Leadership Wisdom of the Week #14

“When our mutual talents are joined there’ll be no limit to their scope.”

– Moominpappa (The Exploits of Moominpappa, Tove Jansson)

This week’s quote reminds us of the power of teamwork. In this excerpt from The Exploits of Moominpappa, Moominpappa is excited about the prospect of building their very own houseboat together with his friend Hodgkins.

At its core, leadership research tells us something simple: when a team works well together, the results can exceed the sum of its parts. At its best, you bring together people with different competencies—or talents, as Moominpappa puts it—and align them toward a shared goal that genuinely engages them and encourages everyone to use their strengths.

In today’s busy working life, we too often forget to get excited about what we are doing—especially together. We know that inspiring strategies and meaningful goals are essential leadership tools, yet they are often overshadowed by more urgent matters. A lot of collaboration nowadays takes place in formal meetings, where day-to-day operational issues dominate the agenda.

There are always too many topics to cover. People move from one meeting to another without anyone truly planning how to make those meetings energizing and collaborative. Instead, we end up frustrated by the sheer number of meetings that drain our energy. There is simply not enough time to build shared excitement around the work, the collaboration, and the results.

But what if the most important goal of a team or project meeting wasn’t to “cover the status as thoroughly as possible,” but to “create shared excitement about our shared goals”? What if a meeting started by jointly answering questions such as: “Which of our achievements this week are we most proud of?”

The status would still get covered, but the conversation, the energy, and ultimately the outcomes would be very different.

Perhaps today’s working life could take a leaf from Moominpappa’s memoirs: approaching our work with a greater sense of pride and shared excitement about what we are building together.