Whenever you are trying to make something work, there is always a performance curve. That goes with life as well as with business. Checkout the questions below about performance curves in relation to teams.
| Questions | Commonly Assumed Answers | Wisdom of Teams Answer |
| What is a working group? | Another label for people working together toward a common end. | A group that can achieve its performance challenge entirely through the combination of individual performances. No collective work products or shared leadership is needed. |
| When does the single-leader or working group discipline perform best? |
Two answers:1) Don’t know.2) When they are teams. | The single-leader discipline is best when the sum of individual contributions is sufficient to achieve the group’s purpose and when speed or time is more critical than collective work. Excellent single leaders make and syndicate their decisions, encourage their groups to share information and best practices, and establish high standards and expectations regarding individual performance. |
| When is the single-leader (or working group) discipline better than the team discipline? |
Three answers are common:1) Never.2) Always.3) Don’t know. | The single-leader discipline is preferable for performance goals that can be met through the sum of individual contributions when the leader really does “know best,” and when time is urgent. In such cases, there is no performance-based need for collective work products, shared leadership, or the real time integration of multiple skills, experiences, or perspectives. At times, the single-leader discipline is better if the downside risk of creating a pseudo-team is much greater than the potential upside gain in performance. |
| Why is a “conscious choice” between the team discipline and the single-leader (working group) discipline important? |
Teams waste time. | In groups who have not mastered the team discipline, the choice to use it will demand hard work, take more time, and run the risk of failure. If performance can only be achieved in this way, then groups should take the risk unless there is a significant downside possibility of creating a pseudo-team. On the other hand, for many performance challenges, the single-leader discipline is more familiar, efficient and less risky. |
| Can a group apply both the single-leader and team disciplines? | Don’t know. | Yes – it can and it should. The choice between the team discipline and the single-leader discipline depends entirely on the nature of the performance challenge at hand. Groups should not choose to be either a team or single-leader driven. They should choose which discipline is most likely to help them achieve the goals at hand. |
| Why are pseudo-teams bad? | They don’t get along. | They waste time, frustrate members and pursue no performance result. Pseudo-teams typically do a poor job of applying either team discipline or the single-leader discipline. Consequently, they hinder and detract from individual performance. They also discourage people (members and sponsors) from trying the team approach again. |
| What should you do about a pseudo-team? | The same thing as any other team that hasn’t “come together.” | Do not tolerate them. Pseudo-teams are very destructive to people on and around them. Insist that pseudo-teams use performance to make the choice between the single-leader and team disciplines. If they persist in failing to make and pursue choices, disband them as quickly as possible. |
| How difficult is it for potential teams to become real teams? | It’s easy if they focus on becoming a team and practice team like behavior. |
It is very hard work because it involves risking constructive conflict as well as mutual trust and interdependence. Perhaps counter intuitively, these risks are best made by focusing on achieving the performance challenge – not on trying to become a team. |
| What do you do when the potential team doesn’t have enough resources or authority, or when management beyond the team is not supportive enough? |
Two common answers:1) Ignore the situation.2) Get better communication between the team and management. | If the problem is real, it needs to be addressed with reference to the team’s performance challenge and with all the necessary people (members and nonmembers) as part of the deliberation. Meanwhile, the team needs to ask itself what it can approach within the constraints it faces and how it can make progress against those possibilities. |
| Why is it difficult to create extra-ordinary teams (“high-performance teams”) on purpose? |
Three answers are common:1) It’s hard to tell.2) It requires a rare kind of team leader.3) It depends on “chemistry.” | The intense level of personal commitment to the team’s goals and working approach as well as to each other’s personal success and growth evident among people on truly extra-ordinary teams goes beyond something that can be mandated or self-consciously created. As a result, the “extra-ordinary” effort occurs because of a near insurmountable obstacle unit must be overcome; such obstacles defeat most teams. |
| What exactly is an extra-ordinary team (“high-performance team”)? | A team that works unusually well together. | A team that outperforms all other like teams by an order or magnitude and also outperforms all reasonable expectations given its composition. It is identifiable by its results and by the individual members’ commitment to one another, a commitment that transcends the team situation. |
