An Excerpt from The Performance Factor

The Characteristics of a High Performance Team

What the cockpit team of United Flight 232 accomplished has never been replicated. The National Transportation Safety Board performed a number of simulations and was not able to get the plane on the ground safely. McDonnell Douglas, which manufactured the DC-10, and United Airlines simulated 45 flights under the same conditions of Flight 232 and did not have one successful landing. To be certain, the number of random events that insert themselves into such a situation are too numerous to calculate but in spite of them, this one team achieved something extraordinary-something no one else has been able to do. What made this particular team so unusually successful?

We Were Doing Great and Then…

For most of us, positive team experiences are rare. If you have been part of an extraordinary team in the past, you will probably long for that experience again. People often drift into and then out of extraordinary team situations, wondering what made that group "click" and how to replicate it. A key first step to more predictable and enhanced team performance is understanding the common characteristics of teams that consistently achieve exceptional results.

A team is like an automobile. Many of us don't understand the inner workings of a modern automobile. Should we ever look under the hood, we see an indecipherable tangle of wires, tubes, pieces, and parts. And if anything breaks down, we very often don't know how to get it running again. As with cars, if we are going to build effective teams, start stalled ones, or fix broken ones, then we must become master mechanics of team dynamics.

As we have studied and researched teams and teamwork over the years, we have found consistently similar qualities and characteristics in teams that achieve exceptional results. This list of characteristics has proven to be of immeasurable value as we have worked with clients to establish new teams or to intervene when team effort was less than effective. It's a short list; in fact it contains only six characteristics. But each characteristic plays a specific and vital role in making the team effective, and therefore it is worth a closer look. If one of these six characteristics is missing or inadequate, the team is, at best, limping. If two or three are lacking, this group is probably not a team at all.

The following model shows the six characteristics in abbreviated form. In the next few chapters, we are going to examine a high performance team and explore each characteristic in some detail.

Common Purpose

The single most important ingredient in team success is a clear, common, compelling task. The power of a team flows out of the alignment of a purpose to which every team member is aligned. The task of any team is to accomplish an objective and to do so at exceptional levels of performance. Teams are not ends in themselves, but rather means to an end. Therefore, high performance teams will be mission-directed, ultimately judged by their results.

Crystal Clear Roles

High performance teams are characterized by crystal clear roles. Every team member is clear about his or her particular role, as well as those of the other team members. Roles are all about how we design, divide, and deploy the work of the team. While the concept is compellingly logical, many teams find it very challenging to implement in practice. There is often a tendency to take role definition to extremes or not take it far enough. However, when they get it right, team members discover that making their combination more effective and leveraging their collective efforts is the key to synergistic results.

Accepted Leadership

High performance teams need clear, competent leadership. When such leadership is lacking many groups lose their way. Whereas a common, compelling task might be the biggest contributor to team effectiveness, inadequate team leadership may be the single biggest reason for team ineffectiveness. Teams are, in the very truest sense, volunteers. Volunteers are not managed, but rather they demand accepted leadership capable of calling out the levels of initiative and creativity that motivate exceptional levels of both individual and collective performance.

Effective Processes

Teams and processes go together. Many professions take processes for granted. It would never occur to a surgical team, construction crew, string quartet, film crew, or the team on the flight deck of Flight 232 to approach their tasks without clearly defined processes. The playbook of a football team or the score sheet of a string quartet clearly outlines their processes. Business teams have processes as well. Instead of a run off tackle, or executing the scene in Act II, such processes might include solving problems, making decisions, managing a meeting, processing insurance claims, or any other activities we undertake in pursuit of our mission. Hopefully, in each of these group processes, each team member has a clear, specific role based on our function, skills, and expertise. In many business settings, however, such processes are often ill-defined or missing entirely. High performance teams identify, map, and then master their key team and business processes. They constantly evaluate the effectiveness of key processes, asking: How are we doing? What are we learning? How can we do it better?

Solid Relationships

One of the biggest misperceptions I find in the world of teams and teamwork is the belief that to work and communicate effectively, team members must be close comrades. Not true. In fact, the diversity of skill, experience, and knowledge needed to effectively and creatively divide the task almost precludes high levels of friendship, which is most often based on common interests.

Speaking of diversity, we find that the more different a team is, the smarter it can be. A team whose members look at the world through the different lenses of function, gender, ethnicity, personality, experience, and perspective has a decided advantage over a more homogenous group. The diverse group will be able to surround problems, decisions, and other team issues with a brighter collective IQ. They will see more solutions and more creative solutions if they can channel their differences into synergy rather than strife.

Because diversity provides plenty of opportunity for discord, conflict, and communication breakdowns, especially among teams that must accomplish their tasks in complex, high velocity, dynamic environments, their differences must be offset by trust, acceptance, respect, courtesy, and a liberal dose of understanding.

Excellent Communication

Communication is the very means of cooperation. One of the primary motives for companies to implement teams is that team-based organizations are more responsive and move faster. A team, or the organization in which it resides, cannot move faster than it communicates. Fast, clear, accurate communication is a hallmark of high levels of team performance. Effective teams have mastered the art of straight talk; there is little wasted motion from misunderstanding and confusion. Ideas move like quicksilver. The team understands that effective communication is key to thinking collectively and finding synergy in team solutions. As a result they approach communication with a determined intentionality. They talk about it a lot and put a lot of effort into keeping it good and getting better.

When it comes to teams, these six characteristics are the lightning in the bottle. If a team gets these few things right, they will realize results as well. By effectively applying the principles and practices I will explain in the next several chapters, teams will avoid many of the pitfalls and problems that derail many team initiatives.

However, the major focus of this book will be on ensuring that you, the team leader, have a clear grasp on the qualities that describe a high performance team. When I was a young U.S. Army finance officer serving in Europe in the late 1960's, the Army sent me to a course where I would learn how to recognize counterfeit currency. America has some of its biggest problems with counterfeit currency overseas because foreign nationals have a strong desire for U.S. dollars and are so unfamiliar with them. I went to the course anxious to see actual counterfeit money; but, I was sorely disappointed when we went through almost the entire day without a peek at the stuff. We spent the day studying authentic U.S. currency, learning about the paper quality, the engraving, ink and printing. Late in the afternoon, one of my classmates could contain his frustration no longer. "How will we ever be able to recognize counterfeit money if we never see any?" he asked. The instructor explained that the very best way to be able to recognize a fake is to be intimately familiar with the "real McCoy." And that's my strategy in this book as well. My objective is to introduce you to the real McCoy when it comes to building high performance teams.

In the next six chapters we will look under the hood of a team. Each chapter will address a specific team characteristic in detail. We will explore what each characteristic brings to team performance, and we will also provide practical exercises that will help you make this quality an integral part of your own team experience.

The Bottom Line

High performance teams have six characteristics that allow them to consistently achieve exceptional levels of results:
· Common Purpose
· Crystal Clear Roles
· Accepted Leadership
· Effective Processes
· Solid Relationships
· Excellent Communication

Message to Team Leaders

If these few characteristics are critical to team success, you, the team leader, are critical to these characteristics.

· It is the team leader who helps the team clarify the task and align behind it.

· It is the team leader who has the power to call the time out needed to allow the team members to clarify roles and the authority to resolve conflict when they can't agree about who does what.

· It is the team leader who must earn the acceptance of team members. The only boss of a team is the task; if you want your team members to serve the task, you better learn how to serve them. Volunteers, and that's what every team member is, will only respond to leaders they accept.

· High performance teams have high performance processes. Again, it is generally the team leader who can create the time and space for the team to identify and design its processes as well as evaluate its effectiveness on a regular basis.

· Team leaders model the qualities of effective team relationships and create opportunities for the team to develop the needed levels of trust, respect, and acceptance.

· Team leaders must create an environment that fosters open, clear, accurate communication-communication that clears the way for exceptional levels of creativity and that allows the team to efficiently implement its processes and move quickly against problems and decisions.

1 National Transportation Safety Board, Aircraft Accident Report, United Airlines Flight 232 (PB90-910406, NSTB/AAR-90/06), 1.17.10.2 Flight Simulator Studies, p.72-73
2 Author not cited, "Capt. Al Haynes," New York, NY, People weekly magazine, 12/25/89, Time Inc., p.102