Recognising and harnessing individual superpowers is the secret to transforming a group of individuals into a high-performing team. But what exactly are these superpowers and how do you uncover them within your team?
Before delving into the exercise itself, let's explore what we mean by "superpowers" in the context of a team. These are not merely skills or competencies but rather the unique qualities, traits and expertise that individuals bring to the table.
Here we share a great team exercise that boosts engagement and the perception of being a high-performing team.
The superpower spotlight exercise
Through this exercise you might find out things like:
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Who is the process-driven one?
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Who is the one who always raises the energy in the room?
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Who’s the person who always has someone in their network to connect you with?
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Who is the one with the product knowledge that you can’t do without?
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Who is the calm one in a crisis?
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Who always pulls it out of the bag when you’ve got a tight deadline?
It’s a great exercise for making individuals feel valued, seen and recognised for the contribution they make. Even new starters will have a superpower that they’ve brought with them, that they may appreciate the opportunity to share with their new team.
Step 1: Set the stage
Start by placing a piece of paper for each person in your team around the room with their name on the top.
If you have 10 team members, you’ll need 10 pieces of paper with one name on each piece of paper.
This usually works best with flipchart paper attached to a wall, but you can work it best based on the space you have.
Step 2: Unleash the superpowers
Ask your team to write one thing that they see as a superpower for each team member on the pieces of paper.
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What is that person great at?
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What do you really value about that person?
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When do you seek the person out for their advice and support?
For a team of 10, each piece of paper should have 9 superpowers/pieces of great feedback for each person.
Step 3: Embrace the feedback
Ask each team member to go and find their own piece of paper. Ask them to read all the great feedback their team has given them and what they believe their superpower is.
Step 4: Self-discovery
Ask them to summarise, based on what is on the paper, what the superpower is that they bring to the team.
This exercise in self-awareness allows individuals to recognise and embrace their unique strengths within the team dynamic.
Step 5: Share & celebrate
Now go round the room, person by person, asking them to share their superpower based on the feedback they’ve been given.
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Are they surprised by the feedback?
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How has the feedback made them feel?
The impact & beyond
You now have a list of superpowers for your team! You can share a summary of this afterward as a way of documenting what everyone brings to your team and as a reminder for the individual part everyone plays in creating a high-performing team.
Bonus… notice that there are some gaps in superpowers that you’d have expected from your team?
Great, you’ve now got some thoughts on future recruitment for superpowers you’re looking to bring into the team, or a training plan to focus on for building up knowledge and expertise in your existing team!
We’d love to hear how you get on!
At Ten Space we help organisations create high-performing teams through capturing feedback from members of the team. We’ve designed surveys that help to identify the key elements of high performance in a team and provide the insights on where teams are excelling and where they need to focus to improve.
If you’d like to talk to us about high-performing teams and how we can help, you can find more at www.tenspace.co.uk, or contact us on 0161 676 3443.
