What is building your bench?
Your bench is your support system. Your bench is the group of people you surround yourself with in order to help you do your job. The people on your bench may be advisors or co-workers or subordinates, but regardless, they are both your crutch and your springboard. They share the workload with you and help you improve your work and your company.
But how do you make your bench as good as possible? Building your bench is a term that refers to building your team from start to finish—from the time you pick your co-workers to sharpening a team that has worked together for years. Like any kind of building, building your bench means laying a foundation, and, over time, continually strengthening, improving, and possibly adding on to, what you have already built.
Everyone who works with a team can work on building a bench. Even the team that has been together for years has to occasionally add new team members or deal with conflict within the team or can improve teamwork. In this sense, building your bench simply means strengthening your team.
A strong bench means that you will work better and your company will be more productive. Ideas will be more creative and stronger; action will be both well thought out and bold. Meanwhile, you and your bench will be far more likely to enjoy work, because you respect and value each other.