THE WISDOM OF TEAMS : CREATING THE HIGH-PERFORMANCE ORGANIZATION Based on the best selling book By Ron R Katzenbach & Douglas K Smith Harper Collins – 2003

INTRODUCTION A team is a small number of people with complementary skills who are committed to a common purpose, performance goals and approach, for which they hold themselves mutually accountable.

TEAM BASICS Six basics define the discipline required for team performance:  Small number – usually less than 12  Complementary skills  Common purpose  Common set of specific performance goals  Commonly agreed upon working approach  Mutual accountability.

Teams are much more about discipline than togetherness. A strong and balanced performance ethic underlies a team culture. Teams remain the most flexible and powerful units of performance, learning and change in any organization. Teams can be more quickly assembled, deployed, refocused and disbanded, without disrupting more permanent structures and processes. In any situation which demands the real-time combination of multiple skills, experiences and judgments, a team gets better results than a group of individuals operating within confined job roles and responsibilities. At the same time, pseudo teams and other compromise units that have not imbibed the discipline and performance across on organization ethic of high performing teams must be systematically weeded out.

A distinction also needs to be made between a performing team and a single leader unit. In the single leader unit, someone takes control, makes the key decisions, delegates and monitors individual assignments and chooses when and how to modify the working approach. But teams are different. Members share responsibilities and accountability and complement each other. The team leader is seldom the primary determinant of team performance.

THE THREE LITMUS TESTS Any performance situation that warrants a team effort must meet three litmus tests: The need for collective work products to be delivered by two or more people working together in real time. Leadership roles that need to shift among the members. The need for mutual accountability in addition to individual accountability.

BECOMING A REAL TEAM A group of people working together does not equate to a team. Working groups: Unlike teams, working groups rely on the sum of “individual bests” for their performance. They pursue no collective work products requiring joint effort. –Unlike teams, working groups come together to share information, perspectives and insights to make decisions that help individuals do their own job better and to reinforce each other’s individual performance standards. –But the focus is always on individual performance and accountability.

Pseudo team: In this case, there could be a significant, incremental performance need or opportunity. –But choosing the team path means people commit to various risks - conflict, joint work products and collective action necessary to build a common purpose and mutual accountability. –People who call themselves teams but take no such risks are at best pseudo teams. Potential team: There is a significant incremental performance need. The group is really trying to improve the performance.

Real team: This consists of a small number of people with complementary skills who are equally committed to a common purpose, goals and working approach for which they hold themselves mutually accountable. High performance team: This group goes beyond a real team in that members are also deeply committed to one another’s personal growth and success.

Establish urgency and direction: The more urgent and meaningful the rationale, the more likely that a real team will emerge. Select members based on skills, not personalities: Teams need complementary skills to get the job done. Of course a balance must be struck between getting members who already have the skills and investing in skill development after the work starts. Pay particular attention to first meetings and actions: Initial impressions always mean a great deal. BUILDING TEAM PERFORMANCE

Set some clear rules of behaviour. Rules must be laid down with respect to attendance, discussion, confidentiality, analytic approach, constructive confrontation, etc. These rules are needed to promote focus, openness, commitment and trust, all oriented towards performance. These rules need not be written down but they must be enforced seriously. Set and seize upon a few immediate performance- oriented tasks and goals. It makes a lot of difference if a few challenging goals are achieved early on.

Challenge the group regularly with fresh facts and information -- New information helps a potential team to redefine and enrich its understanding of the performance challenge. This helps in shaping a common purpose, setting clearer goals and improving upon the team’s common approach. Spend lots of time together – The most successful teams always find a way to spend extra time together, particularly when things go wrong. Exploit the power of positive feedback, recognition & reward: Positive reinforcement can work wonders.

TEAM LEADERS The functions of team leaders can be listed as follows: Keep the purpose, goals and approach relevant and meaningful – Leaders must help their teams gain clarity about their mission, goals and approach. But they must take care not to impose themselves on the team. Build commitment and confidence – Leaders must work to build the commitment and confidence of each individual as well as the whole team. Positive and constructive reinforcement improves mutual accountability and confidence levels. Strengthen the mix and level of skills – Leaders must ensure that the team has all the skills needed to succeed.

Manage relationships with outsiders, including removal of obstacles – Leaders must manage much of the team’s contacts and relationships with the rest of the organization. Leaders must have the courage to intervene on behalf of the team when obstacles are faced. Create opportunities for others – The leaders must be able to provide performance opportunities to their team members. Do real work – Leaders should not just sit back and make decisions. They must contribute in whatever way possible. They should take care not to delegate the nasty jobs to others. There are two things that team leaders never do:  Blame/allow specific individuals to fail  Excuse away shortfalls in team performance.

DEALING WITH OBSTACLES All teams face obstacles. Real teams face obstacles squarely and do not give up easily. The authors recommend five ways of dealing with obstacles: Revisit the basics: The team must reflect on its purpose, approach and performance goals Go for small wins: Nothing galvanizes a struggling team as much as tangible achievements. Inject new information and approaches - Competitive benchmarks, internal case histories, best practices and customer interviews can provide fresh perspectives that can help a team to redefine its purpose, approach and performance goals.

Take advantage of facilitators or training - Successful facilitators can bring problem-solving, communication, interpersonal and teamwork skills to teams who lack them. Training programs can highlight the importance of key skills, common team purpose, good teamwork, clear goals and the role of the leader. Change the team’s membership including the leader - Changing members or sometimes the leader may sometimes help in circumventing the obstacles faced. Real teams thrive on obstacles. Each time they tackle an obstacle, they become stronger. The high performing teams constructively and energetically try to get around barriers.

TEAM PERFORMANCE AT THE TOP For various reasons, generating team performance at senior levels is difficult. The most practical way to build team performance at the top lies not so much in emphasizing good personal chemistry as in finding ways for executives to do real work together. When they succeed, the following pattern emerges: Carving out team assignments that tackle specific issues which are narrower and more concrete than leading the organization as a whole. Assigning work to subsets of the team – Senior management groups have a tendency to spend nearly all of their joint time as a full team reviewing the work of others, discussing issues and making decisions. Instead, work must be given to smaller groups.

Determining team membership based on skills, not position –It is important to be clear about skill requirements and not to assume that the formal position of a member defines his or her skills. –A skill specific approach allows a number of smaller teams to be formed to address particular issues and match up different skill profiles. Requiring all members to do real work –Each member must do real work, as opposed to delegating and reviewing the work of others.

Breaking down the hierarchical pattern of inter action. -The work assignments and contributions to be made should not be based on position in the hierarchy. -Non hierarchically oriented assignments provide fundamental building blocks for team performance. Setting and following rules of behaviour similar to those used by other teams. -Those behaviours must be encouraged that provide focus, avoid hierarchical constraints and promote openness, commitment and trust.

TOP MANAGEMENT’S ROLE The authors predict that teams will be the primary building bock of performance in the high performance organizations of the future. Top managers who aspire for high performance must increasingly understand and emphasize teams. Top management must shape key policies that favour team formation and performance. Team assignments must become an integral part of normal successful careers.

So long as individual accomplishments overshadow team accomplishments, people will remain cautious about joining teams. More important than policies, however, is the way management sends signals by devoting time and attention to foster team performance. Top management must identify which teams will most affect performance and help them move up the performance curve.

THE ROAD AHEAD High performance organizations of the future will be characterized by the following: Balanced performance results – focus on employees, customers and shareholders. Clear, challenging aspirations – the company’s purpose must reflect clear and challenging aspirations that will benefit all the key constituents.

Committed and focused leadership - *** Through their time, attention and other symbolic behaviour, leaders can express a relentless focus on where the company is headed, and an unrelenting dedication to the communication, involvement, measurement and experimentation required to get there. *** These leaders can inspire the organization by making it clear that the pursuit of performance is the single best path to economic and personal fulfilment. An energized workplace dedicated to productivity and learning –People should share an eagerness to ask questions, to experiment with new approaches, to learn from results and to take responsibility for making changes happen.

Skills based sources of competitive advantage –Skills are what matter in an environment characterized by innovation, customer driven service, total quality and continuous improvement. Open communications and knowledge management – Shared values and behavioural norms that foster open communications and knowledge management hold the key. Organizations of the future are likely to have simpler and more flexible structures, with work organized around processes instead of functions or tasks. They will all emphasize teams as the key performance unit of the company. Teams are uniquely suited to apply the multiple skills and perspectives required by any truly cross-functional process.