High-performance team-building in the future of work
combing “through every conceivable aspect of how teams worked together—how they were led, how frequently they met outside work, the personality types of the team members,” the only significant pattern that Project Aristotle could discern was a correlation between team members feeling psychologically safe and team performance. 32 Team leaders and all members can foster psychological safety within teams by demonstrating commitment to the team’s direction and reinforcing practices that create a sense of belonging and enhance cohesion. While a team’s specific practices should be unique to the team, certain fundamental practices—such as allowing all members to have a voice during meetings, ensuring that the whole team is acknowledged for its successes, and encouraging members to critique each other’s ideas rather than the individuals—will support the development of psychological safety, which will ultimately allow trust, constructive conflict, and accountably.
A byproduct of team success enabled by these conditions is that the team will have a greater ability to influence its environment, therefore creating a vicious cycle where a successful team is further advantaged. Within a cycling peloton, the reputation of a strong team with previous successes will attract greater funding and in turn, give it the ability to attract star riders. A successful business team may attract the attention of senior leaders, which may pave the way for additional resourcing. A team with a compelling direction will not only motivate its members but may also inspire support from beyond the team and strengthen a team’s mandate to operate within its environment. And in addition to a team’s practices promoting effective collaboration between members, a team with effective practices will also allow it to collaborate effectively with other teams, therefore further enabling team effectiveness and allowing individual teams to operate alongside other teams as a fluid and self-organizing peloton.
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