The Five Dysfunctions of a Team by Patrick Lencioni
If you could get all the people in an organization rowing in the same direction, you could dominate any industry, in any market, against any competition, at any time.
The most important action that a leader must take to encourage the building of trust on a team is to demonstrate vulnerability first.
A "miner of conflict" - someone extracts buried disagreements within the team and sheds the light of day on them. They must have the courage and confidence to call out sensitive issues and force team members to work through them.
- I think I would enjoy playing this role occasionally.
Recognize when the people engaged in conflict are becoming uncomfortable with the level of discord, and then interrupt to remind them that what they are doing is necessary.
Once the discussion or meeting has ended, it is helpful to remind participants that the conflict they just engaged in is good for the team and not something to avoid in the future.
One of the most difficult challenges that a leader faces in promoting healthy conflict is the desire to protect members from harm.
By avoiding conflict when it is necessary and productive - something many executives do - a team leader will encourage this dysfunction to thrive.
Reasonable human beings do not need to get their way in order to support a decision, but onlyl need to know that their opinions have been heard and considered.
A team should explicitly review the key decisions made during the meeting, and agree on what needs to be communicated to employees or other constituencies about those decisions.
More than any other member of the team, the leader must be comfortable with the prospect of making a decision that ultimately turns out to be wrong.
What the leader cannot do is place too high a premium on certainty or consensus.
A good way to make it easier for team members to hold one another accountable is to clarify publicly exactly what the team needs to achieve, who needs to deliver what, and how everyone must behave in order to succeed.
One of the most difficult challenges for a leader who wants to instill accountability on a team is to encourage and allow the team to serve as the first and primary accountability mechanism. An absence of accountability is an invitation to team members to shift their attention to areas other than collective results.
The ultimate dysfunction of a team is the tendency of members to care about something other than the collective goals of the group.
Team leaders must be selfless and objective, and reserve rewards and recognition for those who make real contributions to the achievement of group goals.