Consumers today have a great deal of information to choose a product or service by, which turns them into 'intelligent' consumers who create new needs. Spotting those needs and designing a value proposition that meets them is a constant challenge for thousands of organisations. That is why it is increasingly necessary to have teams capable of improving or creating projects with an innovative, agile and flexible approach.
It is important to be clear about the basic concepts and the differences between working groups and teams, because we often think we are working as a team when what we actually have is a working group. To work out whether we have a team, let us start with the definition:
'A team is a set of individuals who are interdependent in their tasks, share responsibility for their results and operate within the boundaries of an organisation.'
By contrast, an example of a working group is when a number of people come together to attend a seminar, or to study a subject and debate it. Those people have neither interdependent tasks nor shared responsibilities.
We have to work with the team approach from the start: deliver, and strengthen the shared responsibility of the members.
With our teams up and running, it is common to find one person — a leader, a boss or a manager — pointing the way and setting the criteria and guidelines for how the work has to be done.
What if teams could decide for themselves how to work?
One of the foundations of the agile approach talks about self-organising teams: teams that decide how to work and take responsibility for managing their own effort instead of being managed or directed by others. That moves the team to a higher level in terms of its autonomy and the authority held within it.
What is a high-performing team?
A high-performing team is one capable of reaching results efficiently and effectively while its members maintain a high level of satisfaction and motivation.
Many authors have set out the characteristics of these teams empirically, and almost all of them agree that they only work if:
They have clear objectives, not merely stated but with mechanisms for measuring them.
They have a safe context, where team members are able to show vulnerability, admit they do not know something, ask for help and feel free to give feedback that contributes to the team.
They have shared responsibility, meaning they recognise that the results are everyone's responsibility.
They have working boundaries, with the rules of the game defined explicitly. They are clear about their levels of authority, their communication channels and how far their decisions reach.
Autonomy and responsibility
Specifically, we have to increase trust within the team by creating a space where its members can say things to each other without fear. The retrospective — a Scrum ceremony where the whole team meets to let go of the good and above all the bad of the work they completed — is a cyclical moment of reflection.
The act of delegating is one where responsibility falls on both sides. There are Management 3.0 tools that make this easier by helping teams agree how decisions will be taken; Delegation Poker is one of them.
No less important is feedback, because it will help the team improve and stay in a safe environment.
How do you assess a high-performing team?
There are two levels of assessment:
At task level: assessing the task as such.
At intra-group process level:
Assessing intra-group conflict: how does the team resolve its conflicts, and are they managed properly? Both in the task itself and in the relationships between team members.
Assessing the team's level of cohesion.
Assessing the team's effectiveness.
Finally, we have to follow and sustain the process, and that starts with being clear about the team's purpose and objectives.
