In this blog we continue our exploration of what it is to be an effective team.

Last week we discussed trust, the foundation of Lencioni’s (2002) team effectiveness pyramid. This week we look at the next level  – the capacity to engage in trust-based conflict. In later weeks we will look at collective commitment, mutual accountability and a focus on results.

What’s the talk like?

Think about the team you work in. How many conversations don’t take place that perhaps should? What is stopping you and colleagues from having them? What assumptions, sensitivities and fears are in play? How well do you honestly recognise what is going on inside yourself let alone in others?

In the presence of these potential barriers, just what gets talked about in your meetings? How do these meetings sound, look and feel to you? How much do you give of yourself? How much gets achieved? How much do you look forward to the next one?

Getting stuck, or getting stuck in?

We see many teams that are stuck. The quality of their engagement with one another is stale and limiting. Their energy is often highest around done-it-lots-before execution topics. There is a sense of confidence about these familiar places. And there is usually an easily identified expert to carry the load, and the can.

We see fewer teams that really get stuck in to complex issues with a fearless energy and passionate detachment that generates a high tempo of collective exploration and learning. Each exchange creates new insights. They reflect together. They learn together. Quickly. Effectively. They commit collectively to decisions. And they lead collectively with conviction.

Seems a bit of a challenge?

The great news is that developing trust and the capacity to engage in creative conflict is possible. Yes, it is potentially challenging for some people. Teams are something of a brown-field site and a tailored development approach will always be required.

So, what will you do today to get out of stuckness and start getting stuck in?

Dave
Dave Stewart
Director
The Fresh Air Learning Company

In this blog we continue our exploration of what it is to be an effective team

Last week I titled this blog “In teams we trust”. This week I have changed the words around a bit to position trust as a key enabler of effective team-ship.

Lencioni (2002) posits trust as the foundation of a team effectiveness pyramid rising successively through the capacity for challenge, collective commitment, mutual accountability and a focus on results.

Strength through vulnerability

The sort of trust I am talking about here is the readiness to open up without fear of being taken advantage of in some way. To share hopes and fears, ask for help, admit mistakes, apologise and expose skills gaps.

Difficult in environments characterised by big egos, competition and fear. Yet possible.

Getting real with one another

We facilitated a leadership team retreat in the Brecon Beacons. The brief was to help develop their resilience ahead of a corporate restructure. In essence the task was to help develop trust and collaboration where competition was the norm.

And so, over two nights and two days we created a light appreciative inquiry-based framework within which the team got to know themselves and one another as real people. Communal bunkhouse living and the outdoors enactment of a collaborative storyline allowed the team to really meet itself for the first time.

“We have had conversations here that we could never have had back in the workplace.”

“I remember the moment clearly, the moment when I started experiencing my colleagues as real people; people I wanted to be with, to really engage with, to lead the business with. Up until then we had been kidding ourselves that we were a leadership team!”

Sparking and igniting

For sure, the team has a path yet to travel. However, the spark of self and collective awareness ignited the start of some powerful listening, disclosure and respect.

There are other tools and techniques to help build the foundations of trust in teams. Whatever approach is used, it does need someone to step forward and invite others to explore the courageous notions of trust and vulnerability.

Could that be you?

Dave

Dave Stewart
Director
The Fresh Air Learning Company

In this blog we set the scene for an exploration of what it is to be an effective team. The story will unfold over the coming weeks.

Clients approach us to design and deliver leadership team development programmes. We explore their needs and sometimes we tell them they don’t need a team. We advise them to spend their money elsewhere. They are surprised.

Getting the requirement right

They may not have thought very hard about what they need from their so-called leadership teams. Sometimes they use the term ‘leadership team’ when others might more properly use the term ‘working group’ or ‘project team’.

We invite them to consider the nature of the team’s purpose and goals, the level of interdependency between the entities their team aspires to lead, and the appetite of the team’s participant-leaders to put common purpose and courageous mindful conversations ahead of ego and personal reward. This helps create some clarity about what is required, and a dawning insight into the investment needed.

So, what does an effective team look like? There are lots of models of course, and we will dip in and out of Lencioni’s model (2002) over the coming weeks.

Pain and commitment

Real teamwork is powerful but cost some pain and commitment to do properly.

There is a level of trust required between participants to enable robust compassionate challenge that in turn begets collective commitment to execution and a preparedness to hold one another to account in the service of achieving the desired results.

Pyramid investing

And so there is a pyramid of capacities to be developed and sustained from the bottom up: real trust and openness, robust compassionate challenge, collective commitment to decisions that may not be unanimous, mutual accountability, and a focus on results.

Many leadership teams are great at setting goals and holding others to account. They are great at being surprised and frustrated when goals aren’t met. And they are great at scapegoating people outside the team, down the line. They have failed to invest in their own pyramid.

Trust

How do you develop real trust and openness in your leadership teams? See next week’s blog for some of the things we do to help clients build their pyramids.

Dave
Dave Stewart
Director
The Fresh Air Learning Company