Microsoft Veteran Julie Larson-Green Is Known For Building Successful Teams — Here's How She Does It

Julie Larson-Green had a 25-year career at Microsoft where she worked on everything from Windows to Microsoft Office to Surface devices.

He left Microsoft in November and landed at Qualtrics, the $ 2 billion Provo-Utah-based startup that offers survey software. She is assuming the position of Chief Experience Officer there.

One of the things that attracted Qualtrics CEO Ryan Smith to court Larson-Green was his reputation for forming large teams within Microsoft.

"If you spoke with someone who worked with her, and with each of the channels I spoke with, they all told me about the culture that she created in the teams," Smith told Business Insider.

So we asked Larson-Green to tell us some of his tricks to build and manage great teams. She gave us these four tips.

1. Stay curious about what other people think. Instead of working to achieve the "right culture", which can be an advantage to hire like-minded people, form teams to "bring together different points of view," he said.

2. Help people focus on what they bring in uniquely. Do not turn the wheels looking for golden people who do everything well. Look for people who excel in specific areas.

One can be a genius of engineering but not a great designer. Another may be excellent in communications, but not an engineering genius. Another can be a great designer but not a good communicator.

"Do not try to turn an apple into an orange or a pear, hire an apple, an orange and a pear, and then the team as a unit operates at a much higher level," Larson-Green said.

3. Do not force people to work too much on their weaknesses. If you are going to put together a team's puzzles based on everyone's strengths, that also means that you have to support your people using those strengths and not constantly telling them to improve their weaknesses.

Make sure your employees are making their "exponential effort in the things they like to do," he said. "If they're working super hard on things that are not super good, it takes a lot more effort."

4. Give everyone space to shine. The last piece is to build a collaborative environment. That not only implies that everyone "focuses on their gift", but also means "leaving people a path" on how to carry out their tasks as a unit.

Managers, Larson-Green said, often "focus on how to do something and not on the goal."

But if you give your team a goal and leave them the way to do it, everyone can take care of the parts of the task that they do well. Everyone's contributions will be appreciated.

"This creates less competition in the team and a more collaborative style," he said.