PATRICK LENCIONI: WHAT DESTROYS TEAMS

Every team will experience bumps in the road.

But thought leader Patrick Lencioni knows why some teams have better suspension and make for a smoother ride.

Named "one of the most in-demand speakers in America" by Wall Street Journal, The Table Group founder and organisational health movement pioneer has penned 13 books, including bestsellers The Advantage and The Five Dysfunctions of a Team. He also recently launched his 6 Types of Working Genius tool and book.

Here, Pat appears in 3 video snippets on building strong teams.

Video snippet #1: Lack of trust can destroy teams

Before you can look at how to make a team cohesive, you need to understand ways a team can be destroyed.

As set out in The Five Dysfunctions of a Team, the lack of trust destroys teams.

There are 2 types of trust:

·       Predictive trust is knowing what another person will do if you say or do something. That in itself does not make a great team.

·       Vulnerability-based trust on the other hand, does make a great time. Examples are: “I don’t know the answer” “I screwed this up” “I was a jerk yesterday and I apologise.”

Get your leadership team to be vulnerable, have them admit they’re wrong, apologise, or ask for help when appropriate. That’s what makes a team cohesive. 

Video snippet #2: Conflict is so important

Remember the first fight you had when you married? You thought ‘This is going to be the shortest marriage ever’ yet years later you can cycle through the same fight in 5 minutes.

It's counter-intuitive, but conflict helps to make the relationship stronger. 

Conversely, a partnership can fall apart if you can’t argue.

In the same way, we must be able to to have conflict at work. That only comes from trusting each other.

·       Start by having team members get to know each other (Where did you grow up? How many kids in your family? The hardest thing about your childhood?).

·       Personality-type assessments can help promote honest conversations about everyone’s strengths and weaknesses.

You have to keep practising, but you can become "totally real" at work. Conflict becomes the pursuit of truth. That’s a fabulous way to work.

Video snippet #3: Taking care of “your” department or “pet project”

You’re a leader on the executive team, but you’ve come from the marketing department.

So you retain a soft spot for the marketing department, perhaps even preference it over the executive team on which you sit. That’s dangerous.

·       When you know that everybody else is taking care of their department or their pet projects, the executive team is no longer a team.

·       When the executive team prioritises their pet project or department, each department ends up fighting “bloody, unwinnable battles” with one another – because the executives are not doing this at the top.

Similarly, the best thing you can do for your kids is to work on your marriage.

Just like a family; when kids know there is cohesiveness at “the top” (at the partnership/marriage level) they experience peace and clarity.

In summary, your employees want to know that the executives at “the top” work well together.

A few bumps in the road, yes, but everyone enjoys a smooth trip overall.

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