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October 21 - October 23, 2019
“If you could get all the people in an organization rowing in the same direction, you could dominate any industry, in any market, against any competition, at any time.”
Like so many other aspects of life, teamwork comes down to mastering a set of behaviors that are at once theoretically uncomplicated, but extremely difficult to put into practice day after day.
“You've probably heard my husband say that a fractured team is just like a broken arm or leg; fixing it is always painful, and sometimes you have to rebreak it to make it heal correctly. And the rebreak hurts a lot more than the initial break, because you have to do it on purpose.”
“Trust is the foundation of real teamwork. And so the first dysfunction is a failure on the part of team members to understand and open up to one another.
“Great teams do not hold back with one another,” she said. “They are unafraid to air their dirty laundry. They admit their mistakes, their weaknesses, and their concerns without fear of reprisal.”
“But I'd have to say that every effective team I've ever observed had a substantial level of debate. Even the most trusting teams mixed it up a lot.”
“Basically, I want you all to do two things: be present and participate. That means everyone needs to be fully engaged in whatever we're talking about.”
After just forty-five minutes of extremely mild personal disclosure, the team seemed tighter and more at ease with each other than at any time during the past year.
“Remember, teamwork begins by building trust. And the only way to do that is to overcome our need for invulnerability.”
Our job is to make the results that we need to achieve so clear to everyone in this room that no one would even consider doing something purely to enhance his or her individual status or ego. Because that would diminish our ability to achieve our collective goals. We would all lose.”
“The key, of course, is to define our goals, our results, in a way that is simple enough to grasp easily, and specific enough to be actionable.
As soon as the reality of business problems is reintroduced to a situation like this one, she thought, people revert back to the behaviors that put them in the difficult situation in the first place.
“Politics is when people choose their words and actions based on how they want others to react rather than based on what they really think.”
“If we don’t trust one another, then we aren’t going to engage in open, constructive, ideological conflict. And we’ll just continue to preserve a sense of artificial harmony.”
Kathryn explained, “It’s as simple as this. When people don’t unload their opinions and feel like they’ve been listened to, they won’t really get on board.” “They do if you make them,” countered Nick. “I’m guessing your husband doesn’t let his players vote on whether they want to run wind-sprints.” Kathryn welcomed this kind of challenge. “No, he doesn’t. But he’d let them make a case why they think they shouldn’t. And if he disagreed with them, which in that situation I’m sure he would, he’d tell them why and then send them off running.” “So this isn’t a consensus thing.” Jan’s statement was
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“Once we achieve clarity and buy-in, it is then that we have to hold each other accountable for what we sign up to do, for high standards of performance and behavior. And as simple as that sounds, most executives hate to do it, especially when it comes to a peer’s behavior, because they want to avoid interpersonal discomfort.”
“During the next two weeks I am going to be pretty intolerant of behavior that demonstrates an absence of trust, or a focus on individual ego. I will be encouraging conflict, driving for clear commitments, and expecting all of you to hold each other accountable. I will be calling out bad behavior when I see it, and I’d like to see you doing the same. We don’t have time to waste.”
“But when a company has a collection of good managers who don’t act like a team, it can create a dilemma for them, and for the company. You see, it leads to confusion about who their first team is.”
Some people are hard to hold accountable because they are so helpful. Others because they get defensive. Others because they are intimidating. I don’t think it’s easy to hold anyone accountable, not even your own kids.”
demonstrate trust, engage in conflict, commit to group decisions, hold their peers accountable, and focus on the results of the team, not their own ego.”
Jan tried to explain herself. “I guess I just don't see it that way. It still feels like we're fighting.” “You are fighting. But about issues. That's your job. Otherwise, you leave it to your people to try to solve problems that they can't solve. They want you to hash this stuff out so they can get clear direction from us.”
“I don't think anyone ever gets completely used to conflict. If it's not a little uncomfortable, then it's not real. The key is to keep doing it anyway.”
First, genuine teamwork in most organizations remains as elusive as it has ever been. Second, organizations fail to achieve teamwork because they unknowingly fall prey to five natural but dangerous pitfalls, which I call the five dysfunctions of a team.
These dysfunctions can be mistakenly interpreted as five distinct issues that can be addressed in isolation of the others. But in reality they form an interrelated model, making susceptibility to even one of them potentially lethal for the success of a team.
They trust one another. They engage in unfiltered conflict around ideas. They commit to decisions and plans of action. They hold one another accountable for delivering against those plans. They focus on the achievement of collective results.
Personal Histories Exercise
Questions need not be overly sensitive in nature and might include the following: number of siblings, hometown, unique challenges of childhood, favorite hobbies, first job, and worst
Team Effectiveness Exercise
It requires team members to identify the single most important contribution that each of their peers makes to the team, as well as the one area that they must either improve upon or eliminate for the good of the team. All members then report their responses, focusing on one person at a time, usually beginning with the team leader.
Personality and Behavioral Preference Profiles
360-Degree Feedback
Experiential Team Exercises
When team members do not openly debate and disagree about important ideas, they often turn to back-channel personal attacks, which are far nastier and more harmful than any heated argument over issues.
Contrary to the notion that teams waste time and energy arguing, those that avoid conflict actually doom themselves to revisiting issues again and again without resolution. They often ask team members to take their issues “off-line,” which seems to be a euphemism for avoiding dealing with an important topic, only to have it raised again at the next meeting.
The first step is acknowledging that conflict is productive, and that many teams have a tendency to avoid it.
Teams that Engage in Conflict . . . Have lively, interesting meetings Extract and exploit the ideas of all team members Solve real problems quickly Minimize politics Put critical topics on the table for discussion
Mining Members of teams that tend to avoid conflict must occasionally assume the role of a “miner of conflict”—someone who extracts buried disagreements within the team and sheds the light of day on them.
Real-Time Permission In the process of mining for conflict, team members need to coach one another not to retreat from healthy debate.
commitment is a function of two things: clarity and buy-in.
Great teams make clear and timely decisions and move forward with complete buy-in from every member of the team, even those who voted against the decision. They leave meetings confident that no one on the team is quietly harboring doubts about whether to support the actions agreed on.
Consensus. Great teams understand the danger of seeking consensus, and find ways to achieve buy-in even when complete agreement is impossible.
Certainty. Great teams also pride themselves on being able to unite behind decisions and commit to clear courses of action even when there is little assurance about whether the decision is correct.
the old military axiom that a decision is better than no decision.
it is better to make a decision boldly and be wrong—and then change direction with equal bol...
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A Team that Commits . . . Creates clarity around direction and priorities Aligns the entire team around common objectives Develops an ability to learn from mistakes Takes advantage of opportunities before competitors do Moves forward without hesitation Changes direction without hesitation or guilt
the most effective and efficient means of maintaining high standards of performance on a team is peer pressure.
A Team that Holds One Another Accountable . . . Ensures that poor performers feel pressure to improve Identifies potential problems quickly by questioning one another's approaches without hesitation Establishes respect among team members who are held to the same high standards Avoids excessive bureaucracy around performance management and corrective action Publication
A Team that Focuses on Collective Results . . . Retains achievement-oriented employees Minimizes individualistic behavior Enjoys success and suffers failure acutely Benefits from individuals who subjugate their own goals/interests for the good of the team Avoids distractions
