Team practice, not just for soccer Many business leaders are dumb. "Why?" questions with dismay. Because they routinely miss out on a huge opportunity for improvement. Business organizations and businesses, when enlightened and awake, are interested in high-performance teams. When internal business groups can collaborate powerfully, business problems are efficiently resolved and solutions are quickly implemented. This gives the business a strategic advantage. The concept of improving group performance as a way to improve overall results is commonly understood by sports teams, theater groups, and the military. These types of groups clearly see the need to improve their individual performance and their performance as a group. They have designed processes for their groups. In the army it begins with the "training camp". Then you graduate to "training" and "war games". In sports, this process of group improvement is called "practice" and in theater, "rehearsal."
Team practice, not just for soccer
Many business leaders are dumb. "Why?" questions with dismay. Because they routinely miss out on a huge opportunity for improvement. Business organizations and businesses, when enlightened and awake, are interested in high-performance teams. When internal business groups can collaborate powerfully, business problems are efficiently resolved and solutions are quickly implemented. This gives the business a strategic advantage.
The concept of improving group performance as a way to improve overall results is commonly understood by sports teams, theater groups, and the military. These types of groups clearly see the need to improve their individual performance and their performance as a group. They have designed processes for their groups. In the army it begins with the "training camp". Then you graduate to "training" and "war games". In sports, this process of group improvement is called "practice" and in theater, "rehearsal."
This is where being a jerk comes into play. For the most part, in business there is no formal practice designed to improve or enhance group performance. Oh my ... Could we have a foul here?
A group is not a team
During my years in the business as a coach, I have heard that business leaders refer to many groups of people as "teams." You hear that business leaders use the term all the time. For the most part, I shudder and hyperventilate when the word "team" is used in business. I react this way because it is generally not an accurate description of the group being described. Then I get a rash.
It has been helpful for me to distinguish business groups from business teams. In business organizations you have groups or you have teams. For the most part you have groups. A group is made up of individuals, each responsible and focused on doing their own work. In a group there is no common work agenda, apart from working for the same company.
Imagine a group of people waiting at a bus stop or a group of operators at an online call center taking reservations. In groups there is no need for joint collaboration or group outing. Everyone involved is focused on their individual activity. The people involved are not connected by producing any kind of joint work.
In teams there are several people involved with complementary skills focused on the same result. These people are mutually responsible for an agreed result. Mutual responsibility, as we will see, is a big problem and a very significant difference between teams and groups.
Avoid the "group" of surgery
For example, imagine a meeting in the hospital where you have a group of doctors sitting at the same table. They are there to exchange information and educate each other. Each of these doctors is responsible for their own patients. For the most part, they like each other well and like to gossip.
When these doctors return to their hospital units, there is no mutual responsibility between them for their work or results. They work for the same hospital, but that's where the connection ends. At the meeting they are there to learn, improve and be collegial. Each will do their own individual medical thing. They have no mutual responsibility for each other. This really is just a group of doctors.
Now take the medical group that is doing hip replacement surgery on your father-in-law. There are several nurses, doctors and technicians involved and all involved in a joint product to get the pun out. I think humor in writing is healthy. OMG another play on words.
Clearly, the group of individuals performing surgery relate to each other very differently from the doctors mentioned in the boring aforementioned hospital meeting. With hip replacement surgery we have a team because there is a group procedure and the people involved, as a group, commit to perform this procedure together. And, beyond simply performing a procedure, the surgical team is committed to keeping your patient alive and healthy.
Members of the surgical team depend on each other to carry out their mission. There are transfers and dependencies. Although people have different roles and High Performance coaching Melbourne, there is a common approach, an interrelation and a joint word, but I will not go there: participation and concern.
