The Ideal Team Player

How to Recognize and Cultivate the Three Essential Virtues: A Leadership Fable

By: Patrick M. Lencioni

Narrated by: Stephen Hoye

Length: 5 hrs and 3 mins

Publisher's Summary

In his classic book The Five Dysfunctions of a Team, Patrick Lencioni laid out a groundbreaking approach for tackling the perilous group behaviors that destroy teamwork. Here he turns his focus to the individual, revealing the three indispensable virtues of an ideal team player.

In The Ideal Team Player, Lencioni tells the story of Jeff Shanley, a leader desperate to save his uncle's company by restoring its cultural commitment to teamwork. Jeff must crack the code on the virtues that real team players possess and then build a culture of hiring and development around those virtues. Beyond the fable, Lencioni presents a practical framework and actionable tools for identifying, hiring, and developing ideal team players.

Whether you're a leader trying to create a culture around teamwork, a staffing professional looking to hire real team players, or a team player wanting to improve yourself, this book will prove to be as useful as it is compelling.

©2016 Patrick Lencioni (P)2016 Audible, Inc.

Required Reading/Listening

Would you listen to The Ideal Team Player again? Why?

As the Chief of Staff for my organization I am designing and implementing the Team Development programs. These programs are based on The 5 Dysfunctions of Teams, The Ideal Team Player, and Sean Covey's The Four Disciplines of Execution. While "5 Dysfunctions" focuses on team level development, "The Ideal Team Player" focuses on individual development. I find that I "rewind and re-listen" often with Lencioni, and that I stop and take notes (OneNotes) and record thoughts.

What did you like best about this story?

The drama was fantastic. The characters and personalities engaging.

What about Stephen Hoye’s performance did you like?

Hoye's performance was great. I liked his energy and pace.

Was this a book you wanted to listen to all in one sitting?

Yes!

Any additional comments?

While I began this book thinking about how to teach and share the principles of ideal team players with others, I came away with the determination to change my nature and to become a much better team player. Having and using this book is changing my life and making me a much better team player, and I am making my life a whole lot more fun and exciting.

Great format, narration

Would you recommend this audiobook to a friend? If so, why?

I would definitely recommend this. I found the story form "fable" in the first 70% of the book to be a solid way to put the concepts into practice, so that the nuts & bolts description of the model was crystal clear.

What about Stephen Hoye’s performance did you like?

I listen to virtually all audio books at 1.5X speed, and I found that to be a good pace for this narration. The narration was very clear, contained appropriate inflections, and was engaging. For those who listen to audio books at 1X and find themselves getting distracted/bored, speed up the narration to a speed that will keep you engaged.

Was this a book you wanted to listen to all in one sitting?

It would be a lot of information for one sitting, but the "fable" portion could certainly be engaging for one sitting. The model/application would be something you'd want to listen to more than once. Since the book was split up in this fashion, one can listen to the nuts & bolts application portion and get a lot of benefit w/o having to listen to the entire book over again.

Lot of talk about a simple concept

Would you recommend this book to a friend? Why or why not?

Sure, but the guy reading the book was terrible, almost put me to sleep several times. I would buy the book not the audible version. Go to the end and simply read the overview. If you have read a lot of Patricks stuff then this is repeated material on some levels. I do love Pats stuff so don't think I'm down on him, not at all, just that it is repeating material.

Has The Ideal Team Player turned you off from other books in this genre?

No

Who would you have cast as narrator instead of Stephen Hoye?

Whoever it was that narrated "The hard thing about hard things" by Ben Horowitz, THAT was a great book and well narrated. Also, Steve Jobs narrator.

Did The Ideal Team Player inspire you to do anything?

Perhaps, but not much.

Good book, horrible voiceover

My only complaint here is the person doing the audio book itself sounds like he learned to speak from William Shatner. I feel like I’m listening to a Star Trek reading, his over enunciation is absolutely horrible and making this book a challenge to get through.

loved it

my husbands company required him to read this book. what a great way to show your company Style. it's nice because he's listening to it on his drive to work great motivator

In a perfect world….

Heavily relies on modern day capitalistic slavery. This is an excellent how to get your employees to make you lots of money. This would work in a perfect world, where the leader’s themselves follow through on what they say, but I have worked in the construction industry for many years, and that is almost never the case.

Tedious and not for non-managers

I had to read this as a work requirement. Not being in a managerial position, it was far from any information that I need and the whole book can be summed up as follows.

You want employees who are hungry (ambitious), humble (know and admit when they're wrong, or when someone can do better), and smart (aware of people's feelings, and abilities). I just saved you five hours, and not having to hear the word "jackass" literally fifty times.

At the end of the book while talking about who is humble, Lencioni goes into the most humble person that still walks among us -- Jesus Christ. I can accept someone wanting to promote their faith, but it does rather come out of nowhere. Perhaps he also wants us to hire just Christians. Don't know.

The narrator is absolutely wrong for this book. Perhaps good for an episode of Nova, but is utterly dry for any kind of story.

Overall, this book is far too time consuming for something that could have been written in ten pages. I suppose there are managers who eat up this stuff, but if you're not a person who hires then there are more enlightening books about the human condition.

Subjective much?

A pleasant tale about a team becoming more cohesive. K. So, what objective tools can a business use to achieve that goal? I dunno, cause you certainly won’t find that information in this book. There is no evidence based fact on what to look for in successful employees. Just vague mentioning of “strong culture” and “no jackasses”. There is never once a clear definition of what “success” actually looks like. Save your time, look up actual research, and find objective useable data that is relevant to your company.

great advice and a worthy read

while the story writing is a little cheesy the message is great. I enjoyed this book and will listen to it again.

Complete Bullshit!

The author minimize people down to three adjectives (hungry, humble and [socially]smart) suggesting everyone should judge each other on these qualities and hiring / firing decisions should be made on them. Supposing for a moment that these are the correct 1 size fits all mindsets all workers should have, he completely ignores all other factors. I am an IT manager for a fairly large company. I would rather have an employee who is completely arrogant, wanting to prove their worth if that had the technical knowledge than passive doormat of an employee he thinks is ideal. The worst part of this drivel is that some executive will read this book and believe it. This will drive talented workers away and leave you with a bunch of moronic “yes” men.

Clear and useful

As usual with Lencioni's books, this is a clear and useful illustration of the concept, with suggestions for implementation. It's great to have some clear guidelines like this to help cut through the complexity of running a successful business.

Helpful book and as ever the fables work well

The fables work really well to put the ideas in to context - an enjoyable and educational listen

interesting topic on, worth your time

interesting view on how to choose the appropriate people for your team. good read for team leaders

Another cracker

I just love all of Lencioni's books. By far the best business author for me.

Exactly what you need

If you are one of the leaders in a company, you will definitely find this book useful. It's a step by step guide to making your organisation work like a well oiled machine. And if other leaders around you don't agree to this model...perhaps you're the one working in the wrong organisation : )

Compelling book about fundamentals of team members

Such an easy listen, well worth the time and money as will far outweigh the benefits gained

A good reminder of 3 evergreen virtues!

Patrick Lencioni has put together a nice and very meaningful message through this management fable.

a good read / listen for a budding manager or leader!

Decent, more of the same

If you're familiar with Lencioni's fable approach, more of the same here. Personally it's an approach I find really accessible and enjoyable and whilst not his best, there's plenty of learnings in here for current and aspiring managers/ leaders.
Definitely worth a listen.

it's o k a y

A reasonable follow-up to the 5 Dysfunctions, and the three core tenets of what makes a decent team player are good and useful enough (essentially humility, drive, and EI) to be applied - but there's an unnecessary religious element that pops up throughout, and the end "application" section relies on personality reports that I'm not convinced Lencioni is qualified or able to adequately connect, or dissect. But hey ho, it's an interesting listen up to a point, and I'm sure the three core values will be useful indicators in hiring decisions and employee review.

Good Follow On

Follows up nicely in my opinion to the 'Five Dysfunctions Of A Team' book. Turning into a big Patrick Lencioni admirer of his work and implementing into my work culture.