The 10 Behaviours of Effective Employees

Why do some people add so much more at work than others? Not the cleverest or the loudest, necessarily — often none of those. Over twenty years I've watched what genuinely effective people actually do, and the pattern is stubborn and clear: it comes down to about ten behaviours.

The 10 Behaviours of Effective Employees

Field guide 01 · the seeing series

Start here · free field guide

The 10 Behaviours of Effective Employees

Observable behaviours anyone can recognise, practice, and get better at.

Some people simply make work better wherever they are. It's rarely about being the cleverest or the loudest — it comes down to a handful of behaviours, and behaviours can be learned.

I've spent years studying what those people actually do, and boiled it down to ten. This is where it starts: a short, free field guide. Read it, pick one behaviour, and go from there.

Download the free eBook →Free · instant PDF · no strings

Rob Lambert · Winchester


A mirror, and a map

Why do some people add so much more than others? Why does one person get things done, move ideas towards value, and attract good people towards them – while another produces friction and drama? It's rarely education, certificates, or even years of experience. It goes deeper than that, into how a person actually shows up.

Over twenty years I've studied what makes some people genuinely effective, and the pattern is stubborn and clear. It comes down to ten behaviours – not personality traits you're born with, but observable, repeatable, learnable things anyone can practice and get better at.

They're a mirror for seeing how you show up today, and a map for where to grow next. And for a team, they're a shared language for the kind of behaviour worth having more of.

Nobody has all ten, and you don't need them all. Read the guide, notice the one or two that make you sit up, and start there.


The behaviours

The ten, at a glance

01Visibly passionateThey believe the work is worth doing — and it's catching.
02Open-mindedThey meet change and new ideas with a question, not a reflex "no".
03Bigger than the job titleThey close the gaps between roles, where most trouble hides.
04Company-smartThey learn how the place really works, and see it as a system.
05Customer-focusedThey keep the person who pays at the end of everything they do.
06Relentless improversThey make the system better — understanding it before touching it.
07They do what they said they'd doThey keep the promise, on the day, and own it when they can't.
08Good communicatorsThe wiring under the rest — they listen, and make ideas travel.
09Add skills, and skills, and skillsDeep in one thing, curious about everything, and they never stop.
10BraveThey say the useful thing, kindly and well-timed — even the hard one.

It's one of the astonishing talents of organisations: they can organise themselves into forgetting the only person keeping the lights on – the customer. And then, realising this has happened, launch a new strategy to be customer centric. – From the book, behaviour No. 005 - Customer Focused

Free field guide · edition 01

The 10 Behaviours of Effective Employees

A short, warm read — the whole set of ten, one per chapter. It's the best place to start, and it's yours for free.

  • All ten behaviours, explained and brought to life
  • Written to be read in an afternoon
  • Instant PDF download — no strings
Free
Download the eBook → Instant PDF · read anywhere

When you're ready to go deeper

Two ways to take it further

The guide gets you seeing the behaviours. These help you actually build them — on your own, or with your team.

For you, or your managers

Coaching & Development Guide

£7.99 · one-time

A structured workbook across all ten behaviours, with coaching prompts and reflection exercises to help you build them a day at a time.

  • A development workbook for all ten behaviours
  • Coaching prompts and reflection exercises
  • For personal use or manager-led coaching
  • PDF · lifetime access

For teams and organisations

The Workshop

Bespoke

A facilitated session where your team makes the ten behaviours their own, or creates their own new ones! We work through defining what each looks like in your context, create artefacts to bring them to life and plan how to bring them into the company.

  • Run for your team or whole organisation
  • Shaped around your context and challenges
  • A shared language people actually use afterwards
  • Scoped on a short call — no two are the same

Who it's for

Anyone who wants to be better at their work – and to enjoy it more. Whether you're early in your career and finding your feet, leading a team you'd like to lift up a little, or simply someone who's noticed how much smoother everything runs around a genuinely effective person and fancies being one, this is written for you.

It's not about climbing over people or playing the politics. It's about becoming genuinely good, in ways that travel with you and make every place you work a little better for your being there.

"Don't try to become all ten at once. Pick one. Work on it. Get better. Then move to the next." — from the field guide