Extra Grace Required

In my previous post on teams I discussed the "one another" principles as OCBs. As I said in that post, these provide oil that lubricates the machinery of our teams and eliminates friction. We need to be diligent in our practice those "one anothers."


I have been involved in small groups and various kinds of teams - in the work place, at church, and in sports - and there seems to be a constant in each of these. There is always at least one person in the group that taxes the team. I call these people "EGRs" - Extra Grace Required.

That's not necessarily a bad thing, but if they are allowed to dominate, the effectiveness of the team will be greatly diminished.

Often the need to have a direct (in private) discussion about their behavior and its impact on the team. For many EGRs this is an eye-opener and the feedback relates to things that were truly in their blindspot. In my experience, this works in the majority of cases.

At the extreme, sometimes (very rarely and always as a last resort) the EGRs may have to be removed from the team.

How do you handle EGRs?

Have you ever been an EGR?