Teamness

 

TEAMNESS

 

…there really is no teamness around here… what we need is teamness!

 

I vividly remember the anguish on Monica's face when she tried to describe her dilemma. As head of human resources, her brief was to promote teamwork in the organization. To understand her frustration we need a little background. The organization of just under 100 members of staff had recently undergone reorganization into "teams". Units and groups had been formed to redefine the way work was done. Indeed the structural team had been achieved in terms of layout and design. So when Monica said staff need to work as a "team", to the casual observer what she was saying sounded like a paradox. She went ahead to describe that what she wanted or was looking for as "teamness". In her words she wanted "teamness" to be evident in the office teams.

 

Monica's problem was compounded by the fact that her "teams" were made up of professionally competent persons working on authorized technical processes. They could meticulously take you through their tasks and duties with undeniable precision and accuracy. They knew what to, how to do it and they did it (even if poorly)…They actually meet expectations. Well at least the technical expectations.

 

I had worked with the organization before the reorganization so I was well acquainted with most of the staff. Observing the staff for a few days enabled me to identify with the new situation. The new set up was organizes around computerized processes that allowed departmental teams to work together. Previously where communication would have been across the floor, a lot more was possible from the desk. While observing the groups at work I noticed that they were working in little huddles with minimal interaction. It seemed like they were all gathered round a process that took their total attention to the exclusion of their teammates.

 

Monica had obviously "caught" something, which many of us perhaps never get to appreciate, yet we see it everyday in failed teams. We can paraphrase her thoughts and define what she was seeing in her staff as groups organized in team structure but not behaving as teams. She rightly evaluated that a team draws on more than structure to qualify as a team. It must be a team in "nature" and in "form". A group of people can resemble a team and yet act contrary to the very nature of a team.

 

Reviewing Monica's' situation further indicates a dilemma of potential versus actual or even expected. Her gut feel was that these teams could achieve far more, yet they were operating far below their potential. Her answer to the lack teamness or team essence. Monica is not alone in this dilemma. If you do a quick scan of the groups you are a member of you will find that there is a mere state of coexistence exists in some, while other groups exhibit a highly energized state. In some groups you feel the group could do more. Yet in others no challenge is big enough to scare them off or even damped their spirits. Invariably the "high energy team" will continually out do itself against every challenge. I want to be part of that team. I want to be part of a group of people out to exploit their full potential!

 

This book is not about your team structure it about team essence - teamness. Monica's teams were present, assembled with technical and structural precision, but they were not performing against team expectations. They were not generating team returns. In essence they were not teams at all. The amount of dissonance was enough to convince her they were not teams.

 

The amount of teamness in your team influences the performance of the team. It would be wise to periodically establish the levels of teamness of your team and revamp any losses in team nature before they become destructive. So how do we measure teamness especially since it is such an intangible that manifests itself in behavior? What conceptual framework could we use to develop the team and enhance its performance?

 

The last two lines hold the key to how we can address the question of team essence and work to build our teams from mere team structures to high performing units energized by more than a process assignment, pay or rewards. It is the team members who hold the key to effective teamwork. In our approach we recognize that individuals in high performing teams stretch a little more in order not just to compete or get the job done but to win!

 

 

Excerpt from the book "Effective Teams", by Allan Bukusi, 2003