7. Openness

I once was part of an organization that required teams of two to work very closely for months at a time. One thing the organization stressed was that once a week your team should set aside some time to discuss any problems or concerns in a positive manner. I had thirteen companions over a two year period. Some of us had great weekly time that we made huge progress. Other times communication was very rough and most often would lead to some form of blow up. Usually that blow up included some foul language and maybe some pushing and shoving. After the blow up things would normally get better. The worst was when communication was bad and a blow up never occurred because then the problems would just fester and no one was happy.

Communication is so essential. In fact communication is so important that it doesn't matter if you have a scheduled time every week to talk or if once in awhile you have a blow up as long as the things that need to be said get out. If people just hold it in and never say the things that need saying a wall of enmity is built that could take years to dismantle.

Be open! This is a picture of my friend Lauren. She and I probably have the most open communication ever imaginable.