Today I want to talk about team performance. And why maximum effort doesn’t always equal maximum output.
Have you ever watched your sales and revenue teams both hit their targets, only to see overall market share slip?
Both teams are working incredibly hard; both are winning by their own metrics. Yet, together, they’re missing the mark.
How is that possible?
The Vector Problem
To answer this question, let's get into the math.
A vector has two components: direction and magnitude. Think of it like force applied to move something—it matters both how hard you push and which way you're pushing.
So, if you have four people each applying a force of 2, but they're pushing in different directions—say one person pushing +1, another pushing -1—you don't get a force of 8. You get zero.
All that effort, all that hard work, and you end up with no progress.
That's exactly what can happen with your team.
Both can pull in different directions, accidentally canceling each other out.
The Emotional Connection That Sustains Us
Most people won't sustain hard work unless they have a deep emotional connection to a future they're working toward.
Peter Attia writes about this in his book Outlive. He talks about the difference between extending your lifespan versus extending your "healthspan"—the years when you're actually healthy and vibrant.
As we get older, the work required to stay healthy gets harder and harder. Without a clear vision of why that work matters—maybe you want to climb mountains in retirement or play with your grandkids—most people give up.
The same principle applies to our teams. When people are just "doing their job" without understanding how their work connects to something meaningful, they burn out. They go through the motions. They might even work against each other without realizing it.
But when everyone understands the bigger picture—when they have that emotional connection to where the team is headed—everything changes.
Finding Your Common Goal
The solution isn't to make everyone think the same way or have identical priorities. The solution is alignment around one singular goal that everyone can rally behind.
In our case, we shifted the focus from individual department metrics to overall market share growth. Suddenly, sales and revenue management weren't working against each other—they were collaborating to capture more of the market while maintaining profitability.
Same people, same skills, but now their vectors were aligned.
The amount of force matters much less than the direction. In fact, people trying really hard in the wrong direction can be more detrimental than people moving slowly in the right direction.
What About Your Team?
Take a moment to think about your own team:
Are people clear on the one thing that matters most right now?
Do individual department goals sometimes conflict with overall success?
When you look at your team's daily work, are they pushing in the same direction?
If you're standing back-to-back having the same conversation but seeing completely different things, it might be time to help everyone turn and face the same direction.
Next week, I want to talk about something even more fundamental: how to develop the kind of personal vision that aligns your own life and naturally draws others to be part of what you're building.
See you next week.
Take care,
Josh