Lessons Learned

• Don't hesitate to test the people you supervise.

  • When Trump announced that this week's winning team would not participate in next week's task, he intensified the pressure on both teams to win this round. Then he sat back and watched them handle the extra stress. If they never face high-stakes challenges, how can you gauge their potential?

• Facilitate a process for generating creative ideas.

  • Make sure all ideas are on the table and considered. Most teams use brainstorming, but few do it effectively (they rush the process, judge the ideas too quickly or run immediately with the first idea that sounds good). There are dozens of sound facilitation techniques that can be used. Either get schooled in how to use them or hire a team coach or facilitator who can do it for you.

• Encourage honesty.

  • Great teams need people who tell the truth to find the best answers and make the best decisions. Team members who argue or are willing to disagree with each other aren't bad. On the contrary, a team that has passionate debates (not personal attacks) is a team that likely makes good decisions. Also, when a team recovers from a conflict, confidence and trust build among the team members.

• Resist group-think.

  • Michelle was the only one on her team willing to say that the emperor had no clothes (or too little suit anyway!). She emphatically said she didn't like Carey's suit. Yet her team responded by attacking her and singled her out as not being a team player. Aaron also objected to Carey's pink suit, but he quickly knuckled under and went along with the design anyway. The result? Another crippling loss for his team. Someone has to speak up and take the lead in fighting bad decisions, and good leaders understand that they need to support an environment that not only allows dissension, but encourages it. Managing the process that allows open, honest evaluation and disagreement is fundamental to high-performing teams.

• Process matters.

  • Leaders need to communicate to their team what decision-making style they will use (consensus, consultative, authoritative, majority vote, etc.). Set up clear decision-making expectations and parameters; high-performing teams also use defined criteria to evaluate and make informed decisions for or against ideas presented. For example, Team Arrow might have established that its suits needed to appeal to a broad consumer base as one swimsuit design criteria. Nicole lacked some critical team leadership skills, which affected Team Arrow. She allowed one team member (Carey) to take her entire team down the wrong path. That happened largely because she failed to set up a team process for decision-making and creative collaboration. What could she have done differently?

• Keep your ego out of it.

  • When Nicole made the "gutsy" move to model a bikini in the fashion show, she courted disaster. Sure it was brave to walk the runway with professional swimwear models, but her decision not to use a professional model probably contributed to her team's loss. To win in your career, make sound business decisions, not emotional ones. Managing projects capably and calmly will reflect better on you than all the self-promotion in the world

• Set up team ground rules.

  • The best teams define standards of performance and hold members accountable for those standards. Norms that might have helped Team Arrow include testing assumptions (Carey's, that his suit would appeal to the buyers) and listening to each other. Not listening didn't work out too well for Carey. Even in the boardroom he foolishly couldn't admit to Trump that his suit design was a mistake. It no doubt cost him the game. Listening well is a good way to succeed

• Be positive and consistent.

  • In the boardroom firing, Michelle went over the top and said that Carey had coerced the team into accepting his design. Then after Carey was fired, she tried to mend fences with the rest of her team. They looked at her like the schemer that she apparently is. Nicole, on the other hand, set some pretty solid expectations for her team, including telling them "the next 30 hours is going to be painful," and then rallied them with her enthusiasm to win. Her cheerleading approach and willingness to be open with her team was reflected in their support for her -- even in the boardroom after losing the task. You can't be a negative backbiter one minute and a gentle lamb the next. If you want to be a leader, stay positive.

• Know your customers.

  • When Ivanka Trump pointed out that Carey's tiny bather would appeal to only 1 percent of the male population - and that it represented one-third of his team's men's line - she was teaching an important marketing lesson that Carey had completely overlooked.  If you are an entrepreneur, know who your customers are and develop products that will generate the most profit from them. Developing products that suit only your own taste might gratify your ego - but it is a recipe for marketplace failure.