Thoughts on people, teams, organizations, communities, effectiveness and success
North Americans (OK, maybe just those of us who are Yankees) love simple solutions, especially to complex problems.
We want a pill to cure obesity (instead of a change in diet, lifestyle, better sleep, and appropriate physical activity) and student testing to cure educational ills (in lieu of better teacher training and development, better resourcing, smaller class size, and greater parental involvement).… Read the rest
The are teams – start up teams, executive leadership teams, project teams – that work. And there are teams that don’t. Here’s how you can get the former, and avoid the latter.
The difference between the two is not so much in who is on the team and who is not, but how the teams are formed and how they go about their business.… Read the rest
With a nod to Kelly Clarkson, the first part of a fiscal year for many firms is “off-site” time. Leaders go with their teams to a place off-site with hopes that a change of scenery – and sometimes a round of golf or some collegial dinners – will change dynamics and improve performance.
It probably won’t.
But don’t blame the off-site for the lack of a durable performance bump.… Read the rest
Scott Berkun, whose work I generally like a lot, recently wrote a piece titled Why You Should Be a Team of One. It is a rare miss – a dud, and advice frankly which should be ignored.
Scott has written three books: all are quite good. His most recent, Confessions of a Public Speaker, is particularly good, helpful for someone like me who has 20+ years working with large group facilitation and design when I’m not doing my regular work of coaching execs and team.… Read the rest
Sachin Rekhi’s post PayPals Wars and its Lessons for Today’s Entrepreneurs caught my attention as I surfaced between US professional football (NFL for the locals) league play-offs this weekend. While there is much about the post that is spot-on right – strong vision coupled with short term pragmatic goals, push decision-making down as far as possible, etc. – Sachin makes the case that “It’s all about assembling an A-team.”… Read the rest
Virtual teams continue to be popular but the reality is that not all virtual teams are created equal – nor are many even “teams.” The news from recent research is hardly comforting; “1 in 3 executives believe virtual teams are badly managed.”
The post below, first published as a white paper by Dr. M. J. “Jo” Whitehouse and me in late 2007 is based on our direct experience with several start-ups in the challenging biotech drug development world, provides a clear roadmap to the steps to take – as well as the steps to avoid – in using the potential and leverage of virtual teams effectively.… Read the rest