2+2=5 Team*WORKS

There are times when it is important to try to forge new ground in the concept of teamwork. But it always pays to look back at what others have said about teamwork and think about how it impacts us today. Please share your favorite.

1. Teamwork is the ability to work together toward a common vision. The ability to direct individual accomplishments toward organizational objectives. It is the fuel that allows common people to attain uncommon results.
- Andrew Carnegie

2. None of us is as smart as all of us.
- Ken Blanchard

3. The era of the rugged individual is giving way to the era of the team player. Everyone is needed, but no one is necessary.
- Bruce Coslet, Former Coach, Bengals

4. The ratio of We’s to I’s is the best indicator of the development of a team.
- Lewis B. Ergen

5. The strength of the team is each individual member…the strength of each member is the team.
-Coach Phil Jackson LA Lakers

6. No one can whistle a symphony. It takes an orchestra to play it.
-H.E. Luccock

7. All winning teams are goal-oriented. Teams like these win consistently because everyone connected with them concentrates on specific objectives. They go about their business with blinders on; nothing will distract them from achieving their aims.
- Lou Holtz, former Notre Dame football coach

8. It is amazing what can be accomplished when nobody cares about who gets the credit.
- Robert Yates

9. Effective teamwork will not take the place of knowing how to do the job or how to manage the work. Poor teamwork, however, can prevent effective final performance. And it can also prevent team members from gaining satisfaction in being a member of a team and the organization.
- Robert F. Bales

10. Synergy is the highest activity of life; it creates new untapped alternatives; it values and exploits the mental, emotional, and psychological differences between people.
- Stephen Covey

Take a moment to think back to your last memories of school, and think if it was any more than

Step 1: Cram all of the information you can into your brain,

Step 2: Dump all of that information out onto a test or quiz,

Step 3: Forget everything.

Do you remember how to solve quadratic equations, do you remember how to solve unknown angles in a rhombus? Do you remember the code of a dna strand? That was then and this is now, but I don’t think that anyone would disagree that our nation’s children are experiencing that very same learning pattern, if not worse. There’s no question that the emphasis on standardized education today has dramatically impacted the way teachers teach.

Now, imagine a classroom where those patterns are broken down and students learn and retain. It’s being done, but rarely. I invite my readers to check out this article written by Mitchell Landsberg of the LA Times (http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-davinci29-2009dec29,0,6920485,full.story) who writes about Da Vinci Science High School in Hawthorne, CA.  There teachers “employ a “project-based” curriculum that allows students to learn through hands-on projects, often involving teamwork and computers.”

The 2+2=5 staff have seen first-hand the power that teamwork can have on learning. That’s in the classroom or in the boardroom. When students commit themselves to a project as part of a team they become invested in each other. Students who participate in project based learning (especially team projects) have a significantly more rich learning experience.

Take this story for example:

The Run of the Blob is an activity where team members must join the blob once they are tagged. Individual team members join the blob by joining hands with the person at one of the ends of the blob.

Shawn was the blob leader. As the game went on and on, the blob would get bigger and bigger with each person that was tagged. Ultimately, the blob would break apart in excitement causing the team to have to start over again. Shawn became more and more frustrated with the team each time they were forced to start over. After about three or four unsuccessful attempts, we talked as a class about how leadership could be important in this activity. Kathryn, age ten, said, “A leader is a person that has good ideas and listens to our team’s suggestions. It’s important to have a leader so your team stays in order.” Shawn began to listen to the suggestions of his classmates. Vinisha said, “Since you’re the leader, why don’t you call off where you want us to go, say left, right, faster, slower.” Shawn liked this idea and the activity began again. Shawn began calling out left, right and so on.

To be honest, these children would never have learned about solving this problem by studying for it, reading the solution in a book, or by taking a test on it. They had to experience it! ” And that is what 2+2=5 is all about. There is a stark difference in conceptual learning from a book or from a lecture versus experiential learning by doing, feeling, sensing, and touching. Teamwork can be taught in many environments and at the Da Vinci School they are combining science and teamwork. Landsberg writes, “At Hawthorne, Jared said, his classes were ‘pretty boring’ and he wasn’t inspired by the challenge of scoring well on a test. ‘But here,’ he said, ‘on a project, you have almost a limitless potential.’”

photo credit: http://www.flickr.com/photos/editor/72550972/

Reader Question: Could you talk about the impact of diversity on teams? I’m on a team that has some merging cultures and am experiencing some challenges.

Our response: As our workplaces become more and more diverse, managers have started to appreciate, more deeply, the value and the need for diversity on a work team. Few would argue the fact that diversity of any fashion typically yields diversity of thought which should be considered invaluable in teambuilding. In addition, although recognizing the benefit, few would argue that diversity of thought often puts additional strain on teams and their managers. Therefore, so much emphasis has been placed around managing diversity and the importance of being able to leverage the strength that diversity brings to a team atmosphere. Diversity can easily be one of the greatest strengths or greatest weaknesses of a team based on the team management’s ability to leverage the benefits of diversity.

In my experience with facilitating the 2+2=5 program at this particular elementary school, it appeared that a vast majority of the student population was homogenous from a diversity perspective at some of the schools at which our staff was instructing. I expected the children to struggle with the activity because most of the students did not have exposure to a wide degree of diversity.

The activity, called ‘Labeling’ involved addressing how we use labels to identify and classify each other and how people tend to put people in groups or classifications based on one or two outward characteristics. As I briefed the class on the importance of diversity for teams, my co-facilitator placed a label on the back of each student. These labels each had a shape on it with various patterns or colors. Some people had stickers with circles, squares, or triangles and with various colors. Then the students were instructed to put themselves into a team, without talking.

The students in the class began the activity by scrambling to look at all of the other students’ labels. The students used gestures to communicate what shape the student had on their back. Some students pointed to different colored objects to communicate the color of the shape. While other students, noticeably leaders, were actually dragging some students into groups that had similar shapes. Some of the children were using color as an identifying characteristic, while others were using the shape as the identifying characteristic as to how they were separating into teams based on the stickers. For more on the labelling activity and how to facilitate it, consider purchasing a copy of What a CEO Can Learn From a 4th Grader.

When teams are made up of generally homogeneous team members, growing up in the same schools, with the same cultural background, the same family life, the same values and the same social construct, teams are generally less productive, less effective, and less successful. Diversity on a team helps with team brainstorming and problem solving. When people look at a problem differently, the range of solutions tends to expand, allowing a team to find the best, most effective solution to a problem. When one team member offers a solution that falls within our expected solution set, we fail to challenge the team to find solutions outside of our expectation set. In more simple terms, we fail to think outside the box and team diversity can be a big part of the solution!

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Reader Question: I am a member of a subteam working on a specific piece of the overall project that many subteams are contributing to. It’s obvious to my whole subteam that this one specific group are underperforming. What do we do?

Our Response: A team in and of itself is difficult to manage, let alone multiple teams working towards the same goal, but this happens every day, in every business, whether we realize it or not. Just by showing up to a status meeting late gives the impression that one particular team is not performing up to expectations.

Ways in which to help avoid underperforming subteams or team members:

1. Outline expectations before the start of the project: When the team or teams get together in the beginning of the project to outline even the most basis expections (such as meeting agreed upon deadlines, showing up to meetings on time and prepared, maintaining open communication etc.) can really pay off as the project is underway. When all expectations are on the table, and addressed openly, the chance that a team member (or subteam) fails to meet these expectations is reduced.
2. Make each team member (or subteam) take ownership of a specific task or area. Each team member will take ownership of a task and report on the progress of that task at regularly scheduled status or update meetings. Every detail, even the small ones, must be assigned out in the “expectations meeting” and each team member must have something that they are specifically responsible for. Do not let anyone take a “passenger seat” on anything. No one should adopt the attitude, “I’ll help Bill if he needs anything and if not, I’ll help Sally or Sharon.” Everyone should leave the meeting saying, “I’m responsible for X”
3. Inject new life in the underperforming subteam: As the overall project leader, it may be necessary to move a star player from one high performing subteam to the underperforming subteam. This has the potential for re-energizing the underperforming team. The project leader must be careful about this as if it is not done properly, the underperforming team will resent the change and become alienated. Don’t move the team member over to “help them along”. Move them over for a specific task. For example, the underperforming team receives a new, additional task and Mark is joining your team to help you with that. This gives the underperforming team a task to focus on and unite around the new team member / new energy.

photo credit: http://www.flickr.com/photos/donnagrayson/195244498/

Reader Question: How do you integrate team synergy to prevent something like the Abilene Paradox from occurring?

Our Response: The Abilene paradox (definition credit to http://dictionary.bnet.com/definition/abilene+paradox.html) is a theory stating that some decisions that seem to be based on consensus are in fact based on misperception and lead to courses of action that defeat original intentions. The Abilene paradox was proposed by management professor Jerry Harvey in 1974 following a trip made by his family to the town of Abilene. One person suggested the visit and the others agreed, each believing that everyone else wanted to go. On their return, everyone admitted that they would rather have stayed at home. Harvey used this experience to illustrate the mismanagement of agreement, and of decision making in organizations when apparent consensus is actually founded on poor communication. The Abilene paradox shows similarities to the attribution theory of leadership.

In a team, it is so difficult when everyone wants to please the other to come to a group decision. Sometimes it is easier for one person to make a huge life decision than it is for a team to decide where to go to dinner while working a late night. So how do you create a synergistic team to defeat the Abilene Paradox?

It is so important that team members feel as though they can voice their opinion, in a constructive environment. It is up to the team leader to foster an environment in which teams can feel comfortable to speak up when they like something or when they don’t agree. Communication skills should be built on a team to create synergy between teammates. If there are people on the team that are outspoken, team leaders should discuss with that person how to foster an environment to create a circle of trust for teams to freely express their thoughts.

It is hard when people misinterpret body language, as the father did when he thought everyone was bored in the Abilene Paradox. However, it is important to understand, that although you might think people are feeling one way, the only way to be sure is for people not to make assumptions. It is imperative for team leaders to ensure that they feel comfortable approaching the team with a dilemma, and not just propose a solution based off of false assumptions, but allow the team to make a decision.

When the team has “voiced” its opinion, it is important to just move on, not try to figure out why people decided one way or another; that just hinders the teams ability to move past the Abilene Paradox. Once decisions are made, allow the team to move on to the next task by creating action items for people to move forward with the decision; don’t dwell on the decision.

For more on leadership or communication styles, please visit some past posts. Please feel free to leave your comments and some more solutions you may have in the comments section of this blog entry.

Photo Credit: http://www.flickr.com/photos/lumaxart/2136954043/

Reader Question: This is a common problem with my team- – groupthink. I don’t know if it’s a symptom of laziness or if we just aren’t a strong group of problem solvers. How can we defeat this problem.

Our response: I’ve always heard about the trappings of groupthink. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve heard from managers, “Beware of groupthink.” There’s no doubt that groupthink rears its ugly head in almost any team. Half the battle of defeating groupthink is all about identifying and acknowledging its existence rather than ignoring it.

When a team approaches a problem, it is the job of the leader to make sure that the groupthink trap is on everyone’s mind. The only way to beat it, is to know that it’s coming and actively challenge it. It’s the responsibility of the leader to call out groupthink the moment it starts to occur. The team acknowledges it and takes a step back to change perspective.

Of utmost importance however is to eliminate passengers from the team. I think of a “passenger” as someone who is just along for the ride and who isn’t willing to participate actively in the team. A passenger waits for someone else to take control and isn’t willing to take the reins. We can eliminate passengers by actually replacing them with active participants; but the best leaders can transform a passenger. A good leader will put the passenger in a position where they cannot just go along for the ride. Just by asking the passenger, ‘what do you think’ helps to get the out of the role of the passenger and gets them thinking and acting critically.

Also please note that David Chaudron has some interesting things to say about diagnosing team problems such as groupthink in his article here:  http://www.bizforum.org/Journal/www_journalDGC003.htm.

photo credit:  http://www.flickr.com/photos/grafixer/3527166081/

Reader Question:  I’m on a team where each person thinks they’re in charge. There’s no clear leader. What do we do?

Our Response: We have written several times about the importance of providing all team members with the opportunity to lead. Managers who provide team members with the opportunity to serve in different roles (leader, follower etc) allows team members to see the team from a different perspective, a new lens with which to understand the team environment. With that being said, there is without a doubt, a risk to allowing too many people to lead the team. 

A team does in fact need an indisputable, clearly defined leader who is responsible for taking the reigns in crisis mode. Otherwise, when the team finds itself in a “crisis” either everyone pushes in to be the leader, or no one is willing to take control. Make no mistake, sharing leadership responsibilities is a terrific strategy for a team, but it is a luxury for a team to provide all team members with the chance to lead in certain situations. This can help to identify individual strengths.

If there is no clear leader, take time to identify the individual to whom it comes most naturally. Of course, in business, leader is usually synonymous with manager. In business, a person’s title defines who is and who isn’t the leader. But that is a mistake. A leader is much different from a manager in the way that they interact with the team. (Refer to some of our older posts about leadership skills). No doubt the first year associate on the team could be the leader on a team of seasoned professionals.
Photo Credit: http://www.flickr.com/photos/sgw/2329607771/

Reader Question: My whole team has proposed a course of action, but I believe that the stance is unethical, how should I react? Should I voice my reaction sooner or later?

Our Response: When working in teams, it is so hard to know if what your team is doing is the right or wrong thing to do. Often times, people get confused whether or not they should feel as though something is unethical if the majority believe in it. If you trust the people you work with and don’t want to offend anyone, it is hard to know whether or not you should say anything. So what should you do in this situation?

We believe that people have to keep their integrity and the image that they portray. As soon as you bend the rules, the rules become easier and easier to bend. By no means should anyone at anytime be asked to go against their belief system, however, if teammates are challenged by the views of the team, it is important to go about it in a professional and persuasive manner.

Passive leaders (those considered in the minority of the team), need to be focused on doing the right thing. It is important that members on a team stand up for what they believe, and do not bend under pressure. It is of utmost importance that you voice your opinion, keeping in mind this is not a battle of who is right and wrong, but rather a team initiative to do the ethical thing.

Although the majority feels as though this course of action is the right thing to do, they need to be challenged, just as you have been. Always, no matter the circumstance, stand up for what you believe, but be a leader in the sense that you can persuade team members to do the right thing based off of your passion, professionalism and persuasion. The sooner that this is done, the sooner the team can go about doing the right thing in a timely and effective manner.

Work with the team until you are able to persuade them and show them how things can be done to gain the end result the majority is looking for with the ethical backing of the minority.

Photo credit: http://www.flickr.com/photos/stephenccwu/316669375/

Reader Question: Wendy is the senior manager at Apco, a professional services firm. She’s been with the firm for 27 years and has seen a lot of interesting things in that time.  She has built a fine career around being considered one of the most technically competent people in her field. Lately, however, she’s been struggling with the new software that has come out that is “supposed” to make her job easier. She wishes things could just go back to the old way of doing things. She asks a new member of her team, Ryan, the fresh college recruit, to assist her with the software.

Ryan shoots Wendy an instant message explaining to her how to operate the new software. He’s using words Wendy has never even heard before. She’s having trouble visualizing what he is talking about in the instant message. She wishes he had just come over to show her personally.

Our take: 

Effective communication in the workplace is the primary building block to team success. Barriers to effective communication are often culturally driven, age gap driven, technology gap driven, and gender driven. Even just by understanding that these barriers exist can make us much better communicators, both as senders and receivers of communication. Managers can effectively develop communication skills in their teams by constantly providing opportunities for team members to develop their communication skills through activities. Refer to some of our older posts for activity ideas for refining communication skills on your team.

photo credit: http://www.flickr.com/photos/mugur/63045951/