Lead a winning team

Recently, an article from NY Times highlighted Google’s Project Aristotle – a project set out to understand great teams and to leverage findings to improve team performance.  Several years of data collection, the conclusions were that teams worked better when they were connected at a deeper level by being more open to each other, allowing everyone to contribute their talents, and creating a safe haven for everyone to take risks. 

These conclusions should not be a surprise to anyone because we were put into teams since we were very young.  By the time we enter the workforce as professionals, we would have had countless hours of working in teams for sports, games, homework assignments, volunteering, or just plain ganging up on our older siblings.  Given today’s culture, our children are likely to have been immersed in squad-based video game campaigns or teaming up in MMOs.  So with all the tens of thousands of hours experience in teaming, why is it something that Google and others are still trying to improve? 

I believe team performance is challenged by egos and cultures. Teams are made up of individuals who inherently bring their own egos (and personalities), agendas (needs), values and beliefs to the table.  Individuals also bring their own cultural differences inherited from their diverse backgrounds including where they were born, where they grew up, and where they’ve worked.   These two factors play heavily on how individuals will behave on the team.  I do not think there is a proverbial “cool-aid” that you can give to everyone that will make them all fall in line.  Rather, I believe the answer to leading higher performing teams is helping individuals to learn how to flex their egos and cultures so that they achieve balance between their individual diversity and team success. 

In my experiences, the best teams that I worked with were definitely ones that had a solid identity and purpose, invested in each other’s success, and shared a comradery.

Team identity and purpose – At Superbowl XXXVI, the New England Patriots shocked the American Football community and fans by taking the field as a team rather than being announced as individuals.  They understood that their strength was in unity and the collective talents of the entire team versus a few individuals.  When a team sheds the egos of its individuals and summit to a single identity and purpose, they are more likely to achieve the team’s goals and objectives. 

As a team leader or member, you should think about how you can help the team gain alignment on its identity and purpose.  A popular past time for Americans is engaging in Team Trivia Night at a local pub.  The first task for any team is to come up with a fun team name.  This immediately creates an identity for the team that they can rally around throughout the evening.  I have been part of project teams who established vision, mission statements, and team norms from the get go, and periodically revisited them to ensure everyone remains aligned with the purpose of the team.  You can also leverage team-based competition to create greater employee engagement, and better performance at the workplace.  For example, you can award teams for having the fewest defects or accidents, highest sales, greatest number of lead generations, etc.

Focus on each other’s success – In 2007-2008 NBA Season, the Boston Celtics under the coaching of Doc Rivers adopted an African philosophy known as "Ubuntu" which means "all humanity is connected through a universal bond of sharing."  The basketball team acquired two super stars to complement their own, thus creating an era known as the ‘Big 3.’  Instead of the normal period of “storming,” where individual egos clash when a new team is formed, the team accelerated to “performing” quickly and won the Championship that year by adopting the Ubuntu philosophy of selflessly working as a team. 

As a team leader, you should think about how you are motivating your team.  Are you incentivizing the right behaviors to encourage teaming and selflessness?  Do you curtail behaviors that take away from teaming?  How are you establishing a culture of diversity and inclusion and lifting as you climb?  I’ve facilitated team meetings where we used penalty cards to call out bad behaviors and assigned each person to lead a topic so everyone took a turn in the conversation.

Shared comradery – The book, “The Teammates, A Portrait of a Friendship” by David Halberstam details a 60 plus year friendship between four iconic baseball players of the Boston Red Sox.  The book describes the close friendships between the baseball players that extended well beyond the years when they played as teammates on the field.

The major reason that drives me to be more connected to my team is the depth of my relationships with the other team members.  As a team lead, I often gave ample time for my virtual team to bond in our team meetings through provocative ice breakers.  Sometimes, we would spend extra time on them and did not get to other agenda topics.  I was ok with that because I saw the power of that connection.  When team members opened up about themselves during our regular ice-breakers, it invited others to do the same.  The emotional level of that openness affected how they treated one another.  They were nicer.  They were more comfortable in speaking up, sharing their ideas, and taking risks.  They were less self-oriented.  They wanted each other to succeed.  We sustained these relationships by making sure that we spend time socially together when we are in the same location.  So as a team leader, I encourage you to create opportunities for your team members to connect and bond.  

Thank you for entertaining me as I shamelessly plugged three of the four Boston major sports franchises to illustrate my points.  Apologies to the Boston Bruins hockey team for not getting to your winning ways.  Sports is an easy target for highlighting teams that work well.  Boston sports teams are well known for winning championships.  There are also plenty of examples in sports of egos and cultural differences getting in the way of a team’s success.  Boston teams are no exception to that fact.  When the good things about a team are not sustained, it is very possible for a team to go from being first in league in one season and then becoming the worst in the next.  So as a team leader, you will need to think about ways to sustain the commitment, selflessness, and comradery of your team.

Thank you for reading this post.  As always, please share your thoughts and experiences in the comments and share with your networks if you found it to be useful.

Stay Cheesy,

The Rambunctious Rat