(Last modified Wed Apr 23 00:38 2008)

Teamwork

Most of this material is based on Peter Moxon's excellent book, Building a better team (Ashgate 1998).

What does it take for a group to be a team?

The members share a common purpose (or at least a consensus on the common core of their individual purposes)
The members recognize they belong to the team
The members are interdependent on each other
The members agree on norms or values that regulate their behavior

From this definition we can see several ways a group can fail to be a team:

no common purpose (N.B. this is more often a consensus than a complete agreement)
- no consensus
- consensus in initial circumstances but not later under different circumstances
lack of personal bond among all team members
no feeling of interdependence
- one or more members do not think they depend on others
- one or more members do not believe others depend on them
insufficiently shared norms or values
- no shared values to direct individual work that is to be combined later
- no norms to regulate how members interact with each other

Theory of team formation

In Moxon's theory, teams form in four stages, each of which has a rhyming mnemonic:

Stage	Description	What members ask themselves
1. Forming	Initial awareness	Why are we here? Will I be accepted?
2. Storming	Sorting-out process	Who has what kind of control and power? Will I be respected?
3. Norming	Self-organization	How are we going to work together? How can I help this group?
4. Performing	Maturity	Rock and roll! (okay, that's not really a question) How can we do better?

Generally, people are on their best behavior as they try to come to a consensus on the team's purpose
Cliques may form as members try to accept each other and look for allies, and find some team members easier to bond with
If there is a designated leader, then members look to him/her to guide them

The most painful, most important stage.

Now that the team has some cohesion as a group, members work to gain back enough of their individuality.
Competition between members surfaces
These techniques don't work, in general:
- voting
- compromise
- arbitration
They just postpone the real business, which is settling how the team will function.
Typical comment: "I could do this faster/better/more effectively by myself!"
Any cliques formed in Stage 1 get in the way now.
Conflicts may seem to be win-or-lose battles, with no middle ground.
The leader is challenged by team members.
Members stake out roles they wish to play.
There is no cookbook strategy for getting through this phase -- it's difficult, and each group is unique.
Best advice: establish a strong group feeling in the first phase.
A goal to aim for: that everyone is doing effective things, not destructive things.

Whew!

How can you identify a dysfunctional team?

It's pretty easy, and usually visible from a distance! Disfunctional teams display one or more (usually many) of these characterics:

They don't sit together
They don't sit in a compact group
They don't sit so that each member can see and be seen, and hear and be heard
Not everyone speaks
(If the teams name themselves) They can't come up with a name for the group
They argue about unimportant things (in order to establish status)
They agree about absolutely everything (in order to hide conflicts)
When they argue, no conclusion is reached (because they don't share a common purpose or don't agree on values that justifications could be based upon)
The workload is not balanced among team members
They don't come to meetings (an especially bad sign if they don't tell their teammates in advance)
They don't look at each other
They snarl at each other
One member is clearly dominant
They aren't happy
They aren't enthusiastic

Go whitewater rafting together (OK, maybe not)
Set meeting times and show up for them
Start on time; end on time
Set agendas and cover them (or get consensus on what you do instead)
Be open and honest, as individuals
Accept feedback, as individuals
Settle on an appropriate level of teamwork
Look at root causes, not symptoms; save conflict for substance, not fluff
In a conflict about fluff, look for the substance behind it
Listen to each member's contribution, because the team needs each member to contribute
Protect the team from too-loud and too-quiet members
- Ask quiet ones what they think.
- Politely cut off loud ones if they go on too long
  (e.g. by summarizing and then passing control to someone else:
  "So John, what I hear you saying is '...'. Bob, what do you think about that?")
Reward publicly, chastise privately
- If you have praise for a team member, tell them in front of the team
- If you have criticism for a team member, tell them in private

Here is an interesting checklist.