Catalytic converters...by Torklift Jen

By Torklift Jen

Winning teams have players who make things happen. These are the get-it-done people in a successful organization.  There are even some who take it a step further and are agents for change, creativity, and motivation.  Torklift International is made up of these kinds of people.

As a student of Torklift, one of the assignments we are challenged with is team building with modules in teamwork and leadership skills.

A resource for all employees is John Maxwell’s 17 Indisputable Laws of Teamwork – Embrace Them and Empower Your Team.  The author is well known in the area of motivational speaking, leadership training, and building corporate success.  He uses his personal experience and stories of people and events to explain his points.  It’s like getting into the head of my mentor’s mentors.

One point of particular focus is named the Law of the Catalyst.

Like the important component of a vehicle’s exhaust system, a catalytic converter takes the toxic emissions from a vehicle and turns it into a clean, efficient, well running and controlled machine.  We don’t make them, but our plant is full of catalysts in another form.

Maxwell uses Michael Jordan as a great example of a team catalyst.  Perhaps the greatest basketball player of all time, he was extraordinarily talented on the court and also possessed the ability to bring intensity to the game.  Even after retiring, he continued to stir players by joining in and fueling the competition with good natured “trash talking” and consistently elevating them and pushing everyone on to the next level.

Catalysts are the positive influencers.  Everybody has a bad day, faced a daunting challenge, or just been a little off their game.   I’ve recently come to work with this season’s nasty cold, spewing my own toxic emissions and looking to produce under the weather results.  These people are marked by always being ready to step up and get in the game, they are intuitive, good communicators, passionate, talented, creative, responsible, generous and influencing.

An organization with empowered catalysts is always striving and full of momentum.  Ready or not, Torklift International is up for another big year and in this case action will speak louder than words, so it’s back to work for Torklift Jen.