For me personally, watching any sort of team accomplish something is so inspiring to me.   Especially when the odds are against them… amiright?!  From a flash mob to an underdog team… it’s beyond inspiring when they move in fluid motion together towards an end goal.

“Coming together is a beginning; keeping together is progress; working together is success.”  Henry Ford

Henry Ford is an unlikely hero by today’s standards.  But I am not too proud to say that Henry Ford is one of my personal heroes.  Not only did he come up with the whole assembly line process… but he knows his stuff when it comes to the topic of TEAMWORK.  And teamwork kinda rocks my world!  Especially when it’s done RIGHT!

One of the most interesting facts to me is that Henry Ford recognized that his employees would bring him success so much so that he elevated them by treating them as his business partners.

“It is not unusual to speak of an employee as a partner, and yet what else is he?”  Henry Ford

From sports teams to a group of ladies working together on a quilt to work teams to the U.S. Navy… each person brings their own gifts/talents to the team but they are also committed to working together for the purpose and vision of the whole team.  They are supporting each other by doing their own work and doing it well.

If the team was missing any one of those dedicated individuals (in heart or in body – meaning, if they were physically absent or if there were an ulterior motive) the rest of the team members would have to pick up the slack created by that missing part.

The cog work of the team just would not work… imagine, in the picture below, if any one of those cogs was missing or even dislodged (meaning, with an ulterior motive) the rest of the cogs would not be moving in motion with the rest of the team.  One missing cog prevents the rest of the team from doing their part to make the process work.

That’s a POWERFUL image of the importance of each team member being committed to the success of the team!  Isn’t it?!

“Individual commitment to a group effort – this is what makes a team work, a company work, society work, a civilization work.”  – Vince Lombardi

To break it down – successful team work takes 1) individual commitment to add value, 2) a commitment for the benefit of the team, and 3) dedication to the team.  It’s not rocket science… but that endeavor was a success because of teamwork.  So… maybe it is…