Team identity and mission

Creating team synergy

To create real team synergy, it's essential to start by organizing team meetings. Far from being a waste of time, these meetings achieve several objectives:

• Remind people of the impact of the team's work on the rest of the organization
• Highlight the repercussions of one person's work on the other members of the group
• Encourage interaction between team members
• Provide feedback

From then on, the meeting can become one of the keys to team coaching for the manager, helping him/her to establish his/her leadership.

For the manager, this coaching aims to enable each team member to :

• Situate themselves within the organization and the team
• Understand the work (and constraints) of other team members
• Establish or strengthen links between team members
• Define respective needs
• Get involved in the decision-making process
• Strengthen sense of belonging
• Share difficulties
• Help solve others' problems
• Facilitating communication
• Exploit individual talents
• Creating a space where everyone can flourish

These elements (a non-exhaustive list) contribute to the creation of the team's identity and mission: how what everyone does, individually or as a group, fits into overall strategic objectives.

Validating the team's mission

It may seem obvious, but it's never a bad idea to remind the team of what it's supposed to be doing. Firstly, because their role may have changed recently, and alignment with new objectives may not yet be perfect. Secondly, because some teams do a bit of everything, they can lose sight of what they're really accountable for.

Hence the importance of remembering what products or services they offer, and to whom.
Another point not to be overlooked: defining the team's mission must be simple and understandable, otherwise there's a problem.

It can be enlightening for a manager to conduct a survey (where everyone answers individually, it's not a group session) among the team to ask them their respective understanding of their role, the team's role and how it all fits in with the organization's business objectives. The consistency and harmony of the answers (or lack of it) can act as a stock-taking exercise, providing clues to any differences of opinion or perception about the work to be done.

Are team members able to answer simple questions such as: What is my team's mission? How does my team impact other teams? What are the team's values? How do they translate into behavior and deliverables?What is my role and contribution to my team?

What about dysfunctional teams?

Communication has deteriorated or is non-existent, there are issues at stake but no one is talking openly about them, almost everyone is taking responsibility for themselves... your team is no longer running smoothly. To validate whether your team is dysfunctional, you can ask a few simple questions: when problems arise, do people ask for help? Do meetings run smoothly? Is there a real absence of conflict, or is it simply swept under the carpet? When a problem arises, is it spontaneously dealt with or carefully ignored? Are people able to articulate the team's objectives and how they fit in with those of the organization?

The nature of the answers should guide you as to whether your team is dysfunctional or not. The next question is: How can we correct it?

Generally speaking, there are 5 types of dysfunction:

1. Lack of trust
   Antidote: develop a climate of trust where you can talk about your mistakes without fear of being judged. Mistakes are analyzed to learn constructive lessons, not to put down a colleague. And encourage teamwork and collegial decision-making.
2. Fear of conflict
   Antidote: debating is not arguing. Constructive criticism encourages improvement and innovation: we exchange ideas and find the best solution. It's up to the manager to play the role of mediator.
3. Lack of commitment
   Antidote: Check that expectations are clear, understood... and accepted. Once the discussion is over and decisions have been made: put them in writing and share them with the team so that no one can claim not to know what to do or when to hand in the deliverable.
4. Disempowerment
   Antidote: establish clear performance criteria, give feedback, arbitrate when necessary.
5. Indifference to results
   Antidote: establish reward mechanisms based on team objectives, not personal performance.

In conclusion

A functional team needs to know what it's for, what the roles and responsibilities of each are, and its manager needs to watch out for signs of slippage so that corrective action can be taken as soon as possible. By valuing everyone and creating a safe workspace where everyone can express themselves for the good of all, the team wins, and by extension, the organization.

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