High
Performance Teams - Best Practices.
1.Team building is a means to an end, not an end in
itself. Teams are built to get results on meaningful
tasks. High performance teams (HPTs) know when they
succeed they grow, but if they continuously fail they
go. They cannot be divided, learning disabled, and slow.
They must learn from failures and never take success
as final.
- The sooner they seize upon an immediate performance-oriented
task the better.
- They know it is not the big that eat the small,
but the fast that eat the slow.
- On a scale of one (very poor) to 10 (very good)
how good are we at quickly seizing meaningful opportunities?
How adaptable are we?
2. The best HPTs are built with a balance and blend of
complementary skills.
- They have a blend and balance of social styles but
also technical skills, problem solving skills, and
political savvy. They believe in synergy, i.e. 1+1=3
- They treat differences with respect realizing the
survival value in versatility.
- How are we? 1-10
3. High performance teams (HPTs) have a common compelling
purpose.
- All team members believe the team has an urgent
and worthwhile purpose.
- They feel ‘ownership’ of the purpose,
i.e. it belongs to them.
- How do we rate? 1-10
4. HPTs invest time and effort in developing a team charter,
i.e. values (how they will treat each other), vision/purpose,
and specific attainable goals. How do we rate? 1-10
- There are clear rules on ‘how we will work
together.’
- Guidelines are established on commitment (attendance),
confidentiality, communications etiquette, confrontation,
and most importantly contributions (everyone must
contribute real work)
- Focusing on performance and then achieving success
shapes teams more than anything else. How do we rate?
5. High performance teams(HPTs) develop both mutual accountability
and individual accountability that builds respect, commitment,
and trust. (1-10)
- No group becomes a real team until it can hold itself
accountable as a team.
- Everyone accepts that: “We win as a team or
we lose as a team.”
- HPTs make sincere promises to each other and keep
them.
6. High performance teams ‘blow away barriers and
boundaries’.(1-10)
- The test of a real HPT is when individuals willingly
sacrifice individual goals for team goals.
- Everybody knows what he/she is individually and
jointly responsible for. They can blend individual
autonomy with teamwork without conflict.
- The end focus is on achieving the team purpose not
individual performance.
7. High performance teams communicate continuously and
clearly.(1-10)
- All HPT discussions are open and interactive.
- Everyone understands the others’ roles and skills
and are often cross-trained.
- Everyone is open to receiving and providing constructive
feedback.
- Team killers such as gossip and cliques are hunted
down and eliminated.
- The HPT experience becomes a highlight in everyone’s
career.
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