Functioning Dysfunction

How is your team functioning?  This question surfaces regularly for most of us–and it usually comes from our boss or our bosses boss in a routine check-in. There is a good reason for making sure things are working well as most business leaders view high-performance teams as essential to business success.  Yet, very often as leaders, we struggle the most on teams, especially leadership teams that are often full of team members who don’t mesh and often endure a dynamic one would hardly call a team.

As leaders, we come together from very different professional and business perspectives, such as functions, product, or lines of business. We often need to wrestle for resources, influence, and sometimes even “the” promotion. This is all part of the deal–to represent our unique perspectives, to have a say about our beliefs, and ultimately to grow and develop.

Patrick Lencioni authored “The Five Dysfunctions of a Team” years ago and it still rings true today.   It is apparent today (more than ever) that you can apply it to not only your team, but your family, your peers, your church, your PTA, your Homeowners Association, or even our nation (eg: government). 

True teamwork is so powerful, yet so rare.  Think of those once in a lifetime teams that overachieved.  It was not usually talent, but it was the teamwork which pushed them to greatness.  The boat in the water analogy when everyone is rowing in the same direction…still rings true.

So how do we learn to function at a higher level?  It starts with trust.  Democrats trusting Republicans.  Pitchers trusting catchers.  Husbands trusting wives.  Bosses trusting subordinates.  Neighbors trusting neighbors.  You get the idea. 

How do we achieve that – well (as Leoncini stated) it starts by being vulnerable and open and candid…   From there, we need to overcome the fear of conflict.  Can you have unfiltered debate and discourse (Nike commercial anyone?) without taking it personally?  If we cannot do this, we veil our discussions and provide half-truths and guarded commentary.  And leaves us unsatisfied with outcomes.  And a sense of not being heard.  So if we cannot get our ideas and thoughts “on the table”, then how do we gain commitment from each other (NFL and players).  We lack trust, we do not engage in healthy debate, therefore commitment becomes almost impossible.  See the building blocks here?   Okay, we are progressing up the pyramid of dysfunction.  No trust, no debate, no commitment.  Where does that leave us on accountability?  We tend to avoid it.  If there is not a commitment to a clear and logical plan, if there is not candid and honest feedback to each other – how do we expect to hold each other accountable? 

Why am I telling you all this – because when you add all these together – it just builds to a lack of results.  So imagine for a moment a Congress, a President and a Nation that trust one another, engage in open and honest debate and discourse, making commitments, holding each other accountable and focusing on results?

Liane Davey, the author of You First: Inspire Your Team to Grow Up, Get Along, and Get Stuff Done, presents the simple idea that is perhaps the most profound: if you change yourself, you will change your team.  Specifically, Davey teaches that you need to have five responsibilities every day. Easy to explain and much harder to live:

Start with a Positive Assumption

Short-circuit your biases, unpack your baggage, and truly appreciate the value that your teammates are bringing.

Add Your Full Value

Show up, get off cruise control and bring the benefit of your experiences, your relationships, and your personality instead of just doing what is in your job description.

Amplify Other Voices

Loan your credibility and your airtime to teammates whose minority perspectives are usually shut out of the discussion.

Know When to Say “No”

Retrain yourself when and how to say no to the things that would dilute your focus, stretch your resources, and slow you down.

Embrace Productive Conflict

Tap into the value of different points of view by disagreeing about the issues in a way that promotes understanding and reduces defensiveness.

At work, people’s fears fall into 3 main categories:

• Being misunderstood (their motives or credibility questioned)

• Being excluded (ostracized for not conforming)

• Being invisible (not heard)

All of these fears are inextricably tied to our core feelings of value and sense of worth and if your team is spending the majority of their days outside their psychological safe zone, then it is draining their creative energy and productivity — and likely leading to dysfunctional behaviors.

Strong leaders learn how to manage conflict in ways that maintain psychological safety of the people on the team, in order to have the needed conversations necessary to productive growth. Unfortunately, we are all not strong leaders.

We don’t communicate as well as we think we do…

We think we’re communicating effectively, but the evidence clearly shows that everyone overestimates their ability to communicate.  As a team leader, we need to take this insight to heart to understand how each of our team members thinks and feels so we can best tailor our communication style to what suits them. This small effort to adapt on our part will help build strong relationships and enhance trust.

Maya Angelou said it best: “People will forget what you said and did, but they will never forget how you made them feel.”  Next time you find yourself thinking about the dysfunctional behavior with your team members, take a step back and explore how your attitudes and behaviors are contributing to what you’re seeing. Your team will not begin to work better together until you look at your role in it.  Be the first to change.

Together.  We.  Win.

Dave Harmon
People Division
“Kindness is Currency”
LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/davidharmonhr

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