Teamwork needed to encourage Airmen Published Sept. 24, 2015 By Lt. Col. Matt Jones 22nd Airlift Squadron TRAVIS AIR FORCE BASE, Calif. -- Recently, one of our Travis Airmen asked me what I had learned in my first year in command. I thought about it and answered by stating how little I actually accomplish on my own, how much I rely on my team and how impressive my teammates are. This entire topic may be over simplistic to many, but one I find critical to mission success. I acknowledge teamwork could just as easily be substituted with wingman or Airman but I use it to focus on the combined action of a group of people. I come at this topic from my perspective as a squadron commander and as my team's leader. The three traits every high performing team must have are competence, trust and accountability. As the leader of a team, before you demand competence from your teammates, you must first be competent yourself. This is deliberately the first step, so work on your own competence before proceeding further. This will ensure both the ability to share the team's load when required to do so, as well as the requisite credibility needed to lead. With credibility comes trust, the second trait needed for high performing teams. This should not be complicated. It is a trait that must go both ways and the quickest thing that will derail you if broken by the team's leader. It should be in the background of most decisions you make. A leader has no chance of succeeding if they can't be trusted, which overlaps with the third trait, accountability. Holding members of a team accountable ensures that trust is not fractured. Embedded in accountability are fairness, timeliness, proportionality and consistency. While the term often connotes negativity, members should just as often be held to account in positive ways. When mastering accountability within your team, start with those most senior members, as they will have the largest impact on the other members. Proper accountability allows for healthy movement within a team and helps keep strong performers motivated. These traits and principles were reinforced for me last year when I was reading hundreds of comments from our annual organizational climate assessment. I was first struck by the number of comments that were a result from the actions of Senior NCOs, front line supervisors and functional leaders. I realized that as commander a majority of the unit's climate comes not from me, but instead from dozens of actions that I often don't even observe. I quickly realized that the greatest impact I could make was in my own personal example, trusting those I lead and holding the two dozen Airmen I directly supervise accountable. For the portion of a team's climate that the leader does directly control, simply focus on your own competence and a style of accountability that values fairness, timeliness, proportionality and consistency. My team provides combat strategic airlift in DOD's largest airplane. It is so large that the majority of our mission is geographically separated by two staircases and hundreds of feet of distance within the plane. I often tell our Loadmasters how much I am counting on them as teammates to ensure accurate weight and balance, cargo being properly tied down and all doors/ramps being properly secured. Their typical reaction is a polite smirk followed by the observation that they too are counting on me to safely takeoff and land. It is my favorite reaction and what solidifies why competence, trust and accountability are the hallmarks of excellent teamwork.