A team is a team, right? Perhaps, if you are
talking about a pair of horses hitched together. Even then you might
ask, "How well does that team work together?" Making Teams Work It takes more than a rafting trip, more than training session, and more than a workshop to make a team work. Teams are more than a name. Calling a collection of individuals a team does not make them one. How many times have we seen leadership teams that were teams name only? More often they resemble a meeting of warlords whose only goal is to maximize self-interest. We hope that by calling them leadership teams they will actually exhibit the necessary cooperation and coordination to effectively lead the Organization. But what does it take for a team to be a team? It starts with purpose and interdependence. A compelling Purpose allows people to put forth effort in service of issues larger than themselves. Purpose answers the questions: What will be different as a result of our having worked together? What will we create for the organization, this team and ourselves as a result of our work? If the answers to these questions provide the team members a sense of being part of something larger than themselves, they join in. If not they stand on the sidelines or at best give minimal effort. Interdependence means having to work together to get the job done. Some teams require little interdependence and others require a lot. For example, a basketball team requires more interdependence than a relay team. But all teams require some interdependence. Additionally, effective teams require clear goals, roles that are agreed upon and understood, and well-defined approaches for meetings, decision-making, and information sharing. These are necessary ingredients: Purpose, interdependence, clear goals, roles, and processes. Because teams are made up of human beings, the business of getting teams to work -much less thriving in them - becomes a complicated set of interactions. And as important as these formulations are, they do not deal with the essential issue in teams’-our humanness. The way people experience themselves in a team ultimately determines whether they put wholehearted selves into the work of the team. As paradoxical as it may seem, the key to effective teams is individuals. "To be human is to belong," states Irish poet John O'Donohue. -the desire-to be part of something beyond us -then it would seem that working in teams would be second nature. If it is our nature to belong, what is it that prevents us from doing what comes naturally? I believe the answer lies in choice and voice. What is often forgotten when it comes to teams is that people have a choice about whether or not to join. Now you may say that when it comes to business teams, people do not have a choice. Being a good team player is part of the job. You either join or you find work elsewhere. But when you look carefully at teams, you see that people have a number of choices. Some people enthusiastically join -in the work of the team. Others do not fully commit themselves, preferring to stand on the sidelines and observe the action, essentially leaving while staying in place. Some try to sabotage the work of the team, and still others decide to leave the team. These are just some of the choices available to members of any team. Frequently, those concerned with improving team effectiveness forget that team members have choices and exercise these choices all the time. And because we don't think people have choices, we develop incentive systems to get people to join, believing that the right set of incentives will guarantee the desired results. If we recognize that people have choices and exercise them all the time, then we will worry less about the design of systems guaranteed to get people to work effectively in teams and more about creating team environments where people want to exercise their essential humanness and belong. That is where voice comes in. When it comes to goals, roles, and doing the essential work of the team, team members want their voices heard. They want to be able to influence the outcomes. They want to know that their voice counts in setting the direction and doing the work of the team. Voice is present when team members can identify and resolve problems about the work and about interpersonal issues that arise within the team. So it is not enough to have a meaningful purpose, clear goals, clear roles, or effective team processes. All team members' voices are required in discussing these issues. This does not mean that everyone gets his or her own way, but everyone's voice must be heard. Voice is more than effectively articulating your point of view. Voice requires listening. To have voice is to be understood, and to be understood requires deep listening -the kind of listening where one person can see the world from another's point of view. Choice and voice combine to produce team spirit. Team spirit is the result of your choice to belong to the team and using your voice to make it effective. The team becomes your team and you identify with its successes and failures. You work to make it succeed and make it better when it doesn't. Team members are people you care about, and their success becomes your success. And when they don't succeed, you help them to improve. Everyone learns together, laughs together, argues together, celebrates together, and most important, and gets things done. Making teams requires recognizing that it is our nature to belong- that we want to be part of something larger than ourselves. Thriving in teams requires acknowledging the essential humanness of each member. It all begins with choice and voice.
Richard H. Axelrod is the author of Terms of Engagement: Changing the Way We Change Organizations (Berrett-Koebler Publishers, 2000), and founder of the Axelrod Group, Inc. More From This Author Axelrod has contributed other articles to this journal. Reprinted with permission. Call the AQP information Center at 800-733-3310 for copies of- - "What Shared Management Will Require of You, Are You Ready for Team-Based Management?" The Journal for Quality and Participation, December 1992. - "We Want to Redesign our Work Processes but We're Short on Time and Using the Conference Model(tm) for Work Redesign," The Journal for Quality and Participation, December 1993. - "What Have We Learned? The Conference Model" After Four Years of Practice," The Journal for Quality and Participation, The Journal for Quality and Participation, September 1996. The Axelrod Group, 723 Laurel Avenue, Wilmette, Illinois 60091 Phone: 847.251.7361 Fax: 847.251.7370 |