Chief Learning Officer - August 2007 - (Page 45)

human capital Figure 1: Team-Building Characteristics Group of Contributors “I have a job to do.” • Job add-on • “What is the agenda?” • No link to standards, expectations • No intragroup measures of accountability • No conflict-management process • Status quo preferred • Appropriate for creating an information link between groups • Seeks consensual solutions from the experts Team “We have a job to do.” • Activity integrated into the job • “What is the problem to solve?” • Link to standards, expectations, rewards • Simple and direct measures of accountability • Conflict management is expected • Risk taking encouraged • Appropriate for strategic advantage • Seeks synergistic solutions by leveraging creativity and expertise A learning team seeks more challenges, wants more opportunities to extend talents and creativity and pursues appropriate rewards for accomplishments. A learning team has virtually unlimited potential within its area of performance. In fact, when individuals experience a learning team, they find it hard to return to the status of individual contributor. The benefits for teaming are so great that a learning team becomes an engine of talent retention and development. As this article began, Alex started to analyze the successful and failing teams, and he found that even though the mission was clear for both, the talents were plentiful within both groups and that individuals had some teaming experiences. The main difference was in the level of trust reinforced by the highly skilled feedback in the performing group. The other group never developed a basic appreciation for each group member. Alex wonder whether it could be turned around — if building trust was a foundation to a learning team, could a strategy be employed to start that process? To achieve this goal, Alex solicited help from team development specialists, who said the group first needed to accept that all team members are trying to do the right thing and do their best. (Goodwill is a foundation of trust.) Following the advice of the vice president for organizational learning, Alex interviewed each team member and asked a couple of basic questions: • “If a miracle occurred, and this group became a high-performing team, what behaviors would each team member display that made a difference?” • “On a scale of one to five, with five being most frequent, absolute or towering strength, rate the level of responsibility each team member has for making the team work effectively, the communication of regard and respect each member displays toward the others and the overall potential of the individuals on the team to make a difference on this project.” With a facilitator, the group met to explore the anonymous interview results. For the first time, group members were willing to explore ground rules, and they identified a list of learning needs to help the team. They recognized that some of their team challenges were tied to overly relying on e-mails and BlackBerry notes. Slowly, the group began to discuss measures of accountability and how feedback could be useful, in terms of business numbers, as well as group behavior. Alex found out the hard way that the stages of teaming cannot be skipped or ignored. Deliberate learning activities are required for individuals and for groups to get into the teaming framework. People learn through experience (70 percent), through coaching/mentoring (20 percent) and in classrooms or by books (10 percent). To build a learning team, you have to put individuals into situations from which they can learn that being a team member is different from being an individual contributor. And fundamental to learning and the eventual success of a team is trust, as well as the quality of the feedback built into all aspects of team selection, development and performance. The path from the contributor’s characteristics to those of a highperforming learning team works through various stages, which include thrust, trust, teaming skills, team support and team leadership. 45 August 2007 Roger R. Pearman is the president of Leadership Performance Systems Inc. and Qualifying.org. He can be reached at editor@clomedia.com. I www.clomedia.com I Chief Learning Officer http://www.clomedia.com http://Qualifying.org

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