team training and your first team meetings, you will clearly see the weaknesses (emotionally insecure, inflexible, intellectually lazy, undisciplined, etc.) of your team leaders and team members come to the surface. This is not a time to panic, but rather an opportune time for TEACHING new skills or reinforcing skills that have already been taught in your training sessions. This coaching should be accomplished off-line, in person, and customized to strengthen the players’ weaknesses.

(iv) Trade Them

If you have trained and coached them and given individual players every opportunity to grow as team leaders or members (about three months) and you still aren’t getting the results that you were looking for, then there is only one answer left for you – trade them for championship-caliber people, and bring these champions on-board immediately. Never hesitate in deciding to trade players (just like professional football or baseball teams), since players who aren’t a good fit will eventually tear down your championship team.

For your value analysis team to become a championship value analysis team it will take time, commitment, discipline, and tenacity, but if you don’t start by selecting them right, training them, growing them, and trading players that aren’t a good fit, you will never even be in the game.