Building Leadership and Culture to Drive Growth at Broadridge Financial
Teams may be the #1 preferred method of getting things done in most organizations today. Due to their focus on performance, teams motivate, challenge, reward, and support individuals who are working to change the way they do things. This is especially important in an era when individuals are stretched wearing many hats, and companies are demanding superior performance, innovation, and breakthrough results from diverse teams spread out across global and cultural boundaries. Project teams, product development teams, task teams, my team, your team – wherever two or more are assembled we are tempted to call it a team. Real teams, not just groups that someone simply calls “a team” may be the most effective unit of performance for any enterprise Groups of people call themselves “teams” even though they lack the fundamental ingredients for team performance and effective team behavior – which can doom them to failure. Have you been on a “team” where • People get frustrated and would rather just do it themselves • Morale descends to all-time lows • Expectations are not met and may not even be known to all team members • Deadlines get missed • Goals are not reached • Good performance of well-intentioned, hardworking people is squandered? So what Makes a Team, a Team? A team is a group of individuals (at least two) who: • United by a common purpose (task and outcome expectations) • Sharing a common methodology that requires interdependent activities to achieve outcomes • With clearly-defined roles and responsibilities. And how do we make it High Performing Team? High performance teams do not develop without a significant performance challenge that is meaningful to those involved. Good personal chemistry or the desire to “become a team” can foster teamwork values and practices, but teamwork is not the same as a team. Despite the hope and effort of many people, a team that out performs all others is difficult to create, personally demanding for the members, and can be viewed as threatening to conventional organizations. A high performance team is required to build an unusual degree of mutual trust, “straight talk” and personal commitment. A real team with disciplined, directed action tied to a known and endorsed desired outcome with a process for feedback on accomplishments, will deliver results well beyond what an individual acting alone or acting with others in a non–team situation could achieve. In the 45 minute session we will engage in a fast cycle exchange of information, tools, and discussion around the topic of creating a high performance team. Questions will be formulated for the High Performance Organization Learning Group, discussion threads will begin, and a learning circle community will form around this important topic.
Paul Plotczyk