Many
teams are like the guy crawling through the sand, struggling (unnecesarily).
Then, in an effort to ease the pain, someone says "let's do some
teambuilding" and the mirage is created. A day of teambuilding is
offered up and team members become hopeful and then... poof! The day
of teambuilding is over (the mirage disappears) and everyone is back
at the office crawling along.
A reader of this blog offered up this excerpt from the Harvard Business Review (March-April 1993) called the Discipline of Teams: "But people use the word team so loosely that it gets in the way of learning and applying the discipline that leads to good performance. Groups do not become teams simply because that is what someone calls them. The entire work force of any large and complex organization is never a team, but think about how often that platitude is offered up."
A group of people does not become a high functioning team simply
because they've participated in a team building activity (or a day of
activities). The activities are part of a "disciplined" approach to
building a high performing team.
A high performing team starts with the organization's mission and
vision and core values - - and I'm not talking about just the words
they have on paper... I'm talking about how these are experienced and
lived every day within the organization. And it starts with the
leadership acting as the role model. Every system within the
organization must support high performing (win-win) team consciousness
- - these systems include but are not limited to: the training system,
the planning system, the communication system, the budgeting system,
the information system, and the compensation system.
Here's a metaphor:
-- Karen eats a salad at lunch and believes it will help her live a
"healthy" life. But she eats at McDonalds 5x/week, doesn't exercise,
hates her job, has no friends and watches 40 hours of TV a week (a
national average). Karen is chasing a mirage.
-- Sally has committed to living a healthy life. She eats a diet
based on the advise of a wise nutritionist (who has completed several
in-depth surveys of Sally's health), she has many deep and loving
relationships with quality people, she laughs a lot, she loves her
work, exercises regularly (and has fun doing it), read books that
inspire her and enjoys nature. Sally is living a healthy lifestyle
through discipline.
I see a lot of companies that act like Karen. I'd like to see more
companies like Sally but it takes an enormous amount of discipline to
follow that path (which, by the way, provides HUGE pay-offs).
Are you a team leader who is ready to become the example for your team to follow? Are you ready to learn how to lead your team in a disciplined way?
When
I was a kid we used to play a lot of dodgeball. The two team captains
(usually the loudest/most forceful/most popular kids) had everyone
lineup against a wall and then one-by-one, captains would pick
teammates. The "less useful" kids were always the last to be picked
(slowest, couldn't throw well, etc.). The criteria for selection on
the team was clear to all: how much value could you bring to the
team? Everything was out in the open. It was exciting to be picked
first and a humbling experience to be picked last.
And
what about the "...especially , the famous ones" part of the above
question? Do the managers assume that famous teams (famous organizations)
have some kind of inside knowledge about the value of teambuilding? Enron
was a famous team. United Airlines is famous (about to go bankrupt
though). I'm reminded of the kid in high school who cheats by looking on
the paper of the kid next to him - - the assumption being that kid is a
reliable source of information.
How
do you help a team get unstuck from lose-lose thinking?
