The 5 PillarsTeam Development
So you want to build your business and you know that this will only be achieved with high performing teams. But how? What are the consistent ‘must have’ conditions for effective team working at any level but particularly for leadership teams?
Transform People International’s research and experience with some of the world’s largest corporations across 60 countries has led them to see 5 pillars that are core to high performance. Of course it helps to select people with the right skill set and capabilities for the jobs and roles. And diversity in influencing style, gender, ethnicity and experience makes sense to consider but irrespective of all of that we find we keep coming back to these 5 pillars as being ultra-important.
The 5 pillars of building high performing teams are captured in the Collaborative Health Check™ tool that Transform People uses to get a reality check on team performance. Establishing reality and the status quo of how a team is working today is needed.
The 5 pillars are:
1. Commitment to a common goal
2. Unity of purpose as to how to address the goal
3. Motivation for the team beyond silos or specialisms
4. Strong healthy relationships
5. Great Communication
Collaboration mind-sets and behaviours are the key to moving to high performance and the 5 pillars provide a framework for getting any team on the same page and providing a basis for establishing a vision for any team that seeks renewal and higher performance.
It really helps if a team has a good unified sense of its identity – what it is all about, how it wants to be seen by the stakeholders inside and outside the business. The beliefs and values that are shared by a team need to be aligned around its very identity and sense of purpose. All “singing from the same hymn sheet” and being seen as “one team” is vital. Examining how the team performs against the pillars enables conversations that help teams discuss identity and the beliefs and values that underpin that. This provides a compass for their journey to higher performance.
Commitment to a common goal and the unity of purpose to agree what that is, and how to work to achieving that goal, is core.
If you see a team under-performing first of all ask them the simple question – are you a team?
An answer in the negative more often than not often indicates that while they may on paper be a team they recognise that different goals or interpretation of the common goal leads to a lack of unity of purpose. This is the first thing to fix. Of course the overall business goals are often understood and there may be commitment to these but what great teams have is a “teamness” goal – a goal for their team and how they want to be seen by the world. Signing up to a vision for the team is core to sorting out what needs fixing to achieve that goal individually, and as a team etc. So what is the goal, or short series of goals that act as the vision for increased teamness which in turn will lead to the business goals being achieved?
Motivation beyond the specialism or silo is key for great team performance. You can have highly motivated individuals or specialists within a bigger team but a heads down and a mind-set that says ”we’ll be OK as long as our piece of the business performs well” is a guarantee of disruptive non-collaborative behaviours that benefit nobody. Great teams eradicate silo thinking and behaviours while still delivering the performance that is required from any specialism. Time and attention is given up to other people functions and activities beyond any immediate group focus.
Strong healthy relationships matter. Mutual trust, mutual respect and mutual concern are all at the heart of teams that work well. It’s a no-brainer and teams that take time to have honest conversations of what works well and what doesn’t in these areas will face up to individual differences in style and how they engage with others. This can lead to remarkable changes if addressed effectively. Is there real trust in the team between individuals and sub-teams? Can people really rely on each other and other functions for the big and the little things that matter in a truly collaborative team? Can people sensibly and honestly face up to challenging colleagues about selfish or other behaviours that get in the way of high performance? Often they might not even know about the negative effect they have until they are sensitively raised in group discussion.
Great communication, the 5th pillar is another must have condition. Not more communication for the sake of more. Not leadership or management by email but considered quality regular communication that is truly collaborative, being other-centric rather than self-centred and fit for purpose. Inevitably this takes you into the territory of differences of influencing styles. The leader and others can consider the impact of their personal approach and what processes there are in their daily communication and formal meetings etc. and how these can best be improved.
Finally, teams need effective leaders. The leader is the guardian of the 5 pillar thinking and what it means for how he or she leads and how this is a regular area for tracking behaviour and performance. Experience shows that a leader that openly engages the team in dialogue around these 5 areas can harness a powerful performance that more than compensates for any skill or capability weaknesses. And one who is able to select the best of the best is challenged even more to harness the power of the whole team to avoid the challenges provided by individual star performers who may fall into the trap of thinking they are more important individually than the team.
Team Development is top of mind for many of People Central’s clients, with an ever growing fan base of our personality based Team Development Programs. Call us today on 0508 736 753 to find out how we can support you in developing your team to reach its potential
Acknowledgements:
- Personnelzone
- Ronnie Strong, Transform People International
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