6 Characteristics of an Effective Team
Most of us have been on a sports team in our life. Your family is a team. You’re part of a team at work. If you’ve ever been part of a successful team, all six of these things were there:
- Common Purpose – Teams exist for a purpose. Effective teams are focused on the thing they exist for. The purpose of the team elevates the motivation of the members by pulling their hearts together for something that matters to them all.
- Accepted Leadership – There’s a clear leader and everyone accepts his leadership. Ask anyone on the team who the leader is, they’ll tell you. Note this doesn’t say loved, revered or admired. For the team to work, there’s a leader and everyone is on board with it.
- Specialization of Labor – Effective teams happen when individuals get into roles they’re really good at . . . when their unique skills and talents get applied to a specific job that fits what they’re made for. Great teams happen when diverse people get sprayed into disparate jobs but together, create something special.
- Good Relationships – Team members don’t have to be best friends. They just have to have healthy, respectful relationships. When members of a team get caught up in criticism, personality conflicts, rumors and egos, the team suffers.
- Agreed-Upon Plan and Process – Effective teams operate in a certain way. There’s process . . . like a recipe. Everyone knows what’s to be done, who’s to do it . . . the “when”, “where” and “how”. The military calls them ‘rules of engagement’. Every team member knows their role and the process.
- Good Communication – People screw up. Machines break. Deliveries are delayed. Events occur. On effective teams, communication is fast and efficient. Bad news is delivered early and without fear. Information goes up and down the organization just as easily as between team members. There’s high trust in the process and in each other.
Find a team where these factors are in place and you’ll likely find one that’s pretty effective.
You’ll certainly find one you’d enjoy being a part of. This doesn’t guarantee a winning team. The talent level of your team may not be as high as others. The market you’re in may be undergoing a structural change. You may not have the patents your competitors have. Your team may lack capital or have geographic/demographic disadvantages. You may not have as much capital . . . here’s a ton of variables that drive winning and losing in the larger scheme of things. But more often than not in the real world – the ‘here and now’ – looking at these characteristics can help a leader figure out what’s wrong with a team and show him where he needs to start in making it better.
Question: Is your team working well? Which one of these factors is out-of-whack? Share with us here.
(My friend Pat MacMillan taught me this years and years ago. Thank you Pat!)
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