I have read books and articles on leadership and organizational change for many decades. I especially have been interested in teams and team work. The interesting thing after all this reading is that not everyone agrees about how to help teams improve.
In an interview by Diane Coutu, J. Richard Hackman commented in the article called “Why Teams Don’t Work” (Harvard Business Review, May 2009) that “Most executive coaches focus on individual performance, which does not significantly improve teamwork…. We found that coaching individual team members did not do all that much to help executive teams perform better.” Hackman continues that “teams need coaching as a group in team processes - especially at the beginning, midpoint, and end of a team project…. For the team to reap the benefits of coaching, it must focus on group processes…. Team coaching is about fostering better teamwork on the task, not about enhancing members’ social interactions or interpersonal relationships.”
I smiled when I read Hackman’s comments because seven years earlier Patrick Lencioni in his book, The Five Dysfunctions of a Team (Jossey-Bass, 2002) wrote about the importance of building healthy team relationships, especially the need to build trust amongst team members and to engage in unfiltered conflict around ideas.
Lencioni followed up on this line of thinking in his book, The Truth About Employee Engagement: A Fable About Addressing the Three Root Causes of Job Misery, formerly The Three Signs of a Miserable Job: A Fable for Managers (and their employees) (Jossey-Bass 2007). In this book, he explained that people cannot be fulfilled in their work if they are not known. He especially focused on how team members need to know that their job matters to someone. And that all employees need to be able to gauge their progress and level of contribution for themselves.
Years ago, when teaching the From Vision to Action Leadership Training, I had a student come up to me after class one day and ask an interesting question: “Why do you have us read so many books and articles in this class?”
“For the simple reason,” I explained, “that not everyone looks at the subject from the same angle or comes to the same conclusions. The goal is for you to have a deep understanding of the subjects we are exploring and for you to choose the right solutions given the factors involved.”
And this is how I feel about Hackman’s comments and Lencioni’s writing. Each author brings up an important point. Some days, people helping teams get better should focus on tasks and processes. Other days, these same individuals should focus on improving relationships and building trust amongst all involved. One is not right and the other is not wrong. The key is to figure out when to do one or the other. Helping improve team work is both a science and an art. A well read person can always make the right choice. As Jim Mattis and Bing West wrote in their book, Call Sign Chaos: Learning To Lead (Random House, 2019), “If you haven’t read hundreds of books, learning from others who went before you, you are functionally illiterate - you can’t coach and you can’t lead.” And I agree 100%.
So, this week, focus on improving team processes and team relationships plus keep reading and learning from others who have gone before you.
No comments:
Post a Comment