Episode #282: How to Become A Team Builder Extraordinaire

In our organization, we may be asked to create a new division, new section, create a new team around a new piece of business or create a project team. Well then, where should we start? What is the best practice around doing this? Is there a handy road map we can follow, to make this a bit more friction free? Fortunately, we don’t have to work this out for ourselves or use any expensive trial and error construct. There are six stages for establishing an effective team.

Stage One: Formation

The team leader’s job in the “forming” stage is to create a team bristling with trust, establish a clear structure, set the goals and direction and assign roles according to experience, fit, potential and capability. In the first days, a lot of energy will be spent defining the team and its responses. This is especially the case around determining what we are not going to do, just as much as what we will do. The planning work is in Quadrant Two of time management – not urgent but important. The better job we do at this point, the more time and money we will save later. So investing the time to plan pays dividends later.

Stage Two: Stabilisation

By working together, the members learn about each other and how to work well as a unit. They are delving deep into mastering the tasks they have been assigned. They have clear roles now and are able to get on with it. There is also a culture being formed about the way we work together and how we communicate within and outside the team. If this is not marshaled well by the team leader, the team may never stabilize.

Japan throws up some challenges when teams are formed from joint venture partners, where the initial loyalties are to their own entities, rather than to the joint venture. Even sourcing people from other divisions within the same company can have its challenges with how much they identify with the new construct. The leader has to sort this out early and without any hesitation eject any non-believers. Life is too short to put up with that type of confused loyalty nonsense. If you are going to be here, be here.

Stage Three: Integration

As the work progresses the team starts to stake out its claim within the company. The team itself realises where the strengths of the team are to be found. The diversity amongst the team, which perhaps was a challenge at the beginning, becomes an advantage through sourcing better and richer ideas to solve issues. The cohesion, the focusing on the goals and targets becomes easier. Large objectives have been filleted down to bite size pieces now. There will be a realisation of skill and knowledge gaps within the team and strategies created to fill those gaps with either additional training or by sourcing speciality experts in certain areas. As expertise grows, so do the potential conflicts, so the leader is called upon more often to sort out the people issues within the group.

Stage Four: Actualisation

With experience established now, the team members are more confortable to express their opinions and offer up ideas. The leader must encourage this and use a good/better structure for giving feedback to suggestions. There will always be strong personalities and firm opinions within the group but the leader has to embrace counter ideas, without an outbreak of hostilities within the group. Easier said than done though!

Stage Five: Maturation

Presuming we are making good progress, pride in what the team has achieved begins to shine within the group. The team members are cooperative and have good awareness about what they are good at and not good at, seeking assistance in weaker areas and offering assistance in their stronger suits. The processes have been refined, knowledge has been captured, good results are emerging regularly and everyone feels they are providing value to the organisation. They feel this because the leader makes sure they feel that through their communication and people skills.

If things are not going well, the team leader has to get the team to regroup and figure out what needs to change in order for the team to be successful. The ability to plot a way forward and get everyone behind it is the leader’s key job now. The potential death of the business is also a great galvaniser to pull together to survive and the leader uses that in communication to instill fight rather than flight in the team.

Stage Six: Termination (ending the team)

In some cases the team will have been formed for a project and the project will have been completed so the team is disbanded. Everyone knew this at the start, so it has been factored in. Even so, as the team gets to closure, people may start to worry about where they will go next and may lose focus on the work. The leader has to make sure that everyone’s next job is secured, so they don’t have to expend energy stressing about going into corporate oblivion after the project finishes.

On the other hand, if the project fails or the organisation’s direction changes and the team’s raison d’etre disappears, then the leader has a big job keeping people focused up until the end. The sense of worry and concern is directly proportional to how much information is available. Rumours spread like wildfire. The leader has to be as transparent as possible and share information proactively with the team, if the trust is to be maintained to the end. Not everything goes according to plan in business and we have to be ready for failure too. This is rarely a quick death, more likely a lingering one, so the light goes out slowly. This allows for adjustments along the way and for the leader to prepare appropriately for the end of the team.

Hopefully the new team will be successful and it will be a career builder for everyone. The leader’s job is to manage processes and build people. The build people part is 100% soft skills and this means excellence in people and communication skills. If you are the leader and find you are lacking in these skill areas, then get the training and get it right now. There is not a moment to lose because the demands for those skills will just keep coming.